Wikipedia

Joseph Cohen (philosopher)

Joseph Cohen (born 12 August 1971 in Montreal) is a French philosopher and associate professor of Contemporary Continental Philosophy at University College Dublin.[1] He works principally on German idealism and phenomenology,[2] as well as on contemporary philosophical thought in a European context.

Joseph Cohen
Born (1971-08-12) August 12, 1971 (age 54)
Montreal, Canada
Education
Alma materYork University
Bernard Bourgeois, Jacques Derrida, Robert Legros
Other advisors
Hans-Georg Gadamer, Reiner Wiehl
Philosophical work
EraContemporary Philosophy
RegionWestern Philosophy
InstitutionsUniversity College Dublin
Main interests
German Idealism, Jewish philosophy, Hermeneutics, History of philosophy, Philosophy of history

Since 2007, he is a founding member and secretary of Irish Phenomenological Circle.[1]

Since 2015, he is a founding member (since 2025, honorary) of Les Rencontres Philosophiques de Monaco.[2]

Education

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In 1994, he obtained a Bachelor of Arts degree in philosophy from York University in Toronto,[3] and the following year, a master's degree in philosophy under the supervision of Bernard Bourgeois at Sorbonne Paris North University (Paris XIII).[a]

In 1996, he earned a postgraduate diploma in the history of philosophy under the supervision of Bernard Bourgeois, and in 1997, he received a second postgraduate diploma in philosophy and epistemology at the École des hautes études en sciences sociales (EHESS) under the joint supervision of Jacques Derrida.

In 2001, under the supervision of Hans-Georg Gadamer and Reiner Wiehl, he joined the Philosophy Seminar at the University of Heidelberg before defending his doctoral thesis in philosophy in 2002, supervised by Robert Legros (University of Caen).[4][5]

In 2003, he became a postdoctoral researcher (fellow) in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Strasbourg II[3] in Alsace, and from 2004 to 2010, he was a program director at the Collège international de philosophie in Paris.

Academic career

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From 2004 to 2010, Cohen served as a program director (Directeur de programme) at the Collège international de philosophie in Paris.[3][1] While at the University of Strasbourg, he founded a research unit for Phenomenology, Hermeneutics, and Deconstruction, from 2003 to 2005 . In June 2004, he coordinated at Strasbourg what would become Jacques Derrida's last lecture in France. He organized a doctoral study day that concluded with what would be the last public dialogue between Jean-Luc Nancy, Philippe Labarthe, and Derrida.[6][7]

In Strasbourg, he also worked within the framework of the Parliament of Philosophers (Strasbourg) where he and Gérard Bensussan organized the colloquium "Heidegger: The Danger and the Promise."

He was a member of the editorial board of the journal Rue Descartes (revue) from 2004 to 2008, of the journal Les Temps modernes (Éditions Gallimard) from 2009 to 2014,[3] and of the journal Cités (revue) from 2010 to 2015.[3] He was also a tenured member of the PHILéPOL research team at Paris Descartes University from 2010 to 2015.[3]

In 2015, he joined with Charlotte Casiraghi, Robert Maggiori, and Raphael Zagury-Orly to become a founding member of Les Rencontres Philosophiques de Monaco.[3] Currently, his position at PhiloMonaco is honorary, as he is listed as Membre fondateur honoraire.[2]

From September 2015 to August 2016, he was a research fellow in philosophy at the Heidelberg Centre for Transcultural Studies (Karl Jaspers Centre) at the University of Heidelberg.

In 2016, he and Zagury-Orly relaunched and revived the Foundation for French Judaism, the Colloquium of French-Speaking Jewish Intellectuals,[8] and then, in 2017, the René Cassin Seminar.

In 2018, Alain Fleischer, Zagury-Orly, and Cohen founded Le Fresnoy National Studio, the interdisciplinary research group "The Coming Human."[3]

In 2020, he founded the "Jewish Thought and Contemporary Philosophy" project at the Newman Centre for the Study of Religions, University College Dublin. This project is the first research and higher education seminar on Jewish thought in Ireland.[9][3]

Cohen is a tenured professor of philosophy at the University College, Dublin.[3][2][10]

He has held numerous visiting professorships across Europe, including the University of Heidelberg,[2][3] Karlsruhe University of Arts and Design,[2] Stuttgart University, Sorbonne University,[b][2][3] Sapienza University of Rome,[2][3] University of Macerata,[3] the University of Poitiers,[2] and University of Sassari.[2]

Philosophical work

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Cohen's research primarily intersects German Idealism[2] (specifically G.W.F. Hegel), 20th-century French philosophy and Post-structuralism, phenomenology,[11] and Jewish philosophy.

His work often analyzes the themes of sacrifice,[12] alterity,[13][14][15] and the spectrality[16] of historical events.

He has co-authored several works and articles exploring the philosophy of history and the concept of justice with philosopher Raphaël Zagury-Orly. For example, in 2006, Cohen and Zagury-Orly collaborated with Jean-Luc Nancy, Jean-François Mattéi, Peter Eli Gordon, Marc Crépon, François Raffoul, Françoise Dastur, Holger Zaborowski, Peter Sloterdijk, Gianni Vattimo, Rodolphe Gasché, Mario Ruggenini, Catherine Malabou, Frédéric Neyrat, Michel Vanni, Dominique Pradelle, Gérard Bensussan,Andrea Potestà, Stéphane Habib, and Samuel Weber on the book Heidegger. Le danger et la promesse.[17]

Cohen and Zagury-Orly have extensively explored the intersection of phenomenology, Western metaphysics, and Jewish thought.[18] Their 2021 book, L'Adversaire privilégié : Heidegger, les juifs et nous, offers a comprehensive reading of the totality of Martin Heidegger's oeuvre rather than focusing solely on his later Black Notebooks.[18][19] They argue that a structural isolation or exclusion of the Jewish figure from the "history of being" can be traced back to the very beginning of Heidegger's career in the early 1920s.[18] Representing a generation of scholars trained within the tradition of French Existential phenomenology, also known as Heideggerianism, Zagury-Orly and Cohen advocate for continuing the rigorous study of controversial canonical figures, arguing that confronting the structural exclusions in their texts is vital toward understanding how Western philosophy constructs the concept of "the other."[18][19][20]

Selected bibliography

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Academic papers

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  • Cohen, J. (2012). Levinas and the Problem of Phenomenology. International Journal of Philosophical Studies, 20(3), 363–374. https://doi.org/10.1080/09672559.2012.699309
  • Cohen, J. (2012). ‘Introduction: Emmanuel Levinas’-From Philosophy to the Other. International Journal of Philosophical Studies, 20(3), 315–317.
  • Cohen, J. (2013). The Call of Philosophy. Journal of the British Society for Phenomenology, 44(1), 45–58. https://doi.org/10.1080/00071773.2013.11006787
  • Cohen, J. (2014). On the Possibility of Sacrifice. International Journal of Philosophical Studies, 22(4), 552–568.
  • Cohen, J. (2017). From the Night, the Spectre. In Unconsciousness Between Phenomenology and Psychoanalysis (pp. 133–140). Cham: Springer International Publishing.
  • Cohen, J. (2023). Futurités de l’être : entre le “mourir” et le “vivre” de l’Autre. Metodo, 10(2), 95–118. https://doi.org/10.19079/metodo.10.2.95
  • Cohen, J. (2026). Levinas, Emmanuel (1905/06–1995). In Encyclopedia of Phenomenology (pp. 1–17). Cham: Springer Nature Switzerland.
  • Cohen, J. (2026). Writing, Sedimentations, Difference. On the Aporology of History. Continental Philosophy Review, 1–18.

Books

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Co-authored works

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Notes

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  1. ↑ Cohen's French Wikipedia page claims that his Master's Degree is from Paris I. Another source, his University College Dublin page, says Paris XIII.
  2. ↑ Paris IV and Paris I according to Cohen's University College Dublin page

References

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  1. 1 2 3 Hines, Andrew (1 July 2012). "Interview with Joseph Cohen". Figure/Ground. Archived from the original on 28 January 2015. Retrieved 5 June 2026.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 "Joseph Cohen". Philo Monaco. Les Rencontres Philosophiques de Monaco. Retrieved 5 June 2026.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 "BIO". About Joseph Cohen. University College Dublin. Retrieved 5 June 2026.
  4. ↑ Cohen, Joseph. "le sacrifice de Hegel". SUDOC. Retrieved 6 June 2026..
  5. ↑ Cohen, Joseph (2002). "Altérité et révélation : le sacrifice de Hegel". Theses.fr (in French). University of Caen. Retrieved 6 June 2026.
  6. ↑ "Dialogue entre Jacques Derrida, Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe et Jean-Luc Nancy". Rue Descartes 2006/2 no. 52 (in French). CAIRN.INFO. 9 June 2024. Archived from the original on 5 June 2026. Retrieved 5 June 2026.
  7. ↑ Derrida, Jacques (June 2004). "Penser à Strasbourg / Jacques Derrida, Jean-Luc Nancy, Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe, Lucien Braun, Martin Heidegger, Francis Guibal, Isabelle Baladine Howald, Jacob Rogozinski, Gérard Bensussan, Joseph Cohen". SUDOC. Retrieved 6 June 2026.
  8. ↑ Nicholson-Weir, Rebecca, and Dara Hill. “Emmanuel Levinas and Jewish Thought: Translating Hebrew into Greek: Editors’ Introduction.” Shofar 26, no. 4 (2008): 1–12. http://www.jstor.org/stable/42944901.
  9. ↑ "Current Research Themes and Projects". Research Themes. Newman Centre for the Study of Religions. 1 January 2022. Archived from the original on 22 December 2022. Retrieved 5 June 2026.
  10. ↑ "Frankly Speaking S5 E9 Dr. Joseph Cohen Professor of Philosophy University College Dublin". YouTube. 11 December 2022. Retrieved 5 June 2026.
  11. ↑ Cohen, J. (2012). Levinas and the Problem of Phenomenology. International Journal of Philosophical Studies, 20(3), 363–374. https://doi.org/10.1080/09672559.2012.699309
  12. ↑ Cohen, J. (2014). On the Possibility of Sacrifice. International Journal of Philosophical Studies, 22(4), 552–568.
  13. ↑ Cohen, J., & Zagury-Orly, R. (2003). Un monster de fidélité.
  14. ↑ Foran, L., & Uljée, R. (Eds.). (2016). Heidegger, Levinas, Derrida: the question of difference. Springer.(Quote: Joseph Cohen and Raphael Zagury-Orly investigate the relation between Derrida’s thinking and the tradition of philosophy...out destroying their absolute alterity.)
  15. ↑ Obrigewitsch, A. Rethinking the Relation between Philosophy and Literature. (Quote: I thank Joseph Cohen as well, for acting as external examiner of the thesis, and even more … of Derrida’s reading in relation to alterity and death shall be elaborated.")
  16. ↑ Cohen, J., & Zagury-Orly, R. (2020). History supposes Justice. Das Questões, 9(1), 43–67. https://doi.org/10.26512/dasquestoes.v9i1.31901.
  17. ↑ Bensussan, Gérard (2006). Heidegger. Le danger et la promesse. Paris: Éditions Kimé. ISBN 9782841743957. Retrieved 6 June 2026.
  18. 1 2 3 4 Raphael Zagury-Orly and Joseph Cohen - Interview - 2019-06-15 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPkRSJtv3bo&t=9s) - European Graduate School Video Lectures. Discussion of their research into the topic begins about 5:00. The Black Notebooks are mentioned at 7:44. About 8:00, Cohen talks about the totality of their research, going back to the beginning of Heidegger's career in the 1920s. About 9:00, Zagury-Orly adds a point about the generational approach to French Heideggerianism. Cohan concludes the discussion by stressing how vital he believes it is to study the controversial texts because without them our understanding of Heideggerianism is incomplete.
  19. 1 2 Lévy, Bernard-Henri (29 January 2015). "Why Read Heidegger?". HuffPost The World Post. Archived from the original on 31 May 2026. Retrieved 31 May 2026.
  20. ↑ Raphael Zagury-Orly and Joseph Cohen - "Heidegger. The Privileged Enemy" - 16 June 2019 - European Graduate School Lectures. Cohen and Zagury read passages from their book here (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EAI1VZYd5C4) and at about 7:00 Zagury-Orly says: "What we have come to know as the Heidegger Affair effects the entirety of his philosophical thought."
  21. ↑ Collection of articles from Yossi Klein Halévi, Bruno Karsenti, Cyril Aslanov, Dany Traum, Daniel Epstein, Joseph Cohen, and finally Raphaël Zagury-Orly. Collectif (2022) La règle du jeu n°68. Grasset. Available at: https://research.ebsco.com/plink/a473c90d-96ca-3597-8122-f1f9fe424b62 (Accessed: 9 June 2026).
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