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In this important revisionist study, Posnock integrates literary and psychological criticism with social and cultural theory to make a major advance in our understanding of the life and thought of two great American figures, Henry and William James. Challenging canonical images of bothbrothers, Posnock is the first to place them in a rich web of cultural and intellectual affiliations comprised of a host of American and European theorists of modernity. A startlingly new Henry James emerges from a cross-disciplinary dialogue, which features Veblen, Santayana, Bourne, and Dewey, aswell as Weber.
Dave Beech and John Roberts develop what they call a 'counter-intuitive' notion of the philistine, with insights on cultural division and exclusion.
Matthias Vogel challenges the belief that reason is determined solely by our discursive, linguistic abilities as communicative beings. In his view, the medium of language is not the only force of reason, that music, art and other nonlinguistic forms of communication are also significant.
The Catholic Church is under great pressure to change. The list of debated topics is long: women’s rights, same-sex partnerships, the involvement of the laity, etc. Michael Seewald makes it clear: the Church could be more flexible than it is currently. Discussions about reform move within a narrow dogmatic framework, but this is only one of many possibilities. Here Michael Seewald shows how it is possible for the Catholic Church to undergo fundamental reform while at the same time remaining itself.
Grappling with the moral dimensions of the ways in which technology is applied in today's world, some of the keenest minds of our time raise and attempt to answer four major questions: Do our current problems represent a new element in human affairs or are they merely a continuation of past problems altered somewhat by the pervasiveness of technolo
These 11 essays by noted philosophers and social theorists take up the philosophical aspects of Jürgen Habermas's unfinished project of reconstructing enlightenment rationality. They range in subject matter from classical problems to contemporary debates, covering historical perspectives, theoretical issues, and post-enlightenment challenges. A companion volume of essays will take up the cultural and political aspects of the work. Together, the two volumes underscore the richness and variety of Habermas's project. Contributors Karl-Otto Apel, Richard J. Bernstein, Peter Bürger, Martin Jay, Thomas McCarthy, Herbert Schnädelbach, Charles Taylor, Michael Theunissen, Ernst Tugendhat, Albrecht Wellmer
Modern individuality is the not-so-secret protagonist of Hegel’s practical philosophy. In the framework of spirit, Hegel presents some basic features of the individual’s way of life, lifeworld, self-interpreation, and self-determination, which can also be timely in shaping our own personal and social identities.
When confronted by a range of violent actions perpetrated by lone individuals, contemporary society exhibits a constant tendency to react in terms of helpless, even perplexed horror. Seeking explanations for the apparently inexplicable, commentators often hurry to declare the perpetrators as “evil”. This question is not restricted to individuals: history has repeatedly demonstrated how groups and even entire nations can embark on a criminal plan united by the conviction that they were fighting for a good and just cause. Which circumstances occasioned such actions? What was their motivation? Applying a number of historical, scientific and social-scientific approaches to this question, this study produces an integrative portrait of the reasons for human behavior and advances a number of different interpretations for their genesis. The book makes clear the extent to which we live in socially-constructed realities in which we cling for dear life to a range of conceptions and beliefs which can all too easily fall apart in situations of crisis.
This book examines the Werturteilsstreit ("value-judgment dispute"), from its initial stages in the debates between the eminent German social historian Max Weber and his contemporaries, to more recent contributions from scholars such as Karl Popper, Talcott Parsons, and Jurgen Habermas.
From the launch of the Journal of Social Research in 1932 to the recent work of Jurgen Habermas on law and democracy, the Frankfurt School has produced some of the most ambitious and influential theories of the past century. This new introduction to the critical theory of the School provides a thorough, concise and up-to-date assessment of thinkers including Pollock, Marcuse, Horkheimer, Adorno, Neumann, Lowenthal, Fromm, Kirchheimer and Habermas. Peter Stirk's lively account places the formative work of the School within the context of the Weimar Republic and of Nazi Germany. He contrasts this environment with the very different background of 1950s Germany in which Habermas embarked on his ...