About the Book Cosmopolitanism: Uses of the Idea offers an illuminating and dynamic account of an often confusing and widespread concept. Bringing together both historical and contemporary approaches to cosmopolitanism, as well as recognizing its multidimensional nature, Zlatko Skrbis and Ian Woodward manage to show the very essence of cosmopolitanism as a theoretical idea and cultural practice.
Through an exploration of various social fields, such as media, identity and ethics, the book analyses the limits and possibilities of the cosmopolitan turn and explores the different contexts cosmopolitanism theory has been, and still is, applied to. Critical, diverse and engaging, the book successfully answers questions such as:
- How can we understand cosmopolitanism?
- What is the relationship between cosmopolitanism and ethics?
- What is the relationship between cosmopolitanism and identity?
- How do cosmopolitan networks come into being?
- How do we apply cosmopolitanism theory to contemporary, digital and mediated societies?
This comprehensive and authoritative title is a must for anyone interested in cultural consumption, contemporary citizenship and identity construction. It will be especially useful for students and scholars within the fields of social theory, ethics, identity politics, cultural diversity and globalisation.
Skrbis, Zlatko: - Professor Zlatko Skrbis holds undergraduate degrees in philosophy and sociology of culture from the University of Ljubljana and a PhD in sociology from Flinders University. His research spans the areas of migration studies, social theory and life-course studies. He is the author of numerous papers which appeared in some of the key international journals. His recent books include Cosmopolitanism: Uses of the Idea (2013, with Woodward), The Sociology of Cosmopolitanism (2009, with Kendall and Woodward) and Constructing Singapore (2008, with Barr; Arabic translation in 2013). Zlatko is Vice-Provost (Graduate Education) at Monash University. His portfolio responsibilities include coursework and research graduate education onshore and offshore and the development of early career researchers. Before joining Monash in 2013, he was Dean of Graduate School at The University of Queensland. He was previously the convener of the Universities Australia Council of Deans and Directors of Graduate Research. He held prestigious fellowship appointments at The University of Warwick (2008) and The University of Manchester (2010). He is an Honorary Monash-Warwick Professor and Honorary Professor in Sociology at The University of Queensland.
Woodward, Ian: -
Ian Woodward is a professor in the Department of Marketing and Management at the University of Southern Denmark. He has research interests in the sociological aspects of consumption and material culture and in the cultural and consumptive dimensions of cosmopolitanism, cultural openness, and boundary work. Most recently, he published the coauthored books Vinyl, The Analogue Record in the Digital Age (Bloomsbury, 2015, with Dominik Bartmanski) and Cosmopolitanism, Uses of the Idea (SAGE/Theory, Culture & Society, 2013, with Zlatko Skrbis). He has published widely on a range of related theoretical and empirical areas within consumption and material culture studies, alongside studies of everyday cosmopolitanism including most recently studies around consumer cosmopolitanism, gender, hospitality, fairness, and encounters. With Frederick F. Wherry, he is the editor of the Oxford Handbook of Consumption, and with Julie Emontspool, editor of the collection Cosmopolitanism, Markets and Consumption.
