Sam Gillespie (1 September 1970 – 8 August 2003) was a
philosopher
A philosopher is a person who practices or investigates philosophy. The term ''philosopher'' comes from the grc, φιλόσοφος, , translit=philosophos, meaning 'lover of wisdom'. The coining of the term has been attributed to the Greek th ...
with a particular interest in the work of
Alain Badiou
Alain Badiou (; ; born 17 January 1937) is a French philosopher, formerly chair of Philosophy at the École normale supérieure (ENS) and founder of the faculty of Philosophy of the Université de Paris VIII with Gilles Deleuze, Michel Foucau ...
, a French philosopher, formerly chair of Philosophy at the
École Normale Supérieure
École may refer to:
* an elementary school in the French educational stages normally followed by secondary education establishments (collège and lycée)
* École (river), a tributary of the Seine flowing in région Île-de-France
* École, Savoi ...
(ENS) who wrote about
being
In metaphysics, ontology is the philosophical study of being, as well as related concepts such as existence, becoming, and reality.
Ontology addresses questions like how entities are grouped into categories and which of these entities exis ...
,
truth
Truth is the property of being in accord with fact or reality.Merriam-Webster's Online Dictionarytruth 2005 In everyday language, truth is typically ascribed to things that aim to represent reality or otherwise correspond to it, such as beliefs ...
and the
subject
Subject ( la, subiectus "lying beneath") may refer to:
Philosophy
*''Hypokeimenon'', or ''subiectum'', in metaphysics, the "internal", non-objective being of a thing
**Subject (philosophy), a being that has subjective experiences, subjective cons ...
in a way that, he claims, is neither
postmodern
Postmodernism is an intellectual stance or mode of discourseNuyen, A.T., 1992. The Role of Rhetorical Devices in Postmodernist Discourse. Philosophy & Rhetoric, pp.183–194. characterized by skepticism toward the " grand narratives" of moderni ...
nor simply a repetition of
modernity
Modernity, a topic in the humanities and social sciences, is both a historical period (the modern era) and the ensemble of particular socio-cultural norm (social), norms, attitudes and practices that arose in the wake of the Renaissancein the " ...
. Gillespie was described by
Joan Copjec
Joan K. Copjec (born 1946) is an American philosopher, theorist, author, feminist, and prominent American Lacanian psychoanalytic theorist. She is Professor of Modern Culture & Media at Brown University.
Early life and career
Joan K. Copjec was ...
as "one of the most gifted and promising philosophers of his generation". He was a co-founder of the academic journal ''Umbr(a)''. Gillespie's book ''The Mathematics of Novelty'' was published posthumously in 2008.
Peter Hallward
Peter Hallward is a political philosopher, best known for his work on Alain Badiou and Gilles Deleuze. He has also published works on post-colonialism and contemporary Haiti. Hallward is a member of the editorial collective of the journal ''Radi ...
wrote that "This tremendously valuable book is a landmark in the critical reception of Badiou’s work."
After his death by suicide at age 33, ''The Mathematics of Novelty'' was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at the
University of Warwick
The University of Warwick ( ; abbreviated as ''Warw.'' in post-nominal letters) is a public research university on the outskirts of Coventry between the West Midlands (county), West Midlands and Warwickshire, England. The university was founded i ...
, which Gillespie was posthumously awarded in
2005. Into the first decade of the 21st century, it is now recognized that Gillespie's writings and translations were crucial to the initial reception of Alain Badiou's work in the English-speaking world.
Selected bibliography
;Books
*''The Mathematics of Novelty: Badiou's Minimalist Metaphysics'' (Melbourne: re.press, 2008). For access to the complete version of this title in
pdf
Portable Document Format (PDF), standardized as ISO 32000, is a file format developed by Adobe in 1992 to present documents, including text formatting and images, in a manner independent of application software, hardware, and operating systems. ...
format, visit th
re.press website
;Journal publications
* ‘Slavoj Your Symptom!’, ''UMBR(a)'', no. 1, 1995, pp. 115–9.
* ‘Subtractive’, ''UMBR(a)'', no. 1, 1996, pp. 7–10, (available fro
CSeARCH.
* ‘Hegel Unsutured (an Addendum to Badiou)’, ''UMBR(a)'', no. 1, 1996, pp. 57–69 (available fro
CSeARCH.
* ‘Badiou’s Ethics: A Review’,
Pli: The Warwick Journal of Philosophy', no. 12, 2001, pp. 256–65.
* ‘Neighborhood of Infinity: On Badiou’s Deleuze: The Clamor of Being’, ''UMBR(a)'', no. 1, 2001, pp. 91–106 (available from
CSeARCH.
* ‘Placing the Void – Badiou on Spinoza’, ''Angelaki: Journal of the Theoretical Humanities'', vol. 6, no. 3, 2001, pp. 63–77.
* ‘Beyond Being: Badiou’s Doctrine of Truth’, ''Communication and Cognition'', vol. 36, no. 1-2, 2003, pp. 5–30 (available fro
CSeARCH.
* ‘Get Your Lack On’, UMBR(a), no. 1, 2004, pp. 9–19.
* 'Giving Form to Its Own Existence: Anxiety and the Subject of Truth',
Cosmos and History: The Journal of Natural and Social Philosophy 1: The Praxis of Alain Badiou, 2006, pp. 161–18 (reprinted in ''The Praxis of Alain Badiou'', ed. Paul Ashton, A.J. Bartlett and
Justin Clemens (Melbourne: re.press, 2006, https://web.archive.org/web/20110411133810/http://www.re-press.org/content/view/21/38/)
;Translations
* Badiou, Alain, "Hegel", trans. Marcus Coelen and Sam Gillespie, ''UMBR(a)'', no. 1, 1996, pp. 27–35.
* Badiou, Alain, "On a Contemporary Usage of Frege", trans. Justin Clemens and Sam Gillespie, ''UMBR(a)'', no. 1, 2000, pp. 99–115.
References
External links
* Open Access version o
The Mathematics of Novelty: Badiou's Minimalist Metaphysics
{{DEFAULTSORT:Gillespie, Sam
20th-century Australian philosophers
21st-century Australian philosophers
French–English translators
Alumni of the University of Warwick
1970 births
2003 deaths
20th-century translators
21st-century translators
2003 suicides
Suicides in Australia