The Yearbook of Comparative Literature
YCL is dedicated to the publication of theoretically informed research
in literary studies with a comparative, intercultural, or
interdisciplinary emphasis.
UPCOMING ISSUE:
[cid:image002.jpg@01CBE3F3.19B7B8E0]Volume 55 - The End of a World
This volume comprises a number of very distinguished contributors
(among whom are Alain Badiou, Shoshana Felman, Francois Jullien,
Svetlana Boym, Biodun Jeyiffo, Giuseppe Mazzotta, and others) who
articulate from the perspective of several disciplines - literary
criticism, Psychoanalysis, Philosophy, Political science - the very
problem of a contemporary thinking of the universality in man and of a
world in common. The debate prompts a variety of questions such as
what is the world for contemporary philosophy, and what is the
significance of world literature for contemporary literary thinking?
A further study of these concepts examines what it means for a world
to come to an end, and asks what is a world and what kind of end are
we talking about?
The precise significance of the concept "world" seems to involve two
fundamental dimensions. The dimension of totality - the world is the
realm of everything - and that of commonality - those who inhabit the
world have a commonality of inhabiting the sharing the same world. A
further term to add to the mix is that of universality, thus of
something that can be attributed to everyone, with no exception, and
which marks the fact, beyond any particularity and difference, of
their being the same in relation to that totality which they inhabit.
The possibility of such a common world, of a totality of existence and
a universality in which everybody participates has been increasingly
felt over the last few centuries as being no longer tenable, perhaps
even empty, and thus as having come to an end. At the same time, this
moment of ending has also saw attempts to develop new ways of thinking
about the possibility of a world, a commonality of everyone, and the
dimension of universality in man. Such attempts are perhaps no more
frequent than in our own times, in which the ending and loss of the
world is experienced with great alarm. The end, in the sense of aim of
the achievement of a world, a world thought in a new way, increasingly
seems to be one of our most urgent tasks.
Find out more:
www.utpjournals.com/YCGL/ycgl.html<http://www.utpjournals.com/YCGL/ycgl.html>
Follow us on Facebook:
www.facebook.com/utpjournals<http://www.facebook.com/utpjournals>
--
The University of Edinburgh is a charitable body, registered in
Scotland, with registration number SC005336.
|