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Critical theory

About: Critical theory is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 5372 publications have been published within this topic receiving 164765 citations.


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Book
15 Jun 2005
TL;DR: The Work and the Gift as discussed by the authors explores the predictions of political thinkers on both the left and the right that work is fundamentally changing, or even disappearing; the debates among anthropologists and historians about an archaic gift-economy that preceded capitalism and might reemerge in its wake; contemporary political battles over charity and social welfare; and attempts by modern and postmodern artists to destabilize the work of art as we know it.
Abstract: The Work and the Gift considers how working and giving are taken for opposites and revealed as each other's ghostly shadow. We ask ourselves, for instance, to work for a wage and a living, dooming ourselves forever to the curse of daily toil; and yet we imagine the magnum opus or the oeuvre as a labor of love. We ask ourselves to give with no thought of return; yet we still tell ourselves to give only to the deserving and only where our giving will do some good. Ranging from Marx and Derrida to Friedrich Hayek and Alvin Toffler, Scott Cutler Shershow here explores the predictions of political thinkers on both the left and the right that work is fundamentally changing, or even disappearing; the debates among anthropologists and historians about an archaic gift-economy that preceded capitalism and might reemerge in its wake; contemporary political battles over charity and social welfare; and attempts by modern and postmodern artists to destabilize the work of art as we know it. Ultimately, Shershow joins other contemporary thinkers in envisioning a community of unworking, grounded neither in ideals of production and progress, nor in an ethic of liberal generosity, but simply in our fundamental being-in-common. What results is a brilliant intervention in critical theory and social thought that will be of enormous value to students of literary criticism, anthropology, and philosophy alike.

30 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors describe a class exercise involving the recent Vermont Supreme Court decision to legalize civil unions as an approach to addressing contemporary debates in sociology pertaining to the decline versus transition of the American family social institution.
Abstract: (Originally Published in Teaching Sociology, 32: 79-93.) The majority of literature regarding problem-based learning demonstrates its usefulness as a teaching technique in the natural sciences curriculum. The purpose of this paper is twofold. First, the broad purpose is to illustrate the application of problembased learning for instructing students about controversial issues in sociology. Within the second, more narrowed focus, we describe a class exercise involving the recent Vermont Supreme Court decision to legalize civil unions as an approach to addressing contemporary debates in sociology pertaining to the decline versus transition of the American family social institution. This project is developed using a three-pronged pedagogical approach involving critical theory, problem-based learning, and information literacy. While the technique described in this article is taken from a course on the Social History of American Families, the method can be modified for a variety of courses including sociology of the family, sociology of gender, introduction to sociology, and social problems.

30 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors argue that global transformation is challenging national education: such use is untenable in relation to a holistic view of understanding, and argue further that the holistic view challenges an account of democratic competence in terms of critical thinking, critical pedagogy, and revolutionary pedagology.
Abstract: Education in many countries is used to initiate children and young people into publicly accepted forms of knowledge and to further a common identity among members and citizens of the nation‐state. This study discusses both an uncritical initiation to such knowledge and the value of criticality as an educational goal in terms of critical thinking, critical pedagogy, and revolutionary pedagogy. It contends that global transformation is challenging national education: such use is untenable in relation to a holistic view of understanding. It argues further that the holistic view challenges an account of democratic competence in terms of critical thinking, critical pedagogy, and revolutionary pedagogy. It opens up the possibility of democratic deliberation in post‐national education.

30 citations

Book ChapterDOI
TL;DR: The Frankfurt School as mentioned in this paper is linked with the school of thought called the Frankfurt School, which was founded at the Institut fur Sozialforschung (the Institute for Social Research).
Abstract: Theodor Adorno (1970/1997) declared that art was a form of knowledge. In a somewhat related vein, his critical theorist colleague Herbert Marcuse (1956/1998) characterized art as a mode of cognition that is an alternative to positivism. The work of these two scholars is linked with the school of thought called ‘The Frankfurt School’. Famous for its notion and development of ‘critical theory’, the Frankfurt School’s work was carried out initially at the Institut fur Sozialforschung (the Institute for Social Research). This Institute was established in, but financially independent of, Frankfurt University. Founded in February 1923, a number of the scholars associated with the Institute found themselves drawn to art and the aesthetics as arenas in which alternative ways of thinking and ‘seeing’ were possible. For this group of scholars, in many ways, authentic art represented a ‘Great Refusal’ (Marcuse, 1956/1998, p. 149) against totalizing forms of logic.

30 citations

Book
02 Mar 2000
TL;DR: In contemporary Brazil, the forms of co-ordination of the economy dialectics and modernity, autonomy and solidarity by way of conclusion -critical theory at the turn of the century have been discussed as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: Nature, social systems and collective causality action and movement, memory and social creativity the logic of scientific research evolution and history modernity, tradition and reflexivity in contemporary Brazil the forms of co-ordination of the economy dialectics and modernity, autonomy and solidarity by way of conclusion - critical theory at the turn of the century.

30 citations


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Performance
Metrics
No. of papers in the topic in previous years
YearPapers
2023215
2022403
2021153
2020189
2019206
2018227