130.

3 ] PMLA
theories and
methodologies:
commentaries on
Andrew Cole's
The Birth of
Theory

Das Bekannte überhaupt ist darum, weil es bekannt ist, nicht erkannt. The Function of
—Martin Luther King, Jr.1
Theory at the
LET ME START BY DEFINING “THEORY,” BECAUSE THE DEFINITION ITSELF
Present Time
ILLUSTRATES WHY WE CAN NAME HEGEL AS ITS INVENTOR, RATHER
andrew cole
than Marx or Nietzsche, both of whom pick up where Hegel let of.
As I suggest in he Birth of heory, Hegel founds theory in his break
from Kant, which I regard as the signal moment when philosophy
transforms into theory as we now know it. What makes Hegel difer-
ent from Kant, in other words, is what makes his habits of thought—
his dialectic, above all—lasting and familiar and such a part of what
goes into critical theorizing today, even within schools of thought that
celebrate their anti-Hegelianism or are indiferent to Hegel. In Hegel
we ind the following three features that I am content to call “theory.”
First, theory is distinct from philosophy, because it challenges
the grounds on which you can presume to describe the world, as the
irst section of Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit makes clear in its
portrayal of a subject (or “consciousness”) who is in tatters ater fail-
ing to account coherently for objects in the world. Hegel is bold here.
He starts the Phenomenology of Spirit by undoing philosophy as
practiced in his day. He gives you no transcendental ego, no handy
schematic for possible experience, no subject who cognizes the world
efortlessly but has awkward moral problems, no geometrical proofs,
and no dislike of contradiction. And with no transcendental ego on ANDREW COLE is professor of English and
the scene, Hegel leaves room for something far more compelling: director of the Gauss Seminars in Criti-
the Other, in all of its epistemological and ethical signiicance. (he cism at Princeton University. Recipient
Other is also Hegel’s invention.) of a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2014, he
is author of The Birth of Theory (U of Chi-
It’s for these reasons that I think theory is best deined, in the
cago P, 2014) and Literature and Heresy in
irst instance, as philosophy against itself. heory, like philosophy,
the Age of Chaucer (Cambridge UP, 2008).
requires rigor of thought, but it tries not to confuse consistency for His essays appear in Artforum, ELH, Octo-
systematicity. It’s not for everyone, as Hegel’s long reception history ber, Problemi, the Minnesota Review, and
has made clear. But what’s challenging about Hegel is what’s diicult Speculum, and his next book is called
about getting a grip on thinking itself (even today, philosophers of The Elements of Theory.

© 2015 andrew cole

PMLA 130.3 (2015), published by the Modern Language Association of America 809
 810 The Function of Theory at the Present Time [ PM L A
theories and methodologies

mind ind it nearly impossible to deine “con- 156–61). In other words, in Kant, concepts
sciousness”). In this respect you could say that huddle together while supping at the table
the shit from Kant to Hegel is the shit from of categories, always minding their manners
experience to thought—thinking no longer and doing what they’re tasked to do: process
being spontaneous experience but active re- the manifold. But in Hegel concepts leave the
lection, a perspective on experience. In Kant, table and in so doing depart from ixity, from
in other words, we do the work of reading a order, from transcendence. It’s as if all con-
difficult philosophy about what constitutes cepts in Hegel are regulative concepts, which
experience. But in Hegel we read experience for Kant (in his third Critique) are indeed the
itself and face the diiculties of thinking with stuf of language, poetry, art, imagination, al-
the kind of conidence you might expect from lusion, analogy, and other forms of thought
philosophy. Granted, Kant makes room for by which we labor to make sense of what’s ini-
an alternative: not cognition but “thinking,” tially other to us. In this sense, theory is con-
which involves not constitutive concepts— cerned with the materiality of thought, the
those sorting mechanisms hidden deep within materialization of thinking—which brings us
our noumenal selves that render the manifold to yet another feature of theory.
legible to our understanding—but rather The third aspect that can be said to
regulative concepts, which we consciously define theory is that theory historicizes
contrive to help us divine ideas about what we thought, studying its materialization across
can’t experience directly, the supersensibilia disparate forms of human expression—
(see Critique of Judgement). Hegel, however, music, literature, art, architecture, religion,
collapses this distinction between constitu- philosophy—either in a diachronic or syn-
tive and regulative concepts and dispenses chronic analysis—or, aspirationally, both at
with the supersensibilia or noumena that ne- once. It’s enough for a scholar to focus on
cessitates such conceptual distinctions in the one of these disciplines or only one mode of
irst place. And without constitutive concepts, historical analysis, but Hegel’s ambition was
there’s no Kant: the whole core of his “Coper- to think these all at once or pursue a project
nican” irst Critique drops out. he result is of writing that would take him from form
radical. It not only nulliies critical philosophy to form, time to time, place to place. This
but also leads to another important aspect of is the hardest kind of critical writing to do,
theory as it emerges in Hegel’s work. and Hegel didn’t always succeed, at times of-
he second feature of theory holds that fering what we can all agree are culturally
we are linguistic beings and that experience blinkered positions. But the method is there,
is so structured like a language that it quali- as is the hope for it, once more scotching
ies as a language. Kant would never say this. Kant’s conceptual scheme. Here, again, Hegel
At most, he speaks of the empty but tempo- works over Kant’s constitutive concepts. To
ral unfolding of the “inner sense” (Critique be sure, if Hegel was going to deal in fixed
of Pure Reason 255 [b291]) or the succes- concepts, he would, in true dialectical fash-
sion of perception following on the order of ion, put them in the wrong place—not in the
events. But Hegel says that “it is in language self but in history, whereby the concept of a
that we are conceptually productive” (qtd. in period or some other totalizing conception of
Birth ii), which means that we not only think a historical moment (like an episteme) is al-
in language but also conceptualize in lan- ways in tension with the individual examples
guage. For Hegel, concepts are not just logi- emerging from within its frame, examples
cal operators but igures—igures that then that have a share in conceptualizing a period
double back and do conceptual work (Birth precisely because they conceptualize by other
130.3 ] Andrew Cole 811

theories and methodologies

means: through figuration. Examples—be name “theory” in its most general and par-
they poems, paintings, sculptures—are never ticular sense—theory as a certain relation to
adequate to their moment. Rather, they are philosophy, theory as a point of view on con-
behind or ahead. They contradict their age cepts and on the process of theorizing, and
and one another. Or to turn this formulation theory as relection on history. All of this be-
around: every present moment is a tangle of gins quite clearly in Hegel, and I am unapol-
emergent and residual forms. ogetic for saying so in the light of lingering
hose are the three main points in what I worries about “origins” (Birth 22–23).
argue is Hegel’s invention of theory in oppo- But if dialectics is theory, then where did
sition to Kant’s philosophy, and I support my Hegel get his dialectics? Here we enter into a
case by ofering multiple histories of dialecti- history of thinking from Plato to the present
cal thinking from Plato, Plotinus, and Aristo- that strangely hasn’t been undertaken in the
tle to Hegel (more on this below); from Hegel disciplines of theory. he reason for this la-
to Marx (whose theory of commodity fetish- cuna is not the range of that history but rather
ism restages Hegelian eucharistic fetishism); the prevailing assumptions about the nonva-
from Hegel to Nietzsche (whose dialectical lidity of premodern, or speciically medieval,
tendencies for once deserve acknowledg- thought today. Theorists can’t underesti-
ment); from Hegel to the nineteenth-century mate the Middle Ages any longer. As I argue
English and American critics experimenting in chapters 1 and 2, Hegel didn’t invent his
with Hegelianism contra Victorian formal- dialectic. Rather, he took it from the Middle
ism (T. H. Green, Bernard Bosanquet, Wil- Ages. In (again) seeking to depart from Kant’s
liam Courthope, Leslie Stephen, Vida Dutton critical philosophy, Hegel deliberately adopts
Scudder); from Hegel to Bakhtin (whose the distinctly medieval dialectic of identity/
Hegelianism is always a question); from diference as the signal instance of dialecti-
Hegel to Jameson (always honest about his cal thinking itself. But what makes identity/
Hegelianism); and from Hegel to Deleuze, in diference a medieval dialectic? he answer
whose work you’d expect to ind Hegel as an comes in the realization that while these two
epithet, but who instead supplies perhaps the logical categories, identity and diference, are
best example of a patently Hegelian “concep- familiar to theorists today (thanks to Hegel),
tual iguration,” whereby igures do the work so familiar as to seem to have no history, they
of concepts and vice versa. When the gap weren’t properly dialectical in the philosophy
between Hegel and Deleuze closes, a space of Plato or Aristotle. hey had a beginning,
for utopian thinking opens up, in which dia- rather, in postclassical philosophy, in Plotinus
lectics is energized by phenomenologies past in particular, who radically modiied the an-
and present. cient discipline of dialectic by prioritizing the
It’s ine, of course, even de rigueur, to call thinking of diferences in identity and identi-
yourself a theorist but not a Hegelian. But ties in diference. By setting the categories of
if any of the three points listed above seem identity and diference at the center of dialec-
important for the task of theorizing, even if tic, Plotinus fashioned a powerful dialectical
you use diferent emphases and terms, then mode of contemplation that was inluential
you have Hegel to thank. hat is fundamen- throughout the Middle Ages, with Nicholas of
tally my argument about theory, no more and Cusa representing perhaps the last and best-
no less. If none of your theoretical program known example. Hegel, I show, drew from
is included here, it doesn’t mean it’s not im- this medieval tradition of dialectical thinking
portant. My aim, at any rate, in he Birth of by following the form, placing identity and
heory is to explain why dialectics merits the diference at the center of his own dialectic.
 812 The Function of Theory at the Present Time [ PM L A
theories and methodologies

In so doing, he rejected the classical, or an- and igure to propose a thought only history
tique, legacy of dialectic, as well as the early itself can complete, cautions us that “[t]he
modern aspersions against medieval dialectic. outworn terms thesis, antithesis, and synthesis
will need to be abandoned.” For Blanton, this
ot-cited triadic formula comes nowhere close
Thesis, Antithesis, Synthesis: Kant or Hegel?
to explaining Hegel’s mode of (analogical) re-
he Birth of heory seeks to revive and resitu- lection. Likewise, for Fredric Jameson, this
ate the Hegelian dialectic as the founding of triadic structure is just plain “stupid” (57).
theory. My intentions were never to say that Others have discussed this formula (Mueller;
this founding isn’t contentious (see my com- Kaufmann 167–70). It needs to be emphasized
ments on Hegel versus Kant, above, or the that the main problem with this triadic con-
efort to expunge Hegel from theory, which struction is that it is Kant’s, not Hegel’s. We
I discuss in the book). In his compelling es- need to be clear about this issue if we are to
say here, Warren Montag rightly addresses understand, again, Hegel’s departure from
the inherent polemic in claims about the in- Kant into theory.
vention of theory. In particular, he points to The Kantianism of the formula (thesis,
those moments when Hegel seems to down- antithesis, synthesis) is easily discovered by
play the signiicance of his predecessors, be reading Kant’s three critiques. In the Critique
they scholastic philosophers practicing “for- of Pure Reason, Kant discusses the “antinomy
mal dialectic” or Spinoza, right where Hegel of pure reason” and sets out to analyze two
resembles them most. But a crucial reminder radically opposed “transcendental ideas.” For
is needed here: Hegel is impatient with any example, there is the “thesis” that “the world
scholasticism (medieval or Spinozist) that has a beginning in time, and is also limited
is not dialectical, that is not practicing the as regards space,” and there is the “antith-
dialectic of identity/difference. The irony’s esis” that “the world has no beginning, and
hard to miss: what especially bothers Hegel no limits in space” (396 [a426/b454]). He
is that there’s a discipline called dialectic that meticulously details three other theses and
can sometimes be rigidly undialectical. But antitheses in a similar fashion, and modern
he knows just as well that there were difer- editions print the thesis and the antithesis in
ent kinds of dialectic in the medieval period parallel columns. Each time Kant shows the
from which to choose, and his intention is to opposition to be a false one, from the point
recuperate dialectical thinking first exam- of view of a new ground or synthesis that (al-
pled by Plotinus and iterated time and again ready) understands that there’s a distinction
across the Middle Ages. It’s true that nowhere between noumena and phenomena, intuition
in his lectures on the history of philosophy and sense—for example, “All beginning is
will Hegel say that so-and-so beat me to the in time and all limits of the extended are in
punch and is the better dialectician. How space. But space and time belong only to the
could he? But then again Hegel isn’t exactly world of sense. Accordingly, while appear-
insulting Plotinus by calling his thinking a ances in the world are conditionally limited,
“higher idealism” (Cole, Birth 9, 34–35). In the world itself is neither conditionally nor
any event, my history of medieval dialectical unconditionally limited” (458 [a522/b550]).
philosophy is as selective as Hegel’s. Of course, we learned this many chapters
It’s worth pursuing, however, another earlier in the Critique of Pure Reason. Insofar,
irony—the way Hegel is reduced and formal- then, as the “thesis” and the “antithesis” get
ized today. C. D. Blanton, in his powerful es- something partially right—beginnings are in
say on the way analogy exceeds both concept time, limits are in space, and so on—you can
130.3 ] Andrew Cole 813

say that Kant works over both the thesis and lated discussions, see 66–67, 115–16, 124).

theories and methodologies

the antithesis toward his own result, his own And I detect a smidgen of this thinking in
synthesis consistent with his critical philoso­ Schelling, who works out a challenging re­
phy (see Birth 58–59, 191n211). sponse to Kant, but with some occasional re­
Hegel, in the Science of Logic and the En- cidivist Kantianism.3
cyclopedia of Philosophical Sciences, exposes But we can stop here and let Hegel have a
Kant for doing exactly that, rigging the op­ say. For in his lectures on the history of phi­
positions so that they conform in advance to losophy, he associates this triadic form with
the critical philosophy (Birth 60). Hegel does Kant, at least giving him credit for coming
have a point. Indeed, it’s funny how in Kant’s close to dialectics:
philosophy two cosmological falsehoods, one
a “thesis,” the other its “antithesis,” add up to Kant has therefore set forth as a universal
a certain truth called the transcendental aes­ scheme the rhythm of knowledge, of scien­
thetic. But that’s how Kant wants it, as he puts tiic movement; and has exhibited on all sides
thesis, antithesis and synthesis, modes of the
it plainly in the Critique of Practical Reason:
mind by means of which it is mind, as thus
consciously distinguishing itself. . . . he de­
Thus the antinomy of pure reason, which
fect of Kant’s philosophy consists in falling
becomes manifest in pure reason’s dialectic,
asunder of the moment of the absolute form.
is in fact the most beneficial straying into
(Lectures 477, 478; see also 439, 450–51).
which human reason could ever have fallen,
because it ultimately impels us to seek the key
to get out of this labyrinth—the key which, Hegel identifies the defect in this mode of
when found, also uncovers what one did not thought—as does Kant in fact, whose pur­
seek and yet requires, namely an outlook into pose in using these terms (thesis, antithesis,
a higher, unchangeable order of things. synthesis) is to move beyond what he calls the
“merely dialectical” or the “dialectic play of
And that’s it. hat’s all the synthesis you get— cosmological ideas” (Critique of Pure Reason
“a higher [eine höhere], unchangeable order 448 [a506/b534], 422 [a462/b490]). It’s im­
of things” (138; Kritik 107). In this particular portant to remember, however, that Hegel
case, Kant achieves the “synthesis” (144; 113) and Kant differ in their perspective on the
and “resolution” of virtue and happiness (139; dialectic and dialectical thinking: Hegel pre­
109), “two elements of the highest good which serves the dialectic by rejecting these terms,
are entirely diferent in kind” (144; 114)—and while Kant rejects the dialectic by reducing it
shows that they are transcendentally deduced to them. So even if you see triads in Hegel—
as a uniied concept. (Take note of the term where are there not triads, really?—it’s best
“resolution” ‘Auf lösung,’ which Hegel and that we abandon thesis, antithesis, synthe­
Marx will make properly dialectical.)2 Kant sis. As soon as we rid ourselves of this triadic
uses this method once more in the Critique structure, we discover Hegel to be closer to
of Judgement, in which both the “antinomy of Marx than to Kant. Indeed, we begin to gain
taste” (165; 338) and the “antinomy of judge­ a clearing, sweeping to the side Marx’s own
ment” (213; 384) are posed as a “hesis” (166, (misdirected) critique of the supposedly
214–15; 338, 387–88) and “Antithesis” (166, Hegelian thesis, antithesis, synthesis in such
214–15; 338, 387–88) with a “Solution” ‘Auf­ works as the Poverty of Philosophy, and ind­
lösung’ (166, 216; 339, 388). Fichte, building ing instead places where Hegel anticipates
on Kant, follows the form in his Foundations Marx in his concern for material history
of Natural Right (94–97, 206, 226–27; for re­ within a dialectical frame.
 814 The Function of Theory at the Present Time [ PM L A

History, Hegel, and Marx

theories and methodologies

or, more accurately, “ lord-bondsman” dia-

lectic is the example right under our noses.
Marx once stated that “[m] y dialectical
As I show in chapter 3 of he Birth of heory,
method is, in its foundations, not only difer-
this most famous dialectical scenario in the
ent from the Hegelian, but exactly opposite
Phenomenology of Spirit represents Hegel’s
to it. . . . With [Hegel], it is standing on its
explicit critique of precapitalist modes of
head. It must be inverted, in order to discover
production evidenced in the German states
the rational kernel within the mystical shell”
while Hegel was alive—the forms of Grund-
(Capital 102, 103). he thinking has always
herrschat historians consistently character-
been: see what Hegel does and do the oppo-
ize as feudalism. In his critique, Hegel reveals
site! his imperative isn’t always easy to enact,
himself to be presciently proto-Marxist and
however, because you irst have to know what
exposes, prospectively, how patently absurd
Hegel does, which requires reading lots of his
it is to blame Hegel for condoning capitalism
work, and if you get that far, then you have or to declaim that “Hegel’s stand-point is that
to produce results and do the opposite, which of modern political economy,” as Marx says
just may be so rigorously oppositional as to (qtd. in Birth 118). here was no capitalism
be outright appropriation itself—what some around for Hegel to critique. he truth of the
might call a “negative dialectics.” Marx, for matter is born from an analogy: what feudal-
all his notorious fuming, was perhaps more ism is to Hegel capitalism is to Marx.
levelheaded than Adorno, author of the afore- he analogy itself aims to do two things:
mentioned negative dialectics, on this point. to show that Hegel is presciently Marxist in
Simply, Marx avers: “I . . . openly avowed my- his critique of his “own material surround-
self the pupil of that mighty thinker. he mys- ings,” thereby explaining why Marx would
tification which dialectic suffers in Hegel’s ind Hegel’s dialectic to be theoretically nec-
hands by no means prevents him from being essary to begin with; and to restore modes of
the irst to present its general form of work- production to the analysis not only of history
ing in a comprehensive and conscious man- or literature but of theory and philosophy,
ner” (Capital 102–03). Marx calls Hegel the grounding these latter in the contexts of their
“zuerst” ‘irst’ (Das Kapital 27; my trans.). If emergence. Our entry point into the thought
the birth of theory in Hegel is good enough of modes of production is the fact that ev-
for Marx, who took the dialectic as his theory ery historical present is decidedly uneven.
of everything, it’s good enough for me. Hegel teaches us about historical uneven-
Yet if we are to understand what makes ness as a theoretical and indeed dialectical
Hegelian dialectical theory critical on its matter well before Marx, insofar as he de-
own terms, then we need to unthink Marx’s scribes the local material realities of agrarian
(and Engels’s) famous statement “It has not life and servile obligations persisting in the
occurred to any one of these philosophers German states since the Middle Ages—all
to inquire into the connection of German the while remaining aware that those very
philosophy with German reality, the rela- states are loping their way toward modernity
tion of their criticism to their own material and capital, of which the more “developed”
surroundings.” At least, we need to rethink versions (like England) Hegel had only read
its target. For if any philosopher “inquired about. In a terriic essay, Jord/ana Rosenberg
into the connection of German philosophy captures the idea perfectly in saying that
with German reality, the relation of their “Hegelian thought—shaped by the collision
criticism to their own material surround- of emergent and residual political-economic
ings,” it was Hegel. And his “master-slave” formations—encodes a critical friction point:
130.3 ] Andrew Cole 815

the dialectic is at heart a mediation of histori­ less necessary when scholars engage with

theories and methodologies

cal diference”—which makes it ever more ur- these issues only to neglect varying modes
gent that in cultural analysis today we achieve of production and exploitation across terri-
a “dimensionalizing of our attention,” recog­ tories, preferring instead to regard feudalism
nizing “the uneven and dialectical movement as a iction and slavery a convenient abstrac-
between the surface and the shadows cast,” tion applicable to anything anywhere.5 What
between aesthetics and history.4 matters, in any case, is that Hegel knows
Because I focus on modes of produc- the distinction between the feudal and slave
tion in the reading of Hegel in chapter 3—in modes of production, as does Marx, who af-
particular, feudalism persisting within the irms this interpretation of Hegel in his own
modernity of emergent capitalism—I don’t discussion of Grundherrschat as feudalism
discuss what’s happening very far from the (Birth 82–85).
German states in Haiti. he topic of “Hegel Did feudalism and chattel slavery reside
and Haiti” has many devotees and claims. within the nascent globalizing frame? Did
One argument, in particular, is that Hegel, Kant drink cofee? he second question an-
in writing the lord-bondsman dialectic, was swers the irst. Yes, and there’s no reason why
talking about the Haitian Revolution. In he we have to choose between these modes of
Birth of heory I explain in detail why I don’t production when thinking macrohistorically,
follow this reading; here I can simply say as long as we are speciic about what makes
that I part ways with this interpretation right both so diferent. In this efort, it’s especially
where its author, Susan Buck-Morss, admits important to understand that consumption
that Hegel is silent about Haiti (17, 19–20). as the auratic telos of “trade”—the sweets
For this reason, I maintain that readers of you eat, the tobacco you smoke—has a pesky
his lord-bondsman dialectic must irst pass habit of mystifying diferences in modes of
through German feudalism before getting to production and unevenness in history (and
the colonial and postcolonial implications or thus in human lives), with the result that the
symptoms of this dialectical scenario. I say vast distances between regions are closed
this as a way of acknowledging the real difer- into one airtight global space. he movement
ences between on the one hand the German of commodities like sugar, tobacco, coffee,
states and on the other Haiti—differences and cotton from colonies to nation-states;
that remind us how terribly dissimilar work the transformation of European aesthet-
as a chattel slave was from work as a German ics to suit the colonial imperial imagination
serf, how fundamentally diferent slavery was in all its overreach; the emergence of entire
from feudalism as a mode of production. Let’s legal systems to try to eradicate feudalism
just say that white peasants in the German (unsuccessfully); the parliamentary decisions
states didn’t face the terror the indigenous to withdraw from the slave trade (unsuccess-
peoples of Haiti suffered when the Spanish fully)—these all will disclose the total frame
and French arrived on their shores and forced of their own possibility as long as we adopt
them to harvest crops and mine metals until a version of difference that remains deeply
they collapsed from abuse, exhaustion, thirst, critical and enables us to think the abstract
starvation, or disease (James; Girard). Nor identities through which globalization itself
were European peasants subjected to the hor- obliquely appears.
rors West and Central Africans experienced his question of diference is worth lin-
as they were cruelly packed into the hulls of gering over a bit longer, because it helps clar-
cargo ships to toil as slaves in Haiti. It feels ify why modes of production should remain
elementary to spell this out, but it’s nonethe- central to any critical analysis, as well as to a
 816 The Function of Theory at the Present Time [ PM L A

reading of the histories I present in he Birth sought to “exorcise the traditional patterns of
theories and methodologies

of Theory. For example, two readers of my culture which conlicted with modern modes
book suggest that German historiography, of production” (Rabinbach 67, 68). To unify
philosophy, and theory from Hegel forward these economic and cultural matters under
amount to a medievalism that dangerously the banner of “medievalism” is to risk doing
appeals to historians like Otto Brunner (a exactly what Hannah Arendt asks us to avoid
“rehabilitated” Nazi, as Newman writes here) in her challenging Origins of Totalitarianism:
and to anti-Semites, who construe the Chris- don’t let the so-called German Spirit pass it-
tian and specifically Lutheran triumph on self of as a seamless and self-consistent cul-
the European stage as a triumph of the will— tural logic extending across the centuries.
“spirit’s indomitable march through Germany
toward absolute universality,” according to
Presentism
Parker in his essay. Both critics, that is, be-
lieve that the twinned topics of Hegel and the It is always a problem when well-intentioned
history of German feudalism are inherently critique unwittingly reproduces its object.
amenable to Volkgeschichte and Nazism. I do Ever since Marx worried whether his cri-
not agree and would say that the concept of tique of capital sounded like run-of-the-mill
modes of production would help these readers political economy—and early reviewers of
recognize important breaks across the very Capital thought he was offering precisely
histories they think are seamless. that—theorists have worried whether critique
Max Horkheimer once said that “[w]ho- now simply fuels the machine or serves as the
ever wants to explain anti- Semitism must necessary ventilation of systemic pressures in
speak of National Socialism” (77). He also the way air brakes on a tractor trailer operate
remarked that “whoever is not willing to by preventing the vehicle from stopping. he
talk about capitalism should also keep quiet thinking today is that the older Ideologiekri-
about fascism” (78). Replace “capitalism” with tik and theories of “diference” can’t stop this
“modes of production,” and you have my point machine from moving, much less identify its
about what must also enter into any consid- vulnerabilities. his is a now very common
eration of German history. The twentieth- view within major critical traditions, espe-
century “German problem,” in other words, cially those situated within Marxism. But I
is not medievalism (as Newman and Parker would frame that point of view as the prob-
would have it) but Nazi capitalism fostered by lem of presentism in theory more generally.
corporate interests that doubled as open anti- Presentism besets any theory that focuses
Semitism (Turner; Hayes). Focus on modes only on modernity, to say nothing of “today”
of production even for a second, and you can or “the present.” Presentism happens when
see that this murderous and belligerent form any theory conforms its critical insights to
of state-managed capitalism in Germany was the very theory late capitalism ofers of itself.
a decisive break from feudalism as a mode of More specifically, presentism results when
production, and that this certain break from critics adopt decidedly even and indiferent
feudalism witnessed the concomitant break models of the present, like networks, rhi-
from medievalism and a turn toward modern- zomes, lat ontologies, vital materialisms, and
ism—the “aestheticization of machine tech- object ontologies (to name but a few). hese
nology” and “Taylorized work-processes and are all ontologies of the present.7 As such,
eiciency” (Rabinbach 68).6 In short, “Nazism they are the identities of our age—that is, the
could no longer rely on the simple legitimacy new philosophies of indifference tasked to
of völkisch ideology and agrarian utopia” and elbow out the old philosophies of diference.
130.3 ] Andrew Cole 817

Networks, I admit, have a certain coun­

theories and methodologies

of production. he material past persists in
terhegemonic, democratizing appeal. hey are our present moment in ways we aren’t ac­
vast, interconnected in ininite ways, multi­ customed to recognizing anymore—precisely
nodal, decentralized, nonhierarchical and the sort of disavowal or misrecognition that
feature agency distributed to every actant, me­ capital requires, which is why I think ideol­
diation for every action, translation for every ogy is still a useful term for designating the
relation, and so on. hey are so resilient as to inability to conceptualize diference and un­
be eternal. Yet they are still systems in which evenness. As I aimed to suggest in my book,
a permanent interruption or systemic die­of which is the subject of this forum in PMLA,
ends everything in a lash, if not a boom. And there may be some use in thinking from the
then what? Rhizomes, if you know anything outside again, starting irst in theory and tak­
about plants, grow by dying, the “node” being ing it from there.
as much about death and disconnection as it
is “life” or connectivity. Rhizomes also per­
ish when the conditions around them aren’t
supportive. Multiplicities—rhizomes by an­
other name—exist only on the “plane of con­ NOTES
sistency” (ater Deleuze and Guattari), which 1. hese are Hegel’s words from the Phenomenology of
means that they are even and smooth through Spirit, which King wrote on the front lyleaf of his copy of
Jung’s Psychologie und Erziehung. hey translate as, “Quite
and through. I’m not conident that these for­
generally, the known, just because it is known, is not un­
mulations help us think our uneven and trou­ derstood” (18; trans. modiied). From what I can tell, King
bled present. Rather, they seem to stylize it. read Jung’s entire book in German, cracking the red­
he way out of presentism is a dialectical orange spine in the process. He bracketed many passages
model of diference that invites theorists to do and translated select words in his delicate and legible cur­
sive, always in pencil, sometimes red. Some translations
diferent historical work—to adopt a broader really stand out, as when he renders “Gerechtigkeitliebe”
vision of history not limited to modernity. In­ (15) as “love of justice.” I am grateful for the opportunity
deed, what I’ve tried to supply in he Birth of to consult this volume (and others) from the Morehouse
heory is a rationale for critical theory to re­ College Martin Luther King Jr. Collection at the Robert
W. Woodruf Library of the Atlanta University Center.
turn to a dialectical model of diference—the
2. See my “Dialektična ilozoija.”
sort of diference that asks us to look beyond 3. Schelling’s “three potencies” seem to mirror or at
the identity of modernity, not only beyond best shadow these three steps (180–81).
modernity to the end of capitalism but also 4. Rosenberg’s treatment in this issue of PMLA of
beyond modernity to the moments before it. Samuel Delany’s hrough the Valley of the Nest of Spiders,
Diference gives you a perspective on the past as well as Blanton’s work in Epic Negation on the mod­
ernist epic, are clinics in this respect.
as a series of uneven present moments up to 5. For example, Davis ignores the fact that feudalism
our own time. hese moments don’t need to is a mode of production copiously documented by histori­
fold or collapse, because then diference itself ans of all stripes and instead thinks that it’s a iction, the
loses its perspectival advantage and becomes “ becoming-feudal,” that early modern humanists created
to rationalize colonialism (26; see also 23, 30, and her es­
presentism again. his temporal exercise in
say here). his is a serious misunderstanding of both the
thinking difference against identity is just Middle Ages and economic history into modernity, and
that. It is an efort to practice thinking out­ thus a bad foundation for theory. Of course, Deleuze and
side our age, looking outside our modernity Guattari popularized the “becoming­[ill in the blank]”
long enough to remember that if there were motif that Davis borrows, but they knew well enough to
consider modes of production in their discussion of feu­
other modes of being before us, there will be dalism; see, for example, Anti- Oedipus 220, where they
others ater us. he same goes for all the other follow Maurice Dobb; housand Plateaus 451–61, where
modes, including (most importantly) modes they discuss the transition from feudalism to capitalism.
 818 The Function of Theory at the Present Time [ PM L A
theories and methodologies

6. Horkheimer, however, understood that “[f]ascism Horkheimer, Max. “he Jews and Europe.” Critical he-
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berg, “Molecularization.” 1989. 77–94. Print.
James, C. L. R. he Black Jacobins: Toussaint L’Ouverture
and the San Domingo Revolution. Introd. and notes by
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