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Philosophy & Critical Theory Books in this online selection represent only a sliver of what we offer in the store. If you've got a particular book in mind and want to check on its availability, call us at 415-362-8193.

<<< 1 2 3 4 5 >>>     sort list by title | author Comments on the Society of the Spectacle Third Edition Guy Debord "Guy Debord is a time bomb, and a difficult one to defuse."—Michael Löwy. First published in 1967, Guy Debord's stinging revolutionary critique of contemporary society, The Society of the Spectacle has since acquired a cult status. Credited by... Madness The Invention of an Idea Michel Foucault Compelling and highly influential, Michel Foucault's Madness is an indispensable work for readers who wish to understand the intellectual evolution of one of the most important social theorists of the twentieth century. Written in 1954 and revised... Infinite City A San Francisco Atlas Rebecca Solnit What makes a place? Infinite City, Rebecca Solnit's brilliant reinvention of the traditional atlas, searches out the answer by examining the many layers of meaning in one place, the San Francisco Bay Area. Aided by artists, writers, cartographers, and... A Lover's Discourse Fragments Roland Barthes A Lover’s Discourse, at its 1978 publication, was revolutionary: Roland Barthes made unprecedented use of the tools of structuralism to explore the whimsical phenomenon of love. Rich with references ranging from Goethe’s Werther to Winnicott, from... Camera Lucida Reflections on Photography Roland Barthes A graceful, contemplative volume, Camera Lucida was first published in 1979. Commenting on artists such as Avedon, Clifford, Mapplethorpe, and Nadar, Roland Barthes presents photography as being outside the codes of language or culture, acting on the... Virtual Words Language on the Edge of Science and Technology Jonathon Keats The technological realm provides an unusually active laboratory not only for new ideas and products but also for the remarkable linguistic innovations that accompany and describe them. How else would words like qubit (a unit of quantum information)... Trickster Makes This World Mischief, Myth, and Art Lewis Hyde In Trickster Makes This World, Lewis Hyde brings to life the playful and disruptive side of human imagination as it is embodied in trickster mythology. He first visits the old stories—Hermes in Greece, Eshu in West Africa, Krishna in India, Coyote in... Lipstick Traces A Secret History of the Twentieth Century, Twentieth Anniversary Edition Greil Marcus Greil Marcus, author of Mystery Train, widely acclaimed as the best book ever written about America as seen through its music, began work on this new book out of a fascination with the Sex Pistols: that scandalous antimusical group, invented in... First As Tragedy, Then As Farce Slavoj Žižek From the tragedy of 9/11 to the farce of the financial meltdown—but underlying both is the irrationality of global capitalism. In this bravura analysis of the current global crisis—following on from his bestselling Welcome to the Desert of the... Anti-Oedipus Capitalism and Schizophrenia Gilles Deleuze, Felix Guattari An "introduction to the nonfascist life" (Michel Foucault, from the Preface) When it first appeared in France, Anti-Oedipus was hailed as a masterpiece by some and "a work of heretical madness" by others. In it, Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari set... The Parallax View Slavoj Žižek Philosophical and theological analysis and detailed readings of literature, cinema, and music co-exist with lively anecdotes and obscene jokes in an exploration of the territory Zizek knows best. In this treatise, he delves into the concept of... The Fragile Absolute Or, Why Is the Christian Legacy Worth Fighting For? Slavoj Žižek Slavoj Zizek, the maverick philosopher, author of over 30 books, acclaimed as the "Elvis of cultural theory", and today's most controversial public intellectual. His work traverses the fields of philosophy, psychoanalysis, theology, history and... A Little History of the World E. H. Gombrich In 1935, with a doctorate in art history and no prospect of a job, the 26-year-old Ernst Gombrich was invited by a publishing acquaintance to attempt a history of the world for younger readers. Amazingly, he completed the task in an intense six weeks... Being and Time Martin Heidegger "What is the meaning of being?" This is the central question of Martin Heidegger's profoundly important work, in which the great philosopher seeks to explain the basic problems of existence. A central influence on later philosophy, literature, art... <<< 1 2 3 4 5 >>>