“Joy Is an Act of Defiance”: Op-Ed by Roger Berkowitz Featured in Times Union

Roger Berkowitz, professor of political studies and human rights at Bard and academic director of the Hannah Arendt Center for Politics and the Humanities, wrote an op-ed for Times Union defending the role that joy plays during dark times. The 17th annual Hannah Arendt fall conference this October, “JOY: Loving the World in Dark Times,” will explore joy as a conscious decision to embrace life as it is without succumbing to despair, and encourages us to see the present horror of a world torn apart while still aspiring to a mended and beautiful world. Joy, Berkowitz says, is not a distraction in the face of grim circumstances, but an act of defiance, citing that Arendt—who was arrested by the Nazis and interned in a camp and later lived stateless for 18 years—insisted that we must still find ways to love the world. “Joy is not happiness. It is deeper, riskier, and more transformative,” Berkowitz writes. “Joy erupts in a lover’s gaze, in Beethoven’s late sonatas, in the embrace of a once-wayward child. It is not escape but a visceral affirmation of what matters most. Where happiness can be private, joy demands connection: to others, to meaning, to the world.”

Post Date: 05-20-2025