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Fears and Symbols : An Introduction to the Study of Western Civilization by Elemér Hankiss is a nonfiction available to read on EtoBox.

What is Fears and Symbols : An Introduction to the Study of Western Civilization about?

Giving a panoramic view of Western civilisation, this study is based on the central role that the author believes fear and anxiety have played as the organising motives of human existence and social life. Hankiss argues that existential security has been a major factor in the generation of civilisations, perhaps even more important than the mainstream theories of culture offered by Kant, Freud and Foucault. In order to mitigate fear, human beings and communities have surrounded themselves in two ways. The first being through house and city walls, with instruments and weapons, laws and institutions. Secondly, with the protective sphere of symbols: myths and religions, values and belief systems, ideas and scientific theories, moral and practical rules of behaviour, and a wide range of everyday rituals and trivialities. Hankiss pays particular attention to the role of symbols and symbolic systems in contemporary societies.

Who reads Fears and Symbols : An Introduction to the Study of Western Civilization?

Author

Elemér Hankiss

Publisher

Central European University Press

Published

2001

Language

EN

ISBN

9789639241060

Category

nonfiction

Subjects

Anthropology, Political Science, Western