Organizations are caught in clichés. This means that they do not think for themselves anymore, but rather simply copy pre-existing ideas. This is giving rise to a world which pretends to be knowable, predictable and mouldable, one in which clichés like efficiency, transparency, means-ends rationality, and the strong leader are used without further thought or critique. This is the reason why organizations come into conflict with themselves, and which causes a seemingly unresolvable crisis. Film, however, can show us a totally different world. It has a subversive potency that can wake up the viewer, making them think again, allowing them to see a world which cannot be perceived anymore. It can show the world as it really is again, and can enable us to break through clichés. This book adopts a unique viewpoint on organizations, through its use of film. With the help of philosophers like Deleuze, Heidegger and Sloterdijk, filmmakers like the Coen Brothers, Cronenberg, Antonioni and Tarkovsky and films like The Big Lebowski, eXistenZ, Stalker and Playtime, a world is revealed and explored. It shows the decisive role played by architecture, and why managers are manipulative and impotent at the same time.

A spirited and engaging linguistic and social re-imagination of the role and nature of clichés in communication and interaction.

This collection examines the work of the Italian economist and social theorist Vilfredo Pareto, highlighting the extraordinary scope of his thought, which covers a vast range of academic disciplines. The volume underlines the enduring and contemporary relevance of Pareto's ideas on a bewildering variety of topics; while illuminating his attempt to unite different disciplines, such as history and sociology, in his quest for a 'holistic' understanding of society. Bringing together the world's leading experts on Pareto, this collection will be of interest to scholars working in the fields of sociology and social psychology, monetary theory and risk analysis, philosophy and intellectual history, and political science and rhetoric.

This volume deals with the inherent relation between literary genres and cultural memory. Indeed, generic repertoires may be regarded as bodies of shared knowledge (a sort of ‘encyclopaedia' or 'museum' of stocked culture) and have played and still play an important role in absorbing and activating that memory. The contributors have focused on some specific memory-linked genres that prove especially relevant in remembering and transforming past experiences, i.e. the (post)modern historical novel and various forms of (post)modern autobiographical writing. They deal with such renowned authors as Carlos Fuentes, Vargas Llosa, Umberto Eco, Antonio Tabucchi, John Barth, Julian Barnes, Michel Butor, Nathalie Sarraute, Alain Robbe-Grillet, Claude Simon, Georges Perec and Marguerite Yourcenar. The volume, thus, constitutes an attractive and representative sample of (post)modern forms of rewriting and problematizing individual and collective pasts.

Drawing on a range of theoretical perspectives developed in and around the work of Barthes, Kristeva, Genette and Derrida, Dr Prendergast explores approaches to the concept of mimesis and relates these to a number of narrative texts produced in the period which literary history familiarly designates as the age of realism.