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Literary Criticism Semiotics & Theory

After Poststructuralism

Writing the Intellectual History of Theory

edited by Tilottama Rajan & Michael O'Driscoll

Publisher
University of Toronto Press
Initial publish date
Aug 2002
Category
Semiotics & Theory, General
  • Hardback

    ISBN
    9780802047915
    Publish Date
    Aug 2002
    List Price
    $84.00
  • eBook

    ISBN
    9781442670686
    Publish Date
    Jul 2002
    List Price
    $84.00

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Description

Every history of theory is simultaneously a theory of history. Rajan and O'Driscoll's wide-ranging volume tackles the issue of providing an intellectual history of theory, given a considerable continuity between theory and the history of ideas, and also given theory's own questioning of traditional intellectual historical models. The editors address this challenge by providing thirteen essays on a variety of theorists from Derrida to Zizek. Under the paradigms of genealogy, performativity, physiology, and technology, the essayists explore metaphors for connecting the work of theorists from different times, that are drawn from areas other than history, and that can enrich and revise our understanding of the histories of theory.

Not only do these essays reflect the impact on writing about theory - and by extension on intellectual history - in areas such as psychoanalysis, philosophy, literature, and cultural studies, but they are also an exploration of theme and situation - the writing of intellectual history after the linguistic turn and the poststructuralist critique. Written for the theory specialists, as well as intellectual historians and those in the humanities and social sciences who are concerned with critical theory, the essays represent a re-evaluation of the current state of theory, as addressed by leading scholars in the field.

About the authors

Tilottama Rajan is Canada Research Chair and Distinguished University Professor at the University of Western Ontario. She is the author of Dark Interpreter: The Discourse of Romanticism (also published by Cornell University Press), Deconstruction and the Remainders of Phenomenology: Sartre, Derrida, Foucault, Baudrillard, and Romantic Narrative: Shelley, Hays, Godwin, Wollestonecraft.

Tilottama Rajan's profile page

Michael O'Driscoll is Assistant Professor of English at the University of Alberta.

Michael O'Driscoll's profile page