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Why Theory brings continental philosophy and psychoanalytic theory together to examine cultural phenomena.Themes and summary (AI-generated based on podcaster-provided show and episode descriptions):
➤ Continental philosophy • Psychoanalytic theory • Cultural phenomena analysis • Film and literature examination • Political concepts • Theoretical discussions • Influential thinkers • Artistic genres • Philosophical worksThe podcast "Why Theory" merges continental philosophy and psychoanalytic theory to dissect cultural phenomena. This podcast frequently engages with prominent philosophical figures such as Jacques Lacan, Sigmund Freud, Immanuel Kant, and G.W.F. Hegel, examining their significant theories and how they intersect with contemporary cultural issues. Concepts like the gaze, voice, and symbolic castration are explored in depth through many episodes, reflecting an ongoing focus on psychoanalytic theory.
In addition, "Why Theory" delves into critical themes such as the nature of capitalism, the public sphere, and the politics of liberation, using the works of notable figures like Karl Marx and Jurgen Habermas as springboards for discussion. The podcast often evaluates cultural shifts and artistic expressions, analyzing various literary and film genres, such as horror, musicals, and sports films, and theorizes about their broader societal impacts. There is also an emphasis on pivotal psychoanalytic concepts like the symptom and the death drive.
The hosts tackle socio-political issues with a philosophical lens, covering topics such as race, technology, and feminism. Their discussions frequently oscillate between theoretical exploration and cultural critique, engaging with a range of phenomena from artificial intelligence in education to the portrayal of desire in film. Additionally, they highlight notable cultural contributions and figures, occasionally paying tribute to late theorists and artists. Through these episode explorations, "Why Theory" aims to offer insight into the intersection of philosophy, psychoanalysis, and contemporary cultural dialogues, providing listeners with theoretically rich content that interrogates the complexities of modern life.
| Episodes: |
Voice2025-Oct-26 72 minutes |
Gaze2025-Oct-12 83 minutes |
Robert Redford2025-Sep-28 101 minutes |
The 18th Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte2025-Sep-15 75 minutes |
1844 Manuscripts2025-Sep-01 77 minutes |
The End of History2025-Aug-17 73 minutes |
Top Ten TV Series of the 21st Century2025-Aug-04 111 minutes |
Top Ten Films of the 21st Century2025-Jul-20 106 minutes |
The Musical2025-Jul-07 87 minutes |
Common Sense2025-Jun-22 75 minutes |
On Narcissism2025-Jun-08 79 minutes |
Group Psychology2025-May-26 74 minutes |
Racecraft2025-May-11 73 minutes |
A.I.2025-Apr-28 81 minutes |
Slavoj Žižek: An Overview2025-Apr-13 79 minutes |
Euphemism2025-Mar-30 71 minutes |
The Symptom2025-Mar-16 75 minutes |
The Public2025-Mar-03 83 minutes |
Embracing the Void2025-Feb-17 75 minutes |
Seminar 162025-Feb-02 82 minutes |
David Lynch2025-Jan-20 101 minutes |
Seminar X: Anxiety2025-Jan-05 78 minutes |
Lesbian Christmas2024-Dec-20 95 minutes |
Hegelian Praxis2024-Dec-08 77 minutes |
The Beautiful Soul2024-Nov-25 73 minutes |
Hegel & Feminism2024-Nov-11 77 minutes |
Aufhebung (Sublation)2024-Oct-26 74 minutes |
Contemporary Horror2024-Oct-14 107 minutes |
Fredric Jameson2024-Sep-29 74 minutes |
Horror Film2024-Sep-16 89 minutes |
Heist Film2024-Sep-02 92 minutes |
Sports Film2024-Aug-18 101 minutes |
New Introductory Lectures2024-Aug-04 82 minutes |
Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis2024-Jul-22 79 minutes |
Suture2024-Jul-09 73 minutes |
Extimacy2024-Jun-23 73 minutes |
Prequel2024-Jun-11 74 minutes |
Modernist Novel2024-May-27 77 minutes |
Endings2024-May-11 85 minutes |
Parallax View2024-Apr-28 72 minutes |
Seminar 112024-Apr-13 86 minutes |
Seminar 72024-Mar-30 88 minutes |
Critique Of Pure Reason -- Introduction2024-Mar-16 78 minutes |
Blue Velvet2024-Mar-03 79 minutes |
Critique Of Pure Reason -- Preface2024-Feb-18 80 minutes |
Symbolic Castration2024-Feb-05 91 minutes |
Dialectical Reversal2024-Jan-22 75 minutes |
Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations2024-Jan-08 70 minutes |
Wittgenstein's Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus2023-Dec-24 85 minutes |
1980s Christmas2023-Dec-12 82 minutes |
Discourse on Method2023-Nov-26 68 minutes |
Envy2023-Nov-13 72 minutes |
Science Fiction Cinema2023-Nov-02 95 minutes |
Monadology2023-Oct-12 78 minutes |
The Prince2023-Oct-01 74 minutes |
Surplus Enjoyment2023-Sep-16 76 minutes |
Surplus Value2023-Sep-02 78 minutes |
Oppenheimer2023-Aug-19 81 minutes |
Barbie2023-Aug-05 90 minutes |
Creative Writers & Daydreaming2023-Jul-22 79 minutes |
Uncanny2023-Jul-10 74 minutes |
Poststructuralism2023-Jun-24 77 minutes |
Tribute to Mari Ruti2023-Jun-12 71 minutes |
Succession2023-May-29 84 minutes |
Bottle Episode2023-May-28 83 minutes |
Beyond Good and Evil2023-May-15 76 minutes |
The Racist Fantasy2023-Apr-30 74 minutes |
Twitter2023-Apr-16 73 minutes |
The Radical Western2023-Mar-31 95 minutes |
Western2023-Mar-18 90 minutes |
Critique of Dialectical Reason2023-Mar-05 87 minutes |
Analysis Terminable & Interminable2023-Feb-18 80 minutes |
Negation2023-Feb-05 76 minutes |
Being and Nothingness Side B2023-Jan-23 80 minutes |
Being and Nothingness Side A2023-Jan-08 80 minutes |
Misfit Christmas2022-Dec-21 79 minutes |
Debt2022-Dec-10 72 minutes |
Enjoyment Right & Left2022-Nov-26 82 minutes |
Technology2022-Nov-12 79 minutes |
Love2022-Oct-29 91 minutes |
Badiou2022-Oct-15 73 minutes |
Event2022-Oct-02 77 minutes |
Neurosis2022-Sep-17 81 minutes |
Hegel's Absolute Knowing2022-Sep-04 80 minutes |
Hegel's Religion2022-Aug-20 76 minutes |
Screwball Comedy2022-Aug-06 87 minutes |
Mourning and Melancholia2022-Jul-23 87 minutes |
Wild Psychoanalysis2022-Jul-09 80 minutes |
Abortion Theory2022-Jun-25 80 minutes |
Quilting Point2022-Jun-11 82 minutes |
Seminar 32022-May-29 84 minutes |
Hamlet2022-May-14 91 minutes |
Streaming2022-May-01 75 minutes |
The Woman Doesn't Exist (Aphorism 8)2022-Apr-17 72 minutes |
Film Noir2022-Apr-03 81 minutes |
Dualism & Multiplicity2022-Mar-19 75 minutes |
Mystic Writing Pad2022-Mar-06 74 minutes |
Beyond the Pleasure Principle2022-Feb-20 71 minutes |
Superhero Film2022-Feb-07 74 minutes |
Hegel's Spirit2022-Jan-22 80 minutes |
Metalanguage (Aphorism 7)2022-Jan-08 77 minutes |
The Christmas Film2021-Dec-23 78 minutes |
Casablanca2021-Dec-12 81 minutes |
Retroactivity2021-Nov-27 74 minutes |
Id2021-Nov-14 75 minutes |
Ego2021-Oct-31 71 minutes |
Superego2021-Oct-17 79 minutes |
Dialectic of Enlightenment2021-Oct-03 76 minutes |
Introduction to Biopower2021-Sep-19 78 minutes |
Heidegger and Hegel2021-Sep-05 74 minutes |
Breaking Bad2021-Aug-22 79 minutes |
Twin Peaks The Return2021-Aug-09 93 minutes |
Four Discourses2021-Jul-25 77 minutes |
Read My Desire, Pt. 3: Sex, Difference, Relation2021-Jul-12 101 minutes |
Read My Desire, Pt. 2: Democracy, Anxiety, Film Noir2021-Jun-27 87 minutes |
Graduate School2021-Jun-27 92 minutes |
Read My Desire, Pt. 1: Gaze and Excess2021-Jun-13 78 minutes |
Sublime Object of Ideology2021-May-30 83 minutes |
Alexandre Kojeve2021-May-17 84 minutes |
Psychoanalysis & Narrative2021-May-02 78 minutes |
Alienation2021-Apr-18 69 minutes |
Hegel's Reason2021-Apr-04 81 minutes |
Feminism & Psychoanalysis with Mari Ruti2021-Mar-21 79 minutes |
Screen Memories2021-Mar-07 72 minutes |
Civilization and Its Discontents2021-Feb-22 86 minutes |
Jouissance2021-Feb-06 80 minutes |
Lacan's Seminar 22021-Jan-24 93 minutes |
Domestic Terrorism2021-Jan-10 78 minutes |
Tenet2021-Jan-02 78 minutes |
Popular Music2020-Dec-21 93 minutes |
German Idealism2020-Dec-09 92 minutes |
Hegel's Self-Consciousness2020-Nov-24 75 minutes |
Election Special2020-Nov-08 71 minutes |
Deleuze after Guattari2020-Nov-02 91 minutes |
Deleuze Before Guattari2020-Oct-19 78 minutes |
Deleuze with Guattari2020-Oct-05 99 minutes |
Imaginary2020-Sep-20 73 minutes |
Symbolic Order2020-Sep-06 77 minutes |
The Real2020-Aug-23 74 minutes |
Lacan's Seminar 12020-Aug-09 78 minutes |
Aura2020-Jul-26 77 minutes |
Competing Universalities2020-Jul-14 81 minutes |
Interpassivity2020-Jun-28 77 minutes |
Big Other (Aphorism 6)2020-Jun-14 74 minutes |
Capitalism & Racism2020-Jun-03 69 minutes |
Hegel's Consciousness2020-May-23 73 minutes |
Oedipus Complex2020-May-09 75 minutes |
Missing Signifier2020-Apr-24 71 minutes |
Zaddy Fascism2020-Apr-18 69 minutes |
Penis Envy2020-Apr-04 70 minutes |
Coronavirus and Its Discontents2020-Mar-21 77 minutes |
Unconscious (Aphorism 5)2020-Mar-11 74 minutes |
Kant and Freedom2020-Feb-23 80 minutes |
Mirror Stage2020-Feb-08 85 minutes |
New Materialisms2020-Jan-23 74 minutes |
Psychoanalysis and Aesthetics2020-Jan-08 79 minutes |
objet a2019-Dec-24 97 minutes |
Psychoanalysis and Existentialism2019-Dec-07 77 minutes |
Hegel and Race2019-Nov-18 72 minutes |
Defending Freud (side B)2019-Nov-07 71 minutes |
Defending Freud (side A)2019-Oct-23 71 minutes |
Psychoanalysis and Capitalism2019-Oct-09 75 minutes |
Psychoanalysis and Disability2019-Sep-20 75 minutes |
Mad Men2019-Sep-01 84 minutes |
Incels, Misogyny, and Castration2019-Aug-14 81 minutes |
Signifier Vs. Sign (Aphorism 4)2019-Jul-30 87 minutes |
Contradiction2019-Jul-08 83 minutes |
An Afternoon with Slavoj Zizek -- Hegel2019-Jun-24 98 minutes |
An Afternoon with Slavoj Zizek -- Lacan2019-Jun-10 82 minutes |
An Afternoon with Slavoj Zizek -- Marx2019-May-29 81 minutes |
Immediacy2019-May-14 70 minutes |
A Signifier for the Left2019-May-07 76 minutes |
Us2019-Apr-20 83 minutes |
Cynicism (Aphorism 3)2019-Apr-05 69 minutes |
Conspiracy Theories2019-Mar-21 76 minutes |
Sexuation (Aphorism 2)2019-Mar-04 70 minutes |
Ethics of Psychoanalysis (Aphorism 1)2019-Feb-10 74 minutes |
Psychoanalysis and Racism2019-Jan-26 74 minutes |
Preface to Hegel's Phenomenology2019-Jan-08 74 minutes |
Secular Morality2018-Dec-30 71 minutes |
Theoretically Christmas (side B)2018-Dec-16 74 minutes |
Theoretically Christmas (side A)2018-Dec-12 73 minutes |
(Neo)liberalism2018-Nov-21 77 minutes |
Das Ding2018-Nov-12 70 minutes |
Rupture2018-Oct-29 81 minutes |
Surveillance, Punishment, Crime2018-Oct-12 72 minutes |
Dialectics2018-Oct-05 65 minutes |
Desire & Drive2018-Sep-15 62 minutes |
Political Enjoyment2018-Aug-31 66 minutes |
Master Signifier2018-Aug-16 66 minutes |
The Universal and The Particular2018-Jul-27 56 minutes |
Where to Start 3: Heidegger, Badiou, Agamben, Butler, Derrida2018-Jul-14 63 minutes |
Sports: Ideology, Enjoyment, Contradiction2018-Jun-17 58 minutes |
Where to Start 2: Hegel, Marx, Fanon, Deleuze, Foucault2018-May-18 68 minutes |
Where to Start 1: The Psychoanalytic Theorists2018-May-09 88 minutes |
CGI, Anxiety, The Last Jedi2018-Apr-19 74 minutes |
The Oscars in 2018 and Beyond2018-Feb-28 71 minutes |
Ideology2018-Feb-01 62 minutes |
Seriality2018-Jan-09 65 minutes |
Ernst Lubitsch's To Be or Not to Be2017-Dec-26 55 minutes |
Fake News2017-Dec-05 56 minutes |
LACK 2017: Social Tie, Universality, Plus, Arrival2017-Nov-11 73 minutes |
Blade Runner 20492017-Oct-23 83 minutes |
Theories of Comedy2017-Oct-23 67 minutes |