Elsa Dorlin: The Phenomenology of the Prey (February 20, 2019) | Mercredis de l'Institut

The Phenomenology of the Prey: On the Neoliberal Discrimination of Spared Lives v. Stalked Lives

Abigail R. Cohen Fellow Elsa Dorlin will present the themes of her next book: a philosophical research on the lived experience of the contemporary world — a world we "know" is disappearing. Focusing on the debates on biopolitics, capitalocene, and collapsology in transatlantic critical theory, Elsa Dorlin makes a distinction between the hunted (lives directly exposed to the risks of social, political, or ecological death) and the spared. What lives are spared and what does it mean to feel "spared" when others are "prey"? Based on current events such as European migration policies, public health, and #environmental policies in France, and the crises caused by the mobilisation of the ZADs and Gilets Jaunes, Dorlin adopts a radical phenomenological perspective that offers a new understanding of political life and invites us to politicize the notion of denial.

Edited by Flavien Eripret.