Ensemblance - by Luis de Miranda (Paperback)

About the Book

Through several historical case studies from the last 300 years, Luis de Miranda shows how the phrase 'esprit de corps' acts as a combat concept with a clear societal impact. He also reveals how interconnected, yet distinct, French, English and American modern intellectual and political thought is.

Book Synopsis

Through several historical case studies from the last 300 years, Luis de Miranda shows how the phrase 'esprit de corps' acts as a combat concept with a clear societal impact. He also reveals how interconnected, yet distinct, French, English and American modern intellectual and political thought is.

From the Back Cover

Is esprit de corps the secret engine of history? Esprit de corps has played a significant role in the cultural and political history of the last 300 years. The idea was influential and debated during the European secularisation of education in the eighteenth century, the French Revolution, the United States process of Independence and the Bonapartist Empire. It was praised by British colonialists, French sociologists and during the World Wars. It was also instrumental in the rise of administrative nation-states and the triumph of corporate capitalism. Today, 'esprit de corps' continues to be influential in disparate discourses. Through several historical case studies, Luis de Miranda shows how this phrase acts as a combat concept with a clear societal impact. He also reveals how interconnected, yet distinct, French, English and American modern intellectual and political thought is. In the end, this is a cautionary analysis of past and current ideologies of ultra-unified human ensembles, a recurrent historical and theoretical fabulation the author calls 'ensemblance'. Luis de Miranda is a Researcher in the History of Ideas at Örebro University, Sweden.

Review Quotes

Since Foucault, Deleuze and Guattari and, more recently, Badiou, there has been considerable interest in countervailing the history of individualism with others on the production of group subjectivities, where the individual emerges from out of, or is sacrificially sublimated into, a cog in the machine of a no-less manufactured collective identity. Luis de Miranda's enquiry into the origins and ambivalent spread of esprit de corps, or the subjectivation of 'ensembles', marks a major intervention in this debate. Ensemblance is a remarkable 'histosophical' achievement, a compellingly original mix of transnational history and philosophy, from the philosophes to the present, and beautifully written to boot.-- "Gerald Moore, Associate Professor in Digital Studies, Durham University"

About the Author

Luis de Miranda is a Researcher in the Department of History of Ideas and Science at Uppsala University, Sweden. He is the author of Being and Neonness (MIT Press, 2019), Peut-on jouir du capitalisme? Lacan avec Heidegger et Marx (Max Milo, 2009) and Une vie nouvelle est-elle possible? Deleuze et les lignes (Nous, 2009).