Ross Wilson

The range of Adorno's achievement, and the depth of his insights, is breathtaking and daunting. His work on literary, artistic, and musical forms, his devastating indictment of modern industrial society, and his profound grasp of Western culture from Homer to Hollywood have made him one of the most significant figures in twentieth-century thought. As one of the main philosophers of the Frankfurt School of Critical Theory, Adorno's influence on literary theory, cultural studies, and philosophical aesthetics has been immense. His wide-ranging authorship is significant also to continental philosophy, political theory, art criticism, and musicology. Key ideas discussed in this guide include: art and aesthetics fun and free time nature and reason things, thoughts and being right This Routledge Critical Thinkers guide will equip readers with the tools required to critically interpret Adorno's major works, whilst also introducing readers to his interpretation of classical German philosophy and his relationship to the most significant of his contemporaries.

Theodor Adorno

This book examines the British soldiers on the Western Front and how they responded to the war landscape they encountered behind the lines and at the front. Using a multidisciplinary perspective, this study investigates the relationship between soldiers and the spaces and materials of the warzone, analyzing how soldiers constructed a ‘sense of place’ in the hostile, unpredictable environment. Drawing upon recent developments within First World War Studies and the anthropological examination of the fields of conflict, an ethnohistorical perspective of the soldiers is built which details the various ways soldiers responded to the physical and material world of the Western Front. This study is also grounded in the wider debates on how the First World War is remembered within Britain and offers an alternative perspective on the individuals who fought in the world’s first global conflagration nearly a century ago.

Materiality During the Great War

Landscapes of the Western Front

In Woodlands Wild

The range of Adorno's achievement, and the depth of his insights, is breathtaking and daunting. His work on literary, artistic, and musical forms, his devastating indictment of modern industrial society, and his profound grasp of Western culture from Homer to Hollywood have made him one of the most significant figures in twentieth-century thought. As one of the main philosophers of the Frankfurt School of Critical Theory, Adorno’s influence on literary theory, cultural studies, and philosophical aesthetics has been immense. His wide-ranging authorship is significant also to continental philosophy, political theory, art criticism, and musicology. Key ideas discussed in this guide include: art and aesthetics fun and free time nature and reason things, thoughts and being right This Routledge Critical Thinkers guide will equip readers with the tools required to critically interpret Adorno’s major works, whilst also introducing readers to his interpretation of classical German philosophy and his relationship to the most significant of his contemporaries.

This volume brings together an impressive range of established and emerging scholars to investigate the meaning of ‘life’ in Romantic poetry and poetics. This investigation involves sustained attention to a set of challenging questions at the heart of British Romantic poetic practice and theory. Is poetry alive for the Romantic poets? If so, how? Does ‘life’ always mean ‘life’? In a range of essays from a variety of complementary perspectives, a number of major Romantic poets are examined in detail. The fate of Romantic conceptions of ‘life’ in later poetry also receives attention. Through, for examples, a revision of Blake’s relationship to so-called rationalism, a renewed examination of Wordsworth’s fascination with country graveyards, an exploration of Shelley’s concept of survival, and a discussion of the notions of ‘life’ in Byron, Kierkegaard, and Mozart, this volume opens up new and exciting terrain in Romantic poetry’s relation to literary theory, the history of philosophy, ethics, and aesthetics.

The Meaning of "Life" in Romantic Poetry and Poetics

Laurajane Smith

Geoff Cubitt

Kalliopi Fouseki

The year 2007 marked the bicentenary of the Act abolishing British participation in the slave trade. Representing Enslavement and Abolition on Museums- which uniquely draws together contributions from academic commentators, museum professionals, community activists and artists who had an involvement with the bicentenary - reflects on the complexity and difficulty of museums' experiences in presenting and interpreting the histories of slavery and abolition, and places these experiences in the broader context of debates over the bicentenary's significance and the lessons to be learnt from it. The history of Britain’s role in transatlantic slavery officially become part of the National Curriculum in the UK in 2009; with the bicentenary of 2007, this marks the start of increasing public engagement with what has largely been a ‘hidden’ history. The book aims to not only critically review and assess the impact of the bicentenary, but also to identify practical issues that public historians, consultants, museum practitioners, heritage professionals and policy makers can draw upon in developing responses, both to the increasing recognition of Britain’s history of African enslavement and controversial and traumatic histories more generally.

Ambiguous Engagements

Representing Enslavement and Abolition in Museums

Drawing on a wide range of scholarship, this book offers a new and comprehensive examination of Kant's argument that aesthetic judgements are combined with a claim to subjective universality. The author gives a detailed account of the background to this claim in Kant's epistemology, logic, and metaphysics, before closely attending to the crucial sections of the Critique of the Power of Judgement. In particular, it is shown that Kant's aesthetics requires that his theory of the subject be rethought. Central to the theory of the subject that begins to emerge from the Third Critique is Kant's enigmatic notion of 'life' which is extensively explored here. This study, therefore, thoroughly examines the central features of Kant's account of aesthetic judgements, suggesting that a new and exciting theory of subjectivity begins to be outlined in Kant's aesthetics. The author argues for the placement of Kant's account of the subjective universality of aesthetic judgement at the centre of contemporary philosophical aesthetics.

Ross Wilson

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