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"This book argues that, in the wake of the postmodern, contemporary culture becomes once again concerned with totality, the main focal point of expression for this being concepts of the global. It uncovers predominant ways of conceptualising the global in contemporary literature, film and theory. In so doing, it offers a fresh approach to the study of globalisation and culture, identifying four main categories under which concepts of the global can be placed: the immanent, the transcendent, the contingent and the beyond-measure. Alongside this, it discovers a confrontation between two predominant ways of figuring human relations on a global scale. Conceptualising the Global in the Wake of the Postmodern examines the works of various authors and filmmakers, such as Margaret Atwood, Don DeLillo, Kazuo Ishiguro, Douglas Coupland, David Cronenberg, Charlie Kaufman, and David Lynch, to show how the idea of totality has returned in contemporary culture"-- "The earth, far from being a sphere, is "sausage-shaped" Flann O'Brien, The Third Policeman. Although the above assertion - made by the fictional philosopher de Selby in Flann O'Brien's The Third Policeman (1967) - is patently, and intentionally absurd, it nevertheless proves instructive in outlining the purpose and aims of this book. De Selby arrives at this conclusion by claiming, first, that there are only two possible directions of travel across the Earth. One can either go north or south, but ultimately this makes little difference as (if travelling in a straight line), one will eventually arrive back at the starting point, having somehow, therefore, travelled in both directions. The same point, by this logic, holds for travelling either east or west"--
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