Philosophy and/as Biopolitics

EPTC Incubator Workshop

The Society for Existential and Phenomenological Theory and Culture (EPTC) is looking for submissions for the Second ETPC Incubator. This event will be a collaborative workshop with presentations of work-in-progress as well as paper presentations on this year’s theme: Philosophy and/as Biopolitics.

Some of the most important thinkers from the past century and many of the most innovative philosophers working today have been focused on the rather diffuse question of biopolitics. While the very meaning of this term may remain open to interpretation, it is nevertheless becoming one of the most important philosophical horizons moving into the twenty-first century. What is biopolitics? Looking back on the past century, why is it possible to count so many philosophers as biopolitical thinkers? Which issues and problems can biopolitics address? And what does the turn to biopolitics mean for philosophy as it advances into the next millennium?

Discussion may involve theoretical questions or applied work. Possible figures for consideration include Foucault, Agamben, Arendt, Derrida, Deleuze, Hardt, Negri, Haraway, Nancy, Butler, Schmitt, Rancière, Habermas, Zizek, Grosz, and Nikolas Rose.

This workshop lets presenters bring problems, questions, and concerns about work-in-progress for discussion in a roundtable setting. It is appropriate to bring a project in its nascent stages, specific passages of a work that are causing difficulties or trouble for the author, or work that is at a crossroad and requires more reflection before it can advance. Suitable projects may include journal articles, book chapters, conference papers, lectures, or perhaps doctoral thesis work. Our aim is to incubate and nurture these projects so participants can take them to the next level. The WIP sessions will be bookended by two formal paper presentations to situate and inspire the conversation.

The workshop will be conducted during EPTC’s annual meeting at Canadian Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences, which will be held May 29 –June 1, 2012 in Waterloo, ON.