Matter and Materialisms

Matter and Materialisms: The concept of matter
from Presocratic Philosophy to New Materialism
Materialism is all the rage in contemporary
political and art theory, be it the renewal of
Feuerbach's anti-idealist materialism in the
Marxist tradition (e.g., Badiou, Ranciere, Zizek,
etc.), or the revival of Spinoza's monist
materialism in the feminist tradition (e.g., Donna
Haraway, Elizabeth Grosz, Jane Bennett, etc.). But
what do these strands have in common beyond the
things they oppose (i.e., ideal structures
determining the arc of history, or disembodied
souls separating humanity from nature)? Is there a
positive concept of matter that can be thought
outside its oppositions to idea and spirit? What
does it mean to be a materialist in the present
age, and what does it commit one to?

The purpose of this course is to answer these
questions by returning to the beginning of the
Western philosophical tradition and telling the
story of the concept of matter from its origins in
Ancient Greek physics and metaphysics (i.e., the
presocratics, Plato, and Aristotle), to its
transformation in modern philosophy and
mathematized physics, before exploring the key
influences and ideas upon which contemporary
discourse about materialism turns. This will
provide us with the historical and conceptual
background necessary to critically engage with
contemporary metaphysical debates ignited by
'speculative realism', 'new materialism', and
their critics, and to examine their political and
artistic consequences.