“BAŞLANGIÇ OLSUN DİYE”: ARENDT VE DOĞUMLULUK

Öz

Hannah Arendt'in doğumluluk kavramı, geleneksel olarak Arendt’in Heidegger, Augustine, Benjamin gibi çeşitli düşünürlerle felsefi etkileşiminin sonucunda oluşmuş bir yanıt olarak okunur. Bu makale, Arendt'ın doğumluluk kavramının yeniliğini ve orjinalliğini vurgularken, kavramın basitçe bu felsefi etkilere karşı geliştirilmiş bir yanıta indirgenemeyeceğini savunuyor. Bunun yerine makalede yirminci yüzyılın siyasi deneyimlerinden esinlenen alternatif bir anlayış sunuluyor ve okuyucu Arendt'in doğumsallık deneyimini yerleştirdiği kavramsal çerçeveyi yani totalitarizmin yıkıcı tecrübesini ciddiye almaya teşvik ediliyor. Arendt'e göre doğumluluk başlama ve yeniyi başlatma gücüyle iç içedir. Totaliter rejimler altında yaşanan siyasi izolasyon ve özgürlüğün kaybedilmesi deneyimleri Arendt'e bir karşı teori oluşturmanın gerekliliğini düşündürür. Bir baskı rejimi olarak totaliterlik, eylemi ve çoğulluğu ortadan kaldırmaya çalışırken Arendt de yanıt olarak doğumluluk kavramını geliştirir.

Anahtar Kelimeler

• Hannah Arendt
• Natality
• Totalitarianism
• Action
• Freedom

That there be a beginning”: Arendt and Natality

Öz

ABSTRACT Hannah Arendt’s concept of natality is customarily read as a response to Heidegger’s death-oriented philosophy, a vestige of Arendt’s earlier occupation with Augustine, or a remnant of Arendt’s brush with Jewish messianism by way of Walter Benjamin. This essay argues that the novelty of Arendt’s concept of natality cannot simply be reduced to Heidegger’s or any other philosophical influence. The essay urges the reader to take seriously the historical and political context within which Arendt deploys natality, i.e., the devastating experience of totalitarianism. For Arendt, natality is intertwined with the power to begin and initiate new in the world. The experience of political isolation, superfluousness, and loss of freedom under totalitarian regimes suggest to Arendt the exigency of theorizing a response. Arendt, therefore, formulates natality as a safeguard. Totalitarianism as a regime of oppression seeks to erase action and plurality, and Arendt as a response cements the possibility of human freedom in the irreducible human condition of natality.

Anahtar Kelimeler

• Hannah Arendt
• Natality
• Totalitarianism
• Action
• Freedom

Kaynakça

1. Arendt, H. (1971, October 21). Martin Heidegger at Eighty (A. Hofstadter, Trans.). The New York Review of Books. https://www.nybooks.com/articles/1971/10/21/martin-heidegger-at-eighty/
2. Arendt, H. (1973). The Origins of Totalitarianism (New edition). Harvest Book.
3. Arendt, H. (1977). Between Past and Future: Eight Exercises in Political Thought. Penguin Books.
4. Arendt, H. (1998). The Human Condition (Second Edition). University of Chicago Press.
5. Arendt, H. (2005a). On the Nature of Totalitarianism: An Essay in Understanding. In J. Kohn (Ed.) Essays in Understanding, 1930-1954: Formation, Exile, and Totalitarianism (pp. 328–360). Schocken Books.
6. Arendt, H. (2005b). “What Remains? Language Remains”: A conversation with Günter Gaus. In J. Kohn (Ed.), Essays in Understanding, 1930-1954: Formation, Exile, and Totalitarianism (pp. 1–23). Schocken Books.
7. Benhabib, S. (2003). The Reluctant Modernism of Hannah Arendt (Revised edition). Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.
8. Benjamin, W. (2007). Theses on the Philosophy of History. In H. Zohn (Trans.), Illuminations. Essays and Reflections (pp. 253–264). Schocken Books.

9. Birmingham, P. (2006). Hannah Arendt and Human Rights: The Predicament of Common Responsibility. Indiana University Press.
10. Biss, M. L. (2012). Arendt and the Theological Significance of Natality. Philosophy Compass, 7(11), 762– 771. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1747-9991.2012.00515.x
11. Bowen-Moore, P. (1989). Hannah Arendt’s Philosophy of Natality. Palgrave Macmillan London.
12. Brunkhorst, H. (2001). Equality and Elitism in Arendt. In D. Villa (Ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Hannah Arendt (pp. 178–198). Cambridge University Press.
13. Canovan, M. (1998). Introduction. In H. Arendt, The Human Condition (Second Edition, pp. vii–xx). The University of Chicago Press.
14. Esposito, R. (2008). Bios: Biopolitics and Philosophy (T. Campbell, Trans.; 1st edition). University of Minnesota Press.
15. Esposito, R. (2017). The Origin of the Political: Hannah Arendt or Simone Weil? (V. Binetti & G. Williams, Trans.; 1st edition). Fordham University Press.
16. Gottlieb, S. Y. (2003). Regions of Sorrow: Anxiety and Messianism in Hannah Arendt and W. H. Auden (1st edition). Stanford University Press.
17. Heidegger, M. (1962). Being and Time (J. Macquarrie & E. Robinson, Trans.). Blackwell.
18. Ilhan Demiryol, G. (2018). Arendt and Benjamin: Tradition, Progress and Break with the Past. Journal of the Philosophy of History, 12(1), 142–163. https://doi.org/10.1163/18722636-12341336
19. Kohn, J. (2001). Freedom: The Priority of the Political. In D. Villa (Ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Hannah Arendt (Vols. 113–129). Cambridge University Press.
20. Moyn, S. (2005). Origins of the Other: Emmanuel Levinas Between Revelation and Ethics. Cornell University Press.
21. Totschnig, W. (2017). Arendt’s Notion of Natality. An Attempt at Clarification. Ideas y Valores, 66(165), 328–346. https://doi.org/10.15446/ideasyvalores.v66n165.55202
22. Tsao, R. T. (2002). The Three Phases of Arendt’s Theory of Totalitarianism. Social Research, 69(2), 579– 619.
23. Vatter, M. (2014). The Republic of the Living. Fordham University Press.
24. Villa, D. (1996). Arendt and Heidegger: The Fate of the Political. Princeton University Press.