Upside-down Utopia: Directionality for the City of God

About the Book

Recent scholarship on process-driven utopia exhibits two startling omissions. The first is a lack of practical methodology proposed. The second elision is more serious. Without a way to discriminate between utopian hope and ideological agendas, the target for utopia’s pursuit becomes equally suspect. In this groundbreaking, interdisciplinary investigation of processual theory and methodology, Jay Burkette argues that while situating utopia within prefigurative performance remains the best option, certain facets must be refined to ensure it remains the ‘good place.’ These include a necessary moral grounding for its directionality as well as recognizing that different performative vectors are required from different actors. Blending the thought of Ernst Bloch, St. Augustine, Ruth Levitas, Walter Benjamin, Cristina Sharpe, Kierkegaard, and others, Upside-Down Utopia: Directionality for the City of God demonstrates that determining an appropriate heading for utopian affect entails identifying its genesis within past loss, an initial catastrophe defining humankind’s nature and struggle, highlighting the need for divine aid to orient the quest for the city of God.

Table of Contents:

Acknowledgments
Foreword
Introduction
Part I: Utopian Performativity vs. Merely-Political Comb
Chapter One: Utopia Revisited: Performative Process vs. Fixed Destination
Chapter Two: A Tale of Two Hopes, Part One
Chapter Three: A Tale of Two Hopes, Part Two
Part II: Epistemological Structures for Ordering Utopia’s Method
Chapter Four: Faith as Utopia’s Framework
Chapter Five: The Master’s Tools: What Cannot be Utopia’s Method
Chapter Six: The Ethical Minefield, a Relational Challenge
Part III: Ontological Frameworks and Practical Correctives Informing Utopia’s Method
Chapter Seven: Alternate Futures: Privileged Utopian Correctives
Chapter Eight: Rediscovering an Ancient-Modern Utopian Language
Chapter Nine: A More Excellent Way: Invaded by Love
Conclusion: Mutual Vulnerability: A Disaster-Focused Theory
Appendix: Protopian Theory
Bibliography
About the Author

About the Author :
Jay Burkette teaches philosophy, political theory, security theory, history, and leadership at Virginia Tech University, Southern New Hampshire University, and Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University.

Review :
Burkette's intriguing new book, Upside-Down Utopia, brings cultural, social, philosophical, and theological studies into conversation around the pursuit of a better world. His work relies on interpretations of St. Augustine, Hannah Arendt, Ruth Levitas, and Ernst Bloch, among others. The volume's key insights include the performative and processual aspects of envisioning and working toward a utopia. Recommended. Advanced undergraduates through faculty; professionals. In this unusual book, Jay Burkette provokes readers with new ways of thinking and practicing utopia. Analyzing texts from the ancients to the moderns to the postmoderns, from German Jewish thought to African American thought, and with surprising turns including to Eminem and Camelot, Burkette builds a constructive account of utopia that synthesizes critical theory and theology. While it is unlikely that readers will agree with all of Burkette’s arguments, thinking through those disagreements will surely be edifying. I have long considered Jay Burkette an insightful thinker and wonderful conversationalist. In this provocative and indispensable work, Burkette takes bold steps—navigating the jagged terrain of weaponized vocabularies and polarized social relations—in pursuit of the utopian novum. This opportunity to engage with his formidable intellect, in long-form writing, should be cherished by anyone committed to unmaking codified social hierarchies, realizing divine human dignity, and unceasingly striving towards a better world. In Upside-Down Utopia, Jay Burkette offers a practical guide on how to make progress toward a utopian ideal. Utopia, Burkette suggests, is a verb. Utopia is not a final state that society reaches; instead, it is a process. Burkette uses his expertise in social science and philosophy, and the religious view of the City of God, to show us how we can make a utopian ideal a reality. This book is essential reading for anyone interested in the connection between sociology, moral theory, and religion.