Read Anywhere and on Any Device!

Subscribe to Read | $0.00

Join today and start reading your favorite books for Free!

Create Free Account

Manhunts: A Philosophical History

4.2/5 ( ratings)

Touching on issues of power, authority, and domination, Manhunts takes an in-depth look at the hunting of humans in the West, from ancient Sparta, through the Middle Ages, to the modern practices of chasing undocumented migrants. Incorporating historical events and philosophical reflection, Grégoire Chamayou examines the systematic and organized search for individuals and small groups on the run because they have defied authority, committed crimes, seemed dangerous simply for existing, or been categorized as subhuman or dispensable.

Chamayou begins in ancient Greece, where young Spartans hunted and killed Helots as an initiation rite, and where Aristotle and other philosophers helped to justify raids to capture and enslave foreigners by creating the concept of natural slaves. He discusses the hunt for heretics in the Middle Ages; New World natives in the early modern period; vagrants, Jews, criminals, and runaway slaves in other eras; and illegal immigrants today. Exploring evolving ideas about the human and the subhuman, what we owe to enemies and people on the margins of society, and the supposed legitimacy of domination, Chamayou shows that the hunting of humans should not be treated ahistorically, and that manhunting has varied as widely in its justifications and aims as in its practices. He investigates the psychology of manhunting, noting that many people, from bounty hunters to Balzac, have written about the thrill of hunting when the prey is equally intelligent and cunning.

An unconventional history on an unconventional subject, Manhunts is an in-depth consideration of the dynamics of an age-old form of violence.

Language: English

Pages: 232

Format: Hardcover

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Release: July 22, 2012

ISBN: 0691151652

ISBN 13: 9780691151656

Manhunts: A Philosophical History

4.2/5 ( ratings)

Touching on issues of power, authority, and domination, Manhunts takes an in-depth look at the hunting of humans in the West, from ancient Sparta, through the Middle Ages, to the modern practices of chasing undocumented migrants. Incorporating historical events and philosophical reflection, Grégoire Chamayou examines the systematic and organized search for individuals and small groups on the run because they have defied authority, committed crimes, seemed dangerous simply for existing, or been categorized as subhuman or dispensable.

Chamayou begins in ancient Greece, where young Spartans hunted and killed Helots as an initiation rite, and where Aristotle and other philosophers helped to justify raids to capture and enslave foreigners by creating the concept of natural slaves. He discusses the hunt for heretics in the Middle Ages; New World natives in the early modern period; vagrants, Jews, criminals, and runaway slaves in other eras; and illegal immigrants today. Exploring evolving ideas about the human and the subhuman, what we owe to enemies and people on the margins of society, and the supposed legitimacy of domination, Chamayou shows that the hunting of humans should not be treated ahistorically, and that manhunting has varied as widely in its justifications and aims as in its practices. He investigates the psychology of manhunting, noting that many people, from bounty hunters to Balzac, have written about the thrill of hunting when the prey is equally intelligent and cunning.

An unconventional history on an unconventional subject, Manhunts is an in-depth consideration of the dynamics of an age-old form of violence.

Language: English

Pages: 232

Format: Hardcover

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Release: July 22, 2012

ISBN: 0691151652

ISBN 13: 9780691151656

More books from Steven Rendall

Valkyrie: The Story of the Plot to Kill Hitler, by Its Last Member

3.4/5 ( ratings)

Summertime All the Cats Are Bored

3.6/5 ( ratings)

The Tyranny of Guilt: An Essay on Western Masochism

3.8/5 ( ratings)

Perpetual Euphoria: On the Duty to Be Happy

3.9/5 ( ratings)

Cannibal Island: Death in a Siberian Gulag

3.5/5 ( ratings)

Reason and Rationality

3.4/5 ( ratings)

The Cemetery of Swallows

3.9/5 ( ratings)

Dump This Book While You Still Can!

3.8/5 ( ratings)

A Short History of German Philosophy

3.6/5 ( ratings)

Lethe: The Art and Critique of Forgetting

The Illusion of Cultural Identity

3.3/5 ( ratings)

Eric Rohmer: A Biography

4.2/5 ( ratings)

In the Land of a Thousand Gods: A History of Asia Minor in the Ancient World

4.3/5 ( ratings)

Life Counts: Cataloguing Life on Earth

2.8/5 ( ratings)

Iran: A Short History. Monika Gronke

2.8/5 ( ratings)

Jacob, Menahem, and Mimoun: A Family Epic

3.6/5 ( ratings)

To Write on Tamara?

4.2/5 ( ratings)

Rate this book!

Write a review?