Slavoj Zizek

arguing

love

ideology

existentialism

life

nihilism

pessimism

Friedrich Nietzsche

Jean-Paul Sartre

Arthur Schopenhauer

is an extreme example of posturing – using fancy terms like polysyllables and pretending to have a theory when he has no theory whatsoever.

What you’re referring to is what’s called “theory.” And when I said I’m not interested in theory, what I meant is, I’m not interested in posturing–using fancy terms like polysyllables and pretending you have a theory when you have no theory whatsoever. So there’s no theory in any of this stuff, not in the sense of theory that anyone is familiar with in the sciences or any other serious field. Try to find in all of the work you mentioned some principles from which you can deduce conclusions, empirically testable propositions where it all goes beyond the level of something you can explain in five minutes to a twelve-year-old. See if you can find that when the fancy words are decoded. I can’t. So I’m not interested in that kind of posturing. zizek is an extreme example of it. I don’t see anything to what he’s saying.

is more capable than most at illustrating the contradictions of contemporary capitalism.

Few thinkers illustrate the contradictions of contemporary capitalism better than the Slovenian philosopher and cultural theorist Slavoj zizek.

is rightly described as a performer. He has this element of provocation that is very characteristic and does help to interest people, but I'm not certain that people who are reading Zizek are actually drawn very much nearer rethinking the problems of the left.

I suppose Zizek is rightly described as a performer. He has this element of provocation that is very characteristic and does help to interest people, but I'm not certain that people who are reading Zizek are actually drawn very much nearer rethinking the problems of the left.

has advanced the field of emotional geographies, as well as our understandings of emotion, space, and society.

...the works of Slavoj zizek can advance the field of emotional geographies, as well as our understandings of emotion, space, and society.

provides a rich social theoretical vocabulary that can help explain cultural discontent, how emotional worlds bond and fall apart, why there is no guaranteed harmony in love with our partner, and how emotional worlds are organized in ways so that people can hold onto something that resembles ‘subjectivity’ and ‘reality’.

zizek provides a rich social theoretical vocabulary that can help explain cultural discontent, how emotional worlds bond and fall apart, why there is no guaranteed harmony in love with our partner, and how emotional worlds are organized in ways so that people can hold onto something that resembles ‘subjectivity’ and ‘reality’.

is a dangerous thinker who, the louder he applauds violence and terror—especially the terror of Lenin, Stalin, and Mao, the more indulgently he is received by the academic left.

The curious thing about the zizek phenomenon is that the louder he applauds violence and terror—especially the terror of Lenin, Stalin, and Mao, whose "lost causes" zizek takes up in another new book, In Defense of Lost Causes—the more indulgently he is received by the academic left, which has elevated him into a celebrity and the center of a cult.

[I]t needs to be recognized that instead of being an “interdisciplinary philosopher” or “playfully Hegelian,” zizek elevates the most un-Hegelian idea of all, arbitrariness, to be his guiding method. Throughout a long book [i.e., Did Somebody Say Totalitarianism?] he brings up dozens of topics without providing any coherent explanation of why he chooses to discuss one topic rather than another. Thus, even someone sympathetic to a specific opinion can never be entirely sure whether zizek will stand by his own case, or will simply drop it as he flits to another topic. In addition, though he quotes and makes allusions and references to a wide variety of well-known authors and canonical works, he does not provide reasons for his views of the cited texts. Rather, he makes highly tendentious assertions and expects his readers to submit to what are supposed to be apodictic statements. Should they be skeptical, they can be told that zizek is above “standard” treatments and that he is following a dialectic.

is not an interdisciplinary philosopher or playfully Hegelian, rather he elevates the most un-Hegelian idea of all, arbitrariness, to be his guiding method.

Slavoj Zizek, n.Memes

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