Publisher's Synopsis
It is a cliché now to claim that we live in a "post"-marked world, and indeed the "post-isms" are some of the most used, and abused, expressions in the language. In a general sense, the various kinds of "post-isms" are regarded as a rejection of a prevailing number of cultural certainties on which our life in the so-called Western world has been structured since the eighteenth century. Engaging with the "post-isms" can be regarded as both a philosophical and political endeavour, which demonstrates, among other things, the instability of language, meaning, narrativity and generally any formal systems. In the wake of such theoretical aporia, this volume represents an investigation in the (re)thinking of the implications of the term "post" in current theoretical parlance. Is there a politics always/already embedded within the "post"? Do we need the "post" any more? Did we, in the first place, need it at all? Is it possible to counter essentialism with the "post" prefix? These are some of the questions the volume raises and explores by examining the "post"-marked terms in the theoretical market. The essays included in this volume address different and relevant issues related to the idea of the "post," and those that are representative of different parts of the globe. Thus a reader of the volume will not only have a bird's eye view of the various disciplines where the concept of the "post" is used, but also an eclectic range of contributions about issues that engage with different socio-political dynamics from various parts of the world.
