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Testing and contesting power in philhellenic thought and literature

Item

Title

Testing and contesting power in philhellenic thought and literature

Date

13 November 2021

Abstract

This paper identifies a strain of philhellenic discourse that questions and qualifies revolutionary praxis and, in particular, revolutionary violence, insofar as the latter is understood as a means towards the foundation or restoration of state sovereignty. Surveying key texts from this current of philhellenism – developed primarily in the traditions of German Idealism and British Romanticism – it puts forward two interlocking arguments. First, that this orientation diverges from earlier mainstream traditions of 18th-century Hellenism, which were grounded on the conceptual repertoire of classical republicanism. Second, that the “critique of violence” they propose has to face the dual challenge of resisting, on the one hand, a resolutely historicising and critical understanding of the Greek tradition that would render it irrelevant for the present and, on the other hand, an aestheticizing impulse that would equate revolution with subjective Bildung.

(Edited abstract from conference website)

Type specialization

Format

Text

Language

Bibliographic Citation

https://dimensionsof1821.com/abstracts/#s-zenio

Number Of Pages - Duration

00:20:00

Rights

All Rights Reserved

Position: 8207 (20 views)