Philosophy, Aesthetics and Cultural Theory – serie

This is the first complete account of all Giorgio Agamben's philosophical work on literature. While Giorgio Agamben is most widely known for his political philosophy, at least a third of his output is dedicated to unique, technical and revelatory readings of literature. Indeed, it is impossible to fully understand Agamben's overall movement towards a Messianic philosophy to come without knowledge of the role of poetry in his ontology. The Literary Agamben considers the totality of Agamben's detailed and varied work on literature and poiesis. Organised around three areas, language, poiesis and modernity, the book explains Agamben's theory of literary singularity in all its complexity. William Watkin details Agamben's particular 'ontological' take on linguistics, works through Agamben's definition of poetry as the tension between semantic and semiotic, and engages with Agamben's aggressive yet insightful critique of modern art as productively nihilistic.The book presents Agamben's overall conception of poiesis and its relevancy to future readings in literature, as well as an understanding of how poiesis forms the crucial third part of Agamben's overall philosophical system alongside the more widely disseminated terms 'exception' and 'potentiality'. "The Philosophy, Aesthetics and Cultural Theory series" examines the encounter between contemporary Continental philosophy and aesthetic and cultural theory. Each book in the series explores an exciting new direction in philosophical aesthetics or cultural theory, identifying the most important and pressing issues in Continental philosophy today.

This is an examination of Derrida's work on myth and language, offering a postmodern, deconstructive theory of myth. In "Derrida, Myth and the Impossibility of Philosophy", Anais N. Spitzer examines previously unexplored areas of the scholarship of Jacques Derrida and Mark C. Taylor in order to propose a contemporary, postmodern, deconstructive theory of myth with provocative implications. "Derrida, Myth and the Impossibility of Philosophy" argues that the insights of deconstruction and complexity theory demand a re-examination of mythos (narrative, story, myth) in terms of its disseminative propensities and its disruptive interplay with logos (language, structure, word). Such a re-examination calls into question the relation of mythos and logos as it has been traditionally understood from Plato to modern theorists such as Mircea Eliade, Bruce Lincoln, Claude Levi-Strauss, and Paul Ricoeur. Spitzer goes beyond the limited conception of the relation of mythos and logos in order to provide a nuanced account of myth in relation to philosophy in contemporary theories of writing, philosophy, and religion, thereby setting the stage for future work with myth in a deconstructive mode."The Philosophy, Aesthetics and Cultural Theory" series examines the encounter between contemporary Continental philosophy and aesthetic and cultural theory. Each book in the series explores an exciting new direction in philosophical aesthetics or cultural theory, identifying the most important and pressing issues in Continental philosophy today.

Bernard Stiegler's work on the intimate relations between the human and the technical have made him one of the most important voices to have emerged in French philosophy in the last decade. At the same time both an accessible summation of that work and a continuation of it, The Re-Enchantment of the World advances a critique of consumer capitalism that draws on Freud and Marx to construct an utterly contemporary analysis of our time. The book explores the cognitive, affective, social and economic effects of the 'proletarianization' of the consumer in late capitalism and the resulting destruction of the consumer's savoir-vivre. Reflecting the collective work of his activist organisation, Ars Industrialis, Stiegler here sets forth an alternative path to that of 'industrial populism', one that appeals to the force of the human spirit.The Re-Enchantment of the World also includes the manifesto of Ars Industrialis and an account of the organisation's 2005 summit in Tunis.

Merleau-Ponty and the Paradoxes of Expression offers a comprehensive reading of the philosophical work of Maurice Merleau-Ponty, a central figure in 20th-century continental philosophy. By establishing that the paradoxical logic of expression is Merleau-Ponty's fundamental philosophical gesture, this book ties together his diverse work on perception, language, aesthetics, politics and history in order to establish the ontological position he was developing at the time of his sudden death in 1961. Donald A. Landes explores the paradoxical logic of expression as it appears in both Merleau-Ponty’s explicit reflections on expression and his non-explicit uses of this logic in his philosophical reflection on other topics, and thus establishes a continuity and a trajectory of his thought that allows for his work to be placed into conversation with contemporary developments in continental philosophy. The book offers the reader a key to understanding Merleau-Ponty's subtle methodology and highlights the urgency and relevance of his research into the ontological significance of expression for today's work in art and cultural theory.

This is a major new study of the relationship between early modern European philosophy and the history of the book. "Philosophy and the Book" examines the philosophical mobilization of metaphors for print, inscription, reading and knowledge organization in early modern philosophical texts in continental Europe. Engaging with the work of Gassendi, Descartes, Hobbes, Spinoza, Leibniz and Bayle, the book explores the effect the explosion of early modern print technology, textual distribution and related cultural practices had on the early modern philosophical imagination. Daniel Selcer foregrounds a series of figures that were extremely important to many early modern philosophers as they sought to develop positions on the nature of the material world and our knowledge of it. He explores significant questions for the history of early modern philosophy in relation to the problem of the materiality of philosophical discourse and counterpoises these considerations with approaches in late twentieth-century continental philosophy, such as Foucultian archaeology and Derridean deconstruction.Finally, through rhetorical analysis and historical contextualization, Selcer succeeds in sketching an 'ontology of the page'. "The Philosophy, Aesthetics and Cultural Theory" series examines the encounter between contemporary Continental philosophy and aesthetic and cultural theory. Each book in the series explores an exciting new direction in philosophical aesthetics or cultural theory, identifying the most important and pressing issues in Continental philosophy today.

In Derrida, Myth and the Impossibility of Philosophy, Anais N. Spitzer shows that philosophy cannot separate itself from myth since myth is an inevitable condition of the possibility of philosophy. Bombarded by narratives that terrorize and repress, we may often consider myth to be constrictive dogma or, at best, something to be readily disregarded as unphilosophical and irrelevant. However, such dismissals miss a crucial aspect of myth. Harnessing the insights of Jacques Derrida's deconstruction and Mark C. Taylor's philosophical reading of complexity theory, Derrida, Myth and the Impossibility of Philosophy provocatively reframes the pivotal relation of myth to thinking and to philosophy, demonstrating that myth's inherent ambiguity engenders vital and inescapable deconstructive propensities. Exploring myth's disruptive presence, Spitzer shows that philosophy cannot separate itself from myth. Instead, myth is an inevitable condition of the possibility of philosophy.This study provides a nuanced account of myth in the postmodern era, not only laying out the deconstructive underpinnings of myth in philosophy and religion, but establishing the very necessity of myth in the study of ideas.

In our contemporary age aesthetics seems to crumble and no longer be reducible to a coherent image. And yet given the vast amount of works in aesthetics produced in the last hundred years, this age could be defined “the century of aesthetics”. 20th Century Aesthetics is a new account of international aesthetic thought by Mario Perniola, one of Italy’s leading contemporary thinkers. Starting from four conceptual fields – life, form, knowledge, action - Perniola identifies the lines of aesthetic reflection that derive from them and elucidates them with reference to major authors: from Dilthey to Foucault (aesthetics of life), from Wölfflin to McLuhan and Lyotard (aesthetics of form), from Croce to Goodman (aesthetics and knowledge), from Dewey to Bloom (aesthetics and action). There is also a fifth one that touches on the sphere of affectivity and emotionality, and which comes to aesthetics from thinkers like Freud, Heidegger, Wittgenstein, Lacan, Derrida and Deleuze. The volume concludes with an extensive sixth chapter on Japanese, Chinese, Indian, Islamic, Brazilian, South Korean and South East Asian aesthetic thought and on the present decline of Western aesthetic sensibility.

This is a major new study of the relationship between early modern European philosophy and the history of the book. "Philosophy and the Book" examines the philosophical mobilization of metaphors for print, inscription, reading and knowledge organization in early modern philosophical texts in continental Europe. Engaging with the work of Gassendi, Descartes, Hobbes, Spinoza, Leibniz and Bayle, the book explores the effect the explosion of early modern print technology, textual distribution and related cultural practices had on the early modern philosophical imagination. Daniel Selcer foregrounds a series of figures that were extremely important to many early modern philosophers as they sought to develop positions on the nature of the material world and our knowledge of it. He explores significant questions for the history of early modern philosophy in relation to the problem of the materiality of philosophical discourse and counterpoises these considerations with approaches in late twentieth-century continental philosophy, such as Foucultian archaeology and Derridean deconstruction.Finally, through rhetorical analysis and historical contextualization, Selcer succeeds in sketching an 'ontology of the page'. "The Philosophy, Aesthetics and Cultural Theory" series examines the encounter between contemporary Continental philosophy and aesthetic and cultural theory. Each book in the series explores an exciting new direction in philosophical aesthetics or cultural theory, identifying the most important and pressing issues in Continental philosophy today.

Bernard Stiegler's work on the intriguing relationship between the human and the technical have made him one of the most important voices to have emerged in French philosophy in the last decade. Both an accessible summation of that work and a continuation of it, The Re-Enchantment of the World advances a critique of consumer capitalism that draws on Freud and Marx to construct an utterly contemporary analysis of our time. The book explores the cognitive, affective, social and economic effects of the 'proletarianization' of the consumer in late capitalism and the resulting destruction of the consumer's savoir-vivre. Reflecting the collective work of his activist organisation, Ars Industrialis, Stiegler here sets forth an alternative path to that of 'industrial populism', one that appeals to the force of the human spirit.The Re-Enchantment of the World also includes the manifesto of Ars Industrialis and an account of the organisation's 2005 summit in Tunis.

Merleau-Ponty and the Paradoxes of Expression offers a comprehensive reading of the philosophical work of Maurice Merleau-Ponty, a central figure in 20th-century continental philosophy. By establishing that the paradoxical logic of expression is Merleau-Ponty's fundamental philosophical gesture, this book ties together his diverse work on perception, language, aesthetics, politics and history in order to establish the ontological position he was developing at the time of his sudden death in 1961. Donald A. Landes explores the paradoxical logic of expression as it appears in both Merleau-Ponty’s explicit reflections on expression and his non-explicit uses of this logic in his philosophical reflection on other topics, and thus establishes a continuity and a trajectory of his thought that allows for his work to be placed into conversation with contemporary developments in continental philosophy. The book offers the reader a key to understanding Merleau-Ponty's subtle methodology and highlights the urgency and relevance of his research into the ontological significance of expression for today's work in art and cultural theory.

In our contemporary age aesthetics seems to crumble and no longer be reducible to a coherent image. And yet given the vast amount of works in aesthetics produced in the last hundred years, this age could be defined “the century of aesthetics”. 20th Century Aesthetics is a new account of international aesthetic thought by Mario Perniola, one of Italy’s leading contemporary thinkers. Starting from four conceptual fields – life, form, knowledge, action - Perniola identifies the lines of aesthetic reflection that derive from them and elucidates them with reference to major authors: from Dilthey to Foucault (aesthetics of life), from Wölfflin to McLuhan and Lyotard (aesthetics of form), from Croce to Goodman (aesthetics and knowledge), from Dewey to Bloom (aesthetics and action). There is also a fifth one that touches on the sphere of affectivity and emotionality, and which comes to aesthetics from thinkers like Freud, Heidegger, Wittgenstein, Lacan, Derrida and Deleuze. The volume concludes with an extensive sixth chapter on Japanese, Chinese, Indian, Islamic, Brazilian, South Korean and South East Asian aesthetic thought and on the present decline of Western aesthetic sensibility.

This is the first complete account of all Giorgio Agamben's philosophical work on literature. While Giorgio Agamben is most widely known for his political philosophy, at least a third of his output is dedicated to unique, technical and revelatory readings of literature. Indeed, it is impossible to fully understand Agamben's overall movement towards a Messianic philosophy to come without knowledge of the role of poetry in his ontology. The Literary Agamben considers the totality of Agamben's detailed and varied work on literature and poiesis. Organised around three areas, language, poiesis and modernity, the book explains Agamben's theory of literary singularity in all its complexity. William Watkin details Agamben's particular 'ontological' take on linguistics, works through Agamben's definition of poetry as the tension between semantic and semiotic, and engages with Agamben's aggressive yet insightful critique of modern art as productively nihilistic.The book presents Agamben's overall conception of poiesis and its relevancy to future readings in literature, as well as an understanding of how poiesis forms the crucial third part of Agamben's overall philosophical system alongside the more widely disseminated terms 'exception' and 'potentiality'. "The Philosophy, Aesthetics and Cultural Theory series" examines the encounter between contemporary Continental philosophy and aesthetic and cultural theory. Each book in the series explores an exciting new direction in philosophical aesthetics or cultural theory, identifying the most important and pressing issues in Continental philosophy today.

This book offers the first complete examination of Foucault's reflections on visual art, leading to new readings of his major texts."Foucault's Philosophy of Art: A Genealogy of Modernity" tells the story of how art shed the tasks with which it had traditionally been charged in order to become modern. Joseph J. Tanke offers the first complete examination of Michel Foucault's reflections on visual art, tracing his thought as it engages with the work of visual artists from the seventeenth century to the contemporary period.The book offers a concise and accessible introduction to Foucault's frequently anthologized, but rarely understood, analysis of Diego Velazquez's "Las Meninas" and Rene Magritte's "Ceci n'est pas une pipe". On the basis of unpublished lecture courses and several un-translated analysis of visual art, Tanke reveals the uniquely genealogical character of Foucault's writings on visual culture, allowing for new readings of his major texts in the context of contemporary Continental philosophy, aesthetic and cultural theory. Ultimately Tanke demonstrates how Foucault provides philosophy and contemporary criticism with the means for determining a conception of modern art."The Philosophy, Aesthetics and Cultural Theory" series examines the encounter between contemporary Continental philosophy and aesthetic and cultural theory. Each book in the series explores an exciting new direction in philosophical aesthetics or cultural theory, identifying the most important and pressing issues in Continental philosophy today.

Foucault's Philosophy of Art: A Genealogy of Modernity tells the story of how art shed the tasks with which it had traditionally been charged in order to become modern. Joseph J. Tanke offers the first complete examination of Michel Foucaults reflections on visual art, tracing his thought as it engages with the work of visual artists from the seventeenth century to the contemporary period. The book offers a concise and accessible introduction to Foucaults frequently anthologized, but rarely understood, analyses of Diego Velzquezs Las Meninas and Ren Magrittes Ceci nest pas une pipe. On the basis of unpublished lecture courses and several un-translated analyses of visual art, Tanke reveals the uniquely genealogical character of Foucaults writings on visual culture, allowing for new readings of his major texts in the context of contemporary Continental philosophy, aesthetic and cultural theory. Ultimately Tanke demonstrates how Foucault provides philosophy and contemporary criticism with the means for determining a conception of modern art.

This is a fascinating examination of the relation between absence and chance in Derrida's work and through that a re-examination of the relation between war and literature. "Derrida, Literature and War" argues for the importance of the relation between absence and chance in Derrida's work in thinking today about war and literature. Sean Gaston starts by marking Derrida's attempts to resist the philosophical tradition of calculating on absence as an assured resource, while insisting on the (mis)chances of the chance encounter. Gaston re-examines the relation between the concept of war and the chances of literature by focusing on narratives of conflict set during the Napoleonic wars. These chance encounters or duels can help us think again about the sovereign attempt to leave the enemy nameless or to name what cannot be named in the midst of wars without end. His study includes new readings of a range of writers, including Aristotle, Hume, Rousseau, Schiller, Clausewitz, Thackeray, Tolstoy, Conrad, Freud, Heidegger, Blanchot, Foucault, Deleuze and Agamben.Offering an authoritative reading of Derrida's oeuvre and new insights into a range of writers in philosophy and literature, this is a timely and ambitious study of philosophy, literature, politics and ethics. "The Philosophy, Aesthetics and Cultural Theory" series examines the encounter between contemporary Continental philosophy and aesthetic and cultural theory. Each book in the series explores an exciting new direction in philosophical aesthetics or cultural theory, identifying the most important and pressing issues in Continental philosophy today.