THE UNIVOCITY OF DELEUZE
by Beth Metcalf
bmetcalf.ma.ultranet@rcn.com
What is Univocity?
(2003) Spinoza’s Univocity is the key in the understanding
of Deleuze. Univocity differs from any Representational ontology
of classification according to genus and species.
(2005) Univocity overcomes all
opposition of many/one with Multiplicity (real distinction,
ontologically singular).
The Immanence
of Univocity
(2003) The immanence of Univocity shows us that Individuals are
not separate forms or Subjects. What is the life of immanence
where there are no ‘individuals’ of the kind in
Representational thinking?
Force Relations
(2003) Ideas are the sub-representative internal relation of
difference without a concept. Ideas must not be confused with
concepts.
Transcendental
Empiricism
(2003) Deleuze’s Transcendental Empiricism is not to be
confused with Representational Transcendentalism or Empiricism
which trace conditions from the possibility of the concept.
Expressive Univocity
(2003) Univocity is not a correspondence of an object of
perception with a conceptual form of Representation. It is the
expression of an internal understanding that precedes all
representation.
Ethics and
Common Notions
(2003) Deleuze-Spinoza’s Univocity is an ethics of
difference. It is not a metaphysics of moral generality.
Logic of Sense
(2005) Univocity is the expressive logic of sense. It is not to
be confused with the Representational logic of signification.
Bergson and Univocity
(2005) I will try to make the case that Bergsonism is consistent
with Deleuze’s Univocity. So, why does Deleuze never apply
the term ‘Univocity’ to Bergson’s thought?
The Empty Form of
Time---Eternal Return
(2003) With Univocity, the empty form is not merely empty of
empirical content. It is also empty and without concept. It is
pure order. It is the Eternal Return, the third synthesis of
Univocity.
Nietzsche’s
Univocity
(2005) In order to understand Nietzsche’s Univocity, we must
know the active forces that appropriate it.
Deleuze Versus
Hegel
(2005) Representational philosophy (such as that of Hegel)
presents us with a choice: either you will accept difference as
negatively determined, or you will be condemned to the
undifferentiated abyss of black nothingness where there is no
difference at all. Deleuze rejects that alternative.
(2005) I try to show that Deleuze bases his three syntheses on Spinoza’s parallelism. With Spinozist Univocity, disjunction becomes a real synthesis. Univocity opens all the forms. Disjunction becomes all-inclusive.
(2006) We reach real difference only if we reach the virtual forces of intensity. The virtual is actualized in varieties of singularity.
(2008) I attempt to draw Deleuze's diagram of Stoic Univocity. The diagram is not circular, but it is a paradoxical element unfolding in a Mobius strip.
(2009) I compare what Deleuze calls the 'classical conception' of linguistics with his reading of Hjelmslev. I attempt to show why this is an example of Univocity.
(2009) Analogy is equivocal being said of the univocal. Univocity is the reverse. It is univocal being said of the equivocal.
(2010) I compare Deleuze's movement-image (indirect representation of time) with the time-image (direct presentation of time). In the former, spatialized time is subordinate to movement. In the latter, movement becomes subordinate to a transcendental empty form of time.
(2010) I believe that, if we are to understand the machinic model of flows described by Deleuze and Guattari, it is important to understand their reading of Spinoza. Deleuze and Guattari find machinic univocity in Spinoza.
(2010) Univocity is the answer Deleuze and Guattari give to their question 'What is Philosophy?' Whenever philosophy is thought in the image of Representation, it comes into crisis which can only be settled by a relativism of opinions. Deleuze and Guattari reformulate the problem. Univocity is their answer to the crisis of Representational Phiosophy.
Univocity and Structuralism (Part 1)
(2008) There seems to be some ambiguity about Deleuze’s
assessment of Structuralism. How can his Univocity shed
light on this ambiguity?
Univocity and Structuralism (Part 2)
(2010) In Deleuze’s article ‘How
Do We Recognize Structuralism?’ he criticizes the “old
structure” of structuralism and foresees the “new
structure” of univocity. I attempt to address the
confusion that results when Lacan’s disciples project
notions of the old structure into their reading of Deleuze.
Sub-representative Domain (Part 1) Individuation
(2010) We cannot reach Deleuze’s
univocity unless we reach his sub-representative domain of
univocality. Singular individuation is pre-individual.
It is a process beneath the forms and substances of
representation. The plane of representations must always
remain open to its sub-representative transcendental source, not
in negative opposition but in vice-diction.
Sub-representative Domain (Part 2) Deleuze-Spinoza
(2010) Deleuze’s univocity must include
the sub-representative domain if it is to reach real difference.
I believe we can best understand this through Deleuze’s
Spinozism. Difference is modal, not substantial. To
reach this modal difference, we must reach the sub-representative
plane that Deleuze finds in Spinoza.
Sub-representative Domain (Part 3) Perspectivism
(2010) Deleuze’s perspectivism is the
truth of the relative, not the relativity of truth. But we
can reach this perspectivism only if we reach Deleuze’s
sub-representative plane of univocality. I explore the
example of two critics of Deleuze, Badiou and Hallward, to ask if
they are reaching his perspective.
Sub-representative Domain (Part 4) Intensity
(2011) Intensity is pure difference in itself. But we cannot reach this difference if we are still thinking in terms of concepts bound by extensive relations. We must reach a sub-representative domain of intensity.
(2011) Consciousness is a double of something. Deleuze’s reading of Foucault’s univocity shows that ‘consciousness’ is a ‘statement’ where a prior doubling makes it flush with the real. ‘Consciousness’ as a statement is said in one sense. But ‘consciousness’ has real difference on different historical strata (e.g. the stratum of phenomenological intentionality or the stratum of univocity).
Genesis: Ontological and Logical
(2012) It is a serious, yet common, misunderstanding of Deleuze's univocity to assume that it describes a simple correspondence between the singularity of the individual and the generality of the logical proposition.
(2012) Hyppolite credits Hegel with the insight that philosophy must be an ontology of sense. However, Deleuze notices a problem that Hyppolites's Hegelian bias won't permit him to see --- a problem that prevents both Hyppolite and Hegel from reching an ontology of sense.
Numerical and Real Distinction
(2012) Deleuze’s Spinozist univocity is offered as a solution to the problems of Representational philosophy. But it is not simple to reach the real distinction of Deleuze’s sub-representative virtual. In this article, I try to make the case that Deleuze’s univocity is really different from the Representational interpretations that are so prevalent. I contend that commentary on Deleuze never escapes Representational Thinking because it still confuses numerical distinction of substances for real distinction.
(2013) This article is in response to those who accuse Deleuze of being an "intellectual imposter" of postmodern relativism. In particular, this is in response to 'Fashionable Nonsense' by Alan Sokal and Jean Bricmont; and 'Postmodernism Disrobed' by Richard Dawkins.
BOOK REVIEWS:
Widder’s
Genealogies of Difference
(2003) Nathan Widder remains in Representational thought. He does
not reach Deleuze’s Univocity.
Levi Bryant’s ‘Difference and Givenness’
(2011) ‘Difference and Givenness’, by Levi Bryant is a traditionally strucutralist reading of Deleuze. He believes that we can reach an understanding of Deleuze by way of the structural relations of structuralism. However, I see Deleuze as going beyond traditional structuralism in order to reach a more truly anti-essentialist structure.
Zizek’s ‘Organs Without Bodies’
(2012) Zizek’s structural relations of elements (organs without bodies) prevent him from reaching Deleuze’s intensive forces of difference (bodies without organs). As long as Deleuze is read from a classical perspective, a Unifying One-ness will be the only possible way to understand him. However, once we finally reach Deleuze’s plane of univocity, we can see that Deleuze’s forces never approach Univeralizing Unity. Deleuze says that univocity is the only ontology of immanence, because it is not a unifying theology of transcendence.