Conference Program
International Conference
CRITICAL THEORY AND REASON
Sala Ortega y Gasset (Seminario 217)
Faculty of Philosophy
Universidad Complutense de Madrid
05–06 March 2024
TUESDAY 05 MARCH 2024
0830–0900hrs: Registration
0900–0910hrs: Welcome and Opening Remarks
0910–1040: Session 1–Materiality and Critique (Chair: Gavin Rae)
Is there a Materiality to Reason?
James R. Martel (San Francisco State University, USA)
The Last Katechon: The Role of Critical Intellectuals in the Post-Industrial Society
Justas Patkauskas (Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, Italy)
So Very Tired: The Nature and Ethics of Exhaustion
Sacha Golob (King’s College London, England)
1040–1100hrs: Coffee Break
1100–1230hrs: Session 2–Embodiment (Chair: Cillian Ó Fathaigh)
Critique and Gastronomy: Notes for an Analogical Realism
Valeria Campos–Salvaterra (Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso, Chile)
Critical Theory and Affect: Adorno’s Concept of Touch
Cristina Matei (Kingston University, England)
What Can an Image (of the Body) Do?: Reason, Images, and Materiality
Emma Ingala (Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Spain)
1230–1245hrs: Coffee Break
1245–1345hrs: Session 3–Materiality and Nature (Chair: Sacha Golob)
On an Unwritten Logic: Horkheimer and the Possibility of Materialist Dialectics
Samuel Ferns (University College Dublin, Ireland)
Nature and Freedom: Reconsidering the Materialist Philosophy of Spirit in Dialectic of Enlightenment
Wouter Vijfhuize (Pennsylvania State University, USA)
1345–1545hrs: Lunch (Provided for conference speakers)
1545–1645hrs: Session 4–Information and Reason (Chair: James Martel)
Which Way, Computational Singularity?
Kennan Ferguson (University of Wisconsin: Milwaukee)
Informationcritique, between Reason and Desire
Ashley Woodward (University of Dundee, Scotland)
1645–1700hrs: Coffee Break
1700–1800hrs: Session 5–Technology (Chair: Kennan Ferguson)
The Task of Critical Social Theory in Technological Innovation Processes
Lisann Penttilä (KU Leuven, Belgium)
From Formal–Technical Rationality to Democratic Rationalization: Critical Theory of Technology in Marcuse and Feenberg
Antonio Oraldi (University of Lisbon, Portugal)
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WEDNESDAY 06 MARCH 2024
0915–0930hrs: Registration
0930–1100: Session 6–Critical Theory and Deconstruction (Chair: Gavin Rae)
The Reason to Come: Derrida and Plato on the Future of Reasoning
Jack Kelleher (King’s College London, England)
“From Name to Nomos”: the Name as Institution in Derrida
Cillian Ó Fathaigh (King’s College London, England)
Deconstruction and Ethnocentrism: On Derrida's Generalized Writing
Ramón Macho (Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Spain)
1100–1120hrs: Coffee Break
1120hrs–1250hrs: Session 7–Decolonial Reason (Chair: Emma Ingala)
Decolonial Rationality as Creating Relationality
Friso Timmenga (University of Groningen, Holland)
The Future Stakes of Abyssal Critique
David Ventura (Newcastle University, England)
What Exactly is Globalised in Globalising Critical Theory?
Tamara Caraus (University of Lisbon, Portugal)
1250–1500hrs: Lunch (provided for conference speakers)
1500–1630hrs: Session 8–Monsters, Irrationality, & Political Imaginaries (Chair: Hannah Richter)
“The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters”: Monstrous doubles in Sarah Kofman's “Vatour Rouge”
Eve Judah (University of Cambridge, England)
The Dialectic of Enlightenment and Freudian Drive Theory: The Irrational Ground of Reason and Political Agency
Gavin Rae (Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Spain)
Political Reason and Imagination: Connecting Political Rationality and Political Imaginaries
Mattias Lehtinen (University of Helsinki, Finland)
1630–1645hrs: Coffee Break
1645–1815hrs: Session 8–Politics and Ethics (Chair: Cillian Ó Fathaigh)
Post–Truth Populism and the Enjoyment of Not–Knowing
Hannah Richter (University of Sussex, England)
Anarchism, Indigeneity, and Reason: Louise Michel’s Construction of Radical Pedagogy
Carolyn E. Eichner (University of Wisconsin: Milwaukee)
Hope beyond the Anthropocene: From Denialist Optimism to Affirmative Pessimism
Liesbeth Schoonheim (Humboldt University, Germany)
1815–1820hrs: Close of Conference
- A pdf. version of the program can be downloaded here.