Bataille and the Birth of the Subject
Out of the Laughter of the Socius
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 3774673 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Nidesh Lawtoo (0000-0003-0083-3208, University of Lausanne) |
| Year | 2011 |
| Volume | 16 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 73-88 |
| Publication date | 2011-06-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Angelaki (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0969-725X • E-ISSN: 1469-2899 |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/0969725x.2011.591587 |
| OpenAlex | W1531939896 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 10 |
| References cited | 11 |
After the recuperation of Bataille as a major precursor of the poststructuralist death of the subject by influential theorists such as Foucault, Derrida and Jean-Luc Nancy, recent developments in Bataille studies have begun to place mimetic, contagious affects at the center of the problematic of “sovereign communication” (Borch-Jacobsen, Ffrench). In this article, I extend this emerging line of inquiry by considering the role of laughter in Bataille’s theory of the communicative subject. My claim is that far from relying on what a “metaphysics of the subject,” Bataille’s ticklish form of communication is predicated on the so-far unnoticed, yet explicit debt to Pierre Janet’s “psychology of the socius.” I argue that Bataille’s take on laughter remains important for us today because it provides us with a non-metaphysical starting point to rethink the process of subject formation in intersubjective, relational term. For both Bataille and recent developments in mimetic theory, laughter precedes being, insofar as it is through laughter that the subject comes into being
Art · Epistemology · Freudian slip · Laughter · Literature · Metaphysics · Postmodernism · Psychoanalysis · Subject (documents · Subjectivity · Transcendence (philosophy · French Literature and Critical Theory · French Literature and Criticism · Philosophy, Ethics, and Existentialism · Psychology · Philosophy
Learning, Philosophy, and African Citizenship
Mirror for the Other
Mimetic Apprehension
From coping to carrying on
Making a Difference Through Atmospheres
Bataille and the Homology of Heterology
On Social Vortexes
Thinking laughter beyond humour
Resisting with authority? Anarchist laughter and the violence of truth
Affect
| Unique citing works | 10 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,83 |
| Citation span | 2014 - 2025 (12) |
| Citation velocity | recent |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 10 |