Déjà vu, which doubles and confuses our experience of time, is a psychological phenomenon with peculiar relevance to our contemporary historical circumstances. From this starting point, the acclaimed Italian philosopher Paolo Virno examines the construct of memory, the passage of time, and the “end of history.” Through thinkers such as Bergson, Kojève and Nietzsche, Virno shows how our perception of history can become suspended or paralysed, making the distinction between “before” and “after,” cause and effect, seem derisory. In examining the way the experience of time becomes historical, Virno forms a radical new theory of historical temporality.

Most of us have been perplexed by a strange sense of familiarity when doing something for the first time. We feel that we have been here before, or done this before, but know for sure that this is impossible. In fact, according to numerous surveys, about two-thirds of us have experienced déjà vu at least once, and most of us have had multiple experiences. There are a number of credible scientific interpretations of déjà vu, and this book summarizes the broad range of published work from philosophy, religion, neurology, sociology, memory, perception, psychopathology, and psychopharmacology. This book also includes discussion of cognitive functioning in retrieval and familiarity, neuronal transmission, and double perception during the déjà vu experience.

This book places two key notions up against each other to imagine a new way of conceptualizing historical time. How do the experience of dj vu and the idea 'End of History' relate to one another? Through thinkers like Bergson, Kojve and Nietzsche, Virno explores these constructs of memory and the passage of time. In showing how the experience of time becomes historical, Virno considers two fundamental concepts from Western philosophy: Power and The Act, reinterpreting these with respect to time. Through these, he elegantly constructs a radical new theory of historical temporality.

In Archaism and Actuality eminent Marxist historian Harry Harootunian explores the formation of capitalism and fascism in Japan as a prime example of the uneven development of capitalism. He applies his theorization of subsumption to examine how capitalism integrates and redirects preexisting social, cultural, and economic practices to guide the present. This subsumption leads to a global condition in which states and societies all exist within different stages and manifestations of capitalism. Drawing on Japanese philosophers Miki Kiyoshi and Tosaka Jun, Marxist theory, and Gramsci’s notion of passive revolution, Harootunian shows how the Meiji Restoration of 1868 and its program dedicated to transforming the country into a modern society exemplified a unique path to capitalism. Japan’s capitalist expansion in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, rise as an imperial power, and subsequent transition to fascism signal a wholly distinct trajectory into modernity that forecloses any notion of a pure or universal development of capitalism. With Archaism and Actuality, Harootunian offers both a retheorization of capitalist development and a reinterpretation of epochal moments in modern Japanese history.

This volume offers a new interpretation of one of the most innovative directors in the history of cinema. It is the first book to cover the whole of Godard's career, from the French New Wave to the recent triumphs of Histoire(s) du cinéma and Eloge de l'amour. Drawing on a wide range of literary, filmic and philiosophical texts, the book places Godard's work within its intellectual context, examining how developments in French culture and thought since 1950 have been mirrored in - and sometimes anticipated by - Godard's films. Numerous sequences from Godard's films are singled out for close analysis, demonstrating how the director's radical approaches to narrative, editing, sound and shot composition have made the cinema into an analytical tool in its own right. The book will be essential to all students of Godard's films, and of interest to scholars of modern and contemporary French cinema, culture and thought.

How technology and the politics of attention changed the way we look at art The ways we encounter contemporary art and performance has changed. How are we expectedto engage with today's diverse practice? Is the old model of close-looking still the ideal, or has itgiven way to browsing, skimming, and sampling? Across four provocative and insightful essays, art historian and critic Claire Bishop identifies trends in contemporary practice. Charting a critical path through the last three decades, Bishop pinpoints how spectatorship and visual literacy are evolving under the pressures of digital technology. She explores how researched-based exhibitions have proliferated turning the artist into an investigator or archivist with mixed results. Spatial performance can now involve the artist, dancers, or even the audience as participants, often framed with Instagram in mind. The political event is not longer activated without an understanding of the media that will record and distribute it. The proliferation of works that use modernist architecture is noticeable; but has this become a shorthand for something else? Disordered Attention is a vital survey of 21st century art, from one of the leading art thinkers ofour times.

As debates rage over the place of faith in our national life, Tocqueville’s nineteenth-century crediting of religion for shaping America is largely overlooked today. Now, in Republicanism, Religion, and the Soul of America, Ellis Sandoz reveals the major role that Protestant Christianity played in the formation and early period of the American republic. Sandoz traces the rise of republican government from key sources in Protestant civilization, paying particular attention to the influence of the Bible on the Founders and the blossoming of the American mind in the eighteenth century. Sandoz analyzes the religious debt of the emergent American community and its elevation of the individual person as unique in the eyes of the Creator. He shows that the true distinction of American republicanism lies in its grounding of human dignity in spiritual individualism and an understanding of man’s capacity for self-government under providential guidance. Along the way, he addresses such topics as the neglected question of the education of the Founders for their unique endeavor, common law constitutionalism, the place of Latin and Greek classics in the Founders’ thought, and the texture of religious experience from the Great Awakening to the Declaration of Independence To establish a unifying theoretical perspective for his study, Sandoz considers the philosophical underpinnings of religion and the contribution that Eric Voegelin made to our understanding of religious experience. He contributes fresh studies of the character of Voegelin’s thought: its relationship to Christianity; his debate with Leo Strauss over reason, revelation, and the meaning of philosophy; and the theory of Gnosticism as basic to radical modernity. He also provides a powerful account of the spirit of Voegelin’s later writings, contrasting the political scientist with the meditative spiritualist and offering new insight into volume 5 of Order and History. Republicanism, Religion, and the Soul of America concludes with timely reflections on the epoch now unfolding in the shadow of Islamic jihadism. Bringing a wide range of materials into a single volume, it confronts current academic concerns with religion while offering new insight into the construction of the American polity—and the heart of Americanism as we know it today.

Twentieth-century political philosopher Eric Voegelin is best known as a severe critic of modernity. Much of his work argues that modernity is a Gnostic revolt against the fundamental structure of reality. For Voegelin, “Gnosticism” is the belief that human beings can transform the nature of reality through secret knowledge and social action, and he considered it the crux of the crisis of modernity. As Voegelin struggled with this crisis throughout his career, he never wavered in his judgment that philosophers of the modern continental tradition were complicit in the Gnostic revolt of modernity. But while Voegelin’s analysis of those philosophers is at times scathing, his work also bears marks of their influence, and Voegelin has much more in common with the theorists of the modern continental tradition than is usually recognized. Eric Voegelin and the Continental Tradition: Explorations in Modern Political Thought evaluates this political philosopher—one of the most original and influential thinkers of our time—by examining his relationship to the modern continental tradition in philosophy, from Kant to Derrida. In a compelling introduction, editors Lee Trepanier and Steven F. McGuire present a review of the trajectories of Voegelin’s thought and outline what often is portrayed as his derisive critique of modernity. Soon, however, they begin to unravel the similarities between Voegelin’s thought and the work of other thinkers in the continental tradition. The subsequent chapters explore these possible connections by examining Voegelin’s intellectual relationship to individual thinkers, including Hegel, Schelling, Kierkegaard, Heidegger, and Gadamer. The essays in this volume go beyond Voegelin’s own reading of the modern philosophers to offer a reevaluation of his relationship to those thinkers. In Eric Voegelin and the Continental Tradition, Voegelin’s attempt to grapple with the crisis of modernity becomes clearer, and his contribution to the modern continental tradition is illuminated. The book features the work of both established and emerging Voegelin scholars, and the essays were chosen to present thoughtful and balanced assessments of both Voegelin’s thought and the ideas of the other thinkers considered. As the first volume to examine the relationship—and surprising commonalities—between Voegelin’s philosophy and the continental tradition as a whole, this text will be of interest not only to Voegelin disciples but to philosophers engaged by continental modernism and all disciplines of political philosophy.

Explores contemporary fiction set in the near future to shed new light on our culture's relationship to the Anthropocene.

Since the mid-1950s, successive Canadian governments have grappled with the issue of Canada’s participation in US ballistic missile defence programs. Until Paul Martin’s Liberal government finally said no, policy-makers responded to US initiatives with fear and uncertainty as they endlessly debated the implications - at home and abroad - of participation. However, whether this is the end of the story remains to be seen. Drawing on previously classified government documents and interviews with senior officials, James Fergusson assesses Canada’s policy deliberations and rationales for avoiding a definitive commitment in response to five major US initiatives. He reveals that a combination of factors resulted in indecision: weak leadership, wrangling between the Departments of External Affairs and National Defence, a belief that the United States would defend Canada without much Canadian participation, and a tendency to place uncertain and ill-defined notions of international security before national defence. Successive Canadian governments have failed to transform the debate over ballistic missile defence into an opportunity to define Canada’s strategic interests at home and on the world stage. Balanced and engaging, Canada and Ballistic Missile Defense offers the first full account of Canada’s uncertain response to US ballistic missile defence initiatives and an exploration of the implications of this indecision. It is essential reading for policy-makers, students, and scholars of Canadian foreign and defence policy as well as anyone who wants a fuller understanding of Canadian-American relations. Published in association with the Canadian War Museum.