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Books > Humanities > Philosophy > Western philosophy > Ancient Western philosophy to c 500
This book analyses the diverse ways in which women have been
represented in the Puranic traditions in ancient India - the
virtuous wife, mother, daughter, widow, and prostitute - against
the socio-religious milieu around CE 300-1000. Puranas (lit.
ancient narratives) are brahmanical texts that largely fall under
the category of socio-religious literature which were more
broad-based and inclusive, unlike the Smrtis, which were accessible
mainly to the upper sections of society. In locating, identifying,
and commenting on the multiplicity of the images and depictions of
women's roles in Puranic traditions, the author highlights their
lives and experiences over time, both within and outside the
traditional confines of the domestic sphere. With a focus on five
Mahapuranas that deal extensively with the social matrix Visnu,
Markandeya Matsya, Agni, and Bhagavata Puranas, the book explores
the question of gender and agency in early India and shows how such
identities were recast, invented, shaped, constructed, replicated,
stereotyped, and sometimes reversed through narratives. Further, it
traces social consequences and contemporary relevance of such
representations in marriage, adultery, ritual, devotion, worship,
fasts, and pilgrimage. This volume will be of interest to
researchers and scholars in women and gender studies, ancient
Indian history, religion, sociology, literature, and South Asian
studies, as also the informed general reader.
The" Posterior Analytics" contains Aristotle's Philosophy of
Science. In Book 2, Aristotle asks how the scientist discovers what
sort of loss of light constitutes lunar eclipse. The scientist has
to discover that the moon's darkening is due to the earth's shadow.
Once that defining explanation is known the scientist possesses the
full scientific concept of lunar eclipse and can use it to explain
other necessary features of the phenomenon. The present commentary,
arguably misascribed to Philoponus, offers some interpretations of
Aristotle that are unfamiliar nowadays. For example, the scientific
concept of a human is acquired from observing particular humans and
repeatedly receiving impressions in the sense image or percept and
later in the imagination. The impressions received are not only of
particular distinctive characteristics, like paleness, but also of
universal human characteristics, like rationality. Perception can
thus in a sense apprehend universal qualities in the individual as
well as particular ones.
Described as "a powerful, brilliant, and original study" when first
published, this second edition of Froma Zeitlin's experiment in
decoding the Aeschylus' Seven Against Thebes in the light of
contemporary theory now updates her explorations of the tragic
struggle between Eteocles and Polyneices, the doomed sons of
Oedipus, with a new preface, a new afterword, and the addition of
the relevant Greek texts. The mutual self-destruction of the enemy
brothers in this last act of the cursed family is preceded (and
determined) by one of Aeschylus' most daring innovations through
the pairing of the shields of attackers and defenders in the
central scene of the play as an extended dialogue explicitly
concerned with visual and verbal symbols. In a preliminary
consideration of the relations between language and kinship and
between city and family, between self and society, as determining
forces in fifth-century drama, the heart of the book is a detailed
investigation of this tour de force of semiotic energy. Zeitlin's
decipherment of this provocative text yields a heightened
appreciation of Aeschylus' compositional artistry and the
complexity of his worldview. At the same time, this study points
the way to Zeitlin's larger engagement with the special ideological
role that the city of Thebes comes to play on the tragic stage as
the negative counterpart to the self-representation of Athens.
This book examines the origins of ancient Greek science using the
vehicles of blood, blood vessels, and the heart. Careful attention
to biomedical writers in the ancient world, as well as to the
philosophical and literary work of writers prior to the Hippocratic
authors, produce an interesting story of how science progressed and
the critical context in which important methodological questions
were addressed. The end result is an account that arises from
debates that are engaged in and "solved" by different writers.
These stopping points form the foundation for Harvey and for modern
philosophy of biology. Author Michael Boylan sets out the history
of science as well as a critical evaluation based upon principles
in the contemporary canon of the philosophy of science-particularly
those dealing with the philosophy of biology.
Nietzsche is undoubtedly one of the most original and influential
thinkers in the history of philosophy. With ideas such as the
overman, will to power, the eternal recurrence, and perspectivism,
Nietzsche challenges us to reconceive how it is that we know and
understand the world, and what it means to be a human being.
Further, in his works, he not only grapples with previous great
philosophers and their ideas, but he also calls into question and
redefines what it means to do philosophy. Nietzsche and the
Philosophers for the first time sets out to examine explicitly
Nietzsche's relationship to his most important predecessors. This
anthology includes essays by many of the leading Nietzsche
scholars, including Keith Ansell-Pearson, Daniel Conway, Tracy B.
Strong, Gary Shapiro, Babette Babich, Mark Anderson, and Paul S.
Loeb. These excellent writers discuss Nietzsche's engagement with
such figures as Plato, Aristotle, Kant, Socrates, Hume,
Schopenhauer, Emerson, Rousseau, and the Buddha. Anyone interested
in Nietzsche or the history of philosophy generally will find much
of great interest in this volume.
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