Punk Suprematism

by Slavoj Žižek, Rastko Močnik, Zoja Skušek

Écrits dans la première moitié des années 1980, ces textes sont un mélange unique d'attitude punk et de concepts théoriques empruntés à Althusser, Lacan et à l'art d'avant-garde. Rédigés dans une période turbulente du socialisme yougoslave, ces textes tentaient de comprendre l'importance politique du punk en tant que mouvement de masse de la jeunesse appauvrie. Les conclusions de ces travaux ont eu un effet durable sur la formation théorique du post-marxisme yougoslave, ainsi que sur les formes d'organisation de l'alternative socialiste. Le livre comprend également un avant-propos sur le contexte historique des années 1980 et une vaste bibliographie narrative des publications liées au punk dans la République socialiste de Slovénie, rédigée par Sezgin Boynik. En outre, il comprend également les traductions des deux éditoriaux de Punk Problemi écrits par des théoriciens slovènes renommés.

Paperback

Published June 9, 2022

About the author

Slavoj Žižek is a Slovene sociologist, philosopher, and cultural critic.

He was born in Ljubljana, Slovenia (then part of SFR Yugoslavia). He received a Doctor of Arts in Philosophy from the University of Ljubljana and studied psychoanalysis at the University of Paris VIII with Jacques-Alain Miller and François Regnault. In 1990 he was a candidate with the party Liberal Democracy of Slovenia for Presidency of the Republic of Slovenia (an auxiliary institution, abolished in 1992).

Since 2005, Žižek has been a member of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts.

Žižek is well known for his use of the works of 20th century French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan in a new reading of popular culture. He writes on many topics including the Iraq War, fundamentalism, capitalism, tolerance, political correctness, globalization, subjectivity, human rights, Lenin, myth, cyberspace, postmodernism, multiculturalism, post-marxism, David Lynch, and Alfred Hitchcock.

In an interview with the Spanish newspaper El País he jokingly described himself as an "orthodox Lacanian Stalinist". In an interview with Amy Goodman on Democracy Now! he described himself as a "Marxist" and a "Communist."

Reviews

[Robert B]

Despite its age, this book has some powerful observations about ideologies and culture, how they form, spread, and replicate as tools of control.

[Hannes Nyysti]

The intention and introduction from the editor is inspiring and I wished the content would follow up just the same. It feels like the reading alone on itself does not make a coherent thesis ln on punk and the authors tend to stray off into a side thought away from the topic in question. It might have been too difficult for me, but the words "buergoise" and "ideology" and other philosophical/sociological terms are repeated multiple times on one page each time, which I do not pretend to enjoy. It however brings forward an interest in further studying punk, as well as other philosophical and sociological subjects. Zizek's chapter was unexpectedly the most coherent of all three.