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Loading... Twilight of the Anthropocene Idolsby Tom Cohen
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Following on from Theory and the Disappearing Future, in Twilight of the Anthropocene Idols, Cohen, Colebrook and Miller turn their attention to the eco-critical and environmental humanities' newest and most fashionable of concepts, the Anthropocene. The question that has escaped focus, as "tipping points" are acknowledged as passed, is how language, mnemo-technologies, and the epistemology of tropes appear to guide the accelerating ecocide, and how that implies a mutation within reading itself-from the era of extinction events. No library descriptions found. |
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)304.201Social sciences Social Sciences; Sociology and anthropology Factors affecting social behavior Human ecologyLC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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This is an explicitly philosophical treatise on the implications of the Anthropocene for the humanities, largely drawing on and rethinking the work of Nietzsche and Paul De Man, as well as Derrida, Levinas and other poststructuralist thinkers, in the light of climate change. The clearest and most concisely written section of the book is the Preface, co-authored by Colebrook and Cohen, which plainly sets out the stakes of the Anthropocene for humanism, philosophy and the humanities in general. The subsequent chapters are useful and enlightening but occasionally uneven in their argumentation and, in the case of Cohen’s chapter, written with a kind of nihilistic bravado and unnecessary obscurantism that grates after fifty pages. That said, there are many important ideas here and it represents a significant volume of work in the quickly expanding field of Anthropocene Studies. Pretty much essential reading for scholars in the field of ecocriticism and/or literary theory. ( )