The End of the Soul - Hardcover

Hecht, Jennifer

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0231128460 ISBN 13: 9780231128469

Publisher: Columbia University Press, 2003

Synopsis

On October 19, 1876 a group of leading French citizens, joined together to form the Society of Mutual Autopsy, with the aim of proving that souls do not exist. With this group as its focus, The End of the Soul is a study of science and atheism in France in late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. It shows that anthropology grew out of a struggle between tradition (especially Catholicism) and modernism, and that it became for many a secular religion, with such adherents as Emile Zola, Margaret Sanger, and Arthur Conan Doyle.

About this title

About the Author:

Jennifer Michael Hecht is the author of Doubt: A History and two award-winning books of poetry, The Next Ancient World and Funny. She is a contributor to The New York Times and The Washington Post and is a fellow of the New York Institute for the Humanities.

Review:

"This is a wonderful analysis of the passionate, exuberant and at times bombastic radical anthropologists whose views were central to political culture in late-nineteenth-century France. In lively prose, the author characterizes these combative scientists and their contributions to every conceivable topic of the day, from religion, to morality, to prehistory, to criminality, human equality, feminism, and socialism. It is full of striking insights into the politics of science, especially the ways in which an almost religious fervor for scientific materialism could lead either to radical scientific egalitarianism or it's opposite, scientific racism." -- Nancy Leys Stepan, Columbia University

About this edition

• Publisher: Columbia University Press
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 0231128460
• ISBN 13: 9780231128469
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 304