The paper first discusses two documentaries by Donna Read, >Signs Out of Time< (2004) and >Goddess Remembered< (1989), that focus on the pacific tradition of the female centered settlements on the territories of modern Eastern Europe in the Neolithic and Bronze Ages. Read depicts significant findings of a world-renowned archeologist Marija Gimbutas who claims that a peaceful image of Old Europe embodied in the omnipotent Great Mother changed radically towards the end of the third millennium when violent Indo-European nomads came from Russia and shattered the matriarchal utopia of equality and natural harmony. These tribes introduced the principles of hierarchy and violent male-rule. Read’s and Gimbutas’ findings are further developed and examined in the studies by Riana Eisler and Erich Fromm who also claim that conspicuous material aggrandizement of patriarchal culture severely damaged a blissful matriarchal bond between man and nature. These theoretical insights are applied to Williamson’s compre hension of nature vs. nurture issue in >Mary and the Seal< (1997). In portraying a tender relationship between Mary and the seal, as well as its tragic and totally unnecessary shooting, contemporary patriarchal culture is brought to a trial. The mere existence of the bond between Mary and the seal, an embodiment of an idyllic matriarchal unity between man and nature, testifies to the prevalent need for the return to its substantial but long-forgotten values. The theoretical insights of Graves, Althusser, Freire, Fiske and Miller will also be used in the interpretation of the story.
This paper was inspired by the documentary >The Act of Killing<, directed by an American-born, British filmmaker Joshua Oppenheimer and released in 2012. Provoked and appalled by what is described as one of the worst mass murders in the 20th century, the movie director focuses not so much on the crime itself but the perpetrators of the crimes and the ensuing consequences. A part from the need to bring to open and discuss this part of Indonesian history, as well as the consequences of the communist and subsequent anti-communist political rules, this paper deals, on the one hand, with the question and the essence of human nature capable of such monstrosity and on the other, with the role that art must take in understanding and healing of the open wounds in any nation’s history as well as individual perpetrators of the crimes. For this purpose, the ideological framework of Erich Fromm as given in his study >Anatomy of Human Destructiveness< and also philosophical ideas of Hanna Arendt, specifically concerning the nature of evil itself were used as theoretical framework.
O presente artigo aborda a concepção de amor de Erich Fromm na sua relação com a fé. O ato de amar, segundo o autor em foco, deve ser considerado uma atividade produtiva e interna, que se fundamenta em um aprimoramento das potencialidades psíquicas e emocionais do sujeito. Além disso, de acordo com Fromm, para amar verdadeiramente, é necessária a fé, que é concebida como um traço de caráter, sendo, assim, passível de desenvolvimento. No que tange à metodologia, este estudo pretende empreender uma leitura analítica das obras A arte de amar, Análise do homem e A revolução da esperança, todas de autoria de Erich Fromm, além de recorrer a trabalhos de comentadores do psicanalista humanista. Como objetivo principal, este artigo pretende elucidar as contribuições do pensamento frommiano no que diz respeito à relação entre a fé e o ato de amar. Pretendemos mostrar que, de acordo com Fromm, para o domínio da arte de amar, é necessário que o sujeito aprimore o seu caráter em favor de uma orientação produtiva, ou seja, é preciso que o indivíduo rompa com o narcisismo por intermédio da fé racional, desenvolva a humildade de reconhecer suas próprias limitações e potencialidades, e utilize a razão como um instrumento que o permita visualizar a pessoa amada como de fato ela é, e não como gostaria que ela fosse.
A Frommian perspective on the socio-psychological structure of post-fascism in liberal democracies
(2020)
My research explores Erich Fromm’s social theories of narcissism, alienation and authoritarianism for the purpose of linking those theories together, thereby analysing current populist phenomena as an extension of a fascist development in terms of Enzo Traverso’s conception of post-fascism. In my view, Fromm’s critical social theory of narcissism, which pertains to his two other theories, has great potential to unravel current political issues in liberal democracies that are generally tackled in terms of populism. Through a demonstration of the theoretical scope of Fromm’s social theory, which sheds light on pathological social and political phenomena in historical continuity, I argue that the primary tasks of Critical Theory in Frommian terms are to divulge the sources of fascist orientations in seemingly democratic practice and to offer appropriate remedies for these difficulties. In this light, I conclude that in terms of a Frommian social theory of narcissism, fascist types of politics thrive even in advanced liberal-democratic countries, taking the form of authoritarian populism, particularly where society rests on a narcissistic character structure intertwined with an authoritarian orientation.
This article explores the >lack of meaning< in contemporary society as a consequence of Western dualist thought paradigms and ontologies, via Gilles Deleuze’s concept of >reactivenihilism< following the colloquial murder of God. The article then explores processual and new materialist approaches in the understanding of the lived and carnal self, arguing for immanent and senseful materiality as an ethical platform for religious, environmental, and societal solidarity for tomorrow. For the theoretical justification of the processual approach in understanding the enfleshed self, the article employs John Dupré’s processual approach in the philosophy of biology, as well as Astrida Neimani’s critical posthumanism, and contextualizes these considerations with Erich Fromm’s ethical distinction of being and having.