Towards a philosophy of affective alterity. A reconnaissance
Towards a philosophy of affective alterity. A reconnaissance

Summary/Abstract: The text is an intervention in post-secularist and anti-fundamentalist philosophy of affective alterity. It attempts to reconstruct the philosophical tradition of affective alterity and to construct its theory. Homosexuality is affective alterity, love between Thou and I. In the article, there are explored the dynamic religions in their openness to the Other with an emphasis on Judaism and the “love the stranger” postulate in the Hebrew Bible, to biblical and rabbinical literature as well as Erich Fromm’s and Julia Kristeva’s psychoanalytic interpretations of them. The idea of hospitality, rooted in the Bible and the Koran, was revived by Jacques Derrida, Julia Kristeva, Griselda Pollock and Geoffrey H. Hartman. It is of urgent importance in Poland where the fundamentalist misogyny and homophobia increase. In the paper, queer rights are examined as human rights, and this is again pertinent to Eastern Europe. The methodology of the intersection of cultural analysis and Jewish studies here are inspired by Ernst van Alphen, Mieke Bal, Christina von Braun and Griselda Pollock. A particular connection between Jewisheness and queerness is stressed by Daniel Boyarin, Ann Pelegrini and Alisa Solomon; as the authors write, it is to be found in today’s Poland in the Shterndlech Iton Babel magazine published by the younger generation. Also, the feminist studies of Maria Janion, Kazimiera Szczuka and Bozena Uminska are of significance here. The authors end with visual culture productions: the queer art exhibition curated by Pawel Leszkowicz in Poznan in 2005 and in Gdansk in 2006. The authors also refer to the polymorphous work of the Lithuanian artists Svajonė and Paulius Stanikai and to the work of loss and memory of the Polish artist Ewa Kuryluk. Throughout the paper, the authors propose their understanding of love. The text whose part is entitled “Faith and Democracy” is a sequel to our Polish-language book “Love and Democracy. Reflexions on the Homosexual Question in Poland” published in 2005 with an extensive English summary. According to the authors, Our loves, our subjectivities are despised and disrespected, but created in art and philosophical research as activism. The authors summarize: let us exercise (in) love.

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