Vibrant Matter

Jane Bennetts Vibrant Matter is an important work, linking critical movements in recent continental philosophy, namely a vitalist tradition that runs from Bergson to Deleuze and even, on Bennetts reading, to Bruno Latour, and (on the other hand) a political ecology of things that should speak to anyone conscious enough to be aware of the devastating changes underway in the world around us. There is good reason Bennetts book has, in short order, gained a wide following in disparate areas of political theory and philosophy. - Peter Gratton, Philosophy in Review For the sake of assuaging harms already inflicted we have always cobbled together publics that deal with vibrant matters of floods, fires, earthquakes and so on. For the sake of preventing unseen future harms, Bennetts book argues that we need to take a closer look at how we are embedded in a web of mutual affect that knows no bounds between living and nonliving, human and nonhuman. It is in this refreshingly nave no-holds-barred approach that Bennetts work has much to offer for a reconsideration of our role as thinking, speaking humans in a cosmos of vibrant matter that we continually depoliticize even in our efforts to protect and save the earth . . . a highly recommended read. - Stefan Morales, M/C Reviews Jane Bennetts Vibrant Matter is an admirable book for at least three reasons. First, it is wonderfully written in a comfortable personal style, which is rare enough for academic books. Second, Bennett makes an explicit break with the timeworn dogmas of postmodernist academia. . . . The third point that makes this book admirable is Bennetts professional position: Chair of Political Science at Johns Hopkins University. That someone in a Political Science department at an important university could write as candid a work of metaphysics as Vibrant Matter is an encouraging sign. Perhaps philosophical speculation on fundamental topics is poised for a comeback throughout the humanities. - Graham Harman, New Formations Vibrant Matter is a fascinating, lucid, and powerful book of political theory. By focusing on the thing-side of affect, Jane Bennett seeks to broaden and transform our sense of care in relation to the world of humans, non-human life, and things. She calls us to consider a parliament of things in ways that provoke our democratic imaginations and interrupt our anthropocentric hubris.Romand Coles, author of Beyond Gated Politics: Reflections for the Possibility of Democracy Vibrant Matter represents the fruits of sustained scholarship of the highest order. As environmental, technological, and biomedical concerns force themselves onto worldly political agendas, the urgency and potency of this analysis must surely inform any rethinking of what political theory is about in the twenty-first century.Sarah Whatmore, coeditor of The Stuff of Politics: Technoscience, Democracy, and Public Life This manifesto for a new materialism is an invigorating breath of fresh air. Jane Bennetts eloquent tribute to the vitality and volatility of things is just what we need to revive the humanities and to redraw the parameters of political thought.Rita Felski, author of Uses of Literature Bennetts is one of those books where, on finishing, you want to begin immediately again to experience the excitement and lan vital of eloquent, simple ideas presented in clear, concise and considered prose, wherein the presence of a generous, kind and unpretentious author speaks straight into your understanding. Vibrant Matter is fresh, alert, quiet and potent, a door opening in a stuffy room to let the outside in, which lets it speak so as to embolden us to breathe differently. It will redraw the boundaries of political thought; its already doing so. Read it. -- Mark Jackson * Emotion, Space and Society * Orienting us to re-encounter both nature and familiar objects as newly

Jane Bennett is Professor of Political Theory and Chair of the Department of Political Science at Johns Hopkins University. She is the author of The Enchantment of Modern Life: Attachments, Crossings, and Ethics and Thoreaus Nature: Ethics, Politics, and the Wild, and an editor of The Politics of Moralizing and In the Nature of Things: Language, Politics, and the Environment.

Preface vii Acknowledgments xxi 1. The Force of Things 1 2. The Agency of Assemblages 20 3. Edible Matter 39 4. A Life of Metal 52 5. Neither Vitalism nor Mechanism 62 6. Stem Cells and the Culture of Life 82 7. Political Ecologies 94 8. Vitality and Self-interest 110 Notes 123 Bibliography 157 Index 171