Key Contemporary Concepts

'A book which all students of the human sciences will find useful, both for its range of engagements and its pedagogic ambitions. The book is best thought of as a cabinet full of the theoretical curiosities of the modern age, able to be dipped in to and out of at will. And, like a cabinet of curiosities, it is not just a repository of knowledge but, also, in the very best sense, an entertainment. To be read and to be enjoyed. Nigel Thrift, University of Bristol

John Lechte is Professor in Sociology at Macquarie University, where he has responsibility for Graduate teaching and research. He has written widely on European philosophy and the image, including the work of Julia Kristeva and Georges Bataille. He has just published a key work on the image, Genealogy and Ontology of the Western Image and its Digital Future (2012), and is currently working on the human and the image. With Saul Newman, he will publish, in 2013, Agamben and the Politics of Human Rights: Statelessness, Images, Violence.

A Note on the Text Introduction A Abjection Aesthetics Alienation Allegory Analogue Analytic-Synthetic Arbitrary Atonality B Beauty Being Biotechnology Blase Body C Chance Clone Code Communication Community Complexity Culture Cybernetics Cyberspace Cyborg D Deconstruction Dictionary-Encyclopedia Diegesis Differance Difference-Individuality Differend Digital E Economy Encyclopedia (see Dictionary-Encyclopedia) Entropy Epistemology Eros-Eroticism Event Exchange F Family Fantasy // Phantasy Fantasm Fractal Freedom Fuzzy Logic G General Will Gift Globalisation Governmentality Grammatology H Habitus History I Icon Identification Identity Ideology Image Imaginary Imagination Immanent//Immanence-Transcendent // Transcendence Index Information Interpretation J Justice K Klanfarbenmelodie Knowledge L Labour-power Legitimacy Life Local Logos-Mythos Love M Memory Metaphor Metaphysics Mimesis Modernity Money Montage Mythos (see Logos-Mythos) N Necessity Network Nihilism O Object Ontology Other P Panopticon Phantasy // Phantasm (see Fantasy // Fantasm) Pixel Postmodernity Power Profane (see Sacred-Profane) Q Quantum R Responsibility Ressentiment Rhizome Risk-Society S Sacred-Profane Semiotic Sign: Signifier//Signified Simulacrum Spectacle Subject Synthetic (see Analytical-Synthetic) T Technics Theory Thermodynamics Time Transcendence (see Immanent//Immanence // Transcendent // Transcendence) Truth U Unconscious Universal V Value Virtual (see Cyberspace) Virus, W Work Writing X Xenophobia, Z Zeno's Paradox