Time and History in Deleuze and Serres

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Description

For Gilles Deleuze, time is 'out of joint'. For Michel Serres, it is 'a crumpled handkerchief'. In both of these concepts, explicit references are made to the non-linear dynamics of Chaos and Complexity theory, as well as the New Sciences. The groundbreaking work of these key thinkers has the potential to instigate a radical break from traditional existentialist theories of time and history, affording us the opportunity to view history and historical events as a complex, non-linear system of feedback-loops, couplings and interfaces. In this collection, the first to address the comparative historiographies of Deleuze and Serres, twelve leading experts - including William Connolly, Eugene Holland, Claire Colebrook and Elizabeth Grosz - examine these alternative concepts of time and history, exposing critical arguments in this important and emerging field of research.

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All in all, this is a very nice collection of essays, and combined they do offer a convincing case that bringing the concepts of Deleuze and Serres together can reorient our thinking of both Deleuze and Serres in a number of important ways. One can also find, in Herzogenrath and Berressem's final two essays of the collection, important readings of Henry Adams that nicely complement the earlier essays. -- NDPR, Jeffrey A. Bell, Southeastern Louisiana University

Author Bio

Bernd Herzogenrath is Professor of American Studies at the University of Frankfurt, Germany.