The Chameleon's Last Dance - Join the revellers in a bawdy 'world of men', between Christmas and New Year, as a somnambulist chameleon, a dancing bear and ten lords-a-leaping prance into a bag of glees and good tidings at the retro-Hustler's Ball. Swirling through music, memories of childhood, places, teenage years, TV characters, and friends, past and present, can the chameleon trance-dance through fire and attain the state of 'Mok'sha'?

This book explores the controversial and misunderstood world of sexualised weight gain known as feederism. Conversations with over 20 feeders and feedees are analysed through a psychological and sociological lens. The implications for health professionals working in bariatrics are discussed along with directions for future research.

Focusing on global examples of gender equality, this collection explores non-dominant models of masculinity that represent gender equity in pro-feminist ways. Essays explore new alternative models of masculinity by a wide variety of contemporary authors and texts, ranging from Paul Auster to Jonathan Franzen.

Unique and exciting, this ethnographic study is the first to address a little-known subculture, which holds a fascination for many. The first decade of the twenty-first century has displayed an ever increasing fixation with vampires, from the recent spate of phenomenally successful books, films, and television programmes, to the return of vampire-like style on the catwalk. Amidst this hype, there exists a small, dedicated community that has been celebrating their interest in the vampire since the early 1990s. The London vampire subculture is an alternative lifestyle community of people from all walks of life and all ages, from train drivers to university lecturers, who organise events such as fang fittings, gothic belly dancing, late night graveyard walks, and 'carve your own tombstone'. Mellins presents an extraordinary account of this fascinating subculture, which is largely unknown to most people. Through case study analysis of the female participants, Vampire Culture investigates women's longstanding love affair with the undead, and asks how this fascination impacts on their lives, from fiction to fashion. Vampire Culture includes photography from community member and professional photographer SoulStealer, and is an essential read for students and scholars of gender, film, television, media, fashion, culture, sociology and research methods, as well as anyone with an interest in vampires, style subcultures, and the gothic.

Many people seek to carve out a space for themselves independently of the existing social and political realities of which they are a part. Through a range of ethnographical cases, the book addresses the innovative and complex ways in which social groups show the ability to position themselves between cultures, states, moralities, or local communities and state authorities, thus creating new opportunities for agency in the modern world. As an analytical term, alternative spaces designate "in-between" spaces rather than oppositional structures and are as such both "inside" and "outside" their constituent elements.

Unique and exciting, this ethnographic study is the first to address a little-known subculture, which holds a fascination for many. The first decade of the twenty-first century has displayed an ever increasing fixation with vampires, from the recent spate of phenomenally successful books, films, and television programmes, to the return of vampire-like style on the catwalk. Amidst this hype, there exists a small, dedicated community that has been celebrating their interest in the vampire since the early 1990s. The London vampire subculture is an alternative lifestyle community of people from all walks of life and all ages, from train drivers to university lecturers, who organise events such as fang fittings, gothic belly dancing, late night graveyard walks, and 'carve your own tombstone'.Mellins presents an extraordinary account of this fascinating subculture, which is largely unknown to most people. Through case study analysis of the female participants, "Vampire Culture" investigates women's longstanding love affair with the undead, and asks how this fascination impacts on their lives, from fiction to fashion. "Vampire Culture" includes photography from community member and professional photographer SoulStealer, and is an essential read for students and scholars of gender, film, television, media, fashion, culture, sociology and research methods, as well as anyone with an interest in vampires, style subcultures, and the gothic.

In this original and unusual work, Lucy Chesser explores the persistent recurrence of cross-dressing and gender inversion within Australian cultural life. Examples of cross-dressing are to be found in almost every area of Australian historical enquiry, including Aboriginal-European relations and conflict, convict societies, the goldrushes, bushranging, the 1890s and its nationalist fiction, and World War One. The book compares and contrasts sustained life-long impersonations whereby women lived, worked and sometimes married as men, with other forms of cross-dressing such as public masquerades, cross-dressing on the stage, and the prosecution of men who sought sexual encounters while disguised as women.

"About The Half That Was Never Told"

by John Williams ISBN 13: 978 1 84747 004 1
Published: 2006
Pages: 147

Description

Skinheads, Rastas and Hippies reflects John's involvement in the alternative culture of the 1970s through to the 1990s. He saw a common denominator between the different ethnic and sub-culture groups i.e. Rastas mixing with hippies/ skinheads etc. It was these experiences coupled with his own diagnosis of schzophrenia that lead John to put pen to paper. A truly entertaining read the story reflects John's upbringing and youth in the mixed and sometimes volatile Brixton in South London.

About the Author

John was born in Jamaica in 1955, he currently lives in Brixton, South London. John has had various jobs but has struggled to find employment since becoming ill with schizophrenia. His interests include reading, football and meeting people. He has two children - Adrian aged 16 and Samantha who is 12 years of age. John wrote his book in order to share his perception of his experiences and interpretation of his life issues and tribulations. He believes that the seventies and early eighties were key years in defining the issues of today.

Book Extract

" I have been hanging around and it looks like I am wasting time. You should know that good drop out hang about smoking dope and not ever get a bad day but when you hear of down and out they are even worst. Sometimes I wonder if I would get back on my feet. So far the smoking seems to be all right. Now I am ripe again, big up dropouts.

The truth is that you are trying to be wild and free, as you would like to be without problems, like sunshine after the rain, big up drop out big up and have a better day. Or is it sunshine in the rain. Can you see how much, right on and look how it recurs, at least have a good look. Look as I was saying to a good friend not knowing how she got to be my friend. At first we could not see each other's way, but look how now we see thing like the same.

This book compares the state of knowledge on men and masculinities in 14 countries across Europe, examining the effects of social change, Europeanization, globalization and new post-socialist configurations of Europe for men. Special attention is given to home and work, social exclusion, violence, and health.

The superb classic memoir from a dazzlingly eccentric and endlessly fascinating author and feminist icon - a woman very much ahead of her time - including her time spent on the glorious island of Skiathos 'A happy, hilarious book' Daily Express Nancy Spain was one of the most celebrated - and notorious - writers and broadcasters of the 50s and 60s. Witty, controversial and brilliant, she lived openly as a lesbian (sharing a household with her two lovers and their various children) and was frequently litigated against for her newspaper columns - Evelyn Waugh successfully sued her for libel... twice. Nancy Spain had a deep love of the Mediterranean. So it was no surprise when, in the 1960s, she decided to build a place of her own on the Greek island of Skiathos. With an impractical nature surpassed only by her passion for the project, and despite many obstacles, she gloriously succeeded. This classic memoir is infused with all Spain's chaotic brilliance, zest for life and single-minded pursuit of a life worth living. Perfect for fans of A PLACE IN THE SUN and ESCAPE TO THE COUNTRY 'Full of fun, and that zest of intelligence that never left her' Sunday Times

'Essential reading' Roger Robinson 'Hateful and hilarious, heartbroke and hellbent' Mary Karr 'Sure, wise and devastating . . . a joy' Caleb Azumah Nelson 'Wanda Coleman is not just wickedly wise, she is transcendent' Washington Post Nobody wrote about police hassle like she did. Nobody wrote about making ends meet, about the history of the slave trade or the comedy of the daily grind, with the same breathtaking originality and brio; and few writers, before or since, have had the courage to write with such honesty about their everyday experience of life - and love - in an unjust world. This is the first ever UK publication of the poetry of Wanda Coleman: a beat-up, broke and Black woman who wrote with defiance, humour and clarity about her life on the margins, and who went overlooked by the establishment for decades - even as she was known colloquially as 'the unofficial poet laureate of Los Angeles'. Wicked Enchantment gathers 130 of Coleman's poems in a selection by Terrance Hayes. Funny, angry, endlessly alive and written with an immediacy and frankness that captivate, here is the essential work of a poet of fierce resistance and self-belief against the odds.

Holmes County, Ohio, is home to the largest and most diverse Amish community in the world. Yet, surprisingly, it remains relatively unknown compared to its famous cousin in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. Charles E. Hurst and David L. McConnell conducted seven years of fieldwork, including interviews with over 200 residents, to understand the dynamism that drives social change and schism within the settlement, where Amish enterprises and nonfarming employment have prospered. The authors contend that the Holmes County Amish are experiencing an unprecedented and complex process of change as their increasing entanglement with the non-Amish market causes them to rethink their religious convictions, family practices, educational choices, occupational shifts, and health care options.

The authors challenge the popular image of the Amish as a homogeneous, static, insulated society, showing how the Amish balance tensions between individual needs and community values. They find that self-made millionaires work alongside struggling dairy farmers; successful female entrepreneurs live next door to stay-at-home mothers; and teenagers both embrace and reject the coming-of-age ritual, "rumspringa."

"An Amish Paradox" captures the complexity and creativity of the Holmes County Amish, dispelling the image of the Amish as a vestige of a bygone era and showing how they reinterpret tradition as modernity encroaches on their distinct way of life.

Few terms elicit such strong and varied feelings and yet have so little clarity as "democracy." Leaders of large states use "democracy" to designate their nations' public character even as critics and rivals use the term to validate their own political perspectives. In Envisioning Democracy, the editors and contributors address the following questions: What does democracy mean today? What could it mean tomorrow? What is the dynamic of democracy in an increasingly interdependent world? Envisioning Democracy explores these questions amid the dynamic of democracy as a political phenomenon interacting with forms of economic, ethical, ethnic, and intellectual life. The book draws on the work of Sheldon S. Wolin (1922-2015), one of the most influential American theorists of the last fifty years. Here, scholars consider the historical conditions, theoretical elements, and practical impediments to democracy, using Wolin's insights as touchstones in thinking through the possibilities and obstacles facing democracy now and in the future.

Since the 1980s, neoliberalism has had a major impact on social life and, in turn, research in the social sciences. Emerging from the crisis of the Keynesian welfare state, neoliberalism describes a social transformation that has impacted relationships between citizens and the state, consumers and the market, and individuals and groups. Neoliberal Contentions offers original essays that explore neoliberalism in its various guises. It includes chapters on economic policy and restructuring, resource extraction, multiculturalism and equality, migration and citizenship, health reform, housing policy, and 2SLGBTQ communities. Drawing on the work of influential Canadian political economist Janine Brodie, the contributors use Brodie's scholarship as a springboard for their own distinct analyses of pressing political and social issues. Acknowledging neoliberalism's crises, failures, and contradictions, this collection contends with neoliberalism by "diagnosing the present," situating the phenomenon within a broader historical and political-economic context and observing instances in which neoliberal rationality is reinforced as well as resisted.

Playing Out of Bounds investigates the North American Chinese Invitational Volleyball Tournament (NACIVT), an annual event that began in the 1930s in the streets of Manhattan and now attracts 1200 competitors from the U.S. and Canada. Its two key features are the 9-man game, where there are nine instead of the usual six volleyball players on the court, and the fact that player eligibility is limited to "100% Chinese" and Asian players, as defined in the tournament rules. These rules that limit competitors to specific ethno-racial groups is justified by the discrimination that Chinese people faced when they were denied access to physical activity spaces, and instead played in the alleyways and streets of Chinatowns. Drawing on interviews, participant-observation, and analysis of websites and tournament documents, Playing Out of Bounds explores how participants understand and negotiate their sense of belonging within this community of volleyball players and how membership within and the boundaries of this community are continually being (re)defined. This identity/community building occurs within a context of anti-Asian racism, growing numbers of mixed race players, and fluidity of what it means to be Canadian, American, Chinese, and Asian.