Professor Nikolas Kompridis

Biography

Nikolas Kompridis is Professorial Fellow in the School of Humanities & Communication Arts, specialising in Philosophy and Political Theory.

"I am a philosopher and political theorist engaged in rethinking some essential concepts of political philosophy – primarily, the concepts of reason, freedom, and critique – in light of two new concepts I’ve been developing, namely, receptivity and world-disclosure. My goal is to shed some light on how a certain kind of change is possible – the kind through which citizens are able to express their own political agency as they respond to the political demands of others.

I’m interested in how people come to change how they think and act, and how such change, in turn, can strengthen practices and institutions of democracy."

Areas of Research / Teaching Expertise

Critical theory; democratic theory; theories of agency and action; theories of rationality; theories of identity, recognition, and culture; secularism and modernity; the role of social criticism in social change; the renewal of romanticism; and issues in philosophy of art, literature, music and film. Kant, Hegel, Heidegger, Adorno, Arendt, Habermas, Foucault, Taylor, Cavell.

• political philosophy
• romanticism
• critical theory
• democracy
• secularism
• pluralism
• modernity

Noteworthy Publications

Kompridis, N. (2012). The Aesthetic Turn in Political Thought. London; New York: Continuum.

Kompridis, N. (2006). Critique and disclosure : critical theory between past and future. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.

Kompridis, N. (2006). Philosophical romanticism. New York: Routledge.

Videos

Selected Publications

Chapters in Books

“Romanticism”, Richard Eldridge (ed.), Oxford Handbook of Philosophy and Literature (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), pp. 247-270.

“The Idea of a New Beginning: A Romantic Source of Normativity and Freedom,” Nikolas Kompridis (ed.), Philosophical Romanticism (London: Routledge, 2006), pp. 32 - 59.

“Re-inheriting Philosophical Romanticism,” Nikolas Kompridis (ed.), Philosophical Romanticism (London: Routledge, 2006), pp. 1 - 19.

“The Priority of Receptivity to Creativity: Rethinking the Relation between Aesthetics and Politics,” Nikolas Kompridis (ed.), The Aesthetic Turn in Political Thought (New York: Continuum, 2012).

“Struggling over the Meaning of Recognition: A Matter of Identity, Justice, or Freedom?” Nancy Fraser and Kevin Olson (eds.), Adding Insult to Injury: Social Justice and the Politics of Recognition (London: Verso, 2007). Reprint of article published in European Journal of Political Theory, 6 (3), 2007, pp. 277-289, part of a critical exchange with Nancy Fraser, edited by Nikolas Kompridis

“From Reason to Self-Realization? On the ‘Ethical Turn’ in Critical Theory” John Rundell (ed), Contemporary Perspectives in Critical and Social Philosophy (Leiden: Brill, 2005), pp. 323 – 360.

“Heidegger’s Challenge and the Future of Critical Theory,” Peter Dews (ed.), Habermas: A Critical Reader (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1999), pp. 118 – 152.

Journal Articles

“Receptivity, Possibility, and Democratic Politics,” Ethics and Global Politics, Vol. 4, No. 4, 2011, pp. 255 – 272.
(This article appeared in a special issue of the journal on "A Politics of Receptivity", edited by Nikolas Kompridis).

“On Critique and Disclosure: A Reply to Four Generous Critics,” Philosophy and Social Criticism, 37(9), pp.1063–1077, 2011.
(This article is part of a Book Symposium on my Critique and Disclosure: Critical Theory between Past and Future, involving Amy Allen (Dartmouth), Fred Rush (Notre Dame), Morton Schoolman (SUNY-Albany), and Robert Sinnerbrink (Macquarie)).

“Technology’s Challenge to Democracy: What of the Human?” Parrhesia, Issue 8, 2009.

“The Unsettled and Unsettling Claims of Culture: Reply to Seyla Benhabib,” Political Theory, Volume 34, Number 3, 2006, pp. 389 – 396.
(Part of a “Critical Exchange” with Seyla Benhabib, initiated by her response to “Normativizing Hybridity/Neutralizing Culture” [see below)], this paper appears with Benhabib”s response, “The Claims of Culture Properly Interpreted: Response to Nikolas Kompridis”, in the same issue of Political Theory, pp. 383-388.)

“Normativizing Hybridity/Neutralizing Culture”, Political Theory, Volume 33, Issue 3, June 2005, pp. 318-343.

“Disclosing Possibility: The Past and Future of Critical Theory,” International Journal of Philosophical Studies, Volume 13, Number 3, 2005, pp. 325 – 351.

“Amidst the Plurality of Voices: Philosophy of Music after Adorno” Angelaki: A Journal of the Theoretical Humanities, Volume 8, Number 3, 2003 pp. 167 – 180 (9100 words).