Mapping Benjamin

The Work of Art in the Digital Age

Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht editor Michael J Marrinan editor

Format:Paperback

Publisher:Stanford University Press

Published:28th Jul '03

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Mapping Benjamin cover

Since its publication in 1936, Walter Benjamin’s “Artwork” essay has become a canonical text about the status and place of the fine arts in modern mass culture. Benjamin was especially concerned with the ability of new technologies—notably film, sound recording, and photography—to reproduce works of art in great number. Benjamin could not have foreseen the explosion of imagery and media that has occurred during the past fifty years.

Does Benjamin’s famous essay still speak to this new situation? That is the question posed by the editors of this book to a wide range of leading scholars and thinkers across a spectrum of disciplines in the humanities. The essays gathered here do not hazard a univocal reply to that question; rather they offer a rich, wide-ranging critique of Benjamin’s position that refracts and reflects contemporary thinking about the ethical, political, and aesthetic implications of life in the digital age.

"Mapping Benjamin not only distinguishes itself in format, scope, and tone from the mass of Benjamin books published each year, it provides an up-to-date snapshot of the humanities. This lucidly written book uses Benjamin to chart the parameters of a force field of contemporary intellectual efforts, across disciplines and other divides." -Eva Geulen,New York University

ISBN: 9780804744362

Dimensions: unknown

Weight: 490g

368 pages