Books & Ideas is the English-language mirror website of La Vie des Idées, a free online journal which has gained a large readership and established itself in France as a major place for intellectual debate since 2007.
In this collection of essays, Jean-Claude Schmitt continues his examination of medieval images. Considering the topic from a semantic, historical, and artistic perspective, he explores how the medieval West thought about images and, at times, through images.
In their recent research about Israeli politics, Noam Gidron and his coauthors explore the country’s affective polarization, the support for the judicial overhaul, Likud’s populism, and the relations between them.
Digitally distributed television series are one of the key forms of contemporary entertainment. By analyzing this distinctive form of consumption, it is possible to explain these consumers’ relationship to time, narratives, and decision-making.
Drawing on a socio-historical study of the construction of astronomical observatories on the island of Hawai‘i, Pascal Marichalar shows that scientific policies can no longer be considered separately from their ecological and social impacts.
About: Justine Lacroix, Les valeurs de l’Europe. Un enjeu démocratique, Collège de France éditions
Olivier Mahéo, De Rosa Parks au Black Power : Une histoire Populaire des mouvements noirs, 1945-1970, Presses Universitaires de Rennes
À propos de : Vincent Tiberj, La droitisation française. Mythe et réalités (France’s rightward turn: myths and realities), Puf
A rumour is circulating in some African countries: the French state is organising penis thefts to offset declining fertility. The rumour, spread by Russian propaganda, has become fake news.
The American sociologist Harrison White made a vital contribution to the development of social network analysis. Besides his work in this field, his theoretical synthesis and his understanding of social formations have influenced a variety of fields such as the sociology of art and economic sociology.
Ukraine’s water networks have been mobilized since the start of the war in 2014. Infrastructure workers are some of the last to leave settlements attacked by the Russian army. Water systems and people are resisting but are reaching the limits of their capacity to adapt to violence and disruptions.
A selection of five essays and reviews recently published in Books&Ideas discusses the legacy and renewal of social class studies in France, Great-Britain and India.
The economic crisis that has plagued a great part of the world since 2008 remains baffling as ever, all questions and no answers. Why not start by listing the former, and then imagine what the latter could look like?
The last year has been extremely tough for Europe as a political idea. The debt crisis, the rise of the radical right, repeated and widespread attacks against immigrants, foreigners, but also the very concept of supranational solidarity have seemed to bring one of the richest regions of the globe to the brink of collapse. Is the situation as hard as it has been made to look? And where should Europe’s efforts first turn to?
How do scientific discoveries and progress come about? Against an idealist and triumphalist conception of the history of science, Simon Schaffer’s oeuvre examines science in the making, in close proximity to its practices and actors. Far from diminishing its prestige, this approach restores science to the central place it occupied in Old Regime societies.
Ronald Dworkin’s innovative and politically ambitious work has become essential reading in political and legal theory. Taking issue with classical political liberalism, he argues that liberty and equality are not mutually exclusive, and are indeed inseparable. And against traditional interpretations of law, he argues that law must be understood by comparing it to a collective novel, a mixture of creativity and interpretation.
Rediscovering an activist thinker who was at the origins of eco-feminism, but remains unknown. Her work inspired an extremely heterogeneous movement, but has her ambition to concretely transform the social, economic and political organisation of society been pursued?
La silhouette féminine est depuis longtemps l’objet de normes sociales. À l’heure des réseaux sociaux, ces normes s’intensifient et provoquent en réaction des mouvements « body-positifs ».
Abbès Zouache est connu pour avoir développé une anthropologie de la guerre dans le Proche-Orient médiéval. Dans cet essai personnel, fondé sur son expérience entre Moyen-Orient et Europe, il propose une réflexion sur la croisade comme phénomène mémoriel, en Occident comme dans les pays arabes.
Alors que se multiplient les initiatives muséales privées (fondations Arnault, Pinault, Cartier, etc.), les musées publics apparaissent fragilisés face à des contraintes budgétaires accrues. G. Adam dessine un panorama global des enjeux inhérents à la privatisation des musées.
À propos de : Patrice Canivez, Jean-Jacques Rousseau. La politique face à l’histoire, Puf
Frédéric Jacquin, Mourir de la peste. Anthropologie d’une épidémie (1720-1722), Champ Vallon
Fanny Henriet, L’économie peut-elle sauver le climat ?, Puf
