A highly relevant topic, given current discussions around fake news, fake facts, and misinformation in the media and public sphere This book offers a valuable contribution to how public discourse is impacted by personal bias, beliefs, and convictions Addresses the role and impact of conviction in the public sphere, education, and in political and cultural discourse It discusses where our convictions come from and whether we are aware of them, why they compel us to certain actions, and whether we can change our convictions when presented with opposing evidence that prove our personal convictions "wrong" It brings together scholars from multiple fields, such as philosophy, psychology, comparative literature, media studies, applied linguistics, intercultural communication, and education It will be of particular interest to scholars in communication and journalism studies, media studies, philosophy, and psychology It will contribute substantially to the study of conviction as an aspect of the self we all carry within us and are called upon to examine

The analyses of German and Brazilian cultures found in this book offer a much-needed rethinking of the intercultural paradigm for the humanities and literary and cultural studies. This collection examines cultural interactions between Germany and Brazil from the Early Modern period to the present day, especially how authors, artists and other intellectuals address the development of society, intervene in the construction and transformation of cultural identities, and observe the introduction of differing cultural elements in and beyond the limits of the nation. The contributors represent various academic disciplines, including German Studies, Luso-Afro-Brazilian Studies, Cultural Studies, Linguistics, Art History and the social sciences. Their essays cover a wide range of works and media, and the issues they address are relevant not only for each of the scholarly disciplines involved, but also in discussions of current cultural practices in connection to all forms of media. The collection thus serves as a model for further intercultural research, since it calls into question the very terms through which we understand the relationships between cultures, as well as their products, practices, and perspectives.

An imagination of possibilities, of miscalculations, of futures off-kilter   “Probability is a chimera, its head is true, its tail a suggestion. Futurologists attempt to compel the head to eat the tail (ouroboros). Here, though, we will try to wag the tail.� —Vilém Flusser  Two years after his Vampyroteuthis Infernalis, the philosopher Vilém Flusser engaged in another thought experiment: a collection of twenty-two “scenarios for the future� to be produced as computer-generated media, or technical images, that would break the imaginative logjam in conceiving the social, political, and economic future of the universe. What If? is not just an “impossible journey� to which Flusser invites us in the first scenario; it functions also as a distorting mirror held up to humanity.  Flusser’s disarming scenarios of an Anthropocene fraught with nightmares offer new visions that range from the scientific to the fantastic to the playful and whimsical. Each essay reflects our present sense of understanding the world, considering the exploitation of nature and the dangers of global warming, overpopulation, and blind reliance on the promises of scientific knowledge and invention. What If? offers insight into the radical futures of a slipstream Anthropocene that have much to do with speculative fiction, with Flusser’s concept of design as “crafty� or slippery, and with art and the immense creative potential of failure versus reasonable, “good� computing or calculability. As such, the book is both a warning and a nudge to imagine what we may yet become and be.

The analyses of German and Brazilian cultures found in this book offer a much-needed rethinking of the intercultural paradigm for the humanities and literary and cultural studies. This collection examines cultural interactions between Germany and Brazil from the Early Modern period to the present day, especially how authors, artists and other intellectuals address the development of society, intervene in the construction and transformation of cultural identities, and observe the introduction of differing cultural elements in and beyond the limits of the nation. The contributors represent various academic disciplines, including German Studies, Luso-Afro-Brazilian Studies, Cultural Studies, Linguistics, Art History and the social sciences. Their essays cover a wide range of works and media, and the issues they address are relevant not only for each of the scholarly disciplines involved, but also in discussions of current cultural practices in connection to all forms of media. The collection thus serves as a model for further intercultural research, since it calls into question the very terms through which we understand the relationships between cultures, as well as their products, practices, and perspectives.

Vilem Flusser (1920-1991) has long been known and celebrated in Europe and Brazil primarily as a media theorist. Only recently have other facets of his accomplishments come to light, clearly establishing Flusser as a key thinker.
An accessible and thorough introduction to Flusser's thought, this book reveals his engagement with a wide array of disciplines, from communication studies, posthuman philosophy, media studies, and history to art and art history, migrant studies, anthropology, and film studies. The first to connect Flusser's entire oeuvre, this volume shows how his works on media theory are just one part of a greater mosaic of writings that bring to the fore cultural and cognitive changes concerning all of us in the twenty-first century.
A theorist deeply influenced by his experiences as a privileged citizen of Prague, a Jew pursued by the Nazis, a European emigrant, a Brazilian immigrant, and a survivor keenly interested and invested in history and memory, Vilem Flusser was an outsider in a staunchly hierarchical and disciplined academic world.