Bonnie Honig Seminar: ‘Bartleby’ as a Figure of Inoperativity – The Body Politics of Post-Work

The Institute for the Humanities welcomes 2018-2019 Visiting Fellow Bonnie Honig, Nancy Duke Lewis Professor of Modern Culture and Media and Political Science, Brown University.

She will present a seminar on March 4:

“Bartleby” as a Figure of Inoperativity – The Body Politics of Post-Work

Bartleby, the ubiquitous figure of refusal, is a character in a short story by Herman Melville, whose refusal is expressed in his now famous formula, “I [would] prefer not to. “ In this seminar we will discuss the story in detail, assessing the power and limits of refusal, in language and at work, in Melville’s story. We will attend not only to Bartleby but also, with the help of supplementary texts, to the story’s historical context (eg., the Astor Place riots) and to the other characters all of whom refuse work in a variety of creative ways. Why then has it been Bartleby who has so captured the imagination of critical theorists from Deleuze to Agamben?

Please see the recommended readings at: https://huminst.uic.edu/ifth/events/all-events/2019/03/04/default-calendar/visiting-fellow-seminar-bonnie-honig

Please register for this event at huminst@uic.edu.