THE 20th INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE of the FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE SOCIETY
“Nietzsche, Love and War”
University of Birmingham, UK
September 11-13, 2014
Supported by the Institute for German Studies and the Centre for War Studies
Plenary Speakers:
Christa Acampora (CUNY)
Herman Siemens (Leiden)
Duncan Large (Swansea)
Nicholas Martin (Birmingham)
Wilfried van der Will (Birmingham)
Call for Abstracts — “Nietzsche, Love and War”
“My brothers in war! I love you thoroughly, I am and have always been of your kind.
And I am also your best enemy.”
“What is done out of love always takes place beyond good and evil.”
Prompted in part by the centenary of the outbreak of World War One, during which Nietzsche was variously lionized and decried as a philosopher of war and aggressive nationalism, the 2014 Friedrich Nietzsche Society Conference seeks to re-examine Nietzsche’s attitudes to war and conflict, and the place of these tropes within his philosophical and critical outlook. Simultaneously, the Conference invites contributions that examine what appears to be the obverse of war and conflict in Nietzsche’s writings, namely, the hitherto often overlooked place and significance of love in his weltanschauung.
Nietzsche’s penchant for the language and imagery of war and struggle is undeniable, but we may wish to consider the extent to which this attachment to the language of war is incidental rhetoric and/or hyperbole, and to what extent it is inseparable from Nietzsche’s philosophical concerns and polemical methods.
Some of the many other questions that the Conference will seek to tackle include: the philosophical and cultural origins – and legacies – of Nietzsche’s combative, antithetical modes of thinking; the nature and justification of appropriations of Nietzsche’s reflections on conflict and struggle by advocates of actual war and violence in the twentieth century; the space occupied by, and the status of, Nietzsche’s extensive thoughts on gender, love and friendship within the discursive fields of conflict, contest and contention that appear to pervade his writing; and the nature of interpretative struggles over Nietzsche’s philosophical legacies.
The Friedrich Nietzsche Society welcomes proposals for 30-minute papers on all topics bearing on the conference themes, including the following:
• War as metaphor in Nietzsche’s thought
• Nietzsche’s use of martial imagery
• Nietzsche and the art of war
• The relation between culture and war in Nietzsche’s thought
• Nietzsche and the notion of struggle
• Belligerence as a philosophical mode in Nietzsche’s thought
• The relation between love and war in Nietzsche’s thought
• The roots of Nietzsche’s thinking on conflict and/or love
• Nietzsche and ancient (Greek) ideas of love and/or war
• Nietzsche’s own experiences of war and/or love
• Philosophical legacies of Nietzsche’s thoughts on war and/or love
• Nietzsche’s notion of agon
• Nietzsche on friendship
• Nietzsche on enemies
• Nietzsche and sexual love
• Love and misogyny in Nietzsche
• Nietzsche and homosexuality (the queering of Nietzsche)
• Contesting Nietzsche’s legacies
• Nietzsche and twentieth-century philosophies of violence
• Nietzsche and world war
• Appropriations of Nietzsche in twentieth-century war propaganda
• Artistic legacies of Nietzsche’s thoughts on war and/or love
This list is by no means exhaustive. Papers on other key themes relating to Nietzsche’s ideas on love and war are also welcome.
Your abstract should be no longer than 400 words.
Please submit your abstract by email to friedrich.nietzsche.society@gmail.com as a pdf attachment prepared for blind review, by March 31, 2014.
In the body of the email, please state:
• the title of the paper
• your name and institutional affiliation
• your preferred email contact address
In the subject line of the email, please state only the following:
FNS2014ABSTRACT_YOURLASTNAME.