Alenka Zupančič (born 1 April 1966) is a

Slovenia Slovenia, officially the Republic of Slovenia, is a country in Central Europe. It borders Italy to the west, Austria to the north, Hungary to the northeast, Croatia to the south and southeast, and a short (46.6 km) coastline within the Adriati ...

philosopher Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...

whose work focuses on

psychoanalysis PsychoanalysisFrom Greek language, Greek: and is a set of theories and techniques of research to discover unconscious mind, unconscious processes and their influence on conscious mind, conscious thought, emotion and behaviour. Based on The Inte ...

and

continental philosophy Continental philosophy is a group of philosophies prominent in 20th-century continental Europe that derive from a broadly Kantianism, Kantian tradition.Continental philosophers usually identify such conditions with the transcendental subject or ...

. She is a Slovenian psychoanalytic theorist and philosopher who along with

Mladen Dolar Mladen Dolar (born 29 January 1951) is a Slovene philosopher, psychoanalyst, cultural theorist and film critic. Biography Dolar was born in Maribor as the son of the literary critic Jaro Dolar. In 1978 he graduated in Philosophy and French l ...

and

Slavoj Žižek Slavoj Žižek ( ; ; born 21 March 1949) is a Slovenian Marxist philosopher, cultural theorist and public intellectual. He is the international director of the Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities at the University of London, Global Distin ...

have in large measure been responsible for the popularity in North America (and Europe) of a politically infused

Lacanian psychoanalysis Lacanianism or Lacanian psychoanalysis is a theoretical system initiated by the work of Jacques Lacan from the 1950s to the 1980s. It is a theoretical approach that attempts to explain the mind, behaviour, and culture through a structuralism, str ...

Academics and work

Born in

Ljubljana {{Infobox settlement , name = Ljubljana , official_name = , settlement_type = Capital city , image_skyline = {{multiple image , border = infobox , perrow = 1/2/2/1 , total_widt ...

, Zupančič graduated from the

University of Ljubljana The University of Ljubljana (, , ), abbreviated UL, is the oldest and largest university in Slovenia. It has approximately 38,000 enrolled students. The university has 23 faculties and three art academies with approximately 4,000 teaching and re ...

in 1990 and received her doctorate in 1995 with a dissertation titled ''Dejanje in zakon, nezavedno in pojem''. Zupančič went on to receive a second doctorate from the Université Paris VIII under

Alain Badiou Alain Badiou (; ; born 17 January 1937) is a French philosopher, formerly chair of Philosophy at the École normale supérieure (ENS) and founder of the faculty of Philosophy of the Université de Paris VIII with Gilles Deleuze, Michel Foucault ...

in 1997. She is currently a full-time researcher at the Institute of Philosophy of the

Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts The Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts ( (SAZU)) is the national academy of Slovenia, which encompasses science and the arts and brings together the top Slovene researchers and artists as members of the academy. Cultural significance Establis ...

and a visiting professor at the

European Graduate School The European Graduate School (EGS) is a private graduate school that operates in two locations: Saas-Fee, Switzerland, and Valletta, Malta. History It was founded in 1994 in Saas-Fee, Switzerland by the Swiss scientist, artist, and therapist, ...

.Alenka Zupančič
Faculty page at

. Biography and bibliography. Accessed: May 1, 2010. Zupančič belongs to the

Ljubljana School of Psychoanalysis Ljubljana school of psychoanalysis ( or ), also known as the Ljubljana Lacanian School (), is a popular name for a school of thought centred on the Society for Theoretical Psychoanalysis based in Ljubljana, Slovenia. Philosophers related to Scho ...

, which is known for its predominantly

Lacanian Jacques Marie Émile Lacan (, ; ; 13 April 1901 – 9 September 1981) was a French psychoanalyst and psychiatrist. Described as "the most controversial psycho-analyst since Freud", Lacan gave yearly seminars in Paris, from 1953 to 1981, and ...

foundations. Her philosophy is strongly influenced by Slovenian Lacanian scholars, especially

and

. Zupančič has written on several topics including

ethics Ethics is the philosophy, philosophical study of Morality, moral phenomena. Also called moral philosophy, it investigates Normativity, normative questions about what people ought to do or which behavior is morally right. Its main branches inclu ...

literature Literature is any collection of Writing, written work, but it is also used more narrowly for writings specifically considered to be an art form, especially novels, Play (theatre), plays, and poetry, poems. It includes both print and Electroni ...

comedy Comedy is a genre of dramatic works intended to be humorous or amusing by inducing laughter, especially in theatre, film, stand-up comedy, television, radio, books, or any other entertainment medium. Origins Comedy originated in ancient Greec ...

, and

love Love is a feeling of strong attraction and emotional attachment (psychology), attachment to a person, animal, or thing. It is expressed in many forms, encompassing a range of strong and positive emotional and mental states, from the most su ...

. She is most renowned as a

Nietzsche Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (15 October 1844 – 25 August 1900) was a German philosopher. He began his career as a classical philologist, turning to philosophy early in his academic career. In 1869, aged 24, Nietzsche became the youngest pro ...

scholar, but

Immanuel Kant Immanuel Kant (born Emanuel Kant; 22 April 1724 – 12 February 1804) was a German Philosophy, philosopher and one of the central Age of Enlightenment, Enlightenment thinkers. Born in Königsberg, Kant's comprehensive and systematic works ...

Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (27 August 1770 – 14 November 1831) was a 19th-century German idealist. His influence extends across a wide range of topics from metaphysical issues in epistemology and ontology, to political philosophy and t ...

Henri Bergson Henri-Louis Bergson (; ; 18 October 1859 – 4 January 1941) was a French philosopher who was influential in the traditions of analytic philosophy and continental philosophy, especially during the first half of the 20th century until the S ...

and

are also referenced in her work. She has many videos on

YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

where she talks about her work and the topics. She has also a

Facebook page Facebook is a social-network service website launched on February 4, 2004, by Mark Zuckerberg. The following is a list of software and technology features that can be found on the Facebook website and mobile app and are available to users of ...

. There are videos of her and her lectures on the European Graduate School website. She has 242 works in 305 publications in 6 languages and 3,558 library holdings.

Bibliography

Alenka Zupančič EGS Faculty Page (Biography & Works)

References

External links

Alenka Zupančič
Faculty page at

. Biography and bibliography.
Alenka Zupančič
Profile at the

. Biography and bibliography. * Steven Michels
'Nietzsche, Interrupted: A review of Alenka Zupancic, The Shortest Shadow: Nietzsche's Philosophy of the Two'
In: Lacan.com. * Adam Atkinson
The Odd One In: On Comedy by Alenka Zupančič.
In: Media Culture Reviews. 1966 births Living people University of Ljubljana alumni Academic staff of the University of Ljubljana Academic staff of European Graduate School Slovenian women philosophers Slovenian expatriates in Switzerland Continental philosophers 21st-century Slovenian philosophers {{philosopher-stub