Key Contemporary Concepts

John Lechte is Professor in Sociology at Macquarie University, where he has responsibility for Graduate teaching and research. He has written widely on European philosophy and the image, including the work of Julia Kristeva and Georges Bataille. He has just published a key work on the image, Genealogy and Ontology of the Western Image and its Digital Future (2012), and is currently working on the human and the image. With Saul Newman, he will publish, in 2013, Agamben and the Politics of Human Rights: Statelessness, Images, Violence.

• A Note on the TextIntroductionA Abjection Aesthetics Alienation Allegory Analogue Analytic-Synthetic Arbitrary AtonalityB Beauty Being Biotechnology Blasé BodyC Chance Clone Code Communication Community Complexity Culture Cybernetics Cyberspace CyborgD Deconstruction Dictionary-Encyclopedia Diegesis Différance Difference-Individuality Differend DigitalE Economy Encyclopedia (see Dictionary-Encyclopedia) Entropy Epistemology Eros-Eroticism Event ExchangeF Family Fantasy / Phantasy Fantasm Fractal Freedom Fuzzy LogicG General Will Gift Globalisation Governmentality GrammatologyH Habitus HistoryI Icon Identification Identity Ideology Image Imaginary Imagination Immanent/Immanence-Transcendent / Transcendence Index Information InterpretationJ JusticeK Klanfarbenmelodie KnowledgeL Labour-power Legitimacy Life Local Logos-Mythos LoveM Memory Metaphor Metaphysics Mimesis Modernity Money Montage Mythos (see Logos-Mythos) N Necessity Network NihilismO Object Ontology OtherP Panopticon Phantasy / Phantasm (see Fantasy / Fantasm) Pixel Postmodernity Power Profane (see Sacred-Profane)Q QuantumR Responsibility Ressentiment Rhizome Risk-SocietyS Sacred-Profane Semiotic Sign: Signifier/Signified Simulacrum Spectacle Subject Synthetic (see Analytical-Synthetic)T Technics Theory Thermodynamics Time Transcendence (see Immanent/Immanence / Transcendent / Transcendence) TruthU Unconscious Universal V Value Virtual (see Cyberspace) Virus, W Work WritingX Xenophobia, Z Zeno′s Paradox

′A book which all students of the human sciences will find useful, both for its range of engagements and its pedagogic ambitions. The book is best thought of as a cabinet full of the theoretical curiosities of the modern age, able to be dipped in to and out of at will. And, like a cabinet of curiosities, it is not just a repository of knowledge but, also, in the very best sense, an entertainment. To be read and to be enjoyed.’ Nigel Thrift, University of Bristol