An Anthropology of Deep Time
Geological Temporality and Social Life
Published on 20. May 2020
978-1-108-86390-2 (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
Illustrations
Worked examples or Exercises
File size
7,61 MB
ISBN-13
978-1-108-86390-2 (9781108863902)
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Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
Book
05/2020
Cambridge University Press
€103.40
Article not available at the moment
Book
05/2020
Cambridge University Press
€39.20
Shipment within 15-20 days
Person
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.
