Forms of Life, Human and Non-human

Modern continental philosophy under the impact of the “linguistic turn” has often been accused of a reduction to analyses of texts, discourses, representations, structures of consciousness or subjectivity, cultures and social practices at the expense of material conditions and even authentic political action. In reaction to this, an “ontological turn” has been taken by contemporary theory. This ontological turn, or whatever name one may want to give it, seeks to reinvigorate materialism or object-oriented ontology and, accordingly, to invent new ways of thinking matter, objects, life and the real which escape the grasp of language and thought and vibrate beyond socially and symbolically constructed realities.