New TPPI Webinar Series: China Keywords

Announcing a new Telos-Paul Piccone Institute webinar series, “China Keywords,” beginning Thursday, March 21, at 10 a.m. Eastern Time.

Register for the event here.

Tipping our hat to Keywords: A Vocabulary of Culture and Society, by Raymond Williams, the Telos-Paul Piccone Institute announces its newest webinar series: “China Keywords.” Each webinar will introduce and explore a single concept essential for understanding contemporary Chinese social and political theory. The series will illuminate these concepts with an eye toward non-specialists in the West, while also addressing deep contestations of interest to experts in the field. “China Keywords” is part of TPPI's larger Telos China Initiative.

Continue reading →

Modernity and the Economics of Gift and Charity: On Ivan Illich’s Critique of Abstract Philanthropy

This essay explores the theological and philosophical underpinnings of the work of the radical Catholic social theorist Ivan Illich (1926–2002), via a discussion of the changing meaning of charity in Western thought and practice. It is argued that Illich’s thought is animated by a traditional theological understanding of charity as anchored in local, personal bonds and networks of reciprocity, and that his critique of Western economic modernity has much to do with the gradual depersonalization and institutionalization of charity, theoretically and in society, linked to its transmogrification into “abstract” philanthropy. Drawing on debates around the nature of love and the gift in contemporary theology, philosophy, and social anthropology, the conceptual dynamics of Illich’s account of human sociality are made clear.

Continue reading →

Telos 173 (Winter 2015): Gillian Rose

Telos 173 (Winter 2015) is now available for purchase in our store.

Gillian Rose (1947–1995) had an influence in excess of her literary output and treatment in secondary literature. Author of eight books, two articles, and four book reviews, she also had important, though perhaps hidden, effects on the UK academic scene through academic friendship, doctoral supervision, and interdisciplinary work. She inspired many students and colleagues, even where she does not appear in bibliographies or citations. She made major contributions to introducing the Frankfurt School to the UK; aided the Hegel renaissance in English-language scholarship; and was an early critic of post-structuralism and political theology. Several of the papers gathered here were first given at a conference at Durham University on January 9, 2015, to mark the twentieth year since Rose’s death. That conference and this special issue of Telos are premised on the view that Rose’s work still has much philosophical insight and inspiration to offer. The authors of these papers were students, colleagues, and/or friends of Rose, or studied her work as part of their doctoral research. The diversity of their fields reflects some of the range and interdisciplinarity of Rose’s own work: Hegel, social theory, Marxism, politics, race, recognition theory, education, and theology. We hope that this issue provokes a renewed interest in what Rose can still offer us today.

Continue reading →