Cultural transmission and the French Enlightenment : repurposing the past /
Despite its rhetoric of rupture and rejection of tradition, Enlightenment thinkers sculpted the identity of their movement and projected it into the future via reflection on the past. This volume seeks to explore how the Enlightenment was structured by transmission of older ideas, what processes def...
| Other Authors: | , |
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| Format: | Book |
| Language: | English |
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Liverpool :
Published by Liverpool University Press on behalf of Voltaire Foundation,
[2025].
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| Series: | Oxford University studies in the Enlightenment ;
2025:07. |
| Subjects: |
| Summary: | Despite its rhetoric of rupture and rejection of tradition, Enlightenment thinkers sculpted the identity of their movement and projected it into the future via reflection on the past. This volume seeks to explore how the Enlightenment was structured by transmission of older ideas, what processes defined this transmission, and how the Enlightenment was structured by the transmission of older ideas, what processes defined this transmission, and how the Enlightenment has been received from the end of the eighteenth century to the present day, as well as to examine the ramifications of the continued sourcing of ideas generated during the period for different, and sometimes conflicting, social, political and creative projects. The concept of recycling has been addressed in studies of the history of science and sustainability, as well as digital humanities, and this book develops these thoughts to view repurposing as an interdisciplinary mode of inquiry, arguing that artists, scientists and authors have deliberately engaged and harnessed the past to create new elements of their disciplines. In so doing, this book demonstrates that the past was fundamental to the creation of the Enlightenment, and repurposing was the tool by which Enlightenment thinkers crafted an understanding of history, creating a narrative in which their era appeared to be both a break with the past and the culmination of universal history. |
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| Physical Description: | xxv, 315 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm. |
| Bibliography: | Includes bibliographical references (pages 277-304) and index. |
| ISBN: | 9781836242840 1836242840 |