Introduction: Mapping Mimetic StudiesNidesh Lawtoo and Marina Garcia-GraneroPrelude: The Discus and the Bow: Homer, Machiavelli, and the Grandissimi EsempliNidesh LawtooPART 1 — RE-FRAMINGS OF CLASSICAL MIMESISChapter 1: Plato on FacebookMikkel Borch-JacobsenChapter 2: Techne vs. Mimesis in Plato’s Republic : What Socrates Really Says Against HomerHenry StatenChapter 3: Coercion and Mimesis in Plato: Compelling Someone to Change their NatureCarlos CarvalharChapter 4: Mimetic ResistanceTeresa Casas HernándezChapter 5: Behind Plato’s Shadows and Today’s Media MonstersMark PizzatoPART 2 — THEORETICAL RE-TURNS TO HOMO MIMETICUSChapter 6: Nietzsche’s Nihilism and Mimetic StudiesMarina Garcia-GraneroChapter 7: Essential Violence and René Girard’s Mimetic TheoryWilliam A. JohnsenChapter 8: Bataille on Mimetic HeterologyNidesh LawtooChapter 9: A New Logic of Pathos : The Anti-Oedipal Unconscious in Hysterical MimesisMaría del Carmen Molina BareaChapter 10: Exhibition/Exposition: Irigaray and Lacoue- Labarthe on the Theaters of MimesisNiki HadikoesoemoPART 3 — NEW MIMETIC STUDIES FROM AESTHETICS TO BIOMIMICRYChapter 11: Negative Empathy in Fiction: Mimesis, Contagion, CatharsisCarmen BonaseraChapter 12: Fernando Pessoa and the ([P]Re)Birth of Homo MimeticusKieran Keohane and Carmen KuhlingChapter 13: Literature, Pedagogy, and the Power of Mimesis : On Teaching Maylis de Kerangal’s The HeartEvelyne EnderChapter 14: The Biomimicry Revolution: Contributions to Mimetic StudiesHenry DicksChapter 15: Arks at Sea and Arcs of TimeWilliam E. ConnollyCoda. Beyond Brain and Body : A Dialogue with Vittorio GalleseVittorio Gallese and Nidesh LawtooNotes on ContributorsSecond volume of the Homo Mimeticus series to advance the emerging transdisciplinary field of mimetic studiesAfter the linguistic and the affective turns, the new materialist and the performative turns, the cognitive and the posthuman turns, it is now time to re-turn to the ancient, yet also modern and still contemporary realization that humans are mimetic creatures. In this second installment of the Homo Mimeticus series, international scholars working in philosophy, literary theory, classics, cultural studies, sociology, political theory, and the neurosciences engage creatively with the theory developed by Nidesh Lawtoo in Homo Mimeticus: A New Theory of Imitation to further the transdisciplinary field of mimetic studies.Agonistic critical engagements with precursors like Plato, Aristotle, Nietzsche, Bataille, Irigaray and Girard, involving contributions by leading experts of imitation such as Mikkel Borch-Jacobsen, William E. Connolly, Henry Staten and Vittorio Gallese among many others, reveal the urgency to rethink mimesis beyond realism. From imitation to identification, mimicry to affective contagion, techne to simulation, mirror neurons to biomimicry, Homo Mimeticus casts a shadow—but also a light—on the present and future, from social media to the Anthropocene.After the linguistic and the affective turns, the new materialist and the performative turns, the cognitive and the posthuman turns, it is now time to re-turn to the ancient, yet also modern and still contemporary realization that humans are mimetic creatures. In this second installment of the Homo Mimeticus series, international scholars working in philosophy, literary theory, classics, cultural studies, sociology, political theory, and the neurosciences engage creatively with the theory developed by Nidesh Lawtoo in 'Homo Mimeticus: A New Theory of Imitation' to further the transdisciplinary field of mimetic studies.Agonistic critical engagements with precursors like Plato, Aristotle, Nietzsche, Bataille, Irigaray and Girard, involving contributions by leading experts of imitation such as Mikkel Borch-Jacobsen, William E. Connolly, Henry Staten and Vittorio Gallese among many others, reveal the urgency to rethink mimesis beyond realism. From imitation to identification, mimicry to affective contagion, techne to simulation, mirror neurons to biomimicry, Homo Mimeticus casts a shadow—but also a light—on the present and future, from social media to the Anthropocene.