Evolution and Conversion

René Girard is one of the most divisive and striking intellectuals of the 20th century. Over the past forty years, his work has continued to exert an influence across literary theory, philosophy and the social sciences. Echoing the format of his early works, Evolution and Conversion brings Girard into dialogue with two sympathetic interviewers and allows him to speak candidly about the major tenets of his life and thought.

Hailed by Michel Serres as “the Charles Darwin” of human sciences, Girard is in fact one of the few thinkers who has given full consideration to an evolutionary perspective to explain the emergence of culture and institutions. Evolution and Conversion draws out not only this aspect of his thought but also emphasises the centrality of religion to his work. Girard’s reflection on the relationship between violence and religion is both original and persuasive and, given the urgency of this issue in our contemporary world, in need of a reappraisal.

Chapter 1. The Life of the Mind
Chapter 2. “A theory by which to work”: the Mimetic Mechanism
Chapter 3: The Symbolic Species
Chapter 4. Critique and Dialogue: From Frazer to Levi-Strauss
Chapter 5: Method, Evidence and Truth
Chapter 6: The Scandal of Christianity
Chapter 7: Modernity, Postmodernity and the End of History