Peter Rollins

The Anthropologist Lévi-Strauss famously analyzed a situation in which two groups within the same tribal community drew a map of their village in radically different ways. Their understanding of the objective village layout being directly connected to their social standing. Instead of taking a relativistic stance - with the village layout being seen as purely subjective - or taking the position that an objective mapping was possible - viewing one of the maps as more accurate, or reconciling them in a more exhaustive drawing - Lévi-Strauss argued that this phenomenon hinted at an unsymbolized antagonism in the community. One that prevented the social organization from achieving some kind of some simple, symmetrical, non-antagonistic equilibrium. However, for Lévi-Strauss, it was precisely this antagonism that simultaneously produced and maintained the very system that it distorted and threatened. In this pop-up seminar I use Lévi-Strauss’ reflections - employed by Lacan and, more recently, Žižek - as a jum

It’s very easy for us to question the possibility of experiencing a lasting happiness. Can we really find it? Is it something that we can hold onto for prolonged periods of time? The answer is likely ‘yes’. Indeed there are many who have dedicated their entire lives to cultivating it, even creating retreats and seminars designed to help others realize it. However, in psychoanalysis there is a price to pay for happiness: the fundamental compromise of your desire. The more that happiness pervades ones life, the more that individual becomes estranged from their unspeakable passion. In this way, people like Žižek refer to happiness as the category of the fool. It is the pursuit undertaken by one who would rather avoid confronting the contradictions and antagonisms that lie within them. Contenting themselves instead with a peace that is opposed to chaos, rather than a peace that is hard won via tarrying with the chaos. In this seminar I explore the chasm that lies between happiness and desire via reference t

The is an except from part three of a ten part reading group I ran on the book Capitalism and Desire by Todd McGowan. In this clip I outline the main themes from the third chapter of the text. You can find the whole course on my Patreon.

What Does the Miser Lose | Weil and the Non-Existent Reality of God by Peter Rollins

Recently I joined Michael Gungor for a conversation about themes connected to projection, the Gaze and unhealthy trends in social media. This was part of a Liturgists episode looking at Cancel Culture, which you can find on their podcast channel.

The work of Paul Tillich and Slavoj Zizek criss-cross in a number of fascinating ways. While Tillich rightly passes as a theist, and Zizek rightly passes as an atheist, there is an atheistic dimension in the work of the former and a theistic dimension in the work of the latter. In addition to this, Tillich’s theological vocation is profoundly philosophical, while Zizek’s philosophical project has a deeply theological core. Both draw from similar intellectual sources (German Idealism, Psychoanalysis, Marxism), both wrestle with the nature of desire (Ultimate Concern, Drive) and both offer a reading of true religion as the revelation of a type of quantum indeterminacy at the heart of reality. In this seminar, I will draw out the ways in which Tillich and Zizek orbit around a similar constellation of questions. Once we have seen how their work is complimentary in many ways, I’ll turn my attention to their differences regarding the ultimate aim of religion and the nature of salvation, or the cure. All my lectur

The is an except from part two of a ten part reading group I ran on the book Capitalism and Desire by Todd McGowan. In this clip I outline the main themes from the second chapter of the text. You can find the whole course on my Patreon.

The is an except from part one of a ten part reading group I ran on the book Capitalism and Desire by Todd McGowan. In this clip I outline the main themes from the first chapter of the text. You can find the whole course on my Patreon.

Concluding Q&A by Peter Rollins

Absurdo Confido | VI by Peter Rollins

In this penultimate seminar in my six part series on Pyrotheology, we look at the idea of a community that helps people affirm their individuality. A community that enables us to think for ourselves, take responsibility for our actions, and find freedom from the tyranny of utopia.

In my forth seminar from the six part Pyrotheology course, we delve into the meaning of Lack as a positive force. Here we touch on the idea of a community held together by a shared loss and how the sacred returns to us in a virtual form after its loss as a fantasmic, fictional object. Get full seminars, book studies and courses by joining up at https://pyrotheology.com

In this third seminar from my six part Pyrotheology course, I turn to the theological dimension of the loss of the Sacred Object as described in the previous seminars. Here we turn to the relationship between the Pleasure Principle and the Reality Principle, the Object of Desire and the Object Cause of Desire and the difference between Loss and Lack. Get full seminars, book studies and courses by joining up at https://pyrotheology.com

This is the second of six seminars introducing the theory and technology of Pyrotheology. In this talk, I explore the move from a sense that we are lacking some secret that would make us whole, to the the experience of lack as the secret itself. Get full seminars, book studies and courses by joining up at https://pyrotheology.com

This is the first of six seminars introducing the theory and technology of Pyrotheology. In this talk, I use the structure of a traditional magic trick to outline the trajectory of pyrotheology. Get full seminars, book studies and courses by joining up at https://pyrotheology.com

In this talk I outline what Marx means by Class Conflict and explore why he believed that this was the central antagonism within Capitalism. Note: In the Q&A I said that I thought that the term 'Cultural Capitalism' was used by Angela Nagle on the podcast What's Left, but that's not correct.

This is from a live zoom meeting from one of my Pints and Parables lockdown events. Here I talk about the difference between Desire and Demand.

This is a small excerpt from one of the reading groups I run on Patreon. In this group we tackled Gabriel Marcel's essay 'On the Ontological Mystery' over 2 ninety minute sessions. In this excerpt I did a summery of the first half of the article before we dived into the second half. To find out about future reading groups, visit https://peterrollins.com/calendar

Watching a movie is anything but a passive experience. What happens on the screen is not something we merely observe, but rather offers a mise-en-scène that hooks our desire. Movies show us something about the desire of the society from which they emerge, and something of the desire of the individual that enjoys them. Yet great movies can do more than simply express, incite and manipulate our desire. Some of the most critically acclaimed movies - such as Citizen Kane - confront us with the frailty, contingency and impotence of the objects that often fascinate us the most. This unnerving experience is something that Lacan referred to as an experience of the Gaze. In this seminar, I be look at what this means via reference to some concrete cinematic examples and then connecting it to the work of pyrotheology.

It’s common for evolutionary psychologists to make comparisons between the animal kingdom and human society. One such area of comparison is in relation to the development of hierarchies. We witness hierarchies in the animal kingdom that rest upon some animals natural dominance over others. It’s said that we witness the same thing in human societies. Left to our own devices, we form hierarchies that reflect our respective strengths and weaknesses. But is this really the way hierarchies operate in society? In this proseminar I’ll be looking at how we are never at one with the positions of authority that we inhabit. That they predate us and are never properly tailored to us. Facts that we often attempt to disavow. I draw out how a proper understanding of how we inhabit our various social roles can not only give us insight into the nature of human subjectivity, but also help us understand childhood development, the nature of freedom and the subversive meaning of the Crucifixion.