Search results for ""Author Piero Pierini""

From Plato to Virginia Woolf, Structuralism to Practical Criticism, Introducing Literary Criticism charts the history and development of literary criticism into a rich and complex discipline.Tackling disputes over the value and meaning of literature, and exploring theoretical and practical approaches, this unique illustrated guide will help readers of all levels to get more out of their reading.

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Sociology is interested in the ways people shape the society they live in, and the ways society shapes them. Simply, it is the study of what modern society is and how it functions. In the series' inimitable style, Introducing Sociology traces the origins of sociology from industrialization, revolution and the Enlightenment through to globalization, neoliberalism and the fear of nationalism - introducing you to key thinkers, movements and concepts along the way. You will develop insight into the world around you, as you engage your 'sociological imagination' and explore studies of the city, theories of power and knowledge, concepts of national, racial and sexual identity, and much more.

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What makes philosophy on the continent of Europe so different and exciting? And why does it have such a reputation for being 'difficult'?Continental philosophy was initiated amid the revolutionary ferment of the 18th century, philosophers such as Kant and Hegel confronting the extremism of the time with theories that challenged the very formation of individual and social consciousness.Covering the great philosophers of the modern and postmodern eras - from Nietzsche, Heidegger, Derrida and Deleuze right to up Agamben and ?i?ek - and philosophical movements from German idealism to deconstruction and feminism - Christopher Kul-Want and Piero brilliantly elucidate some of the most thrilling and powerful ideas ever to have been discussed.

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What is beauty, and what is truth? These are some of the questions which aesthetics tries to answer. In our everyday life, we talk about the 'aesthetics' of an artwork or a piece of design. But aesthetics goes beyond the simple experience of art. It is also a branch of philosophy concerned with the whole nature of experience itself, explored through our perceptions, feelings and emotions.

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Capitalism shapes every aspect of our world, beyond just our economic structures; it moulds our values and influences the way we write laws, wage wars and even conduct personal relationships. From its beginnings to the present day, Capitalism: A Graphic Guide tells the story of capitalism's remarkable and often ruthless rise, evolving through strife and struggle as much as innovation and enterprise. This non-fiction graphic novel explores the key developments that have shaped our modern world, from early banking to the Opium Wars, financial crashes, the rise of service economies and concerns about sustainability. It also introduces us to the leading proponents and critics of capitalism, providing both a theoretical and practical understanding of this fascinating subject.

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INTRODUCING guide to the cult author, semiologist and analyzer of advertising, Roland Barthes. Roland Barthes is best known as a semiologist, a student of the science of signs. This sees human beings primarily as communicating animals, and looks at the way they use language, clothes, gestures, hair styles, visual images, shapes and colour to convey to one another their tastes, their emotions, their ideal self-image and the values of their society. Introducing Barthes brilliantly elucidates Barthes' application of these ideas to literature, popular culture, clothes and fashion, and explains why his thinking in this area made him a key figure in the structuralist movement of the 1960s. It goes on to describe how his later insistence on pleasure, the delights of sexual non-conformity, and the freedom of the reader to interpret literary texts in the light of ideologies such as existentialism, Marxism and Freudianism, as well as structuralism itself, continues to make him one of the most dynamic and challenging of modern writers. This is the perfect companion volume to Introducing Semiotics.

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The works of French philosopher Alain Badiou range from novels, poems, 'romanopéras' and popular political treatises to elaborate philosophical arguments engaging with mathematical theory.Badiou suggests that 'philosophy is always a biography of the philosopher', and throughout all of his writing there is a staunch commitment to emancipatory politics and a radical yet faithful subjectivity. His famous, or infamous, philosophy of emancipation is firmly grounded in his fidelity to the universal idea of a collective life.Introducing Alain Badiou is an elegantly written and crisply illustrated guide to an essential contemporary thinker.

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