Description
The nature, faults and future of modern civilization and how these connect to the past are tackled in this broad-reaching volume. Modernity is typically represented as a complete economic, political, cultural and psychological break from earlier time periods and non western cultures, but the ideas and culture of classicism have clearly influenced key modern theorists.
This book explores the relationship between antiquity and modernity, examining a broad range of thought in the process. It considers the views of German philosophers, British political economists, and French social theorists from the end of the nineteenth to the beginning of the twentieth century, including such totemic figures as Adam Smith, Marx, Mill, Nietzsche, Weber, and Freud. The first part considers the development of ideas about the difference between ancient and modern, whether conceptualized in economic, political, cultural, social or psychological terms; and it explores the way that modernity comes to be defined by this difference. The second part explores the uses of the past and of narratives of historical development in the modern era, both in the foundation myths of modernity and in the critiques offered by those who sought to promote alternative forms of society.
About the Author
Neville Morley is Professor of Ancient Economic History and Historical Theory at the University of Bristol. Previous publications include Metropolis and Hinterland: The City of Rome and the Italian Economy (1996), Writing Ancient History (1999), Theories, Models and Concepts in Ancient History (2004), and Trade in Classical Antiquity (2007).
Reviews
"Morley's wide-ranging and ambitious study subjects the mythology of 'modernity' to an incisive critique. This provocative and original book asserts the persistent significance of concepts of antiquity in underpinning the most quintessentially and self-consciously 'modern' disciplines of economics and sociology." Catharine Edwards, Birkbeck College "Morley's study opens a fascinating window onto the history of the shifting ideas of antiquity and the correlative sciences of modernity - onto the ever-changing and still ongoing dilemma of their mutual dependency. Probing the uncertain 'logic of modernity,' Morley obliges us to ask whether, if we have never been modern, was antiquity ever ancient? This is a much-needed reassessment of the classical European traditions of economic, sociological, and political theory." James I. Porter, University of Michigan
Book Information
ISBN 9781405131391
Author Neville Morley
Format Hardback
Page Count 208
Imprint Wiley-Blackwell
Publisher John Wiley and Sons Ltd
Weight(grams) 454g
Dimensions(mm) 236mm * 158mm * 21mm
