Who Sings the Nation-State?: Language, Politics, Belonging - Hardcover

Spivak, Gayatri Chakravorty; Butler, Judith

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1905422571 ISBN 13: 9781905422579

Publisher: Seagull Books, 2007

Synopsis

Who Sings the Nation-State brings together two of America´s foremost critics and two of the most influential theorists of the last decade. Together, they explore the past, present and future of the state in a time of globalization.

What is contained in a state has become ever more plural whilst the boundaries of a state have become ever more fluid. No longer does a state naturally come with a nation. In a world of migration and shifting allegiances - caused by cultural, economic, military and climatic change - the state is a more provisional place and its inhabitants more stateless.

This spirited and engaging conversation ranges widely across Palestine, what Enlightenment and key contemporary philosophers have to say about the state, who exercises power in today´s world, whether we can have a right to rights, and even what the singing of the Star Spangled Banner in Spanish says about the complex world we live in today.

About this title

Book Description:

In a world of migration and shifting allegiances, the state has become a more provisional place and its inhabitants more stateless. What is contained in a state has become ever more plural while the boundaries of a state have become ever more fluid. No longer does a state naturally come with a nation.
This book is set in the form of a conversation between two renowned thinkers, Judith Butler and Gayatri Spivak, who discuss the fact that globalization has made things like national anthems and political boundaries obsolete. The result is a spirited and engaging conversation that ranges widely across Palestine, what Enlightenment and key contemporary philosophers have said about the state, who exercises power in today's world, whether we can have a right to rights, and even what the singing of "The Star Spangled Banner" in Spanish says about the complex world we live in today.

About the Author:

Judith Butler is Maxine Elliot Professor in the Depts of Rhetoric and Comparative Literature at Berkeley and author of numerous works including Giving an Account of Oneself, Subjects of Desire, Gender Trouble, Bodies That Matter, The Psychic Life of Power, Excitable Speech and Antigone´s Claim.

Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak is Avalon Foundation Professor in the Humanities and Director of the Center for Comparative Literature and Society at Columbia University and author of numerous works including In Other Worlds, The Post-Colonial Critic, Outside in the Teaching Machine, A Critique of Postcolonial Reason, and Death of a Discipline.

About this edition

• Publisher: Seagull Books
• Publication date: 2007
• ISBN 10: 1905422571
• ISBN 13: 9781905422579
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 128