Marion Pollaert

Cet article a pour objectif d’étudier la réception des auteurs anciens dans l’œuvre d’Henri Maldiney, notamment dans Aîtres de la langue et demeures de la pensée. Leur traitement différencié procède de la perspective phénoménologique propre à l’auteur, qui consiste à retrouver, sous l’état construit de la langue, un rapport entre langue et pensée qui articule le sens du monde pour la présence humaine autant que le sens même de cette présence par rapport au monde. Maldiney opère une véritable comparaison entre les Présocratiques, Platon et Aristote : il identifie des compréhensions plus ou moins poussées, et sous des modalités bien différentes, de ce niveau d’articulation originaire de la parole ou de la portée « onto-logique » de la langue. Cette forme d’évaluation des sources antiques se double d’une réappropriation de certains concepts, c’est ce qui conduit notamment à donner un sens proprement phénoménologique à la transcendance supra-sensible que conceptualise Platon. La perspective phénoménologique propre à Maldiney se répercute donc dans le rapport même aux auteurs, dans la mesure où ceux-ci parviendraient à poser la même question de l’« origine » qu’il articule lui-même.

Division is a fundamental procedure in the philosophy of classical Antiquity. It consists of describing an object by inscribing it in a general category (its genus) and then making differences or distinctions within this general category until it is sufficiently characterised. While this procedure has long been despised by secondary literature, in recent years it has come to the attention of a growing number of local studies. By presenting studies of division in Plato and Aristotle side by side, the present issue intends to show that division benefits from being approached from a comparative perspective, in order to highlight both the continuities between the two authors, and the irreducible characteristics of their respective approaches.

This special issue brings together selected papers from the international conference Experience in Plato, held at the École normale supérieure in Paris in June 2024, and marks the beginning of a collaboration between the Centre Jean Pépin and the Instituto de Filosofia da Nova in Lisbon. It examines the complex and often ambivalent role of experience (empeiria) in Plato’s philosophy, often regarded, in light of its contrast with technē, as nearly incompatible with rational knowledge. While Plato is frequently interpreted as “anti-empirical,” the volume highlights his nuanced engagement with experience, recognising both its risks — particularly in rhetoric, poetry, and other practically effective but normatively fragile skills — and its indispensable function in action, politics, and moral life. By distinguishing different senses of experience, from unreflective habitual practice to normatively grounded practical competence and transformative intellectual insight, the collection explores how experiential dimensions shape Plato’s epistemology, ethics, aesthetics, and theory of knowledge. Overall, it seeks to reassess experience not merely as a rival to reason, but as a contested and productive category within the Platonic dialogues.

This article examines how Rancière contrasts Plato’s philosophy with sociology, specifically that of Bourdieu and Passeron. In The Philosopher and His Poor, Plato is among those who exclude the majority not only from political power but also from thought and discourse. However, Rancière uses the Republic’s founding myth of inequality to identify the arbitrary basis behind the circular reasoning that justifies thought’s legitimate and illegitimate use based on alleged nature. Can Platonic myth constitute what Rancière terms a ‘discursive act’, which triggers political conflict, that is, the debate on equality as first presupposition? This study of Rancière’s Platonic reference examines the conditions under which philosophical myth can challenge sociology. The emancipatory use of myth involves reconfiguring our concepts of science and society and any notion of nature while scholarly discourse is hinged on processes of social othering that align it with the repressive order of social hierarchy. The comparison between Plato and Bourdieu, as analyzed through Rancière’s critique, reveals a fundamental divergence in their approach to societal structures. According to Rancière, all explanations tend to naturalize, whereas the only correct approach is to emphasize the total absence of any foundation for hierarchy. This problem has epistemological implications: how can we construct a discourse that does not reproduce the exceptionality of authorized speech? On this condition, one can catch a glimpse of the collective and temporal extent of Rancière’s resolute commitment to equality. Taking seriously a definition of the social as a series of perceptual rearrangements allows us to question the anti-institutional limit of Rancière’s thinking.

Henri Maldiney’s work makes it difficult to refer to the concept of essence in the singular, since its meaning seems to have evolved. In Aîtres de la langue et demeures de la pensée, the term is more open to a discussion of the Aristotelian priority of actuality over potentiality, which defines the predetermination of the possible. Even in this work, the concept of “essence” has ambiguous uses and raises the question of its articulation with the being of phenomena and manifestation. On the other hand, in Ouvrir le rien, l’art nu, essence ultimately serves to designate the presence of a being in its irreplaceability. This very particular meaning given to a concept inherited from Greek thought is paradoxical enough to reveal the originality of Henri Maldiney’s ontology: if everything that comes into being can only be measured by a determination of indeterminacy according to an internal law, does what Maldiney calls the essence of a phenomenon ultimately coincide with its manifestation?

This article examines how Rancière contrasts Plato’s philosophy with sociology, specifically that of Bourdieu and Passeron. In The Philosopher and His Poor, Plato is among those who exclude the majority not only from political power but also from thought and discourse. However, Rancière uses the Republic ’s founding myth of inequality to identify the arbitrary basis behind the circular reasoning that justifies thought’s legitimate and illegitimate use based on alleged nature. Can Platonic myth constitute what Rancière terms a ‘discursive act’, which triggers political conflict, that is, the debate on equality as first presupposition? This study of Rancière’s Platonic reference examines the conditions under which philosophical myth can challenge sociology. The emancipatory use of myth involves reconfiguring our concepts of science and society and any notion of nature while scholarly discourse is hinged on processes of social othering that align it with the repressive order of social hierarchy. The comparison between Plato and Bourdieu, as analyzed through Rancière’s critique, reveals a fundamental divergence in their approach to societal structures. According to Rancière, all explanations tend to naturalize, whereas the only correct approach is to emphasize the total absence of any foundation for hierarchy. This problem has epistemological implications: how can we construct a discourse that does not reproduce the exceptionality of authorized speech? On this condition, one can catch a glimpse of the collective and temporal extent of Rancière’s resolute commitment to equality. Taking seriously a definition of the social as a series of perceptual rearrangements allows us to question the anti-institutional limit of Rancière’s thinking.

Le présent volume, coordonné par S. Delcomminette & R. Van Daele, consiste dans les actes de deux journées d’études qui se sont tenues à la Fondation Universitaire de Belgique et à l’Université Libre de Bruxelles les 13 et 14 juin 2019. Les neuf contributions sont précédées d’une introduction qui procède à un très rapide état de la question et esquisse de façon convaincante la cohérence de l’itinéraire suivi. Le collectif vise à étudier, chronologiquement, l’histoire de la réception dans l...