New Critical Theory: Essays on Liberation(New Critical Theory)

New Critical Theory surveys contemporary leftist thought while introducing the tenets of this new form of critical theory. Beginning with an exploration of the relationship between Marxism, Habermas, and the politics of identity, William S. Wilkerson and Jeffrey R. Paris present a collection that critiques the globalization of capital. The development of personality appears as subject to socialized standards in an age of global capitalism. Only after scrutinizing the effects of such a system can liberation be found. The essays within join Critical Theory with postmodern insights on language and subjectivity to provide a more comprehensive view of emancipatory social theory. Through this and other refelctions on critical race, gender, and queer theories, Wilkerson and Paris emerge with an encompassing volume defining New Critical Theory.

Table of Contents:
Chapter 1 Foreword: Back to the Future: Marcuse and the New Critical Theory Chapter 2 Introduction: Why a New Critical Theory? Part 3 Visions and Methods Chapter 4 Obstinate Critique and the Possibility of the Future Chapter 5 Redemption in the Impasse: An Other Communism Chapter 6 Toward a New Critical Theory Chapter 7 Inhabiting Hope: Contributions to a New Materialist Phenomenology Part 8 Intersections beyond Postmodernism Chapter 9 Marcuse and the Quest for Radical Subjectivity Chapter 10 Challenging the Colonial Contract: The Zapatistas Insurgent Imagination Part 11 Critique of Technology Chapter 12 Marcuse and the Aestheticization of Technology Chapter 13 Women Carrying Water: At the Crossroads of Technology and Critical Theory Chapter 14 Chronotopology: Critique of Spatiotemporal Regimes Part 15 Race, Sexuality, and the Normative Foundations of Criticism Chapter 16 Can Queer Theory Be Critical Theory? Chapter 17 The Mother Wit of Justice: Eros and Hubris in the African-American Context Chapter 18 Imagining the Horizon Part 19 Index

About the Author :
William S. Wilkerson is assistant professor of philosophy at the University of Alabama in Huntsville. Jeffrey R. Paris is visiting professor at the University of San Francisco.

Review :
This collection brings together some of the most exciting voices writing in critical theory today. The essays included in the volume show us how critical theory can be expanded to include the burning issues of multiculturalism; racial, ethnic, and language politics; and the pressing demands of feminism. In this collection, Wilkerson and Paris have brought together seasoned veterans of critical theory such as Douglas Kellner, Andrew Feenberg, and James L. Marsh with a new generation of critical theorists including Patricia Huntington, Eduardo Mendieta, Bill Martin, and Cynthia Willett. Although there is no single perspective that unites the authors across topics ranging as widely as the Chiapas Rebellion, queer theory, African-Amercian notions of 'subjectivity,' and Marcuse's early debts to Heidegger, what they share in common is the attempt to renew the critical, radical edge of what we might think of as a 'critical theory industry' dominated by Habermasians. A new, post-Habermasian critical theory finds greater inspiration in the radicalism of HerbertMarcuse than in the critical-theoretic rapprochement with liberalism that has characterized its mainstream development in the United States over the past couple of decades. Anyone interested in answering the question Nancy Fraser once asked, 'What's Critical About Critical Theory?,' will be informed and challenged by this volume. The critical theory that appears here is especially noteworthy for its willingness to learn from and engage in constructive dialogues with postmodernism, feminism, postcolonial t An important, philosophically sophisticated book that ought to be read by anyone who has felt the pull of philosophical dissonance. It is a book that ought to be read by all those who are intellectually accustomed to reading the works of those who continue to testify against continuing injustice. It is also a book that demands to be read by all of those frustrated by the futile in-fighting that has dogged Critical theory for several decades. This book has the potential for cunstructing new bridges both between the various clans that comprise Critical theory and across to other intellectual traditions that have been unduly neglected by an overly canonical reading of Critical theory. New Critical Theory is an important, philosophically sophisticated book that ought to be read by anyone who has felt the pull of philosophical dissonance. It is a book that ought to be read by all those who are intellectually accustomed to reading the works of those who continue to testify against continuing injustice. It is also a book that demands to be read by all of those frustrated by the futile in-fighting that has dogged Critical theory for several decades. This book has the potential for constructing new bridges both between the various clans that comprise Critical theory and across to other intellectual traditions that have been unduly neglected by and overly canonical reading of Critical theory. One is unlikely to encounter an anthology on recent applications of critical theory that is as thorough in its coverage as this one. The editors have done a terrific job assembling an all-star cast of scholars; the writing is impassioned and the territory covered-from philosophical foundations and postmodern challenges to globalization, technology, post-colonialism, race, gender, and sexual orientation-is fresh and exciting. In this collection, Wilkerson and Paris have brought together seasoned veterans of critical theory such as Douglas Kellner, Andrew Feenberg, and James L. Marsh with a new generation of critical theorists including Patricia Huntington, Eduardo Mendieta, Bill Martin, and Cynthia Willett. Although there is no single perspective that unites the authors across topics ranging as widely as the Chiapas Rebellion, queer theory, African-Amercian notions of 'subjectivity,' and Marcuse's early debts to Heidegger, what they share in common is the attempt to renew the critical, radical edge of what we might think of as a 'critical theory industry' dominated by Habermasians. A new, post-Habermasian critical theory finds greater inspiration in the radicalism of Herbert Marcuse than in the critical-theoretic rapprochement with liberalism that has characterized its mainstream development in the United States over the past couple of decades. Anyone interested in answering the question Nancy Fraser once asked, 'What's Critical About Critical Theory?,' will be informed and challenged by this volume. The critical theory that appears here is especially noteworthy for its willingness to learn from and engage in constructive dialogues with postmodernism, feminism, postcolonial theory, and multiculturalism, moving its readers beyond the increasingly sterile debates that dominate the ivory tower, to the concrete, world-historical struggles for liberation on which the soul, the vitality, and ultimately the future of critical theory depends.