Michael Phillipson – författare

First published in 1988, this book attempts to tackle the problem of how to write about art, culture, and the issues of postmodernism in a style appropriate to what is being claimed. The letters are written on art’s behalf to a range of institutions and individuals, and have as their recurring concern the relation between art, culture and representation — both art as representation and how art is represented to, and for, the surrounding culture. They explore the context and viability of art through a range of themes, including writing, the aestheticisation of everyday life, style, design pleasure, fragmentation, hyphenation, technology, and the museum — drawing on materials from the visual arts, music, literature, post-structuralism, contemporary criticism, philosophy, and sociology.

First published in 1988, this book attempts to tackle the problem of how to write about art, culture, and the issues of postmodernism in a style appropriate to what is being claimed. The letters are written on art’s behalf to a range of institutions and individuals, and have as their recurring concern the relation between art, culture and representation — both art as representation and how art is represented to, and for, the surrounding culture. They explore the context and viability of art through a range of themes, including writing, the aestheticisation of everyday life, style, design pleasure, fragmentation, hyphenation, technology, and the museum — drawing on materials from the visual arts, music, literature, post-structuralism, contemporary criticism, philosophy, and sociology.

First published in 1985, this book draws together the author’s artistic with analytical practices which had been developed over many years of sociological enquiry. It interprets a ‘work of art’ as a site on which a viewer or critic is invited to share in questioning celebration of the painting itself. The author reassesses modern painting’s relation to its own origins and to tradition in light of the emergence of ‘postmodern’ practice — exploring its engagement of fundamental questions about language and being. Also assessed is the relevance of the metaphors of writings and Reading to an understanding of painting and viewing practices — looking at painters’ writings as well as phenomenological and post-structuralist writers.

First published in 1985, this book draws together the author’s artistic with analytical practices which had been developed over many years of sociological enquiry. It interprets a ‘work of art’ as a site on which a viewer or critic is invited to share in questioning celebration of the painting itself. The author reassesses modern painting’s relation to its own origins and to tradition in light of the emergence of ‘postmodern’ practice — exploring its engagement of fundamental questions about language and being. Also assessed is the relevance of the metaphors of writings and Reading to an understanding of painting and viewing practices — looking at painters’ writings as well as phenomenological and post-structuralist writers.

This is a work of social theory and philosophy which seeks to make the constitution of social theory a ‘social’ activity. It is essentially a collaborative text, by five authors, committed to a re-awakening of some of the forgotten dimensions of social theorizing. The collaborative work was originally occasioned by an attempt to analyse the notion of social stratification and its treatment in the sociological tradition. The authors’ main concern here is with the nature of social theorizing, and in particular the ‘difference’ between Self and Other, being and beings, Language and Speech. The papers in the book focus on themes that are fundamental to the sense of inquiry and tradition which they are concerned to display. The themes discussed include speech, Language, Identity, Difference, Critical Tradition, Community, Metaphor, Dialectics, Observing and Reading.

The field of crime and delinquency attracts a great deal of heated and partial opinion, prejudice and other forms of mal-thinking. When there is a scientific approach there tends to be a psychological explanation. This book, first published in 1971, is a corrective to both trends. It is a discussion of criminal behaviour in relation to a wide range of behaviours which could be called deviance and regards the whole field from the sociological point of view. The whole discussion is related to social policy, and is vital reading for students of sociology and criminology.

The field of crime and delinquency attracts a great deal of heated and partial opinion, prejudice and other forms of mal-thinking. When there is a scientific approach there tends to be a psychological explanation. This book, first published in 1971, is a corrective to both trends. It is a discussion of criminal behaviour in relation to a wide range of behaviours which could be called deviance and regards the whole field from the sociological point of view. The whole discussion is related to social policy, and is vital reading for students of sociology and criminology.