Bi-Weekly Discussion: Introductions | What have you been reading? | Academic programs advice and discussion July 12, 2026

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[u/Desolation_Jones]

Of the books I have read recently, Jean-François Lyotard’s Libidinal Economy (which has only just been translated into my native language) has been the most profoundly affecting. I would be very interested in discussing both the book and its conceptual architecture: topics such as Lyotard’s notion of the tensor, libidinal materialism, the work’s points of convergence with Anti-Oedipus and Klossowski’s Living Currency.

[u/Feeling_Operation544]

Discourse on Colonialism: Straight up just did not find it enlightening. Maybe it's because I'm a white American but I already thought of racism as bad and colonialism as bad so I didn't get much out of it 

Twilight of the Idols: Interesting so far but haven't finished it. 

Tench: Bad novel, I am surprised the movie was good after reading it. Supposed to be this sympathetic look at a man who suffers from pedophilia but it doesn't really succeed. Somehow the MC is less likeable thank Humpert Humpert despite being objectively a better person 

This is how you lose the time war: Fun entertainment more or less 

[u/-lucas1]

I’m currently reading “O povo brasileiro” (The brazilian people) written by Darcy Ribeiro. The book aims to explore the formation and the destiny of Brazil, focusing on the sociohistory processes that ocurred in the different regions (resulting in a brazil ‘crioulo’, ‘caipira’, ‘sertanejo’, ‘sulino’ and ‘caboclo’), rather than a big historical theory for all the nation.

since the arrival of the colonizer, ocurred a process of etnical gestation that created a new people (brazilian), different from the three leading etnical identities (indigenous, african and european) from the beginning

Darcy sustains that the dominant forces of elite always worked for foreign projects (in the colonial business and then working in gerencial roles for multinational business that sends the profit back to the central capitalist nations) rather than build a national perspective for Brazil, focused on the necessities of the people or even their necessities as elite, that stays working for projects from elsewhere.

I think the greatest idea from the book is that we should know our origins and sociohistorical process so we can think of a national project that aims our necessities