On Reading Heidegger-After the "Heidegger Case"?

• Published in: Critical horizons : journal of social & critical theory Vol. 19; no. 4; pp. 334 - 360
• Main Author: Sharpe, Matthew
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Abingdon Routledge 02.10.2018; Taylor & Francis Ltd
• Subjects: affirmationism; Antisemitism; Black Notebooks; contemporary philosophy; denial; Heidegger; Heidegger, Martin (1889-1976); Nazism; Philosophy
• ISSN: 1440-9917; 1568-5160
• DOI: 10.1080/14409917.2018.1520514

This paper looks at the state of the literature surrounding Heidegger and Nazism today. Part 1 focusses on Hassan Givsan's remarkable work, Une histoire consternante: pourquoi les philosophes se laissent corrompre par le "cas Heidegger", which looks at the different, mutually inconsistent forms of "apologetics" denying that Heidegger had been a Nazi, or that this commitment could have been shaped by his philosophy. Part 2 looks at five themes that emerge from the 2014 French-language collection Heidegger, le sol, la communauté, la race, edited by Emmanuel Faye: Heidegger's anti-semitism, before and in the Black Notebooks; Sein und Zeit and "the political"; Heidegger and his estate's post-war "rewriting" of his Nazi-era texts; Heidegger's esotericism; and his intellectual proximities to other Nazi thinkers. Closing reflections touch on the state of the debate, calling for increased scholarly awareness of the evidence, and debate of its significance.