The Spiral of Thought in the Work of Jacques Rancière

This critical engagement with the thought of Jacques Rancière analyzes the close connection between his style of argumentation and the substance of his arguments around politics and aesthetics. The spiralling logic of Rancière’s writing style and the details of his specific arguments are inextricably linked, I argue. Rancière’s writings deploy a spiralling logic which exploits the power of contradictions and the productivity of ambivalence. Engaging with writings spanning historiography, literature, film and philosophy, the essay reveals how the politics-aesthetics relationship in Rancière’s œuvre demands both a substantive rethink of disciplinary boundaries and of our received understandings of politics and aesthetics.