Radical Philosophy

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Radical Philosophy is a UK-based academic journal of critical theory and continental philosophy, appearing six times a year. It was founded in 1972 in response to the widely felt discontent with the what they perceived to be sterility of academic philosophy at the time, with the purpose of providing a forum for the theoretical work which was emerging in the wake of the radical movements of the 1960s, in philosophy and other fields.^[1]

Contents 1 Aims 2 Content 3 Writers who have contributed to Radical Philosophy 4 Current editorial collective 5 References 6 External links

[edit] Aims

The frontispiece declaration of the first issue outlined the aims of the group and its magazine: Contemporary British philosophy is at a dead end. Its academic practitioners have all but abandoned the attempt to understand the world, let alone change it. They have made philosophy into a narrow and specialised academic subject of little interest to anyone outside the small circle of professional philosophers...The Radical Philosophy group has been set up to challenge this situation...But we do not want to become exclusively preoccupied with the inadequacies of this type of philosophy. Our aim is to develop positive alternatives,. For this there are other traditions which may inform our work (eg. phenomenology and existentialism, Hegelian thought and Marxism). However, the group will not attempt to lay down a philosophical line. Our main aim is to free ourselves from the restricting institutions and orthodoxes of the academic world, and thereby to encourage important philosophical work to develop.

[edit] Content

As well as major academic articles, it has a large and diverse book reviews section and usually some news and at least one commentary on matters of topical interest. Although not associated with any specific left-wing position, the magazine was subtitled a 'Journal of Socialist and Feminist Philosophy' and has been broadly associated with the New Left. Editors of the journal since the early 1970s have included some of the most important Marxist and feminist thinkers in Britain. In recent years it has published articles by many of the most famous thinkers in the social sciences and humanities, from Judith Butler to Alain Badiou, Gayatri Spivak to Jacques Ranciere. It is probably the most widely read philosophical publication in Britain, and has a large circulation throughout the English-speaking world and beyond.^[2]

[edit] Writers who have contributed to Radical Philosophy

• Alain Badiou
• Alex Callinicos
• Etienne Balibar
• Fredric Jameson
• Peter Dews
• Gayatri Spivak
• Jacques Ranciere
• Jean Laplanche
• Judith Butler
• Michael Lowy
• Paul Virilio
• Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe
• Pierre Bourdieu
• Ben Watson
• Roy Bhaskar

[edit] Current editorial collective

• Howard Caygill, Humanities, Goldsmiths, University of London
• David Cunningham, English, University of Westminster
• Howard Feather, Sociology, London Metropolitan University
• Peter Hallward, Philosophy, Middlesex University
• Esther Leslie, Humanities, Birkbeck, University of London;
• Stewart Martin, Philosophy, Middlesex University;
• Mark Neocleous, Politics, Brunel University
• Peter Osborne, Philosophy, Middlesex University
• Stella Sandford, Philosophy, Middlesex University

[edit] References

• A Radical Philosophy Reader, eds Roy Edgley and Richard Osborne (Verso, 1985)

[edit] External links

• Radical Philosophy website Subscribers have access to full-text online access to back-issues of the journal.