{"product_id":"necro-citizenship-9780822327721","title":"Necro Citizenship","description":"\u003cb\u003eBook Synopsis\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cdiv\u003eIn \u003ci\u003eNecro Citizenship\u003c\/i\u003e Russ Castronovo argues that the meaning of citizenship in the United States during the nineteenth century was bound to—and even dependent on—death. Deploying an impressive range of literary and cultural texts, Castronovo interrogates an American public sphere that fetishized death as a crucial point of political identification. This morbid politics idealized disembodiment over embodiment, spiritual conditions over material ones, amnesia over history, and passivity over engagement.\u003cbr\u003eMoving from medical engravings, séances, and clairvoyant communication to Supreme Court decisions, popular literature, and physiological tracts, \u003ci\u003eNecro Citizenship \u003c\/i\u003eexplores how rituals of inclusion and belonging have generated alienation and dispossession. Castronovo contends that citizenship does violence to bodies, especially those of blacks, women, and workers. “Necro ideology,” he argues, supplied citizens with the means to think abo\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTrade Review\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Liberty \u003ci\u003eand\u003c\/i\u003e death? Citizenship \u003ci\u003eand\u003c\/i\u003e necrophilia? The conjunction ‘and’ is shocking and is meant to shock. Russ Castronovo sees American political life as the burial ground of many corpses, literal as well as metaphoric. With ruthless determination he digs these up, examines their tell-tale remains, and, in the process, offers a trenchant critique of some consequences of American democracy.”—Wai Chee Dimock, author of \u003ci\u003eResidues of Justice: Literature, Law, Philosophy\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTable of Contents\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eList of Illustrations \u003cbr\u003e Preface \u003cbr\u003e Introduction: Democray’s Graveyard \u003cbr\u003e 1. Political Necrophilia \u003cbr\u003e Freedom and the Longing for Dead Citizenship \u003cbr\u003e 2. “The Slavery of Man to Himself” \u003cbr\u003e White Male Sexuality, Self-Reliance, and Bondage \u003cbr\u003e 3. “That Half-Living Corpse” \u003cbr\u003e Female Mediums, Séances, and the Occult Public Sphere \u003cbr\u003e 4. The “Black Arts” of Citizenship \u003cbr\u003e Africanist Origins of White Interiority \u003cbr\u003e 5. De-Naturalizing Citizenship \u003cbr\u003e Afterword \u003cbr\u003e Notes \u003cbr\u003e Works Cited \u003cbr\u003e Index\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Duke University Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":49406028546391,"sku":"9780822327721","price":21.59,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0817\/1739\/5799\/files\/9780822327721.jpg?v=1730494296","url":"https:\/\/bookcurl.com\/products\/necro-citizenship-9780822327721","provider":"Book Curl","version":"1.0","type":"link"}