Phantasmatic Knowledge
Visions of the Human and the Scientific Gaze in English Literature, 1880-1930
by Susanne Scholz
Hardback (Published)
(October 2013)
ISBN: 9783825361686
6.5 x 9.65 inches
Price: $34.00
Out of stock
Phantasmatic Knowledge investigates changing anthropological visions as they were negotiated in late Victorian and early twentieth century literature. It starts from the assumption that in nineteenth century scientific discourse, a human being can only be accepted as fully human if it is visually perceived as human. One of the scientific genres to ‘produce’ and normalize man in the late nineteenth century is the case study, so the first part of the book analyses three notorious ‘cases’ of late Victorian London, Joseph Merrick, the so-called “Elephant Man”, Jack the Ripper, and the ‘Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde’. Its second part provides readings of texts by Stevenson and Hardy, and traces the ways in which the emergence of photography created the conditions for a specific way of seeing which also impacted the techniques of literary representation. A final chapter on mummy fiction addresses ethical questions regarding the precarious status of the human as an object of knowledge.
‘Phantasmatic Knowledge’ investigates changing anthropological visions as they were negotiated in late Victorian and early twentieth century literature. It starts from the assumption that in nineteenth century scientific discourse, a human being can only be accepted as fully human if it is visually perceived as human. One of the scientific genres to ‘produce’ and normalize man in the late nineteenth century is the case study, so the first part of the book analyses three notorious ‘cases’ of late Victorian London, Joseph Merrick, the so-called “Elephant Man”, Jack the Ripper, and the ‘Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde’. Its second part provides readings of texts by Stevenson and Hardy, and traces the ways in which the emergence of photography created the conditions for a specific way of seeing which also impacted the techniques of literary representation. A final chapter on mummy fiction addresses ethical questions regarding the precarious status of the human as an object of knowledge.
- By (author) Susanne Scholz
Other Titles in this Series
‘… that I wished myself a horse’
The Horse as Representative of Cultural Change in Systems of Thought
Volume 451
Satire und Postmoderne – unvereinbare Gegensatze?
Aktualisierungsmoglichkeiten und -notwendigkeiten des Satirebegriffs im Kontext des postmodernen Romans
Volume 439
Between the Urge to Know and the Need to Deny
Trauma and Ethics in Contemporary British and American Literature
Volume 413
Entwurfe des Glucks und des guten Lebens in englischen Romanen vom 18. zum 20. Jahrhundert
Volume 452
(En-)Gendering a Popular Theatrical Genre
The Roles of Women in Nineteenth-Century British Melodrama
Volume 443
GenReVisions
Genre Experimentaton and World-Construction in Contemporary Anglophone Literature
Volume 468
Gedachtnis-Fiktionen
Mediale Erinnerungsfiguren und literarischer Eigensinn in britischen Romanen zum Zweiten Weltkrieg
Volume 454
William Shakespeares Romerdramen
Ihre didaktische Evaluation unter Berucksichtigung der 'Gender Studies' fur den interdisziplinaren Englischunterricht
Volume 445
Die Reprasentation von Geschlechterrollen in W. Shakespeares Dramen
Der Beitrag moralisch-didaktischer Traktakte in der elisabethanischen und jakobaischen Zeit
Volume 417
Inter- und transkulturelles Lernen im Englischunterricht
Eine didaktische Analyse einschlagiger Lehrbucher
Volume 456
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