Issue 1


Archive : Ariella Azoulay

For the past two decades, the Hegelian concept Aufhebung keeps appearing in the elaborate literature written on the subject of archives. It describes archival work. Here is a late, characteristic example of this approach: “To archive is to put away, to shelter, to keep . . . The modality of Aufhebung, conventionally translated into English as ‘sublation’. . .


Archive : Ariella Azoulay

For the past two decades, the Hegelian concept Aufhebung keeps appearing in the elaborate literature written on the subject of archives. It describes archival work. Here is a late, characteristic example of this approach: “To archive is to put away, to shelter, to keep . . . The modality of Aufhebung, conventionally translated into English as ‘sublation’. . .


Blood : Gil Anidjar

The inclusion of blood in a lexicon of political concepts would seem to require the removal of two quite formidable obstacles. First, blood is not a concept. And second, blood is not political. I shall return to the first obstacle, but I should begin by deferring to understandable reservations with regards to the removal of the second. For who. . .


Blood : Gil Anidjar

The inclusion of blood in a lexicon of political concepts would seem to require the removal of two quite formidable obstacles. First, blood is not a concept. And second, blood is not political. I shall return to the first obstacle, but I should begin by deferring to understandable reservations with regards to the removal of the second. For who. . .


Colony : Ann Laura Stoler

Political concepts work upon us for very different reasons and entreat our attention in very different ways. Some impose their authority over our thinking and actions because they saturate our environment, incanted strategically, or wondrously shorn of reflection on the public stage. We might seize on them for scrutiny because they seem to offer the possibility of disrupting the. . .


Colony : Ann Laura Stoler

Political concepts work upon us for very different reasons and entreat our attention in very different ways. Some impose their authority over our thinking and actions because they saturate our environment, incanted strategically, or wondrously shorn of reflection on the public stage. We might seize on them for scrutiny because they seem to offer the possibility of disrupting the. . .


Concept : Adi Ophir

Of the many thinkers engaged in conceptual work, only few stop and ask “What is a concept?” This is the question I wish to engage with here. Its form is Socratic, and it is indeed in Socrates’s inquiries that it first appears. “Philosophers have not been sufficiently concerned with the nature of the concept as philosophical reality,” argue Deleuze and Guattari. . .


Concept : Adi Ophir

Of the many thinkers engaged in conceptual work, only few stop and ask “What is a concept?” This is the question I wish to engage with here. Its form is Socratic, and it is indeed in Socrates’s inquiries that it first appears. “Philosophers have not been sufficiently concerned with the nature of the concept as philosophical reality,” argue Deleuze and Guattari. . .


Conquest : Yves Winter

In 1542, the Spanish Dominican priest Bartolomé de Las Casas published his Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies, in which he describes the horrors and atrocities of the conquest of the Americas. Las Casas had arrived in Santo Domingo in 1502 and witnessed the invasion and conquest of the New World. He accompanied the conquistador Diego Velázquez. . .


Conquest : Yves Winter

In 1542, the Spanish Dominican priest Bartolomé de Las Casas published his Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies, in which he describes the horrors and atrocities of the conquest of the Americas. Las Casas had arrived in Santo Domingo in 1502 and witnessed the invasion and conquest of the New World. He accompanied the conquistador Diego Velázquez. . .


Crisis : Janet Roitman

On August 28, 1963, Martin Luther King, Jr. mounted the steps of the Lincoln Memorial to deliver a speech entitled “Normalcy, Never Again.” That day, however, Martin Luther King, Jr. deviated from the “Normalcy” text to improvise what is now known as the “I Have A Dream” speech. On January 20, 2009, the day after Luther King’s birthday and once having being. . .


Crisis : Janet Roitman

On August 28, 1963, Martin Luther King, Jr. mounted the steps of the Lincoln Memorial to deliver a speech entitled “Normalcy, Never Again.” That day, however, Martin Luther King, Jr. deviated from the “Normalcy” text to improvise what is now known as the “I Have A Dream” speech. On January 20, 2009, the day after Luther King’s birthday and once having being. . .


Federation : Jean L. Cohen

Two developments call for creative thinking about constitutional and political forms. The first is the universalization of the political form of the sovereign national state—in the aftermath of formal decolonization and then with the decomposition of the great land based empire of the Soviet Union (post-1989). Norms against conquest and forced annexation. . .


Federation : Jean L. Cohen

Two developments call for creative thinking about constitutional and political forms. The first is the universalization of the political form of the sovereign national state—in the aftermath of formal decolonization and then with the decomposition of the great land based empire of the Soviet Union (post-1989). Norms against conquest and forced annexation. . .


Force : Claudia Baracchi

“Force is that which turns anybody who is subjected to it into a thing.” Near the beginning of “L’Iliade ou le poème de la force,” Simone Weil circumscribes with lapidary brevity the problem of force. The question of force has been haunting political reflection from the outset, according to two distinctive perspectives. On the one hand, the disenchanted observers of. . .


Force : Claudia Baracchi

“Force is that which turns anybody who is subjected to it into a thing.” Near the beginning of “L’Iliade ou le poème de la force,” Simone Weil circumscribes with lapidary brevity the problem of force. The question of force has been haunting political reflection from the outset, according to two distinctive perspectives. On the one hand, the disenchanted observers of. . .


Guilt : Joshua Dubler

As political technologies, we might consider the two principal types of guilt as akin to the American folkloric dyad of the short con and the long con. The distinction, if you recall, is as follows: in the short con, the conman takes the mark for whatever he happens to have on him, whereas in the long con, the mark is sent home for more. So while the short con is more or less . . .


Guilt : Joshua Dubler

As political technologies, we might consider the two principal types of guilt as akin to the American folkloric dyad of the short con and the long con. The distinction, if you recall, is as follows: in the short con, the conman takes the mark for whatever he happens to have on him, whereas in the long con, the mark is sent home for more. So while the short con is more or less . . .


Identity : Akeel Bilgrami

It is doubtful that the concept of identity is susceptible to a substantial philosophical treatment at a high level of generality. This is so not so much because there are too many disparate theories of identity, but more because the sorts of things, the question of whose identity are taken up by philosophers, are too disparate to get a uniform treatment. Broadly speaking. . .


Identity : Akeel Bilgrami

It is doubtful that the concept of identity is susceptible to a substantial philosophical treatment at a high level of generality. This is so not so much because there are too many disparate theories of identity, but more because the sorts of things, the question of whose identity are taken up by philosophers, are too disparate to get a uniform treatment. Broadly speaking. . .


Parasite : Anders M. Gullestad

From holy to base and comic, and then to degenerate and utterly worthless, fit for nothing but extinction: few examples show the extreme flexibility, adaptability, and changing fortunes of concepts as well as that of the parasite. What’s more, this strange historical trajectory has turned the parasite into a key term for understanding the exclusionary. . .


Parasite : Anders M. Gullestad

From holy to base and comic, and then to degenerate and utterly worthless, fit for nothing but extinction: few examples show the extreme flexibility, adaptability, and changing fortunes of concepts as well as that of the parasite. What’s more, this strange historical trajectory has turned the parasite into a key term for understanding the exclusionary. . .


Torture : J.M. Bernstein

“For the purposes of this Convention, torture means any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession, punishing him for an act he or a third person, or for any reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain or suffering. . .


Torture : J.M. Bernstein

“For the purposes of this Convention, torture means any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession, punishing him for an act he or a third person, or for any reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain or suffering. . .