Popular culture Books

Book SynopsisBlast off to the Space Age, when the future was always bright! Futuristic is a full-color hardcover about a time of limitless possibilities... and anxieties. It covers all aspects of 1950s and '60s pop culture from the duck and cover era of the Cold War, the Space Race, the UFO Craze, and the 1969 moon landing. Read about the movies (The Day the Earth Stood Still, Invasion of the Body Snatchers), TV shows (Tom Corbett: Space Cadet, The Jetsons), and collectibles (robots, rockets, comic books, TV tie-ins) that had us looking to the stars. Also featured are interviews with such comic book creators as William Gaines, Joe Orlando, Julius Schwartz, Robert Kanigher, Ross Andru, Mike Esposito, and Larry Lieber about their sci-fi work, plus recollections from sci-fi movie stars (Kevin McCarthy, Peter Graves, Linda Harrison), TV cast members (from shows including Lost in Space, Star Trek, and The Invaders), and others. A graphically immersive experience written and designed by Mark Voger (Monster Mash, Zowie!), Futuristic is a time trip to a future that never exactly came to pass, but lives on vividly in our imaginations!

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Book SynopsisKevin De Ornellas argues that in Renaissance England the relationship between horse and rider works as an unambiguous symbol of domination by the strong over the weak. There was little sentimental concern for animal welfare, leading to the routine abuse of the material animal. This unproblematic, practical exploitation of the horse led to the currency of the horse/rider relationship as a trope or symbol of exploitation in the literature of the period. Engaging with fiction, plays, poems, and non-fictional prose works of late Tudor and early Stuart England, De Ornellas demonstrates that the horse—a bridled, unwilling slave—becomes a yardstick against which the oppression of England’s poor, women, increasingly uninfluential clergyman, and deluded gamblers is measured. The status of the bitted, harnessed horse was a low one in early modern England—to be compared to such a beast is a demonstration of inferiority and subjugation. To think anything else is to be naïve about the realities of horse management in the period and is to be naïve about the realities of the exploitation of horses and other mammals in the present-day world.Trade ReviewEach chapter contains a wealth of contextual and textual references, and De Ornellas characteristically moves across a variety of forms of writing and historical evidence. . . .There is analysis in each chapter that illuminates the main texts considered (the reading of Shirley’s Hide Park is particularly successful and stimulating) and that enables greater understanding of the importance of horse talk. * CHOICE *Table of ContentsAcknowledgments and Preface, i. Introduction Chapter One, “Pricked More with the Spur then the Provender”: Hungry Horses and Woodstock Chapter Two, Agency and/or Containment? Man/Woman and Horse/Rider Relationships in Early Modern England Chapter Three, Trampling on the Bald Pate: Morocco the Wonder Horse and the Humiliation of St Paul’s Chapter Four, Laying the World on Your Mare: the Corrupt Horse-Race in Shirley’s Hide Parke Chapter Five, Constructed Combatants: Political Steeds Before, During, and After the Civil Wars Conclusion Bibliography

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Book SynopsisThe Poetics of American Song Lyrics is the first collection of academic essays that regards songs as literature and that identifies intersections between the literary histories of poems and songs. The essays by well-known poets and scholars including Pulitzer Prize winner Claudia Emerson, Peter Guralnick, Adam Bradley, David Kirby, Kevin Young, and many others, locate points of synthesis and separation so as to better understand both genres and their crafts. The essayists share a desire to write on lyrics in a way that moves beyond sociological, historical, and autobiographical approaches and explicates songs in relation to poetics. Unique to this volume, the essays focus not on a single genre but on folk, rap, hip hop, country, rock, indie, soul, and blues.The first section of the book provides a variety of perspectives on the poetic history and techniques within songs and poems, and the second section focuses on a few prominent American songwriters such as Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, and Michael Stipe. Through conversational yet in-depth analyses of songs, the essays discuss sonnet forms, dramatic monologues, Modernism, ballads, blues poems, confessionalism, Language poetry, Keatsian odes, unreliable narrators, personas, poetic sequences, rhythm, rhyme, transcription methods, the writing process, and more. While the strategies of explication differ from essay to essay, the nexus of each piece is an unveiling of the poetic history and poetic techniques within songs.Charlotte Pence of Knoxville, Tennessee, is the author of The Writer's Path: Creative Exercises for Meaningful Essays. She is also the winner of the Black River Chapbook Competition for her poetry chapbook The Branches, the Axe, the Missing.

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Book SynopsisThe DJ stands at a juncture of technology, performance and culture in the increasingly uncertain climate of the popular music industry, functioning both as pioneer of musical taste and gatekeeper of the music industry. Together with promoters, producers, video jockeys (VJs) and other professionals in dance music scenes, DJs have pushed forward music techniques and technological developments in last few decades, from mashups and remixes to digital systems for emulating vinyl performance modes. This book is the outcome of international collaboration among academics in the study of electronic dance music. Mixing established and upcoming researchers from the US, Canada, the UK, Germany, Austria, Sweden, Australia and Brazil, the collection offers critical insights into DJ activities in a range of global dance music contexts. In particular, chapters address digitization and performativity, as well as issues surrounding the gender dynamics and political economies of DJ cultures and practices.Trade ReviewWhat is enjoyable about the Attias, Gavanas, and Rietveld collection is that it not only draws on perspectives from academics associated with musicology but also includes specialists in social anthropology, cultural studies, communication studies, and media practice. Not only are the local scenes discussed diverse, but the academic perspectives and disciplines represented include multiple views … for this reason, it should be on the radar of scholar’s associated with popular music, and certainly those interested in EDM. Selections from this book would also be well-suited for introductory courses in popular music or music technology. -- Eva J. Egolf * Women and Music *DJ Culture in the Mix offers not only a much broader picture than the standard monolithic account, but a refreshingly different type of picture - a cubist approach, with a dozen viewpoints thrown unpredictably together . . . A timely representation of just how broad the subject is - and should be -- Adam Harper * The Wire *A merit of the book consists of its insights into particular scenes, which is in itself a characterising trait of DJ cultures. Valuable field research, historical research and interviews with scene operators and participants spot light on various contexts...Overall, this makes for a kaleidoscopic look at DJ culture. -- Carlo Nardi, Rhodes University * Dancecult.net *There are good books on dance clubs and dance music, but this is the first volume on the figure of the dance music DJ and it is most welcome. DJ Culture in the Mix is well-organized, up-to-date and genuinely international, and brings together many of the leading figures in dance music studies. Highly recommended. * Will Straw, Ph.D Director, McGill Institute for the Study of Canada and Professor, Department of Art History and Communications Studies, McGill University, Canada *Like a good DJ set, DJ Culture in the Mix is an invigorating, well-conceived collection that leaves us both satisfied and eager for more. Many thanks to this excellent group of scholars for a multifaceted exploration of the rich, but little understood world of the electronic dance music DJ. * Mark Katz, author of Groove Music: The Art and Culture of the Hip-Hop DJ *Exploring everything from the fractious taste politics of New York gay clubland during the post-disco Eighties to the cult of speed in 21st Century drum ‘n’ bass, DJ Culture In the Mix is a collection of probing, insightful essays that will provide stimulation and enlightenment for dance music scholars and dance music fans alike. * Simon Reynolds, author of Energy Flash: A Journey Through Rave Music and Dance Culture *DJ Culture in the Mix fills a long overdue void in DJ and electronic dance music literature. Interdisciplinary in focus and approach, the essays within raise thoughtful questions and offer a range of critical insights into the complexities of DJ cultures and practices around the world. * Rebekah Farrugia, Oakland University, US *One of the strongest points of this collection is the attention it pays to issues of gender in relation to DJs, their careers, and their representations in EDM scenes. … Gavanas and Reitsamer refuse to content themselves with merely observing that the DJ profession is male-dominated, instead striving to understand how this has come to be, how it persists, and what efforts are being made to change it. … DJ Culture in the Mix is an original, valuable, and much-needed contribution to the scholarship of DJS and their activities in the EDM scene. -- Luis-Manuel Garcia * The World of Music (New Series) *Table of ContentsAcknowledgements Chapter 1: Introduction Hillegonda C. Rietveld Chapter 2: Subjectivity in the Groove: Phonography, Digitality, and Fidelity Bernardo Alexander Attias Chapter 3: DJ Technologies, Social Networks, and Gendered Trajectories in European DJ Cultures Anna Gavanas and Rosa Reitsamer Chapter 4: ‘Journey to the Light’? Immersion, Spectacle, and Mediation Hillegonda C. Rietveld Chapter 5: The DJ as Electronic De-Territorializer Mirko M. Hall and Naida Zukic Chapter 6: ‘It’s Not the Mix, It’s the Selection’: Music Programming in Contemporary DJ Culture Kai Fikentscher Chapter 7: Electronic Dance Music and Technological Change: Lessons from Actor-Network Theory - Jonathan Yu Chapter 8: DJ Culture and the Commercial Club Scene in Sydney Ed Montano Chapter 9: DJs and the Aesthetic of Acceleration in Drum ‘n’ Bass Chris Christodoulou Chapter 10: The Forging of a White Gay Aesthetic at the Saint, 1980-84 Tim Lawrence Chapter 11: DJs as Cultural Mediators: the Mixing Work of São Paulo’s Peripheral DJs Ivan Paolo de Paris Fontanari Chapter 12: War on the Dance Floor: Synthscenen’s Military Power Games Johanna Paulsson Chapter 13: DJ-Driven Literature: A Linguistic Remix Simon A. Morrison Contributors Index

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Book SynopsisIn 1977, Dave Sim (b. 1956) began to self-publish Cerebus, one of the earliest and most significant independent comics, which ran for 300 issues and ended, as Sim had planned from early on, in 2004. Over the run of the comic, Sim used it as a springboard to explore not only the potential of the comics medium but also many of the core assumptions of Western society. Through it he analyzed politics, the dynamics of love, religion, and, most controversially, the influence of feminism--which Sim believes has had a negative impact on society. Moreover, Sim inserted himself squarely into the comic as Cerebus's creator, thereby inviting criticism not only of the creation, but also of the creator.What few interviews Sim gave often pushed the limits of what an interview might be in much the same way that Cerebus pushed the limits of what a comic might be. In interviews Sim is generous, expansive, provocative, and sometimes even antagonistic. Regardless of mood, he is always insightful and fascinating. His discursive style is not conducive to the sound bite or to easy summary. Many of these interviews have been out of print for years. And, while the interviews range from very general, career-spanning explorations of his complex work and ideas, to tightly focused discussions on specific details of Cerebus, all the interviews contained herein are engaging and revealing.

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Book SynopsisA longstanding, successful and frequently controversial career spanning more than four decades establishes David Bowie as charged with contemporary cultural relevance. That David Bowie has influenced many lives is undeniable to his fans. He requisitions and challenges his audiences, through frequently indirect lyrics and images, to critically question sanity, identity and essentially what it means to be ‘us’ and why we are here. Enchanting David Bowie explores David Bowie as an anti-temporal figure and argues that we need to understand him across the many media platforms and art spaces he intersects with including theatre, film, television, the web, exhibition, installation, music, lyrics, video, and fashion. This exciting collection is organized according to the key themes of space, time, body, and memory - themes that literally and metaphorically address the key questions and intensities of his output.Trade ReviewThis scintillating collection considers David Bowie's contemporaneity, showing how the star looks very different today—and how every different Bowie is a hero, if just for one day. With each chapter like a crystal ball ricocheting around a multi-level labyrinth, Enchanting David Bowie is full of surprises and delights for the fan and scholar alike. * Christopher Schaberg, Associate Professor of English, Loyola University New Orleans, USA, and author of The Textual Life of Airports and _Deconstructing Brad Pitt *Consider for a moment, David Bowie’s extraordinary body of work, not just the music, but also his assimilation of different media practices: writing, painting, performance, film and video. This volume coheres around four thematic vectors–space, time, body and memory–to interrogate Bowie’s remarkable corpus of cultural production. In the process, Enchanting David Bowie–itself a standout work–not only illuminates but also construes ‘Bowie’–or versions of Bowie–that are at once compelling and fascinating. * Constantine Verevis, Associate Professor of Film & Screen Studies, Monash University, Australia *A comprehensive critical study of the enigma that is David Bowie has been a long time coming - and now it's finally here! Enchanting David Bowie: Space/Time/Body/Memory offers a rich, thoughtful and intellectually challenging series of essays that paint a picture of the complex chameleon that is Bowie. The charismatic array of alter egos, the fascination with cosmic travel, the groundbreaking music that sang its way into the souls of many generations, the transformation of music performance into an art form, the transgressive play with gendered identity - this and so much more makes this collection a must have for anyone serious about Bowie, his identity, his music and his iconic status, which continues to spellbind into the twenty-first century. * Angela Ndalianis, Head of Screen and Cultural Studies, University of Melbourne, Australia *If Bowie, ever the chameleon, is in the habit of leaving aesthetic corpses behind, the goal of Enchanting Bowie is to dissect them. The volume is organized around four thematic concepts: space, time, body, and memory … This may sound disconcerting to Bowiephiles and musicologists, but the end result is actually quite impressive. Bowie’s performance becomes a supple text that can be endlessly reinterpreted. * LA Review of Books *The overwhelming strength of this volume is its extremely broad definition of Bowie’s ‘work’. From album covers, to a customised jacket, to his atypical eyes, we move far beyond monochrome analysis of lyrical content. Its inter- and cross-disciplinary approach, presenting analysis informed by film-making, fashion, musicology, performance and drama, as well as cultural studies and media and communication, results in some highly creative contributions… The effect of this volume as a whole is that much of Bowie’s output, however familiar to the reader, cannot be viewed in the same way after encountering these contributors’ analyses. * Celebrity Studies *Table of ContentsIntroduction: Toija Cinque, Christopher Moore and Sean Redmond List of Contributors Introduction Section One: Space Section Introduction Chapter 1: Keeping Space Fantastic: The Transformative Journey of Major Tom Michael Lupro, Portland State University, USA Chapter 2: Ziggy’s Urban Alienation : Assembling the Heroic Outsider Ian Chapman, The University of Otago, New Zealand Chapter 3: Desperately Seeking Bowie: How Berlin Bowie Tourism Transcends the Sacred Jennifer Otter and John Sparrowhawk, University of East London, UK Chapter 4: Confronting Bowie’s Mysterious Corpses Tanja Stark, Manager, Canasta Studio, Brisbane, Australia Section Two: Time Section Introduction Chapter 5: Time Again: The David Bowie Chronotope Will Brooker, Kingston University, UK Chapter 6: Bowie’s Covers: the Artist as Modernist David Baker, Griffith University, Brisbane, Australia Chapter 7: Ain't There One Damn Flag That Can Make Me Break Down and Cry?: The Formal, Performative and Emotional Tactics of Bowie's Singular Critical Anthem 'Young Americans’ Amedeo D’Adamo, University of Switzerland (It) and the Universita Cattolica, Italy Chapter 8: 2004 (Bowie vs Mashup) Christopher Moore, Deakin University, Australia Section Three: Body Section Introduction Chapter 9: The Eyes of David Bowie Kevin Hunt, Nottingham Trent University, UK Chapter 10: Semantic Shock: David Bowie Toija Cinque, Deakin University, Australia Chapter 11: The Whiteness of David Bowie Sean Remond, Deakin University, Australia Chapter 12: David Bowie is … Customizing Helene Thian, University of the Arts London/London College of Fashion Postgraduate Programme, UK Section Four: Memory Section Introduction Chapter 13: He's Not There: Velvet Goldmine and the Specters of David Bowie Glenn D’Cruz, Deakin University, Australia Chapter 14: Between Sound and Vision: Low and Sense Dene October, University Arts London, UK Chapter 15: Where Are We Now?: Walls and memory in David Bowie’s Berlins Tiffany Naiman, University of California, Los Angeles, USA Chapter 16: ‘You never knew that, that I could do that’: Bowie, Video Art and the Search for Potsdammer Platz Daryl Perrins, University of Glamorgan, UK

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Book SynopsisThe Lost Cinema of Mexico is the first volume to challenge the dismissal of Mexican filmmaking during the 1960s through 1980s, an era long considered a low-budget departure from the artistic quality and international acclaim of the nation's earlier Golden Age. This pivotal collection examines the critical implications of discovering, uncovering, and recovering forgotten or ignored films.This largely unexamined era of film reveals shifts in Mexican culture, economics, and societal norms as state-sponsored revolutionary nationalism faltered. During this time, movies were widely embraced by the public as a way to make sense of the rapidly changing realities and values connected to Mexico's modernization. These essays shine a light on many genres that thrived in these decades: rock churros, campy luchador movies, countercultural superocheros, Black melodramas, family films, and chili westerns.Redefining a time usually seen as a cinematic "crisis," this volume offers a new model of the film auteur shaped by productive tension between highbrow aesthetics, industry shortages, and national audiences. It also traces connections from these Mexican films to Latinx, Latin American, and Hollywood cinema at large.

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Book SynopsisDiscover the wands of your favorite Harry Potter characters.In the Harry Potter films, each wand is as unique as the witch or wizard who wields it. From Hermione Granger’s elegant, vine-wrapped wand to the bone-inlaid wands of the Death Eaters, each was designed and crafted by the filmmakers to reflect its owner’s identity. Harry Potter: The Wand Collection is a visual guide to these magical wands, their makers, and the characters who mastered them. Profiles of each wand feature stunning new photography of the original props, wand statistics, insights from the cast and crew, and other filmmaking secrets from the Warner Bros. archive. This collectible volume is an ideal resource for both wand-wielding veteran fans seeking to learn the history behind these beloved items and a new generation just beginning their journey into the wizarding world. 

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Book Synopsis'Chock-full of gorgeous pieces of art, many of which I would love to hang on my wall, Batman: The Animated Series: The Phantom City Creative Collection, is one of my favorite pieces.' – DC Comics News Mondo is proud to present Batman: The Animated Series: The Phantom City Creative Collection, a visually breathtaking celebration of the Emmy Award–winning series.Known for their limitless passion and incredible ingenuity for film and television posters, Mondo turns their attention to the highly acclaimed show Batman: The Animated Series. The show first aired in 1992 and was instantly met with critical praise for its sophisticated writing and distinctive, noir-influenced art style, generating an intense following that still exists today. Over the years, Mondo has received global recognition for their astonishing artisanal posters, and their creations for Batman: The Animated Series are no exception. The studio has partnered exclusively with the award-winning artist at Phantom City Creative, Inc., Justin Erickson, in order to bring this show to life in a striking and unparalleled way. Filled with Erikson’s slick graphic design as well as beautifully rendered illustrations, this Batman: The Animated Series art book is a one-of-a-kind tribute to one of the greatest animated shows of all time.

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Book SynopsisThe arrival of a new style of music and a new type of drug in 1988 ignited a revolution. To coincide with the 25th anniversary of the second summer of love, this is the definitive story of the seismic movements in music and youth culture that changed the cultural landscape forever. Luke Bainbridge is uniquely positioned to tell this story, having connections both in the industry, through nearly two decades as a music journalist, and on the dancefloor, through two decades of dancing, promoting and DJing. Bainbridge has interviewed most of the protagonists who led the revolution, from the DJs and musicians to the promoters, gangsters and ravers, and built up a relationship of trust and mutual respect. This will be true story of acid house, from the DJ box to the dancefloor. He examines the legacy and lasting impact of acid house, and how the second summer of love is viewed 25 years on. How has acid house been assimilated into mainstream culture? How did the change in drugs, away from ecstasy towards other drugs, affect the music and the party scene? Why has the free party scene never really been replicated, despite new technology greater capacity to organise events and disseminate information? Did the summer of 1988 leave us with a generation of drug users? Has there been any lasting effect of such an explosion in drug use? Who were the real winners and casualties in the story? Do the world's current biggest DJs - Tiesto, Swedish House Mafia, David Guetta have any connection to the original scene? Where next for house and dance music in general?

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Book SynopsisThe Northern Soul scene is a dance-based music culture that originated in the English North and Midlands in the early 1970s, it still thrives today with a mix of fifty-year olds and new converts, and its celebration of 1960s Soul has an international following. This innovative and distinctive book brings together original commissioned essays and pivotal scholarly articles that have defined the field so far, interspersed with dossiers of published journalistic articles and photographs, and interviews with, for instance, producers and directors of Northern Soul-themed films. This publication represents a subject-defining book on the history and contemporary nature of the scene, and the first anthology of work in the field, which will provide a forum for vibrant dialogue and debate for a readership of lecturers and researchers, students and general readers interested in creative analyses and interpretations of the scene, past and present. The book links academic research, photography, film production and journalism in the documentation and analysis of historic and current music scenes. Representations of the scene from different media and different historical locations are juxtaposed to construct a rich and diverse statement about the music, people, places and practices that constitute the Northern Soul scene in the UK.

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Book SynopsisFeminist filmmakers are hitting the headlines. The last decade has witnessed: the first Best Director Academy Award won by a woman; female filmmakers reviving, or starting, careers via analogue and digital television; women filmmakers emerging from Saudi Arabia, Palestine, Pakistan, South Korea, Paraguay, Peru, Burkina Faso, Kenya and The Cree Nation; a bold emergent trans cinema; feminist porn screened at public festivals; Sweden's A-Markt for films that pass the Bechdel Test; and Pussy Riot's online videos sending shockwaves around the world. A new generation of feminist filmmakers, curators and critics is not only influencing contemporary debates on gender and sexuality, but starting to change cinema itself, calling for a film world that is intersectional, sustainable, family-friendly and far-reaching. Political Animals argues that, forty years since Laura Mulvey's seminal essay 'Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema' identified the urgent need for a feminist counter-cinema, this promise seems to be on the point of fulfilment. Forty years of a transnational, trans-generational cinema has given rise to conversations between the work of now well-established filmmakers such as Abigail Child, Sally Potter and Agnes Varda, twenty-first century auteurs including Kelly Reichardt and Lucretia Martel, and emerging directors such as Sandrine Bonnaire, Shonali Bose, Zeina Daccache, and Hana Makhmalbaf. A new and diverse generation of British independent filmmakers such as Franny Armstrong, Andrea Arnold, Amma Asante, Clio Barnard, Tina Gharavi, Sally El Hoseini, Carol Morley, Samantha Morton, Penny Woolcock, and Campbell X join a worldwide dialogue between filmmakers and viewers hungry for a new and informed point of view. Lovely, vigorous and brave, the new feminist cinema is a political animal that refuses to be domesticated by the persistence of everyday sexism, striking out boldly to claim the public sphere as its own.

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Book SynopsisDolly Parton, Songteller: My Life in Lyrics is a landmark celebration of the remarkable life and career of a country music and pop culture legend. As told by Dolly Parton in her own inimitable words, explore the songs that have defined her journey. Illustrated throughout with previously unpublished images from Dolly Parton’s personal and business archives. Mining over 60 years of songwriting, Dolly Parton highlights 175 of her songs and brings readers behind the lyrics. Packed with never-before-seen photographs and classic memorabilia Explores personal stories, candid insights, and myriad memories behind the songs Dolly Parton, Songteller: My Life in Lyrics reveals the stories and memories that have made Dolly a beloved icon across generations, genders, and social and international boundaries. Containing rare photos and memorabilia from Parton’s archives, this book is a show- stopping must-have for every Dolly Parton fan. Learn the history behind classic Parton songs like “Jolene,” “9 to 5,” “I Will Always Love You,” and more. The perfect gift for Dolly Parton fans (everyone loves Dolly!) as well as lovers of music history and country Add it to the shelf with books like Coat of Many Colors by Dolly Parton, The Beatles Anthology by The Beatles, and Born to Run by Bruce Springsteen.

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Book SynopsisA study of the differing views of the conscript based on evidence along the eastern border of France. The popular idea of the swaggering military folk-hero, a potent image for the peasant-conscript, contrasts with the elitist viewof conscription as "the nation in arms". Revolutionary France gave the modern world the concept of the "nation-in-arms", a potent combination of nationalism, militarism and republicanism embodied in the figure of the conscript. But it was not a concept shared by those most affected by conscription, the peasantry, who regarded the soldier as representative of an entirely different way of life. Concentrating on the militarised borderlands of eastern France, this book examines the disjuncture between the patriotic expectations of elites and the sentiments expressed in popular songs, folktales and imagery. Hopkin follows the soldier through his life-cycle to show how the peasant recruit was separated from his previous life and re-educated in military mores; and he demonstrates how the state-sponsored rituals of conscription and the popular imagery aimed at adolescent males portrayed the army as a place where young men could indulge in adventure far from parental and communal restraints. The popular idea of moustachioed military folk-heroes contributed more to the process of turning "peasants into Frenchmen" than the mythology of the "nation-in-arms". WINNER OF THE 2002 RHS GLADSTONE PRIZE. David M. Hopkin is tutor and fellow in history at Hertford College, Oxford University.Trade ReviewThis probing study has wide significance of an understanding of popular culture, gender and national identity... the product of meticulous research and high intelligence. * AMERICAN HISTORICAL REVIEW *Opens up the subject in a boldly original way...in a sophisticated and confident work. * MODERN & CONTEMPORARY FRANCE *Table of ContentsIntroduction Images of the soldier The soldier's tale Conscripts and volunteers The serving soldier: friend and foe The veteran Conclusion: "two races of men"?

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Book SynopsisIf fashion is an expression of individuality, why do we all dress alike? Can modernity be described as the experience of 'feeling modern' and, if so, what part does fashion play? Answering these intriguing questions and many more, this pioneering book shows how the concepts of fashion and modernity are intimately linked. It argues that capitalism and identity construction as social processes both have symbiotic relationships with the fashion system. Technology, the body, nationality and gender are informed and shaped by modernity, and vice versa. Drawing on key modernist texts as well as fashion theory and practice, this book seeks broadly to cover the history of fashion and modernity, a topic that has been surprisingly overlooked. Tackling themes including court masques in seventeenth-century London, Paris couturiers and forensic laboratories in twentieth-century Washington, the authors show how fashion throughout history has been a cornerstone in the construction of a modern self.Trade Review'Fashion and Modernity offers both the conceptual framework and the kind of 'thick' historical and contemporary analyses required to move forward a number of debates in fashion studies. The contributions to this remarkable volume generate a lively, interdisciplinary exchange of perspectives, individually and collectively putting to rest any semblance of a notion of modern, western fashion history as a seamless, linear narrative.' Susan Kaiser, Professor and Chair of the Division of Textiles and Clothing, University of California at Davis.Table of ContentsAcknowledgements Notes on Contributors Illustrations Introduction Christopher Breward and Caroline Evans Fashion and Modernity Elizabeth Wilson Part 1. Producing Identities 1.James Morrison (1789-1857), 'Napoleon of Shopkeepers', Millionaire Haberdasher, Modern Entrepreneur Caroline Dakers Response John Styles 2.Lee Miller and the Limits of Post-war British Modernity: Femininity, Fashion, the Problem of Biography Becky Conekin Response Carol Tulloch 3.People dress so badly nowadays: fashion and late modernity Andrew Hill Response Adam Briggs Part 2.Performing Bodies 4.Court Masques: Tableaux of Modernity in the Early 17th Century Andrea Stuart Response Susan North 5.Ambiguous Role Models : Fashion, Modernity and the Victorian Actress Christopher Breward Response Lynda Nead 6.Multiple, Movement, Model, Mode: The Mannequin Parade 1900-1929 Caroline Evans Response Andrew Bolton Part 3.Processes of Modernity 7.The Fingerprint of the Second Skin Kitty Hauser Response Esther Leslie 8.Cuttings and Pastings Alistair O'Neill Response Barry Curtis 9.entropy (fashion) and emergence (fashioning) Jamie Brassett Response Ben Highmore

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Book SynopsisAt the heart of Stripping, Sex, and Popular Culture lies a very personal story, of author Catherine Roach's response to the decision of her life-long best friend to become an exotic dancer. Catherine and Marie grew up together in Canada and moved to the USA to enroll in PhD programs at prestigious universities. For various reasons, Marie left her program and instead chose to work as a stripper. The author, at first troubled and yet fascinated by her friend's decision, follows Marie's journey into the world of stripping as an observer and analyst. She finds that this world raises complex questions about gender, sexuality, fantasy, feminism, and even spirituality. Moving from first hand interviews with dancers and others, the book broadens into a provocative and accessible examination of the current popularity of "striptease culture," with sex-saturated media imagery, thongs gone mainstream, and stripper aerobics at your local gym. Stripping, Sex, and Popular Culture scrutinizes the naked truth of a lucrative industry whose norms are increasingly at the center of contemporary society.Trade Review[Roach] neither oversimplifies nor romanticizes stripping... What makes Roach's book different is her intensely personal concern about the ramifications of stripping... she puts real faces on abstract theories. Recommended. * CHOICE *Table of ContentsIntroduction: Marie/Foxy Part I. The Strip Club 1. Stripping: Demeaning and/or Empowering? 2. The Work of A Stripper: Six-inch Heels and Pole Tricks 3. 'A Lot of Guys Just Want to Talk' and (Other) Reality Costs of Stripping 4. Where Fantasy Becomes Reality Part II. Stripping and Popular Culture 5. Striptease Culture: Thongs for Everywoman 6. Strippers, Whores, and Sluts: 'Call Off Your Old Tired Ethics' 7. At the Feet of the Goddess: Stripping, Sex, and Spirituality Conclusion: Take It Off!

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Book SynopsisExtreme metal--one step beyond heavy metal--can appear bizarre or terrifying to the uninitiated. Extreme metal musicians have developed an often impenetrable sound that teeters on the edge of screaming, incomprehensible noise. Extreme metal circulates on the edge of mainstream culture within the confines of an obscure 'scene', in which members explore dangerous themes such as death, war and the occult, sometimes embracing violence, neo-fascism and Satanism. In the first book-length study of extreme metal, Keith Kahn-Harris draws on first-hand research to explore the global extreme metal scene. He shows how the scene is a space in which members creatively explore destructive themes, but also a space in which members experience the everyday pleasures of community and friendship.Including interviews with band members and fans, from countries ranging from the UK and US to Israel and Sweden, Extreme Metal: Music and Culture on the Edge demonstrates the power and subtlety of an often surprising and misunderstood musical form.Trade ReviewThis fascinating book... provides real insights into the margins of our culture. Times Higher Education Supplement Sharp, engaging, and staggeringly comprehensive. Extreme Metal is a must-read for metal fans and anyone interested in the study of popular music and subcultural politics in a globalizing age. -- Sam Dunn, Co-Director, Metal: A Headbanger's Journey Although its a thorough work of sociological research, looking at how scenes work differently in different countries, as well as what unites them, delving into the close-knit interactions and often isolationist perspectives that accommodate each other so uniquely and much more, anyone involved in the metal scene can recognise their own relationship with extreme metal in the book, as well as understand the bigger picture. Neuro/Vision Extra: Extreme Metal As the first book-length academic study of extreme metal music and culture, Kahn-Harris's Extreme Metal is an important - and overdue - contribution to scholarship in this field. Perfect BeatTable of Contents* Introduction: From Heavy Metal to Extreme Metal * Chapter One: The Extreme Metal Scene * Chapter Two: The Scene and Transgression * Chapter Three: Experiencing the Scene * Chapter Four: Capital, Power, Infrastructure * Chapter Five: Comparing Extreme Metal Scenes * Chapter Six: Extreme Metal and Subcultural Capital * Chapter Seven: Reflexivity, Music and Politics * Chapter Eight: The Scene and Modernity * Appendix: Details of Quoted Interviewees

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Book SynopsisFashion is everywhere. It is one of the main ways in which we present ourselves to others, signaling what we want to communicate about our sexuality, wealth, professionalism, subcultural and political allegiances, social status, even our mood. It is also a global industry with huge economic, political and cultural impact on the lives of all of us who make, sell, wear or even just watch fashion.Fashion: the key concepts presents a clear introduction to the complex world of fashion. The aim throughout is to present a comprehensive but also accessible and provocative analysis. Readers will discover how the fashion industry is structured and how it thinks, the links between catwalk, celebrity branding, media promotion and mainstream retail, how clothes mean different things in different parts of the world, and how popular culture influences fashion and how fashion shapes global culture.Illustrated with a wealth of photographs, the text is further enlivened with over 30 detailed and rich case studies - ranging across topics as diverse as the meaning of black in fashion, the rise of celebrity branding, the cult of thinness, the politics of veiling, the eroticism of shoes and the power of cosmetics. Features: Boxed chapter overviews open each chapter Bullet points summarizing key ideas conclude each chapter Chapter discussions are illustrated with integrated case material Each chapter is supported by extended Case Studies Key words are highlighted in chapters and defined in an extensive Glossary Further Reading guides the reader to other literature A timeline of Fashion Milestones provides a chronology of major events in the history of fashionTrade Review'Craik's refreshing approach and lucid analysis of the complexities of dress and fashion theory provides essential reading. The author tackles many of those all too familiar dilemmas and questions about fashion's cultural significance with bravado. A panoramic and ambitious study of dress, in all its wider meanings and manifestations.'Claire Wilcox, Senior Curator, Department of Furniture, Textiles & Fashion, V&ATable of ContentsContents Introduction: Why Study Fashion? 1. The Fashion Impulse 2. The Eurocentric Fashion System 3. Fashion Cycles, Symbols and Flows 4. Fashion, Body Techniques and Identity 5. Fashion, Aesthetics and Art 6. Fashion as a Business and Cultural Industry 7. Popular Culture and Fashion 8. The Politics of Fashion Questions for Essays and Class Discussion Annotated Guide for Further Reading Glossary Fashion Milestones Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisHair: Styling, Culture and Fashion explores the social importance of hair, wherever it grows, explaining the cultural significance of hair and hairiness, and presenting a new critical engagement with hair and its stories, histories, performances and rituals. From heads, legs and underarms, to wigs and beards, and everything in between, the presentation, manipulation and daily experience of human hair plays a central and dynamic role within fashion, self-expression and the creation of social identity. The book's diverse range of cross-cultural essays encompasses the study of hair in fashion, film, art, history, literature, performance and consumer culture. Offering an accessible mix of visual analysis, cultural commentary and critical theory, Hair: Styling, Culture and Fashion will appeal to all those interested in the presentation and analysis of cultural identity and the body.Trade ReviewThis work provides an intriguing, interdisciplinary, multifaceted kaleidoscope focused on the universality of hair and its relationship to culture. These studies cover a wide spectrum, such as Hundu ritual tonsuring, African combing, salon styling, Islamic shaving, and aristocratic wigging. Overall, they provide a new lens for understanding the human condition and identity, both the exotic and personal. B. B. Chico, CHOICE MagazineTable of ContentsAcknowledgments Foreword, Caroline Cox Author's Biographies 1. Introduction: Thinking About Hair, Geraldine Biddle-Perry And Sarah Cheang Part One: Histories of Hair On the Head, Face and Body 2. Fashionable Hair In The Eighteenth Century: Theatricality and Display, Louisa Cross, 3. Roots: Hair and Race, Sarah Cheang 4. Revealing and Concealing: Notes and Observations on Eroticism and Female Pubic Hair, Jack Sargeant 5. From Style to Place: The Emergence Of The Hair Salon in the Twentieth Century, Kim Smith 6. The Big Shave: Fashions In Modern Male Facial Hair, Dene October Part Two: Hair & Identity 7. Hair And Male (Homo) Sexuality: Up Top And Down Below, Shaun Cole 8. Hair, Gender And Looking, Geraldine Biddle-Perry 9. Men's Facial Hair in Islam: A Matter of Interpretation, Faegheh Shirazi 10. Resounding Power Of The Afro Comb, Carol Tulloch 11. Concerning Blondeness: Gender, Ethnicity, Spectacle And Footballers' Waves, Pamela Church-Gibson 12. Hair, devotion and trade in India, Eiluned Edwards Part Three: Hair in Representation: Film, Art, Fashion, Literature & Performance 13. Hairpieces: Hair, Identity and Memory in the Work of Mona Hatoum, Leila McKellar 14. Hair Without a Head: Disembodiment and The Uncanny, Janice Miller 15. Hair and Fashioned Femininity in Two Nineteenth-Century Novels, Royce Mahawatte. 16. Hair control: The Feminine 'Disciplined Head', Thom Hecht 17. Hair-'Dressing' In Desperate Housewives: Narration, Characterisation, And The Pleasures Of Reading Hair, Rachel Velody 18. Hair Styling In The Fashion Magazine: Nova In The 1970s, Alice Beard Conclusion 19. Conclusion: Hair and Human Identity, Sarah Cheang and Geraldine Biddle-Perry End Notes Index

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Book SynopsisA cultural history of global electronic dance music countercultures, "Technomad" explores the pleasurable and activist trajectories of post-rave. The book documents an emerging network of techno-tribes, exploring their pleasure principles and cultural politics. Attending to sound system culture, electro-humanitarianism, secret sonic societies, teknivals and other gatherings, intentional parties, revitalisation movements and counter-colonial interventions, "Technomad" investigates how the dance party has been harnessed for transgressive and progressive ends, for manifold freedoms. Seeking freedom from moral prohibitions and standards, pleasure in rebellion, refuge from sexual and gender prejudice, exile from oppression, rupturing aesthetic boundaries, re-enchanting the world, reclaiming space, fighting for 'the right to party', and responding to a host of critical concerns, electronic dance music cultures are multivalent sites of resistance. Drawing on extensive ethnographic, netographic and documentary research, "Technomad" details the post-rave trajectory through various local sites and global scenes, with each chapter attending to unique developments in the techno counterculture: example Spiral Tribe, teknivals, psytrance, Burning Man, Reclaim the Streets, Earthdream. The book offers an original nuanced theory of resistance to assist understanding of these developments. This cultural history of hitherto uncharted territory will be of interest to students of cultural, performance, music, media, and new social movement studies, along with enthusiasts of dance culture and popular politics.Table of ContentsIntroduction; The Rave-olution? 1. Sound System Exodus: Tekno-Anarchy in the UK and Beyond 2. Secret Sonic Societies and Other Renegades of Sound 3. New Tribal Gathering: Vibe-Tribes and Mega-Raves 4. The Technooccult, Psytrance and the Millennium 5. Rebel Sounds and Dance Activism: Rave and the Carnival of Protest 6. Outback Vibes: Dancing Up Country Conclusion: Hardcore, You Know the Score

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Book SynopsisThe interrelationship between fashion and celebrity is now a salient and pervasive feature of the media world. This accessible text presents the first in-depth study of the phenomenon, assessing the degree to which celebrity culture has reshaped the fashion system. Fashion and Celebrity Culture critically examines the history of this relationship from its growth in the 19th century to its mutation during the twentieth century to the dramatic changes that have befallen it in the last two decades. It addresses the fashion-celebrity nexus as it plays itself out across mainstream cinema, television and music and in the celebrity status of a range of designers, models and artists. It explores the strategies that have enabled visual culture to recast itself in the new climate of celebrity obsession, popular culture and the art world to respond adaptively to its insistent pressures. With its engaging analysis and case studies from Lillian Gish to Louis Vuitton to Lady Gaga, Fashion and Celebrity Culture is of major interest to students of fashion, media studies, film, television studies and popular culture, and anyone with an interest in this global phenomenon.Trade ReviewFashion and Celebrity Culture explores the relationship between fashion and style that underpins contemporary celebrity culture. By tracing particular contemporary stylistic shifts as they have intersected with media technologies - photography, cinema, magazines and music - Pamela Church Gibson engages with broad social and cultural transformations in the field of popular culture. Focusing on fashion and its representation, Church Gibson offers a useful point of entry for understanding the processes and meanings that characterize celebrity culture today. * Vicki Karaminas, Associate Professor and Associate Head of the School of Design, University of Technology, Sydney, Australia *Pamela Church Gibson shows that while cinema has, from the early twentieth century forward, influenced fashion trends and often determined who would become a star, the intersection of celebrity, fashion, and high art that has developed in the last twenty years requires us to look "sideways" across the film-media-art-fashion-culture landscape...This is a very smart book in all senses. * Cynthia Baron, Associate Professor in the Department of Theatre and Film, Affiliated Faculty in the American Studies Program, Bowling Green State University, U.S. *Table of Contents1 Introduction 2 Fashion and Celebrity Culture, Past and Present PART I: FASHION & FILM 3 Film Stars as Fashion Icons 4 Hollywood Celebrity Cover Girls 5 ‘Fashion Films': from Prêt-a-porter to A Single Man 6 Sex and The City: From Small Screen to Big Screen PART II: FASHION MEDIA & CULTURE 8 Fashion on Television: So Many Celebrities, So Little Fashion? 7 The Changing Face(s) of the Fashion Magazine and the New Media Landscape 9 Fashion, Music and Celebrity 11 Artists, Celebrity and Fashion: From Wilde and Warhol to Taylor-Wood PART III: FASHION GONE GLOBAL 10 Designers and Models become Brands 12 Other Continents, Other Celebrities, Other Fashions 13 Conclusion: The Future of Celebrity-Driven Fashion Notes References Index

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