Blackwell Publishing
1913; the cradle of modernism.
Modernity took its first breath when an inspired band of writers, composers, performers and other artists, some together and some far apart, intuitively decided it was time. Rabaté (humanities, U. of Pennsylvania), intellectual scion of Derrida and Lacan, delivers the news to key actors in the development of modernity that 1913 was definitely the year of its birth, recounting the achievements in that period of Tagore, Yeats, Pound, Joyce, Du Bois, Stravinsky, Apollinaire, Rilke, Wharton and Proust. Rabaté shows how formally and informally interlinked artists created masterworks one on top of the other, although some may have not been aware of it at the time, but all were keenly aware something was brewing in world politics, a situation which would only need a couple of bullets to knock down the fragile European alliances and set off world war. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)
Adventures in realism.
It may go in and out of fashion on a regular basis in the galleries and museums, but critics never cease to debate the paradoxes and peculiarities of realism. These 16 new essays reclaim realism from the nineteenth century onward, sweeping the critiques of generations with it and covering aspects of literary realism, realists synthesis in the nineteenth-century novel, the spirit of space in the novel, the dirt and horror of naturalism, the impact of photography, the realist aesthetic in painting, interrupted dialogs of realism and modernism, socialist realism, cinematic realism, critical irrealism, the Lacanian real, the feminist real, and the anti-real. The last words on literary realism by Frederic Jameson are particularly interesting. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)
The age of Augustus, 2d ed.
He was a great man's grand-nephew, which is insignificant until we remember his great-uncle was Julius Caesar and Julius Caesar had no sons. Augustus Caesar reaped all the benefits he could from his nephewship, including the fact his uncle was declared immortal and that he was more to Julius than merely someone one endured during the holidays. The result was a royal family, for Julius set a regal example Augustus emulated, a powerful nation that changed from republic to monarchy, and an empire. Eck (history, Cologne U.) does not shirk from closely describing Augustus, who had himself declared immortal in short order, and also the excesses of his very weird family, but also details the great building projects and urban designs, the military victories, and the administrative capabilities strong enough to create and hold a vast empire, at least for a time. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)
The American West; a concise history.
Butler (history, Utah State U.) and Lansing (history, Augsberg College) provide a concise history of the American West, meant to complement the US history curriculum, with an aim to describe the "multi-cultural, multi-structured, and multi-contradictory elements in regional life," along with the societal factors of race, gender, and corporate capital. Covering the pre-colonial era to the present day, they draw on current scholarship and connect the volume to the inclination of the US government to extend its reach through territorial expansion, as well as emphasize the West as part of the fabric of the nation. They address five themes: the convergence of cultures that led people to compete for power and agency; the role of the West as a center for emerging capitalism; the place of the federal government as an overseer of expansion and resources; the importance of violence in the West's history; and attachments to a mythic idea of the region. Sources for the book include public records, newspapers, and secondary literature. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)
The anthropology of globalization; a reader, 2d ed.
This reader highlights recent anthropological research into cultural flows and globalization. After a trio of broad theoretical chapters serve as an introduction, Inda (Chicana/o studies, U. of California at Santa Barbara) organizes the remaining 15 contributions into sections focusing in turn on the circulation of capital, people, commodities, media, and ideologies and discourses. Examples of specific topics from each of these sections include Mayan youth and rural industrialization in Guatemala, "cyberpublics" and diaspora politics among transnational Chinese, McDonald's and consumerism in Moscow (Russia), Indian cinema and global media, and theorization of the local/global interface in analysis of the female inheritance movement in Hong Kong. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)
The art of theater.
Hamilton (philosophy, Kansas State U.) argues that theatrical performance is a distinct art form in which works are identified and assessed separately from the literary texts they draw from. He first enumerates changes in theatrical practice that influenced his argument and explains how a practice can be an art form, based on three requirements. He then discusses how audiences identify performances as separate from the text, how they understand what performers do, and the role of theatrical style. Some of the material in the book is based on previously published articles. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)
Badlands of the republic; space, politics, and French urban policy.
Borrowing from political economy, social constructionalist, and governmentality approaches to the subject, Dikeē (geography, U. of London, UK) explores the relationship between space and politics in the formation of French urban policy, which is especially relevant as space has been the main object of the French policy experience, as opposed to community in the British and North American contexts. His central argument is that the formulation of French urban policy is informed by the republican tradition and that with the rise since the 1990s of republican nationalism, the outlying banlieues have been articulated in increasingly ethnic terms that are seen as threatening to the integrity and unity of the republic, resulting in policy that operates with divisive spatiality. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)
The Blackwell companion to globalization.
Thirty-five essays examine some of the major issues arising from the sociological study of globalization. Editor Ritzer (sociology, U. of Maryland) has organized the material into three sections, the first of which serves as an introduction to the field and offers definitions of globalization, reviews major theories, describes major actors, and considers methodological issues. The second section addresses the major domains of study connected to globalization, including migration, agrarian economics, the environment, urbanization, outsourcing, consumer culture, ideology, the media, information and communications technologies, political globalization, religion, higher education, sport, and public health. The final eight papers discuss major issues and conclusions, including recent trends in global inequalities, globalization and corruption, globalization and sexuality, war and economic globalization, international terrorism, and resistance to globalization. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)
A Brontė encyclopedia.
Robert Barnard has served two terms as the chairman of the Brontė Society and is the author of 40-plus books; Louise Barnard was a university librarian in Australia and Norway for a number of years, and researched extensively for A Brontė Encyclopedia. The result of their combined efforts is an A-to-Z reference work on the Brontė family, their writings, and their lives, which covers their own characters and experiences; the people they met, corresponded with, or were influenced by; the places they went to; and their works from the juvenile and adolescent sagas to the finished fiction and poetry. Altogether the text addresses a period ranging from 1777 (the birth of Patrick) to 1861 (his death); it does not deal with posthumous developments concerning the family, their novels, and their lives. No subject index. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)
C.S. Lewis; a guide to his theology.
Why did Lewis choose fantasy and science fiction to express his new-found faith? Clark (New Testament and Greek, Vanguard U.) first focuses on how Lewis came to his conversion, how he used that experience to take a new look at his world, and how he then chose to reach out to his readership. He then delineates Lewis's interpretations of biblical texts on a variety of topics as he matured in faith, ranging from the ways in which sentient beings present themselves as creatures of God to the use of good and fallen angels in explaining divine creation and providence. Clark examines Lewis's fascination with myth both before and after his conversion and Lewis's understanding of sanctification, purgatory, the descent of Christ, resurrection, judgment, and the ultimate encounter with the face of God. He concludes with commentary on Lewis's theology of redemption. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)
Cases to accompany Contemporary strategy analysis, 6th ed.
Used with the text Contemporary Strategy Analysis or as a stand-alone resource, the cases collected here allow students and executives to apply key strategy concepts and frameworks to top-level decision making at companies that face critical strategic challenges. The cases provide insight into the determinants of competition, the basis of competitive advantage, strategic design for exploiting innovation, and the opportunities and pitfalls of internationalization. For this sixth edition, Grant (management, Georgetown University) provides shorter cases, and updates cases on the US airline industry, the world auto industry, Wal-Mart, Harley-Davidson, and the Virgin Group. Teaching notes to the cases are provided at the publisher's Web site. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)
Challenging welfare issues in the global countryside.
First published as v. 40, no. 6 of Social Policy and Administration, this volume shifts the typical focus of social policy studies from urban to rural areas. Giarchi (applied psycho- social studies, U. of Plymouth, UK) introduces nine chapters that present case studies and analyses of rural welfare issues and policies. In the context of global demographic trends, international contributors examine the provision of public services to rural areas, rural movements in Europe, and the impacts of rural development approaches in the US and elsewhere. The debate over banning fox hunting in the UK echoes ones over hunting in the US West. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)
Citizenship; discourse, theory, and transnational prospects.
Noting the "the return of the citizen" in social science discourse, Kivisto (sociology, Augustana College, Rock Island, Illinois) and Faist (transnational relations and development studies, Bielefeld U., Germany) apply the themes of inclusion, erosion, withdrawal, and expansion to citizenship in liberal democracies. After an overview of who was historically included and excluded as citizens in the modern nation-state, they discuss T.H. Marshall's thesis about the growth of citizens' rights with the rise of the welfare state, critiques of the welfare state, and new modes of citizenship in this era of globalization (e.g., the nested citizenship created by the European Union). (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)
Classical archaeology.
This work is intended by editors Alcock (director, Institute for Archeology and the Ancient World, Brown U., US) and Osborn (ancient history, U. of Cambridge, UK) to serve as an introduction to the material archaeology of the "Classical World;" the world of the Greeks and the Romans between the eighth century BC and the fourth century AD. Following an overview of the field's scope and range and an introduction to its standard methodological tools and modes of analysis, chapters introduce current understandings of classical rural, urban, and household archaeology. Remaining chapters summarize archaeological knowledge of civic religion, commemorative statuary as an expression of political self-presentation, the projection of community identities, and processes and impacts of cultural interchange. Distributed in North America by The David Brown Book Co. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)
Colonialism and grammatical representation; John Gilchrist and the analysis of the "Hindustani" language in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.
Steadman-Jones (English, U. of Sheffield, UK) presents a contextual and textual analysis of the three-volume dictionary and grammar of the Indian language "Hindoostanee" finished by British colonial surgeon John Gilchrist towards the beginning of the 19th century. His goal is to demonstrate for the reader the way that Gilchrist's grammatical work combined technical analytical problems with issues of political representation in a fashion that privileged neither dimension of the work. He accomplishes this goal by examining Gilchrist's personal circumstances; the epistemology of late 18th century linguistic enquiry; and Gilchrist's treatment of nominal and verbal morphology, dialogue as a medium for language learning, and etymological analysis. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)
A companion to international history, 1900-2001.
With 32 articles focused on historical, economic, political and social events and trends of the last century, this first-contact reference gives general readers, high school students and undergraduates a solid background for future study. Articles cover important background issues such as imperialism, nationalism and shifts in diplomacy, the Triple Alliance and the Entente of 1894 to 1914, the house of cards that fell to reveal world war, inter-war politics and the rise of dictators, the new Europe, decolonization, the series of events leading to constant turmoil in the Middle East, globalization, and the world that emerged from the terrible dust of 9/11. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)
A companion to Roman religion.
These 31 articles focus on how humans behaved within the political, cultural, social and economic contexts of Roman religion, with contributors covering the importance of what the Romans believed, early religions and their urban cohorts, religion and the integration of policy and the empire, and a host of media (the epic tradition, coins, reliefs, inscriptions, home religion), symbols and practices (sites, games, processionals, prayers, hymns, music, dance, sacrifice), and related religious identities (Roman diaspora Judaism, religious individualism and intellectual choices, institutional religious options such as Mithrasism and "Romanness"). The collection closes with observations from the outside, including exported Roman religion, the Roman East and Roman religion under the purview of Tertullian. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)
A companion to the history of the book.
The history of the book is a relatively new discipline that looks at books as historical artifacts as well as carriers of literary texts. It considers not just printed volumes, but any texts that have been reproduced and distributed by any means — clay tablets as well as manuscripts. Here scholars from various humanities set out the fundamentals of the field: methods and approaches, periodicals and other book-like entities, and issues. A long section also surveys the history of the material text, from the world before the codex, the book beyond the West, and the codex in the West since 400. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)
Conservation and sustainability in historic cities.
Rodwell, a practicing architect and planner specializing in historic cities and a consultant on site management, examines how conservation and sustainability relate to each other and to the historic sites themselves. He reviews the theories behind conservation and its effect on cultural identity, reveals the weaknesses and strengths in current philosophy and practice, and describes best practices. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)
A concise companion to Shakespeare and the text.
Eleven contributions from leading scholars consider the history of Shakespeare's works in their subsequent editions, providing an introduction to Shakespearian bibliographic studies. Murphy (U. of St. Andrews) begins by closely examining a single scene in Hamlet to analyze the choices made by the editor of one popular edition. Other topics include the publishing trade in Shakespeare's time; the application of postmodernist thought to the task of editing Shakespeare; and the use of online databases in researching Shakespeare's publishing contexts. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)
Contemporary debates in social philosophy.
Mostly American scholars of philosophy explore such issues as freedom and money, the good and bad family, homosexual acts and public discourse, abortion and moral repugnance, privacy, religious toleration, the future of racial integration, Locke's defense of preferential treatment, and the moral responsibility of bystanders. Suitable as a textbook for a college course discussing philosophical perspectives on society. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)
The cost of land use decisions; applying transaction cost economics to planning & development.
Contributing to the debate about regulation and deregulation, Buitelaar (spatial planning, Radboud U. Nijmegen, the Netherlands) looks at the formal rules that are made and used to steer land use decisions. He emphasizes the relationship between how land use institutions are made and used at the site level, and the costs associated with this. Case studies are from Nijmegen, Bristol, and Houston. (Annotation ©2007 Book News Inc. Portland, OR)
