Books published by State University of New York Press

An introduction to Badiou's philosophical thought and its implications for other humanistic disciplines and the social sciences.

Writings by twentieth-century imprisoned authors examining confinement, enslavement, and political organizing in prison.

In Friendship, James O. Grunebaum introduces a new conceptual framework to articulate, explain, and understand similarities and differences between various conceptions of friendship. Asking whether special preference for friends is morally justified, Grunebaum answers that question by analyzing a comprehensive comparison of not only Aristotle's three well-known kinds of friendship -- pleasure, utility, and virtue -- but also a variety of lesser-known friendship conceptions from Kant, C. S. Lewis, and Montaigne. The book clarifies differences about how friends ought to behave toward each other and how these differences are, in part, what separate the various conceptions of friendship.

Risking Difference revisions the dynamics of multicultural feminist community by exploring the ways that identification creates misrecognitions and misunderstandings between individuals and within communities. Drawing on Lacanian psychoanalysis, Jean Wyatt argues not only that individual psychic processes of identification influence social dynamics, but also that social discourses of race, class, and culture shape individual identifications. In addition to examining fictional narratives by Margaret Atwood, Angela Carter, Sandra Cisneros, Toni Morrison, and others, Wyatt also looks at nonfictional accounts of cross-race relations by white feminists and feminists of color.

Focusing on ancient rhetoric outside of the dominant Western tradition, this collection examines rhetorical practices in Egypt, Mesopotamia, Israel, and China. The book uncovers alternate ways of understanding human behavior and explores how these rhetorical practices both reflected and influenced their cultures. The essays address issues of historiography and raise questions about the application of Western rhetorical concepts to these very different ancient cultures. A chapter on suggestions for teaching each of these ancient rhetorics is included.