An investigation of how material agencies structure social and ecological relations

• Read and download the introduction of Onto-Cartography for free now (pdf)
• Read a Q&A between the author, Levi Bryant, and Speculative Realism series editor Graham Harman (pdf)

Onto-Cartography gives an unapologetic defense of naturalism and materialism, transforming these familiar positions and showing how culture itself is formed by nature. Bryant endorses a pan-ecological theory of being, arguing that societies are ecosystems that can only be understood by considering nonhuman material agencies such as rivers and mountain ranges alongside signifying agencies such as discourses, narratives, and ideologies. In this way, Bryant lays the foundations for a new machine-oriented ontology.

This theoretically omnivorous work draws on disciplines as diverse as deconstruction, psychoanalysis, Marxism, media studies, object-oriented ontology, the new materialist feminisms, actor-network theory, biology, and sociology. Through its fresh attention to nonhumans and material being, it also provides a framework for integrating the most valuable findings of critical theory and social constructivism.

Key Features

• An ecological theory of being and social relations that presents a new posthuman theory of the subject and agency within an object-oriented framework
• Investigates how objects exercise power in the social world
• Shows how questions of social theory are a subset of questions of ecology
• Develops a theory of media and media ecology

Find out more

• Read and download the introduction of Onto-Cartography for free now (pdf)