John Protevi is an American academic and writer. He is the Phyllis M. Taylor Professor of French Studies and a professor of philosophy at Louisiana State University. He is a prominent scholar in contemporary French philosophy, particularly known for his work on Gilles Deleuze and his interdisciplinary approach to what he terms the "political philosophy of mind".
Protevi received a B.A. in Philosophy and M.A. in Englih from Pennsylvania State University. [1] He earned his PhD in philosophy from Loyola University Chicago in 1990. [2] He is a key contributor to the Deleuze and Guattari Studies community and has held various visiting professorships, including at Pennsylvania State University. Protevi's research sits at the intersection of philosophy, biology, cognitive science, and political theory. He explores how social and political structures influence biological and cognitive processes—a field he refers to as "political affect".
Protevi edited 2006's A Dictionary of Continental Philosophy published by Yale University Press. [3]
He has written several academic book reviews, including one of American philosophy professor Leonard Lawlor's 2006 book, The Implications of Immanence: Toward a New Concept of Life, entitled, 'The "Miniscule Hiatus": Neo-vitalism in the Great French Philosophy of the 1960s' in which he states, "Beyond phenomenology for Lawlor is "life-ism" or "neo-vitalism," the positive working out of the effects of that "miniscule hiatus" that produces a "completion of immanence". [4]
Protevi's 2009 book, Political Affect: Connecting the Social and the Somatic was reviewed by Dorothea Olkowski for Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews, describing it as an attempt to bring together politically activist philosophy with cognitive science to obtain a nonmechanistic materialism. [5]
Protevi has authored and edited several influential books that apply philosophical concepts to real-world scientific and political issues: