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William James, Pragmatism, and American Culture

William James book cover

Âé¶¹Ó°Ôº the Book:

William James, Pragmatism, and American Culture focuses on the work of William James and the relationship between the development of pragmatism and its historical, cultural, and political roots in 19th-century America. Deborah Whitehead reads pragmatism through the intersecting themes of narrative, gender, nation, politics, and religion. As she considers how pragmatism helps to explain the United States to itself, Whitehead articulates a contemporary pragmatism and shows how it has become a powerful and influential discourse in American intellectual and popular culture.

Âé¶¹Ó°Ôº the Author: 

Deborah Whitehead's research engages two primary areas: 1) the philosophical tradition of American pragmatism, its history and contemporary implications, particularly the work of William James and the late twentieth century revival of pragmatism; 2) religion and media studies, with a current project underway on contemporary U.S. evangelicals’ adoption of various new media forms. Within the field of religious studies, she focuses on religion and American culture, using textual analysis to explore ways that religious and cultural discourses intersect and the kinds of public claims that these discourses make, in contexts ranging from philosophical texts, historical documents, legal texts, and popular culture, to media and new technologies. She specializes in the history of Protestant thought in the U.S. from the post-Civil War era to the present.