Subjectivity and matter in the work of A.N. Whitehead and Gilles Deleuze: developing a non-essentialist ontology for social theory

This thesis examines the concepts of matter and subjectivity in the works of A. N. Whitehead and Gilles Deleuze, and draws out a non-essentialist version of ontology from their work. It argues that many recent accounts of subjectivity have refused to engage with the material or ontological aspect of subjectivity and that this has led to an over-reliance on 'linguistic constructionism' and 'discursive production'. This has meant that the social sciences have focused on the 'cultural' body and left the 'biological' body in the realm of the natural sciences. The thesis uses a range of critiques of Butler's Bodies That Matter to develop the need for a re-thinking of the relations between materiality, subjectivity and ontology. This re-thinking is carried out through an analysis of the work of Spinoza, Whitehead and Deleuze. It is argued that although Spinoza's Ethics may set the parameters of a non-essentialist ontology, he ultimately fails in his attempt to fully materialise his conception of individuality. Whitehead's 'philosophy of organism' (as set out in Process and Reality) is presented as providing a coherent account of existence as a process within which all subjectivity is constituted through a physical and conceptual concrescence. However, his account of the role of language within this process is seen as deficient. It is argued that much of the work of Deleuze is involved with the same concerns as that of Whitehead but that The Logic of Sense (1990) is able to produce an account of the position of language which is consonant with Whitehead's ontological approach. The thesis, thereby, contributes to contemporary analyses of subjectivity by developing a theoretical framework within which the materiality of subjectivity can be conceptualized without invoking scientific or essentialist accounts of physicality.