Product Information
This books ushers in a new way of talking about social phenomena. It develops an ontology of social objects on the basis of the claim that registration or inscription-the leaving of a trace to be called up later-is what is most fundamental to them. In doing so, it systematically organizes concepts and theories that Ferraris's predecessors-most notably Derrida, in his project of a positive grammatology-left in an impressionistic state. Ferraris begins by redefining ontology as a way of cataloguing the world. Before any epistemology can discuss the validity of scientific or nonscientific judgments, one faces a collection of objects, be they natural, ideal, or social. Among these, Ferraris focuses on social objects, elaborating a theory of experience in the social world that leads him to define social objects as inscribed acts. He then uses this notion to interpret social phenomena, also in light of a systematic discussion of the concept of performatives, from Austin to Derrida and Searle. Moving into considerations of the present technological revolution, Ferraris develops a symptomatology of the document that leads to a consideration of legal systems, finding in them original applications for his theory that an object equals a written act. Written in an easy, often witty style, Documentality revises Foucault's late concept of the ontology of actuality into the project of an ontological laboratory, thereby reinventing philosophy as a pragmatic activity that is directly applicable to our everyday life.Product Identifiers
PublisherFordham University Press
ISBN-139780823249688
eBay Product ID (ePID)117520025
Product Key Features
Publication Year2012
FormatHardcover
LanguageEnglish
Book TitleDocumentality: Why It Is Necessary to Leave Traces
AuthorMaurizio Ferraris
TopicLiterature, Popular Philosophy
Dimensions
Item Height229 mm
Item Width152 mm
Additional Product Features
Country/Region of ManufactureUnited States
Title_AuthorMaurizio Ferraris
Series TitleCommonalities