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Through a variety of studies in the emerging field of attentional studies, this book examines and seeks alternatives to the current attention economy. Bringing together the work of leading scholars of ‘critical attention studies'to reflect on issues such as techno-politics, socio-politics, and the politics of distraction, it offers a new and multi-disciplinary conceptualization of attention that emphasizes the connections between attention and curiosity, distraction, decoloniality and care. Above all, The Politics of Curiosity asks us to consider the nature and ambivalence of the curious forms of politics that might be taking shape in the shadow of our current attention economy.The “attention economy” has become a household name: we all know our attention is being harvested, commodified and packaged to be sold to advertisers by capitalist platforms. We all complain about it; some of us dream of disconnection; others call to fight back. By focusing on attentional deficits, and by reducing attention to being focused, however, the common view may miss wider stakes, and more promising opportunities. This collective volume provides a new frame of analysis based on three displacements. First, it relocates attentional issues within a triangulation that explores a continuum between attention, distraction and curiosity. Second, it invites us to investigate into the mental infrastructures that socially condition our perceptions and understandings of the world. Third, it points towards emancipatory politics of curiosity to provide alternatives to the attention economy. Contributions range from pedagogy to media theory, via digital studies, epistemology, sociology, political philosophy, literary history, aesthetics, film and dance studies. They gather some of the leading scholars who shaped the study of attention, questioned the values of distraction and explored the potentials of curiosity over the recent years. They extend across nine countries, four continents and seven languages, to provide a multicultural approach to these debates. Together, they help us understand how our current mental infrastructures have taken shape, under specific regimes of power and authority, in a world dominated by capital, colonialism and patriarchy. But they also sketch what can be done to redeploy them around imperatives of respect and care – from a better awareness of our mental biases, online behaviors and bodily movements, to our collective capacity to restructure classroom interactions, to launch alternative digital platforms, to build democratic movements.The first platform for discussion of the politics of attention and curiosity – and an essential point of reference for future debate – this book will appeal to scholars of sociology, politics and psychology.

Este texto explora y reflexiona la práctica conceptualización, márgenes y simbolización de la la norma y la transgresión en diversos niveles de la vida de la sociedad virreinal, lo que implica también aproximarse a la forma en que los límites fueron conformados y superados. De hecho, en gran medida podría pensarse que el estudio de las normas vigentes en un sistema social surge del estudio de las conductas consideradas transgresoras, y no al revés.

This book focuses on current frontier-related issues such as humanitarian crises, economic crises, discrimination of migrants in certain countries, different typologies of borders such as land, maritime, air, space, and even cyberspace borders, and environmental protection of water resources at borders. It addresses legal and theoretical considerations and presents empirical cases showing the manifestations of the concept in the real world and its dynamics. Without claiming to exhaust the debate on frontiers, especially given the breadth of the subject and the large number of viewpoints from which the phenomenon can be examined, this book intends to be a helpful source of insights for academics, university students, and others who wish to explore the complex and multifaceted worlds that emerge, particularly in a globalized society, from the interaction between the various actors and scenarios that shape the reality of frontiers.

In the context of debates surrounding the effects of new technologies on our mental faculties, particularly the attention span, this volume addresses the notion of a deterioration of attention, and the related ideas of cognitive overload, an inability to concentrate, and attention deficit disorder. Through a new conceptualization of attention based not on individualistic or universalistic approaches, but centered instead on the cultural and social variability of cognitive processes and the multiplicity of forces and environments that encourage, stimulate, and inhibit certain cognitive mechanisms, the author rejects the idea of a degradation or crisis of attention and proposes an alternative vision of the problem of attention in contemporary societies. Placing cultural conventions, social norms, and ecological environments at the forefront of our understanding of individual and collective attention, Attention and its Crisis in Digital Society will appeal to scholars of sociology, psychology, and philosophy with interests in social theory, cognitive processes, and the criticisms often levelled at digital society and new technologies.

La covid-19 nos impacta con terribles cifras de muertos, enfermos y desempleados, pero existen muchos otros ámbitos que han sido afectados y que, a menudo, pasan desapercibidos. Si queremos sacar aprendizajes de una crisis que afecta a todas las esferas de la vida, resulta imprescindible huir de teorías conspiranoicas, fakenews y chivos expiatorios, para reflexionar serenamente con espíritu crítico y constructivo. Con este objetivo, y coordinados por el antropólogo Alberto del Campo Tejedor, una veintena de investigadores y profesores universitarios se unen para pensar la pandemia, más allá de la sanidad y la economía. Los politólogos y sociólogos reflexionan sobre qué ha fallado del Estado de Bienestar, de una sanidad pública que creíamos infalible y aun de nuestros gobernantes; lentos, ineficaces, sumidos en disputas partidistas. Los antropólogos sociales y psicólogos advierten de que el coronavirus sí entiende de clases sociales y nos recuerdan que la crisis pandémica ha tenido un impacto brutal en ciertos colectivos vulnerables, de los que poco se habla; de la misma manera que también existen grupos que han salido airosos, y de cuya fortaleza y capacidad de superación podemos aprender. Los filósofos nos instan a mirar de cara a la muerte y a dejar de obviarla, mientras nos interpelan a plantearnos si no habíamos confiado en exceso nuestra felicidad al individualismo consumista. Vivíamos con cierta inconsciencia y una ingenua fe en las posibilidades del Estado, el Mercado y la Ciencia, y ahora que nos sentimos frágiles e inseguros, los especialistas en Derechos Humanos y Ética nos invitan a retomar el proyecto humanista de empatía y responsabilidad compartida. Afortunadamente la pandemia no solo ha traído consigo miedo, dudas y parálisis, sino también multitud de proyectos creativos, que revelan la faz luminosa, imaginativa, solidaria del ser humano, en la literatura, por ejemplo, o en el terreno de los cuidados. Un libro imprescindible para comprender las variadas e insospechadas implicaciones de la pandemia.