Skip to Content

Department of Philosophy

Robert Sinnerbrink

BA Sydney, PhD Sydney

After studying medicine, creative writing, film, and philosophy, Robert was awarded his PhD on Hegel, Heidegger, and the Metaphysics of Modernity at the University of Sydney in 2002 (http://hdl.handle.net/2123/5710). During his postgraduate research candidature he spent six months studying at the Humboldt Universität in Berlin. He has taught philosophy at a number of institutions, including the University of Sydney, UTS, UNSW, The College of Fine Arts, and Macquarie University, before joining the Macquarie Department of Philosophy in July 2002.

Robert’s research areas of interest include Continental Philosophy, aesthetics, philosophy of film, critical theory, romanticism, Heidegger, and social philosophy. He has recently been awarded an ARC Discovery Grant (with Dr Lisa Trahair and Dr Gregory Flaxman) on ‘Film as Philosophy: Understanding Cinematic Thinking’, commencing in 2010. He is currently co-writing a new book with Trahair and Flaxman on philosophical approaches to cinematic thinking.

Robert is a former Chair of the Australasian Society for Continental Philosophy (ASCP) and is currently a serving member of the ASCP’s executive committee. He is a book review co-editor for the journal Critical Horizons, has been a member of the Sydney Society for Literature and Aesthetics, the International Association for Philosophy and Literature, and a former co-convenor of the Sydney Seminar for the Arts and Philosophy. He is currently on the editorial board of the journal Film-Philosophy (http://www.film-philosophy.com/index.php/f-p), the editorial advisory board of Parrhesia: A Journal of Critical Philosophy (http://www.parrhesiajournal.org/edboard.html), and the general editorial board of the journal Derrida Today (Edinburgh University Press).

Teaching

Robert currently teaches or has taught the following units:

  • PHL 131 Mind, Meaning and Metaphysics
  • PHL 132 Philosophy, Morality and Society
  • PHL 250 Aesthetics
  • PHL 254 Freedom and Alienation
  • PHL 351 Social Philosophy
  • PHL 356 Contemporary European Philosophy
  • PHL 365 Film and Philosophy
  • Honours Seminars: Contemporary political philosophy and the problem of recognition; Advanced Aesthetics; Heidegger and Nietzsche

Graduate Supervision

  • Paolo Bolanos, Language, Critique, and the Non-Identical: Nietzsche and Adorno on the Ethics of Thinking, PhD (passed July 2010).
  • Emma Robinson, Psychoanalysis, Cinema, and the Cultural Politics of Memory: Nostalgia and the Work of Mourning in Kieslowski's Trois Coleurs Trilogy (passed 2004).
  • Berndt Sellheim, L'absente de tous bouquets: Linguistic Negativity in Martin Heidegger and Maurice Merleau-Ponty, PhD (passed 2008) [co-supervised with Jean-Philippe Deranty].

Current Students

  • Sarah Simpson, PhD candidate (co-supervised with Media), Topic: The Metaphysics of the Screenplay
  • Marco Crespo, MA candidate. Topic: Heidegger and Aristotle
  • Adam Tate, PhD candidate. Topic: The Confrontation between Heidegger and the Tradition
  • Altaf Hossein, PhD candidate. Topic: Nietzsche on Truth

List of publications

Book

New Philosophies of Film: Thinking Images (New York/London: Continuum, 2011) http://www.continuumbooks.com/books/detail.aspx?BookId=158030&SubjectId=1020&Subject2Id=876

Understanding Hegelianism (Chesham: Acumen Press, 2007)

Critique Today (edited with Jean-Philippe Deranty, Nicholas Smith, and Peter Schmiedgen) (Leiden: Brill, 2006)

 

Recognition, Work, Politics: New Directions in French Critical Theory (edited with Jean-Philippe Deranty, Danielle Petherbridge, and John Rundell) (Leiden: Brill, 2007).

Book chapters

“Song of the Earth: Cinematic Romanticism in Malick’s The New World,” in Thomas Deane Tucker and Stuart Kendall (eds), Terrence Malick: Film and Philosophy (London/New York: Continuum, 2011).

“Black Swan: A History of Continental Philosophy in Australia and New Zealand” (co-authored with Matheson Russell) in L. Burns, F. Leigh, S. Gardner, G. Oppy, & N. Trakakis (eds) A History of Australasian Philosophy, (Dordrecht: Springer, forthcoming) [15 000 words].

“Questioning Style,” Andrew Klevan and Alex Clayton (eds), The Language and Style of Film Criticism (London: Routledge, 2011), pp. 38-53.

“Re-Enfranchising Film: Towards a Romantic Film-Philosophy,” Havi Carel and Greg Tuck (eds), New Takes in Film-Philosophy (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011), pp. 25-47.

“Disenfranchising Film? On the Analytic-Cognitivist Turn in Film Theory,” James Williams, Ed Mares, Jack Reynolds, James Chase (eds.), Postanalytic and Metacontinental: Crossing Philosophical Divides (Continuum, 2010), pp. 173-189.

“Hugo Münsterberg” in Felicity Colman (ed.), Film, Theory and Philosophy (Durham: Acumen Publishing, 2009), 20-30.

"Violence, Destruction and Sovereignty: Derrida and Agamben on Benjamin’s 'Critique of Violence'" in A. Benjamin and C. Rice (eds.) Walter Benjamin and the Architecture of Modernity (Melbourne: re.press, 2009), 77-91.

"Power, Recognition, and Care: Honneth's Critique of Poststructuralist Social Philosophy" in D. Petherbridge (ed.) The Critical Theory of Axel Honneth (Leiden/Boston: Brill, forthcoming).

"Terrence Malick's The Thin Red Line and The Question of Heideggerian Cinema" in V. Karalis (ed.) Heidegger and the Aesthetics of Living (Cambridge Scholars Press, 2008), pp. 126-141.

"Sein und Geist: Heidegger's Confrontation with Hegel's Phenomenology" in P. Ashton, T. Nicolacopoulous, and G. Vassilacopoulos (eds.) The Spirit of the Age: Hegel and the Fate of Thinking (Melbourne: Re.press, 2008), pp. 185-204.

"Misrecognition and Moral Injury: Reflections on Honneth and Bernstein" in M. Sharpe, J. Freddi, M. Noonan (eds.), Trauma, Historicity, Philosophy (with Special Essays by Agnes Heller and Gyorgy Markus) (Cambridge Scholars Press, 2007), pp. 282-301.

"Critique, Hope, Power: Contemporary Challenges of Critical Theory" (with Jean-Philippe Deranty and Nicholas H. Smith) in Critique Today (ed. R. Sinnerbrink, J-P. Deranty, N. H. Smith, P. Schmiedgen) (Leiden: Brill, 2006), pp. 1-21.

Recognitive Freedom: Hegel and the Problem of Recognition, in J. Rundell, D. Petherbridge, J. Bryant, J. Hewitt, J. Smith, Contemporary Perspectives in Critical and Social Philosophy (Leiden: Brill, 2004), pp. 271-295.

Violence and Subjectivity: Domination and Subjection in Hegel and Nietzsche? in Anatomies of Violence: An Interdisciplinary Investigation, ed. R. Walker, K. Brass, and J. Byron (Sydney: RIHSS Publications, 2000), pp. 37-50.

Articles

“French Philosophy,” entry in G. Oppy and N.N. Trakakis (eds), A Companion to Philosophy in Australia and New Zealand (Monash University Press, 2011).

“The Australasian Society for Continental Philosophy” (co-authored with Matthew Sharpe) in G. Oppy and N.N. Trakakis (eds), A Companion to Philosophy in Australia and New Zealand (Monash University Press, 2011).

“Critical Theory as Disclosing Critique: A Reponse to Kompridis,” Constellations: An International Journal of Critical and Democratic Theory (2011 forthcoming).

“The Future of Critical Theory? Kompridis on World-Disclosing Critique,” Philosophy and Social Criticism (2011 forthcoming).

“Goodbye Lenin? Žižek on Neo-Liberal Ideology and Post-Marxist Politics”, International Journal of Zizek Studies, vol. 4, no. 2, 2010. Available online at: http://zizekstudies.org/index.php/ijzs/article/view/260/338

“‘Cognitivism Goes to the Movies: Paisley Livingston and Carl Plantinga (eds.), The Routledge Companion to Philosophy and Film; Carl Plantinga, Moving Viewers: American Film and the Spectator’s Experience; Torben Grodal, Embodied Visions: Evolution, Emotion, Culture, and Film” (Review Article), Projections: The Journal for Movies and Mind, Volume 4, Issue 1, Summer 2010, pp. 83-98.

“From Mythic History to Cinematic Poetry: The New World Viewed”, Screening the Past, Issue 26, 2009. Available online at: http://www.latrobe.edu.au/screeningthepast/26/early-europe/the-new-world.html

"Culture Industry Redux: Stiegler and Derrida on Technics and Cultural Politics", Transformations Journal (online), Issue 17, 2009. Available online: http://www.transformationsjournal.org/journal/issue_17/article_05.shtml

"Neo-Liberalism or Neo-Anarchism Yes, Please! A Response to Simon Critchley's Infinitely Demanding", Critical Horizons: A Journal of Philosophy and Social Theory, 10(2), August 2009, pp. 163-179.

"French Philosophy in Australia", entry in Companion to Philosophy in Australasia (Monash ePress, 2009)

"The Australasian Society for Continental Philosophy (ASCP)" (with Matthew Sharpe), entry in Companion to Philosophy in Australasia (Monash ePress, 2009)

"The Hegelian 'Night of the World': Zizek on Subjectivity, Negativity, and Universality", International Journal of Zizek Studies, Special Issue on Zizek and Hegel, vol. 2, no. 2, 2008, pp. 1-21. Available online at: http://www.zizekstudies.org/index.php/ijzs/article/view/136/222

"Time, Affect, and the Brain: Deleuze's Cinematic Aesthetics (Review-article), Film-Philosophy, vol. 12, no. 1, April 2008, pp. 85-96. (Available online at: http://www.film-philosophy.com/2008v12n1/sinnerbrink.pdf

"Sein und Geist: Heidegger's Confrontation with Hegel's Phenomenology" in "Rethinking the Place of Philosophy with Hegel", Special Issue of Cosmos and History: The Journal of Natural and Social Philosophy, vol 3, nos. 2-3, 2007, pp. 132-152. Available online at: http://www.cosmosandhistory.org/index.php/journal/article/view/154/104

"The Politics of the Multiple: On Alain Badiou's Being and Event" in Critical Horizons: A Journal of Philosophy and Social Theory 8(1), August 2007, pp. 96-115.

"Grace and Violence: Questioning Politics and Desire in Lars von Trier's Dogville" in Scan: Journal of Media Arts Culture, vol 4. no.2 August 2007. Available online at: http://scan.net.au/scan/journal/display_synopsis.php?j_id=11

"A Heideggerian Cinema? On Terrence Malick's The Thin Red Line," Film-Philosophy, December 2006, vol. 10, no. 3, pp. 26-37. Available as pdf.

"Ereignis, Technology, Art: Poetic Dwelling in the Later Heidegger," Literature and Aesthetics, vol. 16, no.1, June 2006, pp. 81-94.

"Cinema and its Shadow: Mario Perniola's Art and its Shadow," Film-Philosophy, "Continental Film Philosophy Today," vol. 10. no. 2, September 2006, pp. 31-38. Available as pdf.

"Nomadology or Ideology? Zizek's Critique of Deleuze" in Parrhesia. A Journal of Critical Philosophy, No. 1, July 2006. Available as pdf.

"Deconstructive Justice and the 'Critique of Violence': On Derrida and Benjamin," Social Semiotics, vol. 16. no. 3. September 2006. pp. 485-497.

"From Machenschaft to Biopolitics: A Genealogical Critique of Biopower" in Critical Horizons, November 2005, Vol. 6, Issue 1, pp. 239-265.

"Critique, Hope, Power: Contemporary Challenges of Critical Theory" (co-authored with Jean-Philippe Deranty and Nicholas H. Smith) in Critical Horizons, November 2005, Vol. 6, Issue 1, pp.1-21.

"Cinematic Ideas: David Lynch's Mulholland Drive," Film-Philosophy, Vol. 9. No. 34, June 2005. Available online.

"Recognitive Freedom: Hegel and the Problem of Recognition?" Critical Horizons, Vol. 5, 2004, pp. 271-295.

"Heidegger and the 'End of Art'", Literature and Aesthetics, Vol. 14, No. 1, June 2004, pp. 89-109.

"Hegel and the Mythology of Manys", International Journal of Philosophical Studies, Vol. 11, No. 2, 2003, pp. 235-244.

We Hyperboreans: Platonism and Politics in Heidegger and Nietzsche, Contretemps: an Online Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 3, July 2002. Available online at: http://www.usyd.edu.au/contretemps/3July2002/sinnerbrink.pdf.

Active Slaves and Reactive Masters, Deleuze's Anti-Dialectical Nietzsche, Social Semiotics, Vol. 7, No. 2, 1997, pp. 147-160.

The Cook, The Thief, His Wife, and Her Lover: A Discourse on Disgust, in Film: Matters of Style, special edition of Continuum: The Australian Journal of Culture and Media, ed. Adrian Martin Vol. 5, No. 2, 1990, pp. 352-365. Available online at: http://wwwmcc.murdoch.edu.au/ReadingRoom/5.2/Sinnerbrink.html

 

Reviews

Movies as Mythmaking: Irving Singer, Cinematic Mythmaking (Book Review) (Cambridge, Ma.: The MIT Press, 2008),Film-Philosophy, 14.1m 2010. Available online at: http://www.film-philosophy.com/index.php/f-p/article/view/201/198

David James, Hegel: A Guide for the Perplexed (Book Review) (London/New York: Continuum, 2007) in Bulletin de Litterature hegelienne XVIII, Archives de Philosophie, 2008 forthcoming. See http://www.cairn.info/resume.php?ID_ARTICLE=APHI_722_0367

David James, Hegel’s Philosophy of Right: Subjectivity and Ethical Life (Book Review) (London/New York: Continuum, 2007) in Bulletin de Litterature hegelienne XVIII, Archives de Philosophie, 2008. See http://www.cairn.info/resume.php?ID_ARTICLE=APHI_722_0367

Simon Glendinning, The Idea of Continental Philosophy (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2006) (Book Note), Australasian Journal of Philosophy, vol. 86, no. 4, December 2008, p. 696-697.

Nikolas Kompridis, Philosophical Romanticism (Book Review) (London/New York: Routledge, 2007), in Critical Horizons, vol. 9, no. 1, 2008, pp. 112-120.

"Review Essay: Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Lynch But Were Afraid to Ask Lacan," Todd McGowan, The Impossible David Lynch (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007), in South Atlantic Review, vol. 72, no. 4, Fall 2007, pp. 128-132.

Alison Ross, The Aesthetic Paths of Philosophy: Presentation in Kant, Heidegger, Lacoue-Labarthe, and Nancy (Stanford University Press, 2007) in Parrhesia: A Journal of Critical Philosophy, no 3, 2007. Available online at: http://www.parrhesiajournal.org/parrhesia03/parrhesia03_sinnerbrink.pdf

Daniel Frampton, Filmosophy (London: BFI Press, 2006) in Projections: The Journal for Movies and Mind, volume 1, no. 2, Winter 2007, pp. 109-115.

Elliot L. Jurist, Beyond Hegel and Nietzsche: Philosophy, Culture and Agency (MIT Press, 2002) in "Rethinking the Place of Philosophy with Hegel", Special Issue of Cosmos and History, vol 3, nos. 2-3, 2007, pp. 389-395. Available online at: http://www.cosmosandhistory.org/index.php/journal/article/view/177/133

Nikolas Kompridis, Critique and Disclosure: Critical Theory Between Past and Future (the MIT Press, 2006) in Critical Horizons: A Journal of Philosophy and Social Theory, vol. 8, issue 2, 2007, pp. 266-271

Hegel on Ethics and Politics, ed. Robert B. Pippin and Otfried Hoffe, trans. Nicholas Walker (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), pp. xviii + 340. ISBN 0-521-81814-1 in Bulletin de Litterature hegelienne XV, Archives de Philosophie, 2005 (http://www.archivesdephilo.com/)

'Alice Ormiston, Love and Politics. Re-Interpreting Hegel (Albany: State University of New Press, 2004), pp. ix + 164. ISBN 0-7914-6067-3" in Bulletin de Littérature hegelienne XV, Archives de Philosophie, 2005 (http://www.archivesdephilo.com/)

Rosemary Cowan, Cornel West: The Politics of Redemption (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2003) in The Australian Journal of Political Science, Vol. 40, No. 1, March 2005, p. 163.

"Endings. Questions of Memory in Hegel and Heidegger," Bulletin of the Hegel Society of Great Britain, Vol 47/48, pp. 96-100.

 

Translations

Axel Honneth, "The Irreducibility of Progress: Kant's Account of the Relationship between Morality and History", with Jean-Philippe Deranty, Critical Horizons, 8(1), 2007, pp. 1-17.

Axel Honneth, 'The Work of Negativity: A Psychoanalytical Revisioning of the Theory of Recognition', trans. R. Sinnerbrink, Critical Horizons, vol. 7, no. 1, 2006, pp. 101-111.

Translations of Sinnerbrink Articles

“Idee Cinematiche: Mulholland Drive”, Moviement: Pubblicazione de Cultura Cinematografica, 2009 (http://www.moviementmagazine.com/riviste/lynch/index.html)

“Un cinema Heideggeriano? La sottile linea rossa”, Moviement: Pubblicazione de Cultura Cinematografica, 2009 (http://www.moviementmagazine.com/riviste/malick/index.html)

Multimedia

"What is Film-Philosophy? Round Table, October 12, 2009, University of St Andrews, Scotland", Film-Philosophy, vol. 14, no. 1, 2010:
Participants: Robert Sinnerbrink (Macquarie University), John Mullarkey (University of Dundee), Berys Gaut (University of St Andrews), David Martin-Jones (University of St Andrews), William Brown (University of St Andrews). Available online at: http://www.film-philosophy.com/index.php/f-p/article/view/260/217

Current research

Robert's research interests are in the areas of aesthetics and in particular the philosophy of film, critical theory, contemporary French and German philosophy, romanticism, Heidegger, and social philosophy. He is currently co-authoring a book (with Trahair and Flaxman), which explores philosophical approaches to ‘cinematic thinking’ in the work of a number of contemporary filmmakers.

 

Administrative responsibilities

  • Philosophy Learning & Teaching Convenor
  • Philosophy representative on BSocSci Committee
  • member of Philosophy Honours Committee

Contact details

Location: Building W6A Room 724
Phone: (61 2) 9850 9935
Fax: (61 2) 9850 8892
Email: robert.sinnerbrink@mq.edu.au
Officer hours: Mon 3-4; Thur 2-4; or by appointment

[Back to top]

(last updated: 18/7/11 )

Exercitationem

Visi ut aliquid ex

Ut enim ad minima veniam, quis nostrum exercitationem ullam corporis suscipit laboriosam, nisi ut aliquid ex ea commodi consequatur.

Visi ut aliquid ex

Quis autem vel eum iure reprehenderit qui in ea voluptate velit esse quam nihil molestiae consequatur, vel illum qui dolorem eum fugiat quo voluptas nulla pariatu

Et harum quidem rerum facilis est et expedita distinctio.