Anarchism and the crisis of representation : hermeneutics, aesthetics, politics

Cohn (English, Purdue U.) appears to agree with Marxist theorist Frederic Jameson that an all-encompassing "crisis of representation" has befallen Western thought, calling into question "the relationships between our concepts and the truths they are meant to denote, our images and the realities they are supposed to depict, our institutions and the interests they are meant to serve." Finding in the social anarchist tradition the earliest modern critique of political representation, he believes that a close reading of the tradition shows a path out of the contemporary representation impasse, not only in the field of politics but also in the realms of hermeneutics and aesthetics. Annotation 2007 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com) Introduction: The General Form Of The Crisis Of Representation -- False Solutions -- The Necessity Of A Critique Of Representation -- Anarchism As A Critique Of Representation -- Anarchism Beyond Representationalism And Antirepresentationalism -- Anarchist Hermeneutics As Ethics And Ecology -- The Fate Of Representation, The Fate Of Critique -- Reconstructing Anarchist Aesthetics -- Aesthetic Production -- The Critique Of Democracy As Representation -- The Critique Of Economy As Representation -- The Critique Of History As Representation -- The Critique Of Identity As Representation. Jesse S. Cohn. Includes Bibliographical References (p. 292-311) And Index. "Anarchism and the Crisis of Representation is intended to provide readers of literary criticism, art history, political philosophy, and the social sciences with a fresh perspective from which to revisit dead-end theoretical debates over concepts such as "agency," "essentialism," and "realism"--And, at the same time, to offer a new take on anarchism itself, challenging conventional readings of the tradition. The anarchism that emerges from this reinterpretation is neither a musty rationalism nor a millenarian irrationalism, but a living body of thought that points beyond the sterile antinomies of post-modern and Marxist theory."--Jacket