Mark Fisher Meets James Hillman: Melancholy, Manic Culture & the End of Capitalist Realism (with Emma Stamm)
What if depression isn’t an illness to cure but a collective mood that reveals the soul of a broken world? In this episode, Mark Fisher meets James Hillman in a conversation that bridges depth psychology and cultural theory, asking how melancholy and mania shape life under late capitalism. Joined by Emma Stamm, we explore the intersections of acid communism and archetypal psychology—from Fisher’s politics of despair to Hillman’s vision of a polytheistic psyche. Together we ask what happens when sadness becomes privatized, and how imagination might restore the collective body of the soul. This is a dialogue on melancholy, manic culture, and the end of capitalist realism—a descent into the psychic undercurrents of our time.Patreon listeners get access to our extended conversation on ritual, weirding, and the rebirth of imagination in an age of digital exhaustion.Emma's Substack: https://elftheory.substack.com/ Emma's Website: https://www.o-culus.com/ Latest Acid Horizon updates at the time of this episode: https://splitinfinities.substack.com/p/acephalous-vintagia-and-new-thresholdsCorrection: Durations Festival is in November (not October) of 2025Support the showSupport the podcast:Current classes at Acid Horizon Research Commons (AHRC): https://www.acidhorizonpodcast.com/ahrc-mainWebsite: https://www.acidhorizonpodcast.com/Linktree: https://linktr.ee/acidhorizonAcid Horizon on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/acidhorizonpodcast Boycott Watkins Media: https://xenogothic.com/2025/03/17/boycott-watkins-statement/ Join The Schizoanalysis Project: https://discord.gg/4WtaXG3QxnSubscribe to us on your favorite podcast: https://pod.link/1512615438Merch: http://www.crit-drip.comSubscribe to us on your favorite podcast platform: https://pod.link/1512615438 LEPHT HAND: https://www.patreon.com/LEPHTHANDHappy Hour at Hippel's (Adam’s blog): https://happyhourathippels.wordpress.comSplit Infinities (Craig’s Substack): https://splitinfinities.substack.com/Music: https://sereptie.bandcamp.com/ and https://thecominginsurrection.bandcamp.com/
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Witness to the Hellfire of Genocide: Wasim Said’s Testament from Gaza
In this episode, we present the work of Wasim Said, a comrade from Gaza who has documented the atrocities they and their people have experienced during the ongoing intensification of Israel's genocidal war on Palestine in his first book "Witness to the Hellfire of Genocide". The logistics and safety of an interview being made near impossible amidst the horrors, we instead read out a text sent to us by Wasim, and talk to Louis Allday from Liberated Texts who helped bring the book to publication. We discuss the nature of Wasim's struggle as a Palestinian man and as an active practitioner of literature as resistance, the dehumanization of genocide, and the way in which Wasim explicitly uses the medium of writing to transform complicity into witness and responsibility in the consciousness of those who receive his testimony and that of the Palestinian people. You can purchase the book at https://1804books.com/products/witness-to-the-hellfire-of-genocide And donate to Wasim's fundraiser at https://chuffed.org/project/141731-hope-in-the-rubble-a-physics-students-journey-from-the-heart-of-gaza . We also encourage you to ask your local bookstore to stock Witness to the Hellfire of Genocide.Support the showSupport the podcast:Current classes at Acid Horizon Research Commons (AHRC): https://www.acidhorizonpodcast.com/ahrc-mainWebsite: https://www.acidhorizonpodcast.com/Linktree: https://linktr.ee/acidhorizonAcid Horizon on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/acidhorizonpodcast Boycott Watkins Media: https://xenogothic.com/2025/03/17/boycott-watkins-statement/ Join The Schizoanalysis Project: https://discord.gg/4WtaXG3QxnSubscribe to us on your favorite podcast: https://pod.link/1512615438Merch: http://www.crit-drip.comSubscribe to us on your favorite podcast platform: https://pod.link/1512615438 LEPHT HAND: https://www.patreon.com/LEPHTHANDHappy Hour at Hippel's (Adam’s blog): https://happyhourathippels.wordpress.comSplit Infinities (Craig’s Substack): https://splitinfinities.substack.com/Music: https://sereptie.bandcamp.com/ and https://thecominginsurrection.bandcamp.com/
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Deleuze vs Hegel: Beyond Kant and Representation with Henry Somers-Hall
What happens when Deleuze and Hegel are set in violent philosophical encounter over the ruins of Kantian representation? In this episode, we explore how both thinkers attempt to move beyond the categories of judgment and identity to recover the genesis of sense itself. Henry Somers-Hall joins us to trace Deleuze’s path through Kant, Sartre, and Bergson toward a field of pre-individual difference and immanent synthesis. What emerges is a portrait of thought that no longer begins with the subject, but with the forces that make thinking possible.Extended Conversation (Patrons Only) In the extended discussion, we turn to the politics of the practical in Kant, Fichte, and Hegel—and ask whether Deleuze’s constructivism truly escapes the metaphysical State. Henry also reflects on what it means to make oneself a body without organs and where he sees the next frontier for Deleuzian thought.Hegel, Deleuze, and the Critique of Representation: Dialectics of Negation and Difference: https://sunypress.edu/Books/H/Hegel-Deleuze-and-the-Critique-of-RepresentationAlso: https://archive.org/details/hegeldeleuzecrit0000someSupport the showSupport the podcast:Current classes at Acid Horizon Research Commons (AHRC): https://www.acidhorizonpodcast.com/ahrc-mainWebsite: https://www.acidhorizonpodcast.com/Linktree: https://linktr.ee/acidhorizonAcid Horizon on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/acidhorizonpodcast Boycott Watkins Media: https://xenogothic.com/2025/03/17/boycott-watkins-statement/ Join The Schizoanalysis Project: https://discord.gg/4WtaXG3QxnSubscribe to us on your favorite podcast: https://pod.link/1512615438Merch: http://www.crit-drip.comSubscribe to us on your favorite podcast platform: https://pod.link/1512615438 LEPHT HAND: https://www.patreon.com/LEPHTHANDHappy Hour at Hippel's (Adam’s blog): https://happyhourathippels.wordpress.comSplit Infinities (Craig’s Substack): https://splitinfinities.substack.com/Music: https://sereptie.bandcamp.com/ and https://thecominginsurrection.bandcamp.com/
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The Politics of Ghosting: Dominic Pettman on Absence, Intimacy, and Digital Life
What does it mean to live in a world where relationships can vanish overnight, without explanation or closure? In this episode, Acid Horizon speaks with cultural theorist Dominic Pettman about his new book Ghosting: On Disappearance (Polity Press). Together we explore how ghosting unsettles intimacy, accountability, and narrative finality, reaching beyond dating apps into friendships, families, workplaces, and politics. Along the way we trace ghosting as both a form of psychic violence and a survival tactic, a symptom of our digitally mediated lives and a mirror of deeper patterns of absence in contemporary culture.Get the book: https://www.politybooks.com/bookdetail?book_slug=ghosting-on-disappearance--9781509569946#:~:text=%E2%80%9CGhosting%3A%20On%20Disappearance%2C%20takes,tend%20to%20no%20longer%20believe.%E2%80%9DDiscount code: GHO20Tickets for Durations Festival 2025: https://dice.fm/bundles/durations-2025-b5eo?dice_id=M7371ecc8865&_branch_match_id=1500447579897861230&utm_source=web&utm_campaign=visit_bundle&utm_medium=bundle&_branch_referrer=H4sIAAAAAAAAA8soKSkottLXz8nMy9ZLyUxO1UvL1fc1NzY3TE1OtrAwM7WvK0pNSy0qysxLj08qyi8vTi2ydc4oys9NBQDPsz4mOwAAAA%3D%3DSupport the showSupport the podcast:Current classes at Acid Horizon Research Commons (AHRC): https://www.acidhorizonpodcast.com/ahrc-mainWebsite: https://www.acidhorizonpodcast.com/Linktree: https://linktr.ee/acidhorizonAcid Horizon on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/acidhorizonpodcast Boycott Watkins Media: https://xenogothic.com/2025/03/17/boycott-watkins-statement/ Join The Schizoanalysis Project: https://discord.gg/4WtaXG3QxnSubscribe to us on your favorite podcast: https://pod.link/1512615438Merch: http://www.crit-drip.comSubscribe to us on your favorite podcast platform: https://pod.link/1512615438 LEPHT HAND: https://www.patreon.com/LEPHTHANDHappy Hour at Hippel's (Adam’s blog): https://happyhourathippels.wordpress.comSplit Infinities (Craig’s Substack): https://splitinfinities.substack.com/Music: https://sereptie.bandcamp.com/ and https://thecominginsurrection.bandcamp.com/
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Western Marxism vs. Stalinism: Domenico Losurdo’s Controversial Legacy with Ross Wolfe
What if the very idea of Western Marxism has less to do with geography than with defeat? In this episode of Acid Horizon, we dive into Domenico Losurdo’s controversial use of the term and ask what’s at stake in his defense of actually existing socialism against its critics. With our guest Ross Wolfe, we explore the tangled afterlives of Western Marxism—from the Frankfurt School to structuralism, from Stalinism to contemporary China. Along the way we confront the uncomfortable question: do today’s neo-Stalinist revivals echo tendencies on the far right as much as they do Marxist traditions? And for those who want to hear the unfiltered debate, join us on Patreon where we take the gloves off to talk publishing beefs, factional battles, and how the “theory industry” really works behind the scenes.Ross' articles: https://newintermag.com/against-losurdo/Support the showSupport the podcast:Current classes at Acid Horizon Research Commons (AHRC): https://www.acidhorizonpodcast.com/ahrc-mainWebsite: https://www.acidhorizonpodcast.com/Linktree: https://linktr.ee/acidhorizonAcid Horizon on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/acidhorizonpodcast Boycott Watkins Media: https://xenogothic.com/2025/03/17/boycott-watkins-statement/ Join The Schizoanalysis Project: https://discord.gg/4WtaXG3QxnSubscribe to us on your favorite podcast: https://pod.link/1512615438Merch: http://www.crit-drip.comSubscribe to us on your favorite podcast platform: https://pod.link/1512615438 LEPHT HAND: https://www.patreon.com/LEPHTHANDHappy Hour at Hippel's (Adam’s blog): https://happyhourathippels.wordpress.comSplit Infinities (Craig’s Substack): https://splitinfinities.substack.com/Music: https://sereptie.bandcamp.com/ and https://thecominginsurrection.bandcamp.com/
Emerging from affinities with post-structuralism, abolitionism, biopolitics, communism, critical metaphysics, critical mysticism, and ontological anarchy, Acid Horizon is a philosophy and theory podcast committed to thought in motion and political struggle. While these are our grounding currents, each episode opens out onto a wider constellation: ethics, politics, phenomenology, decolonial thought, queer theory, post-psychoanalysis, disability/crip theory, anarchism, Marxism, feminism, and analyses of the emergence of the new right.Comprised of a decentralized collective of friends and comrades, Acid Horizon cultivates a terrain of militant inquiry. From readings that span 20th-century French communism to new perspectives on German idealism, the collective has also undertaken forays into aesthetic experimentation, philosophical heresy, and the history of revolt. We seek the concepts and intensities that gesture toward new forms of life.Acid Horizon pushes theory beyond the academy through live engagements, collaborative reading groups, and collective interventions.
Ireland