Of Joints and Other Articulations
The Futures of Arthrosophy

Michael Marder (Author)

9780810149625, Northwestern University Press

Hardback, published 15 January 2026

176 pages
17.8 x 12.7 x 1.3 cm, 0.454 kg

"Of Joints and Other Articulations is highly original, brilliantly erudite, and extremely well written. Few thinkers can boast such a command of traditions and texts, ancient and modern, Western and Eastern. Marder rigorously controls the metaphorics of joints and articulation to yield a trenchant critique of nihilism in contemporary thought and politics. I know of no competing work." - Mary C. Rawlinson, University College, London

Articulates a philosophical mode of thinking modeled after our bodily construction points

What if we were to reimagine bodies of all kinds - biological and ecosystemic, political and textual, cosmic and artistic - from the perspective of their joints? This is the wager of Michael Marder's philosophical treatise, which explores the extremes of totalization and fragmentation by following the model of the joints, the structures that both articulate anddisarticulate complex living unities.

Of Joints and Other Articulations: The Futures of Arthrosophy proposes that as embodied figures of relations, joints shed new light on the question of time and the meaning of art, the activity of language and the fluctuations of good and ill health, political violence and humility, conversions and perversions. Arthrosophy, the wisdom of joints, supplements and substantiates philosophy itself, teaching us how to think through and with our knees and elbows, hips and shoulders, sutures and pivot joints.

Arthrosophy. The Wisdom of Joints
On Knees and Elbows. The Hinge Joints, or a Speculative Arthrology
Logos. A Dis/Jointure
On Hips and Shoulders. The Ball-and-Socket Joints, or Freedom and Constriction
Arthro-Psycho-Physiology. Joints in the Composition of the Body and the Soul
On Sutures, or the In-Between
Joints and Time
On Neck and Wrists. The Pivot Joints, or Turns and Turnings
Art’
s Articulations
The Arthritic Society
Notes
Index