Hannah Arendt’s Absurdities: The Grace of a Jewish Thinker Seminar

The relevance to Hannah Arendt’s mature political ideas of her doctoral research on the concept of love in Saint Augustine has always been a matter of debate amongst her commentators. In this paper, Arendt’s treatment of Augustine and, more broadly, her appreciation and intimation, throughout her writings, of key Christian theological concepts will be offered as fundamental not only to her defence of politics but additionally and, paradoxically, to her combative style and even the expression of her own Jewishness.

All welcome.

The chair for this seminar will be Professor Andrea Reiter.

Speaker biography

Jonathan studied for his BA(Hons) in Philosophy at Lancaster University in the early 1980s before receiving his MA in Philosophy from Warwick University in 1983. After moving to London, he worked for twelve years in the voluntary sector, initially with a charity for the homeless and then as a residential social worker working with adults recovering from mental illness. During this period he did part-time research at the LSE and completed his teacher training at Goldsmiths’, University of London. Jonathan has held senior lectureships at the University of East London and the University of the Arts, London, where he was, until 2011, a ‘Personal and Professional Development’ Programme Leader. He also designed and taught a module entitled ‘Concept, Critique and Communication’. In 2010, Jonathan gained a PhD from the University of Southampton for his research on the German Jewish philosopher and political theorist, Hannah Arendt. He teaches EAP within the Centre for Language Study in the Humanities Faculty at Southampton and is also a Visiting Fellow in Social Sciences. He is currently researching a book that will examine both Hannah Arendt’s Jewishness and controversial political ideas in the context of the influence on her of Christian theology.