Search results for ""occident""

The Venture of Islam has been honored as a magisterial work of the mind since its publication in early 1975. In this three-volume study, illustrated with charts and maps, Hodgson traces and interprets the historical development of Islamic civilization from before the birth of Muhammad to the middle of the twentieth century. This work grew out of the famous course on Islamic civilization that Hodgson created and taught for many years at the University of Chicago. In the second work of this three-volume set, Hodgson investigates the establishment of an international Islamic civilization through about 1500. This includes a theoretical discussion of cultural patterning in the Islamic world and the Occident."This is a nonpareil work, not only because of its command of its subject but also because it demonstrates how, ideally, history should be written."—The New Yorker

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Oriental Lifestyle will take you on a journey that explores astonishing artistic and architectural worlds, captured by a poetic eye. Like an enchanter, Guillaume de Laubier brings the ochre of the desert alive and highlights the splendour and wonders of palaces and residences rich in ancestral knowledge and history. We discover the beautiful diversity of the Orient-Occident alliance, which has given birth to an innovative and colourful style of decoration. We stop in front of the skyscrapers, museums, and modern villas that are revolutionising architecture and design in the Arab world. This is a book that celebrates the diversity of the art of living, architecture and design in the East today, from Egypt to Tunisia, Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, and also Mauritania and Morocco. Text in English and French.

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Edward Said has been acknowledged as one of the greatest critics and cultural theorists of our time. His groundbreaking work Orientalism initiated the development of postcolonial theory, causing a paradigm shift by re-conceptualizing, deconstructing, and re-presenting the ‘Orient’ as the ultimate ‘Other’ of the ‘Occident.’ Despite its influence on other disciplines, the impact of Said’s work in the field of education has not yet been fully explored. This book translates Said’s complex theory into praxis for readers and educators by gleaning key concepts and methodologies, critical and conceptual frameworks, and uses and ramifications for academic critique. Pedagogy of the Other (appropriately named after Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed) suggests ways and means to create an innovative postcolonial teaching practice that does not marginalize, oppress, or negate the Other, but rather, creates a counter-discourse of representation and empowerment.

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This book explores the role of Chineseness or lo chino in the production of Chilean national identity. It does so by discussing the many voices, images, and intentions of diverse actors who contribute to stereotyping or problematizing Chineseness in Chile. The authors argue that in general, representing and perceiving China or Chineseness as the Other is part of a broader cultural and political strategy for various stakeholders to articulate Chile as either a Western country or one that is becoming-Western. The authors trace the evolution of the symbolic role that China and Chineseness play in defining racial, gendered, and class aspects of Chilean national social imaginary. In doing so, they challenge a common idea that Chineseness is a stable signifier and the simplistic perception of the ethnic Chinese as the unassimilable foreigner within the nation. In response, the authors call for a postmigrant approach to understanding identities and Chilean society beyond stubborn Orient-Occident and us-them dichotomies.

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Bertolt Brecht continues to be regarded as one of the twentieth century's most controversial and influential writers. His life and work raise important questions about the nature and function of literature and theater, about perception and commitment, about feminist approaches to politics and literature, and about intellectual property rights. The Brecht Yearbook is a venue for discussion about aspects of theater and literature that were of particular interest to Brecht, especially the politics of literature and the politics of theater in a global context. The volume Brecht in / and Asia contains twenty-six essays based on presentations given at "Brecht in/and Asia,"the thirteenth Symposium of the International Brecht Society (IBS), which was held at the University of Hawai'i at Manoa in 2010. Themes covered include Brecht in India; contemporary Chinese theater; the 'Chinese' Brecht; tradition, Brecht, and political theater; Brecht between imperialism and postcolonialism, orient and occident; Fritz Bennewitz's intercultural Brecht productions; and Brecht('s) adaptations.

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A multimedia portrait of a fictional woman artist caught between two cultures In her latest body of work, multimedia artist Shirin Neshat (born 1957) turns her focus to the American West. With more than 100 photographs, a two-channel video installation and a feature film, Neshat creates a multilayered look at contemporary America through the eyes of a fictionalized artist. Monumental black-and-white photographs are transformed through Neshat's use of Farsi text and images that have been hand-drawn onto the picture. The texts represent Neshat's interpretation of the dreams of the sitter, with references to ancient myths and ideologies. Neshat works and experiments with photography, video and film, imbuing them with highly poetic and politically charged images and narratives that question issues of power, religion, race, gender and the relationship between the past and present, occident and orient, individual and collective through the lens of her personal experiences as an Iranian woman living in exile.

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Films such as Occident, The Death of Mr. Lazarescu, 4 Months, 3 Weeks & 2 Days, Police, Adjective and If I Want to Whistle, I Whistle have brought Romanian cinema from relative obscurity into the limelight of the international festival circuit and to the attention of professional and lay audiences alike. These films' common aesthetic, thematic, ethical and ideological traits expound a coherent and increasingly important film movement - the new Romanian cinema. Through the prism of a representative selection of twenty extraordinarily well-crafted and highly awarded films made over the last decade, this book offers an overview of Romanian cinema from its origins to the present. It describes the cultural, social and political environment. It features historical and textual analysis of key films. It offers a unique exploration of the films' audio-visual grammar of space and time. It integrates contemporary film theory and cultural and gender studies. It examines the broader (Eastern European) industrial context and the impact of audience and industry discourses. It features interviews with prominent directors such as Cristi Puiu, Cristian Mungiu, and Corneliu Porumboiu.

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Japan: A Short Cultural History was first published in 1931 by the Cresset Press in London and D. Appleton in New York. Writing in the Journal of American Oriental Society in 1959, Edwin O. Reischauer, Harvard professor and leading scholar in Japanese history and culture (and future United States Ambassador to Japan) said this of George Sansom's comprehensive account of Japanese history: "When Sir George Sansom's Japan: A Short Cultural History appeared in 1931, it raised the study of Japanese history in the West to new levels. Its penetrating analysis of institutions, sensitive interpretations of cultural developments, and stylistic charm contrasted with the plodding pedestrian surveys and over-written anecdotal accounts that had hitherto served in the Occident as introductions to Japanese history." The present Stanford edition, the first to appear in paperback in the United States, is a photographic reproduction of the British edition except in two particulars: eight of the original twenty plates have been dropped, and the maps have been redrawn by Margaret Kays. In redrawing the maps it was decided to retain the author's terminology, orthography, and dating even where these have been discarded or suspended by more recent scholarship.

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While the Western perception of "the Orient" has become a well-worn topic in the field of Asian and Middle Eastern studies, the way in which the Arab world has come to perceive the West has been largely neglected. Occidentalisms in the Arab World not only presents a comprehensive overview and pointed commentary on recent works in the emerging field of Occidentalist studies, but also provides new insight on the interplay between ideology and image in the formulation of "the West." Robbert Woltering provides an in-depth look at the ways in which multiple representations and occidentalisms of the West have developed in Egypt since the end of the Cold War. Through the rigorous analysis of political speeches, popular literature, and recurrent images, Woltering examines the ideological foundations that continue to shape the image of the Occident in the twenty-first century. Occidentalisms in the Arab World provides an unparalleled and original commentary on an emerging field at the intersection of Middle East Studies, Political Science, and Media Studies.

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This book brings together a range of viewpoints on a number of the burning issues affecting urban sustainability in North America and Europe at the beginning of the 21st century. H.S. Geyer and his contributors cover a wide spectrum of the urban policy issues that determine the growth and development progress as well as the livability of cities in the Occident.The volume focuses on three broad themes: nuances in urban policy formulation in Britain and the United States; the evolvement of urban systems regionally and globally; and the social and economic forces that determine urban livability and bring about change in the demographic landscape of cities in both Europe and the United States. In this Handbook some of the world's most experienced researchers express their views - often controversial - on topics as diverse as the role of the IT sector, population ageing, migration, global warming and social economics within urban development. This important Handbook has a strong demographic and developmental focus and covers urban policy issues that should be of interest to a wide readership - from urban planning, geography, regional science and economics to international business, population studies, history and political science.

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Negative portrayals of the West in Iran are often centred around the CIA-engineered coup of 1953, which overthrew Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddeq, or the hostage-taking crisis in 1979 following the attack on the US embassy in Tehran. Looking past these iconic events, Ehsan Bakhshandeh explores the deeper anti-imperialistic and anti-hegemonic roots of the hostility to Westernism that is evident in the Iranian press. Distinguishing between negative and outright hostile perceptions of the West – which also encompasses Britain, France and Germany – the book traces how the West is represented as the `Occident’ in the country’s media. From the Qajar period and the Tobacco protests of the late nineteenth century to the ill-fated Anglo-Persian Treaty of 1919, through to the 1953 coup and 1979 hostage crisis, Bakshandeh highlights the various points in history when misinterpretations and conflicts led to a demonisation of the `other’ in the Iranian media. The major recent source of contention between the West and Iran has of course been the nuclear issue and the resultant regime of sanctions. By examining how this and other issues have been represented by the Iranian press, Bakshandeh offers a crucial and often-overlooked aspect of the key relationship between Iran and the West.

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Swiss artist Silvie Defraoui realised a significant part of her work beginning in 1975 together with her husband Chérif (1932–1994). Silvie and Chérif Defraoui compiled their photo and video works, installations, sculptures, and performances under the title Archives du Futur. They taught together at Geneva’s École supérieure des Beaux- Arts (today HEAD–Genève), where they founded the legendary studio Média Mixte and counted a number of renowned artists among their students. The Archives du Futur, to which Silvie Defraoui has continued adding works since Chérif’s premature death, has been made available as a digital catalogue raisonné to browse online. This book accompanies, supplements, and expands on the digital documentation. It gathers 14 commentaries on individual works of the two artists by distinguished art theorists and curators, originally published from 1984 onwards, in various art journals and exhibition catalogues or newly written for this book. They reflect on the artists’ joint oeuvre as well as on work created independently by Silvie Defraoui. Interviews with her and selected lecture texts from the couple’s shared teaching activities shed light on their artistic stance and thematic focuses. The volume invites an exploration of an artistic body of work that is highly topical through its merging of dualities - memory and the present, Orient and Occident, man and woman, tradition and invention. Text in English, French and German.

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Istanbul - city of contrasts, mediator between orient and occident, former grandiose seat of power of the Sultan in the Ottoman Empire, today a bubbling cultural metropolis on the Bosphorus, European City of Culture in 2010, twin town of Cologne since 1997. In the hip quarters of Tesvikiye und Nisantasi, which are the preferred districts of artists and designers, the range of artistic approaches and attitudes is ever-present. The new Turkish art and design scene has been shaped by the innovative breakthrough of the twenty-first century like almost no other city in Europe. Whether in art, design, music or literature, Istanbul is the creative heart of the Turkish avant-garde. The creations of Istanbul's fashion designers are always astonishing, unconventional and modern. They move between history and modernity, tradition and innovation, between humanism and the cosmopolitan, philosophy and religion - poles which, for the Turkish designers, definitely do not oppose one another. To all of them Istanbul is an inexhaustible source of impressions, stimuli, ideas and images. Features works from Arzu Kaprol, Bahar Korçan| Dilek Hanif, Gamze Saraçoglu, Hakan Yildirim, Hatice Gökçe, Idil Tarzi, Mehtap Elaidi, Özlem Süer, Selim Baklaci, Simay Bülbül and Zeynep Tosun. Text in English, German & Turkish.

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What connects Shiite passion plays with Brecht�s drama? Which of Goethe�s poems were inspired by the Quran? How can Ibn Arabi�s theology of sighs explain the plays of Heinrich von Kleist? And why did the Persian author Sadeq Hedayat identify with the Prague Jew Franz Kafka? �One who knows himself and others will here too understand: Orient and Occident are no longer separable�: in this new book, the critically acclaimed author and scholar Navid Kermani takes Goethe at his word. He reads the Quran as a poetic text, opens Eastern literature to Western readers, unveils the mystical dimension in the works of Goethe and Kleist, and deciphers the political implications of theatre, from Shakespeare to Lessing to Brecht. Drawing striking comparisons between diverse literary traditions and cultures, Kermani argues for a literary cosmopolitanism that is opposed to all those who would play religions and cultures against one another, isolating them from one another by force. Between Quran and Kafka concludes with Kermani�s speech on receiving Germany�s highest literary prize, an impassioned plea for greater fraternity in the face of the tyranny and terrorism of Islamic State. Kermani�s personal assimilation of the classics gives his work that topical urgency that distinguishes universal literature when it speaks to our most intimate feelings. For, of course, love too lies �between Quran and Kafka�.

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What connects Shiite passion plays with Brecht�s drama? Which of Goethe�s poems were inspired by the Quran? How can Ibn Arabi�s theology of sighs explain the plays of Heinrich von Kleist? And why did the Persian author Sadeq Hedayat identify with the Prague Jew Franz Kafka? �One who knows himself and others will here too understand: Orient and Occident are no longer separable�: in this new book, the critically acclaimed author and scholar Navid Kermani takes Goethe at his word. He reads the Quran as a poetic text, opens Eastern literature to Western readers, unveils the mystical dimension in the works of Goethe and Kleist, and deciphers the political implications of theatre, from Shakespeare to Lessing to Brecht. Drawing striking comparisons between diverse literary traditions and cultures, Kermani argues for a literary cosmopolitanism that is opposed to all those who would play religions and cultures against one another, isolating them from one another by force. Between Quran and Kafka concludes with Kermani�s speech on receiving Germany�s highest literary prize, an impassioned plea for greater fraternity in the face of the tyranny and terrorism of Islamic State. Kermani�s personal assimilation of the classics gives his work that topical urgency that distinguishes universal literature when it speaks to our most intimate feelings. For, of course, love too lies �between Quran and Kafka�.

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Volume 42 explores material culture, the visual arts, literature, opera, and the stage during the long eighteenth century in France, Britain, the Americas, and China. These essays examine encounters between Europe and the Americas, the Orient and the Occident, as well as the challenges of translation. Several authors analyze the role of gender in literature and life, exploring themes of intimacy, interiority, authority, and knowledge. Table of Contents: Christopher M. S. Johns, "Erotic Spirituality and the Catholic Revival in Napoleonic Paris: The Curious History of Antonio Canova's Penitent Magdalene"; Jeffrey M. Leichman, "Beaumarchais' Revolution: Genre, Politics, and Theatricality in La Mere coupable"; Ed Goehring, "The Jesuit and the Libertine: Some early reception of Mozart's Don Giovanni"; Kristina Kleutghen, "Staging Europe: Theatricality and Painting at the Chinese Imperial Court"; Ana Elena Gonzalez Trevino, "'Kings and their crowns': signs of monarchy and the spectacle of New World otherness in heroic drama and public pageantry"; Annie Smart, "Re-Reading Nature and Exoticism in Chateaubriand's Voyage en Amerique: A Case for the Biophilia Effect"; Kimberly Chrisman-Campbell, "Beauty and the Beast: Animals in the Visual and Material Culture of the Toilette"; Hector Reyes, "Drawing and History in the Comte de Caylus' Recueil d'antiquites". Laura Miller, "Publishers and Gendered Readership in English-Language Editions of Il Newtonianismo per le Dame"; Heidi Bostic, "Graffigny's Self, Graffigny's Friend: Intimate Sharing in the Correspondance 1750-52"; Julie Park, "The Poetics of Enclosure in Sense and Sensibility"; Caroline Austin Bolt, "Mediating Happiness: Performances of Jane Austen's Narrators"; Kate C. Hamilton, "She 'Came up Stairs into the World:' Elizabeth Barry and Restoration Celebrity".

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Some people's path to anthroposophy leads them directly to Rudolf Steiner's early work and The Philosophy of Freedom, and this becomes the philosophical basis for their future exploration. Rudolf Steiner referred to this as a 'safe' approach.But many people's destiny leads them directly to anthroposophy itself, or via one of its practical initiatives, making it difficult sometimes for them to relate to the cognitive basis of anthroposophy. In this unique study Sergei O. Prokofieff offers fresh means of access to Rudolf Steiner's crucially important book, The Philosophy of Freedom. Prokofieff indicates why The Philosophy of Freedom is so important to anthroposophy. It is here that Rudolf Steiner lays the foundations for his method of research. In Steiner's own words: "One who is willing can indeed find the basic principles of anthroposophy in my Philosophy of Freedom". Prokofieff discusses the Christian nature of the anthroposophical method of cognition, and how it is integrally related to freedom and love. This in turn reveals the deeply Christian roots of The Philosophy of Freedom and its importance for modern Christian esotericism. In fact, says Prokofieff, the book holds a 'central position ...in the spiritual history of the Occident'. In considering its multifaceted 'cosmic-human dimension', the author discusses The Philosophy of Freedom in relation to the Mystery of the Resurrection, the Working of the Hierarchies, the Being Anthroposophia, the Fifth Gospel, Rudolf Steiner's Path of Initiation, the Rosicrucian and Michaelic Impulses, the Life Between Death and Rebirth, the Foundation Stone, the Christian Mysteries of Karma and the Science of the Grail.

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Focuses on the cultural, philosophical, political, and scholarly uses of "orientalism" in the German-speaking and Central and Eastern European worlds from the late eighteenth century to the present day. The concept and study of orientalism in Western culture gained a changed understanding from Edward Said's now iconic 1978 book Orientalism. However, recent debate has moved beyond Said's definition of the phenomenon, highlighting the multiple forms of orientalism within the "West," the manifold presence of the "East" in the Western world, indeed the epistemological fragility of the ideas of "Occident" and "Orient" as such. This volume focuses on the deployment -- here the cultural, philosophical, political, and scholarly uses -- of "orientalism" in the German-speaking and Central and Eastern European worlds from the late eighteenth century to the present day. Its interdisciplinary approach combines distinguished contributions by Indian scholars, who approach the topic of orientalism through the prism of German studies as practiced in Asia, with representative chapters by senior German, Austrian,and English-speaking scholars working at the intersection of German and oriental studies. Contributors: Anil Bhatti, Michael Dusche, Johannes Feichtinger, Johann Heiss, James Hodkinson, Kerstin Jobst, Jon Keune, Todd Kontje, Margit Köves, Sarah Lemmen, Shaswati Mazumdar, Jyoti Sabarwal, Ulrike Stamm, John Walker. James Hodkinson is Associate Professor in German Studies at Warwick University. John Walker is Senior Lecturer in EuropeanCultures and Languages at Birkbeck College, University of London. Shaswati Mazumdar is Professor in German at the University of Delhi. Johannes Feichtinger is a Researcher at the Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften.

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The origin and development of Western plainchant, and of the genres of liturgical book in which it is recorded, have occupied Michel Huglo throughout his long career, which has taken him to libraries in every corner of Europe and the United States. This volume, the first in a set of four to appear in the Variorum series, brings together analyses of manuscripts dating from the 9th to the 13th century, including Huglo's pathbreaking studies of the antiphoner of Compiègne, the first troper-prosers, and of alleluia lists as clues to place of origin. The consequences of the Treaty of Verdun (843) for the diffusion of the plainchant repertory, research in medieval musicology in the 20th century, the utility of codicology for musicological manuscript studies, and the critical edition of the Gregorian antiphoner are addressed in other studies included here. Les origines et le développement du plain-chant en Occident et l'étude des genres de livres liturgiques qui le contiennent ont occupé Michel Huglo durant sa longue carrière et l'ont conduit à visiter des bibliothèques partout en Europe et aux Etats-Unis. Ce volume, le premier d'une série de quatre dans la collection Variorum, comprend des analyses de manuscrits du neuvième au treizième siècle, notamment des études novatrices relançant les recherches sur l'antiphonaire de Compiègne, les premiers tropaires-prosaires et les listes d'alleluias comme moyen d'identification des manuscrits de chant. Les conséquences du traité de Verdun (843) pour la diffusion du répertoire de plain-chant, les recherches en musicologie médiévale au XXe siècle, l'application des méthodes de la codicologie à l'étude des manuscrits notés, et l'édition critique de l'Antiphonaire grégorien forment les sujets d'autres études réunies dans ce volume.

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Great Power Strategy in Asia, 1905-2005 analyzes the enduring themes underlying the strategic struggles in East Asia, beginning with the crucial event of the 1904-5 Russo-Japanese War. Jonathan Bailey clearly shows why military history is highly relevant in understanding today’s strategic problems, and how the most important areas of current affairs have their roots in often forgotten corners of military history. He makes his powerful case in three clear sections: an analysis of the explosive factors that led to war between Russia and Japan in 1904, presenting a ten-year perspective of the War, focusing on its consequences: cultural shock in ‘the West’, re-alignment of Asian imperial geography and the failure to learn vital military lessons, as World War I approached a thirty-five year perspective of the war, showing why Japan repeated the essential strategic, operational and tactical ploys of its war against Russia in 1904 in its strike upon the USA in 1941. Allied victory assured the downfall of Europe’s empires in Asia, with the USA inheriting much of the old imperial legacy a centennial view of the Russo-Japanese War, which demonstrates that many of the broader issues identifiable in 1904-05 remain at the heart of today’s strategic discourse: Western apprehension about the economic rise of Japan; the anomalies of an ‘American Empire’; tensions between Occident and Orient; the apparent new relevance of geopolitics; and the importance of demography in perceptions of global power. This book is multidisciplinary, emphasizing the linkages between imperial power-politics, military operations, cultural conflict and commercial rivalry. It is also the story of military innovation, the pathology of learning lessons from the experience of war, and the anticipated rise of Asian, or more specifically Chinese, power a century after the false dawn of the Japanese victory in 1905.This book will be of great interest to all students of the Russo-Japanese War, Asian security, and of military and strategic studies.

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The term Europe has not always been understood in the same way. Depending on the period and influenced by the dominant interpreting elites at the time, it was always different features that were emphasised, "new" traditions that were discovered and created, and different values -- specific to the period -- that were claimed as European. Europe is a construct. That is as true today as in the period before 1945. This monograph focuses on 'Sachbücher' (non-fiction books), travelogues and literary-political writings by eight authors who played a key role in the discourse on Europe in the Third Reich and also partly in the early German Federal Republic. One of them is Walter Kiaulehn. In World War II, in the periodical Signal, Kiaulehn draws up a European family tree of a somewhat different, totalitarian kind -- naturally excluding semi-Asiatic Russia as well as England, a refugee from Europe. England has "swum off" in the direction of the USA. For Ernst Wilhelm Eschmann, Great Britain and France belong to the "margins of Europe" anyway, while the central powers, Germany and Italy, constitute the actual core of the continent. Europe evolves from the centre, and it is characteristically medial, balanced, mediating between tradition and progress. It is the others who are radical and have no appreciation for the middle course: the Americans with their skyscraper fantasies and the Bolsheviks with their anti-cultural tabula-rasa mentality. The New Europe", on the other hand, is the continent where in accordance with a golden mean that has developed historically, a moderate Modernism takes shape. An instance of this is the New Bari, the "favourite city of Fascism" that Gustav R. Hocke visits in 1937 and in which, instead of giant high-rises, he encounters much smaller, six-storey buildings along the new waterfront promenade. The term The New Europe became generally accepted in Germany during the 1930s, and by the beginning of World War II it was an integral part of the German discourse on Europe. Last but not least, this book would like to encourage the reader to critically question the provisionally last 'great narrative' of the Occident -- the narrative according to which Europe evolved from liberal humanist traditions and, based on democratic values, gradually came to have its present form in several intermediate stages beginning in classical antiquity.

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