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2 books match the query 'Knot'
Knot of the Soul
Madness, Psychoanalysis, IslamStefania Pandolfo
University of Chicago Press, 2018
Through a dual engagement with the unconscious in psychoanalysis and Islamic theological-medical reasoning, Stefania Pandolfo’s unsettling and innovative book reflects on the maladies of the soul at a time of tremendous global upheaval. Drawing on in-depth historical research and testimonies of contemporary patients and therapists in Morocco, Knot of the Soul offers both an ethnographic journey through madness and contemporary formations of despair and a philosophical and theological exploration of the vicissitudes of the soul.
Knot of the Soul moves from the experience of psychosis in psychiatric hospitals, to the visionary torments of the soul in poor urban neighborhoods, to the melancholy and religious imaginary of undocumented migration, culminating in the liturgical stage of the Qur’anic cure. Demonstrating how contemporary Islamic cures for madness address some of the core preoccupations of the psychoanalytic approach, she reveals how a religious and ethical relation to the “ordeal” of madness might actually allow for spiritual transformation.
This sophisticated and evocative work illuminates new dimensions of psychoanalysis and the ethical imagination while also sensitively examining the collective psychic strife that so many communities endure today.
Knot of the Soul moves from the experience of psychosis in psychiatric hospitals, to the visionary torments of the soul in poor urban neighborhoods, to the melancholy and religious imaginary of undocumented migration, culminating in the liturgical stage of the Qur’anic cure. Demonstrating how contemporary Islamic cures for madness address some of the core preoccupations of the psychoanalytic approach, she reveals how a religious and ethical relation to the “ordeal” of madness might actually allow for spiritual transformation.
This sophisticated and evocative work illuminates new dimensions of psychoanalysis and the ethical imagination while also sensitively examining the collective psychic strife that so many communities endure today.
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Untying the Knot of War
A Bargaining Theory of International CrisesT. Clifton Morgan
University of Michigan Press, 1994
This book utilizes formal, spatial voting models and game-theoretic techniques to examine why certain international crises erupt into all-out wars while others resolve peacefully through diplomacy. Operating on the premise that a crisis always precedes war, Morgan develops original mathematical frameworks to show how crisis outcomes are fundamentally dictated by the specific characteristics of the bargainers, the multi-dimensional nature of the disputed issues, and the vital interventions of third-party negotiators and agenda setters. By illustrating these formal equations with historical cases, the text moves beyond rigid security-maximization arguments, providing international relations scholars with a robust, predictive framework for conflict resolution and crisis bargaining.
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