1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910790958203321

Titolo

Catastrophes : a history and theory of an operative concept / / edited by Nitzan Lebovic and Andreas Killen

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Berlin, Germany ; ; Boston, Massachusetts : , : de Gruyter Oldenbourg, , 2014

©2014

ISBN

3-11-037377-7

3-11-031258-1

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (208 p.)

Classificazione

AR 14120

Disciplina

363.3409

Soggetti

Disasters - History

Disasters - Social aspects

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Description based upon print version of record.

Nota di contenuto

Frontmatter -- Table of Contents -- Introduction / Killen, Andreas / Lebovic, Nitzan -- The Storyteller and the Seismograph / Coen, Deborah R. -- "Unity, Plasticity, Catastrophe: Order and Pathology in the Cybernetic Era" / Bates, David W. -- The Last Man: The Birth of Modern Apocalypse in Jean Paul, John Martin, and Lord Byron / Horn, Eva -- Accidents happen: The Industrial Accident in Interwar Germany / Killen, Andreas -- German Jewish Judges and the Permanent State of Catastrophe / Lebovic, Nitzan -- Ending Time and again in Ruins: Catastrophe and its Discontents in Jewish Theology / Kavka, Martin -- The Obscenity of Objectivity: Post-Holocaust Anti-Semitism and the Invention-Discovery of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder / Herzog, Dagmar -- Kata and/or Streiphen?: Climate Change and the Politics of Catastrophe / Battistoni, Alyssa -- Anticipating the Climate Catastrophe / Dörries, Matthias -- Conclusion -- The Authors

Sommario/riassunto

Catastrophic scenarios dominate our contemporary mindset. Catastrophic events and predictions have spurred new interest in re-examining the history of earlier disasters and the social and conceptual resources they have mobilized. The essays gathered in this volume reconsider the history and theory of different catastrophes and their aftermath. The emphasis is on the need to distance this process of



reconsideration from previous teleological representations of catastrophes as an endpoint, and to begin considering their "operative" aspects, which unmask the nature of social and political structures. Among the essays in this volume are analyses, by leading scholars in their respective fields, concerning the role of catastrophes in theology, in the history of industrial accidents, in theory of history, in the history of law, in "catastrophe films", in the history of cybernetics, in post-Holocaust discussions of reparations, and in climate change.