Friendship in Postmodern Times
This web special, a liber amicorum, or ‘book of friends’, celebrates Peter Beilharz by engaging with different facets of his complex body of work as an intellectual, educator/mentor, and friend/thought partner, on the occasion of his 70th birthday. Peter has made significant contributions to critical theory, historical sociology, and cultural theory as both a sociology professor and prolific researcher and theorist, one example of his vast work being the founding of this journal, Thesis Eleven, an international wellspring of theoretical rigor, openness, and insight. Across the primary domains of his work, Peter fosters deep relationships, while producing, interpreting, and conducting immense cultural traffic. The contributions collected herein account for these remarkable qualities and achievements by critically engaging with Peter the Intellectual, Peter the Educator/Mentor, and Peter the Friend/Thought Partner. Below you will find a selection of open access essays, postcards and reflections. The full journal issue is available via the website and the Thesis Eleven Sage portal.
Image: Peter with rutes, Melbourne, 2021 (Photo: Sian Supski)
Articles
Exceptionalism and Provincialism: Re-Thinking the Antipodes
by David Roberts
Peter Beilharz captures this ongoing process of exchange, fed by the flow of people, goods, capital and ideas between the old and the new worlds, between metropolitan…
Reflecting on Peter the Teacher
by Julian Potter
Thirty years separate Peter and Zygmunt, another thirty separate myself and Peter. These are generational spans, time enough for considerable changes that challenge traditions. Through my story,…
“Peter’s House of Theory” – A Postcard to Peter
by Margaret Somers
I fell in love with Peter the first time I met him, at an American Sociological Meeting, sometime in the late 1980s, I think. This was, of…
Friendship’s Resonance: On Peter Beilharz’s Goodwill
by Howard Prosser
This is a tale of friendship. Or, more accurately, it’s a reflection on how a friendship based on a few meetings can amount to a lot. I…
Peter Beilharz and Modernity in Ruins
by George Steinmetz
I first met Peter, I believe, at the meetings of the American Sociological Association in Montréal in 2006. After the panel I struck up a conversation with…
A Meeting of Minds: Peter Beilharz, Public Intellectual and Friend
by Philippa Mein Smith
Over the past two decades Peter Beilharz, Thesis Eleven’s Founding Editor, has inspired me and clarified my thinking and direction on two themes that have infused…
Three Lectures: Travel notes, Bendigo, October 2014
by Ivan Vladislavić
It was more of a performance than a ‘lecture’. Peter played Marx and one of his colleagues played Weber, and they argued about class and other things.…
Puzzling Australia
by Peter Murphy
I think that what happened to both of us separately but in unconscious tandem in the 1990s says a lot about the intellectual framing of Australian society…
My Long Friendship with Peter Beilharz, Intellectual and Otherwise
by Jeffrey C. Alexander
For many decades, Peter has been not only a thought partner but also an intimate friend, a thoughtful friend, a friendly fellow thinker, the other side…
A Story of Friendship: An Homage to Peter Beilharz
by María Pía Lara
This reflection is tied up with the memoir written by my dear friend Peter Beilharz (2020), Intimacy in Postmodern Times: A Friendship with Zygmunt Bauman. Indeed,…
Playlist: Beilharz Blues – Looking Backward (2023)/Looking Forward (1953)
Compiled by Trevor Hogan, Christopher Robbins, and Sian Supski
40 songs featuring some of Peter Beilharz’s favourite guitarists
Learning Through and From Peter Beilharz
by Eric Ferris
Peter, like my mentor and friend Chris and Bauman (from books), offered me versions of a relationship to teaching and learning – a relationship between teachers and…
Pete as Mentor, Colleague, Collaborator, Friend: ‘Thanks, Pal!’
by Trevor Hogan
Upon knocking on their front door, the domestic tableau that greeted us included Pete sitting on the floor and leaning against a couch, pen and paper in…
Peter Beilharz’s Baby: The Infancy of Thesis Eleven
by Alastair Davidson
Peter Beilharz is the only one of the three founding editors of Thesis Eleven to have remained with the journal over the decades since 1980. Three generations…
Reflections on Friendship and Gratitude for Peter Beilharz on the Occasion of His ‘Revolution #70’
by Christopher G Robbins and Eric Ferris with Sian Supski
To describe this project as a festschrift seems fitting. It is, indeed, a collection of writings gathered together to honour,…
Recent reviews of Peter’s works
Book Review: Chain’s Toward the Blues
Peter Beilharz, Chain’s Toward the Blues (Bloomsbury Academic, 2023)
Reviewed by Harry Blatterer
Book Review: Beilharz with Bauman, After Bauman
Peter Beilharz, Intimacy in Postmodern Times: A Friendship with Zygmunt Bauman (Manchester University Press, 2020)
Reviewed by Christopher G. Robbins
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