Hosts, Hospitals and Hospitalities

Overview & Synopsis

Current historical and political issues, such as the refugee crisis and climate emergency, are deeply intertwined with notions, images and narratives of (in)hospitality and climate emergency. Departing from seminal works such as those by Kant and Derrida on these subjects, the chapters in this volume engage with these issues and examine how new postcolonial, gender, environmental and medical perspectives reshape current approaches to hospitality in literature, culture and the arts. Through a comparison of case studies from multiple national backgrounds, Hosts, Hospitals and Hospitalities shows how the concept of hospitality shapes the way in which we relate with the Other in diverse – as well as changing – cultural, political, social and environmental contexts. By examining the issues of hospitality from a post-pandemic standpoint, which revised the roles of our private and public spaces in the aftermath of Covid-19, by dwelling on novel issues of climate emergency and by focusing on current developments in terms of migration and displacement, the book adds new light and significant theoretical and methodological perspectives to previous debates about hospitality.