Overview

In What Is Cultural Criticism?, Francis Mulhern and Stefan Collini propose alternative understandings of what ‘culture’ means: rear-guard projection of values excluded by capitalist modernity, or a useful shorthand for a set of collectively practised prompts to reflection? The debate opens with Mulhern’s account in Culture/Metaculture of what he terms metacultural discourse. This has embraced two opposing critical traditions, the elite pessimism of Kulturkritik and populist enthusiasms of Cultural Studies. Each in its own way dissolves politics into culture, Mulhern argues. Collini, on the other hand, protests that cultural criticism provides resources for genuine critical engagement with contemporary society. Tension between culture and politics there may be, but it works productively in both directions. This widely noticed encounter is that rare thing, a sustained debate in which, as Collini remarks, the protagonists not only exchange shots but also ideas. It concludes with Mulhern’s engagement with Collini’s writing on the subordination of universities to metrics and bureaucracy, and a companion rejoinder from Collini on Mulhern’s study on the ‘condition of culture novel’ and his essays on questions of nationality and the politics of intellectuals.

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9781804293379

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Reviews

Praise for Mulhern's Figures of Catastrophe * : * An epic debate over the proper relation between culture and politics. -- Bruce Robbins * boundary 2 * A groundbreaking (though pleasingly understated) intervention. Few critics could match the subtlety of Mulhern's interpretations or the eloquent precision of his prose. -- Maud Ellman * Critical Inquiry * Praise for for Collini's The Nostalgic Imagination * : * The most dazzling piece of literary criticism I have read in ages, written with a wit and intelligence that puts most current academic criticism to shame. -- D. J. Taylor * The Tablet *

An epic debate over the proper relation between culture and politics. -- Bruce Robbins * boundary 2 * Praise for Mulhern's Figures of Catastrophe * : * A groundbreaking (though pleasingly understated) intervention. Few critics could match the subtlety of Mulhern's interpretations or the eloquent precision of his prose. -- Maud Ellman * Critical Inquiry * Praise for for Collini's The Nostalgic Imagination * : * The most dazzling piece of literary criticism I have read in ages, written with a wit and intelligence that puts most current academic criticism to shame. -- D. J. Taylor * The Tablet *

An epic debate over the proper relation between culture and politics. -- Bruce Robbins * boundary 2 * A groundbreaking (though pleasingly understated) intervention. Few critics could match the subtlety of Mulhern's interpretations or the eloquent precision of his prose. -- Maud Ellman * Critical Inquiry (for Mulhern's Figures of Catastrophe) * The most dazzling piece of literary criticism I have read in ages, written with a wit and intelligence that puts most current academic criticism to shame. -- D. J. Taylor * The Tablet (for Collini's The Nostalgic Imagination) *

Author Information

Francis Mulhern is Associate Editor of New Left Review and author of The Moment of ‘Scrutiny’, Culture/Metaculture and Figures of Catastrophe. His latest essay collection Into the Mêlée is newly published by Verso. Stefan Collini is Professor Emeritus of Intellectual History and English Literature at the University of Cambridge. His books include, most recently, Common Writing, Speaking of Universities and The Nostalgic Imagination.

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