SUP Philosophy

SUP Philosophy http://www.sup.org/rss/philosophy.xml The latest titles from Stanford University Press en-us Copyright 2008 Stanford University Press webmaster@www.sup.org (Webmaster) The Future and Its Enemies: In Defense of Political Hope The Future and Its Enemies: In Defense of Political Hope Daniel Innerarity Translated by Sandra Kingery "Thanks to its clear analyses and its multiple avenues of inquiry, this essay points the way to a new democratic lucidity."—Pierre Rosanvallon, Libération "The future no longer holds meaning for societies in thrall to the present. And in this present devoid of meaning, we have as much trouble accepting the legacy of the past as we do envisaging collective action that would take us beyond ourselves. We're obsessed by the here and now and incapable of making plans that would engage us and the future of society as a whole. Without a vision of what is yet to come, and without the will to endow it with meaning, we are reduced to the insignificance of our moment, that of a present ignorant of both its past and future."—Dominique Schnapper, École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, member of the French Constitutional Council (2001-2010) "As we increasingly accelerate our transformation of the present, the future has slowly disappeared. Daniel Innerarity ferrets out this future and finds it where it is to be found: in the discussions that give rise to it, discussions powerful enough to anticipate the ever faster changes to our present. The future is not the result of necessity but of political action. This last only has meaning if it entails choosing a future; if it does not, it already belongs to the past. Political action must look ever further ahead so as not to be overtaken by the convulsions of the short term. Against those who define themselves as post-modern, Innerarity discovers a world of hope and of controlled transformations. The more we discover the future behind the accelerations of the present, the more we find the possibility of choice and the responsibility of making decisions. In so doing, we liberate ourselves from imprisonment in a present that will accelerate on automatic pilot, rejecting intervention of any form and thus any form of democracy. The struggle between the destroyers of the future and its liberators is now central. It has replaced the opposition between the right and the left, because conservers of the present and creators of the future are everywhere to be found. After so many ideologies and somber philosophies that forbid us any future, Daniel Innerarity allows us, and even imposes upon us, an optimism that is also our freedom."—Alain Touraine, École des hautes études en sciences sociales "In this fascinating inquiry into how our image of the future has changed and into the consequences of this modification for democracy, Innerarity explores the challenges of post-heroic politics and the prospect for reclaiming hope as part of transformative politics. The Future and Its Enemies enriches our democratic imagination with new vistas."—Alessandro Ferrara, University of Rome <center><a href="http://www.sup.org/book.cgi?id=20325">To buy this book or view bibliographic details, click here.</a></center> Humans may be the only creatures conscious of having a future, but all too often we would rather not think about it. Likewise, our societies, unable to deal with radical uncertainty, do not make policies with a view to the long term. Instead, we suffer from a sense of powerlessness, collective irrationality, and perennial political discontent. In The Future and Its Enemies, Spanish philosopher Daniel Innerarity makes a plea for a new social contract that would commit us to moral and political responsibility with respect to future generations. He urges us to become advocates for the future in the face of enemies who, oblivious to the costs of modernization, press for endless and unproductive acceleration. His accessible book proposes a new way of confronting the unknown—one grounded in the calculation of risk. Declaring the classical right-left divide to be redundant, Innerarity presents his hopes for a renewed democracy and a politics that would find convincing ways to mediate between the priorities of the present, the heritage of the past, and the challenges that lie ahead. Daniel Innerarity holds the "Ikerbasque" Chair in Social and Political Philosophy at the University of the Basque Country, where directs the Institute for Democratic Governance. His most recent books include the prizewinning Transformation of Politics (2010) and La Sociedad invisible (2004). Innerarity is also a regular contributor to the Spanish newspaper El País. In 2005, Le Nouvel Observateur profiled him in its special issue dedicated to "25 Intellectual Leaders of the Contemporary World." http://www.sup.org/rss/book_rss.cgi?id=20325 http://www.sup.org/rss/book_rss.cgi?id=20325 Post-Postmodernism: or, The Cultural Logic of Just-in-Time Capitalism Post-Postmodernism: or, The Cultural Logic of Just-in-Time Capitalism Jeffrey T. Nealon "This is a work of very considerable importance. Now perhaps more than at any other time, culture and the economy constitute a seamless whole: everything can be given its price. Nealon poses the question: if postmodernism was the cultural logic of late capitalism, what is the cultural logic that has accompanied our current regime of accumulation? His answer is novel and ingenious."—Kenneth Surin, Duke University "Post-Postmodernism is Jeffrey Nealon in full flow: biting, smart, funny, and demonstrating his rare ability to combine philosophical insights with the most irreverent aspects of the popular. He propels us into thought through capital, through the popular, through the philosophical, through the political. Nealon has much to teach us, and he does so in splendid fashion."—Grant Farred, Cornell University <center><a href="http://www.sup.org/book.cgi?id=21791">To buy this book or view bibliographic details, click here.</a></center> Post-Postmodernism begins with a simple premise: we no longer live in the world of "postmodernism," famously dubbed "the cultural logic of late capitalism" by Fredric Jameson in 1984. Far from charting any simple move "beyond" postmodernism since the 1980s, though, this book argues that we've experienced an intensification of postmodern capitalism over the past decades, an increasing saturation of the economic sphere into formerly independent segments of everyday cultural life. If "fragmentation" was the preferred watchword of postmodern America, "intensification" is the dominant cultural logic of our contemporary era. Post-Postmodernism surveys a wide variety of cultural texts in pursuing its analyses—everything from the classic rock of Black Sabbath to the post-Marxism of Antonio Negri, from considerations of the corporate university to the fare at the cineplex, from reading experimental literature to gambling in Las Vegas, from Badiou to the undergraduate classroom. Insofar as cultural realms of all kinds have increasingly been overcoded by the languages and practices of economics, Nealon aims to construct a genealogy of the American present, and to build a vocabulary for understanding the relations between economic production and cultural production today—when American-style capitalism, despite its recent battering, seems nowhere near the point of obsolescence. Post-postmodern capitalism is seldom late but always just in time. As such, it requires an updated conceptual vocabulary for diagnosing and responding to our changed situation. Jeffrey T. Nealon is Professor of English at Penn State University. He is the author of Double Reading: Postmodernism after Deconstruction (1993), Alterity Politics: Ethics and Performative Subjectivity (1998), The Theory Toolbox (2003), and Foucault Beyond Foucault: Power and Its Intensifications since 1984 (Stanford 2008). http://www.sup.org/rss/book_rss.cgi?id=21791 http://www.sup.org/rss/book_rss.cgi?id=21791 Arendt and Adorno: Political and Philosophical Investigations Arendt and Adorno: Political and Philosophical Investigations Edited by Lars Rensmann and Samir Gandesha "The book assembles the most distinguished experts on Arendt and Adorno. Despite the mutual antipathy between the two thinkers, the study reveals they had a surprising affinity, especially with regard to the critique and rethinking of modernity."—Fred Dallmayr, University of Notre Dame "Hannah Arendt and T.W. Adorno are rarely discussed in the same breath. This fine collection draws out points of overlap and causes the reader to pause and reflect about their similarities and differences on important issues."—Stephen Eric Bronner, Rutgers University "This cogent, insightful account of two major intellectual figures seeks to reconstruct their theoretical contexts, to identify their respective contributions, and to establish their continuing relevance. It offers an important defense of a difference-sensitive universalism against particularisms of all kinds, from religious fundamentalism to postmodern identity fetishism. This volume helps to renew critical theory and mobilize its resources in order to explain and assess modernity."—Douglas Moggach, University of Ottawa <center><a href="http://www.sup.org/book.cgi?id=17925">To buy this book or view bibliographic details, click here.</a></center> Hannah Arendt and Theodor W. Adorno, two of the most influential political philosophers and theorists of the twentieth century, were contemporaries with similar interests, backgrounds, and a shared experience of exile. Yet until now, no book has brought them together. In this first comparative study of their work, leading scholars discuss divergences, disclose surprising affinities, and find common ground between the two thinkers. This pioneering work recovers the relevance of Arendt and Adorno for contemporary political theory and philosophy and lays the foundation for a critical understanding of political modernity: from universalistic claims for political freedom to the abyss of genocidal politics. Lars Rensmann is DAAD Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. He is the author of The Frankfurt School and Antisemitism: Politics, Theory, and Philosophy (forthcoming) and, with Andrei S. Markovits, Gaming the World: How Sports are Reshaping Global Politics and Culture (2010). Samir Gandesha is Associate Professor of Modern European Thought and Culture and Director of the Institute for the Humanities at Simon Fraser University. http://www.sup.org/rss/book_rss.cgi?id=17925 http://www.sup.org/rss/book_rss.cgi?id=17925 Testing the Limit: Derrida, Henry, Levinas, and the Phenomenological Tradition Testing the Limit: Derrida, Henry, Levinas, and the Phenomenological Tradition François-David Sebbah Translated by Stephen Barker "François Sebbah, who practices phenomenology above all through a testing of readings—readings that jostle each other—uses phenomenology to experience limits that he neither denounces nor overcomes. Rather, he plunges in headfirst, engulfing himself so as to better draw on that experience, an a-theological baptism of sorts."—Bernard Stiegler <center><a href="http://www.sup.org/book.cgi?id=20100">To buy this book or view bibliographic details, click here.</a></center> In exploring the nature of excess relative to a phenomenology of the limit, Testing the Limit claims that phenomenology itself is an exploration of excess. What does it mean that "the self" is "given"? Should we see it as originary; or rather, in what way is the self engendered from textual practices that transgress—or hover around and therefore within—the threshold of phenomenologial discourse? This is the first book to include Michel Henry in a triangulation with Derrida and Levinas and the first to critique Levinas on the basis of his interpolation of philosophy and religion. Sebbah claims that the textual origins of phenomenology determine, in their temporal rhythms, the nature of the subjectivation on which they focus. He situates these considerations within the broader picture of the state of contemporary French phenomenology (chiefly the legacy of Merleau-Ponty), in order to show that these three thinkers share a certain "family resemblance," the identification of which reveals something about the traces of other phenomenological families. It is by testing the limit within the context of traditional phenomenological concerns about the appearance of subjectivity and ipseity that Derrida, Henry, and Levinas radically reconsider phenomenology and that French phenomenology assumes its present form. François-David Sebbah is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Compiègne in France and was Program Director at the International College of Philosophy in Paris. He is the author of Levinas: Ambiguïtés de l'altérité (2000). http://www.sup.org/rss/book_rss.cgi?id=20100 http://www.sup.org/rss/book_rss.cgi?id=20100 Race and Political Theology Race and Political Theology Edited by Vincent W. Lloyd "This impressive and timely volume aims to correct the omission of race as an orienting factor in political-theological discussion, thus reinvigorating both race theory and political theology. It does an excellent job staking out some of the key claims in a very lively contemporary debate about the origins, uses, and destinies of religion in liberal and post-liberal politics."—Julia Reinhard Lupton, University of California, Irvine "Race and Political Theology poses a set of refreshing and original questions about race and politics to the future of political theology. These questions are not confined to theology alone, however; they have wide theoretical and political implications. The volume is an important intervention within a field that has become oblivious and irresponsible regarding the question of race."—Ananda Abeysekara, Virginia Tech <center><a href="http://www.sup.org/book.cgi?id=20515">To buy this book or view bibliographic details, click here.</a></center> In this volume, senior scholars come together to explore how Jewish and African American experiences can make us think differently about the nexus of religion and politics, or political theology. Some wrestle with historical figures, such as William Shakespeare, W. E. B. Du Bois, Nazi journalist Wilhelm Stapel, and Austrian historian Otto Brunner. Others ponder what political theology can contribute to contemporary politics, particularly relating to Israel's complicated religious/racial/national identity and to the religious currents in African American politics. Race and Political Theology opens novel avenues for research in intellectual history, religious studies, political theory, and cultural studies, showing how timely questions about religion and politics must be reframed when race is taken into account. Vincent Lloyd is Assistant Professor of Religion at Syracuse University. He is the author of Law and Transcendence: On the Unfinished Project of Gillian Rose (2009) and The Problem with Grace: Reconfiguring Political Theology (Stanford, 2011). http://www.sup.org/rss/book_rss.cgi?id=20515 http://www.sup.org/rss/book_rss.cgi?id=20515 The Power of Life: Agamben and the Coming Politics The Power of Life: Agamben and the Coming Politics David Kishik "An outstanding piece of work."—Simon Critchley, New School for Social Research "Combining novel biographical research with lucid textual analysis, Kishik's illuminating The Power of Life shows the reader how Agamben's work can help us to imagine new forms of life and radically transform philosophical thought and practice. His reading of Agamben is precise and informative, and I can think of no better or more reliable guide for working through Agamben's complex writings."—Matthew Calarco, California State University, Fullerton <center><a href="http://www.sup.org/book.cgi?id=20514">To buy this book or view bibliographic details, click here.</a></center> Giorgio Agamben's work develops a new philosophy of life. On its horizon lies the conviction that our form of life can become the guiding and unifying power of the politics to come. Informed by this promise, The Power of Life weaves decisive moments and neglected aspects of Agamben's writings over the past four decades together with the thought of those who influenced him most (including Kafka, Heidegger, Benjamin, Arendt, Deleuze, and Foucault). In addition, the book positions his work in relation to key figures from the history of philosophy (such as Plato, Spinoza, Vico, Nietzsche, Wittgenstein, and Derrida). This approach enables Kishik to offer a vision that ventures beyond Agamben's warning against the power over (bare) life in order to articulate the power of (our form of) life and thus to rethink the biopolitical situation. Following Agamben's prediction that the concept of life will stand at the center of the coming philosophy, Kishik points to some of the most promising directions that this philosophy can take. David Kishik is the author of Wittgenstein's Form of Life (2008) and co-translator, with Stefan Pedatella, of Agamben's What Is an Apparatus? (Stanford 2009) and Nudities (Stanford 2010). He is a fellow at the Institute for Cultural Inquiry in Berlin, though he usually lives in New York. http://www.sup.org/rss/book_rss.cgi?id=20514 http://www.sup.org/rss/book_rss.cgi?id=20514