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Decolonizing Perception and Memory - New Ebook!

We endeavor to explore Deleuze’s reading of the grandmother episode in Proust’s novel, which confronts the narrator with the stark fact of her Death. Deleuze interprets this as revealing the effect of time itself

Decolonizing Perception and Memory - New Ebook!

My sister and I have completed writing our first book together!

Decolonizing Perception and Memory
What is memory’s meaning and function in our lives? Is its role to nostalgically recollect past moments and lost fragments through an involuntary awakening of the forgotten? Or does it primarily serve as a conduit to the creative impulse, disclosing an impersonal, transcendental dimension of time detached from any fixed point of desire?In this study, we explore these contrasting valuations of memory by excavating the French philosopher Gilles Deleuze’s somewhat notorious critique of memory and privileging instead of the artistic revelation of essence. Deleuze develops his position through a close reading of Marcel Proust’s sprawling novel In Search of Lost Time, the monumental early 20th century work dominated by themes of memory, the past, lost love and time regained.Against the grain interpretations receiving wide acclaim, Deleuze provocatively assigns an auxiliary, even dangerous role to involuntary memory in Proust’s writings. He suggests that ultimately, episodes like the famed madeleine and memories of the grandmother must yield to art’s superior signs disclosing impersonal truths outside the theatre of representation.In taking this minority view, Deleuze exhibits striking parallels to his larger project of overturning the priority of identity and representation in Western philosophy.His appraisal refuses consolation or compensation in some restored past, yet equally rejects tragic lament in the name of an immanent life to come. By unpacking Deleuze’s reading of memory and time in Proust, this study consequently sheds light on core elements of his unique contributions to continental thought. It also illustrates his commitment to configuring memory otherwise than as lack seeking redemptive fullness. The political drive to escape attachments animates his willingness to confront ugly, banal sides of death and aging so as to better affirm the untimely, creative force of becoming released through art.Ultimately, we suggest, his idiosyncratic interpretation opens lines of flight from melancholic traps continuing to haunt cultural imaginaries fixated on memorial and nostalgia. It highlights the power of relinquishment for gaining access to the future. The stakes concern nothing less than decolonizing memory.Prologue ......................................................................5Prologue: Overview of the Main Themes and Arguments Regarding Memory, Time, the Virtual, and the Political...........................................................8Chapter 1: Proust, Memory, and the Revelation of Art ...............................................................................13Chapter 2: The Madeleine and the Shock of the Virtual .........................................................................20Chapter 3: The Two-Way Movement of Time: Bergson, Proust, Deleuze ........................................26About the Authors....................................................35Prologue: Overview of the Main Themes and Arguments Regarding Memory, Time, the Virtual, and the PoliticalWe endeavor to explore Deleuze’s reading of the grandmother episode in Proust’s novel, which confronts the narrator with the stark fact of her Death. Deleuze interprets this as revealing the effect of time itself; time produces the idea of death through a forced movement of withdrawal. However, he rejects Freud’s theory of the death drive as a simple return to inorganic matter. Instead, building on his transcendental theory of time, Deleuze proposes a third synthesis of time associated with the empty form of time and the death instinct. This testifies to the desexualization of eros.The political implications center on the need to construct new schemas of memory. Deleuze and Guattari critique arborescent models based around origins and filiation. They propose a rhizomatic approach closer to the continuum of life itself. The impulse is to conceive memory and politics in a non-dominating manner, beyond models tethered to subjectification, hierarchy, and control.By exploring the intersections of time, memory, death, and the virtual, and their political significance, this study elucidates an important dimension of Deleuze’s philosophy. It also suggests possibilities for liberating thought from some of its more regressive attachments. The overall aim is to think difference and becoming otherwise.This study explores a set of interrelated philosophical themes regarding the nature of memory, time, the virtual, and their political implications. At the core of the analysis is Gilles Deleuze’s engagement with Marcel Proust’s monumental novel “In Search of Lost Time”, which contains profound meditations on memory, the past, and time.A key theme examined is the distinction Deleuze draws between habitual, voluntary memory and the shocking encounter with involuntary memory, as famously depicted in Proust’s episode of the madeleine. Deleuze argues that voluntary memory merely gives us the past as past, as something that is no longer, while involuntary memory reveals the pure past. This pure past is the virtual coexistence of the past with the present; it shows, following Bergson, that the past exists simultaneously with the present that has been. This is connected to Deleuze’s transcendental theory of time as splitting at every moment into two directions.Deleuze suggests that involuntary memory provides an encounter with the virtual, enabling contact with the essences of things. Yet he also contends that memory occupies a secondary role in Proust. The revelations of art exceed those of involuntary memory. This is becausememory remains trapped within a form of eros and attachment. Deleuze argues that a superior synthesis of time is found in the death instinct and the overcoming of memory’s erotic lure.
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We hope this enjoyment and passion come through in our writing and that our readers find as much pleasure in the book as we did in creating it. We also incorporated AI-generated art within our book. It allowed us to experiment with visuals that complement our narrative in dynamic and unexpected ways.

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What is memory’s meaning and function in our lives? Is its role to nostalgically recollect past moments and lost fragments through an involuntary awakening of the forgotten? Or does it primarily serve as a conduit to the creative impulse, disclosing an impersonal, transcendental dimension of time detached from any fixed point of desire?

In this study, we explore these contrasting valuations of memory by excavating the French philosopher Gilles Deleuze’s somewhat notorious critique of memory and privileging instead of the artistic revelation of essence. Deleuze develops his position through a close reading of Marcel Proust’s sprawling novel In Search of Lost Time, the monumental early 20th century work dominated by themes of memory, the past, lost love and time regained.

Against the grain interpretations receiving wide acclaim, Deleuze provocatively assigns an auxiliary, even dangerous role to involuntary memory in Proust’s writings. He suggests that ultimately, episodes like the famed madeleine and memories of the grandmother must yield to art’s superior signs disclosing impersonal truths outside the theatre of representation.

In taking this minority view, Deleuze exhibits striking parallels to his larger project of overturning the priority of identity and representation in Western philosophy.

His appraisal refuses consolation or compensation in some restored past, yet equally rejects tragic lament in the name of an immanent life to come. By unpacking Deleuze’s reading of memory and time in Proust, this study consequently sheds light on core elements of his unique contributions to continental thought. It also illustrates his commitment to configuring memory otherwise than as lack seeking redemptive fullness. The political drive to escape necrophilic attachments animates his willingness to confront ugly, banal sides of death and aging so as to better affirm the untimely, creative force of becoming released through art.
Ultimately, we suggest, his idiosyncratic interpretation opens lines of flight from melancholic traps continuing to haunt cultural imaginaries fixated on memorial and nostalgia. It highlights the power of relinquishment for gaining access to the future. The stakes concern nothing less than decolonizing memory.

Overview of the Main Themes and Arguments Regarding Memory, Time, the Virtual, and the Political

We endeavor to explore Deleuze’s reading of the grandmother episode in Proust’s novel, which confronts the narrator with the stark fact of her Death. Deleuze interprets this as revealing the effect of time itself; time produces the idea of death through a forced movement of withdrawal. However, he rejects Freud’s theory of the death drive as a simple return to inorganic matter. Instead, building on his transcendental theory of time, Deleuze proposes a third synthesis of time associated with the empty form of time and the death instinct. This testifies to the desexualization of eros.

The political implications center on the need to construct new schemas of memory. Deleuze and Guattari critique arborescent models based around origins and filiation. They propose a rhizomatic approach closer to the continuum of life itself. The impulse is to conceive memory and politics in a non-dominating manner, beyond models tethered to subjectification, hierarchy, and control.

By exploring the intersections of time, memory, death, and the virtual, and their political significance, this study elucidates an important dimension of Deleuze’s philosophy. It also suggests possibilities for liberating thought from some of its more regressive attachments. The overall aim is to think difference and becoming otherwise.

This study explores a set of interrelated philosophical themes regarding the nature of memory, time, the virtual, and their political implications. At the core of the analysis is Gilles Deleuze’s engagement with Marcel Proust’s monumental novel “In Search of Lost Time”, which contains profound meditations on memory, the past, and time.

A key theme examined is the distinction Deleuze draws between habitual, voluntary memory and the shocking encounter with involuntary memory, as famously depicted in Proust’s episode of the madeleine. Deleuze argues that voluntary memory merely gives us the past as past, as something that is no longer, while involuntary memory reveals the pure past. This pure past is the virtual coexistence of the past with the present; it shows, following Bergson, that the past exists simultaneously with the present that has been. This is connected to Deleuze’s transcendental theory of time as splitting at every moment into two directions.

Deleuze suggests that involuntary memory provides an encounter with the virtual, enabling contact with the essences of things. Yet he also contends that memory occupies a secondary role in Proust. The revelations of art exceed those of involuntary memory. This is because memory remains trapped within a form of eros and attachment. Deleuze argues that a superior synthesis of time is found in the death instinct and the overcoming of memory’s erotic lure.

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