The Gift of European Thought and the Cost of Living
Berghahn Books (Verlag)
978-1-78533-525-9 (ISBN)
European thought is often said to be a gift to the rest of the world, but what if there is no gift as such? What if there is only an economy where every giving is also a taking, and every taking is also a giving? This book extends the question of economies by making a case for an “economy of thought” and a “political economy.” It argues that all thinking and doing presupposes taking, and therefore giving, as the price to pay for taking; or that there exists a “cost of living,” which renders the idea of free thinking and living untenable. The argument is developed against the Enlightenment directive to think for oneself as the means of becoming autonomous and shows that this “light,” given to the rest of the world as a gift, turns out to be nothing.
Vassos Argyrou is Professor of Social Anthropology and Cultural Theory in the School of Social Sciences, University of Hull. His publications include Tradition and Modernity in the Mediterranean: The Wedding as Symbolic Struggle (Cambridge University Press, 1996), Anthropology and the Will to Meaning: A Postcolonial Critique (Pluto Press, 2002), and The Logic of Environmentalism: Anthropology, Ecology and Postcoloniality (Berghahn Books, 2005).
Chapter 1. The Circle
Chapter 2. The Gift of European Thought
The Postcolonial
The Take on/of the Gift
The Power of Giving
Chapter 3. The Economy of Thought
The Phenomenon and the Phantom
‘Think for yourself’
The Socialisation of Thought
Chapter 4. Political Economy
Re-volution
The Hegemonic
Identity Politics
Chapter 5. The Cost of Living
Thinking and not Thinking
Autonomy and Heteronomy
The Cost of Living
References
| Erscheinungsdatum | 11.01.2017 |
|---|---|
| Verlagsort | Oxford |
| Sprache | englisch |
| Maße | 152 x 229 mm |
| Gewicht | 209 g |
| Themenwelt | Sozialwissenschaften ► Ethnologie |
| Sozialwissenschaften ► Soziologie ► Allgemeines / Lexika | |
| ISBN-10 | 1-78533-525-1 / 1785335251 |
| ISBN-13 | 978-1-78533-525-9 / 9781785335259 |
| Zustand | Neuware |
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