[Xmca-l] Re: Heidegger's Notebooks Renew Focus on Anti-Semitism - NYTimes.com

[Greg Thompson]

David,
yes, my gut-level reaction is precisely the one that Paul was pointing out:
if an author is antisemitic, then we take it that his ideas cannot be taken
up seriously, but if he is anti-African (I'm taking some liberties), as
with most of those in the Western tradition, I'm mostly okay with it.
Does that resonate with others?
-greg


On Mon, Mar 31, 2014 at 8:46 AM, David Preiss <daviddpreiss@gmail.com>wrote:

> Greg,
> Why for you "the antisemitism concern with Heidegger seems to be more
> problematic than the anti-African concern". Could you please clarify?
> Thanks!
> David
>
> On Mar 31, 2014, at 11:20 AM, Greg Thompson <greg.a.thompson@gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> > Audre Lourde's words seem relevant to the Heidegger debate and
> particularly
> > to the questions that Paul raises:
> > "For the master's tools will never dismantle the master's house. They may
> > allow us to temporarily beat him at his own game, but they will never
> > enable us to bring about genuine change. Racism and homophobia are real
> > conditions of all our lives in this place and time. I urge each one of us
> > here to reach down into that deep place of knowledge inside herself and
> > touch that terror and loathing of any difference that lives here. See
> whose
> > face it wears. Then the personal as the political can begin to illuminate
> > all our choices."
> > Personally, I've gone back and forth on this quite a bit. I tend to feel
> > that a tool is a tool and while some tools are better for doing certain
> > things than others, the tool itself has no destiny in itself. Would
> anyone
> > argue differently with Heidegger?
> > Are we saying that his whole system was fundamentally antisemitic? and
> that
> > one cannot take up his thinking without being antisemitic?
> > And similarly, following Paul, can we take up the ideas of any slave
> holder
> > or slave supporter or otherwise racist individual without taking into us
> > their racism?
> > Interestingly, for me the antisemitism concern with Heidegger seems to be
> > more problematic than the anti-African concern. (and this supports the
> > issue that Paul was raising).
> >
> > -greg
> >
> >
> >
> > On Mon, Mar 31, 2014 at 7:54 AM, Martin John Packer <
> mpacker@uniandes.edu.co
> >> wrote:
> >
> >> Yes, the problem runs deeper than Heidegger:
> >>
> >> <http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/G/bo3645200.html>
> >>
> >> Martin
> >>
> >> On Mar 31, 2014, at 4:48 AM, Dr. Paul C. Mocombe <
> pmocombe@mocombeian.com>
> >> wrote:
> >>
> >>> As an african/haitian, I am baffled when contemporary scholars want to
> >> ban heidegger from philosophy for his so-called antisemitism.   By their
> >> logic, people of African descent should be clamoring for the banishment
> of
> >> almost all scholars since descartes who showed any sign of racism in
> their
> >> writings.
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> Dr. Paul C. Mocombe
> >>> President
> >>> The Mocombeian Foundation, Inc.
> >>> www.mocombeian.com
> >>> www.readingroomcurriculum.com
> >>> www.paulcmocombe.info
> >>>
> >>> <div>-------- Original message --------</div><div>From: David Kellogg <
> >> dkellogg60@gmail.com> </div><div>Date:03/30/2014  10:47 PM  (GMT-05:00)
> >> </div><div>To: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <
> xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> >> </div><div>Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: Heidegger's Notebooks Renew Focus on
> >> Anti-Semitism -
> >>>      NYTimes.com </div><div>
> >>> </div>Martin:
> >>>
> >>> I've only seen short extracts from the "Black Notebooks", but what
> >>> I've seen suggests that the real problem is not time but precisely the
> >>> problem of "worlding" which was mentioned earlier.
> >>>
> >>> Jews, according to the "Black Notebooks", are an "unworlded" people,
> >>> and because of that they are necessarily parasitic upon peoples who
> >>> are deeply and profoundly in the world, i.e. his truly.
> >>>
> >>>
> >>
> http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/31/books/heideggers-notebooks-renew-focus-on-anti-semitism.html?_r=0
> >>>
> >>> It's a big world, and there are lots of other things to read. They are
> >>> only short extracts, but they are more than enough.
> >>>
> >>> David Kellogg
> >>> Hankuk University of Foreign Studies
> >>>
> >>> On 31 March 2014 10:02, Martin John Packer <mpacker@uniandes.edu.co>
> >> wrote:
> >>>> Hi David,
> >>>>
> >>>> Yes, this always the problem with Heidegger: his appalling politics,
> >> both professional and personal.  However, the conceptual problem he was
> >> working on was also important to philosophers with very different
> politics.
> >> For example, Lucien Goldmann found parallels between Heidegger and
> Lukacs
> >> (ref below). I find it helpful to (try to) understand what Heidegger was
> >> trying to do, and also understand how a philosopher of human existence
> was
> >> unable to prevent himself from becoming a very unpleasant human being.
> (The
> >> problem lies in his treatment of time, in my view.)
> >>>>
> >>>> Martin
> >>>>
> >>>> Goldmann, L. (1979). Lukacs and Heidegger: Towards a new philosophy.
> >> Routledge and Kegan Paul.
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>> On Mar 30, 2014, at 7:10 PM, David Preiss <daviddpreiss@gmail.com>
> >> wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>>> As an aside to the ongoing references to Heidegger... May be of
> >> interest or not.
> >>>>> DP
> >>>>>
> >>
> mobile.nytimes.com/2014/03/31/books/heideggers-notebooks-renew-focus-on-anti-semitism.html?referrer=
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Descarga la aplicación oficial de Twitter aquí
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Enviado desde mi iPhone
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >
> >
> > --
> > Gregory A. Thompson, Ph.D.
> > Assistant Professor
> > Department of Anthropology
> > 883 Spencer W. Kimball Tower
> > Brigham Young University
> > Provo, UT 84602
> > http://byu.academia.edu/GregoryThompson
>
>
>


-- 
Gregory A. Thompson, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
Department of Anthropology
883 Spencer W. Kimball Tower
Brigham Young University
Provo, UT 84602
http://byu.academia.edu/GregoryThompson