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Author: Michel Maffesoli Publisher: U of Minnesota Press ISBN: 9780816626892 Category : Philosophy Languages : en Pages : 174
Book Description
In The Contemplation of the World, eminent French theorist Michel Maffesoli pursues and extends his project of decoding contemporary societies. Here, Maffesoli questions afresh the mundane stuff of contemporary sociality, seeking to discern its primary mode of expression - its forms, style, rules, and principles - its aesthetics. The advent of postmodernity marks the beginning of "the society of the image." It is as if the fragmentation of the social has gradually and necessarily corresponded to massive crumbling of our representations of the real and resulted in their infinite refraction. Henceforward we are living in the heart of an ever-increasing entanglement of objects, signs, and images. Located somewhere between dream and reality, we are the unfettered prisoners of a symbolic universe of growing opacity and mysterious meanings. In The Contemplation of the World, Maffesoli seeks to explore those unobtrusive links that regulate and organize the ensemble of our representations - the raw material refashioned in our imaginary and our fantasies - exploring what it is that is recognizably "postmodern" about them. Maffesoli proposes a map of "the vast domain of the collective imaginary," allowing us to better understand where today's culture stands and helping us to perceive within its clamorous confines the outlines, still frail, of a "community ideal."
Author: Michel Maffesoli Publisher: U of Minnesota Press ISBN: 9780816626892 Category : Philosophy Languages : en Pages : 174
Book Description
In The Contemplation of the World, eminent French theorist Michel Maffesoli pursues and extends his project of decoding contemporary societies. Here, Maffesoli questions afresh the mundane stuff of contemporary sociality, seeking to discern its primary mode of expression - its forms, style, rules, and principles - its aesthetics. The advent of postmodernity marks the beginning of "the society of the image." It is as if the fragmentation of the social has gradually and necessarily corresponded to massive crumbling of our representations of the real and resulted in their infinite refraction. Henceforward we are living in the heart of an ever-increasing entanglement of objects, signs, and images. Located somewhere between dream and reality, we are the unfettered prisoners of a symbolic universe of growing opacity and mysterious meanings. In The Contemplation of the World, Maffesoli seeks to explore those unobtrusive links that regulate and organize the ensemble of our representations - the raw material refashioned in our imaginary and our fantasies - exploring what it is that is recognizably "postmodern" about them. Maffesoli proposes a map of "the vast domain of the collective imaginary," allowing us to better understand where today's culture stands and helping us to perceive within its clamorous confines the outlines, still frail, of a "community ideal."
Author: Jennifer Summit Publisher: University of Chicago Press ISBN: 022603237X Category : Philosophy Languages : en Pages : 253
Book Description
“All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone,” Blaise Pascal wrote in 1654. But then there’s Walt Whitman, in 1856: “Whoever you are, come forth! Or man or woman come forth! / You must not stay sleeping and dallying there in the house.” It is truly an ancient debate: Is it better to be active or contemplative? To do or to think? To make an impact, or to understand the world more deeply? Aristotle argued for contemplation as the highest state of human flourishing. But it was through action that his student Alexander the Great conquered the known world. Which should we aim at? Centuries later, this argument underlies a surprising number of the questions we face in contemporary life. Should students study the humanities, or train for a job? Should adults work for money or for meaning? And in tumultuous times, should any of us sit on the sidelines, pondering great books, or throw ourselves into protests and petition drives? With Action versus Contemplation, Jennifer Summit and Blakey Vermeule address the question in a refreshingly unexpected way: by refusing to take sides. Rather, they argue for a rethinking of the very opposition. The active and the contemplative can—and should—be vibrantly alive in each of us, fused rather than sundered. Writing in a personable, accessible style, Summit and Vermeule guide readers through the long history of this debate from Plato to Pixar, drawing compelling connections to the questions and problems of today. Rather than playing one against the other, they argue, we can discover how the two can nourish, invigorate, and give meaning to each other, as they have for the many writers, artists, and thinkers, past and present, whose examples give the book its rich, lively texture of interplay and reference. This is not a self-help book. It won’t give you instructions on how to live your life. Instead, it will do something better: it will remind you of the richness of a life that embraces action and contemplation, company and solitude, living in the moment and planning for the future. Which is better? Readers of this book will discover the answer: both.
Author: John N. Deck Publisher: University of Toronto Press ISBN: 1442638184 Category : Philosophy Languages : en Pages :
Book Description
Plotinus has been so highly regarded as a mystic that his importance as a philosopher has sometimes been thrown into eclipse. Yet neoplatonic philosophy lives in and through his works; indeed, his original development of Platonic and Aristotelian themes stands as a kind of summation of Greek philosophy as it first came to be known in the Christian West. In Nature, Contemplation, and the One, Professor Deck has undertaken a reappraisal of Plotinus' thought from the standpoint of a central doctrine in the Enneads, that of nature as contemplation. This new view enables him to show that the producing of the physical world by means of contemplation is an internally consistent doctrine with ramifications throughout the Plotinian view of being, causality, and the generation of a plural universe by the self-subsistent One. The result is a systematic account of Plotinus' major teachings, and a fresh view of their meaning and philosophic importance. Professor Deck has appended a new translation of the parts of the Enneads which are central to the doctrine of nature as contemplation, and his study proceeds by careful reference to the original texts. Students, philosophers, and historians will welcome this important and unusually clear-headed approach to a major figure in Western thought.
Author: Thomas Merton Publisher: University of Notre Dame Pess ISBN: 0268162379 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 213
Book Description
The spiritual and psychological insights of these essays were nurtured in a monastic milieu, but their issues are universally human. Thomas Merton lays a foundation for personal growth and transformation through fidelity to "our own truth and inner being." His main focus is our desire and need to attain "a fully human and personal identity." This classic is a newly restored and corrected edition and the inaugural volume of Gethsemani Studies in Psychological and Religious Anthropology, a series of books that explores, through the twin perspectives of psychology and religion, the dynamics and depths of being fully human. "When I speak of the contemplative life I do not mean the institutional, cloistered life, . . . I am talking about a special dimension of inner discipline and experience, a certain integrity and fullness of personal development . . . . Discovering the contemplative life is a new self-discovery. One might say it is the flowering of a deeper identity on an entirely different plane . . ." --Thomas Merton, from the book
Author: Usama ibn Munqidh Publisher: Penguin UK ISBN: 0141919175 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 428
Book Description
The volume comprises lightly annotated translation of a key medieval Arabic text that bears directly on the Crusades and Crusader society and the Muslim experience of them.
Author: Richard Rohr Publisher: Convergent Books ISBN: 0593238796 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 176
Book Description
In this companion to The Universal Christ, Richard Rohr and Patrick Boland offer forty reflections and practices exploring what it means to live “in Christ.” In his landmark book The Universal Christ, Richard Rohr articulated a transformative view of what it means to recognize Jesus as “Christ”—as a portrait of God’s constant, unfolding work in the world. Now, in partnership with Patrick Boland, a psychotherapist and member of Rohr’s Center for Action and Contemplation community, he invites readers to engage with the themes of the book through spiritual practice. Each reflection in this book draws on a key passage of The Universal Christ, paired with prayers, journal prompts, and embodied exercises that invite readers into a more personal encounter with the truth that the presence and compassion of the Christ are in every thing. Whether read daily for the season of Lent or explored over the course of a year, Every Thing Is Sacred is a hope-filled journey into the love at the heart of all things.
Author: Thomas Merton Publisher: Harper Collins ISBN: 0062245082 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 192
Book Description
Now in paperback, revised and redesigned: This is Thomas Merton's last book, in which he draws on both Eastern and Western traditions to explore the hot topic of contemplation/meditation in depth and to show how we can practice true contemplation in everyday life. Never before published except as a series of articles (one per chapter) in an academic journal, this book on contemplation was revised by Merton shortly before his untimely death. The material bridges Merton's early work on Catholic monasticism, mysticism, and contemplation with his later writing on Eastern, especially Buddhist, traditions of meditation and spirituality. This book thus provides a comprehensive understanding of contemplation that draws on the best of Western and Eastern traditions. Merton was still tinkering with this book when he died; it was the book he struggled with most during his career as a writer. But now the Merton Legacy Trust and experts have determined that the book makes such a valuable contribution as his major comprehensive presentation of contemplation that they have allowed its publication.
Author: Thomas Keating Publisher: Crossroad Publishing ISBN: 9780824524951 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 0
Book Description
The Christian heritage contains rich contemplative wisdom, literature, and practice, and this volume is written for those who would like to find enrichment in spiritual practices grounded in non-Christian religions while retaining basic Christian commitments.
Author: Michel Maffesoli
Author: Michel Maffesoli
Author: Thomas Merton
Author: Jennifer Summit
Author: Yūsuf Ībish
Author: John N. Deck
Author: Thomas Merton
Author: Usama ibn Munqidh
Author: Richard Rohr
Author: Thomas Merton
Author: Thomas Keating