The Body Ontology of Capitalism

Critical social theory powerfully negates symbolic structures of political economy and imaginary projections of ideological culture but never quite knows what to do with corporeal bodies. “The Body Ontology of Capitalism” reviews Marx’s account of body ontology in his post-1859 writings (especially Capital, Vol. 1), in which value (abstract labor) is extracted from the concrete bodies of laborers caught in capital’s grasp. Body ontology is analyzed in Marx’s work as well as Lacan’s psychoanalytic social theory, exploring the relationship between structurally wounded bodies and imaginary projections. Zižek’s embodied account of wounded subjects of sublime ideological objects is also used to interpret the body fantasies of late capitalism (undead, cyborg, armored subjects). Following Marx and psychoanalytic theorists, Krier and Amidon conclude that body ontology is necessary to adequately comprehend and critique symbolic and imaginary productions of capital

Easing the Encumbered Subject: Security, Speculation, and Capitalist Subjectivity

Capitalisms’ Future: Alienation, Emancipation and Critique frames 21st century economic and social possibilities in a dialogue between two forms of critical social theory: Marx’s critique of political economy that analyzes capitalism and the critique of political psychology that analyzes authoritarianism. Contributions from social theorists in sociology, philosophy, and cultural studies are brought together to dissect and critique capitalist crises, left-liberalism, left-Thatcherism, resistance to risk-pooling, idealist philosophy, undemocratic social character, status wages and authoritarian spectacles. Throughout, Marx’s centrality to critical social theory is confirmed, both alone and in in powerful combination with Adorno, Durkheim, Dubois, Lacan, Veblen, Weber and others. This book outlines conjoined critiques of commodity-fetishism and authority fetishism as the emancipatory agenda of 21st century critical theory

Electronic structure and magnetism of equiatomic FeN

In order to investigate the phase stability of equiatomic FeN compounds and the structure-dependent magnetic properties, the electronic structure and total energy of FeN with NaCl, ZnS and CsCl structures and various magnetic configurations are calculated using the first-principles TB-LMTO-ASA method. Among all the FeN phases considered, the antiferromagnetic NaCl structure with q=(00pi) is found to have the lowest energy at the theoretical equilibrium volume. However, the FM NaCl phase lies only 1mRyd higher. The estimated equilibrium lattice constant for nonmagnetic ZnS-type FeN agrees quite well with the experimental value, but for the AFM NaCl phase the estimated value is 6.7% smaller than that observed experimentally. For ZnS-type FeN, metastable magnetic states are found for volumes larger than the equilibrium value. On the basis of an analysis of the atom- and orbital-projected density of states and orbital-projected Crystal Orbital Hamilton Population, the iron-nitrogen interactions in NM ZnS, AFM NaCl and FM CsCl structures are discussed. The leading Fe-N interactions is due to the d-p iron-nitrogen hybridization, while considerable s-p and p-p hybridizations are also observed in all three phases. The iron magnetic moment in FeN is found to be highly sensitive to the nearest-neighboring Fe-N distance. In particular, the magnetic moment shows an abrupt drop from a value of about 2 muB to zero with the reduction of the Fe-N distance for the ZnS and CsCl structures.Comment: 12 pages, 6 figure

Critical Theory and the Limits of Academic Economics: Resolving the Political in Piketty’s Capital in the Twenty-First Century

This essay assesses the central arguments of Piketty?s Capital in the Twenty-First Century. We note Piketty?s limited engagement with and active distancing from the writings of Marx. Piketty?s location within the disciplinary boundaries of academic economics seems to have profoundly shaped his surprisingly apolitical analysis. Engagement with the political dimensions of capital is further constrained to increase the book?s influence upon policy. We analyze important limitations to Piketty?s work that result from these disciplinary constraints. Important politically implicated concepts, problems, and approaches that relate to Piketty?s substantial empirical work are: labor process studies, research on speculative capitalism, and literature highlighting institutional and political determinants among varieties of capitalism

On Rereading Klaus Theweleit\u27s Male Fantasies

Klaus Theweleit\u27s Male Fantasies has generated broad interest in the literature of several academic disciplines. His analysis of the symbolic and gender dynamics of the leaders of the German Freikorps (German paramilitary mercenary units of the period 1918-1923) has been widely generalized into a theory of modern masculinity. Two issues inadequately explored in Theweleit\u27s work nonetheless must be read through more recent empirical and theoretical work in history and sociology: (1) the formative role of colonial military experience in the careers of the German Freikorps officers who provide the material for his analysis and (2) the complex historical problem of the facticity of rape in Freikorps activity

Room temperature midinfrared electroluminescence from GaInAsSbP light emitting diodes. .

Room temperature electroluminescence in the midinfrared near 4 µm is reported from GaInAsSbP light emitting diodes grown on GaSb by liquid phase epitaxy. Comparison of the electro- and photoluminescence revealed that light is generated on the p side of the diode. The energy shift (24 meV) is consistent with band gap narrowing and recombination via band tail states due to the Zn doping (1×1018 cm−3) in the p layer of the structure. The temperature dependent behavior of the luminescence and the improved emission intensity was attributed to recombination from localized states arising from electrostatic potential fluctuations due to compositional inhomogeneities in these alloys