The Retro-Futurism of Cuteness

Published: 11/04/2017

Is it possible to conceive of a Hello Kitty Middle Ages or a Tickle Me Elmo Renaissance? The Oxford English Dictionary dates the first reference to “cute” in the sense of “attractive, pretty, charming” to 1834. More recently, Sianne Ngai has offered a critical overview of the cuteness of the twentieth-century avant-garde within the context[…]

Object Oriented Environs

Published: 02/12/2016

Object Oriented Environs is the lively archive of a critical confluence between the environmental turn so vigorous within early modern studies, and thing theory (object oriented ontology, vibrant materialism, the new materialism and speculative realism). The book unfolds a conversation that attempts to move beyond anthropocentrism and examine nonhumans at every scale, their relations to each[…]