For the last in this spring’s speakers series, Tzvetan Todorov will talk on whether memory is an adequate remedy for evil: do our injunctions not to forget, do our truth and reconciliation commissions do us any good?
A renowned and accomplished scholar whose more than twenty books include major contributions to intellectual history among other fields, Todorov received the 2008 Prince of Asturias Award for Social Sciences.
As always, these talks are free and open to the public.
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12 comments
May 4, 2009 at 10:36 am
Vance
Um, your design appears to be commenting in Godwinian fashion on the talk title. “‘Memory as a Remedy for Evil’ — but please interpret this as a bitter irony.”
May 4, 2009 at 10:39 am
eric
I have it on good authority that Todorov’s talk specifically includes discussion of teh Nazis, so the Godwining isn’t mine.
May 4, 2009 at 10:45 am
Vance
Knowing you, and the context, I was sure this wasn’t gratuitous (and doubtless other readers will assume likewise). But the massively overloaded quoted image is a loose cannon, pointing at whatever’s nearest.
May 4, 2009 at 11:04 am
eric
If it’s a cannon that harmlessly blows people into the lecture hall at 5:30 on Thursday, I’m good with it.
May 4, 2009 at 11:17 am
Michael Elliott
Do you all put these talks on iTunesU or anything?
May 4, 2009 at 11:26 am
eric
We used to film and post them, but owing to budget cuts we haven’t the resources anymore, I’m afraid.
May 4, 2009 at 11:44 am
Michael Elliott
Maybe your collective memory of the talks will compensate for the evil of the budget cuts.
May 5, 2009 at 7:21 am
Martin G.
Michael: LOL
Interesting that Todorov is known for his work on concentration camps and modernity and memory and so on. In my neck of the woods he is excklusively known for his interesting but *profoundly* boring work on genre theory. One of those books that you know you have to read and cite when you’re writing your MA, but dread having to read. I’m glad to see Todorov, too, has a sexier side.
May 5, 2009 at 9:04 am
Michael Turner
But, Martin, surely literature is not just a functional entity, but also has a structural identity? At the risk of descending into terroristic formalism, I would go further and say that it exhibits a functional identity that works at cross-purposes with its role as a structural entity. Moreover, considered within the interdimensional context of genre discourses –
Hey! Wake up! Look over there! Nazis.
May 5, 2009 at 2:44 pm
Martin G.
Yikes! Well, sure, but surely each member of the group “nazis” changes the entire category of “nazis” in such a way that the emergent properties of the collective group can be categorized in such a way that each member of the group will perform a difference with the discursive presentation of the collective and that OMG NAZIS GODWIN’S LAW!
May 6, 2009 at 7:50 am
Jackmormon
In my neck of the woods he is excklusively known for his interesting but *profoundly* boring work on genre theory.
Boring?! COME ON, IT’S AWESOME.
May 6, 2009 at 8:43 am
ben
Genre theory sounds more interesting than this talk, which I am now not attending in two locations.