The Culture of Endings

Humanities

Livio Dobrez¹ 

[1] College of Arts and Social Sciences, Australian National University, Retired, 9 Blair Street, Watson, Australian Capital Territory 2602, Australia; E-Mail

关键词: models of temporality;    biblical and mediaeval studies;    eschatology;    apocalypse;    messianism;    the Enlightenment;    Structuralism;    Post-Structuralism;    Post-Modernity;   

DOI  :  10.3390/h3040711

来源: mdpi

【 摘 要 】

This article analyses the cultural state of mind characteristic of historical periods at some kind of endpoint: the end of a world or even of the world or, most hypothetically, of the universe. This is the idea of Last Days. In order to contextualize it, it is necessary to consider varying conceptions of temporality: a hunter-gatherer model, models of cyclical time and of linear time. At least in the West, this last may be understood as a product of Judaeo-Christian thinking, of which the article gives an account focussed on the motifs of eschatology, apocalypse and messianism. Finally the article proposes that the present moment in history, characterized as “Post-Modernity”, may readily be read as a time of endings, perhaps even of a conclusive end.

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
© 2014 by the author; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.