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Philosophy, Ideology & Jokes: An Intro to Slavoj Žižek

Discover the synthesis of Marxism, Kantian critique, Lacanian psychoanalysis, Hegelian dialectics, and cultural criticism in this thought-provoking course on Slavoj Žižek's philosophy. Uncover the ideology, capitalism, and fantasy that shape contemporary life. Delve into the serious, yet often humorous, teachings of one of Europe's most influential philosophers.

  • All levels
  • 21 and older
  • $335
  • Online Classroom
  • 12 hours over 4 sessions

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  • $335
  • Online Classroom
  • 12 hours over 4 sessions
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Class Description

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What you'll learn in this lecture class:

Philosophy, Ideology, and Jokes: an Introduction to Slavoj Žižek

Slavoj Žižek is among the most influential, prolific, and provocative European philosophers of his generation. Amidst a period of tectonic changes, as Soviet socialism came to an end and neoliberalism spread across Europe, Žižek’s thought developed against the grain—due in no small part to his formative experiences of Yugoslavia’s unique system of self-managed market socialism. He levied a fierce defense of communism in the face of liberal triumphalism in the 1990s, making a case for the continued necessity of the Marxist tradition of ideological critique, yet bolstered with precepts borrowed from psychoanalysis. In response to the relativist trends of what is often called “postmodernity,” he remained staunchly committed to dialectical thinking in a Hegelian key. His “low” Gothic style and predilection for jokes, profanity, and pop culture set him apart from his Western European contemporaries—and lent him a notoriety and cross-over appeal seldom achieved among serious philosophers. But, if Žižek’s jokes enable him to bypass taboos and reveal the elephants sitting in the room, we should never lose sight of the serious, even dark and tragic core, of his teaching. What comprises the very serious, if unconventional, system of Žižek’s thought? What has his unique synthesis of Marxism, Kantian critique, Lacanian psychoanalysis, Hegelian dialectics, and cultural criticism contributed to our understanding of the logics—of ideology, capitalism, and fantasy—that shape contemporary life, and the ethics that these imply?

In this course, we will trace the evolution of Slavoj Žižek’s thought across several distinctly politically oriented stages:

  • From his early radical democratic period, focused on the transferential, passionate character of ideology.
  • To his Marxist-Leninist period, in which he interprets the Real as class struggle and seeks a decisionist way out.
  • To his current social-democratic period, where we’ll find his critique of the commodity form sliding into a defense of cultural and political forms.
Throughout, we’ll explore the origins and applications of the key concepts he intercepts, reinterprets, and renders his own, among them fetishism, the Real,, the object, and parallax. Readings will be drawn from his majors works, including, among others, The Sublime Object of Ideology, Welcome to the Desert of the Real, The Parallax View, and Less Than Nothing, which we will pair with secondary readings by Sean Sheehan, Kelsey Wood, and Adrian Johnston.

Throughout, we will ask:

  • How does psychoanalysis square with socio-political critique?
  • How does dialectics operate without sublation, Spirit, or the end of history?
  • Why is truth structured as an illusion?
  • And, can a subject make a difference in a world of irreconcilable perspectives and all-powerful objects?

Remote Learning

This course is available for "remote" learning and will be available to anyone with access to an internet device with a microphone (this includes most models of computers, tablets). Classes will take place with a "Live" instructor at the date/times listed below.

Upon registration, the instructor will send along additional information about how to log-on and participate in the class.

Refund Policy

  • Upon request, we will refund less 5% cancellation fee of a course up until 6 business days before its start date.
  • Students who withdraw after that point but before the first class are entitled to 75% refund or full course credit.
  • After the first class: 50% refund or 75% course credit.
  • No refunds or credits will be given after the second class.

In any event where a customer wants to cancel their enrollment and is eligible for a full refund, a 5% processing fee will be deducted from the refund amount.

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Brooklyn Institute for Social Research

The Brooklyn Institute for Social Research was established in 2011 in Boerum Hill, Brooklyn. Its mission is to extend liberal arts education and research far beyond the borders of the traditional university, supporting community education needs and opening up new possibilities for scholarship in the...

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