Understanding Culture

In this concise, lucid, and elegant introduction to the concept and study of "culture" for all those interested and invested in the increasing relevance of humanities in a day and age in which the exponential growth of commerce and communication gives us less and less pause, time to breath and think twice, Babette Hellemans reminds us of a simple but wide-ranging insight and truth: culture matters and the different and often subtle methods for its historical and intellectual inquiry are as many expressions of the variable ways in which we, as modern subjects and citizens, understand and commemorate our past, live and inhabit our present, and anticipate as well as realize our future. Aptly illustrated and richly documented, this book forms a trusted guide through a pantheon of original and influential thinkers and hotly contested debates, whose terms, the author brilliantly shows, are everything but abstract or merely theoretical. To think about culture high and low, in non-Western no less than classical or modern Western contexts, is nothing short of an ongoing "conversation of mankind," and one whose stakes couldn't be higher today. - Hent de Vries, Russ Family Professor in the Humanities and Philosophy, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore & Director, School of Criticism and Theory at Cornell University, Ithaca

This much-needed and very welcome textbook excels at the challenging task of conveying the intricacies of theory in a crisp and accessible manner to the reader. Abundant in illuminating examples, it is a guide to culture in the best sense of the world: it provides a lasting inspiration for reflection (well after it has been read). - Monika Baár, Professor in Cultural History and the History of Political Thought at the University of Leiden, the Netherlands