{"product_id":"charisma-and-disenchantment-the-vocation-lectures-isbn-9781681373898","title":"Charisma and Disenchantment: The Vocation Lectures","description":"\u003cb\u003eA new translation of two celebrated lectures on politics, academia, and the disenchantment of the world.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e The German sociologist Max Weber is one of the most venturesome, stimulating, and influential theorists of the modern condition. Among his most significant works are the so-called vocation lectures, published shortly after the end of World War I and delivered at the invitation of a group of student activists. The question the students asked Weber to address was simple and haunting: In a modern world characterized by the division of labor, economic expansion, and unrelenting change, was it still possible to consider an academic or political career as a genuine calling? In response Weber offered his famous diagnosis of “the disenchantment of the world,” along with a challenging account of the place of morality in the classroom and in research. In his second lecture he introduced the notion of political charisma, assigning it a central role in the modern state, even as he recognized that politics is more than anything “a slow and difficult drilling of holes into hard boards.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Damion Searls’s new translation brings out the power and nuance of these celebrated lectures. Paul Reitter and Chad Wellmon’s introduction describes their historical and biographical background, reception, and influence. Weber’s effort to rethink the idea of a public calling at the start of the tumultuous twentieth century is revealed to be as timely and stirring as ever. \u003cbr\u003e“I found Weber's lectures—the first of which was delivered during the Bolshevik Revolution—a bracing, relevant read. I also appreciated Damion Searls's approach to translating from the German, ‘skewed towards everyday vocabulary whenever possible’ to reflect the ethos of a popular lecture series.” —Nadia Kalman, \u003ci\u003eWords Without Borders\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“The incoherence of modern life could be said to have been Weber’s great subject. Weber used the term \u003ci\u003eEntz­-auberung\u003c\/i\u003e—‘dis-enchantment’—to describe the way in which science and technology had inevitably displaced magical thinking. . . . His writings anticipate both the rise and fall of the Soviet Union . . . and also the steady, soulless spread of global capitalism.” —Elizabeth Kolbert, \u003ci\u003eThe New Yorker\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cb\u003eMax Weber\u003c\/b\u003e (1864–1920) was a sociologist,  philosopher, jurist, and  political economist. Considered one of the  founders of modern sociology,  he is best known for his book \u003ci\u003eThe Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of  Capitalism\u003c\/i\u003e.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eDamion Searls\u003c\/b\u003e is a translator from German, French, Norwegian, and Dutch and a writer in English. His own books include \u003ci\u003eWhat We Were Doing and Where We Were Going\u003c\/i\u003e,\u003ci\u003e The Inkblots\u003c\/i\u003e,\u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003eand \u003ci\u003eThe Philosophy of Translation\u003c\/i\u003e. He received the Helen and Kurt Wolff Translator's Prize in 2019 for Uwe Johnson's \u003ci\u003eAnniversaries\u003c\/i\u003e.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003ePaul Reitter \u003c\/b\u003eteaches in the German department at the Ohio State University. He is the co-editor, along with Chad Wellmon, of \u003ci\u003eAnti-Education: On the Future of Our Educational Institutions \u003c\/i\u003eby Friedrich Nietzsche, which was published by NYRB Classics in 2015. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003eChad Wellmon \u003c\/b\u003eis the author of \u003ci\u003eBecoming Human: Romantic Anthropology and the Embodiment of Freedom\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eOrganizing Enlightenment: Information Overload and the Invention of the Modern Research University\u003c\/i\u003e, and the forthcoming \u003ci\u003ePermanent Crisis: The Humanities in a Disenchanted Age\u003c\/i\u003e. He is on the faculty of the University of Virginia.","brand":"NYRB Classics","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46299973583077,"sku":"NP9781681373898","price":17.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9781681373898.jpg?v=1767723569","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/es\/products\/charisma-and-disenchantment-the-vocation-lectures-isbn-9781681373898","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}