Thinking Further
Fragments of Communicology
Published on 6. January 2026
Book
Paperback/Softback
120 pages
978-1-5179-1920-7 (ISBN)
Description
The first English-language translation of Vilem Flusser's final series of lectures: the definitive introduction to his methods and ideas in new media theory
In summer 1991, shortly before his death, Vilem Flusser gave a series of lectures as guest professor at Ruhr University Bochum at the invitation of Friedrich Kittler. Flusser intended for these lectures to be the definitive introduction to his "communicology," the study of human communication and the means by which acquired information is saved, processed, and passed on. In Thinking Further, Aaron Jaffe and Michael F. Miller have curated "fragments" from these lectures - first published in German in 2008 - to present the most exciting and timely parts of Flusser's foundational contributions to what is now known as media studies.
These fragments capture Flusser's engagements with a wide range of theories, approaches, and interventions, including ecocriticism, posthumanities, game theory, cybernetics, and translinguistic exchanges. Offering sustained engagements with the ideas of Walter Benjamin, Michel Foucault, Michel Serres, and Jean Baudrillard, Thinking Further models possibilities for thinking through and clarifying the most obscure and obdurate implications of technology and modernity.
As they demonstrate Flusser's contextual positionality and antiuniversalism, the writings presented here also underscore the pleasures and the power of his aphoristic style. Focusing less on Flusser-as-philosopher and more on his role as wry sage at the end of history, Thinking Further is a comprehensive but approachable introduction to his boundary-transcending exploration of the possibilities for communication, writing, and the human condition.
Retail e-book files for this title are screen-reader friendly.
In summer 1991, shortly before his death, Vilem Flusser gave a series of lectures as guest professor at Ruhr University Bochum at the invitation of Friedrich Kittler. Flusser intended for these lectures to be the definitive introduction to his "communicology," the study of human communication and the means by which acquired information is saved, processed, and passed on. In Thinking Further, Aaron Jaffe and Michael F. Miller have curated "fragments" from these lectures - first published in German in 2008 - to present the most exciting and timely parts of Flusser's foundational contributions to what is now known as media studies.
These fragments capture Flusser's engagements with a wide range of theories, approaches, and interventions, including ecocriticism, posthumanities, game theory, cybernetics, and translinguistic exchanges. Offering sustained engagements with the ideas of Walter Benjamin, Michel Foucault, Michel Serres, and Jean Baudrillard, Thinking Further models possibilities for thinking through and clarifying the most obscure and obdurate implications of technology and modernity.
As they demonstrate Flusser's contextual positionality and antiuniversalism, the writings presented here also underscore the pleasures and the power of his aphoristic style. Focusing less on Flusser-as-philosopher and more on his role as wry sage at the end of history, Thinking Further is a comprehensive but approachable introduction to his boundary-transcending exploration of the possibilities for communication, writing, and the human condition.
Retail e-book files for this title are screen-reader friendly.
Reviews / Votes
"Vilem Flusser was among the first to understand that the shift toward a digital world would not only change the way we communicate but alter our fundamental understanding of what communication is. This elegantly curated collection of some of Flusser's last lectures are an ideal introduction to one of the most seductive, stimulating, omnivorous, and incandescent minds of the second half of the twentieth century."-Dominic Pettman, coauthor of Metagestures"In these selections from his final lectures of 1991, in which he pulls out the implications of the 'communicology' toward which he had been working all his writing life, Vilem Flusser shows no sign of coming sedately to rest. Exhibiting all his signature fluency and audacity, and oscillating restlessly between a view of the 'general stupefaction' arising from a world of 'cretinized information' and the freedom of play made available through technology, Flusser offers a new image of the human, whirled out of the 'hurricane that is the communication revolution.'"-Steven Connor, King's College London
More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Minnesota
United States
Target group
College/higher education
Dimensions
Height: 198 mm
Width: 123 mm
Thickness: 10 mm
Weight
152 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-5179-1920-7 (9781517919207)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Persons
Vilem Flusser (1920-1991) was a Czech-born Brazilian philosopher, writer, and journalist. The University of Minnesota Press has published translations of a dozen of his works, including Into the Universe of Technical Images, Does Writing Have a Future?, Gestures, and What If?
Silvia Wagnermaier is cocreator, with Siegfried Zielinski, of the Vilem Flusser archive at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne. She lives and works as a motoring journalist in Austria.
Siegfried Zielinski is Michel Foucault Professor for Techno-Culture and Media Archaeology at the European Graduate School in Saas Fee and visiting professor at Tongji University Shanghai.
Friedrich A. Kittler (1943-2011) was professor and chair of aesthetics and media history at Humboldt University, Berlin and author of Discourse Networks 1800/1900 and Gramophone, Film, Typewriter.
Aaron Jaffe is Frances Cushing Ervin Professor of American Literature at Florida State University.
Michael F. Miller teaches literature and literary theory in the Department of English Language and Culture at the University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands.
Andrew Battaglia is a translator and independent scholar. He has taught at Rice University, the University of Montana, and Seattle University.
Daniel Raschke is assistant professor of English at Bethel College, Kansas.
Silvia Wagnermaier is cocreator, with Siegfried Zielinski, of the Vilem Flusser archive at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne. She lives and works as a motoring journalist in Austria.
Siegfried Zielinski is Michel Foucault Professor for Techno-Culture and Media Archaeology at the European Graduate School in Saas Fee and visiting professor at Tongji University Shanghai.
Friedrich A. Kittler (1943-2011) was professor and chair of aesthetics and media history at Humboldt University, Berlin and author of Discourse Networks 1800/1900 and Gramophone, Film, Typewriter.
Aaron Jaffe is Frances Cushing Ervin Professor of American Literature at Florida State University.
Michael F. Miller teaches literature and literary theory in the Department of English Language and Culture at the University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands.
Andrew Battaglia is a translator and independent scholar. He has taught at Rice University, the University of Montana, and Seattle University.
Daniel Raschke is assistant professor of English at Bethel College, Kansas.
Content
Contents
Note on the Translation
Preface - Friedrich A. Kittler
Editorial Preface: Toward VilEm Flusser's Bochum Lectures - Silvia Wagnermaier and Siegfried Zielinski
Inaugural Lecture: Before the Board of Trustees Motives/Motifs Natural and Human Sciences Communication Theory Lecture 1: On the Communicological Art of Definition Kultur/Kritik Processing: Dialogue
Transmitting: Discourse Saving Mythical: Oral Culture
Magical: Material Culture Standpoints Phenomenological
Informatical
Scientific-Critical Cultural Revolutions From Work to Waste
After the Communication Revolution: Bundling versus Networking Lecture 2: Of Spaces and Order Publicizing I
Publicizing III Virtual Space
Alternate Worlds Calculable Freedom, Intersubjective Creativity
Proxemics
Responsibility Lecture 3: Abstractions and Feedback Numerical Code From Culling to Counting Arithmetic
Geometry Antirationalism: Intuition and Nazism Programming Lecture 4: On Science, Art, Politics, and Technology On the Decline of the Aura and the Death of the Author Work II: Soft and Hard
The Practice of Writing
From Homo universale to Teamwork
The Unemployed as Avant-Garde
The End of Politics I Lecture 5. On the Death of Images and the End of History Video: Instant Philosophy Mirrors: Reflection and Speculation
Bundling Instead of Networking-At the End of All Structures
Networking Games and Art Spiele, Jogos, Games Lecture 6: About Chance and the Freedom to Play with and against It Coincidence
On Freedom I: Refraining From
On Freedom II: Anticipating
Concerning Lost Freedom I: Sin
Concerning Lost Freedom II: Technics and Will
Concerning Lost Freedom III: To Accept Lecture 7: On Leisure Unemployment and Interface On the Suffix "-matic"
On the Prefix "Tele-" Pathos Epilogue: Flusser's Planet - Aaron Jaffe and Michael F. Miller
Notes
Note on the Translation
Preface - Friedrich A. Kittler
Editorial Preface: Toward VilEm Flusser's Bochum Lectures - Silvia Wagnermaier and Siegfried Zielinski
Inaugural Lecture: Before the Board of Trustees Motives/Motifs Natural and Human Sciences Communication Theory Lecture 1: On the Communicological Art of Definition Kultur/Kritik Processing: Dialogue
Transmitting: Discourse Saving Mythical: Oral Culture
Magical: Material Culture Standpoints Phenomenological
Informatical
Scientific-Critical Cultural Revolutions From Work to Waste
After the Communication Revolution: Bundling versus Networking Lecture 2: Of Spaces and Order Publicizing I
Publicizing III Virtual Space
Alternate Worlds Calculable Freedom, Intersubjective Creativity
Proxemics
Responsibility Lecture 3: Abstractions and Feedback Numerical Code From Culling to Counting Arithmetic
Geometry Antirationalism: Intuition and Nazism Programming Lecture 4: On Science, Art, Politics, and Technology On the Decline of the Aura and the Death of the Author Work II: Soft and Hard
The Practice of Writing
From Homo universale to Teamwork
The Unemployed as Avant-Garde
The End of Politics I Lecture 5. On the Death of Images and the End of History Video: Instant Philosophy Mirrors: Reflection and Speculation
Bundling Instead of Networking-At the End of All Structures
Networking Games and Art Spiele, Jogos, Games Lecture 6: About Chance and the Freedom to Play with and against It Coincidence
On Freedom I: Refraining From
On Freedom II: Anticipating
Concerning Lost Freedom I: Sin
Concerning Lost Freedom II: Technics and Will
Concerning Lost Freedom III: To Accept Lecture 7: On Leisure Unemployment and Interface On the Suffix "-matic"
On the Prefix "Tele-" Pathos Epilogue: Flusser's Planet - Aaron Jaffe and Michael F. Miller
Notes