Force of the Postmodern: The Deconstructive Drive in Jack Amariglio's Writings

• Published in: Rethinking Marxism Vol. 36; no. 3; pp. 311 - 337
• Main Author: Madra, Yahya M.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Abingdon Routledge 02-07-2024; Taylor & Francis Ltd
• Subjects: Accentuation; Amariglio, Jack; Collaboration; Discourses; Economics; Epistemology; Genealogy; Modernism; Postmodernism; Postmodernity; Psychoanalysis; Uncanny; Writing
• ISSN: 0893-5696; 1475-8059
• DOI: 10.1080/08935696.2024.2368408

This essay traces the genealogy of the concept of the postmodern in Jack Amariglio's body of work. It recognizes the collaborative accent of Amariglio's writing practice and renders visible a field of discourse that has materialized through the network of collaborations that Amariglio, through the concept of the postmodern, has thereby activated. According to Amariglio, the postmodern, as an epistemological rather than ontological concept, is a discursive byproduct of modernist discourses that emerge endogenously from within the latter but always in a relation of heterogeneity toward their native discourses. A key characteristic of Amariglio's writing has been to highlight these extimate tendencies and trace their consequences on economics as a postmodern discourse. In the spirit of his deconstructive drive, this essay extends his thinking on the postmodern through a number of postmodern moments he has identified, especially in his work with David Ruccio, through the psychoanalytical concept of the uncanny.