PhD Research Fellows

2023-Present

Tyler B. van Wulven, a PhD candidate (ABD) in Philosophy at the University of Kentucky, is the recipient of a Marcuse Society PhD Research Fellowship for 2023 and 2024. He is supervised by Professor Arnold L. Farr and Professor Eric Sanday (University of Kentucky).

Prof. Farr writes:

Tyler was inspired by Chapter Three—"The Conquest of the Unhappy Consciousness"—of Marcuse's One-Dimensional Man, to explore at a deeper level the notion of the unhappy consciousness in Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit.  Tyler explores this idea in the context in trying to develop a critique of social pathologies.   

Working title of dissertation: 

• Essays on Hegel’s Unhappy Consciousness

Tyler explains his dissertation project:

I am generally interested in 19th and 20th century social thought, and I am particularly interested in those thinkers who take seriously the impact of social, historical, and cultural effects on our beliefs, preferences, and attitudes which inform the we way construct, interpret, and act within the world. My dissertation centers on Hegel’s notion of the unhappy consciousness in a variety of ways. I am investigating the extent to which the Phenomenology of Spirit can be read as responding to the basic problem of the unhappy consciousness, how the development of this notion in the rise of Christianity extends into modern rationality (modern scientific rationalism and modern moral rationalism), and how the basic structure of the unhappy consciousness in its suffering provides us with a novel approach to authoritarian identification that emphasizes the suffering of the adherent as opposed to rather unsympathetic and reifying attempts that distance us from this phenomenon. Finally, all of these interests have led to a more general interest in the notion of ‘modernity,’ as well as the history of philosophy and the philosophy of history.

Daniele Cargnelutti, a PhD candidate in Philosophy at the Universidad de Guanajuato, is the recipient of a Marcuse Society PhD Research Fellowship. He is supervised by Professor Stefan Gandler (Universidad Autónoma de Querétaro) and Professor Aureliano Ortega Esquivel (Universidad de Guanajuato).

Prof. Gandler writes:

The project "Dialéctica de la barbarie. Tanteos y exploraciones de sus potencialidades críticas" from Daniele Cargnelutti is—as I understand it—a philosophical experiment that tries to give a new sense of what Walter Benjamin had in mind, when he said that every monument of civilization is at the same time a monument of barbarism. Going in another direction with the same idea, Cargnelutti wants to find an escape from the existing destructive civilizational process by way of something that has still no name, but would be very far away from the today's capitalist reality, which sells itself as the only possible "civilization." In that provocative manner which I know very well from his Bachelor's and Master's theses (both award-winning), Cargnelutti introduces a different sense of the word "barbarism"—a concept that we will explore together critically and with emancipatory commitments during this fellowship year. 

Working Title of Dissertation: 

• • Dialéctica de la barbarie. Tanteos y exploraciones de sus potencialidades críticas

Daniele explains his dissertation project:

The objective of this project is the critical elaboration, from the tradition of Critical Theory—Adorno, Benjamin and Horkheimer—of a dialectical image of barbarism that is not solely related to fascist violence and that does not fall into the typical progressivism of certain philosophies of history. By way of rejecting some readings that are considered to be essentialist or humanist, that is, neither dialectical nor critical, of these authors, we seek to propose the existence of a barbaric notion—new barbarism (Benjamin)—capable not only of moving away from the forms of the current relations of production, but also to offer glimmers of hope in the forms of imagining different worlds (Horkheimer) and of poetic creations that enable non-identitary communication (Adorno). For this, a first critical-analytical moment of search and tracking of the tensions that frame barbarism in the different authors that precede and border the present work is proposed; and then it is intended to carry out an original distancing gesture, with strong help from the critique of civilizational occidentalism carried out from Latin America (Fernández Retamar; Gandler), to test an own idea of barbarism capable of breaking the borders imposed by rationalist humanism of the supposedly monolithic production of philosophical knowledge.

Omar Caloca Lafont, a PhD candidate in Social Sciences at the Universidad Autónoma de Querétaro, is the recipient of a Marcuse Society PhD Research Fellowship. He is supervised by Professor Stefan Gandler (Universidad Autónoma de Querétaro).

Prof. Gandler writes:

The project "Alienation in Response to Contemporary Capitalist Production Modes: A Critical Theory and Psychoanalytic Perspective" from Omar Caloca Lafont is a contemporary contribution from the global south to understand the conceptual confrontation that Herbert Marcuse, Max Horkheimer, Theodor Wiesengrund Adorno, and other authors from the Critical Theory tradition are unfolding, in the first half of the last century, between the social philosophy/critique of  political economy of Karl Marx on the one side, and the social psychology/psychoanalysis of Sigmund Freud on the other. Critical Theory founded in that way a new field of social science, the critique of ideology (as something that does not depend directly on economical questions to understand the very wide social basis of national socialism and fascism).  Caloca Lafont tries to understand today's forms of alienation of consciousness in all existing social classes. For that purpose, he goes back to the mentioned original conceptual confrontation, including at the same time some core contributions from Critical Theory and its critique of ideology.

Working Title of Dissertation: 

• • Alienation in Response to Contemporary Capitalist Production Modes: A Critical Theory and Psychoanalytic Perspective

Omar explains his dissertation project:

This doctoral dissertation undertakes a theoretical review that analyzes Marx's concept of alienation and explores its impact as a phenomenon of subjectivation, drawing a comparison between the production forms of the nineteenth century and those of contemporary capitalism. A critical reflection exercise is proposed to examine the changes that have occurred in the social structure, as well as the effects on the human being subjected to alienated labor and the new forms of subjective constitution of the “capitalist self”.

This study contemplates the sociocultural, political, and psychological spheres from a methodological approach of hermeneutic phenomenology, informed by Critical Theory and psychoanalysis. The works of Adorno, Horkheimer, and Marcuse are revisited to analyze the relevance of Marxist thought and link it to phenomena of labor precariousness, modernization, and psychosocial constitution that occur in the present. From a social sciences perspective, this research proposes a theoretical-methodological crossover between the clinical conception of psychoanalysis (Freud/Lacan) and the line of thought and reflectivity proposed by Critical Theory.

Monika Brenner-Skazedonig, a PhD candidate (ABD) in Media and Communication at Alpen-Adria-Universitaet Klagenfurt, is the recipient of a Marcuse Society PhD Research Fellowship for 2023 and 2024. She is supervised by Professor Rainer Winter (Alpen-Adria-Universitaet Klagenfurt).

Prof. Winter writes:

Monika Brenner-Skazedonig discusses and unfolds Marcuse’s foundational and inspiring analyses of the domination and destruction of nature and of the importance of ecology for Critical Theory in the theoretical context of ecofeminism.  Against this background, she conducts a qualitative-empirical inquiry to describe and understand the experiences and practices of new social eco-movements. In doing so, she will provide an important insight into a form of social activism that is highly relevant today.

Working Title of Dissertation: 

• • Marcuse, Eco-Feminism, and New Social Eco-Movements

Monika explains her dissertation project:

In Chapter 2—"Nature and Revolution"—of Counterrevolution and Revolt, Marcuse elaborates how new radical sensibilities are constitutive for liberating practices. He argues for an approach to nature for its own sake in a non-functionalist way, which is fundamental to overcome the oppressive structures of capitalist societies. Liberation of people depends on liberation of nature. In overcoming the man-made split in conceptualizing nature and culture, materialist ecofeminist’s and Marcuse’s critical thinking overlap. My interest lies in (a) similarities between Marcuse’s concept of nature as subject-object and ecofeminist conceptions of nature-culture-relations and potential mutual enrichments; (b) understanding how the notion of the body and its sensibilities in protest practices can promote “a radical, nonconformist sensibility;” and, (c) how Marcuse’s emphasis on Eros as life force can inspire vivid critical understanding of protest practices in the field of new social eco-movements.

Karl-Hannes Krenner, a PhD candidate (ABD) in Media and Communication at Alpen-Adria-Universitaet Klagenfurt, is the recipient of a Marcuse Society PhD Research Fellowship for 2025. He is supervised by Professor Rainer Winter (Alpen-Adria-Universitaet Klagenfurt).

Prof. Winter writes:

Karl-Hannes Krenner will analyze the evolving technological infrastructure that threatens the democratic foundations of our society. Herbert Marcuse‘s work contains many important concepts and enlightening insights that can elucidate the power structure of our contemporary control society and ways to transform it. The one-dimensionality in the affirmative use of digital technologies propagated by business and politics can be overcome. I fully support his important project.

Working Title of Dissertation: 

• • Thanatos in the Machine: Tech-Capitalism's Dangerous False Needs

Karl-Hannes explains his dissertation project:

The tech-capitalist society in which we live today creates false needs for each and every one of us. Following these false needs and using the technological infrastructure tech-capitalists provide to us, we find ourselves ever more stabilized and integrated into the tech-capitalist society of the western empire. In my dissertation project, I want to examine the dangers of tech-capitalism's cultural totality, which is produced through a ubiquitous material presence of modern technology, leading into an authoritarian society. I will enact my research along the lines of the critical philosophy of Herbert Marcuse, which assumes, in Marcuse's own words in One-Dimensional Man (1964), “that the Destruction Instinct is a large component of the energy which feeds the technical conquest of man and nature.” Through the thorough mediatization and digitalization of society by digital platforms, which follow a surveillance capitalist tech-libertarian agenda, “the one remaining dimension of technological rationality, the Happy Consciousness comes to prevail.” My interest lies in the application of Marcuse's critical thinking about contemporary tech-capitalist society and the development of critical concepts of resistance in the western empire that fend off regressive tendencies and promote a progressive conception of a future society that conserves civilization by shedding oppression in favor of Eros and democracy.

Kalyani Singh, a PhD candidate in the School of Gender and Development Studies at Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU), is the recipient of a Marcuse Society PhD Research Fellowship for 2023 and 2024. She is supervised by Professor Savita Singh (IGNOU).

Prof. Singh writes:

Kalyani Singh’s doctoral research is focused on how the self can still be a witness to all the atrocities women face in the Brahmanical patriarchy in India. Apart from the inequality and oppression structured and enforced by any patriarchy that women, in particular, face, the Brahmanical patriarchy deepens its exploitation and oppression towards women of lower castes, such as Dalit and Bahujan Women. Kalyani Singh’s research offers a creative-critical reading of some of the major texts written by women of these backgrounds. Her reading of Maitreyi Pushpa’s novel, Chak, raises the problem of education that women from lower caste backgrounds face. Even the occurrence of death is not unknown to such girls and women.  She takes up the autobiographical writings of Dalit women such as Shushila Takbhaure’s Shikange ka Dard (Pain of Incarceration), where one's self and its numerous wounds become representative narratives of most such women. By examining and adding more narratives to the field of “writing the self,” she makes a much-needed, fresh, epistemological contribution to the study of self, society, and feminism.

Working Title of Dissertation: 

• • Writing the Self: Dalit-Bahujan Women's Writing in Hindi 

Kalyani explains her dissertation project:

I have chosen to write my doctoral dissertation on the topic, “Writing the Self: Dalit Bajuan Women’s Writing in Hindi,'' as this theme relates to my own life and to those with whom I stand in solidarity. In feminist research, it is epistemologically possible to relate one’s self to the knowledge one creates. I myself come from a background of grievous disregard and denigration. Reading the writings of extraordinary women— writers such as Savitri Bai Phule, Shushila Takbhaure, Rajni Tilak, Anita Bharti, Rajat Rani Meenu, Shanti Yadav and Maitreyi Pushpa—has allowed me to think more deeply about caste patriarchy in India. My research focuses on the material and aesthetic liberation of Dalit and Bahujan women from the Brahmanical patriarchy that exists in India. My theoretical approach employs Creative-Critical Theory, which is constitutive of critical theory and Dalit feminism in India.

Saloni Gaba, a PhD candidate in the School of Gender and Development Studies at Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU), is the recipient of a Marcuse Society PhD Research Fellowship for 2023 and 2024. She is supervised by Professor Savita Singh (IGNOU).

Prof. Singh writes:

Saloni Gaba's PhD proposal entitled, "Alienation of Women in Sanjhi Art: A Feminist Study of Creative Labor,"  was passed by the Doctoral Research Committee of the School of Gender and Development Studies, IGNOU, in 2024. The external examiners appreciated the novelty of the research topic and the Marcusean approach to art and liberation through the performance of creative labor. Her argument relates the devaluation of women's creative labor to household or domestic labor in the capitalist economy. The demotion of women from the position of artist to craft women affects chances of experiencing freedom or liberation through art. The question of how to restore their positions as Sanjhi artists is also posed. Saloni writes, "Most art forms are positively dwarfed because of the ‘one-dimensional’ (Marcuse, 1964) way of life enforced by the capitalist form of economy. All art forms performed by women have been subjected to the position of domestic labor instead of creative labor. Many other forms of creative labor, such as Chikankari and lace-making, fall into the category of domestic labor, which is inherently devalued and rendered invisible due to its association with the domestic sphere. Hence, this research traces the alienation of women in Sanjhi art through a framework informed by Marcuse's concepts and theories, reconstructed  from a Critical Creative Feminist perspective dealing with women's bodies, their double alienation as laboring bodies and their much needed  emancipation." Saloni's arguments examine ways of valuing women's labor, whether domestic or creative, and also, how such can be negotiated within a capitalist economy, and how best to work artistically to create a feminist critique of "capitalism as patriarchal" from the position of a female artist.  This argument points towards the critical  need of transcending the system of women's devaluation as persons and as laboring artists . 

Working Title of Dissertation: 

• • Alienation of Women in Sanjhi Art: A Feminist Study of Creative Labor

Saloni explains her dissertation project:

My research investigates the alienation and marginalization of women in Sanjhi art, a traditional folk art form practised mostly by women in the Braj region of Uttar Pradesh, India. Historically initiated by women, Sanjhi art was later appropriated and dominated by Hindu Brahmin men. The study examines how this shift has contributed to the devaluation of women's creative labour, positioning their work as domestic rather than productive labour within the market economy. Through a feminist lens, the research explores the socio-economic and cultural factors that fuel this marginalization, particularly focusing on the intersectionality of gender and caste. The study seeks to uncover the systemic barriers that hinder their recognition and empowerment by analyzing the experiences of women Sanjhi artists, both in the private and public spheres. It also aims to highlight the intricate power dynamics within the art world, the role of the state and market in the devaluation of Sanjhi art, and the broader implications for women's liberation in contemporary times. Employing a feminist methodology, the study will use ethnographic methods to empirically investigate the lived realities of Sanjhi artists, thereby contributing to the discourse on gender, art, and labour in the context of a neoliberal economy.  

Nathalia Barroso, a PhD candidate (ABD) in Philosophy at Universidade Federal de Ouro Preto (UFOP), is the recipient of a Marcuse Society PhD Research Fellowship for 2023 and 2024. She is supervised by Professor Imaculada Kangussu (UFOP).

Prof. Kangussu writes:

In her PhD research, Nathalia considers the ways art can offer an alternative for society's repressive structure. Alienation is the key concept of her investigations. Reading Marx, with not a little help from Marcuse, she observes not only that—alienated from the products of their labor, from their lives, from themselves, and from the other beings—humanity perceives reality only in the forms it is given but, also, that this petrified sensibility can be broken up and open to other possibilities. The argument of the thesis is that, because art is alienated from the established society, according to Marcuse, the aesthetic experience is an alienation of the alienated structure. Creating a second alienation, that is the alienation of alienation, works of art can break the monopoly of those who have established reality and defined what is real and what is not.                       

Working Title of Dissertation: 

• • Alienação e experiência estética alienante [Alienation and Alienating Aesthetic Experience]

Nathalia explains her dissertation project:

I have a particular interest in aesthetic manifestations that can challenge establishment repressions. This research focuses on the domain and possibilities of overcoming the alienation prevailing in the contemporary world. The theoretical directions offered by Herbert Marcuse point out that the political potential in art is the possibility to denounce reality, proposing a new experience of radical transformation of the values of dominant culture. The aesthetic experience can break with the cycle of alienation, alienating individuals from the situation imposed by the advent of advanced capitalism.

Gabriel Dias, a PhD candidate (ABD) in Philosophy at Universidade Federal de Ouro Preto (UFOP), is the recipient of a Marcuse Society PhD Research Fellowship for 2023 and 2024. He is supervised by Professor Imaculada Kangussu (UFOP).

Prof. Kangussu writes:

Gabriel's project is to study "pixação"—akin to graffiti but not the same thing. Graffiti typically refers to interventions on the public space by painting. Pixação is also intervention on the public space by painting but with a radical difference: it does not figure a meaning, neither a picture, nor any form of mimesis be it with an image or with words. Such paintings look like letters, or better, like hieroglyphs, like a language that is not possible to understand. It is common to see pixações in places very hard to access. Pixação is a forbidden practice. Breaking the existing with longings for change, the visual protests are existential expressions, cries for help, and threats hard to punish. “Guys who are risking their freedom and even their lives to do this—they really want to say something,” said Gabriel, whose reflections link political and aesthetic dimensions using concepts from Critical Theory, with a starting point in Marcuse’s insight regarding desublimation of art. To go beyond the totalitarian capitalist apparatus, which produces an identification between the system and the individual's needs, and determines values, desires, dreams, and fantasies, the “pixação” creates expressions that are, in a sense, (using Marcuse’s words in Counterrevolution and Revolt) an “immediate art, which responds to, and activates, not only the intellect and a refined, 'distilled,' restricted sensibility, but also, and primarily, a 'natural' sense experience freed from the requirements of an obsolescent exploitative society.”                              

Working Title of Dissertation: 

• • Marcuse e a "pixação" enquanto dessublimação da arte. [Marcuse and "pixação" as the desublimation of art.]

Gabriel explains his dissertation project:

In One-Dimensional Man, Marcuse granted marginalized groups a revolutionary position: “they exist outside the democratic process; their life is the most immediate and the most real need for ending intolerable conditions and institutions.” One way of expressing the marginal condition, and Marcuse knew this, is art. In the 1960s, Marcuse created a concept capable of understanding and stimulating aesthetic interventions by marginalized groups, namely, the non-repressive desublimation of art. In an evident subversion of the Kantian sublime and Freudian sublimation, the concept of desublimation deals with aesthetic experiences intimately intertwined with social reality without, however, succumbing to it. “Pixação,” an aesthetic-political movement born in the Brazilian favelas, shares this dynamic and can be understood as an intervention that continues the trend of desublimation of art as theorized by Marcuse.

Fabiana Vieira, a PhD candidate (ABD) in Philosophy at Universidade Federal de Ouro Preto (UFOP), is the recipient of a Marcuse Society PhD Research Fellowship for 2023 and 2024. She is supervised by Professor Imaculada Kangussu (UFOP).

Prof. Kangussu writes:

Fabiana Vieira got a Master's degree in philosophy with a dissertation (entitled “Art and Politics in the Philosophy of Herbert Marcuse”) about the entanglement of the aesthetic and political dimensions signaled by Marcuse throughout his work—from his doctoral dissertation, Der Deutsche Kunstlerroman, until his last book, The Aesthetic Dimension. Her PhD research intends to signal the presence of Marcuse's concept of a New Sensibility in the reflections of Mogobe Ramose, the South African philosopher who widely spread the Ubuntu philosophy. The Bantu term Ubuntu means humanity—expressing the idea that “I am because we are,” “I am because you are.” This position, an element in Ramone’s concept of pluriversality, can shape a New Sensibility. Fabiana's proposal is to investigate how the aesthetic experience can be conceptualized as an experience of the meanings present in both concepts—New Sensibility and Pluriversity.

Working Title of Dissertation: 

• • A nova sensibilidade e pluridiversidade [The New Sensibility and Pluriversality]

Fabiana explains her dissertation project:

Based on the Pluriversality of the Being, which, according to Mogobe Ramose, is the perception that ontologically the Being is the manifestation of the multiplicity and diversity of entities, this Ubuntu philo-praxis and decolonial thinking add a new understanding by which social change becomes an individual need providing a new sensibility, which, according to Herbert Marcuse, “would foster, on a social scale, the vital need for the abolition of injustice and misery and would shape the further evolution...." [Marcuse, An Essay on Liberation (Boston: Beacon Press, 1969, pp. 23-24)] We continue investigating: can we understand the work of art, from an afroperspectivista perspective, as liberatory images—imaginings that demand the great refusal and petition for the new sensibility? 

Ada Ferreira, a PhD candidate in Philosophy at Universidade Federal do ABC (UFABC), is the recipient of a Marcuse Society PhD Research Fellowship for 2023 and 2024. She is supervised by Professor Marilia Mello Pisani (UFABC).

Prof. Pisani writes:

A pesquisa de doutorado de Ada Ferreira se dedica a estudar a obra da pensadora Glória

Anzaldúa. O trabalho, que escolhe como ponto de partida o livro "Borderlands/ La Fronteira:

The new Mestiza", quer investigar como Anzaldúa articula sua crítica ao processo de

colonização territorial, politica e cultural com os processos de resistência e o ativismo. Para este 

trabalho, a questão epistemológica aparece no centro de um debate político sobre o

colonialismo entendido como um epistemicídio, que apaga tradições culturais,

conhecimentos e formas de linguagem e, portanto, de vida. Por isso, Ada propõe investigar

a questão da linguagem poética e política de Anzaldúa a partir da noção de identidades de

fronteira. Além de mobilizar diferentes autoras que ajudam a localizar historicamente o

trabalho de Anzaldúa nas fronteiras de Estados Unidos e México, este trabalho reconhece a

contribuição de Herbert Marcuse seja na articulação entre estética e política, seja na crítica

da violência colonial e na esperança que ele via no que chamava de movimentos do

"Terceiro Mundo". A pesquisa irá trabalhar alguns textos fundamentais de Marcuse porque

acreditamos que ele nos ajudará a localizar a importância do pensamento de Anzaldúa a

partir de um certo modo de entender a teoria critica dos movimentos sociais.

The doctoral research of Ada Ferreira is dedicated to study the work of the thinker Glória

Anzaldúa. The work, which takes the book Borderlands/ La Fronteira: The New Mestiza as

a starting point, aims to investigate how Anzaldúa articulates her critique of the territorial,

political and cultural colonization process with resistance and activism processes. For this

work, the epistemological question appears at the center of a political debate about

colonialism understood as an epistemicide, which erases cultural traditions, knowledge, and

forms of language and, therefore, of life. Therefore, Ada proposes to investigate the question

of Anzaldúa's poetic and political language from the notion of border identities. Besides

mobilizing different authors who help to historically locate Anzaldúa's work on the borders of

the United States and Mexico, this work recognizes the contribution of Herbert Marcuse both

in the articulation between aesthetics and politics, and in the critique of colonial violence and

the hope he saw in what he called "Third World" movements. The research will work on

some fundamental texts by Marcuse because we believe that he will help us locate the

importance of Anzaldúa's thought from a certain way of understanding the critical theory of

social movements.

Working Title of Dissertation: 

• • A construção da New Mestiza em Gloria Anzaldúa—uma discussão sobre a identidade e o feminismo [The construction of the New Mestiza in Gloria Anzaldúa—a discussion about identity and feminism]

Ada explains her dissertation project:

A pesquisa percorre os caminhos que a pensadora chicana Gloria Anzaldúa faz rumo a

construção da ideia de consciência da New Mestiza. Suas obras, de uma maneira peculiar,

desestabilizam a forma como a academia concebe o conhecimento, formando uma nova

possibilidade de experiência e de construção teórica. Dentro das linhas da poesia, da

narrativa, da autobiografia e da mescla de línguas, a autora vai apresentando sua teoria

como um convite para uma conversa. Suas palavras são uma espécie de diálogo que

pretende atravessar as experiências do corpo. Ou seja, em um debate com o feminismo,

Anzaldúa propõe que a teoria possa ter sua inscrição na superfície do corpo, possibilitando

que sistemas rígidos e universais se transformem em pontes para o diálogo. Nesta ponte,

temos essa travessia que proporciona encontros possíveis, como este com Herbert

Marcuse, onde podemos discutir o quanto o feminismo anti-racista e anti-capitalista também

faz parte da teoria de Anzaldúa. O colonialismo, desenvolvido sob os moldes do

capitalismo, construiu o sistema de poder que se estendia às formas de dominação

exercidas pelo homem. A mulher, como escreve Marcuse (1974) era o oposto dessa

dominação, sendo sensível, não violenta e "protetora da vida”, mas infelizmente participava

dela enquanto dominada. Anzaldúa vai explicar que esta dominação persiste numa

sociedade em que o poder se concentra nas mãos dos homens. A escritora, já às margens

dos cânones por ser mulher, enfrenta ainda outros desafios. Além do discurso sobre a

construção social de forças para uma reivindicação de uma justiça social, ela tem que

trabalhar para que seu discurso enquanto mulher de cor, chicana, terceiro-mundista, e com

histórico da classe operária, seja ouvido. No trabalho que desenvolve, Anzaldúa busca

quebrar este ciclo vicioso do nós versus o outro/a outra. Tenta construir uma consciência

mais ampla, mais dialógica e significativa. Um feminismo que não exclua identidade, não

fragmente histórias, mas inclua, ouça, trabalhe em conjunto. Em Anzaldúa, assim como em

Marcuse, vemos a possibilidade de formar alianças, nos reposicionar na luta para confrontar

um problema que alcança todas e todos indiscriminadamente. Essas identidades e todas as

experiências individuais formam uma comunidade que cruza as diferenças, é uma

ferramenta para o fortalecimento coletivo e o combate ao individualismo que ainda

desarticula e separa muitas e muitos de nós. Temas que no fim levam ao mesmo lugar de

dominação. A Mestiza, por fim, é para Anzaldúa uma consciência que está preparada para

dialogar sobre as diferenças. Será essa consciência que vai desarticular o sujeito universal

e convidar seus leitores a experiência do pensamento e do corpo enquanto construção do

próprio sujeito. Enquanto um lugar metaforizado a fronteira onde habita Anzaldúa é local de

trânsito, de conhecimento, de trocas e intercâmbios culturais. E é este o lugar que a Mestiza

precisa ocupar em nós.

The research follows the paths that the Chicana thinker Gloria Anzaldúa takes towards the

construction of the idea of conscience of the New Mestiza. His works, in a peculiar way,

destabilize the way the academy conceives knowledge, forming a new possibility of

experience and theoretical construction. Within the lines of poetry, narrative, autobiography

and the mixture of languages, the author presents her theory as an invitation to a

conversation. His words are a kind of dialogue that intends to cross the experiences of the

body. That is, in a debate with feminism, Anzaldúa proposes that the theory can have its

inscription on the surface of the body, enabling rigid and universal systems to become

bridges for dialogue. On this bridge, we have this crossing that provides possible meetings,

like this one with Herbert Marcuse, where we can discuss how much anti-racist and

anti-capitalist feminism is also part of the theory of the Anzaldúa. Colonialism, developed

under the molds of capitalism, built the system of power that extended to the forms of

domination exercised by man. The woman, as Marcuse (1974) writes was the opposite of

this domination, being sensitive, non-violent and "protective of life," but unfortunately she

participated in it while dominated. Anzaldúa explains that this domination persists in a

society where power is concentrated in the hands of men. The writer, already on the margins

of the canons for being a woman, still faces other challenges. In addition to the discourse on

the social construction of forces for a claim for social justice, she has to work so that her

discourse as a woman of color, chicana, third-worldist, and with a working-class background,

is heard. In the work he develops, Anzaldúa seeks to break this vicious cycle of us versus

the other. He tries to build a wider, more dialogic and meaningful consciousness. A feminism

that does not exclude identity, does not fragment stories, but includes, listens, works

together. In Anzaldúa, as well as in Marcuse, we see the possibility of forming alliances,

repositioning ourselves in the struggle to confront a problem that affects all and all

indiscriminately. These identities and all individual experiences form a community that

crosses differences, it is a tool for collective strengthening and the fight against individualism

that still disarticulated and separates many of us. Themes that in the end lead to the same

place of domination. The Mestiza, finally, is for Anzaldúa a consciousness that is prepared to

dialogue about differences. It will be this awareness that will dismantle the universal subject

and invite its readers to experience thought and the body as a construction of the subject

itself. As a metaphorical place, the frontier where Anzaldúa lives is a place of transit,

knowledge, exchanges and cultural exchanges. And this is the place Mestiza needs to

occupy in us.

Kadú Leandro Firmino, a PhD candidate in Philosophy at Universidade Federal do ABC (UFABC), is the recipient of a Marcuse Society PhD Research Fellowship for 2025. He is supervised by Professor Marilia Mello Pisani (UFABC).

Prof. Pisani writes:

Kadu Leandro Firmino's doctoral research, which I am currently supervising, began in

February 2025. In his study, he investigates the concept of praxis in Herbert Marcuse's work

through two key conceptual crossroads. The first concerns the relationship between labor

and play, highlighting the importance of aesthetics for a critical theory of revolution. The

second examines the connection between Marcuse’s critical theory of praxis and Latin

American thinkers, aiming to understand both the specificity of the notion of praxis in

Marcuse’s work and it contributions and limitations for a critical philosophy rooted in the Latin

American context. Although I have only been involved in his research during his doctoral

studies, I have had the opportunity to discuss, on several occasions, the developments of his

Master's research, which focused on Eros and Civilization and its connections with Reason

and Revolution and Hegel. Kadu has proven to be an excellent interlocutor in the study of

Marcuse’s work, demonstrating intellectual rigor, dedication, and curiosity. His research

reflects a commitment to engaging with Marcuse from the perspective of our time,

addressing contemporary issues within our historical and geographical context. In addition to

academic collaborations, we have also worked together on aesthetic projects in the ABC

region of São Paulo, where we reside. I would like to highlight this aspect of his

aesthetic-political engagement, which undoubtedly provides the necessary sensorial

experience for a deeper philosophical reflection on the notion of praxis, thus articulating form

and content.

Working Title of Dissertation: 

• • "Práxis em Marcuse: do trabalho ao jogo" [Praxis in Marcuse: From Work to Play]

Kadú explains his dissertation project:

My doctoral research focuses on the concept of praxis in the work of Herbert Marcuse, exploring two fundamental conceptual crossroads: the relationship between labor and play and the dialogue between Marcuse’s critical theory of praxis and Latin American theoretical perspectives. By examining the tension between alienated labor and play as an expression of emancipatory human possibilities, this study analyzes the role of the aesthetic dimension in the critique of capitalism and the formulation of a theory of revolution.

I propose a shift in the analytical axis of the problem of praxis, allowing it to be approached beyond the logic of productivist domination, emphasizing its transformative potential. To this end, I establish a critical dialogue between Marcuse and two key Latin American thinkers: Adolfo Sánchez Vázquez and Bolívar Echeverría. While Sánchez Vázquez provides a strong concept of praxis as transformative action, Echeverría problematizes the limits of revolutionary myths, enabling a deeper reflection on both the possibilities and impasses of emancipation. This project emerges from a collaboration established during my master 's studies with Professor Stefan Gandler, a leading scholar on Bolívar Echeverría and Adolfo Sánchez Vázquez. This partnership materialized through a six-month research internship at the Universidad Autónoma de Querétaro (UAQ) in Mexico, where I had the opportunity to engage more deeply with the works of these authors and consolidate the theoretical foundations of this investigation. Beyond a conceptual examination, my aim is to situate praxis within the horizon of our time, connecting Marcuse’s theoretical challenges to the specificities of the Latin American context. Thus, I seek a study that is not limited to theory but unfolds into a broader aesthetic-political engagement, recognizing sensory and artistic experience as fundamental dimensions of philosophical reflection on emancipation. In this way, my research goes beyond an exegetical reconstruction of Marcuse’s thought, striving to expand its implications into new theoretical and geographical territories, contributing to contemporary debates on praxis, alienation, and the possibility of a free existence.

Daniel Neves de Andrade, a PhD candidate in Philosophy at Universidade Federal do ABC (UFABC), is the recipient of a Marcuse Society PhD Research Fellowship for 2023 and 2024. He is supervised by Professor Aléxia Brêtas (UFABC).

Prof. Brêtas writes:

O projeto de doutorado de Daniel Neves de Andrade busca estabelecer conexões entre a teoria benjaminiana da história e o papel da arte pós-aurática na tarefa de dar voz àqueles e àquelas que não aparecem nos arquivos da História oficial. O doutorando – que também é um “cineasta da quebrada” – pretende investigar as possibilidades criativas do cinema independente no processo de transformação social a partir da periferia do capitalismo tardio. Tomando como ponto de partida as teses “Sobre o conceito de história” e o ensaio “A obra de arte na era de sua reprodutibilidade técnica”, sua pesquisa pretende colocar em diálogo categorias benjaminianas maiores como as de “imagens dialéticas”, “montagem” e “tempo-agora” com a produção mais recente de cineastas periféricos, cujo trabalho muito têm contribuído para trazer à luz narrativas e trajetórias de luta rasuradas ou apagadas pelos registros oficiais. Assim, a voz dos povos originários, bem como a de mulheres, pessoas racializadas e de sexualidade fora da norma vêm se somar aos clamores de estudantes, trabalhadores e moradores de regiões periféricas por uma sociedade economicamente menos desigual e mais aberta aos desejos e sonhos de uma vida vivível. Para isso, a reabilitação de uma dimensão estética histórica e culturalmente desvalorizada se revela fundamental para a mobilização de uma outra sensibilidade como pivô de uma revolução total no âmbito intersubjetivo de ideias, afetos e modos de vida compartilhados. Afinal, como diz Marcuse no “Prefácio Político” de Eros e civilização: “hoje, a luta pela vida, a luta por Eros, é a luta política”.

Daniel Neves de Andrade’s doctoral project aims to establish connections between Benjamin’s theory of history and the role of “post-auratic” art in the task of giving voice to those who do not appear in the archives of official History. This PhD candidate—who is also a filmmaker—intends to investigate the creative possibilities of independent cinema in the process of social transformation from the periphery of late capitalism. Taking as a starting point the theses “On the Concept of History” and the essay “The Work of Art in the Era of its Technical Reproducibility,” his research intends to put in dialogue Benjaminian categories such as “dialectical images,” “montage,” and “time-now” with the most recent production of peripheral filmmakers, whose work has greatly contributed to bringing to light narratives and trajectories of struggle erased by official records. Thus, the voice of indigenous peoples, as well as that of women, people of color, and sexuality outside the norm, joins the claims of students, workers, and residents of peripheral regions for a society that is economically less unequal and more open to the desires and dreams of a livable life. For this, the rehabilitation of a historically and culturally devalued aesthetic dimension proves to be fundamental for the mobilization of another sensibility as the pivot of a total revolution in the intersubjective instances of shared ideas, affections, and ways of life. After all, as Marcuse says in the “Political Preface” of Eros and Civilization: “today, the struggle for life, the struggle for Eros, is the political struggle.”    

Working Title of Dissertation: 

• • Walter Benjamin e o cinema periférico: imaginação e memória dos oprimidos em montagem [Walter Benjamin and Peripheral Cinema: Imagination and Memory of the Oppressed in Montage]

Daniel explains his dissertation project:

Nos documentos oficiais, monumentos, livros didáticos, feriados e celebrações cívicas estão presentes os protagonistas da História, seja de uma cidade, de um país, de um continente ou de toda uma época. Mas onde está o registro daqueles anônimos, invisíveis e aparentemente sem importância, como nos disse Bertolt Brecht, que construíram a muralha da China, as pirâmides do Egito, as conquistas dignas de serem lembradas e admiradas coletivamente? A partir da obra de Walter Benjamin e do cinema periférico – isto é, do cinema realizado na periferia do capitalismo –, esse projeto busca investigar e reconstituir parte da memória dos oprimidos a partir de suas próprias narrativas, imagens e lugares de origem. Segundo Benjamin, o historiador materialista deve fazer um trabalho arqueológico com o ocorrido, juntar os cacos e lembrar os mortos para reconhecê-los e redimi-los. No Brasil do século XXI, impulsionados por mudanças sociais e tecnológicas, cineastas moradores de regiões periféricas têm realizado filmes não apenas sobre, mas principalmente nas próprias comunidades onde vivem e atuam. A questão do futuro, do passado e do espaço que os conecta é parte significativa dessas obras. O objetivo desta pesquisa é justamente traçar uma relação entre as ideias de Benjamin sobre o papel das imagens em movimento como instrumentos aptos a contar a história dos vencidos e as produções de um cinema independente situado às margens da indústria cultural. Com a câmera em punho, nós, autodenominados “cineastas da quebrada”, nos posicionamos como o anjo benjaminiano da história, que se recusa a ser arrastado pela tempestade do progresso, resistindo aos avanços do pensamento único nas sociedades unidimensionais, de ontem e de hoje. Por meio de fotos, arquivos, testemunhos e intervenções estético-políticas, buscamos identificar e recolher os escombros das grandes narrativas e lembrar, crítica e criativamente, dos que foram soterrados, esquecidos e silenciados, compondo, a partir de uma perspectiva “marginal”, uma espécie de memória periférica em processo de construção ou “montagem”. Nesse percurso, a arte assume um papel fundamental no esforço de tornar visíveis e compartilháveis os restos e fragmentos de um passado colonial violento cujos lampejos seguem inspirando a formação de uma outra sensibilidade rebelde atenta aos aspectos preteridos por uma tradição civilizatória erigida sobre o sofrimento do trabalho alienado e a repressão sistemática contra a potência de vida representada pela figura de Eros, aqui deslocada e situada no Sul do Sul.

In official documents, monuments, textbooks, holidays, and civic celebrations, the characters of History of a city, a country, a continent, or an entire era are present as protagonists. But as Bertolt Brecht told us, where is the record of those anonymous, invisible and apparently unimportant ones who built the Chinese wall, the pyramids of Egypt, the achievements worthy of being collectively remembered and admired? Based on the work of Walter Benjamin and peripheral cinema—that is, cinema made on the periphery of capitalism—this project aims to investigate and reconstitute part of the memory of the oppressed based on their own narratives, images, and places of origin. According to Benjamin, the materialist historian must do an archaeological work with what happened, put the pieces together, and remember the dead in order to recognize and redeem them. In Brazil in the 21st century, driven by social and technological changes, filmmakers living in peripheral regions have made films not only about, but mainly in their own communities where they live and work. The question of the future, the past, and the space that connects them is a significant part of these works. The objective of this research is precisely to trace relations between Benjamin’s ideas about the role of testimonial images as important instruments able to tell the history of the vanquished and the productions of an independent cinema located on the margins of the culture industry. With the camera in hand, we, self-proclaimed filmmakers “da quebrada,” position ourselves as the Benjaminian angel of history, who refuses to be blown by the storm of progress, resisting the advances of toxic positivity in one-dimensional societies, of yesterday and today. Through photos, archives, interviews, and aesthetic-political interventions, we aim to identify and collect the debris of the great narratives and remember those who were buried, forgotten, and silenced, composing, from a “marginal” perspective, a kind of peripheral memory in the process of construction or montage. In this path, art assumes a fundamental role in the effort to make visible and shareable the remains and fragments of a violent colonial past whose glimpses continue to inspire the formation of another rebellious sensibility attentive to aspects neglected by a civilizing tradition built on the suffering of alienated work and the systematic repression against the life’s drive represented by the figure of Eros, displaced and located in the South of the South.

Gabriel Ramponi, a PhD candidate in Philosophy at Universidade Federal do ABC (UFABC) in Brasil, is the recipient of a Marcuse Society PhD Research Fellowship for 2023 and 2024. He is supervised by Professor Silvio Carneiro (UFABC).

Prof. Carneiro writes:

Em seu doutorado, Gabriel Ramponi debate sobre aspectos epistêmicos e políticos da imaginação. Elemento fundamental para a política contemporânea, ela ocuparia a composição das lutas sociais desenvolvendo novas formas de vida, mas também permite a colonização conservadora das nossas fantasias no modo como a ideologia atravessa nossas subjetividades. Ramponi parte de Eros e civilização de Herbert Marcuse para observar como a imaginação está no coração da dimensão estética, fundamental para superar os limites de uma civilização repressiva. Todavia, em O homem unidimensional, a imaginação libertadora é questionada: a própria sociedade unidimensional captura as dimensões da fantasia e dos prazeres para uma versão dessublimada-repressiva da imaginação. Esta última perspectiva interessa particularmente para além do centro capitalista das sociedades industriais avançadas. Ramponi segue Roberto Schwarz, para quem a matéria social brasileira é moldada por um caráter peculiar da ideologia, quando a elite social procura justificar a escravidão e outras estruturas violentas com uma fantasia humanista, liberal. Mais do que uma falsidade ideológica, trata-se da violência expressa às claras, estruturada como um jogo liberal de uma imaginação cínica. De certo, Marcuse prevê a violência da chegada da modernidade na periferia, destruindo toda possibilidade de vida fora de seu molde unidimensional. Estaria a imaginação também condenada a esse fim? Poderia a imaginação na periferia apresentar formas diversas de luta?

In his doctorate, Gabriel Ramponi discusses epistemic and political aspects of imagination. As a fundamental element of contemporary politics, it would occupy the composition of social struggles in the development of new forms of life. At the same time, it would also allow for the conservative colonization of our phantasies in the way ideology intertwines with our subjectivities. Ramponi starts with Marcuse's Eros and Civilization to observe how imagination is at the core of the aesthetic dimension, central to overcoming the limits of a repressive civilization. However, in Marcuse's One-Dimensional Man, liberating imagination is questioned: unidimensional society captures dimensions of phantasy and pleasures for a repressive-desublimated version of imagination. This last perspective is especially interesting beyond the capitalist core of advanced industrial societies. Ramponi follows Roberto Schwarz, for whom Brazilian social matter is shaped by a peculiar character of ideology, by which the social elite seeks to justify slavery and other violent structures through a humanist liberal phantasy. More than an ideological falsity, this phantasy speaks of violence clearly expressed, structured as a liberal game of cynical imagination. Certainly, Marcuse foresees the violence that accompanies modernity in the periphery, shattering every possibility of life outside its unidimensional form. Would imagination also be condemned to this end? Could imagination in the periphery present different ways of struggle?

Working Title of Dissertation: 

• • Encruzilhadas da Imaginação [Crossroads of Imagination]

Gabriel explains his dissertation project:

Minha pesquisa pretende mergulhar no conceito de imaginação e seus efeitos sociais. Numa relação recíproca, a imaginação busca tanto imagens no mundo quanto as concede na criação deste — e na de outros. A imaginação caminha, portanto, entre as linhas da subjetividade e as da objetividade. Nesse sentido, parto da obra de Herbert Marcuse, mais especificamente de seu livro Eros e Civilização, com vistas à compreender como o filósofo faz uso da imaginação em sua relação com a estética e a psicanálise. Assim, seria possível vislumbrar a imaginação como constituinte tanto de nossa vida psíquica quanto mediadora desta com o mundo externo, em íntima relação com os sentidos. Isso foi central para que Marcuse elaborasse as potencialidades libertadoras da imaginação. Por sua vez, em obra posterior—O Homem Unidimensional—as características que permeiam a imaginação são observadas a partir do momento histórico e da organização social da sociedade industrial avançada. Ali, constatam-se contornos da imaginação sob determinada forma social, o que escancara tanto suas limitações quanto suas possibilidades destrutivas e violentas. Minha investigação, então, pretende questionar o caráter político da imaginação, seu lugar na crítica social e seu potencial, tanto liberador de potência crítica quanto de práticas violentas. Para tanto, me baseio também na crítica literária de Roberto Schwarz. Seu método de crítica literária concebe a forma estética como reveladora da sedimentação histórica: uma espécie de estudo topográfico do chão histórico. Assim, uma sociedade como a brasileira, de herança social e econômica escravocrata, ao mesmo tempo direcionada a práticas comerciais de cunho liberal (economia de exportação, típica de sociedades periféricas, em consonância com os valores da sociedade liberal burguesa) pode nos fornecer valioso material de análise crítica quanto às encruzilhadas da imaginação. Qual sua relação com a reprodução ideológica da elite? Que formas específicas a imaginação assume nesses contornos? E como os diferentes “personagens” sociais a colocam em movimento? Ainda é possível pensar sobre a imaginação em termos de liberação? Estas são algumas das perguntas que guiam a investigação. 

My research intends to delve into the concept of imagination and its social effects. In a reciprocal relation, imagination searches for images within the world as much as it provides them throughout the creation of this same world—and others. Thus, imagination walks between the lines of subjectivity and objectivity. In this sense, my starting point is the work of Herbert Marcuse, more specifically his book Eros and Civilization, to understand how the philosopher makes use of imagination in its relation to aesthetics and psychoanalysis. So, it would be possible to envision imagination both as a constitutive element of our psychic life and as its mediator with the external world, intimately related to our senses. This was central to Marcuse's elaboration of the liberating potentialities of imagination. In turn, in a later work—One-Dimensional Man—the features permeating imagination are observed from the historical moment and the social organization of advanced industrial society. There, contours of imagination are determined under the specific social form, which displays the limitations and destructive and violent possibilities of imagination. My investigation, then, intends to question the political character of imagination, its place in social criticism, and its potential, both liberating of critical potency and violent practices. For this purpose, I also draw on the literary criticism of Roberto Schwarz. His critical method conceives aesthetic form as revealing historical sedimentation: a kind of topographical study of the historical ground. Thus, a society like Brazil, with a social and economic heritage of slavery, and, at the same time, turned towards commercial practices, coined in liberal terms (i.e., an export economy, typical of peripherical societies, consonant with the values of bourgeois liberal society), can provide us valuable material for critical analyses regarding the crossroads of imagination. What is imagination's relation with the elite’s ideological reproduction? What specific forms does imagination assume within these contours? And how do the different social “characters” set it in motion? Is it still possible to think about imagination in liberating terms? These are some of the questions guiding the investigation.  

Bogdan Ovcharuk, a PhD candidate in Politics (Political Theory) at York University (YU), is the recipient of a Marcuse Society PhD Research Fellowship for 2023 and 2024. He is supervised by Professor Terry Maley (YU).

Prof. Maley writes:

Bogdan Ovrachuk’s very unique dissertation undertakes the reconstruction of Marcuse's aesthetic theory using the Hegelian categories of social essence (Wesen) and beautiful “shining-forth” (Scheinen). Ovrachuk’s thesis traces the development of Marcuse’s aesthetic theory from Marcuse’s own dissertation on the German artist-novel to his late work, The Aesthetic Dimension. The thesis project is set against the backdrop of Marcuse’s 1932 work, Hegel’s Ontology and the Theory of Historicity, where Marcuse moves beyond the neo-Kantianism of his earliest work to develop an "ontology of life." Ovrachuk argues that Marcuse’s later work on aesthetic theory has sometimes been seen in the literature, incorrectly, as both utopian and formalistic. Yet it is also grounded in the social ontology of life that Marcuse first discussed in relation to his original adaptation of Hegel’s aesthetic thought.

Working Title of Dissertation: 

• • Beyond the One-Dimensionality of Method: Exploring Hegel's Ontology of World Politics 

Bogdan explains his dissertation project:

Part of my thesis project endeavours to reconstruct the development of Marcuse's aesthetic theory, aiming to elucidate his substantial and integrated approach to social ontology and aesthetics. Through a discussion of the methodological presuppositions of Marcuse’s early approach to the "art-life" problem in his study of the German artist-novel, I will provide the background against which Marcuse’s aesthetics can be assessed. In this early work, Marcuse employed the neo-Kantian methodology to offer a sociology of the artist-novel art-form by revealing its preconditions in modern life. I will show that in Hegel’s Ontology Marcuse surpasses this neo-Kantian methodologism by articulating a substantial and developmental ontology of life. I will further demonstrate that Marcuse’s subsequent aesthetics writings exhibit the Hegelian ontological categories expounded in this work, with a particular focus on two: social essence (Wesen) and beautiful “shining-forth” (Scheinen). This reconstruction  offers an opportunity to reconsider Marcuse’s late writings in its aspect of "illusory aesthetics," which have been wrongly characterized as utopian, formalistic, and subjective in their scholarly reception. Instead, the present analysis suggests that Marcuse’s substantial aesthetics relies on dynamic and historical social ontology that defies both methodologism and naive utopianism. Marcuse is shown to be unique among the Frankfurt School thinkers in extending Hegel’s system to the realm of aesthetics.       

Maor Levitin, a PhD candidate in Politics (Political Theory) at York University (YU), is the recipient of a Marcuse Society PhD Research Fellowship for 2023 and 2024. He is supervised by Professor Terry Maley (YU).

Prof. Maley writes:

Maor Levitin’s dissertation engages in a highly original discussion of the relationship between left leadership and horizontalism in social movements. Levitin uses Erich Fromm’s idea of the productive character as a lens through which to see Marcuse as an exemplar of what Levitin calls "ethical leadership" on the radical left. Focusing on Marcuse’s New Left period and his engagement with the protest movements of the 1960s, Levitin argues that even though Marcuse rejected the label of "guru" of the New Left, he nonetheless played an important role as a mentor or elder to the student and other movements. In his (at times reluctant) role as mentor, Marcuse’s approach was characterized by a sense of mutual reciprocity in which he "decentered" his own celebrity while trying to critically analyze, and be attuned to, the immanent possibilities for radical social change that the movements sought to realize, and that Marcuse in his work after One-Dimensional Man sought to articulate. Building critically and self-reflexively on Weber’s idea of charisma, Levitin further argues that Marcuse exemplified an "ethical charisma" that is grounded in productive character structure. In a key intervention, Levitin distinguishes Marcuse’s left ethical charisma from the charisma of authoritarian leaders, as well as the "manufactured celebrity"/charisma of the culture industries.

Working Title of Dissertation: 

• • Towards a Theory of Left Leadership

Maor explains his dissertation project:

My research is at the intersection of Critical Theory and Critical Leadership Studies. I draw on the ideas of Herbert Marcuse and Erich Fromm in developing an original theory of horizontal and ethical leadership from a radical left vantage point. One of the central arguments informing my dissertation research is that Fromm’s characterological ideal of productiveness can serve as an index of a horizontal leadership style among those activists on the left who are committed to the radical transformation of society and are capable of producing a transformative vision that inspires others. I make the case that this index points to Marcuse as a prominent example of horizontal leadership. Marcuse was certainly a leader of the left, but was he productive and horizontal? The answer is a resounding “yes.” The productiveness underlying Marcuse’s leadership is borne out by the following considerations. For one thing, given Marcuse’s role as mentor as part of his New Left activities and the fact that his mentorship was inflected by a quality of radical egalitarianism—consider, for instance, his relationship with Angela Davis, which was characterized by mutuality and reciprocity—it can be plausibly maintained that Marcuse occupied a position of authority horizontally. Moreover, his leadership style involved his both decentering himself in the New Left movement, which partly explains why it is so easy to overlook the fact that Marcuse was a leader of the left, and being eminently responsive to its rhythms and needs. The horizontality of Marcuse’s approach to politics is further evidenced by his insistence on according equal weight to the various countercultural struggles associated with the New Left rather than privileging one of them to the exclusion of others. In addition to making the case that Marcuse was productive, and that his productiveness was channelled into a unique, horizontal leadership style, I suggest that given the charismatic appeal that he enjoyed among his followers, he may have exemplified what I term ethical charisma. The charisma of ethical charismatics is rooted in their productive character structure and presupposes an attitude of love, care, and responsibility. This type of charisma can be contrasted with both authoritarian charisma and the manufactured celebrity charisma of the culture industry. 

Cristina Parapar, a PhD candidate in Aesthetics at the Sorbonne University (Paris), is the recipient of a Marcuse Society PhD Research Fellowship for 2024. She is supervised by Professor Jean-Marc Lachaud.

Prof. Lachaud writes:

Cristina Parapar aims to reevaluate Theodor W. Adorno’s philosophy of music and reflects on

leichte Musik, Kulturindustrie and aesthetics of emancipation in order to think dialectically

about works of popular music. So far, she has tried to reconcile texts dedicated to "classical

music," such as monographs on Malher, Wagner or Berg and Philosophy of New Music, with

writings dedicated to popular music, such as Current of Music or Über Jazz. She relates these

writings to other authors, such as Herbert Marcuse or Agnès Gayraud. In short, Parapar's

philosophical work consists of analyzing how the sedimented spirit of an era, as that which is

socially preformed in consciousness, is reflected in the musical material of popular music.

Working Title of Dissertation: 

• • Musique authentique et subversion: contribution à une esthétique pour l’émancipation (Authentic Music and Subversion: Contribution to Aesthetics for Emancipation)

Cristina explains her dissertation project:

Inspired by the philosophical analyses of Theodor W. Adorno's work proposed by Professor

Jordi Maiso, I consider popular music as the musical phenomenon distributed by the cultural

industry that presents both the traces of violence of late capitalism and the secret messages of

a possible liberation. For this reason, my thesis examines how popular music contributes to

reveal the falsity of the “untrue whole” and how it presents the fissures of society for the sake

of the emancipation of thought.

To this end, my research focuses on destigmatizing Adornian aesthetics of music, updating it and

rescuing it in order to reflect on the emancipatory dimension of the popular music of our time.

Using the negative dialectic and Adorno's own music-philosophical categories of serious

music, I carry out an exercise of immanent critique that also requires pointing out the limits of

Adorno's philosophy of music. Here is the importance of Marcuse's radical aesthetics.

Marcuse, the author of One-Dimensional Man, extols the subversive and emancipatory character 

of the musical counterculture in discrete allusions in his texts, lectures, and interviews from the 

late 1960s until his passing. Thus, I argue that these subtle reflections not only commend the

resistance to the integration of blues, rock and roll, and folk into late capitalism system, but

also challenge Adornian aesthetics and provide a new horizon of liberation in and from

popular music. Ultimately, it could be said that this dialogue between the two philosophers

demonstrates that their critical thinking is a current and a necessary philosophical tool for

analyzing the subversive potential of popular music.

Christian Garland, a PhD candidate in International Political Economy at King's College (London), is the recipient of a Marcuse Society PhD Research Fellowship for 2024 and 2025.

Working Title of Dissertation:

• • Flexible Subjects: A Contemporary Critical Theory of ‘Flexibility’/’Precarity’

Christian explains his dissertation project:

The thesis and dissertation to be submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in 2024, have the working title "Flexible Subjects: A Contemporary Critical Theory of ‘Flexibility’/’Precarity’." My research aims to develop a Critical Theory of the concept of ‘flexibility’ and the social relations this ideological concept seeks to veil and erroneously explain and justify: precarity and contingency. 

Developed using Frankfurt School Critical Theory (Horkheimer, Adorno, Marcuse)—and it might be said, Marcuse’s especially—the thesis applies Immanent Critique and Ideology Critique (Ideologie Kritik) to critically analyse how the ideology of ‘flexibilty’/ ‘flexibilization’, has been used since its inception in the US and UK in the 1980s. This time, the last 40 years, and the last 35 for the emergence of the concept, can also be identified as the time of Neoliberalism.

The thesis uses as its case study one of the two countries of the ‘Anglo-American Model’, the UK, which gave rise to Neoliberalism and which continues internationally in the 2020s—at least, for now.

In formulating this Critical Theory of ‘flexibility’, the study seeks to be dialectical, and is resolutely ‘negative’, in keeping with Frankfurt School Critical Theory, again Marcuse in particular.

The dissertation investigates the reality of ‘flexibility’/precarity in the contemporary UK: in a society in which work is the primary means of social reproduction, ‘flexible subjects’ are made to accept their own condition of indefinite insecurity and servitude willingly as if it were their own making, and as if they had control over those same conditions when it is not and they do not, but must accept this at any cost.

This Doctoral research also critically explores the two concepts’ discursive substance with a substantial empirical chapter of semi-structured interviews with workers and union organisers in the ‘gig economy’. The differing forms ‘flexibility’/‘precarity’ can be said to take—both employed and underemployed—is also examined in some detail, such as bogus ‘self-employment’, zero-hours contracts, and the categorization of workers as ‘independent contractors’ in the UK in the twenty-first century.

Thais Gobo Miota, a PhD candidate in Philosophy at Universidade Estadual do Oeste do Paraná (UNIOESTE) in Brasil, is the recipient of a Marcuse Society PhD Research Fellowship for 2025. She is supervised by Professor Rosalvo Schütz (UNIOESTE) and co-supervised by Professor Robespierre de Oliveira (UEM).

Prof. de Oliveira writes:

Thais Gobo Miota é minha orientanda de pós-graduação desde 2018. Naquela época, ela desenvolveu o mestrado em Filosofia pela Universidade Estadual de Maringá (UEM) sobre a filosofia de Hegel, mas também estudando a teoria de Marcuse. O contato com a filosofia marcuseana ocorrera a partir da participação do Grupo de Estudos de Teoria Crítica da UEM (Teoria Crítica como teoria da mudança social: cultura, filosofia e psicanálisea), desenvolvido por mim desde 2004, e com o estudo de Razão e Revolução: Hegel e o Despertar da Teoria Social (1941). Em 2021, Thais inicia o doutorado em Filosofia pela Universidade Estadual do Oeste do Paraná (UNIOESTE), com a orientação do Prof. Dr. Rosalvo Schütz e coorientação minha, agora com uma

pesquisa em Marcuse. No doutorado, Thais desenvolve uma tese com foco no projeto de libertação marcuseano. Thais defende que Marcuse apresenta um projeto de filosofia prática cujo objetivo é emancipar os seres humanos da exploração capitalista, e que isso depende de uma mudança na maneira comoa humanidade se relaciona com a natureza: a externa, da qual faz parte, e a sua própria. Thais argumenta que o projeto de libertação de Marcuse atualiza a teoria emancipatória marxiana dos seguintes modos: ao apresentar o cuidado com a natureza como condição sine qua non para a emancipação humana e ao buscar subsídios “de fora” da ordem do capital para pensar esse cuidado. Destarte, Thais defende também que a procura de elementos emancipatórios e externos à lógica capitalista abre a teoria crítica de Marcuse para um diálogo com os saberes dos povos tradicionais brasileiros, contribuindo tanto para oquestionamento de problemas hodiernos e locais quanto para o avanço e adaptação das pesquisas em Marcuse à realidade de hoje.

Thais Gobo Miota has been my postgraduate advisee since 2018. At that time, she completed her Master's degree in Philosophy at the State University of Maringá (UEM) on Hegel's philosophy, while also studying Marcuse's theory. Her engagement with Marcusean philosophy began through her participation in the Critical Theory Study Group at UEM (Critical Theory as a Theory of Social Change: Culture, Philosophy and Psychoanalysis), which I have led since 2004, and through her study of Reason and Revolution: Hegel and the Rise of Social Theory  (1941). In 2021, Thais began her doctorate in Philosophy at the State University of

Western Paraná (UNIOESTE), under the supervision of Prof. Dr. Rosalvo Schütz and my co-supervision, now focusing her research on Marcuse. In her doctoral work, Thais is developing a thesis centered on Marcuse's liberation project. She argues that Marcuse presents a practical philosophy aimed at emancipating human beings from capitalist exploitation, which depends on a transformation in how humanity relates to nature—both external nature, of which it is a part, and its own inner nature. Thais contends that Marcuse's liberation project updates Marxian emancipatory theory in the following ways: by presenting care for nature as a sine qua non condition for human emancipation, and by seeking resources "from outside" the capitalist order to conceptualize this care. Thus, she also argues that the search for emancipatory elements external to capitalist logic opens Marcuse's critical theory to a dialogue with the knowledge of Brazilian traditional peoples, contributing both to the questioning of contemporary and local issues and to the advancement and adaptation of Marcusean research to today's reality.

Working Title of Dissertation:

• • Natureza e Revolução: o projeto de libertação de Herbert Marcuse [Nature and Revolution: Herbert Marcuse’s Project of Liberation]

Thais explains her dissertation project:

A pesquisa tem como tema a articulação entre a emancipação humana e da natureza no

projeto de libertação marcuseano. O problema investigado consiste em apresentar de

que maneira ocorre essa articulação na construção conceitual de Herbert Marcuse, que

inicia em “Novas fontes para a fundamentação do materialismo histórico” (1932) e

chega à maturidade em Contrarrevolução e revolta (1972). Em Marcuse, o cuidado com

a natureza e a recusa da dominação depredatória do meio ambiente é condição sine qua

non para a libertação da humanidade da exploração do capital. A hipótese é a de que

Marcuse faz uma atualização da teoria emancipatória marxiana, atentando para uma

questão fundamental em Marx que, todavia, não recebera a devida atenção na tradição

crítica: a submissão tanto da sociedade quanto da natureza aos domínios da lógica

capitalista. Nos Manuscritos econômico-filosóficos (1844), Marx apresenta as

consequências econômicas do trabalho alienado, mas sobretudo as ontológicas: o

indivíduo alienado, coisificado, é um indivíduo cuja própria essência é modificada.

Nessa modificação, perde sua identificação com a natureza externa e com a interna, i.e.,

a sua própria, pois os seres humanos, segundo Marx, são partes integrantes da natureza

e não dicotômicos em relação a ela. Este é o debate central recuperado por Marcuse e

que se mostra basilar em seu projeto de filosofia da praxis, um projeto direcionado à

libertação de todos os condenados da Terra. Para tanto, o objetivo é mostrar que

Marcuse busca reinserir a humanidade na natureza e que essa é uma questão essencial

para pensar tanto a libertação do trabalho alienado, da mais-valia, quanto estruturar

alternativas para evitar uma catástrofe ecológica cada dia mais iminente. O projeto de

libertação marcuseano consiste, portanto, nessa articulação entre as questões de classe e

as ecológicas, em que o cuidado com a natureza é visto como uma condição que

possibilitaria uma mudança na sensibilidade, na consciência dos seres humanos e,

consequentemente, na forma exploratória das relações entre a humanidade consigo

própria e com a natureza. Destarte, a argumentação aqui formulada toma como base

principal as obras que compõem o projeto teórico-prático de libertação marcuseano.

Como textos de apoio, utilizamos textos de autores que influenciaram essa elaboração,

bem como aqueles que dialogam com Marcuse e os que foram influenciados por ele.

Nesse âmbito, também visa demonstrar a atualidade da teoria de Marcuse em relação às

questões hodiernas e locais.

The research focuses on the articulation between human emancipation and nature in the

Marcusean project of liberation. The problem investigated presents how this articulation

occurs in Herbert Marcuse's conceptual framework, which begins in "New Sources for

the Foundation of Historical Materialism" (1932) and reaches maturity in

Counterrevolution and Revolt (1972). In Marcuse's view, care for nature and the refusal

of the predatory domination of the environment is a sine qua non condition for the

liberation of humanity from the exploitation of capital. The hypothesis is that Marcuse

updates the Marxian emancipatory theory, paying attention to a fundamental issue in

Marx that has not received due attention in the critical tradition: the subjugation of both

society and nature to the domains of capitalist logic. In the Economic and Philosophical

Manuscripts (1844), Marx presents the economic consequences of alienated labor, but

above all the ontological ones: the alienated, reified individuals are those whose very

essence is altered. In this modification, they lose their identification with external nature

and with their internal nature, i.e., their own, since human beings, according to Marx,

are integral parts of nature and not dichotomous in relation to it. This is the central

debate revived by Marcuse, which proves foundational in his project of philosophy of

praxis, a project aimed at the liberation of all the condemned of the Earth. Thus, the

objective is to show that Marcuse seeks to reintegrate humanity into nature, and that this

is an essential question for thinking about both the liberation from alienated labor and

surplus value, as well as structuring alternatives to prevent an increasingly imminent

ecological catastrophe. The Marcusean project of liberation consists, therefore, in the

articulation between class and ecological issues, where care for nature is seen as a

condition that would allow for a change in sensitivity, in the consciousness of human

beings, and consequently, in the exploitative nature of the relations between humanity

and nature, and within humanity itself. Therefore, the argument formulated here is

primarily based on the works that compose the theoretical-practical project of

Marcusean liberation. As supporting texts, we utilize works by authors who influenced

this elaboration, as well as those who engage with, and have been influenced by

Marcuse. In this context, it also aims to demonstrate the relevance of Marcuse's theory

in relation to contemporary and local issues.

Fernanda Andrade Garcia, a PhD candidate in Social Work at Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP)-Franca in Brasil, is the recipient of a Marcuse Society PhD Research Fellowship for 2025. She is supervised by Professor Gustavo Jose de Toledo Pedroso (UNESP).

Prof. Gustavo writes:

Fernanda Andrade Garcia’s research focuses on the possibilities of articulating critical thought with the utopian potentials objectively present in contemporary society, as well as on the emancipatory perspectives that emerge from this connection. This work unfolds issues she addressed in her previous studies, where she investigated the emancipatory nature of art and the revolutionary meaning of Marcusean reflection. Now, drawing on references to Herbert Marcuse in the works of Paulo Freire, she seeks to understand each thinker’s conceptions of utopia, examining how these are developed, their characteristics, and the possibilities they point toward. Since the 1990s, with the increasingly rapid advance of neoliberal policies, there has been a retreat in struggles for social change, accompanied by a worldwide decline of leftist movements. In recent years, this has been linked to the global rise of far-right parties and movements, creating a discouraging scenario. Against this backdrop, Fernanda Garcia’s research aims to find materials for a renewed and rigorous recovery of the idea of utopia, exploring pathways for political action and engaging in dialogue with the critical tendencies within Social Work, which is her academic and professional background.

Working Title of Dissertation:

• • Herbert Marcuse and Paulo Freire: Utopia, Reality, and Emancipation

Fernanda explains her dissertation project:

In my research, I seek to understand and relate the concepts of utopia developed by Herbert Marcuse and Paulo Freire. For Marcuse, utopia is deeply connected to radical criticism of reality and the real possibilities of liberation. For Freire, utopia seems to be related to a critical movement of announcing and denouncing social conditions. For both authors, utopia points to a horizon of possibilities, to that which is not yet, but may become. As a social worker, this discussion seems quite significant to me, because if we take the concept of utopia as a guiding thread to understand its relationship with the radical criticism inscribed in the thinking of Marcuse and Freire, we may find an understanding of utopia that can be updated in the fields of Social Sciences, Critical Theory, and Social Work. Furthermore, perhaps this understanding of utopia can help us distinguish emancipatory forces and tendencies from oppressive forces and tendencies, and also fuel the hopes of a possible dream.

Ana Carolina Meinerz, a PhD candidate in Philosophy at Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP) in Brasil, is the recipient of a Marcuse Society PhD Research Fellowship for 2025. She is supervised by Professor Inara Luisa Marin (UNICAMP).

Prof. Marin writes:

Carolina is a researcher in philosophy and also an artist. Her research reflects this dual identity and restlessness. Her PhD investigation analyzes, with originality, the relationship between the concept of active determinability, developed by Friedrich Schiller, and the new principle of reality formulated by Herbert Marcuse. The study investigates how active determinability contributes to the understanding and possible realization of this new principle, proposed by Marcuse in Eros and Civilization: A Philosophical Inquiry into Freud (1955), by conceiving a less repressive organization of the drive structure in dialogue with aesthetic experience. The research articulates the fields of philosophy, psychoanalysis, and critical theory, exploring the impacts of this integration on the redefinition of the relationship between subject and object, the overcoming of alienation, and the formulation of a non-reified conception of existence.

Working Title of Dissertation:

• • Active Determinability as a Condition for a New Reality Principle 

Carolina explains her dissertation project:

My research explores how Friedrich Schiller's concept of active determinability offers both an explanation and a pathway to realizing Herbert Marcuse's new reality principle. In Eros and Civilization: A Philosophical Inquiry into Freud (1955), Marcuse proposes reorganizing the drive structure toward a less repressive social order, envisioning a reality where sensuousness and reason act harmoniously. Active determinability applied to the drive structure functions as a transformative state capable of dissolving oppressive structures, redefining the relationship between subject and object, overcoming all forms of alienation. This synthesis fosters positive freedom, enabling individuals to actualize their potential while reconciling pleasure and rationality without subordinating one to the other. This perspective is based on the understanding that active determinability allows the de-sublimation of reason (giving way to a sensuous rationality) and the self-sublimation of sensuousness (giving way to non-repressive sublimation), leading to the annulment of constraints and coercions of the dimensions of human life. By promoting a sensuous rationality, the framework challenges the dominance of instrumental reason and opens possibilities for non-repressive forms of sublimation and existence. In this context, imagination becomes central, as perception shifts from passive reception to active cognition, enabling individuals to organize knowledge and experience creatively and freely.

Scott Peyton, a PhD candidate in Philosophy at Michigan State University in the USA, is the recipient of a Marcuse Society PhD Research Fellowship for 2025. He is supervised by Professor Todd Hedrick (Michigan State University).

Prof. Hedrick writes:

Scott’s research is at the forefront of new research that is taking a look at the possibilities and innovations of Herbert Marcuse’s work, and also what can be learned from its pitfalls and shortcomings. He is particularly focused on Marcuse’s Eros and Civilization: A Philosophical Inquiry into Freud (1955) at this time, which is fortunate, given renewed interest in the nexus between Frankfurt School critical theory and psychoanalysis. Eros and Civilization is one of the more creative entries in this genre, and Scott performs valuable scholarship in examining how Marcuse combines current (for him) Freudian ideas about instincts and drives with earlier sets of ideas coming from figures like Friedrich Schiller and Friedrich Nietzsche; Scott also assesses how Marcuse anticipates certain trends in post-Freudian psychoanalysis, and whether post-Freudian ideas might ease some of the tensions that appear in the course of Marcuse’s appropriation of Freud. It’s an honor to work with Scott, and I am excited to see how his thought progresses, in these areas and elsewhere! 

Working Title of Dissertation:

• • Active Determinability as a Condition for a New Reality Principle 

Scott explains his dissertation project:

Generally speaking, my research takes place at the intersection of Frankfurt School Critical Theory, German Philosophy in the Long Nineteenth Century, and Psychoanalytic Theory. I am particularly interested in Herbert Herbert Marcuse’s attempt in Eros and Civilization: A Philosophical Inquiry into Freud (1955), to escape the aporia of the Dialectic of Enlightenment by articulating the possibility of a non-repressive civilization. Central to that project is the reformulation of the concepts of freedom and reason in ways that connect them to instinctual liberation and sensuousness, and thereby uncouple them from repression, internal and external forms of domination, and ego strength. In my research, I seek to reevaluate these concepts, as well as Marcuse’s accounts of drive psychology and the aesthetic dimension which makes the reformation of these concepts possible, through reading Marcuse in light of his nineteenth century influences, such as Friedrich Schiller, G. W. F. Hegel, and Friedrich Nietzsche. Through this research, I hope to clarify Marcuse’s own vision of liberation, as well as to provide insight into the role of drive psychology, aesthetics, and utopian speculation in a critical social theory.

Jess Ellis, a PhD candidate in Philosophy at European Graduate School in Saas-Fee, SWITZERLAND, is the recipient of a Marcuse Society PhD Research Fellowship for 2025. She is supervised by Professor Zeynep Gambetti.

Prof. Gambetti writes:

Jess’s project aims to explore the societal underpinnings of narcissistic consciousness by staging an encounter between Anselm Jappe, Luce Irigaray, and Herbert Marcuse. Marcuse’s take on narcissism becomes the entry point to start reflecting on the constitutive effects of capitalist consumer culture on the psychic principle of reality. The subject’s relationship not only to objects but also to others is contaminated by what appears to be a form of “narcissistic culture” predominant in late capitalist societies. Narcissistic consciousness is alienated consciousness. This is an important re-conceptualization of narcissism through a Marxist critique of Marcuse’s Eros and Civilization: A Philosophical Inquiry into Freud (1955). But Ellis also seeks to relate narcissism to patriarchal constructs of predatory selfhood to provide a feminist corrective to both. To this end, the thesis aims to develop an alternative mode of relating by revalorizing Irigaray’s concept of empathy.

Working Title of Dissertation:

• • A Feminist Psychoanalytic Analysis of Marcuse on Narcissism 

Jess explains his dissertation project:

This doctoral dissertation confronts the growing inconsistent and selfish moral character among individuals affected by the acceleration of consumer culture. Some critical theorists point to the degrading impact alienation has upon an individual’s ability to psychologically flourish. The project compares Herbert Marcuse’s exposition of narcissism as its own reality in Eros and Civilization: A Philosophical Inquiry into Freud (1955) to Anselm Jappe’s thesis in The Self-Devouring Society: Capitalism, Narcissism, and Self-Destruction (2023). The latter text ambitiously espouses that internalization of the current principles of capitalism such as alienation foments a specific kind of character suggestive of a narcissistic profile. To these two accounts, I add a feminist lens courtesy of Luce Irigaray. Such an addition is necessary to further disclose the deeper connections between narcissism and predatory thinking held by those in positions of political power within the North American patriarchy and oligarchy. Emancipatory and decolonial thinking cannot begin with contradictory narcissistic psychological traits, but rather the “thinking senses” (Karl Marx, 1844 Manuscripts) they stifle such as empathy and love. As the thinking and physical senses became mutated and oriented toward capitalist interests over time, human animals aware of collective interests became human individuals pushed to break from this way of being to survive. I maintain that this break from collective reality or what would be thinking with others in mind is actually what Marcuse means when he refers to the narcissist as living in their own delusional reality. In my Master's thesis (Western University), I detail how alienation is an exercise in thinking predominantly oriented with reference to merely the self, away from thinking of one's self within a greater group that also includes nature. According to Irigaray, this is a masculine telos, which envelops others in thought rather than thinking alongside. The dissertation, therefore, carries this gendered discussion of alienation further within the context of narcissism specifically. Such a phylogenetic transmutation in thought underpins and perhaps explains the marked subconscious insecurity displayed in individuals oriented toward (validation from) others who at the same time reject the validity of meaningful collectivities.