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This stimulating and comprehensive study of Will Self's work spans his entire career and offers insightful readings of all his fictional and non-fictional work up to and including his Booker prize nominated novel Umbrella.

Aussi loin que l'on remonte dans l'histoire des civilisations, des peuples, des États, des nations et des communautés, on peut dire de l'étranger qu'il a mobilisé d'innombrables savoirs, suscité des représentations qui se sont inlassablement appliquées à comprendre et à analyser toutes les raisons de sa'venue', à penser la place qu'il devait ou devrait occuper ; l'étranger a donné lieu à des politiques, des législations, des dispositifs et des règlements administratifs – anciens, modernes ou contemporains – qui en ont minutieusement codifié et régulé la présence. Cette présence a, sous toutes les latitudes et à travers les âges, suscité des sentiments d'empathie, de générosité et de fraternité, mais aussi des sentiments d'hostilité, de haine et de rejet.

Giving Blood represents a new agenda for blood donation research. It explores the diverse historical and contemporary undercurrents that influence how blood donation takes place, and the social meanings that people attribute to the act of giving blood. Drawing from empirical studies conducted in the United States, Canada, France, Australia, China, India, Latin America and Africa, the book's chapters turn our attention to the evolution of blood donation worldwide, examining: the impact of technology advances on blood collection practices the shifting approaches to donor recruitment and retention the governance and policy issues associated with the establishment of blood clinics the political and legal challenges of regulating blood systems. This innovative examination moves the focus from individual explanations of rates of blood donation to a social, structural explanation. It will appeal to international scholars and students working in the areas of sociology, medical anthropology, health care, public policy, socio-legal studies, comparative politics, organizational management, health and illness, the history of medicine, and public health ethics.

In Nederland komen mensen met verschillende sociale en culturele achtergronden elkaar tegen op kantoor, in de tram of in de sportschool. Soms leven en werken zij daadwerkelijk samen, vaak ook lijken ze langs elkaar heen te leven. En soms leiden vooroordelen, misverstanden en angst voor het onbekende tot spanningen. Dit heeft geresulteerd in een bezinning op identiteit en een integratiedebat. Interculturele samenwerking in organisaties biedt de lezer vaardigheden en inzichten om juist voordeel te halen uit culturele diversiteit. Het boek beschrijft concrete technieken voor de (toekomstige) professional om inclusief beleid te implementeren, te werken in divers samengestelde teams en om te gaan met culturele dilemma's. Thema's als globalisering, identiteit, verhouding wij/zij, begrip van culturen en (tegengaan van) discriminatie komen diepgaand aan bod. De theorie en de technieken worden verduidelijkt met voorbeelden uit de praktijk en er zijn reflectievragen, tussenvragen en toepassingsopdrachten. Deze herziene druk bevat actuele thema's, zoals de globale arbeidsmarkt, reshoring als vervolgstap op outsourcing en het jihadisme in de westerse samenlevingen. Ook is de theorie geactualiseerd met de vijfde cultuurdimensie van Hofstede, wordt er dieper ingegaan op Pinto's onderscheid tussen F- en G-culturen en is het vraagstuk van de grenzen aan de vrije meningsuiting in een breder kader geplaatst. De website bevat antwoorden bij de opdrachten, rollenspelen en checklists.

Through a reevaluation of the work of some of the most important thinkers of the twentieth century, this book details how semiotics, social sense, and social communication can function together to analyze how culture works in the contemporary era.

Embodied Protests examines how Bolivia's hesitant courtship with globalization manifested in the visceral and emotional diseases that afflicted many Bolivian women. Drawing on case studies conducted among market- and working-class women in the provincial town of Punata, Maria Tapias examines how headaches and debilidad, so-called normal bouts of infant diarrhea, and the malaise oppressing whole communities were symptomatic of profound social suffering. She approaches the narratives of distress caused by poverty, domestic violence, and the failure of social networks as constituting the knowledge that shaped their understandings of well-being. At the crux of Tapias's definitive analysis is the idea that individual health perceptions, actions, and practices cannot be separated from local cultural narratives or from global and economic forces. Evocative and compassionate, Embodied Protests gives voice to the human costs of the ongoing neoliberal experiment.

This volume examines Japanese and Korean politics from both Japanese and Korean angles, exploring why the two countries do not cooperate bilaterally or consult one another, despite their geographical closeness and a number of common features that are central to both countries'domestic politics and foreign policies.

This book provides original insight into the way we now engage and remember national history. Drawing on fieldwork and analysis of international case studies on state commemoration, memorialization, recreational and tourism and times of disaster and crisis, the author demonstrates that not only does the nation frequently retain a strong cultural relevance in our global world but that the emergence of new forms of ritual and remembrance means that in many instances we are seeing the re-enchantment of nationalism. Drawing upon and developing an empirically informed cultural sociology, the author charts the distinctive qualities of these new national rites and how they feed into and advance particular cosmopolitan and orthodox national politics. Because social science has so often wrongly assumed the end of nationalism, the insights of this of the book about the possibilities and limitations of contemporary nationalism demand serious consideration by academics and also by policy makers and the general public.

Contesting the putative'even-handedness'of many introductory social science texts, this innovative book presents strong and provocative arguments on contemporary social issues that will stimulate readers to think critically. The principal theme of the book is that social science is at its best, and most exciting, when it confronts and refutes'cultures of prejudice'—intricate systems of beliefs and attitudes that sustain many forms of social oppression and that are, themselves, sustained by ignorance and fear of the unknown and the unfamiliar. Such a critical social science, it is argued, can make an important contribution to promoting human freedom and extending human capacities. Discussions range from the personal to the political, the national to the global, encompassing social policy analysis (law, health, and welfare), the status of women, and animal liberation, as well as nationalism, racism, political ideology, the global economy, and terrorism. This passionately argued book is an excellent supplementary text for undergraduate social science students, as well as a stimulating read for all those open to hard-hitting confrontations with conventional wisdom. Beginning each chapter with an aphorism, anecdote, or quotation that reflects, illustrates, or challenges particular prejudices, the authors offer concise critical discussions of the issues, informed by some of the best research and thought in the social scientific literature.

Toward an Urban Cultural Studies is a call for a new interdisciplinary area of research and teaching. Blending Urban Studies and Cultural Studies, this book grounds readers in the extensive theory of the prolific French philosopher Henri Lefebvre.

​„Kreativität“ gilt als die strategische Ressource der Zukunft. Lech Suwala betrachtet das Wesen, die Entstehung und die Bedeutungszuweisung von (kultureller) Kreativität. Denn trotz des „Kreativitätshypes“ und zahlreicher Veröffentlichungen gibt es gravierende Mängel beim Verständnis von kultureller Kreativität, die das Fundament der Kultur- und Kreativwirtschaft bildet. Vor diesem Hintergrund wird das Verhältnis von (kultureller) Kreativität und dem Raum als Standort, Ort und Landschaft untersucht. Der Autor entwickelt anhand einer Zusammenführung von interdisziplinären Erkenntnissen ein systemisches Modell des Kreativitätsprozesses an der Schnittstelle von Kreativität, Kultur und Raum, in dem der Raum eine strukturierende und/oder koordinierende Funktion übernimmt.

New edition forthcoming in time for fall 2017!Despite some popular arguments to the contrary, Americans are like people everywhere: naturally social, interdependent, and shaped by social forces. The Myth of Individualism offers a concise introduction to sociology and sociological thinking. Callero challenges the dominant belief that human behavior is the result of free choices made by autonomous actors. Drawing upon personal stories, historical events, and sociological research, Callero offers an informative outlook on enduring social problems that can help us begin the process of developing a sociological perspective. By acknowledging the limits of individual effort and control, we gain insight into our own lives and the lives of others. Callero engagingly examines the fundamental importance of cultural symbols, the pressures of group conformity, the influence of family, the impact of social class, the wide reach of global capitalism, and the revolutionary potential of collective action. The second edition is updated throughout, including new examples from the recent financial crisis and the Arab Spring. It also includes a new chapter on the power of mass media and how media influences our lives. The Myth of Individualism is a must-read for anyone interested in how powerful social forces shape individual lives in subtle but compelling ways.

Despite dying in relative obscurity, Jane Austen has become a global force as different readers across time, space and media have responded to her work. This volume examines the ways in which her novels affect individual psychologies and how Janeites experience her work, from visiting her home to public re-enactments to films based on her writings.

Who owns your sex organs? Different cultures today and in different epochs have given a variety of answers to this question. It may seem self­ evident that every individual owns and has sovereignty over his or her own body parts, such as the head, legs, nose, stomach, pancreas, and other body parts. The sex organs, however, seem to be an exception. Even though they are as much an integral part of the individual as a leg or a liver, the sex organs are unique in that many cultures have established laws and taboos over the use and even the mere display of the sex organs. Thus, certain cultures have placed constraints over the individual's ownership of his or her sex organs and actively regulate and restrict the individual's access and use of those organs. In other cultures, the question of ownership of the sex organs is more decisively answered. In any culture where circumcision to any degree of either the male or female is practiced, permitted, encouraged, or even merely tolerated, it is clear that the individual is not considered to own his own sex organs. In the United States today, the medical establishment has created an is considered acceptable and desirable that anyone for environment where it any reason can authorize or execute the amputation of the foreskin from a male child's penis.

Erstmals präsentiert sich hier die Sozialistische Länder-Forschung der Politologen der Bundesrepublik in einem umfassenden Werk. Zentriert um die europäischen Länder entsteht ein Gesamtspektrum der jüngeren politischen,sozialen und ideologischen Entwicklung, das auch China und Kuba einbezieht. Behandelt werden die Kernfragen des sowjetsozialistischen Systems: Die Interessen der Bürokratie und wichtiger gesellschaftlicher Gruppen im politischen Prozeß, die Abwendung vom stalinistischen Herrschaftsmodell in Richtungdes Korporativismus und des'sozialistischen Parlamentarismus',typische Formen der politischen Konfliktbearbeitung angesichts von Individualisierungs- und Pluralisierungstendenzen, die Rollen der Ideologie und des Alltagswissens sowie einzelnen Politikfelder wie der Kader- und Sozialpolitik.

Cultuurverschillen komen niet alleen voor tussen mensen uit verschillende landen, maar ook tussen mensen uit verschillende milieus, van verschillende sekse of met een verschillende geaardheid. Om met al deze mensen te kunnen werken, is het belangrijk dat professionals in de dienstverlening, de gezondheidszorg en het bedrijfsleven kennis hebben van sociale en culturele verschillen. Bovendien is het nodig dat ze zich ook een bepaalde houding eigen maken: ze moeten ‘met nieuwe ogen'leren kijken naar hun werkomgeving.Met nieuwe ogen brengt studenten deze basiskennis over cultuur en cultuurverschillen bij. Daarnaast ontwikkelen ze met dit werkboek een transculturele attitude door middel van het reflecteren op eigen ideeën. Aan de hand van verschillende situaties wordt beschreven hoe cultuurverschillen zich kunnen uiten en hoe een professional hiermee om kan gaan. Het boek bestaat uit drie hoofdstukken. Elk hoofdstuk begint met leerdoelen en sluit af met (reflectie)opdrachten. De theorie is verrijkt met aansprekende voorbeelden. Deze vierde herziene druk is geheel geactualiseerd. Daarnaast zijn nieuwe onderzoeksgegevens van Hofstede verwerkt, is er voor docenten ondersteunend materiaal beschikbaar zoals de antwoorden van de opdrachten en is de website meer verweven met het boek.

These collected essays contain fundamental contributions to contemporary cultural analysis and theory as well as exemplary interpretations of film, literature and other media. Central issues of current cultural studies are addressed: cultural narratives, cultural identity, collective memory and post-colonial thinking. The oeuvre of cultural and literary critic Wolfgang Müller-Funk encompasses historic analyses such as readings of Broch, Canetti and Musil, and the heritage they passed on. Other essays move from the beginning of the 20th to the 21st century and address questions of space, time and globalization discussing, for example, Walter Benjamin and 9/11.

Vasilii Fedorovich Malinovskii (1765-1814) is a name which has hitherto lacked true resonance in the history of Russian culture. Tt is of course a name known to all students of Alexander Pushkin's biography, for Malinovskii was the first Director of the new Tsarskoe Selo Lyceum, if, sadly, for only the first three of the young poet's years at the school. For those scholars conversant with the intellectual and literary life of the'beautiful beginning'of the reign of Alexander I's reign Malinovskii has his little niche for his remarkable Rassuzhdenie 0 mire i voine (1803) and less for his Osennie vechera (1803), a little-known journal limited to a mere eight weekly issues and written entirely by the editor. As regards the of his'eighteenth-century'Malinovskii, who lived the first thirty-five years life predominantly in the reign of the great Catherine, little information encumbers the memory of even specialists of the period. Indeed, his elder brother, Aleksei Fedorovich (1762-1840), is the more likely to be remembered for his literary and translating work as well for his later position as Head of the Moscow Archive of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which brought him into contact with Pushkin and, not unexpectedly, with Karamzin. Karamzin referred to him as'one of my few old and genuine friends', but one searches in vain for a similar accolade for VasiIii Fedorovich.

Als Instanzen der Beschreibung moderner Gesellschaften gewinnen die Kulturwissenschaften immer mehr an Bedeutung. Rund 100 Autoren aus diversen Fachgebieten haben in diesem Handbuch ihre Forschungen zu den Methoden und Themen der Kulturwissenschaft zusammengetragen. Sie stellen damit die junge Disziplin auf ein theoretisches Fundament und geben einen Ausblick auf künftige Entwicklungen. Der erste Band'Grundlagen und Schlüsselbegriffe'thematisiert die wesentlichen Gesichtspunkte wie Erfahrung, Sprache, Handlung, Identität, Geschichte und Zeit und setzt sie der'gelebten'Kultur und ihren lebenspraktischen Auswirkungen gegenüber.

Orientierung in der kulturwissenschaftlichen Forschungsarbeit. Als Instanzen der Beschreibung moderner Gesellschaften gewinnen die Kulturwissenschaften zunehmend an Bedeutung. Die Bände bieten einen umfassenden Überblick über den gesamten Fachbereich. Rund 100 Autoren aus diversen Fachgebieten tragen ihre Forschungen und Erkenntnisse zu den Methoden und Themen der Kulturwissenschaft zusammen. Sie stellen damit die Disziplin auf ein theoretisches Fundament und geben einen Ausblick auf künftige Entwicklungen. Band 1: Grundlagen und Schlüsselbegriffe Band 2: Paradigmen und Disziplinen Band 3: Themen und Tendenzen

Provides a step-by-step blueprint of cultural dynamics, defining the boundaries between matter and life, life and culture, and animal culture versus human culture. With all these basic concepts the author sets the stage for a renewal of anthropological enquiry.

This collection presents 14 essays by renowned scholars on Deaf people, Deafhood, Deaf histories, and Deaf identity, but from different points of view on the Deaf/Disability compass. Editors Susan Burch and Alison Kafer have divided these works around three themes. The first, Identities and Locations, explores Deaf identity in different contexts. Topics range from a history of activism shaped by the ableism of Deaf elites in the United States from 1880–1920, to a discussion of the roles that economics, location, race, and culture play in the experiences of a Deaf woman from northern Nigeria now living in Washington, D.C. Alliances and Activism showcases activism organized across differences. Studies include a feminist analysis of how deaf and hearing women working together share responsibility, and an examination of how intra-cultural variations in New York City and Quebec affect deaf-focus HIV/AIDS programs. The third theme, Boundaries and Overlaps, explicitly addresses the relationships between Deaf Studies and Disability Studies. Interviews with scholars from both disciplines help define these relationships. Another contributor calls for hearing/not-deaf people with disabilities to support their Deaf peers in gaining langue access to the United Nations. Deaf and Disability Studies: Interdisciplinary Perspectives reveals that different questions often lead to contrary conclusions among their authors, who still recognize that they all have a stake in this partnership.

Cultural Studies signals a major academic revolution for the 21st century. But what exactly is it, and how is it applied? It is a discipline that claims not to be a discipline; it is a radical critical approach for understanding racial, national, social and gender identities.'Introducing Cultural Studies'provides an incisive tour through the minefield of this complex subject, charting its origins in Britain and its migration to the USA, Canada, France, Australia and South Asia, examining the ideas of its leading exponents and providing a flavour of its use around the world. Covering the ground from Gramsci to Raymond Williams, postcolonial discourse to the politics of diaspora, feminism to queer theory, technoculture and the media to globalization, it serves as an insightful guide to the essential concepts of this fascinating area of study. It is essential reading for all those concerned with the quickening pulse of old, new and emerging cultures.

Ce livre traite de l'échange interculturel comme solution aux conflits de culture. La démarche théorique et méthodologique présentée dans ce texte accentue la capacité créatrice des individus et des organisations à transformer un besoin ou un conflit culturel en situation d'échange. L'échange constitue une performance, une capacité de faire et d'être, permettant de désamorcer des conflits collectifs par l'apport des significations culturelles nouvelles. La valeur du changement proposé proveint de son « sens » collectif qui relève, à sont tour, des rapports entre la performance individuelle et la culture environnante. La démarche prend ainsi appui sur la dichotomie culture-performance pour établir des contextes culturels et organisationnels propices à la mise sur pied d'échanges interculturels qui contribueront à l'évolution du milieu. À cette fin, l'approche interdisciplinaire proposée cible trois compétences fondamentales : l'analyse culturelle, la communication interculturelle et le développement du processus créateur individuel et collectif. La sémiotique sert de pont entre les sciences humaines et les sciences sociales pour mettre en valeur les points de convergence théoriques et méthodologiques en matière de culture, de communication et de créativité. Des études de cas au début et à la fin du texte illustrent la genèse et la mise en application du modèle interdisciplinaire de l'échange dans des milieux culturels particuliers. Chaque chapitre se termine par un tableau synoptique qui présente des pratiques signifiantes permettant la transposition du savoir académique en savoir-faire professionnel et la mise sur pied progressive d'un projet d'échange. Du matériel pédagogique d'appui (documentaires et mallettes pédagogiques) permet la mise en application du modèle pour la formation interculturelle et la recherche appliquée.

Choice Recommended Title, February 2010Culture, Class, Distinction is major contribution to international debates regarding the role of cultural capital in relation to modern forms of inequality. Drawing on a national study of the organisation of cultural practices in contemporary Britain, the authors review Bourdieu's classic study of the relationships between culture and class in the light of subsequent debates. In doing so they re-appraise the relationships between class, gender and ethnicity, music, film, television, literary, and arts consumption, the organisation of sporting and culinary practices, and practices of bodily and self maintenance. As the most comprehensive account to date of the varied interpretations of cultural capital that have been developed in the wake of Bourdieu's work, Culture, Class, Distinction offers the first systematic assessment of the relationships between cultural practice and the social divisions of class, gender and ethnicity in contemporary Britain. It is essential reading for anyone interested in the relationships between culture and society.

Following the routinization of assisted reproduction in the industrialized world, technologies such as in vitro fertilization, preimplantation genetic diagnosis, and DNA-based paternity testing have traveled globally and are now being offered to couples in numerous non-Western countries. This volume explores the application and impact of these advanced reproductive and genetic technologies in societies across the globe. By highlighting both the cross-cultural similarities and diverse meanings that technologies may assume as they enter multiple contexts, the book aims to foster understanding of both the technologies and the settings. Enhanced by cross-cultural perspectives, the book addresses the challenges that globalization presents to local understandings of science, technology, and medicine.

This book is a collective effort on the part of researchers affiliated with the CERES Research School in Development Studies in the Netherlands to discuss a series of themes and concepts crucial to the overlapping fields of globalization and development research. While development in the course of the 1980s and 1990s was becoming hinged onto globalization, prior approaches to development were increasingly being criticized. An impasse was announced by various actors in the field, and renewed reflection on some of the basic concepts and methods became inevitable. Much of the initial rethinking went under the sign of postmodernism and tended to give priority to micro- and actor-centered research. Later, with the emerging discussion on globalization, new macro dimensions were added, and efforts were launched to articulate local/global approaches. This book discusses a set of key themes and concepts that reflect these intellectual and historical developments. Used by politicians and researchers, they reflect the continuing concern about inequality and poverty by students and practitioners of development, and contain crucial perspectives for a critical engagement of current globalization processes and their consequences. The chapters in this book examine the notions and issues of globalization, livelihood, identity, governance, transnationalism, and knowledge.

This volume addresses the impact of human movement on the aesthetic practices that make up the fabric of culture. The essays explore the ways in which cultural activities—ranging from the habitual gestures of the body to the production of specific artworks—register the impact of migration, from the forced transportation of slaves to the New World and of Jews to the death camps to the economic migration of peoples between the West and its erstwhile colonies; from the internal and external exile of Palestinians to the free movement of cosmopolitan intellectuals. Rather than focusing exclusively on art produced by those identified as migrant subjects, this collection opens up the question of how aesthetics itself migrates, transforming not only its own practices and traditions, but also the very nature of our being in the world, as subjects producing, as well as produced by, the cultures in which we live. The transformative potential of cultures on the move is both affirmed and critiqued throughout the collection, as part of an exploration of the ways in which globalisation implicates us ever more tightly in the unequal relations of production that characterise late modernity. This collection brings academic scholars from a variety of disciplines into conversation with practising visual and verbal artists; indeed, many of the essays break down the distinction between artist and academic, suggesting a dynamic interchange between critical reflection and creativity.

This book reveals a female sexual economy in the marketplace of contemporary short fiction which locates a struggle for sexual power between mothers and daughters within a larger struggle to pursue that object of the American dream: whiteness.

An ethnographic study of fetoscopy that considers both the broader cultural context of this high-risk obstetrical procedure and the patient's individual experience.In Looking Within, Deborah Blizzard examines the high-risk in utero surgery known as fetoscopy, considering it as both cutting-edge medical technology and as a sociocultural construction of patients, their social networks, and medical providers. She looks at the way individual experiences shape these procedures and how fetoscopy affects individuals (both patients and providers) on a personal, emotional level. Based on an eleven-month ethnographic study of the fetoscopy practice at a community-based hospital and further interviews with former patients, Looking Within offers a vivid picture of the sometimes conflicted, often desperate, and always emotional lives of those undergoing fetoscopy, and challenges current assumptions about normal and appropriate pregnancy experiences. To convey the complex reality of fetoscopy, Blizzard draws from the experiences of the real patients she interviewed for the book to present the fictional case of Melinda and Joe, taking them through the entire process, from diagnosis to decision to outcome. She then discusses the emergence of fetoscopy as an accepted form of high-risk obstetrical care, how fetoscopy programs are established at hospitals, and why otherwise healthy women consent to surgery. Blizzard examines the use of fetoscopy in single-fetus and in twin pregnancies, looking at how religion, culture, society, and medical science inform any understanding of who or what is in utero (a baby? a tumor? a mass?). She also discusses definitions of loss and success, and the narratives patients and their social networks construct to make sense of them. Looking Within will help physicians and nurses improve the development and delivery of fetoscopy procedures, help patients understand this new technology, and help scholars evaluate fetoscopy's bioethical, social, and cultural implications.

Tracing and theorizing the concept of the boundaries through literary works, visual objects and cultural phenomena, this book argues against the reification of boundaries as fixed and empty non-spaces that simply divide the world. Expanding on her previous work on gender and Orientalism, Inge Boer takes us into uncertain territories of fashion and art, tourism and travel, skilfully engaging the ambivalence of boundaries, as both protecting and confining, as bringing distinction while existing by virtue of their ability to be transgressed. In her close readings of that boundaries as desert, as frame, as home (or lack of it), Boer shows that boundaries are spaces within, through, and in the name of which negotiations take place. They are not lines but spaces ; neither fixed nor empty but flexible and inhabited.With the publication of this book, Boer's intellectual legacy stretches beyond her untimely passing. The writings that she left behind can be said to have inaugurated the future of her work, presented in the latter part by several of Boer's intellectual companions. In their original essays, the contributors elaborate on Boer's theme of boundaries as spaces where opposition yields to negotiation. Committed to the artefact as cultural stimulant, as the embodiment of thought, their analyses span a multitude of artefacts and media, ranging from literature to photography, to art installation and presentation, to film and song. Fanning out from Boer ‘s central focus – Orientalism – to other places of contestation, boundaries are shown to mediate the relationship between self and other ; they are, ultimately, spaces of encounter.

In the 1990s, American televison audiences witnessed an unprecedented rise in programming devoted explicitly to women. Cable networks such as Oxygen Media, Women's Entertainment Network, and Lifetime targeted a female audience, and prime-time dramatic series such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Judging Amy, Gilmore Girls, Sex and the City, and Ally McBeal empowered heroines, single career women, and professionals struggling with family commitments and occupational demands. After establishing this phenomenon's significance, Amanda D. Lotz explores the audience profile, the types of narrative and characters that recur, and changes to the industry landscape in the wake of media consolidation and a profusion of channels. Employing a cultural studies framework, Lotz examines whether the multiplicity of female-centric networks and narratives renders certain gender stereotypes uninhabitable, and how new dramatic portrayals of women have redefined narrative conventions. Redesigning Women also reveals how these changes led to narrowcasting, or the targeting of a niche segment of the overall audience, and the ways in which the new, sophisticated portrayals of women inspire sympathetic identification while also commodifying viewers into a marketable demographic for advertisers.

Humans are a striking anomaly in the natural world. While we are similar to other mammals in many ways, our behavior sets us apart. Our unparalleled ability to adapt has allowed us to occupy virtually every habitat on earth using an incredible variety of tools and subsistence techniques. Our societies are larger, more complex, and more cooperative than any other mammal's. In this stunning exploration of human adaptation, Peter J. Richerson and Robert Boyd argue that only a Darwinian theory of cultural evolution can explain these unique characteristics. Not by Genes Alone offers a radical interpretation of human evolution, arguing that our ecological dominance and our singular social systems stem from a psychology uniquely adapted to create complex culture. Richerson and Boyd illustrate here that culture is neither superorganic nor the handmaiden of the genes. Rather, it is essential to human adaptation, as much a part of human biology as bipedal locomotion. Drawing on work in the fields of anthropology, political science, sociology, and economics—and building their case with such fascinating examples as kayaks, corporations, clever knots, and yams that require twelve men to carry them—Richerson and Boyd convincingly demonstrate that culture and biology are inextricably linked, and they show us how to think about their interaction in a way that yields a richer understanding of human nature. In abandoning the nature-versus-nurture debate as fundamentally misconceived, Not by Genes Alone is a truly original and groundbreaking theory of the role of culture in evolution and a book to be reckoned with for generations to come. “I continue to be surprised by the number of educated people (many of them biologists) who think that offering explanations for human behavior in terms of culture somehow disproves the suggestion that human behavior can be explained in Darwinian evolutionary terms. Fortunately, we now have a book to which they may be directed for enlightenment.... It is a book full of good sense and the kinds of intellectual rigor and clarity of writing that we have come to expect from the Boyd/Richerson stable.”—Robin Dunbar, Nature “Not by Genes Alone is a valuable and very readable synthesis of a still embryonic but very important subject straddling the sciences and humanities.”—E. O. Wilson, Harvard University

We are'going virtual'in more and more areas of our lives - from shopping to education, filing systems to love affairs. How can we assess the relationship between technology and culture when culture is so imbued with technology? This clear, concise and readable text aims to offer the student a one-stop guide through this complex and slippery terrain. Introducing a wealth of theoretical perspectives in a lucid and engaging style and covering a range of topical, challenging and intriguing examples - from cyborgs to digital art - it will be an essential text for everyone wanting to make sense of crucial forces of change on contemporary culture.

Herbert Read was a maverick character in the cultural life of the twentieth century. A radical leader of the avant garde in the 1930s, and an anarchist revolutionary during the war years, by the time of his death in 1968 he had become a key figure at the heart of the British cultural establishment. To Hell with Culture offers readers an ideal overview of the ideas that marked out this seminal and hugely influential thinker. It is a controversial work that engages the reader in a wide range of topics, from revolutionary art to pornography.Adept at challenging assumptions and penetrating to the heart of any issue, Read's deft prose encourages the reader to think critically, to question and to subvert the voice of authority, of whatever political or cultural creed. Only through such a critical evaluation of culture, Read believes, can one appreciate the art that arises from the'unpolitical manifestation of the human spirit'. At a time when authority and value are questionable terms, and when culture itself is a contested concept, Read's is both a challenging and an enlightening voice.

Much discussed but poorly understood, globalization is at once praised as the answer to all the world's problems and blamed for everything from pollution to poverty. Here Berger and Huntington bring together an array of experts who paint a subtle and richly shaded portrait, showing both the power and the unexpected consequences of this great force. The stereotypes of globalization--characterized as American imperialism on the one hand, and as an economic panacea on the other--fall apart under close scrutiny. Surveying globalization from individual countries of the five major continents, Many Globalizations shows that an emerging global culture does indeed exist. While globalization is American in origin and content, the authors point out that it is far from a centrally directed force like classic imperialism. They examine the currents that carry this culture, from a worldwide class of young professionals to non-governmental organizations, and define globalization's many variations as well as sub-globalizations that bind regions together. Analytical, incisive and stimulating, Many Globalizations offers rare insight into perhaps the central issue of modern times, one that is changing the West as much as the developing world.'Provocative.... Taken together, the trenchant, well-written essays included in this collection provide indisputable evidence that an identifiable global culture is indeed emerging.'--World Policy Journal'Analytical and penetrating, belongs...on the desks of anyone with an abiding interest in the forces shaping the world.'--Publishers Weekly

Defining the'common knowledge'a'literate'person should possess has provoked intense debate ever since the publication of E. D. Hirsch's controversial book Cultural Literacy: What Every American Needs to Know. Yet the basic concept of'common knowledge,'Ramona Fernandez argues, is a Eurocentric model ill-suited to a society composed of many distinct cultures and many local knowledges. In this book, Fernandez decodes the ideological assumptions that underlie prevailing models of cultural literacy as she offers new ways of imagining and modeling mixed cultural and non-print literacies. In particular, she challenges the biases inherent in the'encyclopedias'of knowledge promulgated by E. D. Hirsch and others, by Disney World's EPCOT Center, and by the Smithsonian Institution. In contrast to these, she places the writings of Zora Neale Hurston, Maxine Hong Kingston, Gloria Anzaldúa, and Leslie Marmon Silko, whose works model a cultural literacy that weaves connections across many local knowledges and many ways of knowing.

Japanese Foreign Policy in Asia and the Pacific aims to provide a broadened framework for examining Japan's foreign policy making by looking at conversion and diversion of interests among Japanese and American policy actors. These include governmental and non-governmental as well as domestic and transnational actors. Utilizing this theoretical framework, the contributors examine the role of U.S. pressure and its interaction with Japan's domestic and Japan-based transnational actors'interests through geographically or thematically focused case studies from Asia and the Pacific regions.

This is a multi-disciplinary study that adopts an innovative and original approach to a highly topical question, that of meaning-making in museums, focusing its attention on pedagogy and visual culture.This work explores such questions as: How and why is it that museums select and arrange artefacts, shape knowledge, construct a view? How do museums produce values? How do active audiences make meaning from what they experience in museums? This stimulating book provokes debate and discussion on these topics and puts forward the idea of a new museum - the post-museum, which will challenge the familiar modernist museum. A must for students and professionals in the field.

In the eighteenth century'virtue'was a word to conjure with. It called to mind heroic predecessors from the Roman Republic such as Cato and Brutus and invoked qualities of personal integrity, selflessness and a concern for the common good, which, though urgently needed, seemed desperately lacking, both in the ruthless party struggles of the age of Anne and subsequently in the all-pervading political corruption of the Walpole administration. When the longed-for political saviour failed to materialize it was increasingly felt that if virtue existed at all then it would have to be sought for among the lower orders of society or else in provincial areas, where simpler and nobler values might still prevail. But with the coming of the French Revolution and Romanticism virtue began to lose its powerful resonances - it now seemed naive and simplistic, all too ready to deny both the complexities of human nature and the possibility of determination by external cultural forces.

French historian Alexis de Tocqueville observed that the conflict between the ideals of individualism and community defines American culture. In this groundbreaking new work, anthropologist Charles Nuckolls discovers that every culture consists of such paradoxes, thus making culture a problem that cannot be solved. He does, however, find much creative tension in these unresolvable opposites. Nuckolls presents three fascinating case studies that demonstrate how values often are expressed in the organization of social roles. First he treats the Micronesian Ifaluks'opposition between cooperation and self-gratification by examining the nature versus nurture debate. Nuckolls then shifts to the values of community and individual adventure by looking at the conflicts in the identities of public figures in Oklahoma. Finally, he investigates the cultural significance in the diagnostic system and practices of psychiatry in the United States. Nuckolls asserts that psychiatry treats genders differently, assigning dependence to women and independence to men and, in some cases, diagnoses the extreme forms of these values as disorders. Nuckolls elaborates on the theory of culture that he introduced in his previous book, The Cultural Dialectics of Knowledge and Desire, which proposed that the desire to resolve conflicts is central to cultural knowledge. In Culture: A Problem that Cannot Be Solved, Nuckolls restores the neglected social science concept of values, which addresses both knowledge and motivation. As a result, he brings together cognition and psychoanalysis, as well as sociology and psychology, in his study of cultural processes.

The emergence of symbolic culture is generally linked with the development of the hunger-gatherer adaptation based on a sexual division of labor. This original and ingenious book presents a new theory of how this symbolic domain originated. Integrating perspectives of evolutionary biography and social anthropology within a Marxist framework, Chris Knight rejects the common assumption that human culture was a modified extension of primate behavior and argues instead that it was the product of an immense social, sexual, and political revolution initiated by women. Culture became established, says Knight, when evolving human females began to assert collective control over their own sexuality, refusing sex to all males except those who came to them with provisions. Women usually timed their ban on sexual relations with their periods of infertility while they were menstruating, and to the extent that their solidarity drew women together, these periods tended to occur in synchrony. The result was that every month with the onset of menstruation, sexual relations were ruptured in a collective, ritualistic way as the prelude to each successful hunting expedition. This ritual act was the means through which women motivated men not only to hunt but also to concentrate energies on bringing back the meat. Knight shows how this hypothesis sheds light on the roots of such cultural traditions as totemic rituals, incest and menstrual taboos, blood-sacrifice, and hunters'atonement rites. Providing detailed ethnographic documentation, he also explains how Native American, Australian Aboriginal, and other magico-religious myths can be read as derivatives of the same symbolic logic.

The world of literary theory and criticism is once again at a crossroads. While much of the academy has been absorbing and institutionalizing that unstable mixture of poststructuralism, deconstruction, political critique and materialist historicism which is known as Cultural Theory, some people have been working up alternative theories. This book is about some of these less familiar Postcultural theories, and about the ways in which they challenge current thinking and open other, positive and constructive, possibilities for thought and research in the nineties.

History of Anthropology is a series of annual volumes, inaugurated in 1983, each of which treats a theme of major importance in both the history and current practice of anthropological inquiry. Drawing its title from a poem of W. H. Auden's, the present volume, Malinowski, Rivers, Benedict, and Others (the fourth in the series) focuses on the emergence of anthropological interest in'culture and personality'during the 1920s and 1930s. It also explores the historical, cultural, literary, and biological background of major figures associated with the movement, including Bronislaw Manlinowski, Edward Sapir, Abram Kardiner, Ruth Benedict, Margaret Mead, and Gregory Bateson. Born in the aftermath of World War I, flowering in the years before and after World War II, severely attacked in the 1950s and 1960s,'culture and personality'was subsequently reborn as'psychological anthropology.'Whether this foreshadows the emergence of a major anthropological subdiscipline (equivalent to cultural, social, biological, or linguistic anthropology) from the current welter of'adjectival'anthropologies remain to be seen. In the meantime, the essays collected in the volume may encourage a rethinking of the historical roots of many issues of current concern. Included in this volume are the contributions of Jeremy MacClancy, William C. Manson, William Jackson, Richard Handler, Regna Darnell, Virginia Yans-McLaughlin, James A. Boon, and the editor.

Charles Horton Cooley Award of the Society for the Study of Symbolic Interaction, 1990'According to Hewitt, the essence of modernity is tension between community and society. This ambitious, sophisticated, and well-written book is a tonic for those who weary of simplistic sermons on the condition of American culture.'--Choice This book explores stability and change in American social character and identity, and offers a theory about what it means to be an individual within contemporary American society. Skeptical of the widely-accepted thesis that the self, at least in America, has drastically changed, John P. Hewitt assumes that there is more historical continuity and that the culture is filled with internal contradictions. Combining the insights of social psychology, with those of writers who have offered critiques of the larger society and its influences on the individual, he revises our understanding of the person in American society. Hewitt examines the theories of such authors as David Riesman, Allen Wheelis, Christopher Lasch, Erving Goffman, Carl Rogers, Ralph Turner, and others. He treats their emphasis on the decline of transformation of the self not as social theory to be tested, but as cultural text that reveals some of the main historical and contemporary features and fault lines of American culture.'American culture is best characterized not as relentlessly individualistic or as lacking in the capacity to conceive of or discuss community, but as torn between individualism and communitarianism, thus creating serious felt difficulties of social adjustment and personal meaning.'Proposing a symbolic interactionist theory of culture, Hewitt emphasizes inherent polarities of meaning and dilemmas of conduct that shape the experience of self: conformity versus rebellion, staying versus leaving, and dependence versus independence. He constructs a theory of identity that views personal identity and social identity as contending means for securing the continuity and integration of the self, and applies the theory to American society by depicting autonomous, exclusivist, and pragmatic strategies of self-construction.'This theoretically sophisticated work is very ably organized and marked by superior scholarly and expository craftsmanship. It will be hailed, I believe, as an important contribution to symbolic interactionism and the sociology and social psychology of everyday life. Hewitt's treatment of self, identity, conformity, differentiation, community, and modernity is a fine example of creative scholarship.'--Charles H. Page, University of Massachusetts (Emeritus)'Hewitt has set himself the ambitious task of providing a symbolic interactionist analysis of culture, society, and self, and has succeeded admirably in the effort. I found his rich description of cultural types to be especially insightful. It is no exaggeration to characterize this book as a landmark work in the development of symbolic interactions.'--Morris Rosenberg, University of Maryland-College Park