After Foucault
Aesthetics, Ethics, Politics
Art and Technology
Critical approaches to gender and sexuality
Critical Theory today
Critique of modernity in an age of globalisation
Democracy to come?
Ethics of Technology
Hegel Today
Merleau-Ponty today
Narrative Identity and Cultural Memory
Phenomenology and Cognitive Science
Philosophy and Literature
Politics or Post-politics?
Sartre/de Beauvoir today
Subjectivity and Recognition
Women and Philosophy

Final programme (updated 27.11.2004)

Macquarie University hosted the 2004 Australasian Society for Continental Philosophy Conference oriented to the theme “Critique Today.”

Contemporary continental philosophy has been criticised for having renounced its critical spirit, for having retreated from the political, or for having conformed itself to the demands of the global marketplace. On the other hand, numerous thinkers continue to challenge prevailing doxa on the social-political, economic, legal, and cultural features of modernity, and many continue to propose critical theoretical responses to our current historical situation.

The 2004 conference invited responses to the question of the status of critique today. What are the prospects for critical theory today? What obligation does philosophy have to question our historical actuality, or to invent new ways of thinking and acting? What is the future of the ‘ethical turn’ in recent Continental thought? What relationships are possible today between philosophy, art, and technology? What are the tasks and challenges for contemporary aesthetic critique? Has contemporary philosophy become “post-political,” or are there new forms of philosophical critique emerging? Are gender, sexuality, and race/ethnicity the new sites of critical thinking? What role can philosophy play in confronting questions of justice, injustice, and the responsibility to others? What are the prospects for critical theory of society in an age of globalisation?

Keynote Speakers:
J.M. Bernstein (Graduate Faculty, New School University, NYC)
Colin Gordon
Genevieve Lloyd

Conference convenors: Dr. Robert Sinnerbrink, Dr. Jean-Philippe Deranty, Dr Peter Schmiedgen and Dr. Nicholas Smith, Department of Philosophy, Macquarie University.
Venue: Building X5B, Macquarie University, North Ryde, Sydney.
Sponsor: The Centre for Research into Social Inclusion, Macquarie University

Film Screening: The Ister (a film by David Barison and Daniel Ross based on Heidegger’s wartime Hölderlin lectures) with a presentation and discussion with co-director Daniel Ross. See www.theister.com for more information about the film.