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Editorial Reviews
Book Description
Cultural Software is the first book that seriously applies theories of cultural evolution and the theory of memes to the problems of ideology and justice. Instead of resting the concept of ideology on outmoded notions of "false consciousness," Cultural Software shows how ideological effects get produced through the spread and reproduction of forms of cultural know-how, or cultural software.
Cultural Software is the first book that seriously applies theories of cultural evolution and the theory of memes to the problems of ideology and justice. Instead of resting the concept of ideology on outmoded notions of "false consciousness," Cultural Software shows how ideological effects get produced through the spread and reproduction of forms of cultural know-how, or cultural software.
Human beings are the bearers of this cultural software, it helps constitute them and shapes them as persons with distinctive values and purposes. Yet cultural software reproduces whether or not it serves the interests of human beings. Rather, cultural conventions and institutions spread as if they had their own interests in survival and reproduction. And some kinds of cultural software can act like virtual parasites, breeding unhappiness and injustice as they reproduce in human minds and institutions.
Drawing on anthropology, evolutionary theory, cognitive science, linguistics, sociology, political theory, social psychology, and law, Cultural Software offers a strikingly original theory of cultural evolution, a theory that explains both shared understandings and diversity within cultures.
"Balkin argues ingeniously that meme theory replaces more familiar critical theories of ideology, because it alone explains how people come to believe the things they believe, without reference to dubious assumptions about "false consciousness" or "hegemony." [Balkin] writes with lucid balance. . . . Balkin's account is the most nuanced and convincing on the question of what we actually gain from meme theory."
--Mark Kingwell, Harpers
"After 250 years of writing about ideology, it is difficult to have something new to say that advances our understanding of this elusive concept, and yet Cultural Software: A Theory of Ideology by J.M. Balkin manages to do just that... a remarkable work that will be usefully read by a broad audience."
--Susan Silbey, American Journal of Sociology
"[A] path-breaking effort to rethink legal critique using ... biological and cybernetic models; the scope of its ambition and the subtlety of its execution are likely to make it a definitive work."
--David Charny, University of Michigan Law Review
"[I]ntelligent and extremely well crafted... [A] wonderfully clear presentation of the major strands of postmodern thought."
--Emily Sherwin, Philosophy in Review
From the Inside Flap
According to J.M. Balkin, cultural evolution occurs through the transmission of cultural information and know-how-- "cultural software"--in human minds. Individuals embody cultural software and spread it to others through communication and social learning. Ideology, he contends, is neither a special nor a pathological form of thought but an ordinary product of the evolution of cultural software. Because cultural understanding is a patchwork of older imperfect tools that are continually adapted to solve new problems, human understanding is partly adequate and partly inadequate to the pursuit of justice.
Balkin offers many current and historical examples that demonstrate the causes of ideological effects and their contributions to injustice. He also enters the current debate over multiculturalism, applying his theory to problems of mutual understanding between people who hold different worldviews.
"A brilliant and daring job of examining law in the light of new thought in the human sciences and vice versa. This is contemporary legal scholarship at its most thoughtful."
--Jerome Bruner, Research Professor of Psychology at New York University and Senior Research Fellow in Law at New York University School of Law.
"Balkin takes the hot button words of current intellectual debate-- culture, ideology, transcendence, pragmatism, historicism-- and manages the considerable feat of making them usable again. He avoids final judgment while at the same time redeeming the vocabulary of final judgment so that it is once again available to those who have learned the lessons of various postmodernisms. An impressive and truly helpful book."
--Stanley Fish, Duke University
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Citations
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21
books
cite this book:
- Writing Genres (Rhetorical Philosophy & Theory) by Amy J Devitt on page 158, Back Matter (1), and Back Matter (2)
- The Anarchist in the Library: How the Clash Between Freedom and Control is Hacking the Real World and Crashing the System by Siva Vaidhyanathan in Back Matter (1), and