Thinking with Animation

Review "As is acknowledged by many, cinema played a significant role in the 20th century’s culture and politics, which is why abundant contributions in cinema studies are being made not only by cultural theorists but also by philosophers. The history of cinema is becoming an intellectual common language in the 21st century as the history of literature did in the 19th century. However, an important part is conspicuously missing: the study of animation, without which no history of cinema would be complete. This book, Thinking with Animation, is a magnificent and necessary contribution to the construction of this language." --Professor Koichiro Kokubun, philosopher, The University of Tokyo, Japan"This volume by Joff P. N. Bradley and Catherine Ju-yu Cheng challenges readers to confront the diverse possibilities proposed by relations of philosophy and animation. The authors confront the ways that thinking with animation and philosophy conjoined can contribute to facilitating fruitful openings onto a broad range of perspectives, including but not limited to ecological catastrophe, ecosophy and ecopsychology; biopolitics, new materialism, and film semiotics; cyberpunk, video games, and zombie aesthetics; and animism, Shintoism and mysticism. Engaging these challenges from a decidedly Deleuzian perspective, the volume’s editors offer to readers a forum in which forms of animation work with philosophy, while also revealing how animated images themselves manifest thought. In short, the vitality of these images allows readers to understand not simply the life forces emerging from animation but also the creative impetus that produces such vibrant thinking." --Charles Stivale, Distinguished Professor Emeritus of French, Wayne State University, USA"Thinking with Animation is a fantastically fresh, new book about anime which also offers a timely exploration of the nonhuman vitality which animates thinking itself. From Mickey Mouse to Princess Mononoke, from Benjamin to Kristeva, this excellent new collection invigorates thought across many fields. What stands out amidst the vibrant discussions of dark topics so pertinent today―from ecology to fascism, war, dystopia, and zombie apocalypse―is something hopeful regarding how thought may be re-animated anew. This positive message for a challenging era will undoubtedly make this book popular with anime-loving students, whilst propelling new directions for film studies, philosophy, film-philosophy, Deleuze and Guattari studies and a host of related areas." --David Martin-Jones, Professor of Film Studies and author of Cinema Against Doublethink, Glasgow University, UK Product Description This volume brings together scholars based predominantly in Asia to contribute provocative and experimental essays on the dynamic relationship between animation and philosophy. In an inventive and playful philosophical way, they address not only the mainstay of Japanese animation, but also Korean film, picture books and Mickey Mouse to understand what we might call film\-philosophy in Asia. In thinking animation with concepts from the technicolour philosophies of Deleuze, Guattari, Stiegler, Benjamin, Kristeva and Heidegger, the book sees animation not as a representation of a philosophical idea per se, but conceptualizes it as a philosophical thinking\-device. In the images themselves, what is at work is not just the thinking of a particular director or manga artist, but, rather, thinking as such, through and by the images themselves. The scholars in this collection are committed to thinking images themselves as thought\-experiments and thinking machines. About the Author Joff P. N. Bradley is Professor of English and Philosophy in the Faculty and Graduate School of Foreign Languages at Teikyo University, Tokyo, Japan. He is also a Visiting Professor at Jamia Millia Islamia (University), New Delhi, India, and a Visiting Research Fellow at Kyung Hee University, Seoul, South Korea. He is cu