Two paths on representational and non-representational mimesis: the reconfiguration of mimesis and historical mimesis as pragmatics of forgetting

Abstract

This proposal has been accepted by Nidesh Lawtoo (PrincipaI Investigator- PI) to integrate team of researchers of the EUROPEAN RESEARCH COUNCIL (ERC) funded project, "Homo Mimeticus: Theory and Criticism" (HOM), namely HOM's fifth specific contribution, "Revisiting the role the figure of the mime played in the rise of key advocates of poststructuralist philosophy, from Derrida to Lacoue-Labarthe, Butler to Deleuze (subprojects A and C at http://www.mdrn.be/projects/homo-mimeticus-theory-and-criticism). HOM project articulates a theory of the mimetic subject that is attentive to psychic phenomena that were central to modernism and are currently returning to the forefront of the theoretical scene: "From the mimetic unconscious to crowd behavior, affective contagion to simulation, plasticity to mirror neurons, there are numerous indications in fields as diverse as literary theory, the social sciences, and the neurosciences that mimesis is a double-faced concept that needs to be rethought both on the side of life and of art." In particular HOM's PI expects the Brazilian researcher's cooperation on two main already agreed topics: a) Deleuze's anti-representational philosophy and the reconfiguration of mimesis in Différence et Répétition (1968), Logique du Sens (1969) and Image-Mouvement (1983)/Image-Temps (1985); and b)development of the Ricoeurian mimetic representation of historical time: the correspondence between the mimesis applied to the historical narrative in Temps et Récit (1983) and the pragmatic of forgetting in L'Histoire, la Mémoire, l'Oubli (2000). The research exchange includes academic stay at KU Leuven. (AU)