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The Key Concepts series brings the work of the most influential philosophers and social theorists to a new generation of readers. Each volume is structured by the central ideas or concepts in a thinker's work, with each chapter in a volume explaining an individual concept and exploring its application.

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13 results in Key Concepts

Gilles Deleuze
  • Key Concepts
  • 2nd edition
  • Edited by Charles J. Stivale
  • Published by:
    Acumen Publishing
    Published online:
    05 May 2014
    Print publication:
    27 October 2011
  • Gilles Deleuze is now regarded as one of the most radical philosophers of the twentieth century. His work is hugely influential across a range of subjects, from philosophy and literature to art, architecture and cultural studies. Gilles Deleuze: Key Concepts brings together leading specialists from a variety of different disciplines to introduce the central concepts in Gilles Deleuze's work. The concepts Deleuze employs in his writings are key to understanding his philosophical approach: they work to unsettle particular bodies of knowledge, to open them up, and to link them to other concepts within and outside those bodies of knowledge. These short and accessible chapters each focus on a single concept and explain what the concept is and what it does. Among the concepts examined are assemblage, the fold, difference and repetition, cinema and desire. The contributors consider how the concepts engage, intersect, and link, and how they relate to other areas of postmodern thought. Gilles Deleuze: Key Concepts is aimed at a readership coming to Deleuze for the first time both from within philosophy and from outside the discipline. It offers an invaluable guide to reading Deleuze's challenging and important body of work.

Pierre Bourdieu
  • Key Concepts
  • 2nd edition
  • Edited by Michael Grenfell
  • Published by:
    Acumen Publishing
    Published online:
    05 April 2014
    Print publication:
    30 September 2012
  • The French social philosopher Pierre Bourdieu is now recognised as one of the major thinkers of the twentieth century. In a career of over fifty years, Bourdieu studied a wide range of topics: education, culture, art, politics, economics, literature, law, and philosophy. Throughout these studies, Bourdieu developed a highly specialised series of concepts that he referred to as his 'thinking tools', which were used to uncover the workings of contemporary society. Pierre Bourdieu: Key Concepts highlights his most important concepts and examines them in detail. Each chapter deals with an individual concept and is written to be of immediate use to the student with little or no previous knowledge of Bourdieu. This new edition of the leading text is entirely revised and updated and includes new essays on Methodology, Politics and Social Space.

Jean-Paul Sartre
  • Key Concepts
  • Edited by Steven Churchill, Jack Reynolds
  • Published by:
    Acumen Publishing
    Published online:
    05 March 2014
    Print publication:
    30 September 2013
  • Most readers of Sartre focus only on the works written at the peak of his influence as a public intellectual in the 1940s, notably Being and Nothingness. Jean-Paul Sartre: Key Concepts aims to reassess Sartre and to introduce readers to the full breadth of his philosophy. Bringing together leading international scholars, the book examines concepts from across Sartre's career, from his initial views on the 'inner life' of conscious experience, to his later conceptions of hope as the binding agent for a common humanity. The book will be invaluable to readers looking for a comprehensive assessment of Sartre's thinking from his early influences to the development of his key concepts, to his legacy.

Theodor Adorno
  • Key Concepts
  • Edited by Deborah Cook
  • Published by:
    Acumen Publishing
    Published online:
    05 February 2013
    Print publication:
    30 June 2008
  • The issues Theodor Adorno explored in his work are as pressing now as they were then and his ideas continue to have an impact on disciplines as diverse as philosophy, sociology, psychology, cultural studies, musicology and literary theory. An uncompromising critic, even as Adorno contests many of the premises of the philosophical tradition, he also reinvigorates that tradition in his concerted attempt to stem or to reverse potentially catastrophic tendencies in the West. This book serves as a guide through the intricate labyrinth of Adorno’s work. Expert contributors make Adorno accessible to a new generation of readers without simplifying his thought. They provide readers with the key concepts needed to decipher Adorno’s often daunting books and essays.

Pierre Bourdieu
  • Key Concepts
  • Edited by Michael Grenfell
  • Published by:
    Acumen Publishing
    Published online:
    05 February 2013
    Print publication:
    31 July 2008
  • The French social philosopher Pierre Bourdieu (1930-2002) is now recognised as one of the major thinkers of the twentieth century. In a career of over fifty years, Bourdieu studied a wide range of topics: education, culture, art, politics, economics, literature, law, and philosophy. Throughout these studies, Bourdieu developed a highly specialised series of concepts that he referred to as his 'thinking tools', which were used to uncover the workings of contemporary society. Pierre Bourdieu: Key Concepts takes a selection of his most important concepts and examines them in detail. Each chapter deals with an individual concept and are written so as to be of immediate use to the student with little or no previous knowledge of Bourdieu. At the same time, each chapter also develops various dimensions around each concept to make the coverage of interest to the more experienced reader.

Merleau-Ponty
  • Key Concepts
  • Edited by Rosalyn Diprose
  • Published by:
    Acumen Publishing
    Published online:
    05 February 2013
    Print publication:
    30 May 2008
  • Having initially not had the attention of Sartre or Heidegger, Merleau-Ponty’s work is arguably now more widely influential than either of his two contemporaries. Merleau-Ponty: Key Concepts presents an accessible guide to the core ideas which structure Merleau-Ponty’s thinking as well as to his influences and the value of his ideas to a wide range of disciplines. The first section of the book presents the context of Merleau-Ponty’s thinking, the major debates of his time, particularly existentialism, phenomenology, the history of philosophy and the philosophy of history and society. The second section outlines his major contributions and conceptual innovations. The final section focuses upon how his work has been taken up in other fields besides philosophy, notably in sociology, cognitive science, health studies and feminism.

Jacques Rancière
  • Key Concepts
  • Edited by Jean-Phillipe Deranty
  • Published by:
    Acumen Publishing
    Published online:
    05 February 2013
    Print publication:
    31 July 2010
  • Although relatively unknown a decade ago, the work of Jacques Rancière is fast becoming a central reference in the humanities and social sciences. His thinking brings a fresh, innovative approach to many fields, notably the study of work, education, politics, literature, film, art, as well as philosophy. This is the first, full-length introduction to Rancière’s work and covers the full range of his contribution to contemporary thought, presenting in clear, succinct chapters the key concepts Rancière has developed in his writings over the last forty years.

Jürgen Habermas
  • Key Concepts
  • Edited by Barbara Fultner
  • Published by:
    Acumen Publishing
    Published online:
    05 February 2013
    Print publication:
    24 February 2011
  • The significance of Kant’s thought is matched by its complexity. His revolutionary ideas are systematically interconnected and he presents them using a forbidding technical vocabulary. A careful investigation of the key concepts that structure Kant’s work is essential to the comprehension of his philosophical project. This book provides an accessible introduction to Kant by explaining each of the key concepts of his philosophy. The book is organized into three parts, which correspond to the main areas of Kant’s transcendental idealism: Theoretical Philosophy; Practical Philosophy; Aesthetics, Teleology, Religion. Each chapter presents an overview of a particular topic, while the whole provides a clear and comprehensive account of Kant’s philosophical system.

Wittgenstein
  • Key Concepts
  • Edited by Kelly Dean Jolley
  • Published by:
    Acumen Publishing
    Published online:
    05 February 2013
    Print publication:
    30 May 2010
  • Wittgenstein’s complex and demanding work challenges much that is taken for granted in philosophical thinking as well as in the theorizing of art, theology, science and culture. Each essay in this collection explores a key concept involved in Wittgenstein’s thinking, relating it to his understanding of philosophy, and outlining the arguments and explaining the implications of each concept. Concepts covered include grammar, meaning and meaning-blindness, language-games and private language, family resemblances, psychologism, rule-following, teaching and learning, avowals, Moore’s Paradox, aspect seeing, the meter-stick, and criteria. Students new to Wittgenstein and readers interested in developing their understanding of specific aspects of his philosophical work will find this book very welcome.

Martin Heidegger
  • Key Concepts
  • Edited by Bret W. Davis
  • Published by:
    Acumen Publishing
    Published online:
    05 February 2013
    Print publication:
    31 December 2009
  • Martin Heidegger's writings are among the most formidable of recent philosophy. The pivotal concepts of his thought are for many the source of both fascination and frustration. Yet any student of philosophy needs to become acquainted with Heidegger’s thought. Martin Heidegger: Key Concepts is designed to facilitate this. Each chapter introduces and explains a key Heideggerian concept, or a cluster of closely related concepts. Together, the chapters cover the full range of Heidegger’s thought in its early, middle, and later phases. The book provides both a comprehensive introduction to Heidegger’s work for the beginning student and an accessible reference for more advanced readers interested in particular aspects of Heidegger’s thought.

Alain Badiou
  • Key Concepts
  • Edited by A. J. Bartlett
  • Published by:
    Acumen Publishing
    Published online:
    05 February 2013
    Print publication:
    31 July 2010
  • Alain Badiou is one of the world’s most influential living philosophers. Few contemporary thinkers display his breadth of argument and reference, or his ability to intervene in debates critical to both analytic and continental philosophy. Alain Badiou: Key Concepts presents an overview of and introduction to the full range of Badiou’s thinking. Essays focus on the foundations of Badiou’s thought, his “key concepts” – truth, being, ontology, the subject, and conditions – and on his engagement with a range of thinkers central to his philosophy, including Plato, Descartes, Spinoza, Heidegger and Deleuze.

Michel Foucault
  • Key Concepts
  • Edited by Dianna Taylor
  • Published by:
    Acumen Publishing
    Published online:
    05 February 2013
    Print publication:
    31 October 2010
  • Michel Foucault's work on freedom, subjectivity and power is now central to thinking across an extraordinarily wide range of disciplines, including philosophy, history, psychology, politics, anthropology, sociology and criminology. Michel Foucault: Key Concepts explores Foucault’s central ideas, such as disciplinary power, biopower, bodies, spirituality, and practices of the self. Each essay focuses on a specific concept, analyzing its meaning and uses across Foucault’s work, highlighting its connection to other concepts, and emphasizing its potential applications. Together, the chapters provide the main co-ordinates to map Foucault’s work.

Immanuel Kant
  • Key Concepts - A Philosophical Introduction
  • Edited by Will Dudley
  • Published by:
    Acumen Publishing
    Published online:
    05 February 2013
    Print publication:
    30 November 2010
  • Immanuel Kant is among the most pivotal thinkers in the history of philosophy. His transcendental idealism claims to overcome the scepticism of David Hume, resolve the impasse between empiricism and rationalism, and establish the reality of human freedom and moral agency. A thorough understanding of Kant is indispensable for any student of philosophy. The significance of Kant’s thought is matched by its complexity. His revolutionary ideas are systematically interconnected and he presents them using a forbidding technical vocabulary. A careful investigation of the key concepts that structure Kant’s work is essential to the comprehension of his philosophical project. This book provides an accessible introduction to Kant by explaining each of the key concepts of his philosophy. The book is organized into three parts, which correspond to the main areas of Kant’s transcendental idealism: theoretical philosophy, practical philosophy, and aesthetics, teleology, religion. Each chapter presents an overview of a particular topic, while the whole provides a clear and comprehensive account of Kant’s philosophical system.