“Philosophy of Failure: Negativity and Error in Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit”

contact: josefina.formanova@cefres.cz

Research Area 2 – Norms & Transgressions

My dissertation project draws on the observation that the current global society revolves around the highly valued ideal of success. In addition, we can witness the declining ability to resign into passivity or doubt on the one hand, as well as the increasing tendency to lethargy where action proves vital on the other. In the broader scope of my research, I explore the notion of passivity in action, and claim it to be the foundation for living in meaningful relationships with others and the world. Specifically, I adhere to the idea of reinventing the understanding of activity according to its inherent uncontrollability, which appears to be present in each human act or relation. My research embarks from the most common situation, in which controllability is open for observations: from human failure. 

In my dissertation, I particularly enquire into the phenomenon of failure in G. W. F. Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit (1806). Hegel’s founding philosophical narrative was written on the brink of modernity, into which the origin of the present paradigm of success and the ideal of social development can be localised. Returning to Hegel’s own understanding of education (Bildung), I offer an overall interpretation of failed effort in the Phenomenology of Spirit, in order to challenge the popular claim that failure is either but a means of success, or contrarily, an utter defeat. The overall objective of my work is thus, first, to contribute to the rigorous Hegelian interpretative corpus, and second, to mark principal indicators of the modern concept of failure, and its legacy in the current meritocratic ethos. 

Regarding the structure of my thesis, I start off with the excursions to the early-modern metaphysics of error, and proceed by discerning the notion of error and failure in the individual chapters of the Phenomenology of Spirit. Besides the main line of my argumentation, I examine selected social-existential modes of (self)relations, addressed by various Hegel’s successors or opponents up until today (mainly current critical theorists). Overall, I seek to claim that failure may shed a light on the dynamics of individual identity and the uncontrollability present in human action. Rather than restricting “failure” to its privative meaning in relation to “success”, I propose to understand failure via its role in biopolitics and scientific methods, and to detect the subtleties of its value in terms of intersubjective relations rather than subjective achievements. 

Education

• Since 2021: PhD student in Philosophy at Charles University, Prague
• 2017 – 2021: MA in Philosophy at Charles University, Prague
• 2012 – 2016: BA in Philosophy and Anglo-American Studies at Charles University, Prague

Participation in research projects

• Since 2024: PhD-participant in Language, Picture, Gesture: Forms of Discursivity (UNCE24/SSH/026), project based at Charles University.
• 2023 – 2024: PhD-participant in Repetition: Mother of Originality? Copying and Its Uncertain Promise (GA23-06150S), project based at Charles University.
• 2023: PhD-participant in Resilient Society for the 21st Century: Crisis Potentials and Effective Transformation, project based at the Czech Academy of Sciences.

Recent academic activities (selection)

• No Matter – Fail Better: The Foundation of Error in the Phenomenology of Spirit. Contribution at international research colloquium at Research Centre for Classical German Philosophy / Hegel-Archive, University of Bochum, Jun. 18, 2024.
• Originality and Repetition. Benjamin’s Anti-doctrinal Theory of Thinking. Contribution at International Critical Theory Conference in Rome, John Felice Rome Center of Loyola University Chicago, May 6, 2024.
• Citovatelné gesto. Dialektika opakování a originality v performativním umění (Quotable Gesture. Dialectics of Repetition and Originality in Performative Art). Contribution at Performativita—narativita—deskriptivita conference, Západočeská univerzita v Plzni, Oct. 25–26, 2023.
• Victorious Failure. Rethinking Failure as a Way-out of the Self-restrictive and Mute Mode of Existence. Contribution to professor Hartmut Rosa’s “Ethics, Religion, and Resonance” Masterclass for PhD students, Aarhus University, Sep. 13–14, 2023.
• The Failure of Philosophy: Language and Cognition Between Hegel and Wittgenstein. Invited lecture organised by prof. A. Moser, Johannes Kepler Unversity Linz, May 5, 2022.

Co-organised conferences: 

• With Muchová and S. Gansinger: When Theory Meets Particularity—Colloquium at the International Critical Theory Conference of Rome. Keynotes: D. Ingram, S. Lessenich, S. Petrucciani et al. Rome: John Felice Roma Centre of Loyola University Chicago, May 5–7, 2024.
• With prof. R. Giovagnoli and doc. G. Gallo: Social Aspects of Cognition: Human and Artificial Life Symposium. AISB Conference. University of Bath, Apr. 18–22, 2017.

Peer-reviewed articles: 

• K filosofii zbitého myšlení. Dialektika citovatelného gesta podle Waltera Benjamina (The Philosophy of Beaten Thinking. Benjamins´ Dialectic of Quotable Gesture). In: Filosofický časopis (forthcoming).
•   „Selhání základem morálních teorií? K dialektické metaetice Michaela Steinmanna“ (Failure as the Bases of Moral Theories? On Michael Steinmann’s Dialectical Metaethics). In: Filosofický časopis (peer-reviewed).
• Social Structure of Cognition in the Philosophy of G.W.F. Hegel and L. Wittgenstein. In: Kínesis—Revista de Estudos dos Pós-Graduandos em Filosofia, 2017, 9/20. https://revistas.marilia.unesp.br/index.php/kinesis/article/view/7732

Academic book reviews: 

• Hannah Arendtová—Walter Benjamin: Lovení perel. In: Filosofický časopis (forthcoming).
• Marek Kettner (ed.): Lovení perel—Walter Benjamin a Hannah Arendtová. In: E*forum. Dec. 6, 2023. https://www.ipsl.cz/index.php?id=2283&menu=e-forum&sub=e-forum&str=text.php 
• G. Feinberg—I. Landa—J. Mervart (eds.): Karel Kosík and the Dialectics of the Concrete. In: Reflexe, 63/2022, pp. 111–120.
• Odemykat Adorna Benjaminem—Susan Buck-Morssová: Původ negativní dialektiky. Theodor W. Adorno, Walter Benjamin a Frankfurtský institut. In: Filosofický časopis, 3/2022, pp. 631–636.