
An Anthropology of Deep Time
Geological Temporality and Social Life
Richard D. G. Irvine(Author)
Cambridge University Press
Published on 28. May 2020
Book
Paperback/Softback
220 pages
978-1-108-79222-6 (ISBN)
Description
In the face of debates about the Anthropocene - a geological epoch of our own making - and contemporary concerns about ecological crisis and the Sixth Mass Extinction, it is more important than ever to locate the timeframe of human activity within the deep time of planetary history. This path-breaking book is a timely critical review of the anthropology of time, exploring our human relationship with the timescale of geological formation. Richard D. G. Irvine shows how the time-horizons of social life are a matter of crucial concern, and lays bare the ways in which human activity becomes severed from the long-term geological and ecological rhythms on which it depends.
Reviews / Votes
'If much of the current sense of ecological crisis turns on how resources are abstracted from the conditions of their renewal, suppose that very evocation of the future were itself an abstraction we cannot afford. Told with verve and wit, this foray into encounters with deep time asks us to see the time that we are hiding from ourselves. Irvine's clarity of argument opens out the 'anthropology of time' onto a new horizon of global significance.' Marilyn Strathern, University of CambridgeMore details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Cambridge
United Kingdom
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Product notice
Paperback (trade)
Illustrations
Worked examples or Exercises
Dimensions
Height: 229 mm
Width: 152 mm
Thickness: 13 mm
Weight
332 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-108-79222-6 (9781108792226)
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Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions

Book
05/2020
Cambridge University Press
€103.40
Article not available at the moment

E-Book
05/2020
Cambridge University Press
€23.49
Available for download
Person
Richard D. G. Irvine is Lecturer in Social Anthropology at the University of St Andrews.
Content
Introduction; 1. Time depth; 2. Time travelling pits and migrant rocks; 3. Excluding water; 4. The problem with presentism; 5. Mapping deep time; 6. Geology and biography; 7. Enter catastrophe; 8. Wasteland.