Negative Ecstasies

Despite Georges Bataille’s acknowledged influence on major poststructuralist thinkers—including Foucault Derrida Kristeva Lacan Baudrillard and Barthes—and his prominence in literary cultural and social theory rarely has he been taken up by scholars of religion even as issues of the sacred were central to his thinking. Bringing together established scholars and emerging voices Negative Ecstasies engages Bataille from the perspective of religious studies and theology forging links with feminist and queer theory economics secularism psychoanalysis fat studies and ethics. As these essays demonstrate Bataille’s work bears significance to contemporary questions in the academy and vital issues in the world. We continue to ignore him at our peril.