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Christopher Johnson

Professor of French, Faculty of Arts

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Teaching Summary

My specialist teaching is mainly focused on French thought and intellectual history.

In the first year I have lectured on the Enlightenment and the Encylopédie.

In the second year I teach a module on Nineteenth-Century French Fiction, which includes the novels of Balzac, Flaubert and Zola.

In the final year I have taught two modules:

Representations of the Exotic - this module looks at French representations of non-Western, 'exotic' cultures from the early modern period up to the twentieth century. Writers studied include Montaigne, Montesquieu, Diderot, Chateaubriand, Flaubert and Lévi-Strauss.

Intellectuals in Post-War France - this module looks at three important French thinkers of the post-war period, Jean-Paul Sartre, Claude Lévi-Strauss and Jean-François Lyotard, representing three intellectual movements: existentialism, structuralism and post-modernism.

Research Summary

My main areas of research interest are contemporary French thought and the philosophy of technology. I have published books on Derrida and Lévi-Strauss, and a number of shorter pieces on… read more

Recent Publications

  • JOHNSON, C., 2013. All Played Out? Lévi-Strauss's Philosophy of History New Left Review. 79(Jan-Feb), 55-69
  • JOHNSON, C., 2013. The prehistory of technology: on the contribution of Leroi-Gourhan’s anthropology to Stiegler’s philosophy of technology. In: HOWELLS, C. and MOORE, G., eds., Stiegler and Technics Edinburgh University Press. (In Press.)
  • JOHNSON C., 2012. Bricoleur and bricolage: from metaphor to universal concept Paragraph. 35(3), 355-372
  • JOHNSON, C., 2011. ‘Epoch, event, context’, ‘The cybernetic imaginary’, ‘Grammatology as a “positive” science’, ‘Writing in evolution, evolution as “writing”’. In: GASTON, S and MACLACHLAN, I., eds., Reading of Grammatology Continuum. 3-5, 11-14, 79-81, 91-3

Current Research

My main areas of research interest are contemporary French thought and the philosophy of technology. I have published books on Derrida and Lévi-Strauss, and a number of shorter pieces on science/technology-related subjects: biotechnology, machine translation, cybernetics, the space age. I am currently preparing a book on the French ethnologist and prehistorian André Leroi-Gourhan, and also researching a longer-term project on the reception of cybernetics in France. I am a founding member of the Science Technology Culture Research Group.

See my discussion of BRICOLAGE at http://www.wordsoftheworld.co.uk/videos/bricolage.html

Past Research

My past research has focused on the following aspects of contemporary French thought:

Derrida and deconstruction;

Lévi-Strauss, structuralism and anthropology;

Jacob, Monod and the language of molecular biology;

French intellectuals and the role of the interview in post-war French thought.

Future Research

The history of cybernetics, in particular the reception of cybernetics in France.

  • JOHNSON, C., 2013. All Played Out? Lévi-Strauss's Philosophy of History New Left Review. 79(Jan-Feb), 55-69
  • JOHNSON, C., 2013. The prehistory of technology: on the contribution of Leroi-Gourhan’s anthropology to Stiegler’s philosophy of technology. In: HOWELLS, C. and MOORE, G., eds., Stiegler and Technics Edinburgh University Press. (In Press.)
  • JOHNSON C., 2012. Bricoleur and bricolage: from metaphor to universal concept Paragraph. 35(3), 355-372
  • JOHNSON, C., 2011. ‘Epoch, event, context’, ‘The cybernetic imaginary’, ‘Grammatology as a “positive” science’, ‘Writing in evolution, evolution as “writing”’. In: GASTON, S and MACLACHLAN, I., eds., Reading of Grammatology Continuum. 3-5, 11-14, 79-81, 91-3
  • JOHNSON, C., 2011. Leroi-Gourhan and the limits of the human French Studies. 65(4), 471-87
  • JOHNSON, C.M., 2009. Before Babel: Lévi-Strauss and language. In: WISEMAN, B., ed., Cambridge Companion to Lévi-Strauss Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 237-54
  • JOHNSON, C., 2008. Analogue Apollo: cybernetics and the space age Paragraph: the journal of the Modern Critical Theory Group. 31(3), 304-326
  • JOHNSON, C.M., 2008. Derrida and technology. In: GLENDINNNING, S. and EAGLESTONE, R., eds., Derrida’s Legacies London: Routledge. 54-65
  • JOHNSON, C.M., 2007. The intellectual as celebrity: Claude Lévi-Strauss. In: GAFFNEY, J. and HOLMES, D., eds., Stardom in Postwar France Berghahn. 152-74
  • JOHNSON. C.M., 2006. I-you-we, Robot. In: BRADLEY, A. and ARMAND, L., eds., Technicity Prague: Litteraria Pragensia. 101-28
  • JOHNSON, C.M., 2005. Derrida: the Machine and the Animal Paragraph. 28(3), 102-20
  • JOHNSON, C.M., 2005. Avant Babel: Claude Lévi-Strauss, la langue, les langues. In: LAÜGT, E. and RIDON, J-X, eds., Nouvelles lectures de l'exotisme (Actes du premier colloque Nottingham-Pau) Nottingham: University of Nottingham. 29-39
  • JOHNSON, C.M., 2004. Rien ne va plus: Lévi-Strauss et l'histoire virtuelle. In: WISEMAN, B., ed., Les Temps Modernes, Special issue: Claude Lévi-Strauss, 628 Paris: Gallimard. 58-74
  • JOHNSON, C.M., 2004. Claude Lévi-Strauss: les années de formation. In: IZARD, M., ed., Special number of Cahiers de l'Herne: Claude Lévi-Strauss 82. Paris: Editions de l'Herne. 136-141
  • JOHNSON, C.M., 2004. Machine translation(s) Paragraph. 27(1), 64-78
  • JOHNSON, C.M., 2003. Claude Levi-Strauss: the Formative Years Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • JOHNSON, C.M., 2003. Introduction; and Lévi-Strauss in his interviews. In: JOHNSON, C.M., ed., Thinking in dialogue: the role of the interview in post-war French thought Nottingham: University of Nottingham. 1-4; 33-47
  • JOHNSON, C.M., 2003. Biotechnologies. In: WOLFREYS, J., ed., Glossolalia: key words in critical theory Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. 23-33
  • JOHNSON, C.M., ed., 2003. Thinking in dialogue: the role of the interview in post-war French thought Nottingham: University of Nottingham.
  • JOHNSON, C.M., 2002. Claude Lévi-Strauss. In: SIMONS, J., ed., From Kant to Lévi-Strauss: the background to contemporary critical theory Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. 228-243
  • JOHNSON, C.M., 1999. La vie, le vivant: biologie et autobiographie. In: MALLET, M-L., ed., L'animal autobiographique: autour de Jacques Derrida Paris: Galilée. 353-368
  • JOHNSON, C.M., 1999. Ambient technologies, uncanny signs Oxford Literary Review. 21, 117-134
  • JOHNSON, C.M., 1999. Structuralism, biology and the linguistic model. In: WOLFREYS, J., BRANNIGAN, J. and ROBBINS, R., eds., The French connections of Jacques Derrida Albany NY: State University of New York Press. 135-148
  • JOHNSON, C.M., 1998. 'Derrida', 'Structuralism', 'Lévi-Strauss', 'Anthropology and ethnology'. In: HUGHES, A. and READER, K., eds., Routledge encyclopaedia of contemporary French culture London: Routledge.
  • JOHNSON, C.M., 1998. Derrida and science Revue Internationale de Philosophie. 205, 477-494
  • JOHNSON, C.M., 1997. Sociology and anthropology
  • JOHNSON, C.M., 1997. Derrida: the scene of writing London: Phoenix Press.
  • JOHNSON, C.M., 1997. Anthropology and the sciences humaines: the voice of Levi-Strauss History of the Human Sciences. 10(3), 122-133
  • JOHNSON, C.M., 1997. Introduction; and Anthropology and sociology: from Mauss to Lévi-Strauss Modern and Contemporary France. 5(4), 405-408; 421-432
  • JOHNSON, C.M., 1997. Anthropology and sociology: from Mauss to Levi-Strauss Modern and Contemporary France. 5(4), 421-432
  • JOHNSON, C.M., 1997. Levi-Strauss: the writing lesson revisited Modern Language Review. 92(3), 599-612
  • JOHNSON, C.M., 1996. Mauss' gift: the persistence of a paradigm Modern and Contemporary France. 4(3), 307-318
  • JOHNSON, C.M., 1996. La leçon de philosophie: de Derrida à Lévi-Strauss. In: LISSE, M., ed., Passions de la littérature: avec Jacques Derrida Paris: Galilée. 125-139

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