Jonathan Basile
@jonothingeb.bsky.social
Postdoc at UofT, Institute for Hist & Phil of Sci & Tech, 20th C literature and science, viruses, evolutionary theory, deconstruction, libraryofbabel.info. Author: Virality Vitality (https://sunypress.edu/Books/V/Virality-Vitality)
Pinned
This little pathogen I’ve created now has a life of its own. Virality Vitality, on the subterfuges of reproduction and contagion, has just been published!
Unfortunately, only in hardcover for the time being (sunypress.edu/Books/V/Vira...); if you’d like to read it just get in touch!
Unfortunately, only in hardcover for the time being (sunypress.edu/Books/V/Vira...); if you’d like to read it just get in touch!
Really a fantastic overview of literary criticism, the university, and a lot of other things today
Long overdue, "Criticism LTD" has a stand-alone webpage with working links to every episode bibliography, etc.
Criticism LTD (2023-2024)
Apple Podcasts Season Link Criticism LTD. Trailer (July 26, 2023) A first look at the eighth season of The American Vandal Podcast, an assessment of the contemporary state of literary criticism and…
mattseybold.com
October 27, 2025 at 10:30 PM
Really a fantastic overview of literary criticism, the university, and a lot of other things today
These cuts, and similar ones at Columbia and U of Chicago, are transparently union busting tactics (using the Trump administration as an excuse to do what they already wanted to do)
Wow. Harvard nuking its PhD programs
- Science PhD admissions reduced by more than 75%
- Arts & Humanities reduced by about 60%
- Social Sciences by 50–70%
- History by 60%
- Biology by 75%
- The German department will lose all PhD seats
- Sociology from six PhD students to zero
- Science PhD admissions reduced by more than 75%
- Arts & Humanities reduced by about 60%
- Social Sciences by 50–70%
- History by 60%
- Biology by 75%
- The German department will lose all PhD seats
- Sociology from six PhD students to zero
Harvard FAS Cuts Ph.D. Seats By More Than Half Across Next Two Admissions Cycles | News | The Harvard Crimson
The Faculty of Arts and Sciences slashed the number of Ph.D. student admissions slots for the Science division by more than 75 percent and for the Arts & Humanities division by about 60 percent for th...
www.thecrimson.com
October 21, 2025 at 10:03 PM
These cuts, and similar ones at Columbia and U of Chicago, are transparently union busting tactics (using the Trump administration as an excuse to do what they already wanted to do)
Reposted by Jonathan Basile
Thanks to American Campus, the podcast about the history of higher education, for featuring my book. We talk about how NPR and PBS emerged from equal access to education discourses. And how Media Studies originated as a strategy of public media activism.
How universities created NPR and PBS with Josh Shepperd - American Campus Podcast
How public universities gave rise to public mediaReferences and suggested readings:Josh Shepperd. 2023. Shadow of the New Deal: The Victory of Public Broadcasting. University of Illinois Press.Laura G...
americancampuspodcast.buzzsprout.com
October 13, 2025 at 2:26 PM
Thanks to American Campus, the podcast about the history of higher education, for featuring my book. We talk about how NPR and PBS emerged from equal access to education discourses. And how Media Studies originated as a strategy of public media activism.
I’ll be speaking in 5 minutes :)
Our conference on Dialectical Biology, the Marxist tradition represented by the work of Richard Lewontin, is this weekend! Join us Friday to Sunday, online or in Toronto, register here: ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...
Help spread the word if you can!
Help spread the word if you can!
October 11, 2025 at 6:47 PM
I’ll be speaking in 5 minutes :)
Rasmus Winther is talking now! Join us on zoom for an exciting day of dialectical biology!
Our conference on Dialectical Biology, the Marxist tradition represented by the work of Richard Lewontin, is this weekend! Join us Friday to Sunday, online or in Toronto, register here: ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...
Help spread the word if you can!
Help spread the word if you can!
October 11, 2025 at 1:07 PM
Rasmus Winther is talking now! Join us on zoom for an exciting day of dialectical biology!
I’m doing the hand symbol for dialectics
The "Dialectical Biology Today" Conference is...Today! Here's @jonothingeb.bsky.social welcoming participants to this gathering considering the legacies of Richard Lewontin. 🌱🐋 @ihpst-uoft.bsky.social
You can see the schedule & join on Zoom here! ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...
You can see the schedule & join on Zoom here! ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...
October 11, 2025 at 2:20 AM
I’m doing the hand symbol for dialectics
Our conference on Richard Lewontin is starting today! Come join us on zoom (register here: ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...) or in person if you're in Toronto!
October 10, 2025 at 2:06 PM
Our conference on Richard Lewontin is starting today! Come join us on zoom (register here: ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...) or in person if you're in Toronto!
I went apple picking last week. This fruit has levels that the supermarket just isn't capturing
October 9, 2025 at 2:52 AM
I went apple picking last week. This fruit has levels that the supermarket just isn't capturing
Our conference on Dialectical Biology, the Marxist tradition represented by the work of Richard Lewontin, is this weekend! Join us Friday to Sunday, online or in Toronto, register here: ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...
Help spread the word if you can!
Help spread the word if you can!
October 7, 2025 at 6:27 PM
Our conference on Dialectical Biology, the Marxist tradition represented by the work of Richard Lewontin, is this weekend! Join us Friday to Sunday, online or in Toronto, register here: ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...
Help spread the word if you can!
Help spread the word if you can!
I’m enormously grateful to Ian James, who has written the first review of my book, Virality Vitality. It’s an honor to be read so carefully and generously:
olrsupplement.com/2025/10/06/v...
olrsupplement.com/2025/10/06/v...
![Overall, then, Basile’s book deserves recognition as a major contribution to the contemporary literature of biodeconstruction. But it is also exemplary of the manner in which biodeconstruction can intervene in an original and important way within the philosophical or conceptual fundamentals of biological theory and the ethics and politics of biological practice. There are, no doubt, many biologists who wish to turn to philosophy and the work of philosophers to better understand the implications and wider importance of their work. This may particularly be so in areas where there is so much dogmatic doctrine and economic interest at play. In this context, the biodeconstructive work of Basile and that of others, like Vitale, deserves to be read. One also gets the sense, reading Virality Vitality, of the ongoing importance of Derrida’s legacy and of the way in which this legacy can offer a useful corrective to some of the tendencies within philosophy in the wake of postmodernism and in the context of the so-called ‘ontological turn’. Similarly, the inventiveness of Basile’s book reminds us that Derrida’s legacy needs to remain open and not restricted by attempts to ensure forms of fidelity to a body of thought that has always questioned the terms in which any gesture of fidelity might first be judged. Thus, Basile’s work should, arguably, be allied, not just with those works that form the emergent canon of biodeconstruction, but also with a range of recent and contemporary work that situates itself with the domain of the life sciences and that inherits more broadly from the post-deconstructive moment. There is a wider field here that also places a key emphasis upon something like the reading and interpretation of life, upon ‘natural lection’, rather than seeking new forms of ontological ground.[8] The open, plural, and above all ceaselessly inventive recasting of Derridean thought, such as one finds in Basile’s book, offers no better way of securing its legacy in both t…](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:ykogj6vcfefcnbu4mpjz64bb/bafkreifmdxnu24rgxav6fxnhcfd5rxaxuh7zglamlsqhpmgdjfja7nv2oe@jpeg)
October 6, 2025 at 12:54 PM
I’m enormously grateful to Ian James, who has written the first review of my book, Virality Vitality. It’s an honor to be read so carefully and generously:
olrsupplement.com/2025/10/06/v...
olrsupplement.com/2025/10/06/v...
Virality Vitality is now a paperback! Discount code: SNPF25.
How do viral phenomena undermine basic concepts of the life sciences and philosophy, including the body, immunity, self-reproduction, and species? How does this affect synthetic biology’s attempts to control life?
How do viral phenomena undermine basic concepts of the life sciences and philosophy, including the body, immunity, self-reproduction, and species? How does this affect synthetic biology’s attempts to control life?
This little pathogen I’ve created now has a life of its own. Virality Vitality, on the subterfuges of reproduction and contagion, has just been published!
Unfortunately, only in hardcover for the time being (sunypress.edu/Books/V/Vira...); if you’d like to read it just get in touch!
Unfortunately, only in hardcover for the time being (sunypress.edu/Books/V/Vira...); if you’d like to read it just get in touch!
October 2, 2025 at 2:25 PM
Virality Vitality is now a paperback! Discount code: SNPF25.
How do viral phenomena undermine basic concepts of the life sciences and philosophy, including the body, immunity, self-reproduction, and species? How does this affect synthetic biology’s attempts to control life?
How do viral phenomena undermine basic concepts of the life sciences and philosophy, including the body, immunity, self-reproduction, and species? How does this affect synthetic biology’s attempts to control life?
Abstracts of the talks are now online: ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...
October 1, 2025 at 2:23 PM
Abstracts of the talks are now online: ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...
Reposted by Jonathan Basile
Join us in commemorating 40 years of groundbreaking biological insights from October 10-12. Participate at the Goldring Student Centre or virtually to honour the contributions of evolutionary biologist Richard Lewontin. Find more details here: ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...
September 22, 2025 at 1:02 PM
Join us in commemorating 40 years of groundbreaking biological insights from October 10-12. Participate at the Goldring Student Centre or virtually to honour the contributions of evolutionary biologist Richard Lewontin. Find more details here: ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...
"Despite the university requiring students to undergo the training, the Trump administration still cut $790m in research funding."
September 30, 2025 at 4:05 AM
"Despite the university requiring students to undergo the training, the Trump administration still cut $790m in research funding."
Reposted by Jonathan Basile
Dialectical Biology Today: Legacies of Richard Lewontin
A hybrid conference bringing together voices old and new to revisit how The Dialectical Biologist still resonates, and reinvigorates, contemporary biology
www.dialecticalsystems.eu/events/diale...
A hybrid conference bringing together voices old and new to revisit how The Dialectical Biologist still resonates, and reinvigorates, contemporary biology
www.dialecticalsystems.eu/events/diale...
September 26, 2025 at 8:59 AM
Dialectical Biology Today: Legacies of Richard Lewontin
A hybrid conference bringing together voices old and new to revisit how The Dialectical Biologist still resonates, and reinvigorates, contemporary biology
www.dialecticalsystems.eu/events/diale...
A hybrid conference bringing together voices old and new to revisit how The Dialectical Biologist still resonates, and reinvigorates, contemporary biology
www.dialecticalsystems.eu/events/diale...
Reposted by Jonathan Basile
I’m excited to be part of this hybrid event celebrating Richard Lewontin’s legacy from October 10-12. I’ll be presenting a talk titled “Dialectical Biology as Ideology Critique” on Saturday morning. You can register for the Zoom link and see the program here: ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...
September 26, 2025 at 7:54 PM
I’m excited to be part of this hybrid event celebrating Richard Lewontin’s legacy from October 10-12. I’ll be presenting a talk titled “Dialectical Biology as Ideology Critique” on Saturday morning. You can register for the Zoom link and see the program here: ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...
Reposted by Jonathan Basile
I wrote a piece for the Oxford Literary Review's online supplement on the cultural significance of darkness and how our relationship to the night has changed in modern times—from theology and poetry to the Copernican Revolution and the proliferation of light pollution in the contemporary world.
A special autumnal equinox edition of The OLR Supplement: @hantologique.bsky.social on darkness and the night sky, from St. John of the Cross and the Tao Te Ching to Pascal, Trakl, and contemporary science and technology - What has "Enlightenment" cost us? olrsupplement.com/2025/09/22/p...
Plus de lumière: A Few Words on Darkness - The OLR Supplement
For the Autumnal Equinox, a reflection on the night sky, the stars and their disappearance in religion, poetry, philosophy, science, and technology
olrsupplement.com
September 24, 2025 at 1:42 PM
I wrote a piece for the Oxford Literary Review's online supplement on the cultural significance of darkness and how our relationship to the night has changed in modern times—from theology and poetry to the Copernican Revolution and the proliferation of light pollution in the contemporary world.
We now have this nifty flier for our upcoming conference on Marxist biology - please help spread the word!
(registration including for zoom link here: ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...)
(registration including for zoom link here: ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...)
September 23, 2025 at 5:23 PM
We now have this nifty flier for our upcoming conference on Marxist biology - please help spread the word!
(registration including for zoom link here: ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...)
(registration including for zoom link here: ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...)
A special autumnal equinox edition of The OLR Supplement: @hantologique.bsky.social on darkness and the night sky, from St. John of the Cross and the Tao Te Ching to Pascal, Trakl, and contemporary science and technology - What has "Enlightenment" cost us? olrsupplement.com/2025/09/22/p...
Plus de lumière: A Few Words on Darkness - The OLR Supplement
For the Autumnal Equinox, a reflection on the night sky, the stars and their disappearance in religion, poetry, philosophy, science, and technology
olrsupplement.com
September 22, 2025 at 2:30 PM
A special autumnal equinox edition of The OLR Supplement: @hantologique.bsky.social on darkness and the night sky, from St. John of the Cross and the Tao Te Ching to Pascal, Trakl, and contemporary science and technology - What has "Enlightenment" cost us? olrsupplement.com/2025/09/22/p...
Reposted by Jonathan Basile
An upcoming conference highlighting the legacy of Marxist biologist Richard Lewontin. Speakers such as Sonia Sultan and Alejandro Fábregas-Tejeda. Worth checking out for those with an interest in ecological-development and niche construction.
I'm excited to share with you all a conference I'm planning Oct. 10-12: Dialectical Biology Today: Legacies of Richard Lewontin.
It will be hybrid in Toronto and on zoom, so please join us however you can! Register for zoom link here: ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...
It will be hybrid in Toronto and on zoom, so please join us however you can! Register for zoom link here: ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...
September 21, 2025 at 7:47 PM
An upcoming conference highlighting the legacy of Marxist biologist Richard Lewontin. Speakers such as Sonia Sultan and Alejandro Fábregas-Tejeda. Worth checking out for those with an interest in ecological-development and niche construction.
From @auralflaneur.bsky.social - what can Foucault's prison activism and Derrida's anti-Apartheid advocacy tell us about lived experience testimony in the fight to abolish modern day slavery? olrsupplement.com/2025/09/19/l...
Lived Experience Testimony and Engaged Intellectuals - The OLR Supplement
Re-thinks the practice and policy surrounding lived experience testimony, drawing on Foucault and Derrida's activism
olrsupplement.com
September 19, 2025 at 2:23 PM
From @auralflaneur.bsky.social - what can Foucault's prison activism and Derrida's anti-Apartheid advocacy tell us about lived experience testimony in the fight to abolish modern day slavery? olrsupplement.com/2025/09/19/l...
Reposted by Jonathan Basile
An awesome hybrid conference on the legacies of Richard Lewontin is coming to Toronto. Elliott Sober is the keynote! "Dialectical Biology Today" runs from October 10-12. Learn more and register below! #philbio 🐋🌱
@ihpst-uoft.bsky.social
ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...
@ihpst-uoft.bsky.social
ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...
September 19, 2025 at 10:35 AM
An awesome hybrid conference on the legacies of Richard Lewontin is coming to Toronto. Elliott Sober is the keynote! "Dialectical Biology Today" runs from October 10-12. Learn more and register below! #philbio 🐋🌱
@ihpst-uoft.bsky.social
ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...
@ihpst-uoft.bsky.social
ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...
I'm excited to share with you all a conference I'm planning Oct. 10-12: Dialectical Biology Today: Legacies of Richard Lewontin.
It will be hybrid in Toronto and on zoom, so please join us however you can! Register for zoom link here: ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...
It will be hybrid in Toronto and on zoom, so please join us however you can! Register for zoom link here: ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...
September 15, 2025 at 5:35 PM
I'm excited to share with you all a conference I'm planning Oct. 10-12: Dialectical Biology Today: Legacies of Richard Lewontin.
It will be hybrid in Toronto and on zoom, so please join us however you can! Register for zoom link here: ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...
It will be hybrid in Toronto and on zoom, so please join us however you can! Register for zoom link here: ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...
I have a new article out on Kafka! Basically, I argue that Derrida's reading of Before the Law/The Trial recognizes an undecidability that inhabits Benjamin's and Deleuze and Guattari's readings. Let me know if you'd like a copy!
doi.org/10.3366/olr....
doi.org/10.3366/olr....
September 9, 2025 at 5:20 PM
I have a new article out on Kafka! Basically, I argue that Derrida's reading of Before the Law/The Trial recognizes an undecidability that inhabits Benjamin's and Deleuze and Guattari's readings. Let me know if you'd like a copy!
doi.org/10.3366/olr....
doi.org/10.3366/olr....
Reposted by Jonathan Basile
this is such a wonderful interview
I spoke with Peggy Kamuf and Samuel Weber about the place of deconstruction in the 1990s canon wars debates, and its relevance to similar debates taking place today - very excited to share this with you all!
olrsupplement.com/2025/08/28/t...
olrsupplement.com/2025/08/28/t...
The University in Deconstruction, an Interview with Peggy Kamuf and Samuel Weber - The OLR Supplement
Kamuf and Weber reflect on the place of deconstruction in the debates of the canon wars, and its relevance to similar debates taking place today
olrsupplement.com
August 29, 2025 at 6:49 AM
this is such a wonderful interview