TrueSciPhi

Podcast Profile: Why Theory

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222 episodes
2017 to 2026
Median: 77 minutes
Collection: Philosophy

Description (podcaster-provided):

Themes and summary (AI-generated based on podcaster-provided show and episode descriptions):

This podcast brings continental philosophy and psychoanalytic theory into conversation in order to interpret cultural forms and political life. Across its episodes, the hosts frequently provide close, teaching-oriented readings of major philosophical and theoretical texts—especially figures in the German idealist tradition (Kant and Hegel), Marx, Freud, Lacan, and contemporary interlocutors such as Žižek—clarifying core concepts while tracing their influence across intellectual history. Recurring concerns include contradiction, universality, freedom, morality versus politics, alienation, desire, anxiety, the symptom, narcissism, group psychology, and how psychic structures intersect with social organization.

Alongside textual exegesis, the show uses film and television as a testing ground for theory. Genre-focused discussions treat cinema and TV not just as entertainment but as formal systems that stage problems of desire, law, enjoyment, repetition, and the impossible. The hosts also analyze particular filmmakers and actors as sites where aesthetic choices and political or ethical questions converge, and they attend to shifts in media form—such as what distinguishes an episodic television “cut” from contemporary streaming models.

A strong throughline is critique of contemporary capitalism and its effects on subjectivity and public life, addressed through topics like structural violence, euphemism, the erosion of the public sphere, the reconfiguration of vices into virtues, and the pressures to brand the self. The podcast also turns to current issues—such as artificial intelligence in higher education—to ask how new technologies reshape labor, authority, and the imagined “Big Other,” while keeping its focus on the interplay between cultural artifacts, political structures, and the psyche.

Episodes:

Theorizing the World Cup 2026-Jul-06 87 minutes

What Is Literature? (Literature and Existentialism) 2026-Jun-21 80 minutes

Michael Clayton 2026-Jun-07 74 minutes

Existentialism Is A Humanism 2026-May-24 76 minutes

Impossible Professions 2026-May-11 80 minutes

Avarice 2026-Apr-26 74 minutes

Ambition 2026-Apr-13 71 minutes

Transcendental Analytic (Kant's Critique of Pure Reason) 2026-Mar-29 80 minutes

Rob Reiner: An Overview 2026-Mar-15 88 minutes

Transcendental Deduction (Kant's Critique of Pure Reason) 2026-Mar-02 84 minutes

Transcendental Aesthetic (Kant's Critique of Pure Reason) 2026-Feb-15 74 minutes

Superegoic Enjoyment 2026-Feb-01 82 minutes

Structural Violence 2026-Jan-19 76 minutes

Pluribus 2026-Jan-04 71 minutes

Millennium Christmas 2025-Dec-21 80 minutes

The Episode 2025-Dec-07 71 minutes

Lacan's Seminar 19: ...or Worse 2025-Nov-23 75 minutes

Lacan's Seminar 18: On a Discourse... 2025-Nov-09 75 minutes

Voice 2025-Oct-26 72 minutes

Gaze 2025-Oct-12 83 minutes

Robert Redford 2025-Sep-28 101 minutes

The 18th Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte 2025-Sep-15 75 minutes

1844 Manuscripts 2025-Sep-01 77 minutes

The End of History 2025-Aug-17 73 minutes

Top Ten TV Series of the 21st Century 2025-Aug-04 111 minutes

Top Ten Films of the 21st Century 2025-Jul-20 106 minutes

The Musical 2025-Jul-07 87 minutes

Common Sense 2025-Jun-22 75 minutes

On Narcissism 2025-Jun-08 79 minutes

Group Psychology 2025-May-26 74 minutes

Racecraft 2025-May-11 73 minutes

A.I. 2025-Apr-28 81 minutes

Slavoj Žižek: An Overview 2025-Apr-13 79 minutes

Euphemism 2025-Mar-30 71 minutes

The Symptom 2025-Mar-16 75 minutes

The Public 2025-Mar-03 83 minutes

Embracing the Void 2025-Feb-17 75 minutes

Lacan's Seminar 16: From an Other... 2025-Feb-02 82 minutes

David Lynch 2025-Jan-20 101 minutes

Seminar X: Anxiety 2025-Jan-05 78 minutes

Lesbian Christmas 2024-Dec-20 95 minutes

Hegelian Praxis 2024-Dec-08 77 minutes

The Beautiful Soul 2024-Nov-25 73 minutes

Hegel & Feminism 2024-Nov-11 77 minutes

Aufhebung (Sublation) 2024-Oct-26 74 minutes

Contemporary Horror 2024-Oct-14 107 minutes

Fredric Jameson 2024-Sep-29 74 minutes

Horror Film 2024-Sep-16 89 minutes

Heist Film 2024-Sep-02 92 minutes

Sports Film 2024-Aug-18 101 minutes

New Introductory Lectures 2024-Aug-04 82 minutes

Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis 2024-Jul-22 79 minutes

Suture 2024-Jul-09 73 minutes

Extimacy 2024-Jun-23 73 minutes

Prequel 2024-Jun-11 74 minutes

Modernist Novel 2024-May-27 77 minutes

Endings 2024-May-11 85 minutes

Parallax View 2024-Apr-28 72 minutes

Lacan's Seminar 11: The Four Fundamental Concepts of Psychoanalysis 2024-Apr-13 86 minutes

Lacan's Seminar 7: The Ethics of Psychoanalysis 2024-Mar-30 88 minutes

Critique Of Pure Reason -- Introduction 2024-Mar-16 78 minutes

Blue Velvet 2024-Mar-03 79 minutes

Critique Of Pure Reason -- Preface 2024-Feb-18 80 minutes

Symbolic Castration 2024-Feb-05 91 minutes

Dialectical Reversal 2024-Jan-22 75 minutes

Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations 2024-Jan-08 70 minutes

Wittgenstein's Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus 2023-Dec-24 85 minutes

1980s Christmas 2023-Dec-12 82 minutes

Discourse on Method 2023-Nov-26 68 minutes

Envy 2023-Nov-13 72 minutes

Science Fiction Cinema 2023-Nov-02 95 minutes

Monadology 2023-Oct-12 78 minutes

The Prince 2023-Oct-01 74 minutes

Surplus Enjoyment 2023-Sep-16 76 minutes

Surplus Value 2023-Sep-02 78 minutes

Oppenheimer 2023-Aug-19 81 minutes

Barbie 2023-Aug-05 90 minutes

Creative Writers & Daydreaming 2023-Jul-22 79 minutes

Uncanny 2023-Jul-10 74 minutes

Poststructuralism 2023-Jun-24 77 minutes

Tribute to Mari Ruti 2023-Jun-12 71 minutes

Succession 2023-May-29 84 minutes

Bottle Episode 2023-May-28 83 minutes

Beyond Good and Evil 2023-May-15 76 minutes

The Racist Fantasy 2023-Apr-30 74 minutes

Twitter 2023-Apr-16 73 minutes

The Radical Western 2023-Mar-31 95 minutes

Western 2023-Mar-18 90 minutes

Critique of Dialectical Reason 2023-Mar-05 87 minutes

Analysis Terminable & Interminable 2023-Feb-18 80 minutes

Negation 2023-Feb-05 76 minutes

Being and Nothingness Side B 2023-Jan-23 80 minutes

Being and Nothingness Side A 2023-Jan-08 80 minutes

Misfit Christmas 2022-Dec-21 79 minutes

Debt 2022-Dec-10 72 minutes

Enjoyment Right & Left 2022-Nov-26 82 minutes

Technology 2022-Nov-12 79 minutes

Love 2022-Oct-29 91 minutes

Badiou 2022-Oct-15 73 minutes

Event 2022-Oct-02 77 minutes

Neurosis 2022-Sep-17 81 minutes

Hegel's Absolute Knowing 2022-Sep-04 80 minutes

Hegel's Religion 2022-Aug-20 76 minutes

Screwball Comedy 2022-Aug-06 87 minutes

Mourning and Melancholia 2022-Jul-23 87 minutes

Wild Psychoanalysis 2022-Jul-09 80 minutes

Abortion Theory 2022-Jun-25 80 minutes

Quilting Point 2022-Jun-11 82 minutes

Lacan's Seminar 3: The Psychoses 2022-May-29 84 minutes

Hamlet 2022-May-14 91 minutes

Streaming 2022-May-01 75 minutes

The Woman Doesn't Exist (Aphorism 8) 2022-Apr-17 72 minutes

Film Noir 2022-Apr-03 81 minutes

Dualism & Multiplicity 2022-Mar-19 75 minutes

Mystic Writing Pad 2022-Mar-06 74 minutes

Beyond the Pleasure Principle 2022-Feb-20 71 minutes

Superhero Film 2022-Feb-07 74 minutes

Hegel's Spirit 2022-Jan-22 80 minutes

Metalanguage (Aphorism 7) 2022-Jan-08 77 minutes

The Christmas Film 2021-Dec-23 78 minutes

Casablanca 2021-Dec-12 81 minutes

Retroactivity 2021-Nov-27 74 minutes

Id 2021-Nov-14 75 minutes

Ego 2021-Oct-31 71 minutes

Superego 2021-Oct-17 79 minutes

Dialectic of Enlightenment 2021-Oct-03 76 minutes

Introduction to Biopower 2021-Sep-19 78 minutes

Heidegger and Hegel 2021-Sep-05 74 minutes

Breaking Bad 2021-Aug-22 79 minutes

Twin Peaks The Return 2021-Aug-09 93 minutes

Four Discourses 2021-Jul-25 77 minutes

Read My Desire, Pt. 3: Sex, Difference, Relation 2021-Jul-12 101 minutes

Read My Desire, Pt. 2: Democracy, Anxiety, Film Noir 2021-Jun-27 87 minutes

Graduate School 2021-Jun-27 92 minutes

Read My Desire, Pt. 1: Gaze and Excess 2021-Jun-13 78 minutes

Sublime Object of Ideology 2021-May-30 83 minutes

Alexandre Kojeve 2021-May-17 84 minutes

Psychoanalysis & Narrative 2021-May-02 78 minutes

Alienation 2021-Apr-18 69 minutes

Hegel's Reason 2021-Apr-04 81 minutes

Feminism & Psychoanalysis with Mari Ruti 2021-Mar-21 79 minutes

Screen Memories 2021-Mar-07 72 minutes

Civilization and Its Discontents 2021-Feb-22 86 minutes

Jouissance 2021-Feb-06 80 minutes

Lacan's Seminar 2: The Ego in Freud's Theory... 2021-Jan-24 93 minutes

Domestic Terrorism 2021-Jan-10 78 minutes

Tenet 2021-Jan-02 78 minutes

Popular Music 2020-Dec-21 93 minutes

German Idealism 2020-Dec-09 92 minutes

Hegel's Self-Consciousness 2020-Nov-24 75 minutes

Election Special 2020-Nov-08 71 minutes

Deleuze after Guattari 2020-Nov-02 91 minutes

Deleuze Before Guattari 2020-Oct-19 78 minutes

Deleuze with Guattari 2020-Oct-05 99 minutes

Imaginary 2020-Sep-20 73 minutes

Symbolic Order 2020-Sep-06 77 minutes

The Real 2020-Aug-23 74 minutes

Lacan's Seminar 1: Freud's Papers on Technique 2020-Aug-09 78 minutes

Aura 2020-Jul-26 77 minutes

Competing Universalities 2020-Jul-14 81 minutes

Interpassivity 2020-Jun-28 77 minutes

Big Other (Aphorism 6) 2020-Jun-14 74 minutes

Capitalism & Racism 2020-Jun-03 69 minutes

Hegel's Consciousness 2020-May-23 73 minutes

Oedipus Complex 2020-May-09 75 minutes

Missing Signifier 2020-Apr-24 71 minutes

Zaddy Fascism 2020-Apr-18 69 minutes

Penis Envy 2020-Apr-04 70 minutes

Coronavirus and Its Discontents 2020-Mar-21 77 minutes

Unconscious (Aphorism 5) 2020-Mar-11 74 minutes

Kant and Freedom 2020-Feb-23 80 minutes

Mirror Stage 2020-Feb-08 85 minutes

New Materialisms 2020-Jan-23 74 minutes

Psychoanalysis and Aesthetics 2020-Jan-08 79 minutes

objet a 2019-Dec-24 97 minutes

Psychoanalysis and Existentialism 2019-Dec-07 77 minutes

Hegel and Race 2019-Nov-18 72 minutes

Defending Freud (side B) 2019-Nov-07 71 minutes

Defending Freud (side A) 2019-Oct-23 71 minutes

Psychoanalysis and Capitalism 2019-Oct-09 75 minutes

Psychoanalysis and Disability 2019-Sep-20 75 minutes

Mad Men 2019-Sep-01 84 minutes

Incels, Misogyny, and Castration 2019-Aug-14 81 minutes

Signifier Vs. Sign (Aphorism 4) 2019-Jul-30 87 minutes

Contradiction 2019-Jul-08 83 minutes

An Afternoon with Slavoj Zizek -- Hegel 2019-Jun-24 98 minutes

An Afternoon with Slavoj Zizek -- Lacan 2019-Jun-10 82 minutes

An Afternoon with Slavoj Zizek -- Marx 2019-May-29 81 minutes

Immediacy 2019-May-14 70 minutes

A Signifier for the Left 2019-May-07 76 minutes

Us 2019-Apr-20 83 minutes

Cynicism (Aphorism 3) 2019-Apr-05 69 minutes

Conspiracy Theories 2019-Mar-21 76 minutes

Sexuation (Aphorism 2) 2019-Mar-04 70 minutes

Ethics of Psychoanalysis (Aphorism 1) 2019-Feb-10 74 minutes

Psychoanalysis and Racism 2019-Jan-26 74 minutes

Preface to Hegel's Phenomenology 2019-Jan-08 74 minutes

Secular Morality 2018-Dec-30 71 minutes

Theoretically Christmas (side B) 2018-Dec-16 74 minutes

Theoretically Christmas (side A) 2018-Dec-12 73 minutes

(Neo)liberalism 2018-Nov-21 77 minutes

Das Ding 2018-Nov-12 70 minutes

Rupture 2018-Oct-29 81 minutes

Surveillance, Punishment, Crime 2018-Oct-12 72 minutes

Dialectics 2018-Oct-05 65 minutes

Desire & Drive 2018-Sep-15 62 minutes

Political Enjoyment 2018-Aug-31 66 minutes

Master Signifier 2018-Aug-16 66 minutes

The Universal and The Particular 2018-Jul-27 56 minutes

Where to Start 3: Heidegger, Badiou, Agamben, Butler, Derrida 2018-Jul-14 63 minutes

Sports: Ideology, Enjoyment, Contradiction 2018-Jun-17 58 minutes

Where to Start 2: Hegel, Marx, Fanon, Deleuze, Foucault 2018-May-18 68 minutes

Where to Start 1: The Psychoanalytic Theorists 2018-May-09 88 minutes

CGI, Anxiety, The Last Jedi 2018-Apr-19 74 minutes

The Oscars in 2018 and Beyond 2018-Feb-28 71 minutes

Ideology 2018-Feb-01 62 minutes

Seriality 2018-Jan-09 65 minutes

Ernst Lubitsch's To Be or Not to Be 2017-Dec-26 55 minutes

Fake News 2017-Dec-05 56 minutes

LACK 2017: Social Tie, Universality, Plus, Arrival 2017-Nov-11 73 minutes

Blade Runner 2049 2017-Oct-23 83 minutes

Theories of Comedy 2017-Oct-23 67 minutes