Peyman Vahabzadeh | University of Victoria (original) (raw)

Papers by Peyman Vahabzadeh

Political Economy Critique - نقد اقتصاد سیاسی, 2024

بخشی از مقدمه‌ی کتاب «برای زمین و فرهنگ: جنبش شورایی ترکمن در ایران، ۱۳۵۷-۱۳۵۸» و گفتگوی وبسایت ... more بخشی از مقدمه‌ی کتاب «برای زمین و فرهنگ: جنبش شورایی ترکمن در ایران، ۱۳۵۷-۱۳۵۸» و گفتگوی وبسایت جدلیه در مورد کتاب

British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies, 2024

An elaborate sting operation by Iranian security (SAVAK) centred on Abbas Shahriyari, an able SAV... more An elaborate sting operation by Iranian security (SAVAK) centred on Abbas Shahriyari, an able SAVAK secret agent and a Tudeh Party member, to entrap underground leftist activists in the 1960s unwittingly unleashed a complex transnational web involving Iranian opposition and Soviet intelligence. The People's Fadai Guerrillas (PFG) eventually assassinated Shahriyari and vastly propagated this operation through an extensive communiqué. The assassination marked the decisive, and highly symbolic, rejection of the legacy of the Tudeh Party by the rising Marxist PFG that came from an entirely younger generation, but it unwittingly also exposed in retrospect the complex web of actors drawn into SAVAK's sting operations. This paper situates this assassination in its historical context and quadrangular web of Tudeh Party, PFG, Soviet intelligence, and SAVAK. It offers a close reading of PFG's extensive communication about this assassination as the break within Iran's communist movement.

Political Economy Critique / نقد اقتصاد سیاسی, 2023

This long paper paper celebrates the life of Italian Philosopher Professor Gianni Vattimo and rem... more This long paper paper celebrates the life of Italian Philosopher Professor Gianni Vattimo and remembers his philosophy in three parts: Postmodernity and weak though; weak belief and Christianity; and hermeneutic communism.

این مقاله به زندگی و فلسفه‌ی پروفسور جانی واتیمو، فیلسوف ایتالیایی می‌پردازد و فلسفه‌ی وی را در سه بخش توضیح می‌دهد: پسامدرنیته و اندیشه‌ی ضعیف؛ باور ضعیف و مسیحیت؛ و کمونیسم هرمنوتیک

نقد اقتصاد سیاسی, 2023

"Event and Movement: A Phenomenological Glance on the Occasion of the First Anniversary of Zhina'... more "Event and Movement: A Phenomenological Glance on the Occasion of the First Anniversary of Zhina's Movement" offers four phenomenological gazes into the world-historical Woman Life Freedom movement in Iran (2022) in its first anniversary. In Persian.

«رخداد و جنبش: نگاهی پدیدارشناسانه در نخستین سالگرد جنبش ژینا»
چهار نگاه پدیدارشناسنانه بر جنبش زن زندگی آزادی را به بهانه‌ی نخستین سالگرد آن ارائه می‌دهد.

The Myth of Middle East Exceptionalism: Unfinished Social Movements (book), 2023

In light of creative resistances of MENA peoples, the Middle East exceptionalism of orientalist o... more In light of creative resistances of MENA peoples, the Middle East exceptionalism of orientalist origins is losing its grounds. Agamben's "state of exception" is met critically to register a few highlights of such resistances: the Green Movement in Iran, the Jasmine Revolution in Tunisia, and the democratic confederalism of Rojava register world-historical exceptions to perceptions of exceptionalism.

In September 2022, I was invited by Unidad Especial de Paz, Universidad de Antioquia in Colombia,... more In September 2022, I was invited by Unidad Especial de Paz, Universidad de Antioquia in Colombia, to deliver 6 public talks and academic lectures on the subjects of violence, nonviolence, peace, and reconciliation in the aftermath of the Peace Accord in 2016 that ended 52 years of civil war. This was a tremendous opportunity to witness how Colombian society is trying to turn the page on its history. My reflections offer a glimpse of the challenges the people are facing and the efforts civil society is making to ensure that Colombia won’t go back.

انسانم آرزوست, 2021

"A Human Is My Desire: About Peyman Vahabzadeh's Works" is written by Iranian scholars Dr. Saeed ... more "A Human Is My Desire: About Peyman Vahabzadeh's Works" is written by Iranian scholars Dr. Saeed Sharifi and Fatemeh Khoshnevisan on my theoretical approach, in particular on my book "Articulated Experiences" (2003) and published in Iran (in Persian). There are two papers here: the "Preface" by Professor Ian Angus and my own "Foreword."

«انسانم آرزوست: پیرامون آثار پیمان وهاب زاده»
کتابی است اثر دکتر سعید شریفی و فاطمه خوشنویسان که به رویکرد نظری من به ویژه در کتاب تجربه‌های بیان شده می‌پردازد. فایل پیوستی شامل پیشگفتار پروفسور ایان انگس و پیش‌واژه‌ی من است که در این کتاب منتشر شده اند.

Iranian Studies, 2021

The emergence and rapid but short-lived presence of Students for Freedom and Equality (SFE; in Pe... more The emergence and rapid but short-lived presence of Students for Freedom and Equality (SFE; in Persian: Daneshjuyan-e Azadikhah va Barabaritalab or DAB) across major Iranian campuses and their fateful 4 December 2007 protest rally on the campus of the University of Tehran speaks of the return of leftist student activism to Iranian campuses after almost two decades of absence or invisibility within the context of post-revolutionary Iran. SFE was an umbrella democratic organization: its activists came from a plurality of social and political backgrounds and adhered to diverse leftist ideas. But in the context of pro-Reform Movement student activism in Iranian post-secondary institutions in the late 1990s and in 2000s, for a short time the SFE tried to hegemonize student activism and challenge the various pro-government tendencies in university campuses. Before state repression forced the SFE out of operation in 2007, Students for Freedom and Equality brought to campuses candid discussions of social justice issues, critique of Iran’s neoliberal economic policies, and challenges to censorship and lack of freedom.

Mapping the Role of Intellectuals in Iranian Modern and Contemporary History, 2020

Mostafa Sho‘aiyan (1935–1976) has remained a singular intellectual and activist within twentieth-... more Mostafa Sho‘aiyan (1935–1976) has remained a singular intellectual and activist within twentieth-century Iranian history. Gone are the long years during which he was relegated to oblivion, as well as the short years later during which yellow journalism tried to appropriate his critical stances for its anti-leftist propaganda. Moreover, Sho‘aiyan can no longer be locked up in the prison house of rigid leftist politics and doctrinal ideology. In fact, my in-depth studies of his life and politics, in particular, my book containing a comprehensive intellectual biography of Sho‘aiyan, show that he transcends the very politics and ideology with which he is being identified. Contrary to yesteryear, Sho‘aiyan can no longer be simply ignored or appropriated, as now he stands within the ranks of the critical intellectuals in the twentieth-century Iran due to recent scholarship on his life and thought.
Sho‘aiyan’s writings are voluminous—over 2,300 pages. He researched and wrote on an impressive range of diverse subjects from poetry and fiction to history, policy analysis, and theory. He introduced a maverick tradition of open letters at the time when secrecy was the most valued characteristic of politics in general and underground activism in particular. After experiment-ing with legal and nonviolent methods in the early 1960s as a way of bring-ing about change in the post-1953 Iran, he chose militant and underground activism, all the while he conducted extensive research and functioned as a freelance and self-didact scholar who would engage with international and national equally. He was indeed an overlooked internationalist but also a global thinker.

Crossing Borders, 2020

If we consider Reiner Schürmann’s “hypothesis of epochal or metaphysical closure”—inspired by Ma... more If we consider Reiner Schürmann’s “hypothesis of epochal or metaphysical
closure”—inspired by Martin Heidegger—as speaking to
the very history that we are living right now in the West, instead of
some esoteric, conceptual plaything for the armchair academic, then
we can revisit the cultural, social, and political processes of our time
in light of the possibility of the changing principles of intelligibility
governing our age—the (changing) principles that spectrally appear to
us primarily through action. It is thus transgressive action that can open new futures.

به یاد دوست (تقدیم به آیرو), 2020

Reflections on the life and poetry of Verya Mazhar (V.M.Airu) بازتاب‌هایی بر زندگی و شعر وریا ... more Reflections on the life and poetry of Verya Mazhar (V.M.Airu)

بازتاب‌هایی بر زندگی و شعر وریا مظهر (و. م. آیرو)

Crossing Borders: Essays in Honour of Ian H. Angus, Beyond Phenomenology and Critique, 2020

Introduction to forthcoming co-edited book, "Crossing Borders: Essays in Honour of Ian H. Angus, ... more Introduction to forthcoming co-edited book, "Crossing Borders: Essays in Honour of Ian H. Angus, Beyond Phenomenology and Critique" (ARP Press, 2020).

une autre vision | La Source | Vol 21, No 2 - 21 janvier au 4 février 2020, 2020

Le 24 janvier se tiendra à SFU une conférence organisée autour du thème de la violence, de son op... more Le 24 janvier se tiendra à SFU une conférence organisée autour du thème de la violence, de son opposé et des souffrances qu'elles entraînent tant chez l'homme que dans la nature. C'est le professeur de sociologie Peyman Vahabzadeh qui s'exprimera sur le sujet, accompagné du professeur émérite des humanités Ian Angus, tous deux de la même université. Éclairage. La Source : Nous savons tous ce qu'est la violence,
mais pouvez-vous nous expliquer ce qu'est la non-violence ? Peyman Vahabzadeh : Ma confession, mon travail et mes recherches démontrent que nous ne savons pas vraiment ce qu'est la violence.

Violence non violence et souffrance necessaire: une autre vision | La Source | Vol 21, No 2 - 21 janvier au 4 février 2020

Objectividad, subjetividad y vida cotidiana: A 50 años de la aparición de La construcción social de la realidad de Peter Berger y Thomas Luckmann, 2019

En los debates en torno a La construcci6n social de la realidad (1966) -obra pionera de Berger y ... more En los debates en torno a La construcci6n social de la realidad
(1966) -obra pionera de Berger y Luckmann, publicada hace
50 aftos y que continua siendo uno de los textos mas populares
en sociologia-, se reconoce en gran parte la veta fenomenol6-
gica de su enfoque. Su trabajo esta vinculado adecuadamente
con el camino abierto por Alfred Schutz, quien merece recibir
creditos por su sociologia fenomenol6gica. Sin embargo,
a menudo se pasa por alto que lo que califica el enfoque de
Berger y Luckmann como un trabajo "fenomenol6gico'' es una
conexi6n oblicua con las raices fenomenol6gicas -de hecho, un
desliz conceptual [conceptual slippage]-. En la medida en que
este capitulo se concentra en los contornos principales de La
construcci6n social de la realidad, abordara una gran preocupaci6n
con respecto al concepto mismo de 'construcci6n social:
al ofrecer una breve genealogia conceptual de la interpretaci6n
sociol6gica de conceptos fenomenol6gicos de Berger y Luckmann,
que muestra las continuidades y rupturas con esta tradici6n.
El documento presenta el trazo de los conceptos clave de
Berger y Luckmann hasta Alfred Schutz y luego hasta Edmund
Husserl. Esta genealogia conceptual no solo aclarara algunos
malentendidos que rodean este importante trabajo y su concepto
central, sino que tambien mostrara que La construcci6n
social de la realidad contiene un desliz conceptual que explica
de manera interesante su popularidad.

Bizhan Jazani: en route to a democratic theory of the liberation front, 2019

Persian translation of Chapter 3 of "A Guerrilla Odyssey" on the theories of Iranian Marxist Bizh... more Persian translation of Chapter 3 of "A Guerrilla Odyssey" on the theories of Iranian Marxist Bizhan Jazani (1938-1975).
برگردان فارسی فصل سوم کتاب «اودیسه چریکی» درباره تئوری‌های مارکسیست ایرانی، بیژن جزنی (۱۳۱۶-۱۳۵۴)

بازتاب‌هایی بر بازی فوتبال در سایه‌ی جام جهانی روسیه ۲۰۱۸

The Iranian Exodus has created an unprecedented cultural situation. As a result of the mass emigr... more The Iranian Exodus has created an unprecedented cultural situation. As a result of the mass emigration of Iranians, new Iranian communities have emerged in major urban areas, mostly across North America, Western Europe, and Australia. Iranians have been fleeing the despotism of the Islamic Republic of Iran for various social and/or political reasons. Among those leaving the country are intellectuals, scholars, political dissidents, freelance writers, literary figures, and artists. These immigrants find themselves in an unfamiliar situation. If nothing else, many find it a paramount difficulty for various reasons to communicate with their host cultures. Thanks to new experiences of emigration and resettlement, once solidly molded worldviews become shaken, if not shattered. Thus, many artists revise their past works critically.

The confrontation of Iran's Fadai Guerrillas with Mostafa Shoaiayn is the subject of this Forewor... more The confrontation of Iran's Fadai Guerrillas with Mostafa Shoaiayn is the subject of this Foreword.
رویکرد چریک‌های فدایی به مصطفی شعاعیان موضوع این پیشواژه است

This paper offers an introductory opening to the political theory of Ernesto Laclau and Chantal M... more This paper offers an introductory opening to the political theory of Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe.
این پیشگفتار فشرده و کوتاه درآمدی است بر نظریه‌ی سیاسی ارنستو لاکلاو و شانتل موف

Political Economy Critique - نقد اقتصاد سیاسی, 2024

بخشی از مقدمه‌ی کتاب «برای زمین و فرهنگ: جنبش شورایی ترکمن در ایران، ۱۳۵۷-۱۳۵۸» و گفتگوی وبسایت ... more بخشی از مقدمه‌ی کتاب «برای زمین و فرهنگ: جنبش شورایی ترکمن در ایران، ۱۳۵۷-۱۳۵۸» و گفتگوی وبسایت جدلیه در مورد کتاب

British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies, 2024

An elaborate sting operation by Iranian security (SAVAK) centred on Abbas Shahriyari, an able SAV... more An elaborate sting operation by Iranian security (SAVAK) centred on Abbas Shahriyari, an able SAVAK secret agent and a Tudeh Party member, to entrap underground leftist activists in the 1960s unwittingly unleashed a complex transnational web involving Iranian opposition and Soviet intelligence. The People's Fadai Guerrillas (PFG) eventually assassinated Shahriyari and vastly propagated this operation through an extensive communiqué. The assassination marked the decisive, and highly symbolic, rejection of the legacy of the Tudeh Party by the rising Marxist PFG that came from an entirely younger generation, but it unwittingly also exposed in retrospect the complex web of actors drawn into SAVAK's sting operations. This paper situates this assassination in its historical context and quadrangular web of Tudeh Party, PFG, Soviet intelligence, and SAVAK. It offers a close reading of PFG's extensive communication about this assassination as the break within Iran's communist movement.

Political Economy Critique / نقد اقتصاد سیاسی, 2023

This long paper paper celebrates the life of Italian Philosopher Professor Gianni Vattimo and rem... more This long paper paper celebrates the life of Italian Philosopher Professor Gianni Vattimo and remembers his philosophy in three parts: Postmodernity and weak though; weak belief and Christianity; and hermeneutic communism.

این مقاله به زندگی و فلسفه‌ی پروفسور جانی واتیمو، فیلسوف ایتالیایی می‌پردازد و فلسفه‌ی وی را در سه بخش توضیح می‌دهد: پسامدرنیته و اندیشه‌ی ضعیف؛ باور ضعیف و مسیحیت؛ و کمونیسم هرمنوتیک

نقد اقتصاد سیاسی, 2023

"Event and Movement: A Phenomenological Glance on the Occasion of the First Anniversary of Zhina'... more "Event and Movement: A Phenomenological Glance on the Occasion of the First Anniversary of Zhina's Movement" offers four phenomenological gazes into the world-historical Woman Life Freedom movement in Iran (2022) in its first anniversary. In Persian.

«رخداد و جنبش: نگاهی پدیدارشناسانه در نخستین سالگرد جنبش ژینا»
چهار نگاه پدیدارشناسنانه بر جنبش زن زندگی آزادی را به بهانه‌ی نخستین سالگرد آن ارائه می‌دهد.

The Myth of Middle East Exceptionalism: Unfinished Social Movements (book), 2023

In light of creative resistances of MENA peoples, the Middle East exceptionalism of orientalist o... more In light of creative resistances of MENA peoples, the Middle East exceptionalism of orientalist origins is losing its grounds. Agamben's "state of exception" is met critically to register a few highlights of such resistances: the Green Movement in Iran, the Jasmine Revolution in Tunisia, and the democratic confederalism of Rojava register world-historical exceptions to perceptions of exceptionalism.

In September 2022, I was invited by Unidad Especial de Paz, Universidad de Antioquia in Colombia,... more In September 2022, I was invited by Unidad Especial de Paz, Universidad de Antioquia in Colombia, to deliver 6 public talks and academic lectures on the subjects of violence, nonviolence, peace, and reconciliation in the aftermath of the Peace Accord in 2016 that ended 52 years of civil war. This was a tremendous opportunity to witness how Colombian society is trying to turn the page on its history. My reflections offer a glimpse of the challenges the people are facing and the efforts civil society is making to ensure that Colombia won’t go back.

انسانم آرزوست, 2021

"A Human Is My Desire: About Peyman Vahabzadeh's Works" is written by Iranian scholars Dr. Saeed ... more "A Human Is My Desire: About Peyman Vahabzadeh's Works" is written by Iranian scholars Dr. Saeed Sharifi and Fatemeh Khoshnevisan on my theoretical approach, in particular on my book "Articulated Experiences" (2003) and published in Iran (in Persian). There are two papers here: the "Preface" by Professor Ian Angus and my own "Foreword."

«انسانم آرزوست: پیرامون آثار پیمان وهاب زاده»
کتابی است اثر دکتر سعید شریفی و فاطمه خوشنویسان که به رویکرد نظری من به ویژه در کتاب تجربه‌های بیان شده می‌پردازد. فایل پیوستی شامل پیشگفتار پروفسور ایان انگس و پیش‌واژه‌ی من است که در این کتاب منتشر شده اند.

Iranian Studies, 2021

The emergence and rapid but short-lived presence of Students for Freedom and Equality (SFE; in Pe... more The emergence and rapid but short-lived presence of Students for Freedom and Equality (SFE; in Persian: Daneshjuyan-e Azadikhah va Barabaritalab or DAB) across major Iranian campuses and their fateful 4 December 2007 protest rally on the campus of the University of Tehran speaks of the return of leftist student activism to Iranian campuses after almost two decades of absence or invisibility within the context of post-revolutionary Iran. SFE was an umbrella democratic organization: its activists came from a plurality of social and political backgrounds and adhered to diverse leftist ideas. But in the context of pro-Reform Movement student activism in Iranian post-secondary institutions in the late 1990s and in 2000s, for a short time the SFE tried to hegemonize student activism and challenge the various pro-government tendencies in university campuses. Before state repression forced the SFE out of operation in 2007, Students for Freedom and Equality brought to campuses candid discussions of social justice issues, critique of Iran’s neoliberal economic policies, and challenges to censorship and lack of freedom.

Mapping the Role of Intellectuals in Iranian Modern and Contemporary History, 2020

Mostafa Sho‘aiyan (1935–1976) has remained a singular intellectual and activist within twentieth-... more Mostafa Sho‘aiyan (1935–1976) has remained a singular intellectual and activist within twentieth-century Iranian history. Gone are the long years during which he was relegated to oblivion, as well as the short years later during which yellow journalism tried to appropriate his critical stances for its anti-leftist propaganda. Moreover, Sho‘aiyan can no longer be locked up in the prison house of rigid leftist politics and doctrinal ideology. In fact, my in-depth studies of his life and politics, in particular, my book containing a comprehensive intellectual biography of Sho‘aiyan, show that he transcends the very politics and ideology with which he is being identified. Contrary to yesteryear, Sho‘aiyan can no longer be simply ignored or appropriated, as now he stands within the ranks of the critical intellectuals in the twentieth-century Iran due to recent scholarship on his life and thought.
Sho‘aiyan’s writings are voluminous—over 2,300 pages. He researched and wrote on an impressive range of diverse subjects from poetry and fiction to history, policy analysis, and theory. He introduced a maverick tradition of open letters at the time when secrecy was the most valued characteristic of politics in general and underground activism in particular. After experiment-ing with legal and nonviolent methods in the early 1960s as a way of bring-ing about change in the post-1953 Iran, he chose militant and underground activism, all the while he conducted extensive research and functioned as a freelance and self-didact scholar who would engage with international and national equally. He was indeed an overlooked internationalist but also a global thinker.

Crossing Borders, 2020

If we consider Reiner Schürmann’s “hypothesis of epochal or metaphysical closure”—inspired by Ma... more If we consider Reiner Schürmann’s “hypothesis of epochal or metaphysical
closure”—inspired by Martin Heidegger—as speaking to
the very history that we are living right now in the West, instead of
some esoteric, conceptual plaything for the armchair academic, then
we can revisit the cultural, social, and political processes of our time
in light of the possibility of the changing principles of intelligibility
governing our age—the (changing) principles that spectrally appear to
us primarily through action. It is thus transgressive action that can open new futures.

به یاد دوست (تقدیم به آیرو), 2020

Reflections on the life and poetry of Verya Mazhar (V.M.Airu) بازتاب‌هایی بر زندگی و شعر وریا ... more Reflections on the life and poetry of Verya Mazhar (V.M.Airu)

بازتاب‌هایی بر زندگی و شعر وریا مظهر (و. م. آیرو)

Crossing Borders: Essays in Honour of Ian H. Angus, Beyond Phenomenology and Critique, 2020

Introduction to forthcoming co-edited book, "Crossing Borders: Essays in Honour of Ian H. Angus, ... more Introduction to forthcoming co-edited book, "Crossing Borders: Essays in Honour of Ian H. Angus, Beyond Phenomenology and Critique" (ARP Press, 2020).

une autre vision | La Source | Vol 21, No 2 - 21 janvier au 4 février 2020, 2020

Le 24 janvier se tiendra à SFU une conférence organisée autour du thème de la violence, de son op... more Le 24 janvier se tiendra à SFU une conférence organisée autour du thème de la violence, de son opposé et des souffrances qu'elles entraînent tant chez l'homme que dans la nature. C'est le professeur de sociologie Peyman Vahabzadeh qui s'exprimera sur le sujet, accompagné du professeur émérite des humanités Ian Angus, tous deux de la même université. Éclairage. La Source : Nous savons tous ce qu'est la violence,
mais pouvez-vous nous expliquer ce qu'est la non-violence ? Peyman Vahabzadeh : Ma confession, mon travail et mes recherches démontrent que nous ne savons pas vraiment ce qu'est la violence.

Violence non violence et souffrance necessaire: une autre vision | La Source | Vol 21, No 2 - 21 janvier au 4 février 2020

Objectividad, subjetividad y vida cotidiana: A 50 años de la aparición de La construcción social de la realidad de Peter Berger y Thomas Luckmann, 2019

En los debates en torno a La construcci6n social de la realidad (1966) -obra pionera de Berger y ... more En los debates en torno a La construcci6n social de la realidad
(1966) -obra pionera de Berger y Luckmann, publicada hace
50 aftos y que continua siendo uno de los textos mas populares
en sociologia-, se reconoce en gran parte la veta fenomenol6-
gica de su enfoque. Su trabajo esta vinculado adecuadamente
con el camino abierto por Alfred Schutz, quien merece recibir
creditos por su sociologia fenomenol6gica. Sin embargo,
a menudo se pasa por alto que lo que califica el enfoque de
Berger y Luckmann como un trabajo "fenomenol6gico'' es una
conexi6n oblicua con las raices fenomenol6gicas -de hecho, un
desliz conceptual [conceptual slippage]-. En la medida en que
este capitulo se concentra en los contornos principales de La
construcci6n social de la realidad, abordara una gran preocupaci6n
con respecto al concepto mismo de 'construcci6n social:
al ofrecer una breve genealogia conceptual de la interpretaci6n
sociol6gica de conceptos fenomenol6gicos de Berger y Luckmann,
que muestra las continuidades y rupturas con esta tradici6n.
El documento presenta el trazo de los conceptos clave de
Berger y Luckmann hasta Alfred Schutz y luego hasta Edmund
Husserl. Esta genealogia conceptual no solo aclarara algunos
malentendidos que rodean este importante trabajo y su concepto
central, sino que tambien mostrara que La construcci6n
social de la realidad contiene un desliz conceptual que explica
de manera interesante su popularidad.

Bizhan Jazani: en route to a democratic theory of the liberation front, 2019

Persian translation of Chapter 3 of "A Guerrilla Odyssey" on the theories of Iranian Marxist Bizh... more Persian translation of Chapter 3 of "A Guerrilla Odyssey" on the theories of Iranian Marxist Bizhan Jazani (1938-1975).
برگردان فارسی فصل سوم کتاب «اودیسه چریکی» درباره تئوری‌های مارکسیست ایرانی، بیژن جزنی (۱۳۱۶-۱۳۵۴)

بازتاب‌هایی بر بازی فوتبال در سایه‌ی جام جهانی روسیه ۲۰۱۸

The Iranian Exodus has created an unprecedented cultural situation. As a result of the mass emigr... more The Iranian Exodus has created an unprecedented cultural situation. As a result of the mass emigration of Iranians, new Iranian communities have emerged in major urban areas, mostly across North America, Western Europe, and Australia. Iranians have been fleeing the despotism of the Islamic Republic of Iran for various social and/or political reasons. Among those leaving the country are intellectuals, scholars, political dissidents, freelance writers, literary figures, and artists. These immigrants find themselves in an unfamiliar situation. If nothing else, many find it a paramount difficulty for various reasons to communicate with their host cultures. Thanks to new experiences of emigration and resettlement, once solidly molded worldviews become shaken, if not shattered. Thus, many artists revise their past works critically.

The confrontation of Iran's Fadai Guerrillas with Mostafa Shoaiayn is the subject of this Forewor... more The confrontation of Iran's Fadai Guerrillas with Mostafa Shoaiayn is the subject of this Foreword.
رویکرد چریک‌های فدایی به مصطفی شعاعیان موضوع این پیشواژه است

This paper offers an introductory opening to the political theory of Ernesto Laclau and Chantal M... more This paper offers an introductory opening to the political theory of Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe.
این پیشگفتار فشرده و کوتاه درآمدی است بر نظریه‌ی سیاسی ارنستو لاکلاو و شانتل موف

Bilingual Remarks delivered to the Opening Ceremony of Persian Collection, Poirier Branch of Coqu... more Bilingual Remarks delivered to the Opening Ceremony of Persian Collection, Poirier Branch of Coquitlam Public Library, June 2011.

سخنان دوزبانه در مراسم گشایش بخش فارسی شعبه پواریه کتابخانه کوکیتلام، ژوئن ۲۰۱۱

گفتگوی علی نیلی از سوی نسیم بیداری (چاپ تهران) -- شماره ۷۴، آذر ۱۳۹۵ ــ با پیمان وهاب‌زاده در مور... more گفتگوی علی نیلی از سوی نسیم بیداری (چاپ تهران) -- شماره ۷۴، آذر ۱۳۹۵ ــ با پیمان وهاب‌زاده در مورد مصطفی شعاعیان

Ali Nili's interview with Peyman Vahabzadeh for Nasim Bidari (Tehran) -- No. 74, December 2016 -- on Mostafa Sho'aiyan, Iranian leftist thinker

گفتگوی سامان صفرزایی از نشریه شهروند امروز (چاپ تهران) -- شهریور ۱۳۹۰ -- با پیمان وهاب‌زاده در مو... more گفتگوی سامان صفرزایی از نشریه شهروند امروز (چاپ تهران) -- شهریور ۱۳۹۰ -- با پیمان وهاب‌زاده در مورد رابطه میان شهروندی و حکومت از دیدگاه هانا آرندت
An interview with Peyman Vahabzadeh by Saman Safarzai from Shahrvand Emrooz (Tehran) -- September 2011-- about the relations between citizenship and the state from the point of view of Hannah Arendt

گفتگوی محمد غفوری از نشریه فرهنگ امروز (چاپ تهران) -- شماره ۱۵، دی ماه ۱۳۹۵ -- با پیمان وهاب‌زاده... more گفتگوی محمد غفوری از نشریه فرهنگ امروز (چاپ تهران) -- شماره ۱۵، دی ماه ۱۳۹۵ -- با پیمان وهاب‌زاده در مورد رویکرد پدیدارشناسانه‌ی او به جامعه‌شناسی

Peyman Vahabzadeh interviewed by Mohammad Ghafoori from Farhang Emrooz (Tehran) -- No. 15, December 2016 -- regarding his phenomenological approach to sociology.

Digital presence has created conditions of irreality. Digital platforms have affected activism a... more Digital presence has created conditions of irreality. Digital platforms have affected activism and rendered them abstract and ineffective in creating meaningful social change. The abstract presence online feeds off concrete, historical humans. The insights of Marx on concrete, human labour, which cannot be abstracted from, and the thought of Heidegger regarding the age of world-picture when concrete human worlds are reduced to representations provide watersheds into reassessing activists' exit out of the hegemonic matrix of digital irreality.

Reflections on the life and poetry of Verya Mazhar (V. M. Airu). In Persian. بازتاب‌هایی بر زندگ... more Reflections on the life and poetry of Verya Mazhar (V. M. Airu). In Persian.

بازتاب‌هایی بر زندگی و شعر وریا مظهر (و. م. آیر.و)

An Iranian's Reflections on World Cup Russia 2018. The short reflections rethink the way football... more An Iranian's Reflections on World Cup Russia 2018. The short reflections rethink the way football is played, in the field and on the minds of the people.

سخنرانی نویسنده‌ی کتاب «اودیسه‌ی چریکی» (انتشارات دانشگاه سیراکیوز) در کانون کتاب تورنتو، ۲۰۱۰ Th... more سخنرانی نویسنده‌ی کتاب «اودیسه‌ی چریکی» (انتشارات دانشگاه سیراکیوز) در کانون کتاب تورنتو، ۲۰۱۰
The author's book launch and public talk on A Guerrilla Odyssey (Syracuse University Press), invited by Toronto Book Club, 2010.

Historical Materialism, 2022

From Intro to Review Essay: Call to Arms presents the latest addition to a trail of literature s... more From Intro to Review Essay:

Call to Arms presents the latest addition to a trail of literature surrounding the People’s Fadai Guerrillas (PFG, in Persian: Cherikha-ye Fadai-ye Khalq, later the Organisation of Iranian People’s Fadai Guerrillas, OIPFG; ‘fadai’ in Persian means ‘self-sacrificing’) – a self-declared Marxist-Leninist urban-guerrilla group founded in 1971 that, despite its small size and limited operations against the dictatorship of the US-backed Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, captured the political imagination of Iranian dissidents in the 1970s and had an impact on the events that led to the 1979 Revolution. Previous studies on the PFG included a lengthy, two-volume work of ‘research’,1 and selected security documents, both of which commissioned and published by the Islamic Republic Ministry of Intelligence2 (in Persian); a scholarly, analytical work on the PFG’s theories and history3 (in English); and a growing number of edited or authored memoirs and reflections on the part of PFG activists (in Persian). The subject remains fresh despite the attempts of the Islamic Republic’s appropriation of the existing literature to depict the guerrillas as violent gangsters.

Link available below.

Book review of the novel, Mina's Revolution by Mehrnoosh Mazarei. A young Iranian revolutionary w... more Book review of the novel, Mina's Revolution by Mehrnoosh Mazarei. A young Iranian revolutionary woman immigrates to the United States where, through many turbulences of life, she tries to find herself.

A review of Assef Bayat's "Street Politics: Poor People's Movements in Iran" published in The Rai... more A review of Assef Bayat's "Street Politics: Poor People's Movements in Iran" published in The Rain Review of Books (2006)

THE SCHOLARLY LITERATURE pertaining to the issue we nowadays conveniently, and loosely, call " gl... more THE SCHOLARLY LITERATURE pertaining to the issue we nowadays conveniently, and loosely, call " globalization " is well established and vast. In exposing, quite judiciously , the various aspects of, and injustices caused by, the existing pace of global capitalism, however, such literature remains in many cases also vague, inconsequential , overly descriptive, ideologically rigid, and unable to provide rigorous theoretical grounds for understanding the issue. Numerous pages are dedicated to documenting the effects of the expansion of capitalist systems around the world. Numerous pages record both local and international movements and resistances against this phenomenon. Volumes supply policy criticisms on various state, su-pra-state, interstate , or corporate levels. Yet, the foundational works that would potentially contribute to the modes of activism against the injustices manifested through various processes of transnational capitalism become harder to find despite the growing number of titles, which, ironically, tells us something about the mar-ketability of books on globalization.

Review of Gianni Vattimo's Nihilism and Emancipation: Ethics, Politics, and Law. The review explo... more Review of Gianni Vattimo's Nihilism and Emancipation: Ethics, Politics, and Law. The review explores Vattimo's nihilistic, postmetaphysical politics, and his ethics without moral principles. It explores the way Vattimo constructs a form of democracy that moves away from violence.

A review of Reiner Schurmann's posthumous chef d'oeuvre, Des Hégémonies Brisées, Broken Hegemonie... more A review of Reiner Schurmann's posthumous chef d'oeuvre, Des Hégémonies Brisées, Broken Hegemonies. The work contains a radically new interpretation of the major constitutive figures of eras of western philosophy. Schürmann's interpretation is new in that it rethinks these eras through their dominant languages: Greek, Latin, and vernacular languages. Schürmann offers a deconstruction of the institution of the " ultimate referents " that enable governable eras by defining thinking and doing in each era and by securing all thought and action to a point of moorage—and at times unquestionably so. As such, the hermeneutical strategy of the book is informed by the meticulous reading of the flashes of death and destitution right into the inceptive and instituting moments that yield an entire subsequent era. Broken Hegemonies is then about the singularizing effect of mortality that always returns to haunt works of natality through dispossession.

A review essay concerning the disturbing book by Canadian philosopher, Michael Ingatieff, The Les... more A review essay concerning the disturbing book by Canadian philosopher, Michael Ingatieff, The Lesser Evil: Political Ethics in the Age of Terror (Princeton University Press, 2004). This review essay critic ally examines the disastrous consequences of the politics of fright and the ethics of the " lesser evil " as advocated by Michael Ignatieff. In light of his arguments, this paper unravels the assumptions at the heart of his theory and raises certain problems with the way he formulates the issue of political ethics as well as his recommendations for American policy makers (who seem to be the target audience of this book).

The publication of On the Life and Works of Bijan Jazani celebrates the influential leftist theor... more The publication of On the Life and Works of Bijan Jazani celebrates the influential leftist theorist's life and intellectual legacy. In the past decade numerous memoirs or oral histories have been published on the political life of many leftist activists, revealing aspects of their groups or parties, but this volume is arguably the first of its kind in providing a forum where activists, comrades and commentators all reminisce and reflect on the life of one prominent activist and leader. While this volume should encourage other works of this category, it also invites critical reflections about the historiography of the Iranian Left. For, although the Left has exercised a significant role in the Iranian social composition and political life, it has also largely defied historiography. Thus, in many respects, the Iranian Left still remains hidden behind the mist of mystery, distortions, censorship , and secrecy. Unfortunately, the governments responsible for the suppression of the Left can only be partially blamed for the problem.

The Art of Defiance-Introduciton: Reading the Invisible Ink, 2022

Introduction to my new book, The Art of Defiance, published by Edinburgh University Press, 2022. ... more Introduction to my new book, The Art of Defiance, published by Edinburgh University Press, 2022.
The Book studies the connection between the rise of militant resistance to the repressive regime of the Shah, focusing in particular on the People's Fadai Guerrillas, and the works of poetry, short fiction, songs and soundtracks, and films, that supported the guerrillas' fight for democracy and justice. The book develops a new theory of reading political arts as defiant action, and offers extensive case studies.

A Rebel's Journey: Mostafa Sho'aiyan and Revolutionary Theory in Iran, 2019

From Publisher's Summary: Mostafa Sho'aiyan (1936-1975) was a leading Marxist intellectual in ... more From Publisher's Summary:

Mostafa Sho'aiyan (1936-1975) was a leading Marxist intellectual in twentieth-century Iran and a prolific author of theory, history, fiction and poetry. In an era of repressive politics following the 1953 coup that toppled the democratically elected government of Mossadeq and restored the rule of the Shah, he became a key figure on the militant left. From a life underground Sho'aiyan contributed significantly to the study of Iranian history and politics, and developed a unique theory of revolution - one specific to Iran and yet also international in reach.

With A Rebel's Journey, Peyman Vahabzadeh provides the first intellectual biography of this singular theoretician, offering fascinating insights into his life and work. Vahabzadeh not only sets Sho'aiyan's thought in the context of their time and place, but offers an ambitious reconstruction of his revolutionary theory for the twenty-first century, setting out how it might contribute to today's expanding movements for social justice and liberation.

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From Reviewers' Comments:

Reviews

‘Deeply informed and passionately engaged, this is an exceptional work of scholarship, reconstructing the life and thought of pre-revolutionary Iran's most exceptional figure on the left… Vahabzadeh has done a wonderful job of intellectual restoration and remembering, while showing an intriguing path forward to the revolutionaries of our time.'
- Afshin Matin-Asgari, Professor of Middle East History, California State University, Los Angeles

‘This is an elegant and original account of the life, times, and intellectual and theoretical contributions of the Iranian revolutionary Mustafa Sho‘aiyan. It is, in particular, a timely work, emphasising Sho‘aiyan's continuing relevance in an era of "savage, globalised capitalism”.'

- Stephanie Cronin, Elahé Omidyar Mir-Djalali Research Fellow, University of Oxford

'An outstanding interpretive and critical overview of the vast body of Mostafa Sho‘aiyan’s writings. Peyman Vahabzadeh masterfully reveals Sho‘aiyan’s cosmopolitan and frontal theory of rebellion, and his singular and uncanonical leftism.'

- Mojtaba Mahdavi, Professor of Political Science, University of Alberta

‘Vahabzadeh offers an elegiac meditation to one of the most sophisticated revolutionary political theorists of modern Iran. Meticulously researched, A Rebel’s Journey re-situates Sho‘aiyan’s long-neglected oeuvre at the center of the Iranian intellectual history and the history of anticolonial liberation struggles of the Global South.’

- Behrooz Ghamari-Tabrizi, Professor of Near Eastern Studies, Princeton University

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This PDF version provides the introductory remarks about Mostafa Sho'aiyan in my new book, "A Rebel's Journey: Mostafa Sho'aiyan and Revolutionary Theory in Iran" (OneWorld, 2019). ISBN: 9781786076205

Violence and Nonviolence: Conceptual Excursions into Phantom Opposites, 2019

From the Publisher's abstract: Through an original and close reading of the key literature regar... more From the Publisher's abstract:

Through an original and close reading of the key literature regarding both revolutionary violence and nonviolence, this book collapses the widely-assumed concepts of violence and nonviolence as mutually exclusive. By revealing that violence and nonviolence are braided concepts arising from human action, Peyman Vahabzadeh submits that in many cases the actions deemed to be either violent or nonviolent might actually produce outcomes that are not essentially different.

Vahabzadeh offers a conceptual phenomenology of the key thinkers and theorists of both revolutionary violence and various approaches to nonviolence. Arguing that violence is inseparable from civilizations, Violence and Nonviolence concludes by making a number of original conceptualizations regarding the relationship between violence and nonviolence, exploring the possibility of a nonviolent future and proposing to understand the relationship between the two concepts as concentric, not opposites.