Overheating - An Anthropology of Accelerated Change

The world is overheated. Too full and too fast; uneven and unequal. It is the age of the Anthropocene, of humanity's indelible mark upon the planet. In short, it is globalisation - but not as we know it. In this groundbreaking book, Thomas Hylland Eriksen breathes new life into the discussion around global modernity, bringing an anthropologist's approach to bear on the three interrelated crises of environment, economy and identity. He argues that although these crises are global in scope, they are perceived and responded to locally, and that contradictions abound between the standardising forces of information-age global capitalism and the socially embedded nature of people and local practices. Carefully synthesising the ethnographic and comparative methods of anthropology with macrosocial and historical material, Overheating offers an innovative new perspective on issues including energy use, urbanisation, deprivation, human (im)mobility, and the spread of interconnected, wireless information technology.

About the author

Thomas Hylland Eriksen (1962 – 2024) was Professor of Social Anthropology at the University of Oslo and former President of the European Association of Social Anthropologists (EASA). He was among the most highly cited anthropologists of his generation, and his classic and accessible textbook Small Places, Large Issues remains a cornerstone in anthropology courses. His later books, including Overheating, tackled the important issue of climate change within the discipline.

Product details

• Authors: Thomas Hylland Eriksen, Eriksen Thomas Hylland
• Publisher: Pluto
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Released: 31.03.2018
• EAN: 9780745336398
• ISBN: 978-0-7453-3639-8
• No. of pages: 192
• Subjects: Natural sciences, medicine, IT, technology > Natural sciences (general); Social sciences, law, business > Social sciences (general); Globalization, SOCIAL SCIENCE / Human Geography, Cultural Studies, POLITICAL SCIENCE / Globalization, SCIENCE / Philosophy & Social Aspects, SOCIAL SCIENCE / Anthropology / General, SOCIAL SCIENCE / Anthropology / Cultural & Social, TECHNOLOGY & ENGINEERING / Social Aspects, Social & cultural anthropology, ethnography, Social and cultural anthropology, Development Studies