Transparency and the logic of auto-immunity

<p>In <em>Voyous, </em>Jacques Derrida develops his argument starting from the presupposition that democracy as such is the entity whose integrity and immunity are at stake and, therefore, under investigation. This gesture reflects the setting in which ten years before, in <em&g...

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Main Author: Emanuele Antonelli
Format: Article
Language:deu
Published: Università degli Studi di Milano 2011-12-01
Series:Lebenswelt: Aesthetics and Philosophy of Experience
Online Access:http://riviste.unimi.it/index.php/Lebenswelt/article/view/1594
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spelling doaj-4a3937145e2f4837899340088b21af242020-11-24T22:56:06ZdeuUniversità degli Studi di MilanoLebenswelt: Aesthetics and Philosophy of Experience2240-95992011-12-010110.13130/2240-9599/15941481Transparency and the logic of auto-immunityEmanuele Antonelli<p>In <em>Voyous, </em>Jacques Derrida develops his argument starting from the presupposition that democracy as such is the entity whose integrity and immunity are at stake and, therefore, under investigation. This gesture reflects the setting in which ten years before, in <em>Foi et savoir</em>, he had cast his reasoning about the logic of immunity. There, it was one of the sources of religion, the <em>immunity </em>of the sacred, that operated according to this logic. The hyphen between these two essays, beside Derrida’s own crossed references, is the genealogical reasoning on the meaning and essence of the concept of democracy: contrary to what Derrida claims, it will be maintained that Athenian democracy had a clear immune matrix, whose constant exercise is clearly defined, in spite of himself, by Vernant, and it will be shown how modern democracy has been forced to change policy. Modern democracy is an entity characterized by an immune deficiency. In order to save Derrida’s intuition from both the collapse of different vantage points and from a quite bizarre reticence in taking into account of the immune value of rituals, our starting point will be René Girard’s œuvre and his reading of the role of immune logic in sacred systems and, more generally, in modernity. The threshold between the auto-immune reaction, immune deficiency and auto-immune disease, between the sacrifice who delimits and constitutes the self and the <em>holocauste du peuple en détail</em>, is the space where, constantly exposed to the risk of auto-denial, democracy lives.</p><p> </p>http://riviste.unimi.it/index.php/Lebenswelt/article/view/1594
collection DOAJ
language deu
format Article
sources DOAJ
author Emanuele Antonelli
spellingShingle Emanuele Antonelli
Transparency and the logic of auto-immunity
Lebenswelt: Aesthetics and Philosophy of Experience
author_facet Emanuele Antonelli
author_sort Emanuele Antonelli
title Transparency and the logic of auto-immunity
title_short Transparency and the logic of auto-immunity
title_full Transparency and the logic of auto-immunity
title_fullStr Transparency and the logic of auto-immunity
title_full_unstemmed Transparency and the logic of auto-immunity
title_sort transparency and the logic of auto-immunity
publisher Università degli Studi di Milano
series Lebenswelt: Aesthetics and Philosophy of Experience
issn 2240-9599
publishDate 2011-12-01
description <p>In <em>Voyous, </em>Jacques Derrida develops his argument starting from the presupposition that democracy as such is the entity whose integrity and immunity are at stake and, therefore, under investigation. This gesture reflects the setting in which ten years before, in <em>Foi et savoir</em>, he had cast his reasoning about the logic of immunity. There, it was one of the sources of religion, the <em>immunity </em>of the sacred, that operated according to this logic. The hyphen between these two essays, beside Derrida’s own crossed references, is the genealogical reasoning on the meaning and essence of the concept of democracy: contrary to what Derrida claims, it will be maintained that Athenian democracy had a clear immune matrix, whose constant exercise is clearly defined, in spite of himself, by Vernant, and it will be shown how modern democracy has been forced to change policy. Modern democracy is an entity characterized by an immune deficiency. In order to save Derrida’s intuition from both the collapse of different vantage points and from a quite bizarre reticence in taking into account of the immune value of rituals, our starting point will be René Girard’s œuvre and his reading of the role of immune logic in sacred systems and, more generally, in modernity. The threshold between the auto-immune reaction, immune deficiency and auto-immune disease, between the sacrifice who delimits and constitutes the self and the <em>holocauste du peuple en détail</em>, is the space where, constantly exposed to the risk of auto-denial, democracy lives.</p><p> </p>
url http://riviste.unimi.it/index.php/Lebenswelt/article/view/1594
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