Gramsci - (Antipode Book) by Michael Ekers & Gillian Hart & Stefan Kipfer & Alex Loftus (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

This unique collection is the first to bring attention to Antonio Gramsci's work within geographical debates. Presenting a substantially different reading to Gramsci scholarship, the collection forges a new approach within human geography, environmental studies and development theory.

• Offers the first sustained attempt to foreground Antonio Gramsci's work within geographical debates
• Demonstrates how Gramsci articulates a rich spatial sensibility whilst developing a distinctive approach to geographical questions
• Presents a substantially different reading of Gramsci from dominant post-Marxist perspectives, as well as more recent anarchist and post-anarchist critiques
• Builds on the emergence of Gramsci scholarship in recent years, taking this forward through studies across multiple continents, and asking how his writings might engage with and animate political movements today
• Forges a new approach within human geography, environmental studies and development theory, building on Gramsci's innovative philosophy of praxis

From the Back Cover

This first volume on Antonio Gramsci's relevance to contemporary concerns with space and nature takes Gramsci scholarship in new directions. It shows how his writings, well known for their historical nuance, also convey a rich spatial sensibility and a distinctive approach to geographical and ecological questions.

By linking Gramsci's socially differentiated understanding of politics to his spatial and ecological concerns, the contributors demonstrate his relevance to new audiences. While recognizing his sometimes problematic discussions of sexuality, gender, racism, and (post)colonialism, several contributors discern distinctive elements of his work that bear directly on current debates.

The volume presents a substantially different Gramsci from post-Marxist perspectives and recent anarchist and post-anarchist critiques. It retains his revolutionary orientation, and highlights the profound conceptual and political leverage that a spatialized reading of Gramsci enables today. Reorienting his innovative philosophy of praxis, it proposes new approaches within human geography, environmental studies, and development theory.

Review Quotes

"This edited collection is a beacon of critical engagement with Gramsci's philosophical and theoretical work and his political practice. This could be expected from the co-editors, each of whom has already critically appropriated and applied Gramsci's ideas, and they have now added 12 impressive contributors to their number ... This is an important contribution to the urgent critical work of recovering, appropriating and recontextualizing Gramsci's concepts, methods and analyses, and, above all, 'translating' them for the current conjuncture, in which issues of political ecology as well as political economy are ever more critical to human flourishing." (Antipode, 1 November 2013)

"A book that has just landed on my desk is the fantastic volume edited by Michael Ekers, Gillian Hart, Stefan Kipfer and Alex Loftus entitled Gramsci: Space, Nature, Politics ... My hope is that this intervention and the outstanding chapters from all the additional contributors in the book will provoke renewed debate on space, nature, and politics in and beyond Gramsci!" (Adam Morton, adamdavidmorton.com, 13 November 2012)

About the Author

Michael Ekers is Assistant Professor at the University of Toronto Scarborough. In addition to his interests in Gramsci, his research focuses on urban unemployment and rural relief projects in Depression-Era British Columbia, and questions of masculinity, race, and the social contribution of the unemployed.

Gillian Hart is Professor at the University of California Berkeley and Honorary Professor at University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban. She is currently working on a companion volume to Disabling Globalization: Places of Power in Post-Apartheid South Africa (2002).

Stefan Kipfer is Associate Professor at York University, Toronto. His research deals with comparative urban politics and the role of the urban in social and political theory, particularly in Marxist and counter-colonial traditions. He is the co-editor (with Kanishka Goonewardena, Richard Milgrom, Christian Schmid) of Space, Difference, Everyday Life: Reading Henri Lefebvre (2008).

Alex Loftus is a Senior Lecturer at King's College London. His research focuses on the political ecology of water and the political possibilities within urban ecologies. He is the author of Everyday Environmentalism: Creating an Urban Political Ecology (2012).