Pindar-the 'Theban eagle', as Thomas Gray famously called him-has often been taken as the archetype of the sublime poet: soaring into the heavens on wings of language and inspired by visions of eternity. In this much-anticipated new study, Robert Fowler asks in what ways the concept of the sublime can still guide a reading of the greatest of the Greek lyric poets. Working with ancient and modern treatments of the topic, especially the poetry and writings of Friedrich Hoelderlin (1770-1843), arguably Pindar's greatest modern reader, he develops the case for an aesthetic appreciation of Pindar's odes as literature. Building on recent trends in criticism, he shifts the focus away from the first performance and the orality of Greek culture to reception and the experience of Pindar's odes as text. This change of emphasis yields a fresh discussion of many facets of Pindar's astonishing art, including the relation of the poems to their occasions, performativity, the poet's persona, his imagery, and his myths. Consideration of Pindar's views on divinity, transcendence, time, and the limits of language reveals him to be not only a great writer but a great thinker.

What led so many intellectuals, politicians and scientists to believe in, and insist on, the existence of race? In exploring this question this book examines themes in the history of race, including nationalism, imperialism, colonialism, eugenics, biopolitics, fascism, Nazism and communism, from 1789 to the present day. "Race and Modernity" provides an easily accessible, but conceptually challenging, synthesis of the current research into the relationship between race and modernity, richly illustrated with reference to primary source material. Specifically, the book examines how societies the world over appropriated the concept of race as a vehicle for transmitting social and political messages that transgressed political differences and opposing ideological camps. The authors examine case studies from the UK, the United States, Japan, Romania, Greece and Sudan, among others, and use these to chart the emergence and evolution of the concept of race, and look at the legacy of these ideas for the present day.

This book investigates notions of the individual, society, the state, economic relations and historical change that exist in the political left by drawing on contemporary philosophical, political and social thought. Using a discourse perspective, this work brings together the many fractious strains in the left, including social democracy, anarchism, communism and market socialism, and discusses them in terms of their relationships with each other. Not only does the study disentangle the left from liberal capitalism and progressive movements-such as those against racism and inequality-it sees the current left as intertwined with its history and its visions of the future.

This book provides a comprehensive survey of Edmund Burke's historical thought, a neglected area of both Burke scholarship and historiography. Ranging from Burke's general conception of history to his accounts of English, European, American, Irish and Asian-Muslim history, this book offers much-needed depth and context to his political life. Sora Sato illuminates Burke's ideas on civilisation and world order with careful analysis of both his well-known historical concepts, such as the ancient constitution of England and the spirit of chivalry, as well as his lesser-known opinions on war and the military. Written with clarity and precision, this book is an invaluable reference for scholars of Burke, early modern European history and political philosophy.

Blending past and present, this brief history of economics is the perfect book for introducing students to the field.A Brief History of Economics illustrates how the ideas of the great economists not only influenced societies but were themselves shaped by their cultural milieu. Understanding the economists' visions - lucidly and vividly unveiled by Canterbery - allows readers to place economics within a broader community of ideas. Magically, the author links Adam Smith to Isaac Newton's idea of an orderly universe, F Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby to Thorstein Veblen, John Steinbeck's Grapes of Wrath to the Great Depression, and Tom Wolfe's The Bonfire of the Vanities to Reaganomics.Often humorous, Canterbery's easy style will make the student's first foray into economics lively and relevant. Readers will dismiss "dismal" from the science.

Concerned primarily with relations between Protestant Christianity and the main currents in secular intellectual life over the course of the past century, the essays in this volume disclose the persistence, complexity, and fragility of religious thought in the new university dominated intellectual environment of the modern period. Arguing that three important patterns of response emerged from the challenges to religious belief posed by nineteenth-century science and scholarship--the traditionalist, the naturalist, and the modernist responses--the volume is organized to bring out the continuing interplay of reciprocal influences among them. The contributors show that a dialectic between naturalistic and religious points of view has contributed significantly to the character and style of modern American thought.

This collection of essays is addressed to the legacy of Enlightenment thought, with respect to 18th-century notions of human nature, human rights, representative democracy or the nation state, and with regard to the barbarism, including the Holocaust, allegedly unleashed by 18th-century ideals of civilization. Each author offers an interpretation of modern or postmodern philosophy against the background of a so-called Enlightenment Project, envisaged as the conceptual ghost that haunts modernity.

This book deals with three major French thinkers of the seventeenth century, Descartes, Pascal, and Malebranche. It examines their influential critical accounts of the impact of the body and of social relationships on experience, and the need to correct this by reference to metaphysical or religious truth.

This book explores the Romanian Orthodox Church's arguments on national identity to legitimize its own place in a post-communist Romania. The work traces the clergy's deployment of the concepts of Christian Orthodoxy and Latin legacy as part of an uncharted constellation of arguments in contemporary intellectual history. A survey of public intellectuals' opinions on national identity complements the Church's views. The investigation attempts to offer an insight into the Church's efforts to re-assert itself, given free rein in a post-dictatorial world of accelerated modernization. After clarifying and surveying the Church's claims on institutional and national identity, the book then also explores the secular ideas on the subject. The subsequent analysis treats this material as "speech acts" (statements doing, not only saying, something) which are occasionally out of sync. Against a background of secularization, the Church's rhetoric articulates a distinct line of thought in the post-89 intellectual landscape.

"Women on the Edge re-envisions women's cinema as contemporary political practices by exploring the works of twelve filmmakers. Moving on from the 1970s feminist adage that the personal is political, Sharon Lin Tay argues that contemporary women's cinema must exceed the personal to be politically relevant and ethically cogent"--Provided by publisher.

Many studies of fictions of city life take the flneur as the characteristic metropolitan type and streets and plazas as definitive urban spaces. Looking at novels and films set in London and Paris from L'Assommoir to Nil By Mouth, this book shows that mass housing is equally central to images of the modern city.

After decades of myth making, C.G. Jung remains one of the most misunderstood figures in Western intellectual history. This comprehensive study of the origins of his psychology provides a new perspective on the rise of modern psychology and psychotherapy. It reconstructs the reception of Jung's work in the human sciences, and its impact on the social and intellectual history of the twentieth century. The book creates a basis for any future discussion of Jung by opening new vistas in psychology.

"A Brief History of Economics" illustrates how the ideas of the great economists not only influenced societies but were themselves shaped by their cultural milieu. Understanding the economists' visions - lucidly and vividly unveiled by Canterbery -allows readers to place economics within a broader community of ideas. Magically, the author links Adam Smith to Isaac Newton's idea of an orderly universe, F. Scott Fitzgerald's "The Great Gatsby" to Thornstein Veblen, John Steinbeck's "Grapes of Wrath" to the Great Depression, and Tom Wolfe's "The Bonfire of the Vanities" to Reaganomics. Often humorous, Canterbery's easy style should make the student's first foray into economics lively and relevant. Readers will no longer dare call it the "dismal science".

Literature and Encyclopedism in Enlightenment Britain tells the story of long-term aspirations to comprehend, record, and disseminate complete knowledge of the world. It draws on a wide range of literary and non-literary works from the early modern era and British Enlightenment.

Kant's Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason is one of the great modern examinations of religion's meaning, function and impact on human affairs. In this volume, the first complete English-language commentary on the work, James J. DiCenso explains the historical context in which the book appeared, including the importance of Kant's conflict with state censorship. He shows how the Religion addresses crucial Kantian themes such as the relationship between freedom and morality, the human propensity to evil, the status of historical traditions in relation to ethical principles, and the interface between individual ethics and social institutions. The major arguments are clearly and precisely explained, and the themes are highlighted and located within Kant's mature critical philosophy, especially his ethics. The commentary will be valuable for all who are interested in the continuing relevance of religion for contemporary inquiries into ethics, public institutions and religious traditions.

A collection of essays based on an international conference in 1989. The essays examine both the historical dimension of the European idea and the problems of national and transnational identity confronting European integration in the 1990s. Chapters discuss post-modern Europe, Europe and Japan, the European identity, political parties, contemporary feminist movements, socialism, Austrian identity and an essay on Mitterand.

This introductory guide to Louis Althusser provides the first major overview of his work since the publication in French of thousands of pages of essays, books, and letters unknown before 1990. Focusing on Althusser's writing on art, theater, and literature, Warren Montag traces the contradictory development of Althusser's thought from the early 60s to his autobiography, The Future Lasts Forever. Montag also explores how Althusser's reflections on reading can shed new light on well-known texts such as Heart of Darkness and Robinson Crusoe.

In a systematic and comprehensive analysis of the relationship between sociology and cultural studies, Gregor McLennan lucidly guides us from central philosophical questions in the social sciences to new interpretations of such urgent contemporary questions as Eurocentrism, multiculturalism, and reflexivity. The author offers a range of closely linked arguments concerning the viability of the 'idea of sociology', the development of cultural studies, and the balance between positivity and reflexivity in setting the right kind of 'mood music' for progressive intellectual work.

One of the most vital questions of our time is how the new electronically based information technology can be used to its best advantage. We are now entering an era of multi-media communication which can bring benefit or dangers in its train. This volume offers a comprehensive, up-to-date survey of the present and future impact of these modern technologies (including word processors, videotex and video and digital optical discs) on professional, business and scholarly research information, as well as on information to the general public. The contributors are all experts in their fields, and include practitioners as well as scholars. The volume is intended for anyone who has a professional interest in information transfer, and those who wish to keep abreast of matters of important current concern. It provides a balanced and detailed, but easily readable introduction to the topic.

"Based on impressive research in a wide variety of sources, including popular literature, advertisements, true confession and physique magazines, advice columns, sex surveys, vice investigation reports, and personal letters, "The First Sexual Revolution" offers a provocative interpretation of the impact of the sexual revolution on men. White's boldly-stated criticism of sexual liberalism is sure to arouse controversy. Yet his view of men confused by new expectations of attractiveness and sexiness, threatened by women's demands for sexual satisfaction, yet essentially still in control, is compelling."
--Leila J. Rupp Ohio State University, Co-author of "Survival in the Doldrums: The American Women's Rights Movement, 1945 to the 1960s,"

In the early 1900s, a sexual revolution took place that was to define social relations between the sexes in America for generations. As Victorian values gradually faded, and a commercialized consumer culture emerged, the female figure of the flapper came to embody early-twentieth century femininity. Simultaneously, masculine ideals were also undergoing radical change. Who then was this New Man to accompany the New Woman? Who was the flapper's boyfriend?

In this remarkable book, Kevin White draws on a vast array of sources to examine the ideology--spread through movies, advertisements, sex confession magazines, social hygienists, sex manuals, and Freudian popularizers --that has defined modern American manhood. Examining attitudes toward masturbation, homosexuality, violence against women, feminism, free love, and the emerging dating system, "The First Sexual Revolution" shows how American men in the Jazz Age were subjected to a barrage ofinformation and advice about their sexuality that stressed not character but personality and sex appeal. Repression was out; sexual expression--performance--was in.

This New Man was more egalitarian and more sexual than the Victorian patriarch. But the diffusion to the middle class of the Victorian underworld ethos of primitivism and violence against women, and the flight from commitment to relationships, heralded instability and tensions that continues to define American sexual relations. To illustrate this point, Dr. White takes a close look--through letters and diaries--at the successes and failures of nine marriages involving actively feminist women, demonstrating the pressures that this revolution in values caused. Dr. White concludes that the return to primitivism characterized by the men's movement marks the most recent aftershock of the revolution that has shaped us all.

Quadratic equations, Pythagoras' theorem, imaginary numbers, and pi - you may remember studying these at school, but did anyone ever explain why? Never fear - bestselling science writer, and your new favourite maths teacher, Michael Brooks, is here to help. In The Maths That Made Us, Brooks reminds us of the wonders of numbers: how they enabled explorers to travel far across the seas and astronomers to map the heavens; how they won wars and halted the HIV epidemic; how they are responsible for the design of your home and almost everything in it, down to the smartphone in your pocket. His clear explanations of the maths that built our world, along with stories about where it came from and how it shaped human history, will engage and delight. From ancient Egyptian priests to the Apollo astronauts, and Babylonian tax collectors to juggling robots, join Brooks and his extraordinarily eccentric cast of characters in discovering how maths made us who we are today.

This book examines why several American literary and intellectual icons found themselves to be pioneering scholars and lifelong students of the Hispanic world. The author asserts that these gifted Americans focused on the Hispanic world that they might shape their own country's identity after Independence and the War of 1812, a crucial time for the young republic, and that they found inspiration in a most unlikely place: the seat of the collapsing Spanish empire.

The relations between science and philosophy in the early nineteenth century remain one of the most misunderstood topics in modern European intellectual history. By taking the brilliant career of Danish physicist-philosopher Hans Christian A~rsted as their organizing theme, leading international philosophers and historians of science reveal illuminating new perspectives on the intellectual map of Europe in the age of revolution and romanticism. They show how A~rsted, an intrepid traveller and cosmopolitan from the periphery of enlightened Europe, mediated between the great scientists of Germany, France, and Britain and profoundly shaped post-kantian philosophy and the emerging new energy physics of the nineteenth-century.