The Heavenly Writing

The Heavenly Writing PDF Author: Francesca Rochberg
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9781139455855
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 368

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Book Description
In antiquity, the expertise of the Babylonians in matters of the heavens was legendary and the roots of both western astronomy and astrology are traceable in cuneiform tablets going back to the second and first millennia BC. The Heavenly Writing, first publsiehd in 2004, discusses the place of Babylonian celestial divination, horoscopy, and astronomy in Mesopotamian intellectual culture. Focusing chiefly on celestial divination and horoscopes, it traces the emergence of personal astrology from the tradition of celestial divination and the use of astronomical methods in horoscopes. It further takes up the historiographical and philosophical issue of the nature of these Mesopotamian 'celestial sciences' by examining elements traditionally of concern to the philosophy of science, without sacrificing the ancient methods, goals, and interests to a modern image of science. This book will be of particular interest to those concerned with the early history of science.

The Heavenly Writing

The Heavenly Writing PDF Author: Francesca Rochberg
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9781139455855
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 368

Get Book Here

Book Description
In antiquity, the expertise of the Babylonians in matters of the heavens was legendary and the roots of both western astronomy and astrology are traceable in cuneiform tablets going back to the second and first millennia BC. The Heavenly Writing, first publsiehd in 2004, discusses the place of Babylonian celestial divination, horoscopy, and astronomy in Mesopotamian intellectual culture. Focusing chiefly on celestial divination and horoscopes, it traces the emergence of personal astrology from the tradition of celestial divination and the use of astronomical methods in horoscopes. It further takes up the historiographical and philosophical issue of the nature of these Mesopotamian 'celestial sciences' by examining elements traditionally of concern to the philosophy of science, without sacrificing the ancient methods, goals, and interests to a modern image of science. This book will be of particular interest to those concerned with the early history of science.

The Archaic

The Archaic PDF Author: Paul Bishop
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1136633677
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 329

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Book Description
The Archaic takes as its major reference points C.G. Jung's classic essay, 'Archaic Man' (1930), and Ernesto Grassi's paper on 'Archaic Theories of History' (1990). Moving beyond the confines of a Jungian framework to include other methodological approaches, this book explores the concept of the archaic. Defined as meaning 'old-fashioned', 'primitive', 'antiquated', the archaic is, in fact, much more than something very, very old: it is timeless, inasmuch as it is before time itself. Archē, Urgrund, Ungrund, 'primordial darkness', 'eternal nothing' are names for something essentially nameless, yet whose presence we nevertheless intuit. This book focuses on the reception of myth in the tradition of German Idealism or Romanticism (Creuzer, Schelling, Nietzsche), which not only looked back to earlier thinkers (such as Jacob Boehme) but also laid down roots for developments in twentieth-century thought (Ludwig Klages, Martin Heidegger). The Archaic also includes: studies of the Germanic dimension of the archaic (Charles Bambach, Alan Cardew) a discussion of the mytho-phenomenological approach to the archaic (Robert Josef Kozljanič) a series of articles on Jung's understanding of the archaic (Paul Bishop, Susan Rowland, Robert Segal). This book will be of interest to psychoanalysts, anthropologists and phenomenologists, as well as students of psychology, cultural studies, religious studies, and philosophy, as it seeks to rehabilitate a concept of demonstrable and urgent relevance for our time.

Art History as Cultural History

Art History as Cultural History PDF Author: Richard Woodfield
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134392370
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 308

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Book Description
This book focuses on Aby Warburg (1866-1929), one of the legendary figures of twentieth century cultural history. His collection, which is now housed in the Warburg Institute of the University of London bears witness to his idiosyncratic approach to a psychology of symbolism, and explores the Nachleben of classical antiquity in its manifold cultural legacy. This collection of essays offers the first translation of one of Warburg's key essays, the Gombrich lecture, described by Carlo Ginzburg as 'the richest and most penetrating interpretation of Warburg' and original essays on Warburg's astrology, his Mnemosyne project and his favourite topic of festivals. Richard Woodfield is Research Professor in the Faculty of Art and Design at the Nottingham Trent University, England. He has edited E.H Gombrich's Reflections on the History of Art (1987), Gombrich on Art and Psychology (1996), The Essential Gombrich (1996), and a volume on Riegl in the Critical Voices in Art, Theory and Culture series. He is also the General Editor of a new series of books for G+B Arts International, Aesthetics and the Arts. Edited by Richard Woodfield, Research Professor in the Faculty of Art and Design at Nottingham Trent University, UK.

Interpretation and Intellectual Change

Interpretation and Intellectual Change PDF Author: Ching-I Tu
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1351511777
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 371

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Book Description
"This volume deals with the development of Chinese hermeneutics, or exegetic systems, from their beginnings to the twentieth century. The contributors address critical issues in the study of Chinese hermeneutics by focusing on key periods during which the hermeneutic tradition in China underwent significant changes.The volume is divided into six parts, corresponding to the six major periods of intellectual change in traditional and contemporary China. Part 1 considers the foundational period of Chinese hermeneutics, examining Confucian classics such as the Analects, Mencius, and the Book of Odes. Part 2 traces the broadening of the hermeneutic tradition from Confucian classics to the military canon, political discourse, astronomy, and Buddhist exegesis from the Han to the Chinese Middle Ages. In Part 3 the focus is on Zhu Xi's monumental synthesis and redefinition of the Confucian tradition at the beginning of the early modern period. His vision of Confucian thought remained influential throughout the imperial period, and his interpretations of the Confucian classics became state orthodoxy starting with the thirteenth century. Part 4 focuses on this challenge and discusses the intellectual changes that took place during the late imperial period and their profound effects on Chinese hermeneutics. Part 5 documents the challenges to traditional Chinese hermeneutics in the modern era and the emergence of a new, critical hermeneutics in the beginning of the twentieth century. The volume concludes with Part 6, which explores Chinese hermeneutics from a comparative perspective and identifies its distinctive features.The understanding of Chinese hermeneutics gained from these essays is that of a dynamic plurality of traditions that has endured into the twentieth century and continues to shape contemporary intellectual debates."

History and Social Theory

History and Social Theory PDF Author: Peter Burke
Publisher: Cornell University Press
ISBN: 9780801472855
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 244

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Book Description
The second edition of this indispensable review of the emergence of the fields of history and social science and traces their tentative convergence as he reappraises the relations between them.

Modes of Thought

Modes of Thought PDF Author: David R. Olson
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521566445
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 324

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Book Description
Modes of Thought addresses a topic of broad interest to the cognitive sciences. Its central focus is on the apparent contrast between the widely assumed 'psychological unity of mankind' and the facts of cognitive pluralism, the diverse ways in which people think and the developmental, cultural, technological and institutional factors which contribute to that diversity. Whether described in terms of modes of thought, cognitive styles, or sensibilities, the diversity of patterns of rationality to be found between cultures, in different historical periods, between individuals at different stages of development remains a central problem for a cultural psychology. Modes of Thought brings together anthropologists, historians, psychologists and educational theorists who manage to recognise the universality in thinking and yet acknowledge the cultural, historical and developmental contexts in which differences arise.

Popular Religion in Germany and Central Europe, 1400-1800

Popular Religion in Germany and Central Europe, 1400-1800 PDF Author: Trevor Johnson
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1349248363
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 291

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Book Description
Studies in the field of popular religion have for some time been among the most innovative in social and cultural history, but until now there have been few publications providing any adequate overview for Germany and the Holy Roman Empire. This volume presents the results of recent research by younger scholars working on major aspects of this subject. The nine essays range over nearly four centuries of German history, encompassing late-medieval female piety, propaganda for radical Hussite dissent, attitudes towards the Jews, legitimation for the witchcraze on the eve of the Reformation, attempts to implement Protestant reform in German villages, Reformation attacks on popular magic and female culture, problems of defining the Reformation in small German towns, Protestant popular prophecy and formation of confessional identity, and the missionising strategies of the Counter-Reformation.

The Magical Imagination

The Magical Imagination PDF Author: Karl Bell
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1107377846
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 309

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Book Description
This innovative history of popular magical mentalities in nineteenth-century England explores the dynamic ways in which the magical imagination helped people to adjust to urban life. Previous studies of modern popular magical practices and supernatural beliefs have largely neglected the urban experience. Karl Bell, however, shows that the magical imagination was a key cultural resource which granted an empowering sense of plebeian agency in the nineteenth-century urban environment. Rather than portraying magical beliefs and practices as a mere enclave of anachronistic 'tradition' and the fantastical as simply an escapist refuge from the real, he reveals magic's adaptive and transformative qualities and the ways in which it helped ordinary people navigate, adapt to and resist aspects of modern urbanization. Drawing on perspectives from cultural anthropology, sociology, folklore and urban studies, this is a major contribution to our understanding of modern popular magic and the lived experience of modernization and urbanization.

Merchants, Politics and Society in Early Modern India

Merchants, Politics and Society in Early Modern India PDF Author: Chatterjee
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9004644741
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 287

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Book Description
This monograph deals with the social and political context of commercial activity in early modern India - a period during which Eastern India (and Bihar) experienced the transition to British colonial rule. As a point of departure from existing scholarly literature that usually studies this transition in material terms, this volume uses an approach that takes into account the configuration of social relations and political connections within which, it argues, commercial activity was embedded. Using merchants and bankers as its subjects, this book deals with the structure of trade and banking, the position of merchants in the cultural order and the role of the state in perpetuating this order.

Social Representations

Social Representations PDF Author: Serge Moscovici
Publisher: NYU Press
ISBN: 0814756301
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 321

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Book Description
Serge Moscovici first introduced the concept of social representations into contemporary social psychology nearly forty years ago. Since then the theory has become one of the predominant approaches in social psychology, not only in Europe, but increasingly in the United States as well. While Moscovici's work has spread broadly across the discipline, notably through his contributions to the study of minority influences and the psychology of crowds, the study of social representations has continued to provide the central focus for one of the most distinctive and original voices in social psychology today.