Jacques Derrida & "The Science of Ghosts"

“Cinema plus Psychoanalysis equals the Science of Ghosts.” 
― Jacques Derrida

British filmmaker Ken McMullen's improvisational, non-linear film, 'Ghost Dance' (1983) concerns itself with various 'ghosts' (e.g., Kafka, Marx, Freud) and the issue of memory (the past) and how it functions in the present ... French philosopher Jacques Derrida plays 'himself' in the film and comments upon ghosts as they pertain to cinema and representation itself ... cinema, for Derrida, 'is the art of ghosts' and he regards himself - as portrayed in the film - as yet another ghost in whom he 'believes' ... modern technology (specifically, telecommunications), he says, instead of vanquishing ghosts, actually multiplies them ... however this is not necessarily negative - its quite the opposite - 'long live the ghosts!' he exclaims near the end of the clip ... the late Pascale Ogier plays 'Pascale' who is questioning Derrida ...

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'Speech Is Blind' - Jacques Derrida On 'Echo And Narcissus'

'Speech Is Blind' - Jacques Derrida On 'Echo And Narcissus'

Here, Derrida discusses the Greek myth of Echo and Narcissus, linking ideas such as Echo's repeating of Narcissus' last words (in whatever he spoke), to the non-transparency, the 'blindness' that he feels characterizes all speech ... however, Derrida maintains that Echo is able to 'appropriate' Narcissus' language in such a way that it becomes hers, in a sense, subverting Hera's punishment... he finally asks how two such 'blind' persons can love one another...

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Resistances of Psychoanalysis by Jacques Derrida

Narcissism: A short animation video

A photo posted by Freud Quotes (@freud.quotes) on Jan 13, 2016 at 5:41am PST

Joyce, Derrida, Lacan and the Trauma of History: Reading, Narrative, and Postcolonialism

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In Joyce, Derrida, Lacan and the Trauma of History, Christine van Boheemen-Saaf examines the relationship between Joyce's postmodern textuality and the traumatic history of colonialism in Ireland. Joyce's influence on Lacanian psychoanalysis and Derrida's philosophy, Van Boheemen-Saaf suggests, ought to be viewed from a postcolonial perspective. She situates Joyce's writing as a practice of indirect 'witnessing' to a history that remains unspeakable. The loss of a natural relationship to language in Joyce calls for a new ethical dimension in the process of reading. The practice of reading becomes an act of empathy to what the text cannot express in words. In this way, she argues, Joyce's work functions as a material location for the inner voice of Irish cultural memory. This book engages with a wide range of contemporary critical theory and brings Joyce's work into dialogue with thinkers such as Zizek, Adorno, Lyotard, as well as feminism and postcolonial theory.

Resistances of Psychoanalysis by Jacques Derrida

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In the three essays that make up this stimulating and often startling book, Jacques Derrida argues against the notion that the basic ideas of psychoanalysis have been thoroughly worked through, argued, and assimilated. The continuing interest in psychoanalysis is here examined in the various "resistances" to analysis - conceived not only as a phenomenon theorized at the heart of psychoanalysis, but as psychoanalysis's resistance to itself, an insusceptibility to analysis that has to do with the structure of analysis itself. Derrida not only shows how the interest of psychoanalysis and psychoanalytic writing can be renewed today, but these essays afford him the opportunity to revisit and reassess a subject he first confronted (in an essay on Freud) in 1966. They also serve to clarify Derrida's thinking about the subjects of the essays - Freud, Lacan, and Foucault - a thinking that, especially with regard to the last two, has been greatly distorted and misunderstood.

The first essay, on Freud, is a tour de force of close reading of Freud's texts as philosophical reflection. By means of the fine distinctions Derrida makes in this analytical reading, particularly of The Interpretation of Dreams, he opens up the realm of analysis into new and unpredictable forms - such as meeting with an interdiction (when taking an analysis further is "forbidden" by a structural limit). Following the essay that might be dubbed Derrida's "return to Freud," the next is devoted to Lacan, the figure for whom that phrase was something of a slogan. In this essay and the next, on Foucault, Derrida reencounters two thinkers to whom he had earlier devoted important essays, which precipitated stormy discussions and numerous divisions within the intellectual milieus influenced by their writings. In this essay, which skillfully integrates the concept of resistance into larger questions, Derrida asks in effect: What is the origin and nature of the text that constitutes Lacanian psychoanalysis, considering its existence as an archive, as teachings, as seminars, transcripts, quotations, etc.? Derrida's third essay may be called not simply a criticism but an appreciation of Foucault's work: an appreciation not only in the psychological and rhetorical sense, but also in the sense that it elevates Foucault's thought by giving back to it ranges and nuances lost through its reduction by his readers, his own texts, and its formulaic packaging.

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Introducing Derrida: A Graphic Guide

Derrida and Lacan: Another Writing

Buy Derrida and Lacan here.

Derrida and Lacan: Another Writing is a major comparative study of these two giants of contemporary thought. It contrasts Derrida's deconstruction with Lacan's psychoanalytic thought and argues that Lacan presents us with a form of deconstruction different to Derrida's. This Lacanian approach opens up the possibility of engaging critically with Derridean deconstruction. Lacan demonstrates that an attention to the order of the imaginary, along with the genesis of the human being and his language, should cause us to modify our understanding of the relation between language and the real, which is deconstruction's concern. Michael Lewis argues that this is what psychoanalysis offers to philosophy - a way of relating its own transcendental thought to the insights of the empirical sciences, which Lacan draws upon in his theory of the genesis of the human being and of language. Lewis argues that Derrida's thought represents the most advanced formulation of transcendental philosophy, and as a result, if the Lacanian criticism may be applied to his work, then it may be applied to all transcendental thought.This book engages with the entire development of Lacan's thought in its attempt to demonstrate that Lacan presents an alternative to Derrida's understanding of the nature of 'archi-writing'. It represents a systematic development of Slavoj e'i e'ek's attempt to present a Lacanian alternative to Derridean deconstruction. It will be of interest to all readers in continental thought, transcendental philosophy, psychoanalytic theory, and the relations between philosophy and the natural and human sciences.

Introducing Derrida: A Graphic Guide

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Brilliant illustrated guide to the best-known and most controversial continental philosopher of the latter 20th century. Jacques Derrida is the most famous philosopher of the late 20th century. Yet Derrida has undermined the rules of philosophy, rejected its methods, broken its procedures and contaminated it with literary styles of writing. Derrida’s philosophy is a puzzling array of oblique, deviant and yet rigorous tactics for destabilizing texts, meanings and identities. ‘Deconstruction’, as these strategies have been called, is reviled and celebrated in equal measure. Introducing Derrida introduces and explains his work, taking us on an intellectual adventure that disturbs some of our most comfortable habits of thought.

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Zizek's Jokes: There is an old Jewish joke, loved by Derrida…

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Introducing Continental Philosophy: A Graphic Guide

Introducing Continental Philosophy: A Graphic Guide

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What makes philosophy on the continent of Europe so different and exciting? And why does it have such a reputation for being ‘difficult’?

Continental philosophy was initiated amid the revolutionary ferment of the 18th century, philosophers such as Kant and Hegel confronting the extremism of the time with theories that challenged the very formation of individual and social consciousness.

Covering the great philosophers of the modern and postmodern eras – from Nietzsche, Heidegger, Derrida and Deleuze right to up Agamben and Žižek – and philosophical movements from German idealism to deconstruction and feminism – Christopher Kul-Want and Piero brilliantly elucidate some of the most thrilling and powerful ideas ever to have been discussed.

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Introducing Political Philosophy: A Graphic Guide 

Zizek's Jokes: There is an old Jewish joke, loved by Derrida…

about a group of Jews in a synagogue publicly admitting their nullity in the eyes of God. First, a rabbi stands up and says: “O God, I know I am worthless. I am nothing!” After he has finished, a rich businessman stands up and says, beating himself on the chest: “O God, I am also worthless, obsessed with material wealth. I am nothing!” After this spectacle, a poor ordinary Jew also stands up and also proclaims: “O God, I am nothing.” The rich businessman kicks the rabbi and whispers in his ear with scorn: “What insolence! Who is that guy who dares to claim that he is nothing too!”

Buy Zizek's Jokes: (Did You Hear the One About Hegel and Negation?) here.