Michael J. Shapiro
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Michael Joseph Shapiro (born February 16, 1940) is an American educator, theorist, and writer. He is a Professor Emeritus of Political Science at the
University of Hawaii at Mānoa A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, the ...
. His work is often described as "postdisciplinary," drawing from such diverse fields as
political philosophy Political philosophy or political theory is the philosophical study of government, addressing questions about the nature, scope, and legitimacy of public agents and institutions and the relationships between them. Its topics include politics, l ...
,
critical theory A critical theory is any approach to social philosophy that focuses on society and culture to reveal, critique and challenge power structures. With roots in sociology and literary criticism, it argues that social problems stem more from soci ...
,
cultural studies Cultural studies is an interdisciplinary field that examines the political dynamics of contemporary culture (including popular culture) and its historical foundations. Cultural studies researchers generally investigate how cultural practices re ...
,
film theory Film theory is a set of scholarly approaches within the academic discipline of film or cinema studies that began in the 1920s by questioning the formal essential attributes of motion pictures; and that now provides conceptual frameworks for und ...
,
international relations theory International relations theory is the study of international relations (IR) from a theoretical perspective. It seeks to explain causal and constitutive effects in international politics. Ole Holsti describes international relations theories as a ...
,
literary theory Literary theory is the systematic study of the nature of literature and of the methods for literary analysis. Culler 1997, p.1 Since the 19th century, literary scholarship includes literary theory and considerations of intellectual history, mo ...
, African American studies,
comparative politics Comparative politics is a field in political science characterized either by the use of the ''comparative method'' or other empirical methods to explore politics both within and between countries. Substantively, this can include questions relatin ...
,
geography Geography (from Greek: , ''geographia''. Combination of Greek words ‘Geo’ (The Earth) and ‘Graphien’ (to describe), literally "earth description") is a field of science devoted to the study of the lands, features, inhabitants, and ...
,
sociology Sociology is a social science that focuses on society, human social behavior, patterns of Interpersonal ties, social relationships, social interaction, and aspects of culture associated with everyday life. It uses various methods of Empirical ...
,
urban planning Urban planning, also known as town planning, city planning, regional planning, or rural planning, is a technical and political process that is focused on the development and design of land use and the built environment, including air, water, ...
,
economics Economics () is the social science that studies the Production (economics), production, distribution (economics), distribution, and Consumption (economics), consumption of goods and services. Economics focuses on the behaviour and intera ...
,
psychoanalysis PsychoanalysisFrom Greek: + . is a set of theories and therapeutic techniques"What is psychoanalysis? Of course, one is supposed to answer that it is many things — a theory, a research method, a therapy, a body of knowledge. In what might b ...
,
crime fiction Crime fiction, detective story, murder mystery, mystery novel, and police novel are terms used to describe narratives that centre on criminal acts and especially on the investigation, either by an amateur or a professional detective, of a crime, ...
,
genre studies Genre studies is an academic subject which studies genre theory as a branch of general critical theory in several different fields, including art, literature, linguistics, rhetoric and composition studies. Literary genre studies is a structu ...
, new musicology,
aesthetics Aesthetics, or esthetics, is a branch of philosophy that deals with the nature of beauty and taste, as well as the philosophy of art (its own area of philosophy that comes out of aesthetics). It examines aesthetic values, often expressed thr ...
and
indigenous politics Indigenous may refer to: *Indigenous peoples *Indigenous (ecology), presence in a region as the result of only natural processes, with no human intervention * Indigenous (band), an American blues-rock band * Indigenous (horse), a Hong Kong racehor ...
. As the political theorist
William E. Connolly William Eugene Connolly is an American political theorist known for his work on democracy, pluralism, capitalism and climate change. He is the Krieger-Eisenhower Professor of Political Science at Johns Hopkins University. His 1974 work ''The Ter ...
has described him: "no one writing in English today has as wide a command over diverse references or develops more profound insights from them".Review of Shapiro's ''Methods and Nations: Cultural Governance and the Indigenous Subject''
at Amazon


Career

Shapiro's early work in
political science Political science is the scientific study of politics. It is a social science dealing with systems of governance and power, and the analysis of political activities, political thought, political behavior, and associated constitutions and la ...
covered the conventional areas of the discipline, including
political psychology Political psychology is an interdisciplinary academic field, dedicated to understanding politics, politicians and political behavior from a psychological perspective, and psychological processes using socio-political perspectives. The relations ...
,
decision theory Decision theory (or the theory of choice; not to be confused with choice theory) is a branch of applied probability theory concerned with the theory of making decisions based on assigning probabilities to various factors and assigning numerical ...
and
electoral politics An electoral system or voting system is a set of rules that determine how elections and referendums are conducted and how their results are determined. Electoral systems are used in politics to elect governments, while non-political elections ma ...
.Michael Shapiro
Faculty profile at University of Hawaiiʻi at Mānoa. Department of Political Science
Around 1980, however, under the influence of philosophers such as
Michel Foucault Paul-Michel Foucault (, ; ; 15 October 192625 June 1984) was a French philosopher, historian of ideas, writer, political activist, and literary critic. Foucault's theories primarily address the relationship between power and knowledge, and how ...
, Shapiro began employing concepts from
continental philosophy Continental philosophy is a term used to describe some philosophers and philosophical traditions that do not fall under the umbrella of analytic philosophy. However, there is no academic consensus on the definition of continental philosophy. Pri ...
and
cultural studies Cultural studies is an interdisciplinary field that examines the political dynamics of contemporary culture (including popular culture) and its historical foundations. Cultural studies researchers generally investigate how cultural practices re ...
including
governmentality Governmentality is a concept first developed by the French philosopher Michel Foucault in the later years of his life, roughly between 1977 and his death in 1984, particularly in his lectures at the Collège de France during this time. Governmenta ...
, micropolitics, the movement-image, the time-image, and
rhythmanalysis ''Rhythmanalysis: Space, Time and Everyday Life'' is a collection of essays by Marxism, Marxist sociology, sociologist and urbanist philosophy, philosopher Henri Lefebvre. The book outlines a method for analyzing the rhythms of urban spaces and the ...
, while introducing unconventional devices such as
first-person narrative A first-person narrative is a mode of storytelling in which a storyteller recounts events from their own point of view using the first person It may be narrated by a first-person protagonist (or other focal character), first-person re-teller, ...
into his essays. Shapiro's postdisciplinary political thought is the subject of a forthcoming volume from the Routledge book series "Innovators in Political Theory", which will feature a retrospective of his most important essays in a single volume. Shapiro is the editor of a book series in
political theory Political philosophy or political theory is the philosophical study of government, addressing questions about the nature, scope, and legitimacy of public agents and institutions and the relationships between them. Its topics include politics, l ...
(with the University of Edinburgh Press) entitled ''Taking on the Political''; previously, he was editor the journal Theory and Event from 2004 to 2009, a book series in
international studies International relations (IR), sometimes referred to as international studies and international affairs, is the scientific study of interactions between sovereign states. In a broader sense, it concerns all activities between states—such as ...
and
comparative politics Comparative politics is a field in political science characterized either by the use of the ''comparative method'' or other empirical methods to explore politics both within and between countries. Substantively, this can include questions relatin ...
(with the
University of Minnesota Press The University of Minnesota Press is a university press that is part of the University of Minnesota. It had annual revenues of just over $8 million in fiscal year 2018. Founded in 1925, the University of Minnesota Press is best known for its book ...
) entitled ''Borderlines''. Shapiro received his Ph.D. in
political science Political science is the scientific study of politics. It is a social science dealing with systems of governance and power, and the analysis of political activities, political thought, political behavior, and associated constitutions and la ...
from
Northwestern University Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston, Illinois. Founded in 1851, Northwestern is the oldest chartered university in Illinois and is ranked among the most prestigious academic institutions in the world. Charte ...
in 1966, before moving on to a position as professor and chair of the University of Hawaiii at Mānoa's Political Science Department. Shapiro has also taught at the
University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...
(1968–1970), the
University of Massachusetts Amherst The University of Massachusetts Amherst (UMass Amherst, UMass) is a public research university in Amherst, Massachusetts and the sole public land-grant university in Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Founded in 1863 as an agricultural college, it ...
(1979 and 1986), the
University of Bergen The University of Bergen ( no, Universitetet i Bergen, ) is a research-intensive state university located in Bergen, Norway. As of 2019, the university has over 4,000 employees and 18,000 students. It was established by an act of parliament in 194 ...
in
Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and t ...
(1972–73), the
Tisch School of the Arts The New York University Tisch School of the Arts (commonly referred to as Tisch) is the performing, cinematic and media arts school of New York University. Founded on August 17, 1965, Tisch is a training ground for artists, scholars of the a ...
at
New York University New York University (NYU) is a private research university in New York City. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded by a group of New Yorkers led by then-Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin. In 1832, the ...
(2002), and the
European Graduate School The European Graduate School (EGS) is a private graduate school that operates in two locations: Saas-Fee, Switzerland, and Valletta, Malta. History It was founded in 1994 in Saas-Fee, Switzerland by the Swiss scientist, artist, and therapist, Pao ...
in
Saas-Fee Saas-Fee () is the main village in the Saastal, or the Saas Valley, and is a municipality in the district of Visp in the canton of Valais in Switzerland. The village is situated on a high mountain plateau at 1,800 meters (5,900 feet), surrounded ...
,
Switzerland ). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the federal courts, are in other cities (Bellinzona, Lausanne, Luzern, Neuchâtel ...
. With his colleagues at the
University of Hawaii at Mānoa A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, the ...
Political Science Department, Shapiro founded what is sometimes called the Aloha School.


Bibliography

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * Original printed in 1993. * * * * * * * Aesthetics of Equality (Oxford University Press, 2023) Writing Politics: Studies in Compositional Method (Routledge, 2021). The Phenomenology of Religious Belief (Bloomsbury, 2021). Geopolitics of the Pakistan-Afghanistan Borderland co-edited with Syed Sami Raza (Routledge, 2021). The Cinematic Political: Film Composition as Political Theory (Routledge, 2020). Punctuations: How the Arts Think the Political (Duke University Press, 2019). The Political Sublime Duke University Press (2018). Deforming American Political Thought nd edition with a new chapter and subtitle Challenging the Jeffersonian Legacy (Routledge, 2016). Politics and Time: Documenting the Event (Polity, 2016). War Crimes: Atrocity, and Justice (Polity, 2015). Genre and the ostCommunist Woman co-edited with Florentina Andreescu (Routledge, 2015).


See also

*
American philosophy American philosophy is the activity, corpus, and tradition of philosophers affiliated with the United States. The ''Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy'' notes that while it lacks a "core of defining features, American Philosophy can nevert ...
*
List of American philosophers This is a list of American philosophers; of philosophers who are either from, or spent many productive years of their lives in the United States. {, border="0" style="margin:auto;" class="toccolours" , - ! {{MediaWiki:Toc , - , style="text-ali ...


Notes


External links


Michael J. Shapiro Faculty Page
at
European Graduate School The European Graduate School (EGS) is a private graduate school that operates in two locations: Saas-Fee, Switzerland, and Valletta, Malta. History It was founded in 1994 in Saas-Fee, Switzerland by the Swiss scientist, artist, and therapist, Pao ...
. (Biography, bibliography and video lectures)
An interview with Shapiro by ''Theory Talks''Book Review ''The Politics of Representation: writing practices in biography, photography, and policy analysis''A discussion with Michael J. Shapiro on cinema and politics by Lorenzo Rinelli on ''JGCinema''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Shapiro, Michael J. 20th-century American philosophers 21st-century American philosophers Philosophers from Hawaii American political scientists American political philosophers American expatriates in Switzerland Critical theorists University of Hawaiʻi faculty Academic staff of European Graduate School University of Massachusetts Amherst faculty 1940 births Living people Tisch School of the Arts faculty Philosophers from Massachusetts