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The Mixed Discourses of Modernism Dana Seitler, Atavistic Tendencies: The Culture of Science in American Modernity (Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 2008). 328pp. ISBN: 9780816651245. Paul Peppis, Sciences of Modernism: Ethnography, Sexology, and Psychology (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014). 321pp. ISBN: 9781107042643.

The Mixed Discourses of Modernism Dana Seitler, Atavistic Tendencies: The Culture of Science in... The Mixed Discourses of Modernism Dana Seitler, Atavistic Tendencies: The Culture of Science in American Modernity (Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 2008). 328pp. ISBN: 9780816651245. Paul Peppis, Sciences of Modernism: Ethnography, Sexology, and Psychology (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014). 321pp. ISBN: 9781107042643. In his polemic We Have Never Been Modern, Bruno Latour poses a distinct problem for the study of modernism. For, if we have never been modern, what, precisely, are scholars of modernist literature, art, and culture studying? Latour suggests that many of the claims made by moderns about the modern ­ that it constitutes a break with the past, with tradition, that it is a moment of historical progress without precedent ­ belie another state of affairs. Beneath the narratives of purification which define the gap between modern and pre-modern, scientific truth and misguided myth, what we find instead is a proliferation of hybrid beings that link present to past, culture to nature. Once we begin to think about modernism in Latour's nonmodern terms, it becomes clear how crucial investigations of the intersection of scientific and literary discourses are to an understanding of the cultural operations of the period. Two recent studies, Dana Seitler's http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Modernist Cultures Edinburgh University Press

The Mixed Discourses of Modernism Dana Seitler, Atavistic Tendencies: The Culture of Science in American Modernity (Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 2008). 328pp. ISBN: 9780816651245. Paul Peppis, Sciences of Modernism: Ethnography, Sexology, and Psychology (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014). 321pp. ISBN: 9781107042643.

Miller, Jesse
Modernist Cultures , Volume 10 (1): 127 – Mar 1, 2015
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Publisher
Edinburgh University Press
Copyright
© Edinburgh University Press 2015
Subject
Book Reviews; Film, Media and Cultural Studies
ISSN
2041-1022
eISSN
1753-8629
DOI
10.3366/mod.2015.0102
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Abstract

The Mixed Discourses of Modernism Dana Seitler, Atavistic Tendencies: The Culture of Science in American Modernity (Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 2008). 328pp. ISBN: 9780816651245. Paul Peppis, Sciences of Modernism: Ethnography, Sexology, and Psychology (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014). 321pp. ISBN: 9781107042643. In his polemic We Have Never Been Modern, Bruno Latour poses a distinct problem for the study of modernism. For, if we have never been modern, what, precisely, are scholars of modernist literature, art, and culture studying? Latour suggests that many of the claims made by moderns about the modern ­ that it constitutes a break with the past, with tradition, that it is a moment of historical progress without precedent ­ belie another state of affairs. Beneath the narratives of purification which define the gap between modern and pre-modern, scientific truth and misguided myth, what we find instead is a proliferation of hybrid beings that link present to past, culture to nature. Once we begin to think about modernism in Latour's nonmodern terms, it becomes clear how crucial investigations of the intersection of scientific and literary discourses are to an understanding of the cultural operations of the period. Two recent studies, Dana Seitler's

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Modernist Cultures – Edinburgh University Press

Published: Mar 1, 2015

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