What happens when we glance around a room? How do we trust what we see in fleeting moments? Glancing counts for more of human perception than previously imagined. An entire universe is perceived in a glance, but our quick and uncommitted attention prevents examination of these rapid acts and processes.

ContentsAcknowledgmentsPrologue: Regaining the GlanceIntroduction: Taking in the World at a GlancePart One: Approximating to the Glance1. Getting into the Glance2. Coming Closer to the Glance3. Becoming and Being Oriented by the Glance4. The Hegemony of the GazePart Two: Glancing Earlier and Farther Afield5. The Glance in Ancient Athens6. The Sudden, the Surprising, and the Wondrous: With Walter Benjamin on the Streets of ParisCodaPart Three: Getting Inside the Glance7. The Singularity of the Glance8. Glancing Time9. Attending and GlancingPart Four: Praxis of the Glance10. The Ethics of the Glance11. The Natural Environment in a Glance12. Glancing at the Image in Photography and PaintingConcluding Thoughts: Catching Sight of SurpriseAfterword: Families of the Glance and the GazeIndex

Elegantly written, this book, its erudition formidable, offers the reader an encyclopedic glance into a treasure-trove of information and knowledge bearing on vision: material in cinema studies, architecture, art criticism, world history, anthropology, urban studies, psychology, psychoanalysis, literature, and the natural sciences, as well as philosophy. To venture into its beckoning pages of stories is to undertake a richly rewarding journey, glancing at the world through configurations of time and space.Vol. IV.1 April 2009