by John Lechte
Edgar Morin was born Edgar Nahoum, of Sephardic Jewish parents, in Salonica (now Thessaloniki), Greece, on 8 July 1921. He died, at the very grand age of 104, at Neuilly-sur-Seine on 29 May 2026.
by Alonso Casanueva Baptista
Each rug is crafted by a single artisan who works on the loom for weeks or months, eight hours a day, every day. Dalila seemed particularly happy about this fact, underscoring how her sense of autonomy and creativity in composing the theme, motifs, colour scheme… would make up the final creation, one that cannot be replicated. Whether the design follows traditional rule or adapts to a recent trend, it is the artisan who will pour their personal inspiration onto the loom.
by Howard Prosser
Raymond Geuss’ latest book, Tracks in Chaos: Philosophical Orientation and Political Reflection, published by Polity in 2026, provides the basis for the present interview. Bringing together a set of essays on philosophy, politics and social theory, the book returns to problems that have long animated Geuss’s work: orientation, critique, authority, morality and political judgement.
by Peter Murphy
Malouf grew up in Brisbane and identified deeply with the city. In his collection of essays, The First Place (2014), Malouf paints a remarkable picture of Australia … He points to the distinct differences in topography between Australian cities, and he makes the interesting claim that the hilly features of Brisbane and its meandering river shape, in some elemental way, a distinctive manner of thinking about the world.
Contributors: Dan Tout, Lorenzo Veracini, Brad West, Darren Jorgensen, Eduardo de la Fuente, Loïc Wacquant, Felix Kämper, Anna Schubertová, Giannis Ninos, Nicolás Rudas, Lachlan Ross, James William Santos, Simon Schaupp, Mathew Abbott, Marcello Spanò, Adrian Jones and Daniel Sullivan
by Darren Jorgensen and Tami Xiang
Wang Qingsong’s monumental photography unveils the deep structures of Chinese history and society. The title of the first survey of Wang’s work in Australia, exhibited at the Cullity Gallery in the School of Design at the University of Western Australia, is Everlasting Inscription. It attempts to describe Wang’s resistance to the forgetting of Chinese history, while illuminating the structural legacies by which life in China assumes its collective shape.
The International Conference on Marxist Critical Theory in Eastern Europe will be held during November, 2026 in Chengdu, China. This will be an opportunity for the presentation of new work and research results across a wide variety of Eastern Europe Marxist Critical Theory Studies, to enhance the world-wide field of Marxist critical theories, to share studies of critical theory of Eastern Europe, and to promote the construction of Chinese Marxism and its aesthetics.
Thesis Eleven is delighted to share details of the first public event in the inaugural Bauman Memorial Conversations, a new biennial series of public dialogues hosted by the Bauman Institute.
The 2026 Conversations, “Thinking Displacement,” will explore displacement in its human, ecological, and intellectual dimensions. The first conversation will be held online on March 25, 2026.
Contributors: Thomas Furse, Lorenzo Buti, Rodrigo , Aaron Augsburger, Luyang Zhou, Udeepta Chakravarty, Bjørn Schiermer, Ioannis Rigkos-Zitthen, Nikos Kapitsinis, Domonkos Sik, Roger Burrows, Zoran Poposki, Shaun Best, Trevor Jackson and Tom Boland
by Darren Jorgensen
For five decades, Terry Smith has been a crucial part of conversations on both Australian and contemporary art. Since his 1974 essay, ‘The Provincialism Problem,’ through to a series of publications on global contemporary art, Smith has been both prolific and influential in the discipline of art history.
This Festschrift honors the enduring legacy of George Ritzer, one of sociology’s most influential and recognizable figures. Ritzer’s scholarship has helped shape core areas of the discipline—ranging from consumption and social theory to globalization and beyond—while also generating new conceptual terrains such as McDonaldization, prosumption, and the study of “nothing” and “something.”
George’s work is both timely and timeless. He has been, and continues to be, a sort of social seer, someone who is able to both see what is seemingly most relevant in the contemporary moment, but also that which is likely to remain impactful in the future. He not only sees what is worthy of critical analysis today, but also what is likely to be critical to analyze tomorrow.
By Gregory Jones-Katz
With Karl Marx in America[i], Andrew Hartman burrows and raises molehills, creating extensive networks of historical and political ideas for our intellectual nourishment. Throughout its hefty 500 pages and nine chapters, Hartman adroitly historicizes a wide range of American readers’ uses of Marx since the mid-nineteenth century.
Fu Qilin, Marxist Aesthetics in Eastern Europe (Chinese Science Publishing, 2025)
Reviewed by David Roberts
by Peter Beilharz
Claus Offe was a fine scholar, a sharp thinker, and a good person. An extraordinary colleague, and a fascinating example of the marginal Frankfurt thinker.
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