How might the anthropological study of cosmologies the ways in which the horizons of human worlds are imagined and engaged illuminate understandings of the contemporary world? This book addresses this question by bringing together anthropologists whose research is informed by a concern with cosmological dimensions of social life in different ethnographic settings. Its overall aim is to reaffirm the value of the cosmological frame as a continuing source of analytical insight.
Attending to the novel cosmological formations that emerge in such fields as modern markets, political landscapes, digital media and popular cinema, the book's key task is to explore how modern circumstances are constituted within the variable imagination of worlds and their horizons. It will be of interest to all students and researchers in anthropology, as well as scholars in fields as diverse as film studies, cultural studies, comparative religion, science and technology studies, and broader social theory.
How is the ethnographic study of 'cosmologies' relevant to contemporary anthropology? How might such an orientation, understood as a focus on the ways in which the horizons of human worlds are imagined and engaged, illuminate understandings of the contemporary world? This book addresses these questions by bringing together anthropologists whose research is informed by a concern with cosmological dimensions of social life in different ethnographic settings. Its overall aim is to reaffirm the value of the cosmological frame as a continuing source of analytical insight. Attending to the novel cosmological formations that emerge in such fields as modern markets, political landscapes, digital media and popular cinema, the book's key task is to explore how modern circumstances are constituted within the variable imagination of worlds and their horizons. In doing so, the book also placed the comparative study of cosmologies in relation to broader trends in contemporary anthropological thinking. The book includes contributions by such leading anthropologists as Don Handelman, Caroline Humphrey, Bruce Kapferer, Daniel Miller, Marshall Sahlins, and Gregory Schrempp, as well chapters by a range of exciting younger scholars. It will be of interest to all students and researchers in anthropology, as well as scholars in fields as diverse as film studies, cultural studies, comparative religion, science and technology studies, and broader social theory.
