On monsters : an unnatural history of our worst fears / Stephen T. Asma.

By:

Asma, Stephen T

Material type: Text

TextPublication details: Oxford ; New York : Oxford University Press, 2009.Description: 1 online resource (xii, 351 pages) : illustrationsContent type:

text

Media type:

computer

Carrier type:

online resource

ISBN:

9780199714513
0199714517
1283058685
9781283058681
9786613058683
6613058688
9780199745777
0199745773

Subject(s):

Genre/Form:

Additional physical formats: Print version:: On monsters.DDC classification:

398.24/54 22

LOC classification:

GR825 .A86 2009eb

Online resources:

Click here to access online

Contents:

Introduction: extraordinary beings -- pt. 1. Ancient monsters. Alexander fights monsters in India -- Monsters are nature's playthings -- Hermaphrodites and man-headed oxen -- Monstrous desire -- pt. 2. Medieval monsters: messages from God. Biblical monsters -- Do monsters have souls? -- The monster killer -- Possessing demons and witches -- pt. 3. Scientific monsters: the book of nature is riddled with typos. Natural history, freaks, and nondescripts -- The medicalization of monsters -- Darwin's mutants -- pt. 4. Inner monsters: the psychological aspects. The art of human vulnerability: angst and horror -- Criminal monsters: psychopathology, aggression, and the malignant heart -- Torturers, terrorists, and zombies: the products of monstrous societies -- Future monsters: robots, mutants, and posthuman cyborgs.

Subject: "Monsters. Real or imagined, literal or metaphorical, they have exerted a dread fascination on the human mind for many centuries. They attract and repel us, intrigue and terrify us, and in the process reveal something deeply important about the darker recesses of our collective psyche. Stephen Asma's On Monsters is a wide-ranging cultural and conceptual history of monsters--how they have evolved over time, what functions they have served for us, and what shapes they are likely to take in the future. Asma begins with a letter from Alexander the Great in 326 B.C. detailing an encounter in India with an 'enormous beast--larger than an elephant with three ominous horns on its forehead.' From there the monsters come fast and furious--Behemoth and Leviathan, Gog and Magog, the leopard-bear-lion beast of Revelation, Satan and his demons, Grendel and Frankenstein, circus freaks and headless children, right up to the serial killers and terrorists of today and the post-human cyborgs of tomorrow. Monsters embody our deepest anxieties and vulnerabilities, Asma argues, but they also symbolize the mysterious and incoherent territory just beyond the safe enclosures of rational thought. Exploring philosophical treatises, theological tracts, newspapers, pamphlets, films, scientific notebooks, and novels, Asma unpacks traditional monster stories for the clues they offer about the inner logic of an era's fears and fascinations. In doing so, he illuminates the many ways monsters have become repositories for those human qualities that must be repudiated, externalized, and defeated. Asma suggests that how we handle monsters reflects how we handle uncertainty, ambiguity, insecurity. And in a world that is daily becoming less secure and more ambiguous, he shows how we might learn to better live with monsters--and thereby avoid becoming one."--Publisher's website.

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Item type	Home library	Collection	Call number	Materials specified	Status	Date due	Barcode
Electronic-Books	OPJGU Sonepat- Campus	E-Books EBSCO			Available

Includes bibliographical references (pages 285-333) and index.

"Monsters. Real or imagined, literal or metaphorical, they have exerted a dread fascination on the human mind for many centuries. They attract and repel us, intrigue and terrify us, and in the process reveal something deeply important about the darker recesses of our collective psyche. Stephen Asma's On Monsters is a wide-ranging cultural and conceptual history of monsters--how they have evolved over time, what functions they have served for us, and what shapes they are likely to take in the future. Asma begins with a letter from Alexander the Great in 326 B.C. detailing an encounter in India with an 'enormous beast--larger than an elephant with three ominous horns on its forehead.' From there the monsters come fast and furious--Behemoth and Leviathan, Gog and Magog, the leopard-bear-lion beast of Revelation, Satan and his demons, Grendel and Frankenstein, circus freaks and headless children, right up to the serial killers and terrorists of today and the post-human cyborgs of tomorrow. Monsters embody our deepest anxieties and vulnerabilities, Asma argues, but they also symbolize the mysterious and incoherent territory just beyond the safe enclosures of rational thought. Exploring philosophical treatises, theological tracts, newspapers, pamphlets, films, scientific notebooks, and novels, Asma unpacks traditional monster stories for the clues they offer about the inner logic of an era's fears and fascinations. In doing so, he illuminates the many ways monsters have become repositories for those human qualities that must be repudiated, externalized, and defeated. Asma suggests that how we handle monsters reflects how we handle uncertainty, ambiguity, insecurity. And in a world that is daily becoming less secure and more ambiguous, he shows how we might learn to better live with monsters--and thereby avoid becoming one."--Publisher's website.