Hungarian Cultural Center presents: REVOLUTION, IDEOLOGY AND MEMORY October 14, 2006

MAgyar Kulturalis Kozpont/ Hungarian Cultural Center

REVOLUTION, IDEOLOGY AND MEMORY
Sponsored by Radical Society

Panelists Agnes Heller, Paul Berman, and Csaba Békés use the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the 1956 Hungarian Revolution to examine the relationship between revolution and ideology in today’s world.

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To what extent have past revolutions been ideologically driven, and to what extent are they similarly driven today? To what extent is ideology counter-revolutionary, and to what extent is revolution ultimately directed against ideology? Has the connection between political revolution and political ideology become passé or even antithetical? How do Islamic fundamentalism, religious ideology and neoconservative philosophy affect the way we perceive revolution? And to what extent does every revolution represent a resurgence of memory, a reaching back to prior revolutions and mythical politics?

Reception to follow the discussion.

ABOUT THE PANELISTS

Agnes Heller experienced the Hungarian Revolution of '56 firsthand. As a student of Lukács's during the 1950s, she was a prominent member of the "Budapest School." She has written widely on the philosophy of history and morals, and, more recently, the theory of modernity. Her books include Everyday Life (1970; trans. 1984), The Theory of Need in Marx (1974), Philosophy of Left Radicalism (1978; trans. as Radical Philosophy, 1984), Theory of History (1982), Beyond Justice (1987), Can Modernity Survive? (1990), and A Philosophy of History in Fragments (1993). Agnes Heller is Hannah Arendt Professor of Philosophy in the Graduate Faculty of the New School for Social Research, New York. Look for her essay on trauma in the 2006 fall issue of Radical Society.

Paul Berman writes on politics and literature. His books, which have been translated into more than fourteen languages, include Power and the Idealists (2005), Terror and Liberalism (2003), and A Tale of Two Utopias (1996). He writes for The New Republic, The New York Times Book Review, The New York Times Magazine, Slate, Dissent, The New Yorker, and a variety of other journals in the United States and elsewhere.

Csaba Békés is one of Hungary's leading scholars of new Cold War history. He is the Founding Director of the Cold War History Research Center in Budapest (www.coldwar.hu) and a Senior Research Fellow at the 1956 Institute in Budapest. This fall he comes to New York as a Visiting Fulbright Professor at New York University. Békés' English-language publications include a major edited volume on the 1956 Revolution, published in 2002 (featured on NPR, US News & World Report, The New York Times and elsewhere).

Official Website: http://www.culturehungary.org