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The article is an analytical and critical review of the main ideas of philosophical practice. The review was prepared on the basis of the author's personal participation in the work of international conferences on philosophical practice over the past three years. The comparison of the three last conferences reveals how tensions around definitions and goals of the practice have been reduced in ways that reflect an openness and appreciation of multiplicity. The anguish surrounding the boundaries of the field have decreased as well, and is seems that philosophical practice is ready to reflect on itself through the research, publication, networking and mapping.

The article is an analytical and critical review of the main ideas of philosophical practice. The review was prepared on the basis of the author's personal participation in the work of international conferences on philosophical practice over the past three years. The comparison of the three last conferences reveals how tensions around definitions and goals of the practice have been reduced in ways that reflect an openness and appreciation of multiplicity. The anguish surrounding the boundaries of the field have decreased as well, and is seems that philosophical practice is ready to reflect on itself through the research, publication, networking and mapping.

This article examines three commentaries on the Aggadah story of the Talmudic sage Rabbah bar bar Hana's incredible journeys: by the Maharal of Prague (16th cent.), the Gaon of Vilna (18th cent.) and Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav (end 18th – 19th cent.) While all three authors see the story in an allegorical vein, each one has their own focus and seems to wander away from the text proper and interpret it through the lens of their own set of ideas, be it philosophy, metaphysics, ethics, asceticism or mysticism. So Maharal of Prague sees the Haggadah as kind of philosophical and mystical treatise. He hints to the reader that this Haggadah contains the secrets of metaphysics and Kabbalah. For the Vilna Gaon the story has an ethical message. He sees the crow as talmid haham whose face is black from malnutrition and studying the Torah at night. Rabbi Nachman is the most exalted and ecstatic scholar of all three. He uses the interpretation of Haggadah as part of his mystical lessons. The topic of his lesson is Messianic Deliverance.

This article reveals the communist transnational infrastructure that connected South African communists with socialist regimes in the early 1950s. Before the establishment of a global anti-apartheid movement after Sharpeville, this network enabled the circulation of people and ideas outward from South Africa. Communist education and institutions in the country opened up avenues for protest, mobility and community for political dissidents. When state persecution of communists increased in 1948, activists used this infrastructure to escape the country, procure employment or continue their political engagement abroad. I demonstrate this by tracing the journey of the South African communists Pauline Podbrey and H.A. Naidoo who were forced to leave the country in 1951 due to their political activity against the regime as well as apartheid legislation that outlawed interracial marriages such as theirs. Once in Britain, the couple were sent by the British Communist Party to Hungary to participate in the Cold War battle over hearts and minds as radio broadcasters. This case-study demonstrates how the intersection of Cold War politics, apartheid and race shaped the escape routes and future trajectories of communist anti-apartheid activists. Reconstructing the couple's itineraries between dissent and disillusionment, it questions the dominant post-apartheid narrative of the struggle as a heroic tale of survival and triumph, and highlights the fragmentation and failure of political lives.