The militant historian : the concept of history in the work of Alain Badiou / Kerry William Purcell

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Purcell, Kerry William, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Badiou, Alain.

History--Study and teaching.

History.

Physical Description:

1 online resource

Place of Publication:

London : Bloomsbury Academic, 2024

Summary:

"This is the first wide-ranging analysis of Alain Badiou's use, development and transformation of the concept of history. Despite the wealth of perspectives now available on how social and cultural practices take shape, historicism still appears to be the most dominant. The Militant Historian examines this primacy and reveals how Badiou's work offers a radical riposte.Exploring key texts in Badiou's oeuvre and how his philosophical ideas disrupt dominant conceptions of history and the role of the historian, Kerry William Purcell addresses how these ideas could transform our approaches to the historical and what it means to 'do history' as a meaningful endeavour. Adopting a chronological approach to Badiou's work, each chapter explores specific conceptual developments in his writing and how they lend themselves to a reconsideration of the subject who speaks history. From these new and disruptive modes of doing emerges the figure of the militant historian – a role with the potential to impact how we practice history outside the narrow strictures of academic life"-- Provided by publisher

Contents:

Structuralism and the crisis of history

History as internal exclusion : from ‘the (re)commencement of dialectical materialism’ to ‘mark and lack’

The ‘paradoxical history of eternity’ : Badiou, Mao and the ‘historico-truth’

Between the eagle and the old mole : history, historicity and the theory of the subject

The historian as ‘retroactive agent of interventional practice’ : being and event and logic of worlds

Fragments of eternity and the immanence of truths

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index

Online resource; title from home page (Bloomsbury Collections, viewed October 29, 2025)

Other Format:

Print version: Purcell, Kerry William. London : Bloomsbury Academic, 2024

ISBN:

9781350383449

1350383449

9781350381063

1350381063

9781350381070

1350381071

OCLC:

1479201157

Publisher Number:

CIPO000186609

Access Restriction:

Restricted for use by site license