Anthem Press

For a quarter of a century now, and more particularly over the last decade, Maurice Halbwachs has inspired a growing literature embodied by many sociologists and historians of social sciences, published for the most part in scientific journals, focusing on the sociological thought that Halbwachs developed in his writings. Then come many studies that emerge from the history of ideas and epistemology: these are entirely devoted to a particular facet of Halbwachs’ work, either to place it in its scientific context or to discuss it on the basis of fundamental cognitive issues.

Our task is not to summarize or synthesize the thinking of Halbwachs, which would be far too vast an undertaking for an exercise of this kind. He was keenly aware of the most pressing epistemological and methodological questions surrounding the nascent sociology. He thought about the place of demography in the study of social life; he posed the problem of the role of psychology; and he considered the application of statistics. Better yet, he asked what a society really is: a kind of “organization” trying to last and preserve itself, adapting to the conditions of its environment. There is no doubt that Halbwachs contributed to the emergence of sociology especially after World War I. His studies have always been innovative, part of the intellectual debates at the moment. In particular, his work invests the question of knowing if it was possible to study in a positive way human spirit, and especially intellectual faculties.

This study examines the significant roles of five women poets, in order of chronology: Eliza Hamilton Dunlop, Mary Bailey, Caroline Leakey, Emily Manning, and Louisa Lawson. The work of these poets can outline the development of women’s poetry in Australia and internationally across the nineteenth century, and their inclusion radically alters current scholarship, rethinking the ways in which women poets, feminist politics, and the legacies of Romanticism relate to colonial poetry. Colonial poetry in Australia has generally been interpreted through a lens of oppositionality or insularity. 

These poets are examined through a transnational frame, which foregrounds challenges to women’s subjugation, and oppression relating to class, and race. Since studies of colonial Australian women writers have tended to focus on those writing novels or journals, women’s poetry of the period has received less critical attention. The highly gender-conscious writing of these poets reflects knowledgeable and innovative political dialogues that consistently demonstrate the global context of colonial women’s poetry. These poets often took what may be considered a cosmopolitan approach, which extended beyond British or emergent Australian nationalisms, in which gender was recognised as a unifying category far more than nation or Empire, extending their interests across ancient cultures, including Greek, Roman, and Indian, Italian, North American, French as well as European cultures, and sometimes incorporating discourses around slavery, indigeneity, and New- and Old-World dichotomies. 

This book is concerned with the related historical relationships of women’s political writing and gender to colonialism, literary romanticism, and emerging national identities. Themes explored in this study, demonstrating these poets’ access to a political discourse of gender and class, include abolitionism, Hellenism, eroticism and spiritualism. In prioritising the contributions of women, particularly through print culture, this study seeks to recognise colonial Australian women’s poetry as a transnational literature, politicised by its engagement with imperialist and nationalist discourses at a transnational level.

'The Anthem Companion to Georg Simmel' brings together new interpretations of the work of this sociologist and philosopher. It discusses how Simmel’s work is relevant, interesting and significant for advancing contemporary discussions and debates. Compared to the volumes of works on other sociological giants like Émile Durkheim, Karl Marx and Max Weber, the Anglophone secondary literature on Simmel has remained relatively scarce until recently.

The book addresses general questions on ‘social life in process’ that characterize the whole of Simmel’s work and also includes chapters that focus on specific issues. The primary concern in each chapter is not just to review Simmel’s ideas or provide accurate readings but often neglected readings but also to explore how Simmel offers a model for addressing various disciplinary concerns and examine the degree to which he continues to speak to the experience of the present.

The international scholars writing in this companion are contributors to an emerging new wave of Simmel scholarship. Included in the volume is Austin Harrington’s translation of selections from Simmel’s book on Goethe and a comprehensive list of Simmel’s work in English.

'The Anthem Companion to Pierre Bourdieu' provides an introduction to the French sociologist’s thought and an evaluation of the international significance of his work from a range of national perspectives. This volume assesses Bourdieu’s work as a product of his social situation in France and, more importantly, in relation to his experience as French Algeria gained its independence. The companion then proceeds to ask how the concepts he developed can legitimately be applied to other situations.

The volume is divided into two parts, with the first devoted to aspects of Bourdieu’s thought and the second discussing case-studies of the international deployment of his thought. The international list of contributors elaborate on the implications and consequences of Bourdieu’s phenomenological orientation; explore the meaning of ‘reflexivity’ in Bourdieu’s work offering, in the process, a comprehensive guide to relevant secondary literature; examine the validity of the ways in which Margaret Archer and Bernard Lahire have attempted to go beyond Bourdieu’s original formulations; and spell out the implications of Bourdieu’s thinking in relation to the possibility of an international social science. The contributors also provide a biometric analysis of the circulation of Bourdieu’s ideas within Europe and offer interpretations of Bourdieu’s work within their own national contexts rather than in terms of a shared discourse of international sociology.

This book proposes to examine the nature of religion by seeking its origin within the context of the theory of evolution and the development of the human brain. It is argued that religion is the way the mechanism of natural selection in the theory of evolution operates to help humans survive in the context of a dangerous and hostile world. Survival is accomplished when profound experiences like trance cause a rewiring of the brain, giving birth to what later is identified as religious attitudes and ways of behaving. It is possible to speculate that without the development of religion, humans might not have survived to create cultures and civilizations. Therefore, the development of religion makes it possible for early humans to thrive. This evolutionary process involved adaptation to one’s environment, creation of social groups, and development of the body and the brain.
There are also other neglected aspects of evolution not discussed by previous theorists. The implications of the embodied nature of human beings are not always stressed by cognitive theorists. What they more specifically tend to neglect is that human bodies are chemical factories. It is numerous chemicals created within the body that contribute to the development of religious experiences. Another neglected aspect of those influenced by the theory of evolution is that early humans exerted a will to power to survive. This so-called will to power is a process of empowerment with the goal of enabling humans to become strong and powerful enough to survive. This will to power is not something metaphysical but is rather part of the dynamic of natural selection. It is possible to think of the proposed will to power within the operation of evolution as a thought experiment with the goal of enriching the theory of evolution.
With a review of the so-called Big Bang theory about the beginning of the universe, Darwin’s theory of evolution, the quest for the birth of religion, and the cognitive contribution to this quest, the initial chapter commences a major theme of this book, namely the importance of origins. It includes an examination of the problematic nature of religion from a comparative perspective. Pre-historical times witnessed early Homo sapiens surrounded by danger as they attempted to survive. For our human ancestors, religion was not a way to get rich or to distinguish oneself from others, it was a means of survival. This was a perfectly natural development and response to one’s hostile environment.

Categorization is an essential and unavoidable instrumentality for conceptually navigating a world—indeed for being able to conceptualize a world to be navigated. Classification is a pivotal instrument for scientific systemization, featured as a basis for the philosophical understanding of reality since Aristotle, but classificatory concepts of sorts, types and natural kinds inevitably pervade our understanding of ourselves and our position in the social as well as the natural world at all levels. The authors argue that the character, purpose, context and culturerelativity of categories and categorization have been widely misunderstood—that standard philosophical views are substantially correct in some respects but markedly mistaken in others.

The book offers a comprehensive survey of basic principles of classification and categorization, with a multitude of illustrative examples accompanied by instructive analysis of ways and means. Initial chapters include a critical examination of previous work on the nature of categories, a wide-ranging survey of the ways in which categories have been conceptualized in the history of philosophy and a survey of relevant empirical work and scientific theory regarding both perceptual categories and categorization in general. In later chapters, the authors argue that the long-seated misunderstandings of categories that they identify underlie paradoxes in logic regarding vagueness and identity, puzzles in philosophy of science regarding induction, essences, natural laws and natural kinds, and problems in social philosophy and our ethical lives as well. A more adequate grasp of the nature of categories and categorization offers a better understanding of a range of classical philosophical problematics and the promise of alternative approaches.