Dance Books
Oxford University Press Inc Facial Choreographies
Book SynopsisThe face contributes a vital, yet often overlooked, component of dance performance. Facial Choreographies: Performing the Face in Popular Dance examines what the face does in dance and what it may mean. Author Sherril Dodds focuses on popular presentational dance, which permits the face to be one of excess and spectacle, as well as disclosure or deception. The concept of facial choreography resists the idea that the expressive countenance in dance is simply by chance, and instead conceives its movement as purposeful, creative, and communicative. The book centers on three facial case studies: global celebrity Michael Jackson, whose face has occupied a site of fervent controversy; Maddie Ziegler, child star of the reality television series Dance Moms and de facto face of pop star Sia; and a community of hip hop dancers who engage in fiercely contested dance battles. Chapters are organized according to action-expressions, actively working even in times of stillness: SMILE, LOOK, FROWN, CRY, SCREAM, and LAUGH. Across each case study, the book explores pedagogies of facial composition, the purpose of codified expressions, and how dancers re-choreograph their faces as a critical unworking of what a dancing visage might represent. Facial choreographies engender opportunity for startling creativity, the articulation of identity, a cathartic expression of emotions and attitudes, and the capacity to dismantle previously held assumptions. As the dancing face tauntingly slips between visual, sensory, and kinetic registers it ensures that nothing can be taken at face value.
£104.41
Oxford University Press Inc Facial Choreographies
Book SynopsisThe face contributes a vital, yet often overlooked, component of dance performance. Facial Choreographies: Performing the Face in Popular Dance examines what the face does in dance and what it may mean. Author Sherril Dodds focuses on popular presentational dance, which permits the face to be one of excess and spectacle, as well as disclosure or deception. The concept of facial choreography resists the idea that the expressive countenance in dance is simply by chance, and instead conceives its movement as purposeful, creative, and communicative. The book centers on three facial case studies: global celebrity Michael Jackson, whose face has occupied a site of fervent controversy; Maddie Ziegler, child star of the reality television series Dance Moms and de facto face of pop star Sia; and a community of hip hop dancers who engage in fiercely contested dance battles. Chapters are organized according to action-expressions, actively working even in times of stillness: SMILE, LOOK, FROWN, CR
£39.19
Oxford University Press Inc Unmaking Contact
Book SynopsisUnmaking Contact interrogates contact, understood in Global North dance discourse as a shorthand for the movement discipline of contact improvisation (CI) and its characteristic shifting points of weight-sharing between two or more bodies through physical touch, by attending to power asymmetries that are foundational to this practice.By placing South Asian aesthetics, bodies, discourses, and philosophies on touch at the heart of its interrogation through the lenses of caste, ecology, faith, gender, and sexuality, author Royona Mitra argues for an intersectional, intercultural, and inter-epistemic understanding of contact, that may or may not involve touch. The book shifts and expands understandings of contact in dance-making through intercultural epistemologies that examine notions of touch and contact. In this book the term contact signals both a shorthand for CI and a shift away from it to more expansive choreographic considerations. It becomes an apparatus for dismantling power regimes; it is conjured as a catalyst to examine power in social relations; it appears as a fulcrum of ecological relationality; it arises as critical encounters full of generative and transformative potential; and finally, it manifests as community.
£22.99
OUP USA Oxford Handbook of Improvisation in Dance
Book SynopsisFrom the dance floor of a tango club to group therapy classes, from ballet to community theatre, improvised dance is everywhere. For some dance artists, improvisation is one of many approaches within the choreographic process. For others, it is a performance form in its own right. And while it has long been practiced, it is only within the last twenty years that dance improvisation has become a topic of critical inquiry. With The Oxford Handbook of Improvisation in Dance, dancer, teacher, and editor Vida L. Midgelow provides a cutting-edge volume on dance improvisation in all its facets. Expanding beyond conventional dance frameworks, this handbook looks at the ways that dance improvisation practices reflect our ability to adapt, communicate, and respond to our environment. Throughout the handbook, case studies from a variety of disciplines showcase the role of individual agency and collective relationships in improvisation, not just to dancers but to people of all backgrounds and abilities. In doing so, chapters celebrate all forms of improvisation, and unravel the ways that this kind of movement informs understandings of history, socio-cultural conditions, lived experience, cognition, and technologies.Trade ReviewMost contributors are from the US, the UK, and Continental Europe, and they range from young scholars to scholars with years of experience. This range makes the volume useful for a broad audience. The fairly consistent and approachable length of each essay (15-20 pages) will encourage comparative readings. Well-sourced references accompany each piece, and a helpful index is included. ... Highly recommended * CHOICE *Table of ContentsIntroduction. Improvising Dance: A Way of Going About Things Vida L Midgelow Section 1: Life worlds and Ethics 1. Life Practices Ann Cooper Albright 2. Ethico-aesthetic practice of improvising: relations through motion Fiona Bannon 3. Reflections on dance improvisation and its dynamic interrelationship with everyday movement Libby Worth 4. A Philosophy of the Improvisational Body Sondra Fraleigh 5. Chance encounters, Nietzschean philosophy and the question of improvisation Philipa Rothfield 6. Moving in medias res: Towards a phenomenological hermeneutics of dance improvisation Nigel Stewart Section 2: Attunement and Perception 7. I notice that I'm noticingEL Sally Doughty 8. Embodied Consciousness in Improvised Performance Nalina Wait 9. 'Mass may be the single most important sensation': Perceptual Philosophies in Dance Improvisation Malaka Sacro-Thomas 10. Rethinking Improvisation from a Daoist perspective of Qi-energy I-Ying Wu 11. Exploring Uncertainties of Language in Dance Improvisation Louise McDowall Section 3: Habit, Freedom and Resistance 12. Improvisation and Habit Gary Peters 13. Unpredictable Maneuvers: Eva Karczag's Improvised Strategies for Thwarting Institutional Agendas Doran George 14. Movements of freedom: performing popular liberty in the early cancan Claire Parfitt-Brown 15. Valorizing Uncertainty: Chance, Totalitarianism and Soviet Ballet Janice Ross 16. The Emancipation of Improvisation Larry Lavender Section 4: Memory and Transmission 17. Improvisation and Argentinean Tango: On playing with body memories Susanne Ravn 18. Dancing Life Norah Zuniga Shaw 19. What Remains Robert Bingham & Stephanie Hanna 20. Improvisational Practices in Jazz Dance Battles Jane Carr and Irven Lewis 21. Twelve Days in Tarbena: an evolutionary approach to moving through silence and sound to speech in Ruth Zaporah's Action Theater training Robert Vesty 22. Intention and Surrender Stephanie Skura Section 5: Agency and Transformation 23. Transcending Boundaries: Improvisation and disability in dance Sarah Whatley 24. Artful humanising conversations: Improvisation in Early Years dance Kerry Chappell and Lizzie Swinford 25. Instinctive Connections: Improvisation as a research methodology in health and care settings Lisa Dowler 26. Somatic Sensing and Creaturely Knowing in the University Improvisation Class Ali East 27. Improvising Happiness: Belly Dance's Evolution through Improvisation Barbara Sellers Young Section 6: Interconnectivity, emergence and technologies 28. Dancing the Interface: Improvisation in Zones of Virtual Exchange Thomas DeFrantz 29. Programmed Improvisation Inspied from Autonomous Humanoids Amy LaVeirs 30. Contact Improvisation and Embodied Social Cognition April Flakne 31. Modelling Improvisation as Emergence: A Critical Investigation of the Practice of Cognition Colleen Dunagan, Roxane Fenton, and Evan Dorn 32. Towards a cognitive theory of joint improvisation: The case of tango argentino Micheal Kimmel Section 7: Ecology and Environments 33. Improvisation and the Earth: Dancing in the Moment as Ecological Practice Tamara Ashley 34. Dancing the Land: An Emerging Geopoetics Melinda Buckwalter 35. Scoring and Siting: Improvisatory Approaches to Site-Specific Dance Victoria Hunter 36. The Dancer, the Philosopher and the Tramp Hilary Elliot 37. Audience Improvisation and Immersive Experiences: the sensuous world of the body in the work of Lundahl & Seitl Josephine Machon Section 8: Techniques, Strategies and Histories 38. Lost in the Footlights: The Secret Life of Improvisation in Contemporary American Concert Dance Kent De Spain 39. In the Moment: Improvisation in Traditional Dance Anthony Shay 40. Playing with the Beat: Choreomusical Improvisation in Rhythm Tap Dance Allison Robbins & Christopher J. Wells 41. Moving Sound: New Relationships between Contemporary Dance and Music in Improvisation Anna Sanchez Colberg & Dimitris Karalis 42. Mens Agilis Corpore Agili Ivar Hagendoorn 43. Embodiology®: A Hybrid Neo-African Improvisation-as-Performance Practice distinguished by Dynamic Rhythm Sheron Wray
£155.00
Oxford University Press Making Music for Modern Dance Collaboration In The Formative Years Of A New American Art Source Readings
Book SynopsisMaking Music for Modern Dance is a fascinating collection of source readings that offer first-hand accounts of musical collaboration for early modern dance in America.Trade ReviewWow! A book with such glorious content and organization that I would enthusiastically use it in my own courses, and recommend it to students and all readers in modern dance history, music for dance, collaborative and interdisciplinary arts, and American music history. How wonderful to have all these primary sources (many rare or previously unavailable) under one cover, each one placed in a clear context. A fantastic contribution illuminating an often neglected subject. * Greg Presley, Music Instructor, Gonzaga University, and former pianist for Martha Graham *This meticulously researched and annotated collection of articles gives invaluable context to the development of dance as an American art form and the intertwining and influences of leading composers and dance figures to its history. * Janet Mansfield Soares, author, Martha Hill and the Making of American Dance and Professor of Dance Emerita, Barnard College, Columbia University *Table of ContentsIntroduction: Threads of America's Heritage in Music and Dance Part One: Musical Collaboration for a New Era in Dance Overview: The Question of Using Old Music for New Dance 1. Émile Jaques-Dalcroze. How to Revive Dancing Music and the Dancer 2. Isadora Duncan. Dancing to Beethoven's Seventh Symphony 3. Baird Hastings. Music for Isadora Duncan's Dance 4. Helen Caldwell. The Dance Poems of Michio Ito: The White Peacock, to Music by Griffes 5. Denishawn program. America and the Dance Music Visualization 6. Norman Cazden. On Dancing to Bach: Humphrey-Weidman Programs 7. Ted Shawn. American Music and Composers: What Dancers Need Part Two: Creative Procedures and Ingredients Overview: Some Challenges of Collaboration, and Composers Debate What Works 8. Louis Horst. Music and Dance: The New Generation's Change in Methods 9. Henry Gilfond. Louis Horst 10. Gertrude Lippincott. A Quiet Genius Himself: A Dance Teacher's Tribute to Louis Horst 11. Wallingford Riegger. Synthesizing Music and the Dance 12. Ernestine Stodelle. Sensing the Dancer's Impulse: A Dancer Talks about the Art of Composer-Accompanists 13. Vivian Fine. My Scores for Modern Dance: Tragedy and Comedy 14. Doris Humphrey. The Race of Life: My Side of the Story The Relationship of Music and Dance 15. Lehman Engel. Under Way: Composing for Martha Graham Details of Contemporary Collaboration 16. Henry Cowell. Relating Music and Concert Dance: An Idea for Elastic Form 17. Norman Lloyd. Sound-Companion for Dance: Henry Cowell's Talent 18. Norman Lloyd. Composing for the Dance: A Retrospective Overview of Procedures; Personal Experiences; and Advice to Collaborators Part Three: Towards New "American" Styles Overview: Defining "American" Music; Common Musical Concerns of Ballet and Modern Dance 19. Verna Arvey. The Cosmopolitan Scene of the 1920s and '30s: Avant-Garde Experiments; Symphonic Ballet Scores; Jazz 20. Virgil Thomson. The Theatrical Thirties 21. Katherine Teck: Virgil Thomson's Later Reflections 22. Dance Observer. Editorial: Dance and American Composers Drawing Upon Folk Music and War-Time Patriotism 23. Woody Guthrie. People Dancing 24. Nora Guthrie. Sophie Maslow and Woody 25. Agnes de Mille. Music for Martha 26. Aaron Copland. The Commission for Appalachian Spring 27. Gail Levin. Aaron Copland's America 28. Richard Philp. Appalachian Spring: An Appreciation 54 Years Later Building on the Horton Experience 29. Larry Warren and Others. Lester Horton: Of Money, Music, and Motivation 30. Katherine Teck. Kenneth Klauss: Musician for California Dancers 31. Katherine Teck. Carmen de Lavallade: Dancing to Many Musical Styles 32. Alvin Ailey. Instructions: How to Play the Drums 33. Jennifer Dunning. Alvin Ailey's Revelations 34. Alvin Ailey with A. Peter Bailey. How Revelations Came to Be Part Four: Instruments, Technology, and the Avant-Garde Overview: Expanding Timbre Possibilities with Percussion, Vocalization, Electronic Instruments, and the Sounds Around Us 35. Franziska Boas. Percussion Music and Its Relation to the Modern Dance 36. Henry Cowell. East Indian Tala Music 37. Lehman Engel. Choric Sound for the Dance 38. John Cage. Goal: New Music, New Dance 39. Otto Luening. Electronic Music for Doris Humphrey's Theatre Piece No. 2 40. Alwin Nikolais. My Total Theater Concept 41. John Cage. Experimental Music 42. John Cage. Communication 43. Carolyn Brown. Dancing with the Avant-Garde Part Five: Well-Springs of Creative Collaboration Overview: Diverse Methods and Aesthetic Ideas 44. Leonard Bernstein. "Fun" in Music and the Dance 45. Paul Taylor. Why I Make Dances 46. Carlos Surinach. My Intention to Serve Spanish Ballet Serves American Modern Dancers Instead 47. Lou Harrison. Meditations on Melodies, Modes, Emotion, and Creation 48. Lucia Dlugoszewski. New Music for the Dance: Choices Open to Collaborators at Mid-Century Part Six: Master Artists Speak to Future Generations Overview: Postwar Trends, and Music in the Training of Dancers 49. Erick Hawkins. My Love Affair With Music 50. Bessie Schönberg. Finding Your Own Voice 51. Paul Draper. Music and Dancing 52. José Limón. Dancers Are Musicians Are Dancers Afterword: Creativity in One's Own Time Appendix: Checklist of Composers Notes, Commentary, and Recommended Resources Bibliographic Essay Index
£40.80
Oxford University Press, USA Musical Intimacies and Indigenous Imaginaries Aboriginal Music And Dance In Public Performance
Table of ContentsAcknowledgments ; Chapter 1 Introduction: Publicity, Counterpublicity, Antipublicity ; Chapter 2 Public and Intimate Sociability in First Nations and Metis Fiddling ; Chapter 3 "#1 on NCI": Country Music and the Aboriginal Public ; Chapter 4 "Your Own Heart Will Make its Own Music": Gospel Singing, Individuation, and the Comforting Community ; Preface to Chapter 5 ; Chapter 5 "We Don't Want to Say No to Anybody Who Wants to Sing": Gospel Music in Coffee-House Performance ; Chapter 6 Antipublicity: Family Tradition and the Aboriginal Public ; Chapter 7 Circulation Controversies ; Conclusion ; Bibliography
£28.97
Oxford University Press French Moves The Cultural Politics of Le Hip Hop Oxford Studies in Dance Theory
Book SynopsisThis book shows how le hip hop reflects a republic of culture rather than a culture industry; a minority identity politics that takes shape as a movement poetics or figural language; and the public valorization of dance as a technique, meriting unemployment compensation and understood as a high-tech knowledge practice.Trade ReviewFelicia McCarren has succeeded brilliantly in taking dance out of its disciplinary confines, showing how vital a consideration of hip-hop is to any attempt to understand the dynamics of race and identity in contemporary France; the progress of the globalization of culture; the transformational power of moving bodes; and the mutually constitutive relation between bodies and technologies. McCarren makes it impossible for semiotics or cultural theory to remain indifferent to dance. * Carrie Noland, author of Agency and Embodiment: Performing Gestures/Producing Culture *The strengths of McCarren's research lay both in the cross-disciplinary structural analysis of national ideology and state funding of the arts (and research on the arts) insofar as they relate to particular communities and individuals in complex national, social, and cultural situations. Likewise, McCarren's introduction to works that might not be widely known to scholars bring new perspectives on French concert dance and the ways in which dance might be read as part of debates on national and global politics. * H-France Review *...Offers an original perspective on contemporary hip-hop theatre. * Dance Review Journal *Table of ContentsContents ; Introduction: "French?": Circulation, Immigration and Assimilation ; Part I: Politics and poetics ; Chapter 1: Hop Hop Citizens: politics, culture and performance ; Chapter 2: Hip Hop Dance "speaks" French: droit de citer ; Chapter 3: Hip Hop as post-colonial representation: Farid Berki's Invisible Armada and Exodust ; Part II: Technology and techniques ; Chapter 4: Dancing In and Out of the Box: Frank II Louise's Drop It!(2000) and Compagnie Choream's Epsilon (1999) ; Chapter 5: Breaking history: Helene Cixous' L'histoire terrible mais inachevee de Norodom Sihanouk, Roi du Cambodge and Yiphun Chiem's Apsara (2007) ; Chapter 6: Techniques: French urban dance in intellectual context ; Conclusion
£33.19
Oxford University Press Dancers as Diplomats American Choreography in Cultural Exchange
Book SynopsisDancers as Diplomats chronicles the role of dance and dancers in American cultural diplomacy, telling the story of how these tours in shaped and sometimes re-imagined ideas of America in unexpected, often sensational circumstances-pirouetting in Moscow as the Cuban Missile Crisis unfolded and dancing in Burma in the days just before the country held its first democratic elections.Trade ReviewSmoothly written with strong, coherent narrative, Dancers as Diplomats confirms the importance of dance in US cultural exchange. Researching across Cold War and Post-9/11 ideologies of nation and cultural diplomacy, Croft demonstrates how the international exposure of American dance remains inextricably bound up with Washington-based political economies. An essential offering for anyone interested in cultural studies, dance history, or international affairs, Dancers as Diplomats proves that performance might always exceed governmental guidelines and intentions. * Thomas F. DeFrantz, Duke University *Table of ContentsIntroduction ; Chapter One: Ballet Nations: The New York City Ballet on Tour in the Soviet Union in 1962 ; Chapter Two: Refusing Modernist Formulas of Second-Class Citizenship: Arthur Mitchell and the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater ; Chapter Three: Too Sexy for Export or Just Sexy Enough: Martha Graham Dance Company ; Chapter Four: Negotiating Community and Diaspora: Twenty-First Century Dance Diplomacy ; Chapter Five: Never A Solo ; Appendix A: List of Interviews ; Appendix B: List of US State Department Tours ; References ; Index
£32.29
Oxford University Press She is Cuba A Genealogy of the Mulata Body
Book SynopsisThis book traces the history of the Cuban mulata and her association with hips, sensuality and popular dance. It examines how the mulata choreographs her identity through her hips. Combining literary and personal narratives with historical and theoretical accounts of Cuban popular dance history, religiosity and culture, this work investigates the power of embodied exchanges.Trade Review"This triumphant offering invigorates dance scholarship with an outstanding coordination of historical method, performative writing, and coherent, compelling analysis of dance practice in Cuba. Written with authority, literary drive, and compassion, She Is Cuba answers a call for carefully considered research to explore the racialized feminine, the powers of the State, and to demonstrate the centrality of the living body in the construction of social identity." --Thomas F. DeFrantz, Duke University, Professor of African & African American Studies and Dance, Duke University "The mulata body dances off the page. Blanco Borelli writes her way through the Cuban siren-call of the hips. Her bi-lingual and seductive language privileges rumor and corporeality while engaging with rich histories sprung from archival research."--Anita Gonzalez, Professor of Theatre and Drama, University of MichiganTable of ContentsPrologue, Entre Familia/Between Family ; Introduction ; Chapter 1: Historicizing Hip(g)nosis ; Interlude 1: Echando Cuentos/Telling Stories ; Chapter 2: Hip(g)nosis at Work: Rumors, Social Dance and Cuba's Academias de Baile ; Interlude 2: A Marriage Proposal ; Chapter 3: Hip(g)nosis as Pleasure: The Mulata in Film ; Interlude 3: Lost Baggage ; Chapter 4: Hip(g)nosis as Brand: Despelote, Tourism and Mulata Citizenship ; Conclusion or Rear Endings ; Index
£31.44
Oxford University Press Landscape of the Now A Topography Of Movement Improvisation
Book SynopsisLandscape of the Now takes readers on a deep journey into the underlying processes and structures of movement improvisation. Based on interviews with Steve Paxton, Simone Forti, Nancy Stark Smith, and others, this book offers the rare opportunity to find some clarity in what is often a complex and confusing creative experience.Trade ReviewDe Spain is a master storyteller. More than that, he is a philosopher who uses his exceptional analytical skills to get to the heart of what defines postmodern improvisation as improvisation. This quest - a personal passion for De Spain - energizes the book. * David Gere, co-editor, Taken By Surprise: A Dance Improvisation Reader *Improvisation is the alchemy of giving form to the present moment. Contained within are essentially master classes in addressing some of the varied mysteries and issues that can emerge from the practice of improvisation. De Spain's book shines a bright light on how these eight groundbreaking artists wrap words around their processes of inquiry and their experiences of the embodied mind in motion. * Eric Handman, Assistant Professor of Dance, University of Utah *I began to read and realized I had started my next dance. De Spain's invitation to your own practice is waiting. De Spain, with his curiosity and engagement, has brought eight master artists to our studio doors. * Bebe Miller, Artistic Director, Bebe Miller Company *Table of ContentsIntroduction ; What and Who ; Section One: Issues ; Agendas ; Tracking ; Verbal/Nonverbal Awareness ; The Audience/Improviser Relationship ; Intentionality ; What is Good? ; The Transpersonal ; Section Two: Resources ; Body ; Movement ; The Senses ; Space ; Time ; Artistic Form ; Images and the Imagination ; Cognitive Skills ; Emotion ; Memory ; Structures ; Attention ; Conclusion ; Appendix ; Suggested Reading ; Index
£36.54
Random House UK A Dance
Book Synopsis
£53.66
The University of Chicago Press American Allegory Lindy Hop and the Racial
Book SynopsisSituates dance within a larger Chicago landscape of segregated social practices. Delving into two Chicago dance worlds, lindy hop and steppin', the author uses a combination of participant observation and interviews to bring to the surface the racial tension that surrounds white use of black cultural forms.Trade Review"In American Allegory, Black Hawk Hancock has written a rich and intricately detailed ethnography of the distinct worlds of lindy hop and steppin'. Here, readers are offered a guide to the ways in which cultural expressions have come to occupy separate racial and spatial realms and how this apparent segregation of race, culture, and identity is practiced in the United States today." (Andrew Deener, author of Venice: A Contested Bohemia in Los Angeles)"
£84.00
The University of Chicago Press American Allegory
Book SynopsisSituates dance within a larger Chicago landscape of segregated social practices. Focusing on new forms of appropriation in an era of multiculturalism, the author underscores the institutionalization of racial disparities and offers insights into the intersection of race and culture in America.Trade Review"In American Allegory, Black Hawk Hancock has written a rich and intricately detailed ethnography of the distinct worlds of lindy hop and steppin'. Here, readers are offered a guide to the ways in which cultural expressions have come to occupy separate racial and spatial realms and how this apparent segregation of race, culture, and identity is practiced in the United States today." (Andrew Deener, author of Venice: A Contested Bohemia in Los Angeles)"
£26.60
The University of Chicago Press Island Possessed
Book SynopsisIn this book, Dunham reveals how her anthropological research, her work in dance, and her fascination for the people and cults of Haiti worked their spell, catapulting her into experiences that she was often lucky to survive.
£26.60
The University of Chicago Press Metaphor and Musical Thought
Book SynopsisTreating issues of language, aesthetics, semiotics, and cognition, this book offers an evaluation and an original theory of the ways our cultural values have informed the metaphors we use to address music.Trade Review"Spitzer has written an informative and thought-provoking work, leaving us to question not only our methods of music analysis but our very choice of words in speaking and writing about music." (Notes)
£37.05
The University of Chicago Press To Dance is Human A Theory of Nonverbal
Book Synopsis
£28.50
University of Chicago Press Yor249b225 B224t225 Goes Global Artists Culture
Book SynopsisResponding to growing international interest in Yoruba culture, practitioners of bata performance - a drumming, dancing, and singing tradition - have presented themselves to the world as an emblem of traditional Nigeria. This work describes the dramatic changes and reinventions of traditional bata performance.
£80.00
The University of Chicago Press Yoruba Bata Goes Global Artists Culture Brokers
Book SynopsisResponding to international interest in Yoruba culture, practitioners of bata performance have presented themselves as an emblem of traditional Nigeria. Locally, however, the market for bata has been declining. This work explores this disjunction, revealing the world of bata artists and the global culture market that helps to sustain their art.
£22.80
The University of Chicago Press Shaping Society Through Dance Mestizo Ritual
Book SynopsisDuring the patron saint fiesta in the Andean town of San Jeronimo, Peru, crowds gather at sunset in the town square, eagerly awaiting the entrance of the colorful dance troupes, or comparsas. Offering a look at a tradition, this title is a compelling example of the anthropology of performance.
£60.02
The University of Chicago Press Strange Footing Poetic Form and Dance in the
Book SynopsisFor premodern audiences, poetic form did not exist solely as meter, stanzas, or rhyme scheme. Rather, the form of a poem emerged as an experience, one generated when an audience immersed in a culture of dance encountered a poetic text. Exploring the complex relationship between medieval dance and medieval poetry, Strange Footing argues that the intersection of texts and dance produced an experience of poetic form based in disorientation, asymmetry, and even misstep. Medieval dance guided audiences to approach poetry not in terms of the body's regular marking of time and space, but rather in the irregular and surprising forces of virtual motion around, ahead of, and behind the dancing body. Reading medieval poems through artworks, paintings, and sculptures depicting dance, Seeta Chaganti illuminates texts that have long eluded our full understanding, inviting us to inhabit their strange footings askew of conventional space and time. Strange Footing deploys the motion of dance to ch
£86.45
The University of Chicago Press DAlbuquerques Children Performing Tradition in
Book SynopsisThis work examines the musical influences of a Malaysia's Portuguese community, whose roots lie in the conquest of Malacca in 1511 by the Portuguese seafarer Afonse D'Albuquerque.
£80.00
The University of Chicago Press Infinite Repertoire
Book SynopsisIn Guinea's capital city of Conakry, dance is everywhere. Most neighborhoods boast at least one dance troupe, and members of those troupes animate the city's major rites of passage and social events. In Infinite Repertoire, Adrienne Cohen shows how dance became such a prominenteven infrastructuralfeature of city life in Guinea, and tells a surprising story of the rise of creative practice under a political regime known for its authoritarianism and violent excesses. Guinea's socialist state, which was in power from 1958 to 1984, used staged African dance or ballet strategically as a political tool, in part by tapping into indigenous conceptualizations of artisans as powerful figures capable of transforming the social fabric through their manipulation of vital energy. Far from dying with the socialist revolution, Guinean ballet continued to thrive in Conakry after economic liberalization in the 1980s, with its connection to transformative power retrofitted for a market economy and a rapiTrade Review"[Infinite Repertoire] is a nuanced and meticulously researched account of the historical and the contemporary significance of the Guinean 'ballet'... Cohen advances a solid argument about the significance of the performative arts and the need to study political history in the ways in which it inscribes itself, and is transformed through bodily practices beyond the spoken and written word." * Anthropos *“Infinite Repertoire is a brilliant historical and ethnographic exploration of how aesthetics shape power and how politics are embodied. Ultimately a meditation on time, it argues that the contingencies of performances allow artists to recall the past while creating new narratives for potential futures. This book lyrically examines the interplay among creative improvisation, affective remembering, and material-semiotic order. Cohen shows how performers take account of their changing contexts to constantly remake meaningful and powerful signs.” -- Jesse Weaver Shipley, Dartmouth College “Cohen examines the many informal dance troupes scattered across the urban landscape in Guinea today. In lively prose, Cohen shows how dance in Guinea is a mode of economic advancement as well as cultural performance, a political commentary on the state of things, and, finally, a way of making the world.” -- Brian Larkin, Barnard College, Columbia University“Guinea’s renown for spearheading ‘African ballet’ produced legions of dancers who today artfully combine semiotic resources from both the socialist past and neoliberal present. Infinite Repertoire offers a viscerally kinetic ethnography of the transformative power of dance to mobilize affect and imbue citizen-state relations with a vitality it would otherwise lack. Drawing on her extensive engagement with and participation in Conakry’s dance scene, Cohen crafts a brilliant analysis of postsocialist performativity that sets a new bar for parsing the relationship between aesthetics and politics.” -- Kelly M. Askew, University of MichiganTable of ContentsNotes on Orthography and Transcription Preface: Name-Finding Invitation: City of DancePart I: Aesthetic Politics, Magical Resources 1. Why Authority Needs Magic 2. Privatizing Ballet 3. The Discipline of Becoming: Ballet’s PedagogyPart II: Delicious Inventions 4. Female Strong Men and the Future of Resemblance 5. Core Steps and Passport Moves: How to Inherit a Repertoire 6. When Big Is Not Big Enough: On Excess in Guinean Sabar Epilogue: Embodied Infrastructure and Generative Imperfection Acknowledgments Addendum: Artists in the Diaspora Notes References Index
£86.45
The University of Chicago Press Infinite Repertoire
Book SynopsisTrade Review"[Infinite Repertoire] is a nuanced and meticulously researched account of the historical and the contemporary significance of the Guinean 'ballet'... Cohen advances a solid argument about the significance of the performative arts and the need to study political history in the ways in which it inscribes itself, and is transformed through bodily practices beyond the spoken and written word." * Anthropos *“Infinite Repertoire is a brilliant historical and ethnographic exploration of how aesthetics shape power and how politics are embodied. Ultimately a meditation on time, it argues that the contingencies of performances allow artists to recall the past while creating new narratives for potential futures. This book lyrically examines the interplay among creative improvisation, affective remembering, and material-semiotic order. Cohen shows how performers take account of their changing contexts to constantly remake meaningful and powerful signs.” -- Jesse Weaver Shipley, Dartmouth College “Cohen examines the many informal dance troupes scattered across the urban landscape in Guinea today. In lively prose, Cohen shows how dance in Guinea is a mode of economic advancement as well as cultural performance, a political commentary on the state of things, and, finally, a way of making the world.” -- Brian Larkin, Barnard College, Columbia University“Guinea’s renown for spearheading ‘African ballet’ produced legions of dancers who today artfully combine semiotic resources from both the socialist past and neoliberal present. Infinite Repertoire offers a viscerally kinetic ethnography of the transformative power of dance to mobilize affect and imbue citizen-state relations with a vitality it would otherwise lack. Drawing on her extensive engagement with and participation in Conakry’s dance scene, Cohen crafts a brilliant analysis of postsocialist performativity that sets a new bar for parsing the relationship between aesthetics and politics.” -- Kelly M. Askew, University of MichiganTable of ContentsNotes on Orthography and Transcription Preface: Name-Finding Invitation: City of DancePart I: Aesthetic Politics, Magical Resources 1. Why Authority Needs Magic 2. Privatizing Ballet 3. The Discipline of Becoming: Ballet’s PedagogyPart II: Delicious Inventions 4. Female Strong Men and the Future of Resemblance 5. Core Steps and Passport Moves: How to Inherit a Repertoire 6. When Big Is Not Big Enough: On Excess in Guinean Sabar Epilogue: Embodied Infrastructure and Generative Imperfection Acknowledgments Addendum: Artists in the Diaspora Notes References Index
£29.45
The University of Chicago Press Sounding the Center History Aesthetics in Thai
Book SynopsisThis work investigates the power behind classical music and dance in Bangkok, the capital and sacred center of Buddhist Thailand. Focusing on the ritual of honouring teachers of music and dance, Deborah Wong reveals a complex network of connections among kings, teachers, knowledge and performance.
£76.00
The University of Chicago Press Sounding the Center
Book SynopsisThis work investigates the power behind classical music and dance in Bangkok, the capital and sacred center of Buddhist Thailand. Focusing on the ritual of honouring teachers of music and dance, Deborah Wong reveals a complex network of connections among kings, teachers, knowledge and performance.
£38.00
Bloomsbury Publishing (UK) Theatre and History
Book SynopsisRebecca Schneider is Professor of Theatre Arts and Performance Studies at Brown University, USA. She is the author of The Explicit Body in Performance and Performing Remains: Art and War in Times of Theatrical Reenactment, as well as numerous essays. She is the Consortium Editor for The Drama Review: A Journal of Performance Studies, edited by Richard Schechner, and is co-editor with David Krasner of the book series Theater: Theory/Text/Performance.Trade Review"Coherent and clear, each of the sections illuminates the relationship between theatre and history in a different but always convincing and engaging manner. An attractive text for anyone interested in putting this relationship into perspective, ideal for beginning or more advanced students." - Marvin Carlson, Sidney E. Cohn Distinguished Professor of Theatre, Comparative Literature and Middle Eastern Studies, City University of New York, USA 'The clear, playful authority of the volume leaves readers simultaneously eager for Schneider's next book and inspired to expand the interdisciplinary dimensions of their own work.' - Glenn Odom, Roehampton University, UKTable of ContentsSeries Editors' Preface 1. Theatre And History 2. 'And' 3. 'History' 4. 'Theatre' 5. History and the Theatre Artist 6. The Anti-theatrical Prejudice 7. The Anti-intellectual Prejudice 8. Theatre and the Historian 9. The Problem with Passions 10. The Problem with Archives 11. Whose History is Theatre's History? 12. Of Knives and Blood Bibliography Index.
£10.90
Palgrave Macmillan Society Dancing
Book SynopsisBased on new archival research, this book uniquely presents a fresh interrogation of how, among London's fashionable society, dancing in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries was variously a means of social modelling, change, conformity and creative individual expression.Trade Review'The strength of this book lies in the variety of facets of social dance in the late Victorian/early twentieth century which it addresses. This range of content culminates in a rich picture of time, place, people, their dances and their dancing.' - Alexandra Carter, Emeritus Professor in Dance Studies, University of Middlesex, UKTable of ContentsAcknowledgements Preface List of Illustrations Contents PART I: SOCIETY DANCES Fashionable Bodies and Society Dancing Fashioning Dance Histories The Seasonal Round Public Spaces Late Victorian Repertoire Anarchy in the Ball Room PART II: FASHIONING GENTILITY A Noble Profession Temples of Terpsichore The Fashioning of Ladies Modelling the Lady Where are our Men? Dancing Dogs and Manly Men PART III: MODERN MOVES Moving into the Twentieth Century Modernizing Terpsichore Civilization Under Threat Knuts and Aliens Civilizing from the Centre Looking Back, Moving On Notes Bibliography Index
£85.49
Palgrave MacMillan UK Leaders of the Opposition From Churchill to Cameron
Book SynopsisA renewed interest in nature, the ancient Greeks, and the freedom of the body was to transform dance and physical culture in the early twentieth century. The book discusses the creative individuals and developments in science and other art forms that shaped the evolution of modern dance in its international context.Trade Review'Foregrounding the work of the British 'natural movement' pioneers, whilst enlivening concepts of 'the natural' and 'natural movement' as they exist within a range of contexts, this exciting collection makes an important contribution to the field of dance studies. Intersecting detailed studies of a range of movement practices with historical and contemporary discourse the book is interdisciplinary in approach and will be of interest to a broad range of readers. Thoroughly enjoyable.'- Vida L Midgelow, University of Northampton, UKTable of ContentsList of Illustrations Acknowledgements Notes on Contributors Nature, Force and Variation; R.Fensham Constructing and Contesting the Natural in British Theatre Dance; A.Carter Ideas of Nature, the Natural and the Modern in Early Twentieth-CenturyDance Discourse; M.Huxley & R.Burt The Ancient Greeks and the 'Natural'; F.Macintosh From the Artificial to the Natural Body: Social Dancing in Britain 1900-1914; T.Buckland Dancing Based on Natural Movement; M.A.Johnstone & M.Atkinson Undressing and Dressing Up: Natural Movement's Life in Costume; R.Fensham Nature Moving Naturally in Succession: An Exploration of Doris Humphrey's Water Study ; L.Main Tensing and Relaxing Naturally: Systematic Approaches to Training the Body; S.Foster 'Female Nature', Body Culture and Plastique ; K.Vedel Tethering the Flow: Dialogues between Dance, Physical Culture and Antiquity in Interwar Australia; A.Card Mining Anatomy: Moving Naturally; L.Worth Index
£42.74
Bloomsbury Publishing (UK) Clown Readings in Theatre Practice 3
Book SynopsisJON DAVISON is Visiting Lecturer at Central School of Speech and Drama in London, UK where he was formerly Creative Fellow investigating Clown/Actor Training. He has been a clown, teacher, director, actor and writer for the last 30 years. He is a co-founder of the Escola de Clown de Barcelona in Spain, where he developed the first ever Clown History and Theory unit. He is also a member of the World Parliament of Clowns.
£32.99
Palgrave MacMillan UK Performing SiteSpecific Theatre Politics Place Practice Performance Interventions
Book SynopsisThis book investigates the expanding parameters for site-specific performance to account for the form's increasing popularity in the twenty-first century. Leading practitioners and theorists interrogate issues of performance and site to broaden our understanding of the role that place plays in performance and the ways that performance influences itTrade Review'This excellent anthology provides a wide-ranging collection of essays on critical issues of place-based theatre. It includes articles that treat historical and contemporary themes from the perspectives of both theorists and practitioners in a variety of institutional contexts. As the best anthologies do, it both bolsters and challenges the discipline.' - Professor Laurie Beth Clark, University of Wisconsin Madison, USA 'This is a welcome addition to the developing literature on site-specific theatre and performance, whose chief virtue lies in providing a range of original essays testifying to the diversity and disparateness of contemporary site-based work.' - Steve Bottoms, New Theatre Quarterly 'Performing Site-Specific Theatre is an insightful collection of essays that presents an interesting examination of site-specific theory and practice. It is a welcome addition to a field still largely located in performance studies and art, here exploring its intersection with theatre... [The book] will be a useful book for researchers and teachers of site-specific performance, including its theories and practices.' - Kris Darby, Contemporary Theatre ReviewTable of ContentsList of Illustrations Acknowledgements Notes on Contributors The 'Place' and Practice of Site-Specific Theatre and Performance; J.Tompkins PART I: SITE-SPECIFICITY AND ECONOMICS Rethinking Site-Specificity: Monopoly, Urban Space, and the Cultural Economics of Site-specific Performance; M.McKinnie PART II: SITE-SPECIFICITY AND THE NARRATIVES OF HISTORY Rehearsing Across Space and Place: Rethinking A Masque Presented at Ludlow Castle; S.Bennett & J.Sanders Embodied Presence and Dislocated Spaces: Playing the Audience in Ten Thousand Several Doors in a Promenade, Site-specific Performance of John Webster's The Duchess of Malfi ; J.Collins Haunted House: Staging The Persians with the British Army; M.Pearson Toiling, Tolling and Telling: Performing Dissensus; K.Irwin PART III: SITE SPECIFITIY AND THE SLIPPAGE OF PLACE Beyond Site-specificity: Environmental Heterocosms on the Street; S.Haedicke Repetition and Performativity: Site-specific Performance and Film as Living Monument; A.Birch Contemporary Ekkeklemas in Site-specific Performance; L.Ferris 'Places, like property prices, go up and down': Site-specificity, Regeneration and The Margate Exodus; L.Owen PART IV: SITE-SPECIFICITY AND THEATRICAL INTIMACY Ambulatory Audiences and Animate Sites: Staging the Spectator in Site-specific Performance; K.Zaiontz Immersive Negotiations: Binaural Perspectives on Site-specific Sound; B.Barton & R.Windeyer My Sites Set on You: Site-specificity and Subjectivity in 'Intimate Theatre'; H.Iball PART V: SITE SPECIFICITY AND POLITICS Siting the People: Power, Protest and Public Space; S.Nield Bibliography Index
£94.99
Bloomsbury Publishing (UK) Performance and the Contemporary City An
Book SynopsisNICOLAS WHYBROW isAssociate Professor ofTheatre and Performance Studies at the University of Warwick, UK. He is the author of Street Scenes, linking Brechtian and Benjaminian ideas to an experience of contemporary Berlin, and Art and the City (I.B.Tauris, 2009).
£35.14
Columbia University Press Looking Back in Wonder Diary of a Dance Critic
Book SynopsisDiscusses the development of dance from 1949 to 1984 and examines the work of dancers and choreographers.
£70.40
Columbia University Press Copyright Law Symposium 39 ASCAP Copyright Law
Book Synopsis
£90.40
Columbia University Press Hearst Over Hollywood
Book SynopsisHearst Over Hollywood draws on hundreds of previously unpublished letters and memos, FBI Freedom of Information files, and personal interviews to document the scope of Hearst's power in Hollywood. Louis Pizzitola tells the hidden story of Hearst's shaping influence on both film publicity and film censorship as well as the growth of the "talkies," and the studio system.Trade ReviewA valuable contribution to American film history. Cineaste I don't know if there could be a more timely book right now than this particular book...I can't recommend it highly enough. -- Frank Rich Pizzitola doesn't slight much of anything...He works in fascinating digressions... This groundbreaking volume's focus on Hearst's imagemaking illuminates exactly how he went about warping the world to his will. San Francisco Chronicle This well-written, meticulously researched biography of a flawed figure reveals a more complex portrait of Hearst than previous biographies. Highly recommended. Library Journal Stands as a comprehensive examination of how movie truth is created and how Hearst helped set its boundaries. Publishers Weekly [F]or those interested in the growth of entertainment media, Louis Pizzitola's history of the news magnate is fascinating. -- Bob Hoover Pittsburgh Post-Gazette Includes numerous photographs and stills and more material on the movies than any other Hearst biography. ChoiceTable of ContentsPreface: Ourselves as Others See Us 1. Behind the Scenes, 1880s-1890s 2. The Artist-Journalist, 1895-1898 3. Film News, 1898-1906 4. Medium for a New Century, 1900-1907 5. It Pays to Advertise, 1907-1914 6. When Men Betray, 1914-1916 7. Perils of Passion, 1915-1917 8. Trader, 1915-1918 9. The Perils of Propaganda, 1917-1918 10. Fits and Starts, 1917-1919 11. Over Production, 1919-1922 12. Fire and Smoke, 1922-1925 13. Industry, 1925-1929 14. Above the Law, 1929-1934 15. Remote Control, 1934-1940 16. Hollywood Isolationist, 1940-1947 17. No Trespassing, 1947-1951
£35.70
Columbia University Press Wondrous Difference
Book SynopsisThis innovative book focuses on the contested origins of ethnographic film from the late nineteenth century to the 1920s, vividly depicting the dynamic visual culture of the period as it collided with the emerging discipline of anthropology and the new technology of motion pictures.Trade ReviewA significant contribution to knowledge about methods of recording and presenting visual culture of non-Western peoples in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Choice With fascinating examples and illustrations culled from a number of international archives,Wondrous Difference is an invaluable resource for cinema historians, anthropologists, archivists, and museum professionals... Griffiths is working within a new tradition of scholars approaching visuality with a historically integrated and culturally critical perspective... The masterful way in which Griffiths navigates and reveals the complexity of these relationships sets a standard for others to follow. -- Amy J. Staples Film Quarterly Wondrous Difference will make an excellent... textbook for advanced undergraduate or graduate courses in both visual anthropology and the history of anthropology. -- Deborah Poole Current AnthropologyTable of ContentsPart I: Precinema and Ethnographic Representation 1. Life Groups and the Modern Museum Spectator 2. Science and Spectacle: Visualizing the Other at the World's Fair 3. Knowledge and Visuality in Nineteenth-Century Anthropology Part II: Early Ethnographic Film in Science and Popular Culture 4. The Ethnographic Cinema of Alfred Cort Haddon and Walter Baldwin Spencer 5. "The World Within Your Reach": Popular Cinema and Ethnographic Representation Part III: First Steps: The Museum and Early Filmmakers 6. Early Ethnographic Film at the American Museum of Natural History 7. Finding a Home for Cinema in Ethnography: The First Generation of Anthropologist-Filmmakers in America 8. Conclusion: The Legacy of Early Ethnographic Film
£80.00
Columbia University Press Virtual Publics Policy and Community in an
Book SynopsisA collection of interdisciplinary essays that examine how the internet has affected conceptions of community and public life.Table of ContentsIntroduction. The Reality of Virtuality Part 1. Users and the Structure of Technology The Net Effect: The Public's Fear and the Public Sphere, by Gilbert B. Rodman The Internet, Community Definition, and the Social Meaning of Legal Jurisdiction, by Paul Schiff Berman Architectural Design for Online Environments, by Anna Cicognani Community, Affect, and the Virtual: The Politics of Cyberspace, by J. Macgregor Wise Securing Trust Online: Wisdom or Oxymoron?, by Helen Nissenbaum Part 2. Technology and the Structure of Communities TV Predicts Its Future: On Convergence and Cybertelevision, by Tara McPherson Women Making Multimedia: Possibilities for Feminist Activism, by Mary E. Hocks and Anne Balsamo Is It Art, in Fact?, by Mitch Geller Making the Virtual Real: University-Community Partnerships, by Alison Regan and John Zuern Where Do You Want to Learn Tomorrow? The Paradox of the Virtual University, by Collin Gifford Brooke Community-Based Software, Participatory Theater: Models for Inviting Participation in Learning and Artistic Production, by Susan Claire Warshauer Communication, Community, Consumption: An Ethnographic Exploration of an Online City, by David Silver Can Technology Transform? Experimenting with Wired Communities, by Mark A. Jones
£87.20
Columbia University Press Levinas and the Cinema of Redemption
Book SynopsisTrade ReviewGirgus's book offers fresh, intriguing insights. ChoiceTable of ContentsAcknowledgments Introduction: Time, by Film 1. American Transcendence: Levinas and a Short History of an American Idea in Film 2. Frank Capra and James Stewart: Time, Transcendence, and the Other 3. The Changing Face of American Redemption: Henry Fonda, Marilyn Monroe, Paul Newman, and Denzel Washington 4. Sex, Art, and Oedipus: The Unbearable Lightness of Being 5. Fellini and La dolce vita: Documentary, Decadence, and Desire 6. Antonioni and L'avventura: Transcendence, the Body, and the Feminine Notes Index
£73.60
Columbia University Press Levinas and the Cinema of Redemption
Book SynopsisTrade ReviewGirgus's book offers fresh, intriguing insights. ChoiceTable of ContentsAcknowledgments Introduction: Time, by Film 1. American Transcendence: Levinas and a Short History of an American Idea in Film 2. Frank Capra and James Stewart: Time, Transcendence, and the Other 3. The Changing Face of American Redemption: Henry Fonda, Marilyn Monroe, Paul Newman, and Denzel Washington 4. Sex, Art, and Oedipus: The Unbearable Lightness of Being 5. Fellini and La dolce vita: Documentary, Decadence, and Desire 6. Antonioni and L'avventura: Transcendence, the Body, and the Feminine Notes Index
£23.80
Columbia University Press Gilbert and Sullivan
Book SynopsisTrade ReviewA superb examination of Gilbert and Sullivan's comic operas... Highly recommended.Library Journal Library Journal Rich, challenging, irritating, inspiring, provocative, just what one wants in a new G&S study, this is a worthwhile albeit tough read. CHOICE Williams substantive study is all the more praiseworthy because her biting insights into gender and sexuality, sharpened through the lens of contemporary critical theory, are tucked within what could pass as a much more staid study of Gilbert and Sullivan. -- Josephine Lee Nineteenth Century Gender Studies Unmodified rapture should best describe the scholarly reponse to this exciting contribution to a broad swath of disciplines... Victorian Studies this book will be an important reference point for future discussions of Gilbert and Sullivan, gender, and the Victorian stage. -- Benjamin D. O'Dell English Literature in Transition, 1880-1920 [A] triumphant cultural history. -- Joseph Bristow Studies in English Literature, 1500-1900 An outstanding pick... this is a recommendation for any college-level course in Gilbert and Sullivan, and for readers who would receive a fine reinterpretation of their works and impact. Midwest Book ReviewTable of ContentsList of Illustrations Preface Acknowledgments Introduction Part I. Genres 1. Outmoding Classical Extravaganza, Englishing Opera Bouffe: Thespis 2. Gender in the Breach: Trial by Jury 3. English Magic, English Intoxication: The Sorcerer 4. "Never Mind the Why and Wherefore": The Parody of Nautical Melodrama in H.M.S. Pinafore 5. Recollecting Illegitimacy: The Pirates of Penzance Part II. Genders 6. New Light on Changing Gender Norms: Patience 7. Transforming the Fairy Genres: Women on Top in Iolanthe 8. War Between the Sexes: Princess Ida Part III. Cultures 9. Estrangement and Familiarity: The Mikado 10. Mixing It Up: Gothic and Nautical Melodrama in Ruddigore 11. The Past Is a Foreign Country: The Yeomen of the Guard 12. Imaginary Republicanism: The Gondoliers 13. Capitalism and Colonialism: Utopia, Limited 14. Continental Recollections: The Grand Duke After Gilbert and Sullivan: The Momentum of Parody Notes Index
£73.60
Columbia University Press Pretty
Book SynopsisTrade ReviewRemarkably wide-ranging and engagingly intricate. Rosalind Galt's argument is bold, its mode of argumentation sure and convincing. This very original take on culturally received and culturally determining ideas and emotions surrounding visual pleasure is long overdue. Galt's book is a necessary contribution to the study of the image in film and visuality studies. -- Brigitte Peucker, author of The Material Image: Art and the Real in Film and Incorporating Images: Film and the Rival Arts One of the most attractive features of Galt's book is her ability to corral so many different iterations of art and film criticism and provide so many examples from world cinema, effecting in the end a general theory of world cinema, of a pretty world cinema. -- Akira Mizuta Lippit, University of Southern California Brilliantly engaging and absolutely knowledgeable. This is a key work... Highly recommended. ChoiceTable of ContentsList of Illustrations Acknowledgments Introduction: The Pretty as Troublesome Image 1. From Aesthetics to Film Aesthetics: Or, Beauty and Truth Redux 2. Colors: Derek Jarman and Queer Aesthetics 3. Ornament and Modernity: From Decorative Art to Cultural Criticism 4. Objects: Oriental Style and the Arabesques of Moulin Rouge! 5. At the Crossroads: Iconoclasm and the Anti-aesthetic in Postwar Film and Theory 6. Forms: Soy Cuba and Revolutionary Beauty 7. Perverse Prettiness: Sexuality, Gender, and Aesthetic Exclusion 8. Bodies: The Sumptuous Charms of Ulrike Ottinger Postscript: Toward a Worldly Image Notes Filmography Bibliography Index
£70.40
Columbia University Press Chinese Womens Cinema
Book SynopsisTrade ReviewRecommended Choice Chinese Women's Cinema offers thoughtful theoretial interventions into feminist film theory and superb analyses of Chinese female filmmakers that will certainly spark additional study of historically constituted Chinese women's cinema and its complex negotiation of female subjectivities. -- Tina Mai Chen Cinema JournalTable of ContentsAcknowledgments Introduction: Transnational Feminist Reconfiguration of Film Discourse and Women's Cinema, by Lingzhen Wang Part I: Female Authorship Negotiated in Different Times, Spaces, and Genres 1. Socialist Cinema and Female Authorship: Overdetermination and Subjective Revisions in Dong Kena's "Small Grass Grows on the Kunlun Mountain" (1962), by Lingzhen Wang 2. Masochist Men and Normal Women: Tang Shu Shuen and "The Arch" (1969), by Yau Ching 3. Migrating Hearts: The Cultural Geography of Sylvia Chang's Melodrama, by Zhen Zhang Part II: Gendered Voices: Images and Affect 4. The Voice of History and the Voice of Women: A Study of Huang Shuqin's Women's Films, by Xingyang Li 5. Post-Taiwan New Cinema Women Directors and Their Films: Auteurs, Images, Language, by Yu-Shan Huang and Chun-Chi Wang 6. Affect, Memory, and Trauma Past Tense in Hu Mei's "Army Nurse" (1985) and Xu Jinglei's "Letter from an Unknown Woman" (2004), by E. Ann Kaplan Part III: The Visual Subject and Feminist Cinema 7. The Encoding of Female Subjectivity: Four Films by China's Fifth-Generation Women Directors, by S. Louisa Wei 8. From Mao's "Continuous Revolution" to Ning Ying's "Perpetual Motion" (2005): Sexual Politics, Neoliberalism, and Postmodern China, by Gina Marchetti 9. Searching for Female Sexuality and Negotiating with Feminism: Li Yu's Film Trilogy, by Shuqin Cui Part IV: Female Writing, Performance, and Issues of Cinematic Agency 10. To Write or to Act, That Is the Question: 1920s to 1930s Shanghai Actress-Writers and the Death of the "New Woman", by Yiman Wang 11. Gender, Genre, and Performance in Eileen Chang's Films: Equivocal Contrasts Across the Print-Screen Divide, by Yingjin Zhang 12. Chu T'ien-wen and the Sotto Voce of Feminine Expression in the Films of Hou Hsiao-Hsien, by Christopher Lupke 13. To Become an Auteur: The Cinematic Maneuverings of Xu Jinglei, by Jingyuan Zhang Part V: Migration, Diaspora, and Transcultural Practice of Gender and Cinema 14. In Search of Esther Eng: Border-Crossing Pioneer in Chinese-Language Filmmaking, by Kar Law 15. Transpacific Waves in a Global Sea: Mabel Cheung Yuen-Ting's Cinematic Archive, by Staci Ford 16. Filming One's Way Home: Clara Law's Letters to Oz, by Shiao-Ying Shen Filmography Glossary Bibliography Index
£73.60
Columbia University Press Chinese Womens Cinema
Book SynopsisTrade ReviewRecommended Choice Chinese Women's Cinema offers thoughtful theoretial interventions into feminist film theory and superb analyses of Chinese female filmmakers that will certainly spark additional study of historically constituted Chinese women's cinema and its complex negotiation of female subjectivities. -- Tina Mai Chen Cinema JournalTable of ContentsAcknowledgments Introduction: Transnational Feminist Reconfiguration of Film Discourse and Women's Cinema, by Lingzhen Wang Part I: Female Authorship Negotiated in Different Times, Spaces, and Genres 1. Socialist Cinema and Female Authorship: Overdetermination and Subjective Revisions in Dong Kena's "Small Grass Grows on the Kunlun Mountain" (1962), by Lingzhen Wang 2. Masochist Men and Normal Women: Tang Shu Shuen and "The Arch" (1969), by Yau Ching 3. Migrating Hearts: The Cultural Geography of Sylvia Chang's Melodrama, by Zhen Zhang Part II: Gendered Voices: Images and Affect 4. The Voice of History and the Voice of Women: A Study of Huang Shuqin's Women's Films, by Xingyang Li 5. Post-Taiwan New Cinema Women Directors and Their Films: Auteurs, Images, Language, by Yu-Shan Huang and Chun-Chi Wang 6. Affect, Memory, and Trauma Past Tense in Hu Mei's "Army Nurse" (1985) and Xu Jinglei's "Letter from an Unknown Woman" (2004), by E. Ann Kaplan Part III: The Visual Subject and Feminist Cinema 7. The Encoding of Female Subjectivity: Four Films by China's Fifth-Generation Women Directors, by S. Louisa Wei 8. From Mao's "Continuous Revolution" to Ning Ying's "Perpetual Motion" (2005): Sexual Politics, Neoliberalism, and Postmodern China, by Gina Marchetti 9. Searching for Female Sexuality and Negotiating with Feminism: Li Yu's Film Trilogy, by Shuqin Cui Part IV: Female Writing, Performance, and Issues of Cinematic Agency 10. To Write or to Act, That Is the Question: 1920s to 1930s Shanghai Actress-Writers and the Death of the "New Woman", by Yiman Wang 11. Gender, Genre, and Performance in Eileen Chang's Films: Equivocal Contrasts Across the Print-Screen Divide, by Yingjin Zhang 12. Chu T'ien-wen and the Sotto Voce of Feminine Expression in the Films of Hou Hsiao-Hsien, by Christopher Lupke 13. To Become an Auteur: The Cinematic Maneuverings of Xu Jinglei, by Jingyuan Zhang Part V: Migration, Diaspora, and Transcultural Practice of Gender and Cinema 14. In Search of Esther Eng: Border-Crossing Pioneer in Chinese-Language Filmmaking, by Kar Law 15. Transpacific Waves in a Global Sea: Mabel Cheung Yuen-Ting's Cinematic Archive, by Staci Ford 16. Filming One's Way Home: Clara Law's Letters to Oz, by Shiao-Ying Shen Filmography Glossary Bibliography Index
£23.80
Columbia University Press Hideous Progeny
Book SynopsisTrade Review... Hideous Progeny is a valuable contribution to discussions of disability, spectacle, and eugenics in genre fiction and film. -- Hannah Tweed, University of Glasgow H-Net ReviewsTable of ContentsList of Illustrations Acknowledgments Introduction: Disability, Eugenics, and Classic Horror Cinema 1. Eugenic Reproduction: Chimeras in Dracula and Frankenstein 2. Enfreaking the Classic Horror Genre: Freaks 3. Revelations and Convulsions: Spectacles of Impairment in Classic Horror Film 4. Mad Medicine: Disability in the Mad-Doctor Films 5. Shock Horror and Death Rays: Disabling Spectatorship Conclusion Notes Bibliography Selected Films Index
£70.40
Columbia University Press Hideous Progeny
Book SynopsisTrade Review... Hideous Progeny is a valuable contribution to discussions of disability, spectacle, and eugenics in genre fiction and film. -- Hannah Tweed, University of Glasgow H-Net ReviewsTable of ContentsList of Illustrations Acknowledgments Introduction: Disability, Eugenics, and Classic Horror Cinema 1. Eugenic Reproduction: Chimeras in Dracula and Frankenstein 2. Enfreaking the Classic Horror Genre: Freaks 3. Revelations and Convulsions: Spectacles of Impairment in Classic Horror Film 4. Mad Medicine: Disability in the Mad-Doctor Films 5. Shock Horror and Death Rays: Disabling Spectatorship Conclusion Notes Bibliography Selected Films Index
£23.80
Columbia University Press Heritage Film
Book SynopsisTrade ReviewThe elusive and amorphous nature of the heritage film is adeptly brought into focus by this lucid discussion of the debates surrounding one of the most contested concepts in film and television studies... An invaluable introduction for students of national identity in film and television period drama. -- Pam Cook, University of Southampton This series is tailor-made for modular approach to film studies... An indispensable tool for both lecturers and students. -- Paul Willemen, University of Ulster ...an excellent survey of the existing academic literature on the subject... -- Giacomo Boitani Journal of American Studies of TurkeyTable of ContentsAcknowledgements Introduction: Placing the Heritage Film 1. The British Heritage Film: Nation and Representation 2. Production Cycles and Cultural Significance: A European Heritage Film? 3. Narrative Aesthetics and Gendered Histories: Renewing the Heritage Film Afterword: Tradition and Change Filmography Bibliography Index
£16.19
Columbia University Press Dekalog 5 On Dogville 05
Book SynopsisOn Dogville is the result of the lively debates prompted by Lars von Trier's film amongst its wide and diverse public. The essays in the volume have been written by authors from across Europe interested in different theoretical approaches and perspectives, ranging from philosophy and ethics to film history, critical theory, gender and media studies, and linguistics. The volume presents the reader with a plurivocal account of the film's context and its relevance to the discussions on various topical issues in contemporary culture. Each chapter focuses on one or more aspects of the film, building on specific concepts and theoretical frames such as the Marxist paradigm of objectification, Girard's theory of violence, Deleuze's philosophy of film, the theological category of grace, the concept of integrity, Wittgenstein's reflections on 'seeing-as' and aspect change, and, finally, feminist critique to Jakobson's linguistic theories. While providing stimulating and at times diverging readin
£16.19
Columbia University Press Theatre and Evolution from Ibsen to Beckett
Book SynopsisReveals the deep, transformative entanglement among science, art, and culture in modern timesTrade ReviewShepherd-Barr's knowledge of the theater and of theater history is striking. This is manifestly original, deep scholarship. -- Christopher Collins, author of Paleopoetics: The Evolution of the Preliterate Imagination Shepherd-Barr is the perfect person to write a book on theater and evolution, a long-overdue topic, given the lively debate that has sprung up around the novel and evolution. Her chapters on Ibsen and Shaw are masterful, easily the best writing on these two important playwrights in recent years. -- Martin Puchner, Harvard University Shepherd-Barr is one of very few scholars equipped to do authoritative cultural history in this area. She offers new and original perspectives, even on such figures as Ibsen, Shaw, and Beckett, each of whom has spawned a field of critical literature in his own right. This is a distinctive and significant contribution and a work of high-quality intellectual engagement. The scholarship is substantial, and the writing is so lucid and well paced that the book is a pleasure to read. -- Jane Goodall, author of Performance and Evolution in the Age of Darwin With remarkable insight and erudition, Kirsten Shepherd-Barr traces a line of descent going from Darwin's theories to plays by Ibsen, Strindberg, Shaw, O'Neill, Wilder, Brecht, Beckett, Albee, and Stoppard, including numerous lesser-known playwrights. This astoundingly original study of the modern theater displays the riches contained in post-Darwinian debates. As Winnie says in Happy Days, 'natural laws... it all depends upon the creature you happen to be.' Such laws, laws we never voted for or understood fully, give rise to concepts like evolution, selection, propagation, extinction, mutation, variation, progression, regression, regeneration, repopulation, recapitulation, and filiation, all of which come alive magnificently on the stage. -- Jean-Michel Rabate, University of Pennsylvania Quite outstanding... It relates the issues that have dominated the drama of the last 150 years-nature, heredity, sexuality, the environment-to the evolutionary debate... Destined to be one of those books that will transcend its immediate purpose. -- Michael Billington Impressive... A valuable contribution to the field of theatre and science. Review of English Studies Shepherd-Barr's account of Ibsen's engagement with Darwinism should become a locus classicus. Times Literary Supplement - Books of the Year A pleasure to read. Shepherd-Barr ambitiously and fluently covers a remarkable quantity and variety of authors and the text takes it place as an important milestone in this young sub-field within literature and science. British Society for Literature and Science A stellar example of interdisciplinary research... this study shines in its effortless balancing of two disciplines and its vivacity of style. Victorian NetworkTable of ContentsPreface Acknowledgments Introduction 1. "I'm Evolving!": Birds, Beasts, and Parodies 2. Confronting the Serious Side 3. "On the Contrary!": Ibsen's Evolutionary Vision 4. "Ugly... but Irresistible": Maternal Instinct on Stage 5. Edwardians and Eugenicists 6. Reproductive Issues 7. Midcentury American Engagements with Evolution 8. Beckett's "Old Muckball" Epilogue: Staging the Anthropocene Notes Index
£44.00
Columbia University Press New Tunisian Cinema
Book SynopsisTrade ReviewLang's impressive study is a valuable and timely achievement. Through subtle and rich close readings of eight films released between 1986 and 2006, he examines how contemporary Tunisian filmmakers resisted authoritarianism in both the public and private spheres of their society and successfully forged a national cinema that sought to keep in sight the secular and modern vision of their country's founding intellectuals. -- Hakim Abderrezak, University of Minnesota Well written and well researched, this book draws on a variety of fields to offer clear readings of eight key films. The decoding of these films as allegories of political resistance is well argued and draws on an immense wealth of knowledge both theoretical and practical. -- Florence Martin, author of Screens and Veils: Maghrebi Women's Cinema Robert Lang's New Tunisian Cinema is a timely and impressive examination of some of the most politically engaged films made during the Ben Ali era. This is the book I and many others have been waiting for-it fills a long overdue need to approach Tunisian cinema with both historical accuracy and theoretical rigor. It deserves to be widely read. -- Nouri Gana, editor of The Making of the Tunisian Revolution New Tunisian Cinema offers penetrating readings of eight Tunisian films made between 1986 and 2006 that elaborate a mode of cultural resistance. The films are anchored in their social and political context, and the analyses take up the 'national question' through the filmmakers' vision of their society's problems. This original work enriches our understanding of the political and cultural history of Tunisia and sheds new light on the implications of a 'Revolution' that holds up a mirror to us. -- Kmar Bendana, University of La Manouba, Tunisia Carefully researched and documented, and backed by Lang's strong theoretical knowledge, this original contribution is an excellent addition to the "Columbia University Film and Culture Series". Choice Lang's study is erudite, well written, and compelling, and offers students of Arab cinemas a welcome set of inquiries to inspire further studies of the works and themes he addresses. -- Kamran Rastegar International Journal of Middle East Studies As the first monograph published in the US on Tunisian cinema, Lang's book fills a major gap in scholarship... This excellent study is accessible to students and enriching for scholars interested in North African studies. It will be sure to stimulate further scholarship on the rich production of Tunisian cinema. -- Mohammed Hirchi Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies An excellent introduction to the themes and filmmakers that make Tunisian cinema stand out. -- Eoin Bell-Games Film MattersTable of ContentsPreface Acknowledgments 1. The Nation, the State, and the Cinema 2. "The freedom to be different, to choose your own life": Man of Ashes (Nouri Bouzid, 1986) 3. Laughter in the Dark: Sexuality and the Police State in Halfaouine (Ferid Boughedir, 1990) 4. Sexual Allegories of National Identity: Bezness (Nouri Bouzid, 1992) 5. The Colonizer and the Colonized: The Silences of the Palace (Moufida Tlatli, 1994) 6. "It takes two of us to discover truth": Essaida (Mohamed Zran, 1996) 7. "It takes a lot of unruly individuals to make a free people": Bedwin Hacker (Nadia El Fani, 2002) 8. Inventing the Postcolonial Nation/Constructing a Usable Past: The TV Is Coming (Moncef Dhouib, 2006) 9. "Destiny answers the people's call for life, darkness will be dispelled, and chains will break" Notes Filmography Glossary Bibliography Index
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