Science of Sacrifice - American Literature and Modern Social Theory

"The Science of Sacrifice is an extremely impressive exploration in intellectual and cultural history. . . . Susan Mizruchi works comfortably in the disciplines she excavates, and her insights are extremely illuminating and frequently brilliant."--Orlando Patterson, Harvard University

List of contents

Acknowledgments Ch. 1Sacrificial Arts and Sciences Ch. 2The Return to Sacrifice in Melville and Others Ch. 3Rites of Passage in an "Awkward Age" Ch. 4Du Bois's Gospel of Sacrifice Afterword Notes Index

About the author

Susan L. Mizruchi is Associate Professor of English and American Studies at Boston University. She is the author of The Power of Historical Knowledge: Narrating the Past in Hawthorne, James, and Dreiser (Princeton).

Summary

From ritual killings to subtle acts of self-denial, the practice and rhetoric of sacrifice has a special centrality in modern American literature. This book portrays an episode in American cultural history when the literary movement of realism and the fledgling field of sociology both converged in the belief that sacrifice is basic to sociality.

Additional text

"The Science of Sacrifice is an extremely impressive exploration in intellectual and cultural history. . . . Susan Mizruchi works comfortably in the disciplines she excavates, and her insights are extremely illuminating and frequently brilliant."—Orlando Patterson, Harvard University

Product details

• Authors: Susan Mizruchi, Susan L Mizruchi, Susan L. Mizruchi, Mizruchi Susan L.
• Publisher: Princeton University Press
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Released: 24.05.1998
• EAN: 9780691015064
• ISBN: 978-0-691-01506-4
• No. of pages: 496
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > Linguistics and literary studies > General and comparative literary studies; Social sciences, law, business > Sociology > General, dictionaries; USA, Cultural Studies, LITERARY CRITICISM / American / General, SOCIAL SCIENCE / Anthropology / Cultural & Social, LITERARY CRITICISM / Modern / 20th Century, American English, United States of America, USA, Literary studies: from c 1900 -, Literary studies: c 1900 to c 2000