Guest lecture, Sept 26: Ori Rotlevy: “Rethinking Freedom in Tradition: Benjamin between Kant and Kafka”

26 September 2019, 4 pm, Odette Hall 323

ORI ROTLEVY is a postdoctoral fellow at the Franz Rosenzweig Minerva Research Center at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and teaches philosophy at Tel Aviv University. He works on Walter Benjamin in relation to Kantianism, on the one hand, and to contemporary critical theory, on the other. Among his publications are essays on Flânerie, on Benjamin’s method of Umweg and its scholastic context, and on Kant’s transcendental ideas. An essay on Benjamin’s concept of tradition is forthcoming in New German Critique. His lecture will present a new perspective on the latter concept. Reading Benjamin’s familiar discussions of tradition regarding Kafka alongside less familiar references regarding Kant, will show this concept is directed not merely towards the problematics of transmissibility in modernity, but also towards the unique freedom made possible in tradition – freedom in which internal destruction, transition and transformation are essential moments.

This event is co-sponsored by the German Academic Exchange Service, with funds provided by the German Federal Foreign Office.

If you have any accommodation needs, please e-mail german@chass.utoronto.ca five business days prior to the event, and we will do our best to assist you.