In evolutionary biology, punctuated equilibrium is a theory that proposes that once a species appears in the fossil record, the population will become stable, showing little evolutionary change for most of its geological history. This state of little or no morphological change is called stasis. When significant evolutionary change occurs, the theory proposes that it is generally restricted to rare and geologically rapid events of branching speciation called cladogenesis. Cladogenesis is the process by which a species splits into two distinct species, rather than one species gradually transforming into another.
Posthumanism or post-humanism is an idea in continental philosophy and critical theory responding to the presence of anthropocentrism in 21st-century thought. Posthumanization comprises "those processes by which a society comes to include members other than 'natural' biological human beings who, in one way or another, contribute to the structures, dynamics, or meaning of the society."
In social theory, a metanarrative is an overarching narrative about smaller historical narratives, which offers a society legitimation through the anticipated completion of a master idea. The term was popularized by the writing of French philosopher Jean-François Lyotard in 1979. Metanarrative is considered a foundational concept of postmodernism.
Fredric Ruff Jameson was an American literary critic, philosopher and Marxist political theorist. He was best known for his analysis of contemporary cultural trends, particularly his analysis of postmodernity and capitalism. Jameson's best-known books include Postmodernism, or, The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism (1991) and The Political Unconscious (1981).
Niles Eldredge is an American biologist and paleontologist, who, along with Stephen Jay Gould, proposed the theory of punctuated equilibrium in 1972.
Saul Newman is a British political theorist who writes on post-anarchism. He is professor of political theory at Goldsmiths College, University of London.
Jonathan Donald Kramer was an American composer and music theorist.
Kate Soper is a British philosopher. She is currently Visiting Professor at the University of Brighton.
Michael E. Zimmerman is an American philosopher, integral theorist, author, and academic. He is a Professor Emeritus of Philosophy for Tulane University and University of Colorado at Boulder.
Douglas Kellner is an American academic who works at the intersection of "third-generation" critical theory in the tradition of the Frankfurt Institute for Social Research, or Frankfurt School, and in cultural studies in the tradition of the Birmingham Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies, or the "Birmingham School". He has argued that these two conflicting philosophies are in fact compatible. He is currently the George Kneller Chair in the Philosophy of Education in the Graduate School of Education and Information Studies at the University of California, Los Angeles.
Ariel Salleh is an Australian sociologist who writes on humanity-nature relations, political ecology, social change movements, and ecofeminism.
Joseph Carroll is a scholar in the field of literature and evolution. He received his PhD in Comparative Literature from the University of California, Berkeley and is now Curators’ Distinguished Professor Emeritus at the University of Missouri–St. Louis.
Robert Garner is a British political scientist, political theorist, and intellectual historian. He is a Professor Emeritus in the politics department at the University of Leicester, where he has worked for much of his career. Before working at Leicester, he worked at the University of Exeter and the University of Buckingham, and studied at the University of Manchester and the University of Salford.
Todd F. Davis is a prize-winning American poet and critic.
Kenneth Womack is an American writer, literary critic, public speaker, and music historian, particularly focusing on the cultural influence of the Beatles. He is the author of the bestselling Solid State: The Story of Abbey Road and the End of the Beatles, John Lennon, 1980: The Last Days in the Life, and Living the Beatles Legend: The Untold Story of Mal Evans.
Masahiko Aoki was a Japanese economist, Tomoye and Henri Takahashi Professor Emeritus of Japanese Studies in the Economics Department, and Senior Fellow of the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research and Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies at Stanford University. Aoki was known for his work in comparative institutional analysis, corporate governance, the theory of the firm, and comparative East Asian development.
Robert T. Tally Jr. is a professor of English at Texas State University. His research and teaching focuses on the relations among space, narrative, and representation, particularly in U.S. and comparative literature, and he is active in the emerging scholarly fields of geocriticism, literary geography, and the spatial humanities. Tally is the editor of "Geocriticism and Spatial Literary Studies," a Palgrave Macmillan book series established in 2013. The translator of Bertrand Westphal's Geocriticism: Real and Fictional Spaces and the editor of Geocritical Explorations, In addition to his numerous essays on literature, criticism, and theory, Tally has written books on Herman Melville, Edgar Allan Poe, Kurt Vonnegut, and J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit, as well as a critical introduction to the work of literary critic and theorist Fredric Jameson.
Carl A. Raschke is an American philosopher and theologian. Raschke is a Past Chair and Professor of Religious Studies Department at the University of Denver, specializing in continental philosophy, the philosophy of religion and the theory of religion. He was given the university lecturer award for 2020-2021. He is also listed with the affiliated faculty of the Global Center for Advanced Studies.
Michael Thomas is research professor at Liverpool John Moores University. His work incorporates the field of digital education in relation to social justice, the educational implications of disadvantage, online and distance education, digitally mediated communication, and higher education policy.
Josephine Donovan is an American scholar of comparative literature who is a professor emerita of English in the Department of English at the University of Maine, Orono. Her research and expertise has covered feminist theory, feminist criticism, animal ethics, and both early modern and American literature with a special focus on American writer Sarah Orne Jewett and the local colorists. She recently extended her study of local color literature to the European tradition. Along with Marti Kheel, Carol J. Adams, and others, Donovan introduced ecofeminist care theory, rooted in cultural feminism, to the field of animal ethics. Her published corpus includes ten books, five edited books, over fifty articles, and seven short stories.
