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Hannah Arendt’s Lectures on Kant’s Political Philosophy
In the Fall of 1970, Hannah Arendt delivered a series of lectures on Kant’s political philosophy. She was scheduled to teach Kant again in the spring of 1976, though her death in December 1975 prevented her from doing so. Indeed, the fact of her untimely death is central to the story of Arendt’s Kant lectures – both their origin and the scholarly attention given to them. Being lecture notes, they were, of course, not published – nor were they ever intended for publication. Relegated to a cardboard box and stored in the Manuscript Division of the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., they became the interest of a then-graduate student, Ronald Beiner, who sought to read them for the purposes of his dissertation research.10-31-2024
Quote of the Weeks
Abolishing the World As It Is
Imagine human beings who spend their entire lives confined within a cave peering at a shadowy surface of images. These beings see nothing but images of the real. In the Republic, Plato asks his readers to imagine just this. His provocation does not depict humans held captive by a stream of images projected on mobile devices with bright, sensitive surfaces. Though our own cave tests the limits of the image, Plato’s cave remains instructive.03-28-2016
Enlarged Thought in Arendt and Kant
Arendt focuses on a particular passage in Kant's Critique of Pure Judgment, taking his idea of "enlarged thought" as an "expanded movement of thinking" that provides space for one to reach a more "general standpoint," rather than simply relying on a broad set of knowledge.03-10-2016
Thinking in and through “Emergency”
Among its accomplishments, Eichmann in Jerusalem reflects on the close relation between language and thinking, especially in moments of emergency.02-28-2016
Feel the Bern: Understanding The Spirit of Political Revolution
Bernie Sanders' appeal illustrates how widespread the political sentiments that Hannah Arendt identified as the causes of revolution are in both parties.02-21-2016
Studying the History of Political Theory with Hannah Arendt
Arendt never gave an account of her methodology in political theory, but in her notes, we see her offering a way to engage the world of political thinking.02-14-2016
On the Possibility of an Arendtian Nuclear Theory
N.A.C. Taylor observes that if we are to have an Arendtian nuclear theory, we must now construct it ourselves.01-31-2016
Action and Interaction
Action and interaction both relate to the public space, but where and how they occur in the world differs significantly.01-24-2016
Japan's Collective Self-Defense: On Arendt, Sovereignty, and Peace
To identify freedom with free will has brought the “most dangerous consequence,” for it allows us to claim freedom at the price of all others' sovereignty.01-17-2016
Leading Students Into the World
The authority of teachers lies, at least in part, in their ability to set aside judging and to present the world as it is to their students.01-10-2016