Title: Aesthetics, Representation and Cultures of Cruelty
Subtitle: Making Meaning In and After Apartheid South Africa and the Soviet Gulag
Subject Classification:  War and Conflict, History, Philosophy  
BIC Classification: JPHV, HBTB, HPQ
BISAC Classification: HIS027100, PHI005000, SOC053000
Binding: Hardback, eBook
Planned publication date: Aug 2026
ISBN (Hardback): 978-1-80866-072-6
ISBN (eBook): 978-1-80866-073-3

e-books available for libraries from   Proquest  and   EBSCO   with non-institutional availability from  GooglePlay

For larger orders, or orders where you require an invoice, contact us  admin@ethicspress.com

Description

This edited collection offers a new perspective on the cultural and ethical legacies of systemic violence by juxtaposing two major sites of 20th-century state cruelty - apartheid South Africa and the Soviet Gulag - using aesthetics as a critical lens. Here, the aesthetic is expanded beyond the arts to encompass the material, affective, and everyday practices through which violent histories are made perceptible and their afterlives are navigated.

The editors have brought together an acclaimed group of interdisciplinary scholars, to forge a unique dialogue between the Global South and the Soviet East. Chapters explore how meaning is made in the wake of atrocity through diverse forms such as testimony, visual art, memory objects, archives, and landscapes. *Aesthetics, Representation and Cultures of Cruelty* is an essential reference for scholars and students of memory studies, trauma studies, political theory, ethics, and history, challenging readers to rethink how we perceive and represent the enduring impact of state-sponsored violence and oppression.

Biography

Editor(s):  Pumla Gobodo-Madikizela, the 2024 Templeton Prize Laureate, is a professor in the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences at Stellenbosch University, where she holds the South African National Research Foundation’s Research Chair in Violent Histories and Transgenerational Trauma and is the Director of the Centre for the Study of the Afterlife of Violence and the Reparative Quest (SAVARQ). Tamar Garb is a professor at University College London, UK. Nanci Adler is a professor at the University of Amsterdam in the Netherlands.

Reviews

This title is currently being reviewed. Please check back for further updates in due course.