A Study of Affect and Death in Twentieth Century Philosophy Pubblico

Abstract

In this thesis, I argue that 20th century continental philosophy’s concern with the problem death poses for the subject is just one component of a broad nexus of affective relations and comportments towards death within the history of philosophy. Following Philippe Ariès’ critical history of Western death mentalities, I claim that the present is characterized by a culture of death “denial,” one that is defined by the absence of meaningful considerations of mortality, and which engenders within the culture of the self an omnipresent death “anxiety.” My claim is that philosophy has the power to unearth and excavate alternative ways of knowing and “feeling” death from the past and that doing so can challenge the dominant affects and mentalities which shape the present. Specifically, I draw on three key philosophers of death to make my argument: the psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan, the esoteric writer Georges Bataille, and the phenomenologist Martin Heidegger. I argue that the dominant “affect” in Lacan’s writings on death is a quasi-rationalist, “scientific” affect, which studies death via systematic analysis of topographical, linguistic structures of the unconscious. Georges Bataille, in contrast, also writes in the heritage of Freudianism yet departs from Lacan’s structuralism, opting instead to descend into a mystical and irrationalist pursuit of non-knowledge and death, which find their bodily corollaries in the affect of eroticism and the manic-philosophical practice of laughter. My ultimate argument is that the narrative of the “mortals” offered by the late Heidegger, as opposed to the earlier figure of Dasein, is characterized by a meditative affect, one that surpasses Lacan and Bataille in extricating the meaning of death from the structure of the subject. Heidegger constellates death as the shrine of the Nothing and the revelation of the “secret” of Being; death divulges the meaning of life through the permanent concealment of the secret of existence, situating the individual within a community of mortals that shares and holds within itself an innate opacity: the mystery of death and nothingness. Heidegger’s mortal dwelling views death not as something frightening, but as a shelter and refuge which enables serene, poetic communion with the world.

Table of Contents

Introduction: A History of Death, Affect, and Philosophy ..............................................................1

Chapter 1: Jacques Lacan, A Scientist of Death ............................................................................18

Chapter 2: Georges Bataille, Eroticism & Laughter .....................................................................41

Chapter 3: Martin Heidegger, Meditations on Mortal Dwelling ...................................................61

Conclusion: The Mortals, Eusapia, the Secret, and Consumer Society .........................................82

Works Cited ...................................................................................................................................89

About this Honors Thesis

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School	Emory College
Department	Philosophy
Degree	B.A.
Submission	Honors Thesis
Language	English
Research Field	Philosophy
Parola chiave	laughter Dasein eroticism Jacques Lacan death drive affect Georges Bataille death mentalities Martin Heidegger Ariès death
Committee Chair / Thesis Advisor	Andrew Mitchell, Emory University
Committee Members	John Johnston, Emory University Noëlle McAfee, Emory University

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