Continuum Publishing Group

American visual cultures.

Working from a social theory, which recognizes a "capitalist- democratic totality," and responding to recent events and trends indicating that totality is becoming global, Holloway (American Studies, U. of Derby, UK), Beck (American literature and culture, U. of Newcastle upon Tyne, UK) and contributors examine the codes in American visual culture. They begin with the period extending from the Civil War to the Great Depression, including visual representations of Manifest Destiny, imaginary female Civil War soldiers, race in silent films, and the marketable avant-garde; and they continue with representations in the 1929-1963 era of the New Deal, war, the emergence of television as a propaganda tool, and the emergence of abstract expressionism. A section on 1963 to 1980 explores postmodernism, violence, dissent, and commodity feminism, and the final set of articles describes visual politics in terms of NAFTA, marketing memory, representing race and sight-bites on the news. (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

Architecture theory; a reader in philosophy and culture.

Ballantyne (architecture, U. of Newcastle) presents 23 selections to help readers think creatively about architecture. They range from the 19th century — Shelley, Emerson, Thoreau, Poe — to the 21st — Patsy Healey, Ian Buchanan. He introduces each section, drawing from the thinking of Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari and Richard Rorty. (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

Cosmopolis II; mongrel cities of the 21st century.

Sandercock (community and regional planning, U. of British Columbia) describes with fondness our "mongrel cities" and the powers behind them. She begins with an examination of modernist planning, how it succeeded and failed at its aims, and why so many planners and lay people found it objectionable in that it did not take into consideration the realities of cities as living beings. She then examines those realities in light of community, fear, and integration, and argues for a new planning imagination that includes playfulness, storylines and honest considerations of power, spirit, and the rigors of living together. (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

The Crystal Palace and the Great Exhibition; art, science, and productive industry; a history of the Royal Commission for the Exhibition of 1851. (reprint, 2002)

This is a reprint of a 2002 book. Britain's Crystal Palace was built for the Universal Exhibition of the Work of All Nations (known to the British as the Great Exhibition) of 1851, and has since then become a national icon. Urban historian Hobhouse tells of the formation of the Royal Commission, an organization that was created to run the Exhibition. The Commission was intended to dissolve once its work was complete, but did not: it still exists today, and Hobhouse herself is a former Commissioner. This book relates the complex story of how the Commission went on to play a leading role in art and science promotion and education in Britain. The book includes over 80 black & white plates, as well as several color plates. (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

The guerilla film makers handbook.

Filmmakers Jolliffe and Jones interview 150 film industry insiders, asking their subjects questions designed to provoke advice on how to become a successful independent filmmaker. The interviews are grouped into sections covering filmmaker training, film development, film- related organizations, finance, talent, production, postproduction, sales, and aftermath. The text is liberally sprinkled with "tips" side boxes covering similar topics. Also included are case studies of independent films such as "Thirteen," "Donnie Darko," and "The Singing Detective." (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

Introducing planning.

In this introduction to town planning, Greed (built environment, U. of the West of England) takes students through the structures of planning, the development process, the history of planning, and the social, political and theoretical dimensions of planning. The text includes illustrations, case material, guides to further reading, and questions for further analysis. Each chapter ends with three categories of student tasks: information gathering, conceptual and reflective. (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

Julia Kristeva; live theory.

Lechte (sociology, Macquarie U.) and Margaroni (literary and cultural theory, U. of Cyprus) introduce students to the work of critic and theorist of contemporary culture Kristeva. They examine both her recent work since 1995, and earlier key works from the 1980s. An interview is included that was conducted in 2002 and 2003 in her office at the University of Paris. (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

Medieval Norwich.

Sixteen contributors, many of them from the U. of East Anglia, UK, have written 13 chapters on a broad range of topics concerning medieval Norwich, including the urban landscape, churches, religious houses, religious practice, glass painting, trade, the urban elite, the Reformation, and health. The goal of forming a relatively complete one-volume history of what was England's second largest medieval city has been achieved through the range of subjects and the depth of the chapters, which present current research, discuss historiography, and rely on archaeological and other material remains. Though primarily of interest to medievalists, this volume is written in language accessible to the interested general reader. Sections of b&w plates are included. Distributed in the U.S. by Palgrave. (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

Mercia, an Anglo-Saxon kingdom in Europe. (reprint, 2001)

Mercia dominated Anglo-Saxon Britain from the early eighth through the ninth centuries, but is little considered by either the public or scholars. Historians and museum curators analyze and interpret literary, art, historical, and archaeological sources to explore the polity of the church and state, relations with other cultures, the material and visual cultures, and the kingdom's retreat before an ascendant Wessex. (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

Negative horizon; an essay in dromoscopy.

Written at the interstices of history, architecture, philosophy, and politics, this study deals with such matters as changing human modes of locomotion and warfare and their effects on our perception of the world. Virilio (director, École Spéciale d'Architecture, France) articulates a theory of human history that centers on the notion of the constant acceleration of space and time. This constant acceleration he believes, has dangerous implications for human abilities to deal with technological change and for the prospects of global democracy. (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

A new history of Japanese cinema; a century of narrative film.

This volume addresses the historical development of Japanese cinema, and the confluence of traditional arts, sociopolitical trends, and Western technology. Previous studies of Japanese cinema concentrated on stylistic development, or on a particular era; but Standish (film studies, School of Oriental and African Studies, U. of London) discusses the subject in terms of modernity and the Shochiku Tokyo Studios, nationalism and empire, the state, humanism, transgression, and genres and gender. The book includes a select filmography and bibliography. (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

The philosophy of modern literary theory. (reprint, 1999)

Zima (comparative literature, U. of Klagenfeld) presents a short introduction to the problems, theories and concepts of literary criticism from New Criticism to deconstruction and postmodernism. He argues that modern theories can only be properly understood when placed in the philosophical and aesthetic context in which they originated and evolved. The discussion ranges across the philosophical underpinnings of English literature as well as the critical literatures of Europe and North America. This paperback edition is a reprint of the edition first published by Athlone Press in 1999. (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

The politics of aesthetics; the distribution of the sensible.

In his forward, Ranciére (aesthetics and politics emeritus, U. de Paris VIII) states his concern is for aesthetic acts that create new approaches to sense perception and political subjectivity. Working from questions asked by the editors of the journal Alice, Ranciére shows how art and politics are closely linked by their mutual delimitation of the thinkable and the unthinkable. In doing so he steps outside the confines of the Marxist and Frankfurt traditions, along with those imposed by post-structuralists. This English edition includes an interview with Ranciére about historical and hermeneutic methodology, positive contradiction, politicized art, and universality, historicity and equality and an afterword on the lessons of Ranciére by Slavoj Zizek. (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

The reception of Walter Pater in Europe.

This volume is part of a series of texts that examines the ways selected British authors have been translated, published, distributed, read, and reviewed in continental Europe in order to understand the dissemination of ideas and texts. The reception of Pater is a fruitful study because the patterns of response closely follow the development of European national cultures, particularly their response to modernism. This collection addresses Pater's reception in Italy, France, Germany, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Poland and Spain. Bann (history of art, U. of Bristol) introduces the papers with an overview of Pater's legacy and a discussion of the conflation of Pater's work with that of John Ruskin and Oscar Wilde. The volume includes a list of Pater's essays and a timeline of his European reception. (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

A sense of the sacred; theological foundations of sacred architecture and art.

In order to impart a deeper understanding the relationship between the various arts and theology, and especially liturgical celebrations, Roman Catholic liturgical scholar Seasoltz (liturgy, St. John's College, Collegeville) traces the history of the arts in Western society at large and particularly within the churches. Among important points, he says, are the major shifts that took place following the Renaissance, and the sharp conflicts between religion and the arts since the Enlightenment. (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

Slavoj Zizek; live theory.

Butler (English, media studies, and art history, U. of Queensland) introduces the thinking of contemporary Slovenian cultural analyst Zizek to undergraduates in social and cultural theory and philosophy. He argues that the notions of the master-signifier and the act pervade his work. (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

South-western Britain in the early Middle Ages.

Pearce (museum studies, U. of Leicester) suggests how society in southwestern Britain was transformed from the late Roman period, roughly the fourth century, to the tenth century, some 18 human generations. Geographically, her study covers modern Cornwall, Devon, Somerset, and most of Dorset. Drawing more on archaeological than documentary evidence, she explores how people came to see themselves as Christians, how they expressed prestige, what they thought about the mixed Roman and barbarian world they were part of, and what they used material things for. (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)

Stars and stardom in French cinema. (reprint, 2000)

Reminding her readers that glamour can exist outside of Hollywood, Vincendeau (film studies, U. of Warwick) analyzes the French star system and the careers of its participants. The text examines the lives, images and performance styles of such celebrated actors as Jean Gabin, Brigitte Bardot, Jean-Paul Belmondo, Alain Delon and Catherine Deneuve in the context of the French film industry and French society. Vincendeau includes a filmography for each of her subjects. This paperback edition is a reprint of the volume first published in 2000 by Wellington House. (Annotation ©2006 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)