Virginia Woolf has for many years been seen as a key participant in British literary modernism. Following a period of relative critical neglect following her tragic death in 1941, her body of work has earned her recognition as a groundbreaking feminist thinker, a perceptive literary critic, a formidably creative diarist and correspondent, and as one of the twentieth century s leading essayists. Most notably, her experimental fiction, from her first novel The Voyage Out to the posthumously published Between the Acts, has grown in both popularity and critical renown. All of her work remains in print, and novels such as Mrs Dalloway, To the Lighthouse, and Jacob s Room are regularly read and discussed both inside and outside the academy. Few modernist writers indeed, few writers of any period have had such a pronounced and lasting impact on literary culture. There has been, and continues to be, an enormous amount of critical and scholarly work done on almost all aspects of Woolf s writing and life. Monographs, journal articles, and collections of essays dedicated to Woolf s writing appear every year alongside scholarly and popular biographies, and there is an annual international conference dedicated solely to her work. Yet amidst this veritable inundation of exegetical energy, this tremendous and ever-growing body of scholarly work on Woolf, there is one curious omission. While Woolf was both in theory and practice fascinated by questions of character and characterization, scholarship has not generally been directed towards this field. This may be due to both general theoretical discomfort with the critical category of character, and to a sense that Woolf s work in particular may not respond well to such interpretations. However, Woolf was very much an experimenter in character, and readings that minimize or ignore this interest miss an important facet of her work. This book offers the first full-length reading of Virginia Woolf s career-long experimentation in character. It examines her early journalism, from her short reviews of contemporary literature to more substantial essays on Gissing and Dostoyevsky, for indications of her engagement with questions of characterization, and links this interest to her later fictional writings. In The Voyage Out she establishes a continuum of levels of characterization, a key element of which is the Theophrastan type, an alternative form of characterization that corresponds to a way of knowing real people, while in Jacob s Room she seeks to represent an elusive essence that may exist outside of the structuring forms of social life, and which is accessible through speculative identification. Mrs Dalloway explores the shaping of character through social pressure, and To the Lighthouse proposes a simplified version of character as an ethically acceptable way of relating to other people. A similar notion is picked up in The Waves, in which a limited character, or form of caricature, is proposed as a possible solution to the problems of characterization. In Between the Acts, many of these themes reappear as Woolf simultaneously situates her characters more firmly than ever in a comprehensible physical and social context, and explores areas where language and rationality fail. Virginia Woolf: Experiments in Character is an important book for Woolf studies in particular, modernism studies more generally, and literature collections.
Since coming to power in 2007, the Sandinista Front of National Liberation (FSLN) has proclaimed itself the government of the poor and the government of peace and reconciliation. Accordingly, the regime has endeavoured to control and manipulate the symbols, social images, important spaces, and situations of popular struggles for social justice in the country. Under the watch of Daniel Ortega s administration, Nicaragua has become a country where an extraordinary effort is put into social spectacles, propaganda, and theatricality to create the impression of social and economic transformation. While the current regime orchestrates impressive social performances in support of its power, there are other social spectacles marking Nicaragua s urban landscape that tell a different story. These mine the gap between experiences and promises in today s Nicaragua. The exhibit of suffering bodies in public national spaces as political weapons by pesticide victims, as well as a transvestite circus spectacle in Managua redefine spaces and states of invisibility and visibility by articulating social positions through performance. The bodies of these Nicaraguans refusing to be invisible show Nicaragua s ongoing social drama of a predominant social power relation of inclusion and exclusion within a narrative intersected by political power, marginality and theatricality. As spectacularized bodies, they become avenues for showing processes of structural violence. Although there has been some excellent academic research focusing on performance or/and theatre in Nicaragua, such scholarship seldom attends to the very important connections between daily staged public social acts and local, national/global politics that deal directly and indirectly with marginalized social/cultural landscapes in this country. This book fills the gap by examining the connections between Nicaragua s marginalized landscapes and bodies, between social/political visibility and invisibility, and the relationship between social abandonment and social encompassment in the nation. Three sites form the core of this study: the current government s commoditized performances of compassion for the poor and traditionally excluded components of Nicaraguan society; fringe circuses and their displays of sexual marginality in undesirable urban areas; and, exhibits of suffering bodies in public national spaces as political weapons (aimed at the government and multinationals) by former banana plantation workers. One of the main contributions of Performance, Theatre, and Society in Contemporary Nicaragua is in its collective gathering of insights in areas of performance studies and ethnography that highlight and invoke local epistemes to critique Western ideologies and paradigms. With a view to furthering a critical ethnographic/performative epistemology, the book explores the methodological potentialities of research and presentation in Nicaragua. Through a methodology that combines ethnography and performance studies, called here presentational ethnography, the book brings together theoretical and interpretive insights about the links among neoliberal politics, nostalgia of the revolution and public spectacles that challenge prescribed notions of gender, sexuality and marginality in Nicaragua. Performance, Theatre, and Society in Contemporary Nicaragua is an important book for performance studies, social cultural anthropology, theatre studies and Latin American studies.
This book by renowned anthropologist Harald Haarmann illuminates the acquisition of knowledge, and the meanings underlying forms of knowledge, in a broad temporal scope, ranging from the Neolithic through the modern era. Spiritual knowledge is at the heart of this work, which views myth and religion encoded in Neolithic female figurines and revived in the contemporary primitive artwork of artists such as Constantin Brancusi and Henry Moore. Within such a framework, this study employs the knowledge and insights of the relatively new, and very important, interdisciplinary field of archaeomythology, which ties together information from archaeology, DNA studies, mythology, anthropology, classical studies, other ancient language studies, and linguistics. This study does so with a wealth of information in these fields, offering meaningful resolutions to many questions regarding antiquity, and shedding light upon several previously misunderstood phenomena, from the true function of Stonehenge (that its purpose was not astronomical), to the fact that there could not have been a mass movement of agriculturalists from Anatolia to Europe (this is a currently hotly contested issue), to important Eurasian religious beliefs and mythological motifs (with an excellent discussion of shamanism), to systems of writing (with a wonderful discourse upon ancient writing systems), religious expression, and mythology of the exceptionally significant cultures of Old Europe (Neolithic southeastern Europe). The book further discourses upon the legacy of this culture in Minoan and then Greek culture, Old European (pre-Indo-European) lexical items (that is, substrate vocabulary) in Greek, and finally the preservation of Neolithic spirituality in Modern Art. With this interdisciplinary approach, the study demonstrates that all of the subjects of this study are interconnected, in a powerful wholeness. Ancient knowledge, Ancient know-how, Ancient reasoning is an unprecedented study that will appeal across many disciplines, including archaeology, mythology, anthropology, classical studies, ancient language studies, and linguistics. The book also includes several images, maps, and tables that will prove helpful to the reader.
From the time Singapore gained self-government, both girls and boys have been given equal opportunities in education. This access to education has resulted in increased female literacy and improved social and economic status for women. However, in spite of this improvement, women s gender ideologies remain conservative and patriarchal. The school is an ideological apparatus of the state and this study examines how the education system has been used to influence the construction of femininity in school, thus maintaining the state s hegemony and preservation of a patriarchal framework in Singapore. It seeks to explore two questions: how the concept of femininity is constructed in the school curriculum and whether education for girls has empowered women or if it actually has entrapped them in subordination and maintenance of the patriarchal structure of society. In doing so, the author examines the gender ideology of the ruling elite through an analysis of its discourse on women and education. This will provide an understanding of the motivations behind policies such as equal educational opportunities for girls, and will highlight the primacy of pragmatic considerations of national economic advancement. At the same time, issues of subject choice and sex-differentiated curriculum as well as the embedding of gender ideology in curricular materials and school disciplinary codes are also examined in the light of how the concept of femininity is constructed in the school curriculum. A number of studies have focused on Singapore women s lives and careers, including their struggle to maintain coherence in their roles as career women on the one hand, and wives, and mothers on the other. What has not been examined is the school s role in the girls construction of femininity. The school, as the ideological apparatus of the state plays an important role in socializing girls to the norms, beliefs and value systems of the Singapore society. It is important to examine the state s gender ideologies and how such ideologies are transmitted via the education system. Gender messages are embedded in the formal and informal school curricula and these play an important part in children s construction of their gender identities. It has been assumed that because girls and boys are given equal opportunities in education, there are no important gender issues in the sphere of education. This book questions such an assumption and problematizes the role of education as a liberating force for women to investigate if education has indeed liberated women or entrapped them in subordination in a patriarchal society. This is the first comprehensive study of the impact of girls education on their construction of their gender identity. The author shows that women play an important but subordinate role in Singapore, be it in the economic, political or social sphere, and the government s support for equal opportunities for girls is based on pragmatic economic considerations and not on adherence to any dogma or theory. This gender ideology that is reflected in the education policies and curricula for schoolgirls emphasized patriarchal values and upheld traditional feminine virtues such as gentleness, docility and submissiveness. At the same time education and curricular policies encouraged girls to study the hard sciences, like the boys. All these have resulted in the construction of a dual role for women in both the economic and domestic spheres. The study also shows that for many years, education for girls had entrapped them in constructing a gender identity that upheld a patriarchal social structure. However, since the turn of the century, this construct has unraveled as the provision of modern education, especially in science and technology and the opportunities for employment have enabled women to become independent in many senses of the word, and this has brought about changes in society s gender ideology. The Construction of Femininity in a Postcolonial State: Girls Education in Singapore is an important book for any collection on gender and education. Educationists and the general public would find this study an enlightening read because it raises awareness about the importance of the role of education in the construction of gender identities.
In this book, renowned Korean studies scholar Peter H. Lee casts light on important works previously undervalued or suppressed in Korean literary history. He illuminates oral-derived texts as Koryo love songs, p'ansori, and shamanist narrative songs which were composed in the mind, retained in the memory, sung to audiences, and heard but not read, as well as other texts which were written in literary Chinese, the language of the learned ruling class, a challenge even to the reader who has been raised on the Confucian and literary canons of China and Korea. To understand fully the nature of these works, one needs to understand the distinction between what were considered the primary and secondary genres in the traditional canon, the relations between literature written in literary Chinese and that penned in the vernacular, and the generic hierarchy in the official and unofficial canons. The major texts the Koreans studied after the formation of the Korean states were those of the Confucian canon (first five, then eleven, and finally thirteen texts). These texts formed the basic curriculum of education for almost nine hundred years. * The literati who constituted the dominant social class in Korea wrote almost entirely in literary Chinese, the father language, which dominated the world of letters. This class, which controlled the canon of traditional Korean literature and critical discourse, adopted as official the genres of Chinese poetry and prose. Among the works in literary Chinese examined, this book explores the foundation myths of Koguryo and Choson, which center on the hero's deeds retold and sung to music composed for the purpose. Works in the vernacular discussed in this book include Kory? love songs, which reveal oral traditional features but have survived only in written form. Lyrics were often censored by officials as dealing with "love between the sexes." They intensely affect today's listener and reader, who try to reimagine the role of a general audience assumed to have the same background and concomitant expectations as the composers. The book also illuminates the works of the shaman, who occupied the lowest social strata. Shamans had to endure suffering imposed by authority, but their faith and rites brought solace to many, powerful and powerless, rich and poor. Some extant written texts are riddled with learned diction-Sino-Korean words and technical vocabulary from Buddhist, Daoist, and Confucian traditions. This study explores how the unlettered shamans of the past managed to understand these texts and commit them to memory, especially given the fact that shamans depended more on aural intake and oral output than on the eye. The Story of Traditional Korean Literature opens the window to the fusion--as opposed to the conflict--of horizons, a dialogue between past and present, which will enable readers to understand and appreciate the text's unity of meaning. The aim of crosscultural comparison and contrast is to discover differences at points of maximum resemblance. Lee's comparative style is metacritical, transnational, and intertextual, involving also social and cultural issues, and also paying careful attention to be non-Eurocentric, nonpatriarchal, and nonelitist. This book will provide critical insights into both the works and the challenges of the topics discussed. It will be an important resource for those in Asian studies and literary criticism.
Lord Ferdinando Stanley was the fifth earl of Derby, a leading claimant to the throne. Considered a man who had everything, he was also the patron of the company of players which was fortunate enough to include William Shakespeare. One April Fool's Day, 1594, he was reportedly approached by a witch (one of the famous legion of "Lancashire witches") and they engaged in brief conversation while strolling outside his largest palace, Lathom Hall. Four days later, he fell violently ill. For twelve days he lingered, while four of the best doctors in the country, including the famous Dr. John Case of Oxford, labored in vain to save him.Who killed Lord Stanley and why? Historians started debating that question almost as soon as he died, and outraged gossip was to be heard everywhere in England. This second edition studies the death of Lord Derby within the immediate contexts of Elizabethan power politics, succession mania, passionate religious controversy, the records of prominent families in the North, and the cult of personality just then beginning to become a major factor in the nation's social history. The book's scope also includes subcultural contexts such as Elizabethan poetry (Lord Derby was a pastoral love poet, some of whose work survives), witchcraft, medicine, spy networks, and both approved and disapproved methods of political assassination (with poison being the most frowned upon because of its disreputable "Italianate" connotations).
Conversant in critical and creative modes of thought, this book examines the uses of translation in Asian and Anglophone literatures to bridge discontinuous subjectivities in Eurasian transnational identities and translingual hybridizations of literary Modernism. Anglophone Literatures in the Asian Diaspora: Literary Transnationalism and Translingual Migrations focuses on the roles of mysticism and language in Dict e's poetic deconstruction of empire, engaging metaphysical issues salient in the history of translation studies to describe how Theresa Cha and four other authors Sui Sin Far, Chuang Hua, Kazuo Ishiguro, and Virginia Woolf used figurative and actual translations to bridge discontinuous subjectivities. The author Karen Lee s explorations of linguistic politics and poetics in this eclectic group of writers concentrates on the play of innovative language deployed to negotiate divided or multiple consciousness. Over the past decade, emerging scholarship on transnationalism and writers of Asian heritage has focused primarily on diasporic Asian literary production on American soil. For instance, Rachel Lee s seminal publication, The Americas of Asian American Literature: Gendered Fictions of Nation and Transnation (1999), examines how Asian American feminist literary criticism is shaped by global-local influences in the United States. Additionally, Transnational Asian American Literature: Sites and Transits (2006), edited by Shirley Lim, et al., explores the transnational aspects of Asian literature in America, analyzing a discursive globalized imaginary as American writers Asian of heritage move within and across national boundaries. Following Lim s anthology, Lan Dong s Transnationalism and the Asian American Heroine (2010) concerns the representations of women transposed from Asian oral traditions of women warriors to the United States. However, less scholarship on the Anglophone literatures of Asia and the Americas has focused on Asian writers within broader comparative frameworks of global perspectives outside Asian American literature and in comparison to Asian British literature, or aside from the parameters of specific Asia-to-America tropes such as the aforementioned woman warrior, as in Sheng-mei Ma s Immigrant Subjectivities in Asian American and Asian Diaspora Literatures (1998), or Kandice Chuh and Karen Shimakawa s Orientations: Mapping Studies in the Asian Diaspora (2001). Uniquely situated among these discussions, Lee s book extends current lines of inquiry by including the oeuvres of diasporic Asian writers in Asia, America, and abroad, presenting their works within the contexts of transnationalism via the dual lenses of translation and translingual migration. As new scholarship, this book foregrounds literary transnationalism and translingual migrations in a context of East to West as a study of representative Anglophone literatures in the Asian diaspora. Anglophone Literatures in the Asian Diaspora: Literary Transnationalism and Translingual Migrations is highly relevant to university teaching audiences in postcolonial literature, Asian American studies, Anglophone writers of the Asian diaspora, cultural feminism, Eurasian studies, and translation studies.
Edgar Allan Poe is a Romantic writer whose main aim in writing even in his so-called Gothic tales has been the deciphering of the soul and a fascination with the workings of the unconscious. As a post-enlightenment believer in the language of dreams, he experimented new ways of discovering the self. His practice shared a lot with and provided a rich soil for what was to be called analytical psychology. Edgar Allan Poe: An Archetypal Reading, while ostensibly attempting to read Poe s writings by way of archetypal models, takes the confident critical stance of resisting being limited by a singular--Jungian -approach, even though this would have been a convenient, even expected, route to take. The psychological or Freudian approach, which provides one major framework of interpreting symbols, has already been applied to Poe, with its own contribution and limitation, but in this book Poe is studied from an archetypal perspective. This approach is also used to deal with symbols in a framework, but the structure is more extensive because it attempts to address symbols not as symptoms in pathological cases but as normal phenomena in life. In a critical climate that sees scholarship mired in the feet-dragging obsession with arriving at originality and theoretical novelty, the present book s ability to retain its critical focus is evidence of a disciplined scholarly mind. Zarei carefully acknowledges the tradition out of which the adopted methodology emerges, and he is also mindful of the complexities and problematics that form a kind of critical baggage. The book navigates this complicated discourse with ease which is a testament of the author s mastery over the subject, as well as the primary material. The introductory chapter is convincing in its description of the archetypal approach, presenting its relationship to other, similar critical modes and therefore addressing the criticism that such an approach is old-fashioned. The organization of the book by aspects of the mythic tradition -heroism, journey and return -reinforces its purpose; these thematic elements apply to virtually the whole history of narrative writing. Therefore, the analysis locates Poe in a mythic-epic tradition rather than merely pointing out archetypal elements to a less clear purpose. Cultural and political concerns are incorporated persuasively into the argument. The choice of primary material covers the range of Poe s writings and provides an accurate representation of his body of work as they are mapped onto the archetypal models proposed in this book, thereby validating the models as more than mere conceptual ideas. The book makes a substantial contribution because it will be helpful to anyone interested in post-Jungian readings of Poe. Given that a substantial cohort of Poe critics employ psychoanalytic techniques, largely Freudian, these chapters should be a useful edition to the accumulated wisdom about an American Romantic author. Edgar Allan Poe: An Archetypal Reading is a useful addition to collections in American literature.
Research examining how schoolteachers have been represented in the news is scarce. This is noteworthy, given the recognition that the news media has an influential agenda-setting function, plays a pivotal role in shaping public opinion, and can influence educational policy. Indeed, there is a view amongst some authorities that education policy and news media coverage are irrevocably interconnected. Specifically in relation to newspapers, research indicates that their coverage can be particularly influential in informing and influencing public debate and policy about a variety of educational issues. Research has also been conducted on the reactions of teachers, reporting that they perceive news media coverage as important in shaping public opinion and education policy, as well as affecting their relationships with families, friends, and the community. Teachers in various countries have also expressed frustration at what they have perceived as a negative focus in coverage. Furthermore, news media coverage has been seen to play a role to the decline in the status of teaching that has been documented by researchers from many developed countries over the past three decades. It has been claimed that contemporary news media coverage has led to greater scrutiny and criticism of the teaching profession than ever before, with educators increasingly having to explain and justify their work. In addition to the widespread concern about the decline in the status of teaching, many countries are experiencing ongoing teacher recruitment and retention problems. Despite this, very few studies have considered how schoolteachers and teaching as a profession are depicted in the news media. Particularly scarce are investigations with a historical dimension. This book helps fill the gap by examining the reporting in The West Australian newspaper, one of the oldest newspapers in Australia and a daily publication since 1885. It is offered as a contribution towards rectifying the deficit in the corpus of work on how newspapers have depicted teachers and points the way towards one of a number of avenues of research that other scholars in the field could take for various contexts (including different countries) and time periods. The specific aim of the study is to provide a historical analysis of The West Australian newspaper s representation of teachers over two decades. To that end, it examines the portrayal of teachers in its reporting of five major educational developments in the state of Western Australia that were the subject of sustained coverage at various times between 1987 and 2007: unit curriculum (1987 1989), industrial dispute (1995), standardised testing (1997 2001), teacher shortage (1997 2007), and outcomes-based education (2005 2007). Although the study focused on The West Australian newspaper, the topics chosen reflect the international trends and universal issues in education. Each of the topics in the study is located within the broader context of related developments internationally, and especially in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia. Three key representations of teachers are identified: negative representations, sympathetic representations, and positive representations. The negative representations refer to coverage which is overtly critical of teachers such as reporting which condemns teachers for taking industrial action, the sympathetic representations relate to reporting which typically presents teachers as stressed, overburdened and powerless; and the positive representations show teachers as valued by the community and devoted to their students and work. The central argument of the study is that The West Australian s coverage was dominated by both negative and sympathetic representations of schoolteachers, while positive representations were relatively rare. Overall, the coverage presented a less flattering image of teachers than that which emerges from the educational research literature, yet it provided a more balanced presentation of teachers than the extremes of hero and villain which tend to dominate popular culture. Its portrayal of teachers was generally consistent with that of other news media, with a movement towards a more sympathetic treatment in recent reporting reflecting a trend also identified in contemporary British newspaper coverage. Although the sympathetic coverage did recognize the challenges faced by teachers, it consistently presented teaching as a profession in a negative light. Across the coverage, there was almost a total absence of voices defending teaching or presenting it as an attractive career option. In addition, comments of any type from individual teachers were rare. Overall, the book highlights the need for key media spokespeople in education politicians, union representatives, bureaucrats and academics to consider carefully the messages they want to send regarding teachers and teaching. It also points to implications for journalism education and journalism practice. This book should be read by those working in the fields of educational policy, journalism education, media studies, and history of education internationally, particularly those working in these fields in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand.
Contemporary American dance scholars agree that the first venue for critically informed, aware, and diverse reflections on dance was Impulse. While Impulse was recognized as the platform for dance scholarship during the years of its publication, following its cessation in 1970, only a handful of libraries and collections retained a full complement of its issues. Over time and out of view Impulse began to fade from memory, and many upcoming dance scholars were unaware of its rich history and seminal contributions to the field. Fortunately, as Impulse collected dust on shelves, technologies evolved that offered hope for the preservation of print and media collections. In 2008 a project was initiated to preserve Impulse as a digital collection and bring together a cohort of dance scholars to analyze each issue from today's point of view. Their collected works are presented in Contemporary Dance History: Revisiting Impulse, 1950-1970. There is no comparable study or project designed to preserve and facilitate access to original source materials in dance at this time. Perspectives on Contemporary Dance History: Revisiting Impulse, 1950-1970 stands alone as a compendium of critical analyses of the full roster of a publication dedicated to dance. As eminent authors of the time were invited to contribute to issues of Impulse, contemporary dance scholars were invited to contribute to this book that examines Impulse from today's point of view. This volume revisits the journal's breadth of commentary, scope of authorship, and provocative yet engaging discourses. In these regards Perspectives on Contemporary Dance History: Revisiting Impulse, 1950-1970 is unlike any other contemporary volume of dance studies. Perspectives on Contemporary Dance History: Revisiting Impulse, 1950-1970 will be of interest to current and emerging dance scholars, dance historians, cultural theorists, education specialist, arts librarians, and those who seek a model for reclaiming the foundational literature of a discipline.
Each year in the United States alone, over 125,000 children suffer serious burn injuries, and only a relative few are treated at specialized centers. Ratios are even more dismal in other regions of the world. These cases require immediate and complex care from a myriad of disciplines if survival and full functional recovery are to be achieved. This unprecedented book is therefore a vital resource as it describes the most advanced practices in use throughout the world in every type of burn wound category, providing clear descriptions of treatment methods from every discipline's perspective and from a variety of countries. It is the first book ever undertaken that is solely dedicated to providing a comprehensive roadmap to caregivers involved in treating and rehabilitating the child with a serious burn injury, from emergency room to resocialization. It is also the first planned approach to the future of pediatric burn care and education. The contributors to the volume were carefully selected for their expertise for this volume and are considered the top surgeons in the field. The editor, renowned surgeon and professor, Dr. Bradley Phillips, has devoted his career to the care of injured children. As an operating surgeon, active clinician, educator, lecturer and prolific author, Dr. Phillips' expertise is widely respected and recognized in the field. In this text, he has leveraged his Burn-Trauma-ICU background with selected colleagues from around the world in order to produce a work that encompasses the unique and cultural-specific aspects of caring for burned children. Pediatric Burns is an unprecedented edited volume that focuses on the spectrum of childhood burn injury. A collaborative work from authors around the world, this book describes the principles of management from Time Zero through Long-term Rehabilitation. Recognized experts have written individual chapters and the entire work addresses practical issues involved in caring for this unique patient population. This is a limited paperback edition.
"Alison Moore's sparkling collection of essays offers a host of fascinating perspectives on gender in French politics from the European witch-craze through to the current head-scarf controversy." - Colin Jones, Professor of History, Queen Mary University of London "Sexing Political Culture in the History of France gathers together several compelling essays that nuance older studies about how gender and sexual symbols stand in for the nation in its various incarnations from the Early Modern period to the present. By combining a long historical trajectory with detailed analyses of how the state or its opponents have used symbolic meaning to mobilize political action, clarify or criticize hierarchy, or simply make sense of social norms, these essays demonstrate the distinctive power of such symbolism and thus of this area of focus, which traverses intellectual, social, cultural history as well as the history of gender and sexuality. This is a cutting-edge collection that moves coherently from the early modern witch hunt to race in postcolonial France." - Carolyn J. Dean, John Hay Professor of International Studies, Brown University "Sexing Political Culture in the History of France marks a genuinely new departure in European history of sexuality studies. Alison Moore has gathered together contributions which demonstrate the manifold ways in which the language of gendered and sexualized stereotypes, behaviors, and practices has been deployed in the service of patriotic propaganda and the othering energies of nationalism in the French context. Further, she urges a nuanced focus on the fact that scholars too have embraced the tendency to metaphorize national, religious and political situations using sexual and gendered symbols. As such, the book also stands as a meditation on the political and libidinal character of historiography itself. The essays collected together in the volume cover a broad historical span and treat a wide-ranging array of fascinating topics from sixteenth- and seventeenth-century witch-hunts to historically recent debates about French secularism, Islamophobia, and the wearing of the veil. This book is a must-read for all students and scholars of French and European studies, gender and sexuality studies, and the history of ideas." - Lisa Downing, Professor of French Discourses of Sexuality, University of Birmingham
"Rethinking Chineseness: Translational Sinophone Identities in the Nanyang Literary World is the first book devoted to Sinophone Southeast Asian literature in the English-speaking world. Conceptually innovative and flawlessly written, this book makes an important contribution not only to the emergent and growing field of Sinophone studies, but also to Southeast Asian studies, Chinese studies, comparative literary studies, diaspora studies, and minority and multicultural studies. Anyone interested in questions of identity calibrated through such vectors as language, culture, history, geography, and nationality will find this book to be extremely valuable. This is an impressive accomplishment." - Professor Shu-mei Shih, University of California at Los Angeles "E. K. Tan has done magnificent work in rethinking literary and cultural politics in the context of Sinophone articulations. In Rethinking Chineseness he looks into sources drawn from the Sinophone communities in Southeast Asia, identifies indigenous and diasporic contestations, and teases out the radical elements in the contemporary debate about Chinese identities. Both historically engaged and theoretically provocative, Tan's book is a most important source for anyone interested in Chinese and Sinophone literary and cultural studies." - Professor David Der-wei Wang, Harvard University "With his illuminating historical and theoretical mapping of the concepts, from Overseas Chinese to Chinese Diaspora, Chineseness to Sinophone, E.K. Tan has done a brilliant job in this highly challenging, interdisciplinary project by weaving together discourses in various academic fields and providing an integrated cross-referential discussion. His selection of works by Singaporean and Malaysian writers fills in glaring gaps and further contributes to the richness and complexities of the notion of Sinophone literature and culture. It is a definitive basic reference in this field." - Professor Quah Sy Ren, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
Sexuality is often perceived as shameful, for the dangers it potentially precipitates rape, incest, exploitation, cruelty, and humiliation often outweigh its pleasures. Essentialist arguments surrounding sexuality have historically cast the subject as taboo, and even within relationships where sex is sanctioned namely heterosexual marital relationships it is often a difficult subject to navigate and negotiate. Over the last thirty years, feminist, postcolonial and queer theorists have interrogated the ways in which sexuality is conceptualized and constructed, specifically with the intention of deconstructing essentialist notions of sexuality and identity formation. Yet, while recent theoretical interventions have re-situated sexuality as a historical and social category allowing us to see how ideas about sexuality are linked to forms of power and other hegemonic categories of identity and subjectivity like class, race, gender and nationality sexuality remains a contentious subject. Debates surrounding the politics and problems of pleasure still proliferate within the academy, and in contemporary popular culture and society the pervasiveness of moral panics concerning the sexualisation or pornographication of Western cultures indicate that sexuality remains an elusive and complex topic, and one that requires continued critical reflection. A review of recent scholarship investigating the cultural representation of sexuality, work that pays specific attention to the imaginary and the expressive, reveals that much critical attention has tended to focus on film, theatre, and the visual arts rather than literature. While this is not surprising given the dominance of visual culture in today s media-saturated societies around the world, literature and written discourse will continue to play a central role in determining how we understand and define our (sexual) selves as long as there are literate populations. This collection seeks to close a gap in current critical scholarship by attending precisely to the nexus between sexuality and literature of the contemporary moment. It contends that reading, not just viewing, informs how we think of ourselves as sexual beings, and that literature and the written realm of the imagination remains an important outlet for the expression and exploration of sexual desire, sexual acts, sexual being, sexual identity and sexual interaction. In critically examining the plural representations of sexuality in contemporary literature, this book has a distinctly global emphasis, containing essays that interrogate sexuality in the work of not only a number of mainstream American and British writers but also less well-known writers from New Zealand and Canada. All of the chapters owe primary intellectual and theoretical debts to three broad and overlapping domains of critical scholarship and practice: feminism, queer theory, and postcolonial studies. As the first critical collection of essays to consider the representation of sexuality across such a wide variety of contemporary writing, Sexuality and Contemporary Literature analytically foregrounds insights into the historical and current arrangements of sexuality that contemporary literature provides, while also inviting the reader to imagine other possibilities for the future that literary texts open up. Sexuality and Contemporary Literature is an important book for literary and cultural studies collections.
Why a book on a research study using grounded theory, a methodology that is currently celebrating its 50th anniversary? Although the theory has now been in existence for many years, there has never been a book recounting its application through numerous interconnected studies, as it was originally intended to be used. This book represents the first book-length cohesive narrative on how this method was rediscovered by a researcher over the course of a new series of studies, redeveloped in the context of a topic previously undisturbed, applied, poked around, and problems generated (with solutions to these found or not). There has never been a narrative on how a researcher sat down and worked through data over decades in order to evolve his or her own grounded theory and methodology about a specific phenomenon. This study is also a response to the need for a book that mixes the three traditional genres of the literature on methodology many of which are cited and are themselves subjects and also adds to a debate on research about research methods, by developing a case study of what it is like to be the human subject that is called the researcher as well as a pursuant of empirical methodology. The purpose of this book is to break a number of the conventions of research texts by writing an academic text on methodology as a case study of building case studies, one that cites classic works in the field and contains autobiographical considerations throughout its account, one that narrates the conscious process of designing a framework from the range of philosophies that were involved in chronicling this topic. Most importantly, however, this book has developed to be the story of being a human enquirer, one with a research and professional trajectory to work towards. This study also offers a wholly different approach by describing the processes and evolutions that brought the author Simon Hayhoe to develop what he terms a grounded methodology.
It took two hundred years to implement democracy within the nation-state, from the emergence of democratic theories during the Enlightenment to the introduction of popular government after World War I. If the same process were to follow at the international level, and the treaty of Versailles was taken as the baseline for the calculation, a democratic world order could be expected to emerge by 2119 - hence the title of this book. The point is the long perspective. Most scholars in mainstream political science and international relations are skeptical of the prospect of global democracy and believe that in the short run the fight against corruption and abuse of power is a more pressing task. This is true and very much an important mission; as such, corruption is treated in a special chapter of the book. But in fulfilling this mission, the finite goal should not be forgotten. The present good must not be the enemy of the ultimate best. To promote short-time accountability in world politics, leading scholars suggest new, so called pragmatic methods instead of old-fashioned values such as political equality and electoral accountability. Critical analyses of how this pragmatism has already functioned in various international organizations are presented as well as a discussion of four models of global democracy: "federalism", "cosmopolitanism", "global corporatism" and "stakeholder democracy". The book is a bold, unique and provocative defense of classical democracy transferred to the global level. Today, students of international politics are learning that global democracy is not feasible. The future is said to belong to the nation-state. Still, in an era of globalization more and more decisions are made on the supranational level. Small social changes in one place have great consequences elsewhere. Rivers, winds, migration, financial operations, trade and travel do not stop at national borders. The question is not whether there exists a decision-making process above the nation-states but rather if these decisions should be made in a democratic fashion or in some other way. The reason for studying the book, then, is to obtain a critical view of the conventional wisdom today so that the goal of global democracy is not abandoned. 2119 - The Year Global Democracy Will Be Realized applies a comprehensive approach to globalization and democracy and presents new insights in the intriguing dialectics between these two phenomena. After the end of the Cold War, democratic theory has changed from "input-legitimization" in terms of voting, participation, and procedure to "output-legitimization" with an emphasis on welfare, consensus, and results. Again, Platös guardians are hailed as the people¿s true friend, whereas the possibilities to hold the collaborating governors to account by the voters are rendered more difficult. Anyone interested in this philosophical change should read the book. 2119 - The Year Global Democracy Will Be Realized is written in a clear and accessible manner, deliberately avoiding jargon, and will be especially useful for students and scholars in political science, international relations, and related fields as well as for journalists, moulders of public opinion, political decision-makers, and involved citizens.
Ousmane Sembène was a Senegalese film director, producer, and writer whom the Los Angeles Times considered one of the greatest authors of Africa. Often called the "father of African film," Sembène strongly believed that African films should be geared primarily toward educating the masses and making the philosophical quandaries and political issues contested by elites accessible to the poor and those with little to no formal education.Although Sembène's central aim was to reach African audiences and encourage a dialogue within Senegalese society, his films are also extraordinarily effective in introducing non-African audiences to many of the most intriguing cultural issues and social changes facing African people today. The films are not fast paced in the manner of many Hollywood films. Rather, they are deliberately unhurried and driven by the narrative. They show actual ways of life, social relations, and patterns of communication and consumption, and the joys and tribulations of West African people. For people who have never been to Africa, the films offer an accessible first gaze. For those who have visited or lived in an African culture, the films provide a way to explore African society and culture more profoundly. Sembène was an independent filmmaker, solely and totally responsible for the content of his films, which were inspired by the realities of daily life. This focus on microcosmic social relations and day-to-day politics is so central to Sembène art, his films breed provocative commentary on social, historical, political, economic, linguistic, religious, and gender issues relevant to Senegalese society. Because of his concern with daily Senegalese life, Sembène targeted the common people whose voices are seldom or never heard. In fact, depicting the struggles and concerns of average Senegalese people was a central preoccupation of his films, as he himself has articulated. This study examines the artistry of Sembène's films as well as the multitude of signifying elements Sembène uses in them to communicate in less direct ways with his audience. The book interprets the meaning conveyed by images through their placement and function within the films, and it contributes new insights into Sembène's interpretations of cultural practices and the meanings he ascribes to social behaviors. It examines how Sembène uses language, mise-en-scène, cinematography, and creative editing to evoke the emotions of his targeted audience. Several chapters in the volume also demonstrate how the many ironies and political economic tensions that are so characteristic of Sembène's work are best understood within the sociocultural context of each film's production. Hence, to make sense of Sembène's cinema, one must be willing to read beyond the denoted meaning of the storyline and to dig into the cultural significance of the carefully selected and manipulated codes and images.
Many historical books have been written about the Sand Creek massacre--some were sympathetic to the actions of Colonel Chivington while others acknowledged the injustice. The Sand Creek massacre is a complicated piece of Colorado history with very little consensus. In the mid 1990s, Arapaho and Cheyenne people started visiting the location where the massacre was believed to have occurred with the permission of some local landowners. They claimed that their communities continued to suffer from the collective memories of the event, and they wanted to begin to heal through spiritual cleansing rituals. This sparked a movement to establish a memorial at the Sand Creek location. After nearly ten years of extensive research financial negotiations and state and federal lobbying efforts, the Sand Creek Massacre National Historic Site was established as a national park by Congress. It opened to the public in April of 2007. The Sand Creek Memorial National Historic Monument stands out because it shows the US federal government not only acknowledging wrongdoing towards American Indian people but also attempting to memorialize that wrongdoing in an official capacity. This memorial has set a unique precedent in American history. Unlike other monuments, this one begins with an acknowledgment of the injustice and tragedy that occurred at the location. For this reason, the Sand Creek Massacre National Park and Monument presents a unique opportunity to examine cultural identity, history and national identity. While memorials that acknowledge tragedy have been examined by scholars, this is usually done after the completion of the design. The present study is therefore unique because it also examines the unfolding of the memorialization process prior to the completion of the memorial design. This unique site posed an opportunity to examine how the US dominant cultural interests would be able to manage such a tragic and unflattering narrative while maintaining a cohesive national identity in the face of such action. The site also presented an excellent opportunity to examine the collective memory and memorialization, in terms of the experience and cultural identity of the Cheyenne and Arapaho people, which is detailed in thus book. Finally, this study also analyzes and interprets how a memorial can contribute to long term peace and reconciliation interests amongst ethnic groups formerly engaged in violent and intractable conflict. Many discussions of collective memory utilize a specific disciplinary perspective and methodology, but this unique book integrates ethnographic, critical, rhetorical, and historical methods of research. It also examines the performative and ritual aspects of collective memory and not just the physical, textual and historical artifacts of memory. As such, this study contributes to the theoretical discussion of how collective memorialization contributes to long term processes of peace and reconciliation. This book will be a valuable resource to cultural anthropologists, rhetoric and communication studies scholars, American Indian studies scholars, peace studies and conflict resolution scholars, historians, as well as critical theory and cultural studies theorists.
Nobel Laureate Gao Xingjian is amongst the most challenging writers of the present era. He has probed the dynamics of Chinese and European literature and developed unique strategies for the writing of seventeen plays, two novels, a collection of short stories and a collection of poems. He has also written two collections of criticism. The present collection takes the title Aesthetics and Creation from the name of the Chinese collection from which most of these essays are drawn, but it also includes some of Gao's most recent unpublished essays. University of Sydney academic Mabel Lee is the translator, and the book also includes her authoritative introductory essay that contextualizes Gao's significant position as an independent and uncompromising voice in the noisy hype of the globalized world of the present in which creative writers and artists are forced to conform with the demands of political and other group agendas, or with market forces, in order to survive. In incisive and cogently argued essays, he exposes the political dynamics of so-called "modernity" in Western literature and art, and how this has been enthusiastically embraced in China since the 1980s. In other essays he analyses traditional and modern European and Chinese notions of fiction, theatre and art, and elaborates on what aspects of writers and artists from both cultures have informed him in developing his own aesthetics in narration, performance and the visual arts. These essays testify to the extent of the cosmopolitanism of his aesthetics that both informs and are manifested in his literary and art creations. This book has importance and relevance to the general reader with an interest in literature and art as a creative human pursuit that is not demarcated by national or cultural boundaries. This book is both indispensable and inspiring reading for intellectuals and informed readers who regard themselves as citizen of the world. For academics, researchers and students engaged in the disciplines of literature and visual art studies, world literature studies, comparative literature studies, performance studies, theatre studies, cultural studies, narrative fiction studies, and studies in the history of literature and the visual arts in modern times, this book is essential and thought-provoking reading that will have many positive outcomes.This book is in the Cambria Sinophone World Series (General Editor: Victor H. Mair).
Ever since they were written in the fourteenth century, The Romance of the Three Kingdoms and The Water Margin have been considered masterpieces of traditional Chinese fiction. People from different social strata have read them and remembered their stories and characters. Since the early twentieth century, Chinese critics have regarded them as part and parcel of their country's literary heritage, offering largely positive artistic assessments even as they criticize their feudal elements. In contemporary China the popularity of the two novels has made them logical choices for adaptation, resulting, for example, in a large number of films and TV dramas based on episodes in the two novels. Given their importance in traditional Chinese literature, these two classics have garnered a tremendous amount of critical attention from scholars. However, nearly all critics have treated them as literary works, failing to explore, in a concentrated manner, their cultural values even as they acknowledge their widespread social influence. This book is not a work of literary criticism in the conventional sense. Rather, it is a cultural/ideological critique. Liu Zaifu's interest lies not in the artistry of the two novels but in the cultural values they reflect and spread. In summing up the worship of violence as the ideal in The Water Margin and the worship of trickery as the ideal in The Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Liu Zaifu uses the two novels as windows to look into certain unhealthy aspects of Chinese culture, linking the novels' enduring popularity and social impact to the Chinese national character. Liu also contrasts the two novels with other classics, such as The Classic of Mountains and Seas and The Dream of the Red Chamber, to demonstrate the multiplicity of Chinese culture. As he calls the two classics into question, he continues to carry the May Fourth critical spirit in contemporary China and expands the scope of cultural criticism. A Study of Two Classics is the first book that focuses exclusively on the cultural values of the two classics. In addition, Liu Zaifu examines how traditional commentators like Jin Shengtan and Li Zhi promoted the cultural values embedded in the two classics and how these harmful values are received and reinforced in contemporary China. He draws inspiration from May Fourth intellectuals, particularly Lu Xun, and from a wide range of works by Western scholars. For instance, he uses Oswald Spengler's notion of "pseudomorphosis" to explain the degeneration and falsification of certain values in Chinese culture. As he engages in cultural comparison either implicitly or explicitly he also asks questions about modernity and modernization. Liu's style is essayistic, which allows him to bring both erudition and personal observation into play. Originally written for a Chinese audience, this highly anticipated translated work will help English-speaking readers understand the issues a leading contemporary Chinese critic tries to address. This is a critical book for scholars and students in Asian studies and literature. This book is part of the Cambria Sinophone World Series (series editor: Victor H. Mair).
By examining case studies of tough times for the president, this book broadens the understanding of presidential power and both the limits and opportunities chief executives face as they govern from the Oval Office. It points to a new view of the sources of presidential power. This study of presidential adversity illuminates the fundamental sources of executive power-executive actions, foreign policy initiatives, organizational changes, going public, and unconventional actions-that form a foundation for the persuasive influence that many see as the epitome of presidential leadership. It also shows how presidents cope with the kinds of tough circumstances in which chief executives find themselves all too often. The case studies show American chief executives facing some of the toughest political situations of their presidencies, and illuminates important episodes in modern political history. The authors show Gerald Ford trying to govern without any of the traditional sources of political capital, Bill Clinton recovering from two near-death political experiences (the loss of Congress in 1994, then the Lewinsky scandal), and the unraveling of the George W. Bush presidency. The authors also use these insights to help build an alternative understanding of presidential power. The authors' cases of presidents in tough times leads to a new view of presidential power as situational leverage. They sketch an understanding of power as leverage that takes into account the resources that a president is able to apply in a particular situation, weighed against the risks and obstacles that threaten to undermine presidential goals and the opportunities that help to motivate the president. This approach presents a more accurate, realistic, and useful view of presidential power than Richard Neustadt's catchy but misleading "power to persuade." Moreover, viewing power as leverage helps to account for why recent presidents have devoted time and attention to employing and expanding their capacity for unilateral action. Tough Times for the President is a unique book because it provides a different perspective on America's most important office. Most books on the presidency focus on issues of presidential leadership, presidential greatness, or influence over policy, but none compares how presidents have responded to the political challenges confronting them. This book is appropriate for upper-division undergraduate students, graduate students
Climate Change Politics offers a critical, yet hopeful examination of political vitality in the politics of climate change and discusses how people use various forms of communication to challenge existing power hierarchies. Because the meanings of climate change and of the numerous aspects of reality associated with it are constructed through communication, we offer an analysis of communication practices and structures as constitutive of climate change politics. A broad variety of case studies demonstrate how the choices made within various forms of public engagement result from social interaction based on communication. The editors of the volume follow Chantal Mouffe in describing "the political" as engagement with processes of debate and decision making on collective issues where different values, preferences, and ideals are played out and opposed. This book examines communication as a key component of climate change politics and shows how climate change communication has the potential to invigorate civic politics. It analyzes how citizens represent, construct, and circulate ideas about climate change and how these practices relate to decisions and public policies, as well as to political identities. Contributing authors explore how changes in the ways information is produced and consumed have contributed to new spaces for political engagement. They analyze a range of semiotic resources and practices within which the meanings of climate change are negotiated. By looking at the multiple ways people experience and communicate about climate change, the analysis extends beyond the cognitive to include emotional, aesthetic, and other epistemologies that shape political engagement with this issue. Individual chapters examine various forms of climate change communication, including artistic expression ranging from installations to cinema, on web-based spaces, and on other alternative media. Working from the premise that communicative practices provide the basis for broad public engagement, this book identifies and examines how the possibilities entailed in that engagement may yet contribute to a transformation of climate change politics that empowers both individual political subjects and their communities. Climate Change Politics is likely to be of interest to a variety of audiences including researchers and students of climate change politics, environmental communication, and social movements in disciplines such as communication, geography, political science, and sociology. The book is suitable as a textbook for both advanced undergraduate and graduate courses on climate change and society; environmental communication; and science, technology, and society.
"This highly original book shifts our attention away from the preoccupations of the U.S. to India and from conventional social science and area studies perspectives to civilizational sensibilities. In a series of searching essays by well-informed Indian scholars, China's rise appears in a fresh light. Rather than seeking to bend China's experience only to the impatient expectations of secular liberalism, this important book reminds us of the imagined affinities that a civilizational understanding of self and other creates in India for China and the empathetic patience it engenders. Our understanding of China is greatly enriched by new insights that this broader vision yields." - Peter J. Katzenstein, Walter S. Carpenter, Jr. Professor of International Studies, Cornell University
By concentrating on issues in postcolonial nations, the authors decenter western notions of public relations practice and embrace the cultures, economies, and political structures that have been profoundly influenced by the legacy of colonialism. Instead, the authors conceptualize public relations as a communicative and relationship-building practice that can bridge the political- and cultural-economic spheres of globalization, recasting practice as a central tenet of a global social justice agenda. The purpose of this study is to examine critically how public relations is shaping globalization efforts and practices in countries that have historically experienced western control. The study aims to document those practices to solidify a commitment to participatory public relations that alleviates serious social issues and inequities. This is an important book for public relations scholars and practitioners, along with those in the strategic communication, international communication, and international relations fields.
Canada has a complex health delivery system which is a conglomeration of 13 public plans--10 provincial and three territorial as well as a number of federally administered plans serving special populations such as Aboriginals and Veterans--all providing full coverage for most hospital and physician services as well as partial coverage for many services that vary among plans. The importance of this study is that it examines how the public/private sector relationship in health care delivery--particularly that of the for-profit sector--has developed both historically and in recent years, in three subnational provincial jurisdictions within a federal system. The case study provinces are Ontario, Quebec, and Alberta. The study examines both similarities and differences in this development. These provinces are highly distinct in their political culture and political history affecting health care delivery. Ontario and Quebec are Canada's most populous provinces and Alberta is an increasingly populous prairie state. Alberta is unique in its long-time governance of the Progressive Conservative party and its predecessor the Social Credit Party. Ontario has had a more variable political history with periods of Progressive Conservative, New Democratic Party and Liberal leadership and in recent years Quebec governance has shifted between the Parti Québecois and the Liberal Party. In this study, one dimension that the authors examine are political dispositions to act regarding public/private initiatives in health care delivery and how this affects health care delivery in these provinces. Provincial medical and hospital plans are constrained by the Canada Health Act of 1984. For necessary medical and hospital services, the provinces and territories must adhere to the five principles of the Act in order to receive federal funding. However for other extended health care and health care-related services, there are federal contributions that are not constrained by these principles--although subject to reporting obligations. Another factor providing some flexibility in provincial Medicare plans is that necessary hospital and medical services are not enumerated in the Canada Health Act. This has allowed some "delisting" of services which is discussed in the case studies. In the provincial case studies, the authors examine how the federal/provincial dynamic in the delivery of health care services has worked out in the three provinces, with respect to similarities and differences regarding the involvement of the for-profit sector both within and outside the respective Medicare systems. They also examine how the fiscal setting has affected both political and economic sustainability pressures with respect to inclusion of private commercial initiatives in these three provincial settings. The authors note that these initiatives occur both within and external to Canadian provincial Medicare systems and that there is a need to see that such initiatives are held publicly accountability to meet equity and access goals. The study utilizes government documents, press reports and personal interviews to draw a picture of health delivery developments within the Canadian federal context. This study adds to the comparative health policy literature by applying a comparative approach to subnational provincial cases. It is also noteworthy to note that globally, many nations' health insurance plans incorporate a mixed public and private health delivery system, albeit that the mixes of for-profit and not-for-profit organizations will vary with respect to the ideological, political, cultural and historical characteristics of various nations. This is an important book for collections in Canadian studies, political science, and public health.
The Classic of Changes (Yi jing) is one of the most ancient texts known to human civilization, always given pride of place in the Chinese classical tradition. And yet the powerful fascination exerted by the Classic of Changes has preserved the archaic text, widely attracting readers with a continuing interest in trying to understand it as a source of reflection and guide to ordinary circumstances of human life. Its monumental influence over Chinese thought makes the text an indispensable element in any informed approach to Chinese culture.Accordingly, the book focuses on the archaic core of the Classic of Changes and proposes a structural anthropological analysis for two main reasons. First, unlike many treatments of the Yi jing, there is a concern to place the text carefully in the context of the ancient culture which created it, allowing a fuller appreciation of its divinatory mission, a unique orientation towards writing and literature. Second, the approach differs from traditional exegesis which did not and ultimately could not address problems of textual understanding in a holistic sense. This book is not a translation of the Classic of Changes; it is a careful interpretation, or rather method of exploration, of the connectivities and topography of the text as a whole. By isolating the social forms of an individual life, against the background of the archaic cosmology, as the structural preconditions for each randomized divination, this analysis succeeds in illuminating dimensions of early Chinese life that would not otherwise be accessed through other historical or archaeological materials. This provides a penetrating anthropological view into the conditions of thought in an archaic society to a degree previously unavailable. This book is thus a bold and powerful attempt at modeling an ancient culture in a way never before conceived sociologically, a profound auto-ethnography teaching us about the philosophical anthropology of its makers and preparing the way for further understanding of later classical texts. It will be of interest to all those engaged in seeking philosophical anthropological understanding of culture and writing, and especially contributes to the study of cultures of antiquity and their modes of thought. Anyone interested in complex, formalized classification systems would want to consider this analysis.
Popular and scientific literature is still permeated with male aggression as a product of long evolution. The fact that violent aggression appears in the archeological records less than half as long ago as artistic expression should give pause to any student of human behavior. Humans are nothing like apes--chimpanzees, bonobos, gorillas, or orangutans which developed their mating systems independently from humans, and from each other. Chimpanzees have a promiscuous mating system, bonobos are completely hedonistic, gorillas have a harem system, and orangutans are essentially solitary. In those species, males may compete with each other, so aggression can occur. Gibbons would be a better model for human behavior because they live in nuclear families (several ages of dependant offspring living with adults for many years) and are never aggressive toward each other. Nuclear families are intimately tied to peaceful living because, once established, there is no need for aggression, except for defence of territory against outsiders. Although male aggression is a sad fact of modern society, factors other than genetic heritage should be examined to explain this. This book reviews the recent advances in the knowledge of human evolution that have greatly changed our conceptions. It has been uncovered that humans are nothing like chimpanzees, and far less like baboons. Early humans never knuckle-walked, left the jungle for the savannah where they roamed widely in dispersed populations, and for more than four million years lived in small groups or relatively peaceable societies with fathers raising children and joining with other adult males for community projects. Human Evolution and Male Aggression dispels misconceptions based on flawed interpretations of biology and behavior. It tells the compelling story of the human male's peaceful past. It summarizes recent advances in understanding of bones, brains, hormones, and genetics that reveals humans for who they are. In reviewing the behavior of other primate males and their relationship to females and infants, it sets the stage for a new paradigm of male behaviour--one in which aggression, though possible, is suppressed most of the time in favor of affiliative behaviors that benefit females, infants, and society as a whole. Encompassing topics relevant to biological and social sciences, this book will be of interest to students of primatology, evolutionary biology, anthropology, and human behaviour.
Traditionally, freedom of speech has been justified as necessary for democratic government and as an essential individual right. This study departs from traditional legal and philosophical theories and breaks new ground by demonstrating that well-established and contemporary social theory explains the essential role of speech in highly differentiated modern societies. Utilizing some of Emile Durkheim s well-established classical concepts relating to the division of labor in society, the book builds on the consequences of division of labor such as increased individuation and diminution of shared beliefs to demonstrate that as division of labor increases, so does the social requirement of increased freedom of expression. As shared beliefs diminish, economic, social and political decisions cannot be made by a society without increased freedom of expression. As Durkheim focused on division of labor, contemporary sociologist Jurgen Habermas builds on this and specifically recognizes the need for consensus building among individuals in modern highly differentiated societies. Consensus, in turn, is built through freedom of expression listening as well as speaking. By combining the work of Durkheim and Habermas, a comprehensive blueprint and theoretical model for freedom of speech is established independent of existing legal or philosophical theory. Having developed a sociological basis for freedom of expression, Freedom of Speech and Society proceeds to justify use of the theory by presenting empirical evidence that supports the continued relevance of Durkheim s classical theories. Durkheim predicted that as division of labor increased, there would be a trend toward civil as compared to criminal remedies for the same type of offensive conduct. He based this conclusion on the fact that criminal law reflected violation of community values while private remedies were more directed toward conduct that injured the individual as opposed to society as a whole. As division of labor increased, commonly held beliefs would, in turn, diminish and public crimes would more likely be treated as private offenses. Again, breaking new ground, this study demonstrates the validity of this theory in the context of speech law through application of empirical evidence showing the decrease of criminal defamation and growth of private defamation remedies. This chronology tracks the evolution of modern societies and the ever-increasing division of labor. Freedom of expression in the age of the internet communication without borders is a frequent subject of debate both on a political and legal level. However, the theoretical underpinnings have generally been confined to legal and philosophical analysis. These existing theories are not entirely satisfying because they cannot explain freedom of speech beyond the individual. Freedom of Speech and Society presents arguments that freedom of expression in the twenty-first century can be approached as a social phenomenon through the application of sociological theory. Existing approaches are either confined to political communication or focus on individual wellbeing. In this book, sociological arguments for freedom of expression are derived from both Emile Durkheim s classical social theory and the contemporary theories of Jurgen Habermas. Application of these theories demonstrates that freedom of speech is essential from a societal point of view. This book is the first attempt to bring sociological theory into the free speech debate. Almost always viewed as an individual right, this study, using classical sociological theory, argues that freedom of expression is essential as a group right and that without an expansive freedom of expression, modern society simply cannot efficiently operate. Viewed through the lens of sociological theory, freedom of expression is seen to be not only desirable as an individual privilege but also essential as a societal right. To validate the use of classical sociological theory, the author demonstrates that empirical evidence concerning the demise of criminal libel is predicted by Durkheim s theory and that recent archeological evidence supports the continuing vitality of classical sociology. To bring sociological theory into the 21st Century, the contributions of contemporary German sociologist Jurgen Habermas are also employed. This modern theory also validates the classical theory. Once viewed through the lens of social theory, freedom of expression as justified by traditional legal and philosophical is explored and then the two approaches are compared. While sociology and philosophy are not at odds, they are not perfectly congruent because one focuses on societal needs while the other is based on the individual. When combined, a more comprehensive perspective can be constructed and, perhaps, a more accurate need for freedom of expression is established. Freedom of Speech and Society is an important and ground-breaking book for political, media, and legal studies.
Rap music and its gangster rap variant are now far too important and influential in American life to be ignored by the general public and research communities alike. Artists and promoters alike have made a number of questionable claims about the authenticity and impact of their music that have been taken for granted and not been critically assessed. Those who have written about from communications, music and cultural studies have provided an important but relatively fixed narrative that leaves the central claims and impacts of this entrepreneur unaddressed. It is in this context that the author Benjamin Bowser began studying hip hop and gangster rap precisely because the influence of this movement and music on African American adolescents HIV infection risk takers. At the same time, the frequent use of the N-word by gangster rappers has become a major unaddressed issue in civil rights that has also not been studied. Furthermore, an important reason to study these unaddressed issues is to not only better understand them, but to offer solutions to the problems they pose and to improve the quality of life of all involved. Within the rapidly growing literature on hip hop and gangster rap, Gangster Rap and Its Social Cost stands out from the rest because it provides a number of unique contributions. First, based upon a community case study, the author asserts that gangster rap has empowered white racists and, as a consequence, has reduced the quality of life and civil rights of listeners and non-listeners alike. Second, this book goes to great length to make a serious distinction between gangster rap and hip hop. Disentangling one from the other opens the door to a more focused and critical analysis of gangster rap and provides an outline of the unmet potential of rap in hip hop. Third, national surveys are used as evidence in the debate about the size and characteristics of the rap and hip hop listener audiences. There are some surprises here that should reframe the controversy on who listens to and buys rap music. Fourth, there is a first generation of psychological and social scientific research on rap music that is summarized through 2011. Finally, the problems in gangster rap are not inevitable and we do not have to live with them. They can be effectively addressed without attacking the civil liberties of gangster rappers or their corporate sponsors. Gangster Rap and Its Social Cost is must reading for young adults, parents, those who both enjoy and dislike rap music, and students in sociology, psychology, ethnic studies, communication, music, community studies and public health.
Across time and place, pregnancy and childbirth rank among the most transformative physical and psychological events in women s lives. Women s childbearing experiences depend not only on their own biology and psyche but also on the nature and quality of care they receive. The nature of the prevailing obstetric care model in the early 21st-century United States has been described as high-tech, low touch, highlighting its emphasis on using medical technology, as opposed to non-technological care and support, to control unproblematic physical processes on the argument that this approach improves maternal safety and comfort. However, it should be noted that reasonably reliable national data fail to show significant maternal or newborn health gains corresponding to recent, dramatic rises in hospital obstetric procedures such as labor induction, labor acceleration, and cesarean delivery. In this context where medical intervention, necessary or not, assumes an increasingly central role in the childbearing equation, questions of what mothers expect to happen in labor and delivery and how their subsequent birth experiences meet those expectations become paramount. Global numeric indicators cannot capture the quality of women s reactions to childbirth itself, particularly as maternal care shifts in response to consumer interests it presupposes, offering options for comfort, care, and even the possibility of foregoing the labor process altogether. This work reflects the critical need to document early 21st-century U.S. mothers own words on what they expected to happen in childbirth and later, how labor and delivery went and how it met their expectations. Among this book s most important contributions is its inclusion of extensive interview material drawn from 75 diverse women who spoke freely on their childbirth expectations and subsequent experiences. By itself, the interview material lends an important, though at times unsettling, insider perspective on how labor and delivery can unfold. The narratives also provide a maternal view on how those charged with their care respond during this physically and emotionally demanding transition. In addition, the book provides a timely analysis of scientific data on contemporary maternal care procedures, making plain why so many refer to 21st-century mainstream obstetric care as technocratic. The scientific data serve as an excellent backdrop for more extensive coverage of the maternal interviews, organized around the distinctions mothers made related to the childbirth pathway on which they anticipated traveling such as natural childbirth in a hospital, planned cesarean delivery, or planned vaginal birth after cesarean. The pathways are in turn discussed in terms of their relationship to an underlying technocratic, humanistic, or holistic maternal care philosophy. Historically, it has been assumed that maternal biological forces are the primary drivers of what ultimately becomes a woman s childbirth experience. However, this book s unique approach to explaining birth experiences as a function of an anticipated childbirth pathway with a distinct, underlying care philosophy indicates that biological forces only partly explain how and why maternal expectations of childbirth may align with or stray far from what they originally anticipated. A final integrative chapter offers critical commentary and recommendations tied to what, from women s perspective, they believed they could really expect compared to the reality of childbirth in the early 21st century United States. The book is targeted towards an academic readership, including scholars and medical professionals with interest in women s health, women s and maternal mental health, women s reproductive health, reproductive technology, medical humanities, medical anthropology, narrative studies, pregnancy, and childbirth.
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