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Nihilism
Most significant problems of contemporary life have their origins in nihilism and its paradoxical logic, which is simultaneously destructive to and constitutive of society. Yet, in social theory, nihilism is a surprisingly under-researched topic. This book develops a systematic account of nihilism in its four main forms: escapism, radical nihilism, passive nihilism and 'perfect nihilism.' It focuses especially on the disjunctive synthesis between passive nihilism (the negation of the will) and radical nihilism (the will to negation), between the hedonism/disorientation that characterizes the contemporary post-political culture and the emerging forms of despair and violence as a reaction to i...
The Culture of Exception
We live in an ever-fragmenting society, in which distinctions between culture and nature, biology and politics, law and transgression, mobility and immobility, reality and representation, seem to be disappearing. This book demonstrates the hidden logic beneath this process, which is also the logic of 'the camp'. Social theory has traditionally interpreted the camp as an anomaly, as an exceptional site situated on the margins of society, aiming to neutralize its 'failed citizens' and 'enemies'. However, in contemporary society, 'the camp' has now become the rule and consequently a new interrogation of its logic is necessary. In this exceptional volume, the authors explore the paradox of the camp, as representing both an old fear of enclosure and a new dream of belonging. They illustrate their arguments by drawing on contemporary sites of exemption - such as refugee camps, rape camps and favelas - as well as sites of self-exemption including gated communities, party tourism and celebrity cultures.
Sociology Through the Projector
Sociology through the Projector takes issue with the question of how contemporary film can help answering the general, abstract but still urgent question: what is the social today? This book explains the performative relation to contemporary social theory in which cinema functions as a tool for social diagnosis. There is much to be learned about social theory through an encounter with films as films are part and parcel of the society they portray. Increasingly more lay knowledge about social problems and facts stems from cinema as it offers to large audiences a popular and pedagogical introduction to social knowledge. Social theory cannot avoid a critical engagement with cinema as cinema int...
Strangers, Ambivalence and Social Theory
First published in 1998, this volume dwells upon the socio-political problem of "under-representation" at great length within the context of immigration through analysis of Turkish immigrants within the "cosy" country of Denmark on the European Periphery. The main purpose has been to show the fictitious and constructed character of the identities that are normally presupposed and taken for granted. Bülent Diken attempts to "defamiliarize" the familiar notions of the "immigrant" and what is taken for granted in the field of immigration. To counter this, Diken allows the "immigrant" to speak throughout interviews. In addition, the study dwells on local and central state policies and planning. This requires a merger of social theory with research on immigration as well as (social and physical) planning, in this case in a Danish context with an examination on how the application of planning and urban politics are oriented toward immigrants. Together with an interest in political and discursive "strategies", the "tactics" used by immigrants in coping with these strategies are focused on at length.
The New Despotism
Ours is a post-political society that cannot imagine radical change; a ‘one dimensional’ society in which politics is reduced to economic concerns. Paradoxically, however, everybody today is subjected to the imperative of regular radical change. Populations have grown accustomed to the idea that one constantly needs to adapt to radical transformations, modify one’s life strategy in tune with the demands of the market on the one hand and the politics of security on the other. Indeed, the idea that there are unquestionable authorities, the idea of ‘despotism’, no longer refers to exceptional circumstances in which politics is suspended but rather seems to have become normalized as part of daily life. This book aims to articulate the genealogy of the despotism-economy-voluntary servitude nexus focusing on their different constellations in the prism of social theory and political philosophy. As it traces the genealogy of this nexus its concern is the field of formation, intervention and intelligibility that arises when and as the three concepts encounter one another.
Revolt, Revolution, Critique
In contemporary society the idea of ‘revolution’ seems to have become obsolete. What is more untimely than the idea of revolution today? At the same time, however, the idea of radical change no longer refers to exceptional circumstances but has become normalized as part of daily life. Ours is a ‘culture’ of permanent revolution in which constant systemic disembedding demands a meta-stable subjectivity in continuous transformation. In this sense, the idea of revolution is painfully timely. This paradoxical coincidence, the simultaneous absence and presence of the desire for radical change in contemporary society, is the point of departure for the symptomatic reading this book offers. ...
Precarious Life
In her most impassioned and personal book to date, Judith Butler responds in this profound appraisal of post-9/11 America to the current US policies to wage perpetual war, and calls for a deeper understanding of how mourning and violence might instead inspire solidarity and a quest for global justice.
The Cinema of Nuri Bilge Ceylan
Film maker Nuri Bilge Ceylan's meditative, visually stunning contributions to the 'New Turkish Cinema' have marked him out as a pioneer of his medium. Reaping success from his prize-winning, breakout film Uzak (2002), and from later festival favourites Once Upon a Time in Anatolia (2011) and Winter Sleep (2014), he has quickly established himself as an original and provocative writer, director and producer of 21st century cinema. In an age where Turkey's modernisation has created societal tensions and departures from past tradition, Ceylan's films present a cinema of dislocation and a vision of 'nostalgia' understood as homesickness: sick of being away from home; sick of being at home. This ...
God, Politics, Economy
The book intervenes into the contemporary debate on religion, politics, and economy, focusing on the field of formation which emerges as these seemingly autonomous spheres encounter one another. Empirically, it concentrates on examples from literature, theatre, and cinema as well as a case study of the recent revolts in Turkey where a ‘moderate’ Islamic government is in power. Theoretically, its focus is on the contemporary ‘return’ of religion in the horizon of the critique of religion, seeking to articulate an affirmative politics that can re-evaluate the value of dominant values in religious governance and governance of religion.
The Culture of Exception
We live in an ever-fragmenting society, in which distinctions between culture and nature, biology and politics, law and transgression, mobility and immobility, reality and representation, seem to be disappearing. This book demonstrates the hidden logic beneath this process, which is also the logic of 'the camp'. Social theory has traditionally interpreted the camp as an anomaly, as an exceptional site situated on the margins of society, aiming to neutralize its 'failed citizens' and 'enemies'. However, in contemporary society, 'the camp' has now become the rule and consequently a new interrogation of its logic is necessary. In this exceptional volume, the authors explore the paradox of the camp, as representing both an old fear of enclosure and a new dream of belonging. They illustrate their arguments by drawing on contemporary sites of exemption - such as refugee camps, rape camps and favelas - as well as sites of self-exemption including gated communities, party tourism and celebrity cultures.
