The matter of history : how things create the past / Timothy J. LeCain, Montana State University.

Author
LeCain, Timothy J., 1960- [Browse]
Format
Book
Language
English
Published/​Created
  • Cambridge, United Kingdom : Cambridge University Press, 2017.
  • ©2017
Description
xix, 346 pages : illustrations ; 23 cm

Availability

Available Online

Copies in the Library

Location Call Number Status Location Service Notes
Firestone Library - Stacks GF13 .L43 2017 Browse related items Request

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    Summary note
    New insights into the microbiome, epigenetics, and cognition are radically challenging our very idea of what it means to be 'human', while an explosion of neo-materialist thinking in the humanities has fostered a renewed appreciation of the formative powers of a dynamic material environment. 'The Matter of History' brings these scientific and humanistic ideas together to develop a bold new post-anthropocentric understanding of the past, one that reveals how powerful organisms and things help to create humans in all their dimensions, biological, social, and cultural. Timothy J. LeCain combines cutting-edge theory and detailed empirical analysis to explain the extraordinary late-nineteenth century convergence between the United States and Japan at the pivotal moment when both were emerging as global superpowers. Illustrating the power of a deeply material social and cultural history, 'The Matter of History' argues that three powerful things - cattle, silkworms, and copper - helped to drive these previously diverse nations towards a global 'Great Convergence'.
    Bibliographic references
    Includes bibliographical references and index.
    Contents
    • Fellow travelers : the nonhuman things that make us human
    • We never left Eden : the religious and secular marginalization of matter
    • Natural-born humans : a neo-materialist theory and method of history
    • The longhorn : the animal intelligence behind American open-range ranching
    • The silkworm : the innovative insects behind Japanese modernization
    • The copper atom : conductivity and the great convergence of Japan and the West
    • The matter of humans : beyond the Anthropocene and toward a new humanism.
    ISBN
    • 9781107134171 ((hardback))
    • 110713417X ((hardback))
    • 9781107592704 ((paperback))
    • 1107592704 ((paperback))
    LCCN
    2017029482
    OCLC
    989761822
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