Nadir Lahiji
Written with the aim not to contest but clarify, not to argue but to explain, The Unconscious Spirit of Communism seeks to praise Karatani and his unique intellectual project, which stands as corrective to a now more-than-a-century-old Marxism, as well as to the many Marxists, from Friedrich Engels on, who have distorted Marx’s thought—today no less than in the first decades of the twentieth century.
Biographical Note
Nadir Lahiji holds a Ph.D. in architecture from The University of Pennsylvania. He is the author of most recent Kōjin Karatani’s Philosophy of Architecture (Routledge, 2024). His previous books include Architecture in the Age of Pornography: Reading Alain Badiou (Routledge, 2022); Architecture, Philosophy and Pedagogy of Cinema: From Benjamin to Badiou (Routledge, 2021); Architecture or Revolution: Emancipatory Critique After Marx (Routledge, 2021); An Architecture Manifesto: Critical Reason and Theories of a Failed Practice (Routledge, 2019), and Adventures with the Theory of the Baroque and French Philosophy (Bloomsbury, 2018 [2016]). He is the co-author of The Architecture of Phantasmagoria: Specters of the City (Routledge, 2016). His edited books include Can Architecture Be an Emancipatory Project: Dialogues on Architecture and the Left (Zero Books, 2016), The Missed Encounter of Radical Philosophy with Architecture (Bloomsbury, 2015 [2014]), Architecture Against the Post-Political: Essays in Reclaiming the Critical Project (Routledge, 2014), The Political Unconscious of Architecture: Re-opening Jameson’s Narrative (Ashgate, 2012 [2011]).
Readership
This book is especially relevant to scholars and students of Marxian studies, philosophy, and critical theory, particularly those interested in Karatani’s reconstruction of Marx. It will also appeal to readers of Kantian and Hegelian Marxism, offering an accessible introduction to Karatani’s singular work for a broad international academic audience.
Table of Contents
Foreword
Preface
Acknowledgements
Introduction: Communism and the Return of the Repressed
1 Karatani and the Liberated Marx
2 Marx and the Unconscious
3 The Science of Spirit
4 Kant, Marx, and Transcendental Critique
5 The Gift and Modes of Exchange
6 Theory of the State
7 Socialism and Associationism
8 Kant’s Perpetual Peace
9 Metaphors in Marx
10 Nation and Transcritique on Kant and Freud
11 Isonomia and Socrates
Epilogue: Marx and the Unconscious Spirit
Bibliography
Index
