In my spare time, I take an interest in Political life, cinema and music, as well as health. My weekends are a patchwork of political talk, trips to the cinema and attempts to up the activity rate by swimming, walking and other forms of exercise.
My research interests include Phenomenology, and the History of Technics, Critical Theory and Transcendental Aesthetics. This last provides an account of the arrival of meaning and order in configurations of space and time. While students of particle physics spend enormous amounts of money seeking to split ever smaller particles, and listen deep underground for the echoes of the Big Bang, the sources of human confusion are to be traced in misunderstandings and miscommunications, and in a certain dislocation of individual time from the collective time of daily events.
I am researching these processes as analysed in the writings of Jean-Luc Nancy, with a monograph on the way under the title 'The Return of the Thing: Reading Jean-Luc Nancy'. Jean-Luc Nancy is a French philosopher who taught for many years at the University of Strasbourg. Born in 1940, he is still actively reserchng and publishing, and is to be found commenting on current political and international events. He is a good example of a publc intellectual, for whom the privielge and demand of being a University Professor is to take a view and intervene in relation to key questions of the day.
My next grand project is to come to terms with the output of a radical thinker called Michel Serres who supposes that climate change and information technology have totally transformed how we should think about the classical questions of philosophy.
Teaching is a way of testing the adequacy of current formulations of problems, and of current and historical responses to them. Presenting philosophy to students is always invigorating since they have their own distinctive take on issues and their own requirements for making sense of their own lives and understanding of philosophy. If research work can not be made accessible to students it is not obvious what its point might be.
The texts to be read are difficult; the ideas conveyed by them not self-evident.
Studying for a philosopy degree is an opportunity to get assistance in grappling with both ideas and texts: not just from your teachers but also from similarly motivated peers. The discussion in class is often the best way to find a way into thinking with and through complex ideas which at first look impenetrable or obscure.
The world is made up of complex shifting forces; the ideas and concepts needed to make sense of them are also complex and at first sight difficult to grasp.
I will attempt to put you in a position so you can read the texts and think about the issues for yourself; and then make up your mind what you think of them: whether they help you develop your own understanding and give you a sense of what it takes to do philosophy.
There is also the need to ask how the texts in the history of philosophy sometimes continue and sometimes fail to ddress our issues of today.
It is important to ask in what ways philosophy is still the same as in the time of Plato and Aristotle, and in what ways it has changed ? The inclusion of women in the discussion and writing of philosophical texts to be studied is one major change to be thought about, and the imbalance betweennumbers of texts by men and texts by women as philosophy is taught needs discussion.
HEFCE RAE Panels in Philosophy 2001, 2008
Founder member of the Society for European Philosophy UK (1997); Second President, 2000-2004
Founder member of Editorial Board, Derrida Today Edinburgh University Press (2008)
Editor of New Book Series for Bloomsbury Publishers (2016): Michel Serres and the reinvention of philosophy
Professional Promotions Processes internal and external
Peer review for publishers' ms. and journal articles
Extensive examining for PHD/D.Phil/M.Litt. UK, Canada, Australia
External Examuer undergraduate programs (fourth, fifth, sixth level Dublin City University 2017-2021
Membership of Arts and Humanities Faculty Committees: FRDC, Faculty Ethics Committee etc.
PHD management in Philosophy, gaining AHRC recogntion for the provison at MMU in 2004
MMU delegate on the AHRC NorthWestPathwayDoctoralTrainingProgramme
English, German, French
Philosophy at MMU is unusual in paying strict attention to differences between French and German, English and American trajectories of philosophy in the last century. I was trained in the latter, but did my postgraduate research in the former. MMU gives me the opportunity to continue to work in the gap between. The former is attuned to general questions of cultural transmission and historical specificity; the latter focuses on detailed analysis and questions of pressing moral concern. Students today, in a world in transition, gain much from putting detail and moral urgency back into a wider conceptual, historical context.
Three Words to Sum Up the Course: Context, Detail, Independent Reading.
In the very first sentence or phrase of any piece of language use, there arrive precedents and models. To understand a text message requires practice and familiarity;. In the same way, your teachers seek to give you enough of the required context to appreciate the detail of what is under discussion, and to provide you with the possibility of making progress through independent reading.
Third Year Course: Heidegger and phenomenology: Reading Being and Time
Second Year Course: Phenomenology: Husserl and Michel Henry, Levinas and Simone de Beauvoir.
MA Course: Ethics and Phenomenology: Derrida and Nancy
PHD supervision: phenomenology and aesthetics: the post-Kantian tradtion: Kant, Husserl, and Heidegger, Benjamin, Derrida, and Nancy, feminist philosophical critique.
J. Hodge (2007). Derrida on Time. Routledge.
J. Hodge (1995). Heidegger and Ethics ISBN 0-415-03288-1 hbk ISBN 0-415-09650-2 pbk. London, England and New York, USA: Routledge.
J. Hodge (2019). Adorno and Phenomenology in advance : between Hegel and Husserl. Philosophy Today. 63(2), pp.403-425.
J. Hodge (2014). ‘Provocations and Improvisations concerning reality: the encounters of Jacques Derrida and Jean-Luc Nancy' Derrida Today ISSN 1754-8500 eISSN: 1754-8519. Derrida Today. volume 7(Number 1), pp.79-101.
J. Hodge (2013). Phenomenological futures in dispute: Emmanuel Levinas, Jacques Derrida and Jean-Luc Nancy. South African Journal of Philosophy. 32(4), pp.383-394.
J. Hodge (2011). Philosophy in a time of terror: Kant and Derrida. Women. 22(2-3), pp.204-219.
J. Hodge (2011). Excription at the Edge of Sense: Reading Jean-Luc Nancy. Aesthetic Pathways. 2(1), pp.3-30.
J. Hodge (2010). Otherwise than Ontology: Derrida, Levinas, Heidegger. Derrida Today. 3(1), pp.37-56.
J. Hodge (2007). Derrida's transcendental contraband: Impossible acts. Textual Practice. 21(2), pp.295-312.
J. Hodge (2006). Phenomenologies of faith and hope. Journal of the British Society for Phenomenology. 37(1), pp.37-52.
J. Hodge (2005). Jacques Derrida: 1930-2004 - A critical appreciation. JOURNAL OF THE BRITISH SOCIETY FOR PHENOMENOLOGY. 36(2), pp.121-128.
J. Hodge (2005). Husserl, Freud, a suivre: Derrida on time. Journal of the British Society for Phenomenology. 36(2), pp.188-207.
J. Hodge (2004). Excesses of subtlety: The current reception of Edmund Husserl (Review essay). JOURNAL OF THE BRITISH SOCIETY FOR PHENOMENOLOGY. 35(2), pp.208-213.
J. Hodge (2003). Feminism and Utopia: Irigaray Reading Kant. Women: A Cultural Review. 14(2), pp.195-209.
J. Hodge Goddesses of Destiny. New Nietzsche Studies. 4(3), pp.107-124.
J. Hodge (2002). Why aesthetics might be several. Angelaki - Journal of the Theoretical Humanities. 7(1), pp.53-67.
J. Hodge (2002). Ethics and time - Levinas between Kant and Husserl. DIACRITICS-A REVIEW OF CONTEMPORARY CRITICISM. 32(3-4), pp.107-134.
J. Hodge (1999). Renaming the Law: Derrida and Sexual Difference. Women's Philosophy Review. 20,
J. Hodge (1999). Heideggerian temporalities: Genesis and structure of a thinking of many dimensional time. Research in Phenomenology. 29(1), pp.119-140.
J. Hodge (1998). A small history of the body (contribution to a research project: Time and the body). Angelaki - Journal of the Theoretical Humanities. 3(3), pp.31-43.
J. HODGE (1995). FORGETTING, EUROPE, TRADITION, PHILOSOPHY. JOURNAL OF THE BRITISH SOCIETY FOR PHENOMENOLOGY. 26(3), pp.255-267.
J. HODGE (1994). HEIDEGGER, EARLY AND LATE, THE VANISHING OF THE SUBJECT BETWEEN AMBIGUITY AND DUPLICITY. JOURNAL OF THE BRITISH SOCIETY FOR PHENOMENOLOGY. 25(3), pp.288-301.
J. Hodge (2018). Aesthetics and politics: Between adorno and heidegger. In: The new aestheticism. pp.218-236.
J. Hodge (2015). ‘Sobriety and Intoxication: Benjamin and Heidegger reading Hoelderlin”,. In: Benjamin and Heidegger: Sparks will Fly, SUNY Press: Albany, NY. State University Press of New York, Albany NY,
J. Hodge (2014). On Time, and Temporisation; On temporalisation and history. In: Jacques Derrida. Routledge, pp.103-112.
J. Hodge (2011). Derrida’s Specters: Futurity, Finitude, Forgetting. F. Halsall, J. Jansen, S. Murphy. In: Critical Communities and Aesthetic Practices. Springer,
J. Hodge (2011). Heidegger on the Movement of Nihilism: Virtue and Technology. LP. Hemming, K. Amiridis, B. Costea. In: The Movement of Nihilism. Continuum,
J. Hodge (2010). Queering Hegel; Three Incisions. K. Hutchings, T. Pulkkinen. In: Hegel's Philosophy and Feminist Thought. Palgrave Macmillan,
J. Hodge (2010). Something Unique is Afoot in Europe: Derrida reading Kant. P. Fletcher, A. Bradley. In: The Politics to Come. Continuum,
J. Hodge (2009). Topographies of the Border: rewriting Transcendental Aesthetics. D. Hoens, S. Jottkandt, G. Buelens. In: The Catastrophic Imperative. Palgrave MacMillan,
J. Hodge (2008). Poietic Epistemology: Reading Husserl through Adorno and Heidegger. I. Macdonald, K. Ziarek. In: Adorno and Heidegger. Stanford University Press,
J. Hodge (2007). Derrida’s Transcendental Contraband: Impossible Acts. S. Wortham, A. Weiner. In: Encountering Derrida. Continuum Intl Pub Group,
J. Hodge (2007). Phenomenology to come: reading Derrida elliptically. M. McQuillan. In: The politics of deconstruction. Pluto Pr,
J. Hodge (2005). Authenticity and Apriorism in Husserl’s Logical Investigations. G. Banham. In: Husserl and the Logic of Experience. Palgrave MacMillan,
J. Hodge (2005). The timing of elective affinity: Walter Benjamin’s Strong Aesthetics. AE. Benjamin. In: Walter Benjamin and Art. Continuum,
J. Hodge (2003). Adorno and Heidegger: Between Aesthetics and Politics. JJ. Joughin, S. Malpas. In: The New Aestheticism. Manchester University Press,
J. Hodge (2000). Demonic Nihilism and Philosophical Inheritance. KA. Pearson, D. Morgan. In: Nihilism Now!. Palgrave MacMillan,
J. Hodge (2000). Disjunctive Reading: Heterodoxical Kant" for Jones and Rehberg. A. Rehberg, R. Jones. In: The matter of critique. Clinamen Press Ltd.,
J. Hodge (2000). Forays in Philosophical Feminism: Sexual Difference, Genealogy, Teleology. S. Ahmed, J. Kilby, C. Lury, M. McNeil, M. Mcneil, B. Skeggs. In: Transformations. Routledge,
J. Hodge (2000). The Epistemotopology of the Demon. G. Banham, C. Blake. In: Evil Spirits. Manchester University Press,
J. Hodge (2000). Freedom, Phusis, Techne: thinking the inhuman. S. Brewster. In: Inhuman Reflections. Manchester University Press,
J. Hodge (1994). Habermasian Passion and Nietzschean Contagion. BE. Babich. In: Nietzsche's Philosophy of Science. SUNY Press,
J. Hodge Earth world and the winds of change: Heideggr and Globalisation University of Sussex November 2015. In: pending. Universiyt of Sussex, 3/11/2015.
J. Hodge The Logic of Ectopic Movement: Jean-Luc Nancy and Andre Brink June 2015 Unversity of Portsmouth England. In: pending. Portsmouth, 18/6/2015.
J. Hodge 'The Return of the Thing: psychoanalytical critique in the writings of Jean-Luc Nancy'. In: pending. Athens Greece, 3/3/2015.
J. Hodge (2012). Derrida and Hospitality: Theory and Practice. OXFORD UNIV PRESS
J. Hodge (2008). Unquiet understanding: Gadamer's philosophical hermeneutics. OXFORD UNIV PRESS
J. Hodge (2001). Derrida and the political. JACKSON PUBLISHING & DISTRIBUTION
J. Hodge (2001). Jacques Derrida: Opening lines. JACKSON PUBLISHING & DISTRIBUTION
J. Hodge (1998). Kierkegaard and modern continental philosophy: An introduction. JACKSON PUBLISHING & DISTRIBUTION
J. Hodge (1995). The fate of the new Nietzsche - AnsellPearson,K, Caygill,H. WILEY-BLACKWELL
J. Hodge (1995). Nietzsche, feminism and political theory - Patton,P. WILEY-BLACKWELL
Member of the Husserl Circle, Society for Women in Philosophy, Hegel Society of Great Britain, British Society for Phenomenology, Society for European Philosophy, Society for Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy
Editorial Boards of Aesthetic pathways (APW); Derrida Today; Angelaki: Journal for Theoretical Humanities and the Journal for the British Society for Phenomenology
Member of Common Room, Wolfson College, Association of Senior Members, Somerville College, Oxford