Bert Olivier Boeken

The essays assembled in this volume focus on philosophical questions regarding various aspects of communication. They are predicated on the author’s conviction that communication between human beings, regardless of the many difficulties involved, is something of sufficient importance to justify a patient philosophical exploration such as that embarked upon here. Interwoven with philosophical considerations readers will find insights gained from psychoanalytical thinkers such as Jacques Lacan and Julia Kristeva. The essays address a wide range of themes. Sometimes they concern fundamental things, such as the question of the very possibility of communication or the indispensable function of communication in sexual relations. The communicational significance of a certain kind of architecture is scrutinized, as well as that of images in our media-saturated, postmodern world, together with the connection between the latter and the experience of identity today. Other essays concentrate on communicational phenomena such as seduction and Kristeva’s notion of ‘revolt’, the difficulties surrounding communication in the age of ‘Empire’, and the reappearance of communicational sophistry as a theme in contemporary cinema.

These essays are critical explorations of different societal and cultural themes and phenomena, including love, life, worldviews, the human subject, time, politics, woman's desire, art, cinema, architecture and literature. The various topics are approached from critical-philosophical, psychoanalytical and poststructuralist perspectives, in the process engaging with thinkers such as Plato, Freud, Nietzsche, Heidegger, Kant, Deleuze and Guattari, Lacan, Kristeva and Rancière. Their aim is to shed light on some areas where human experience and theoretical scrutiny converge, and to do so at a time when critical philosophical thinking is waning in the face of the superficiality that all too often marks communicational exchanges on social media.

The philosophical essays collected here are predicated on the conviction that we live in a time when all-encompassing philosophical systems can no longer be seriously entertained as a true reflection of extant reality. Instead, an indefinite number of perspectives on – or discursive appropriations of – what is thought of as ‘reality’ are possible. Sometimes they diverge and sometimes they intersect in surprising ways, as these essays show. While the belief in an all-inclusive philosophical system is rejected, the author shows that every perspective displays a coherence and illuminating power of its own. The collection is divided into two parts. The first considers philosophy, the individual and society, covering themes including the deleterious effects of capitalism on natural ecosystems, the modern conception of ‘immortality’ in Nietzsche’s thought, Lacan’s provocative interpretation of capitalist discourse, the current status of the humanities in universities, individual autonomy, the meaning of ‘identification’, global ‘terrorism’, and Plato’s philosophical self-subversion. The second part gathers together perspectives on the arts and society, with the author arguing that reflections on cinema, architecture and music never isolate these arts from social concerns, but demonstrate their interconnectedness.

This collection of philosophical essays addresses important issues in the arts, encompassing painting, sculpture, photography, film and architecture. The author’s point of departure is the conviction that art in all its manifestations is an extremely significant cultural practice because it embodies a creative, reflective appropriation of social, political, economic, religious, historical and ecological developments, and as such merits close philosophical scrutiny, reflection and interpretation. The question of whether painting is still a viable artistic practice in our technocratic society is considered here, and it is no accident that both this issue and that of artificial intelligence are approached from the perspective of the phenomenological thought of Maurice Merleau-Ponty, among other thinkers. Equally important is the consideration of the relationship between art and the ethical, as highlighted by significant recent artistic events, as well as discussion of the transformational influence of ecological art and the culturally symptomatic meaning of kitsch. Other themes discussed include play and artistic tradition, formulating a suitable model for art ‘beyond’ Kierkegaard’s aesthetic and ethical models, the meaning of 9/11 for architecture, and Lyotard’s claim that today only an aesthetic of the sublime, instead of the beautiful, can help us make sense of art.