Trauma, History, Philosophy: With Feature Essays

In the age of the war on terror and what one critic has called 'disaster capitalism', the topic of trauma has assumed renewed cultural relevance. Trauma, Historicity, Philosophy is a collection of essays by Australian philosophers, psychoanalysts, and cultural theorists on the genealogy, semantics, and relevance of the concept of 'trauma' in the contemporary world.

The collection features two essays by Agnes Heller and Gyorgy Markus addressing trauma, and what psychoanalysis' elevation of 'trauma' to cultural centrality means (and has meant) for modern philosophy and social theory. Other essays address '911', cyber-terrorism, the shoah, political tyranny, the 'end of history', and engage with the thought of Kierkegaard, Schmitt, Hobbes, Derrida, Agamben, Badiou, Zizek, Lacan and Freud.