Words and Worlds: A Lexicon for Dark Times

Words and Worlds explores the challenges societies now face, challenging the self-evidence of established ideas and ethnocentric assumptions. Case studies conducted across five continents with eight different disciplines offer a fresh look at the interconnected worlds we inhabit in solidarity and discord.

\n Format: Paperback / softback
\n Length: 328 pages
\n Publication date: 25 June 2021
\n Publisher: Duke University Press
\n

Born in a time of anxiety, Words and Worlds delves into the disconcerting challenges that societies currently face. Through an exploration of a political lexicon encompassing common words such as democracy, revolution, knowledge, authority, inequality, toleration, war, and power, the contributors to this book challenge the assumed self-evidence of these terms. By unveiling the hidden transcripts and unexpected trajectories of many established ideas, including notions of human belonging and the call for openness and transparency in research and public life, they shed light on the intricate web of meanings and implications.

The case studies conducted across five continents utilizing the tools of eight different disciplines challenge the ethnocentric assumptions, false moralism, and cultural prejudices that underlie much discussion on corruption or even the virtue invested in resilience. The critique of the ubiquitous use of crisis to characterize our times exposes how this framing obscures the unjust conditions of existence and the violence of everyday life.

Together, the essays in this volume offer a fresh perspective on the interconnected worlds we inhabit, both in solidarity and in discord.

Contributors. Banu Bargu, Veena Das, Alex de Waal, Didier Fassin, Peter Geschiere, Behrooz Ghamari-Tabrizi, Caroline Humphrey, Ravi Kanbur, Julieta Lemaitre, Uday S. Mehta, Jan-Werner Müller, Jonathan Pugh, Elizabeth F. Sanders, Todd Sanders

\n Weight: 482g\n
Dimension: 152 x 229 x 24 (mm)\n
ISBN-13: 9781478014164\n \n