The Creativity of Action

Author: Joas, Hans

Humanities

Published on 26 October 1996 by Polity Press.

Paperback / softback | 352 pages, 0
228 x 153 x 18 | 536g

Hans Joas is one of the foremost social theorists in Germany today. In this outstanding book he outlines the fundamentals of a new theory of action, drawing on philosophical pragmatism. The work is based upon Joas's celebrated study of George Herbert Mead, but also establishes direct ties between Mead's work and approaches drawn from German traditions of philosophical anthropology. A major feature of Joas's theory is an emphasis on the creative character of human action. Human activity is not coincidentally, but in a fundamental sense, creative. The work contains new discussions of the nature of human intentions, the embodied character of human action and the character of intersubjectivity.

The problem of action is of crucial importance in both sociology and philosophy, and this book adds fresh impetus to the lively discussions current in the English-speaking world.