Deleuze, Merleau-Ponty and the question of the flesh

What does Gilles Deleuze mean when he talks about meat, flesh and the ominous body without organs? Could they correspond to different layer of phenomenal experience? Or do they transcend the level of the phenomenal?

In this reading group, we will be exploring the resonances, yet also differences between Deleuze's philosophy and Merleau-Ponty's phenomenological account of the flesh.

Who is Thérèse Gräff? 

Thérèse Gräff is a PhD student in philosophy at Charles University in Prague who is completing an internship at the Department during the month of February. She will be giving the following seminar aimed at PhD and undergraduate students. If you are interested in attending, please write to her before February 15, at the following email address: thereseltt@gmail.com.

The seminars will be held in English. 

READINGS

Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1968): Visible and Invisible, Translators Preface: 54-56 (pdf pages): “The flesh” + evtl Passages from Eye and Mind

Daniela Voss (2013): The philosophical concepts of meat and flesh: Deleuze and Merleau-Ponty

Gilles Deleuze (1981): The Logic of Sensation - Chapter 4 (“Body, meat and spirit”), Chapter 6 (“Painting and Sensation”) and Chapter 7 (“Hysteria”)

Gilles Deleuze/ Felix Gattari (1980): A Thousand Plateaus - Part 6: How do you make yourself a Body without Organs