Eugene B. Young, Ph.D.

Dr. Young is a literary and film theorist with a background in continental philosophy, particularly in the work of Gilles Deleuze; he has taught in both the English and Philosophy Departments at Le Moyne since 2010, and frequently teaches his interdisciplinary senior seminar called “Power, Knowledge, and the Obscure.” Dr. Young is interested in the way that fiction creates worlds of reality and truth, and, more importantly, the way that fiction can be artistic when it is composed by ideas that are “inexplicable.” He develops this poststructuralist theory in his book Cinematic Art and Reversals of Power: Deleuze via Blanchot (Bloomsbury, 2022). The book builds on his work as primary author of The Deleuze & Guattari Dictionary (Bloomsbury, 2013) and his dissertation work in Comparative Literature on literary paradox to explore the dynamics between the imaginary and the false in the work of art. Dr. Young’s literary and film theory shows that in reversing the limits of exteriority (reality, truth) within those of interiority (perception, affection), art is outside of relations of power. His articles explore similar intersections between art, politics, habit, and memory, such as his work on eternal return for Edinburgh University Press and his work on truth, hyperbole, and politics for the Los Angles Review of Books.

Dr. Young also teaches courses on Franz Kafka, William Shakespeare, Ralph Ellison, and Stanley Kubrick, as well as on the Meaning of Dreams, Modern Philosophy, Literature and Revolution, Utopias and Dystopias, Art Worlds, and the Meaning of Life. He is the recipient of the 2020/21 Boudreau Award for Scholarship in English at Le Moyne. His current book project distinguishes his theory of poststructuralist aesthetics from new historicism and from deconstruction as a mode of literality.