Difference has been a term of choice in the humanities for the last few
decades, animating an extraordinary variety of work in philosophy,
literary studies, religion, law, the social sciences-indeed, in
virtually every area of the academy.
In projects ranging from deconstructive readings of canonical texts to a
radical rethinking of the sacred, difference has been the node around
which theorists have explored questions of conflict, power, identity,
meaning, and knowledge itself in postmodern culture. At this point, what
difference does difference make?
In this imaginatively conceived book, Julian Wolfreys talks to thirteen
leading scholars about the place of difference in their own work, in
their own fields, and in their teaching. How has intellectual engagement
with difference-its celebration of otherness and opposition, whether in
a work of art or in world politics-shaped teaching, reading, and writing
in today's colleges and universities? And at a time when identity
politics and cultural critique have been institutionalized by the
academy, has difference been domesticated?
Personal and revealing, these conversations come together as a kind of
collective self-portrait of the humanities at one of its important
junctures. Thinking Difference offers provocative reflections on what
ideas and practices will drive the next generation of critical thinking.
Here are original conversations on the career of a key concept with:
Nicholas Royle, Derek Attridge, Peggy Kamuf, Avital Ronell, Arkady
Plotnitsky,
John P. Leavey, Jr., Mary Ann Caws, Jonathan Culler, Gregory L. Ulmer,
J. Hillis Miller, John D. Caputo, Kevin Hart, and Werner Hamacher
