Outsider Theory

A vital and timely reminder that modern life owes as much to outlandishthinking as to dominant ideologies.

What do the Nag Hammadi library, Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code, speculativefeminist historiography, Marcus Garvey's finances, and maps drawn by asylumpatients have in common? Jonathan P. Eburne explores this question as never beforein Outsider Theory, a timely book about outlandish ideas. Eburne brings readers onan adventure in intellectual history that stresses the urgency of taking seriously- especially in an era of fake news - ideas that might otherwise be discarded orregarded as errant, unfashionable, or even unreasonable. 

Examining the role of such thinking in contemporary intellectual history, Eburnechallenges the categorical demarcation of good ideas from flawed, wild, or bad ones,addressing the surprising extent to which speculative inquiry extends beyond thework of professional intellectuals to include that of nonprofessionals as well, whetheramateurs, unfashionable observers, or the clinically insane. 

Considering the work of a variety of such figures - from popular occult writers andgnostics to so-called outsider artists and pseudoscientists - Eburne argues that anunderstanding of its circulation and recirculation is indispensable to the history ofideas. He devotes close attention to ideas and texts usually omitted from ormarginalized within orthodox histories of literary modernism, critical theory, andcontinental philosophy, yet which have long garnered the critical attention ofspecialists in religion, science studies, critical race theory, and the history of theoccult. In doing so he not only sheds new light on a fascinating body of creativethought but also proposes new approaches for situating contemporary humanitiesscholarship within the history of ideas. 

However important it might be to protect ourselves from "bad" ideas, Outsider Theoryshows how crucial it is for us to know how and why such ideas have left theirFall 2018 University of Minnesota Pressimpression on modern-day thinking and continue to shape its evolution.