
Transformation in Contemporary French Philosophy
Edinburgh University Press
Will be published approx. on 31. August 2026
Book
Hardback
336 pages
978-1-3995-4091-9 (ISBN)
Description
This collection brings together an international range of specialists to explore the multi-faceted ways in which twentieth-century French philosophy affirms the fundamental importance of transformation. The essays enhance our understanding of how various individual French philosophers have conceived the term, including the innovative implications of their respective conceptions. They show that although emphasis is often placed on its heterogeneity and the differences between its proponents, twentieth-century French philosophy is fundamentally, if implicitly, shaped around a common focus on the primordial importance of transformation.
By engaging with the thinking of Bergson, Sartre, Beauvoir, Merleau-Ponty, Fanon, Deleuze, Foucault, Derrida, Kristeva, Ricoeur, Ruyer, Simondon, Serres, Castoriadis and Malabou, the contributors also rethink a range of issues, including ethics, information, ontology and politics.
By engaging with the thinking of Bergson, Sartre, Beauvoir, Merleau-Ponty, Fanon, Deleuze, Foucault, Derrida, Kristeva, Ricoeur, Ruyer, Simondon, Serres, Castoriadis and Malabou, the contributors also rethink a range of issues, including ethics, information, ontology and politics.
Reviews / Votes
This collective contribution to work on French philosophy is both nicely heterogeneous and fully coherent. Its featured subjects are a striking departure from the usual suspects, while building on the state of the art. Its twelve chapters offer a fresh look at existing problematics and distinctive approaches to new material. It will be essential reading for anyone working on recent and contemporary French thought, writ large. -- Patrick ffrench, King's College London This excellent collection of texts, which exemplarily shows the radicality and vivacity of twentieth-century French philosophy, brings to the forefront how, throughout this tradition, philosophical discourses have always engaged in the task of transforming themselves incessantly by and through active transformations, and thus alterations, of classically inherited and received concepts and notions, meanings and practices, systems and methods. In effect, this collection proposes more than a series of interpretations, it also and more urgently provokes us to question further our history by taking on the responsibility of thinking philosophically a future for philosophy. -- Joseph Cohen, University College DublinMore details
Language
English
Place of publication
Edinburgh
United Kingdom
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Dimensions
Height: 234 mm
Width: 156 mm
ISBN-13
978-1-3995-4091-9 (9781399540919)
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
Emma Ingala is Associate Professor in the Department of Logic and Theoretical Philosophy at the Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Spain. She specializes in post-structuralist thought, political anthropology, feminism, and psychoanalysis. Her recent publications include co-editing the volumes Philosophy across Borders (Routledge, 2025), Historical Traces and Future Pathways of Poststructuralism: Aesthetics, Ethics, Politics (Routledge, 2021), The Meanings of Violence: From Critical Theory to Biopolitics (Routledge, 2019) and Subjectivity and the Political: Contemporary Perspectives (Routledge, 2018). She has also been an invited Visiting Professor at Royal Holloway, University of London, and the University of California, Berkeley, USA. Cillian O Fathaigh is Assistant Professor and Marie Sklodowska-Curie Actions Fellow in Philosophy at the Jagiellonian University, Poland. Prior to that, he was a Lecturer at King's College London and a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Universidad Complutense de Madrid. He previously completed his PhD at the University of Cambridge, where he was a Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Scholar. He currently works at the intersection of political philosophy, European philosophy, and the philosophy of the digital, with a particular focus on the concept of institutions. His work has been published in prestigious international journals, including Philosophy and Social Criticism; Journal of Medicine and Philosophy; Angelaki; Paragraph; and Derrida Today. He is co-editor of Subjective Agency and Poststructuralism (Routledge, 2025-with Gavin Rae); and Derrida's Politics of Friendship: Amity and Enmity (Edinburgh University Press, 2022-with Luke Collison and Georgios Tsagdis). Gavin Rae is Professor in the Department of Logic and Theoretical Philosophy at the Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Spain. His research interests lie in nineteenth and twentieth century European philosophy, where he works at the intersection of socio-political philosophy, psychoanalytic theory, ontology, and ethics. Besides over sixty published articles and book chapters, he is the author of eight monographs, the most recent of which are The Politics of Reason: A Postfoundational Approach (Edinburgh University Press, 2026), Questioning Sexuality: From Psychoanalysis to Gender Theory and Beyond (Edinburgh University Press, 2024), and Poststructuralist Agency: The Subject in Twentieth Century Theory (Edinburgh University Press, 2020). He has also co-edited six volumes, the most recent of which are Subjective Agency and Poststructuralism (Routledge, 2025-with Cillian O Fathaigh), Philosophy across Borders (Routledge, 2025-with Emma Ingala), and Historical Traces and Future Pathways of Poststructuralism: Aesthetics, Ethics, Politics (Routledge, 2021-with Emma Ingala).
Editor
Senior Lecturer in the Department of Logic and Theoretical PhilosophyUniversidad Complutense de Madrid (UCM), Spain.
Bill & Melinda Gates scholarUniversity of Cambridge
Associate ProfessorUniversidad Complutense de Madrid, Spain
Content
Acknowledgements
Introduction: The Problem of Transformation
Emma Ingala, Cillian O Fathaigh, and Gavin Rae
PART I: METAPHYSICS, PHENOMENOLOGY, AND POSTCOLONIAL THEORY
1. Bergson and the Nature of Change: Adventures Across the Metaphysics, Epistemology, and Science of Transformation
Craig Lundy
2. Transformation of the Self in Sartre: Imaginary and History
Marieke Mueller
3. Simone de Beauvoir: On Transformation through Ambiguity
Sara Cohen Shabot
4. Merleau-Ponty and Historical Transformation: The Dialectics of Situation and Action
Jerome Melancon
5. Beyond Violence: Milieu and Social Transformation in Fanon's Psychiatric Writings
Cillian O Fathaigh
PART II: EVENT, AGENCY, AND DIFFERENCE
6. "The Great Pyramid is an Event": Thinking Creativity and Transformation with Deleuze and Whitehead
Hannah Richter
7. Foucault's Account of the Will: Making Sense of Historical Transformations
Tuomo Tiisala
8. The Transformative Power of Derrida's Differance
Nicole J. Anderson
9. Transforming the Sound of Revolt: Kristeva, Moten, and Phonic Materiality
Sid Hansen
PART III: NARRATION, INFORMATION, AND ONTOLOGY
10. The Transformative Potential of Ricoeur's Narrative Self
Katrina Mitcheson
11. Information as Transformation: Ruyer, Simondon, Serres
Ashley Woodward
12. From Magma to Plasticity: Transformation in Castoriadis and Malabou
Gavin Rae
Notes on Contributors
Index
Introduction: The Problem of Transformation
Emma Ingala, Cillian O Fathaigh, and Gavin Rae
PART I: METAPHYSICS, PHENOMENOLOGY, AND POSTCOLONIAL THEORY
1. Bergson and the Nature of Change: Adventures Across the Metaphysics, Epistemology, and Science of Transformation
Craig Lundy
2. Transformation of the Self in Sartre: Imaginary and History
Marieke Mueller
3. Simone de Beauvoir: On Transformation through Ambiguity
Sara Cohen Shabot
4. Merleau-Ponty and Historical Transformation: The Dialectics of Situation and Action
Jerome Melancon
5. Beyond Violence: Milieu and Social Transformation in Fanon's Psychiatric Writings
Cillian O Fathaigh
PART II: EVENT, AGENCY, AND DIFFERENCE
6. "The Great Pyramid is an Event": Thinking Creativity and Transformation with Deleuze and Whitehead
Hannah Richter
7. Foucault's Account of the Will: Making Sense of Historical Transformations
Tuomo Tiisala
8. The Transformative Power of Derrida's Differance
Nicole J. Anderson
9. Transforming the Sound of Revolt: Kristeva, Moten, and Phonic Materiality
Sid Hansen
PART III: NARRATION, INFORMATION, AND ONTOLOGY
10. The Transformative Potential of Ricoeur's Narrative Self
Katrina Mitcheson
11. Information as Transformation: Ruyer, Simondon, Serres
Ashley Woodward
12. From Magma to Plasticity: Transformation in Castoriadis and Malabou
Gavin Rae
Notes on Contributors
Index