John Roberts: Philosophizing the Everyday: Revolutionary Praxis and the Fate of Cultural Theory (2006)

“After modernism and postmodernism, it is argued, the everyday supposedly is where a democracy of taste is brought into being – the place where art goes to recover its customary and collective pleasures, and where the shared pleasures of popular culture are indulged, from celebrity magazines to shopping malls. John Roberts argues that this understanding of the everyday downgrades its revolutionary meaning and philosophical implications. Bringing radical political theory back to the centre of the discussion, he shows how notions of cultural democratization have been oversimplified. Asserting that the everyday should not be narrowly identified with the popular, Roberts critiques the way in which the concept is now overly associated with consumption and ‘ordinariness’. Engaging with the work of key thinkers including, Lukacs, Arvatov, Benjamin, Lefebvre, Gramsci, Barthes, Vaneigem, and de Certeau, Roberts shows how the concept of the everyday continues to be central to debates on ideology, revolution and praxis. He offers a lucid account of different approaches that developed over the course of the twentieth century, making this an ideal book for anyone looking for a politicised approach to cultural theory.”

Publisher Pluto Press, 2006
ISBN 0745324118, 9780745324111
147 pages

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PDF (updated on 2014-7-26)

Andrew Feenberg: Transforming Technology. A Critical Theory Revisited (2002)

Thoroughly revised, this new edition of Critical Theory of Technology rethinks the relationships between technology, rationality, and democracy, arguing that the degradation of labor–as well as of many environmental, educational, and political systems–is rooted in the social values that preside over technological development. It contains materials on political theory, but the emphasis has shifted to reflect a growing interest in the fields of technology and cultural studies.

Publisher Oxford University Press US, 2002
ISBN 0195146158, 9780195146158
218 pages

Keywords and phrases
Marxism, critical theory, theory of technology, critique of technology, capitalist, deskilling, Frankfurt School, technological rationality, technoscience, Marx, Minitel, double aspect theory, socialist, Soviet Union, artificial intelligence, public ownership, posthumanist, online education, hegemony, division of labor

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PDF (updated on 2012-7-31)

William E. Connolly: Neuropolitics: Thinking, Culture, Speed (2002)

Why would a political theorist venture into the nexus between neuroscience and film? According to William Connolly — whose new book is itself an eloquent answer — the combination exposes the ubiquitous role that technique plays in thinking, ethics, and politics. By taking up recent research in neuroscience to explore the way brain activity is influenced by cultural conditions and stimuli such as film technique, Connolly is able to fashion a new perspective on our attempts to negotiate — and thrive — within a deeply pluralized society whose culture and economy continue to quicken.

In Neuropolitics Connolly draws upon recent brain/body research to explore the creative potential of thinking, the layered character of culture, the cultivation of ethical sensibilities, and the critical role of technique in all three. He then shows how a series of films — including Vertigo, Five Easy Pieces, and Citizen Kane — enhances our appreciation of technique and contests the linear image of time now prevalent in cultural theory.

Connolly deftly brings these themes together to support an ethos of deep pluralism within the democratic state and a politics of citizen activism across states. His book is an original and rigorous study that attends to the creative possibilities of thinking in identity, culture, and ethics.

Publisher University of Minnesota Press, 2002
ISBN 081664022X, 9780816640225
218 pages

Keywords and phrases
virtual memory, apodictic, amygdala, nontheistic, Kantian, Lucretius, Gilles Deleuze, Spinoza, Citizen Kane, neo-Kantians, Epicurus, Antonio Damasio, cultural theory, Friedrich Nietzsche, Ilya Prigogine, Henri Bergson, Isabelle Stengers, existential, immanent, intersubjective

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PDF (updated on 2012-7-14)