Melancholy Politics:

Loss, Mourning, and Memory in Late Modern France

By: Jean-Philippe Mathy

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Paperback | 7 March 2011

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248 Pages

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22.9 x 15.2 x 1.8

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The current cultural climate in France is often described as one of &;déclinisme&; or &;sinistrose,&; a mixture of pessimism about the national future, nostalgia for the past, and a sinister sense of irreversible decline concerning the present. The notion of &;democratic melancholia&; has become widely popular, cropping up time and again in academic papers and newspaper articles. In Melancholy Politics, Jean-Philippe Mathy examines the development of this disenchanted mood in the works of prominent French philosophers, historians, and sociologists since the beginning of the 1980s. This period represents a significant turning point in French intellectual life, as the legacy of major postwar and sixties theorists such as Lévi-Strauss, Derrida, and Foucault was increasingly challenged by a younger generation of authors who repudiated both Marxism and structuralism. The book is not a classic intellectual or cultural history of post-1968 France, but rather a contribution to the understanding of the present&;a collection of soundings into what remains largely a complex, ongoing process.

Industry Reviews

“Melancholy Politics is a stimulating and enjoyable read. . . .

[The book] is perhaps best viewed as a work of contemporary history infused with a healthy dose of memory studies theory, and should certainly be read by anyone with an interest in how a nation attempts to deal with its past.”

—Adam Timmins, Journal of Contemporary European Studies

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