The School of History and Philosophy, University of New South Wales, cordially invites you to the following seminar:
Magdalena Zolkos (UWS) Arendt’s Metaphoric Figurations in “The Jew as Pariah” Abstract: The figure of a “conscious pariah” has occupied a distinctive and salient presence in the oeuvre of Hannah Arendt. Her writing about the pariah has brought together her preoccupations with political peripheriality of the Jewish populations in modern European states and some of the key concepts of her political theory: rebellion, political action and political equality. While contemporary Arendtian scholarship has offered a thorough investigation of the historical and philosophical aspects of her pariah construct, the claim of this paper is that its rhetorical and figurative dimensions have been undeservedly neglected or downplayed. In this paper I offer a reading of Arendt’s essay “The Jew as Pariah” from the perspective of its rhetorical performance, and suggest that it unfolds, rather deliberately, in a mode of allegory. More specifically, I suggest that Arendt allegorizes the conscious pariah as body-in-metamorphosis; a subject that undergoes, and potentially also brings about to the community, metamorphic transformation. At the same time, however, Arendt's pariah is a distinctively non-redemptive figure. Magdalena Zolkos is a Research Fellow in Political Theory at the Centre for Citizenship and Public Policy, University of Western Sydney. She is the author of Reconciling Community and Subjective Life: Trauma Testimony as Political Theorizing in the Work of Jean Améry and Imre Kértesz (Continuum, forthcoming) and co-editor of State, Security and Subject Formation (Continuum, 2010). Her current research interest is reconciliation and political community. When? Tuesday 16 March, 1 p.m. Where? Room 308B, Morven Brown Building, University of New South Wales A light lunch is provided. No bookings are necessary, and all are welcome. For further information, please contact Joanne Faulkner, [email protected], 9385 2287 Dr. Joanne Faulkner ARC Research Fellow School of History and Philosophy Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences Room 338, Morven Brown Building University of New South Wales, Kensington, NSW 2052 Australia [email protected] +61 2 9385 2287 http://hist-phil.arts.unsw.edu.au/staff/joanne-faulkner-633.html _______________________________________________ SydPhil mailing list: http://sydphil.info 885 subscribers now served. To UNSUBSCRIBE, change your MEMBERSHIP OPTIONS, find ANSWERS TO COMMON PROBLEMS, or visit our ONLINE ARCHIVES, please go to the LIST INFORMATION PAGE: http://sydphil.info
