The Center for 21st Century Studies is excited to announce that After Extinction is now available from the University of Minnesota Press! The book originates from our 2015 conference of the same name and includes essays inspired by and evolving from panels, lectures, and conversations at and around the conference.
Including both prominent and unusual voices in current debates around the Anthropocene, After Extinction asks authors from diverse backgrounds to address the question: What comes after extinction? The book looks at the future of humans and nonhumans, exploring how the scale of risk posed by extinction has changed in light of the accelerated networks of the twenty-first century. Considering extinction as not just a biological event, but also as a cultural, artistic, and media event, the collection examines extinction in relation to a variety of topics, including disability, human exceptionalism, science-fiction understandings of time and posthistory, photography, the contemporary ecological crisis, the California Condor, systemic racism, Native American traditions, and capitalism.
From discussions of the anticipated sixth extinction to the status of writing, theory, and philosophy after extinction, the contributions of this volume are insightful and innovative, timely and thought provoking.
Edited and introduced by C21 director Richard Grusin, the volume includes essays by Daryl Baldwin (Miami U.), Margaret Noodin (UWM), and Bernard Perley (UWM); Claire Colebrook, (Penn State); William E. Connolly (Johns Hopkins); Ashley Dawson (CUNY Graduate Center); Joseph Masco (Chicago); Nicholas Mirzoeff (NYU); Jussi Parikka (U of Southampton); Cary Wolfe (Rice); and Joanna Zylinska (Goldsmiths, U of London).