With its exalted emotionality, Pentecostalism is a widespread religious movement in Latin America and Africa. It is a blend of Methodism and African religious culture which arouses the passions of the poorest Brazilian masses. Pentecostal conversion is experienced as a sudden break which radically transforms the life of these sectors of the population. Pentecostalism is an Utopia of equality, love and emotion, which is staged during the worship service. However, it is also characterized by authoritarian features. Pentecostalism is slowly eroding the foundation of Western political categories.

Ghost Movies in Southeast Asia and Beyond explores ghost movies, one of the most popular film genres in East and Southeast Asia, by focusing on movie narratives, the cultural contexts of their origins and audience reception. In the middle of the Asian crisis of the late 1990s, ghost movies became major box office hits. The emergence of the phenomenally popular "J-Horror" genre inspired similar ghost movie productions in Korea, Thailand, Taiwan, Hong Kong, the Philippines and Singapore. Ghost movies are embedded and reflected in national as well as transnational cultures and politics, in narrative traditions, in the social worlds of the audience, and in the perceptual experience of each individual. They reflect upon the identity crises and traumas of the living as well as of the dead, and they unfold affection and attraction in the border zone between amusement and thrill, secular and religious worldviews. This makes the genre interesting not only for sociologists, anthropologists, media and film scholars, but also for scholars of religion.

Illuminating one of the most pervasive issues of our time, Popular Culture is the first book to link the importance and implications of popular culture with pedagogical practice. It shows how cultural forms such as Hollywood films, pop music, soap operas, and televangelism are organized by gender, age, class, race, and ethnicity, thus providing the contradictory text that both enables and disables emancipatory interest, so fundamental to the formation of self and society. What emerges is a redefinition of the very notion of popular culture.

Many prominent science fiction writers, artists, and editors began as s.f. "fans." This is the first book to survey fandom's history, manifestations, and accomplishments, including clubs, fanzines, and conventions. The 24 essays are divided into sections that consider the following: the types of people who become fans and the satisfactions they receive; the development of fandom in America; fandom in Europe and the Orient; social interactions in the form of local clubs or wider-drawing conventions; and long-term results in the form of beginning professional careers in writing or publishing, exercising critical attention, and so forth. The writers of these essays have all participated in the activities they describe. The book also contains a glossary, an annotated bibliography, and an index. Overall, this book gives a detailed look at the most important facets of a fascinating subculture that has contributed significantly to the direction of modern science fiction.

Handling the Hard Stuff: Conversations on the Philosophy of Alcohol provides students with a collection of articles that helps them consider the implications of living in an alcohol-saturated world. The anthology marries discussions on various styles of alcohol with readings on the nature of identity, responsibility, freedom, sex, gender, and virtue. Throughout, students are invited to explore a number of thought-provoking questions such as: Are humans evolutionarily programmed to desire the taste of fermenting fruit? Do we fundamentally change our identity when we are inebriated? How responsible, both legally and morally, are we for what we do while inebriated? What role does alcohol play in the dating ritual? What are the dangers of an addiction to alcohol? Each unit includes pre-reading questions and prompts to introduce key topics and prepare students for greater levels of engagement and questioning. Written to help students engage more thoughtfully, concertedly, and diligently with the concept of alcohol not just as a crutch or a treat -but as something that can offer philosophical investigation and discernment, Handling the Hard Stuff is an ideal resource for courses and programs in philosophy.

Featuring the custom car cult of hot rods, drag racers and low riders, classic films like Thunder Road and American Graffiti, 'rebels' such as James Dean and Marlon Brando, and much more, 'Car Culture' is as exuberant and fascinating as the car craze itself. With 48 pages of brilliant color photographs.

The first edited volume to examine philosopher Slavoj Zizek's influence on, and his relevance for, theatre and performance studies. Featuring a brand new essay from Zizek himself, this is an indispensable contribution to the emerging field of Performance Philosophy.

Sitting in the ruins of the Third Reich, most Germans wanted to know which of the two post-war German states would erase the material traces of their wartime suffering most quickly and most thoroughly. Consumption and the quality of everyday life quickly became important battlefields upon which the East-West conflict would be fought. This book focuses on the competing types of consumer societies that developed over time in the two Germanies and the legacy each left. Consuming Germany in the Cold War assesses why East Germany increasingly fell behind in this competition and how the failure to create a viable socialist "consumer society" in the East helped lead to the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. By the 1970s, East Germans were well aware that the regime's bombastic promises that the GDR would soon overtake the West had become increasingly hollow. For most East German citizens, West German consumer society set the standards that East Germany repeatedly failed to meet.By exploring the ways in which East and West Germany have functioned as each other's "other" since 1949, this book suggests some of the possibilities for a new narrative of post-war German history. While taking into account the very different paths pursued by East and West Germany since 1949, the contributors demonstrate the importance of competition and highlight the connections between the two German successor states, as well as the ways in which these relationships changed throughout the period. By understanding the legacy that forty-plus years of rivalry established, we can gain a better understanding of the current tensions between the eastern and western regions of a united Germany.

This is a pioneering work, timely, scholarly, and grounded in critical-sociological, anthropological, and philosophical traditions. It offers an empathic analysis of pluralist, Afrocentric, and postmodernist advocacies of multicultural education and multiculturalism, but reveals formidable flaws in their conceptions of gender, race, culture, knowledge, learning, and social change. It is required reading for those desiring a synopsis of the literature on multicultural education and multiculturalism, and an understanding of the disputes among the various schools of thought. The author claims that multiculturalism is DEGREESInot DEGREESR a remedy for problems of sexism, racism, and educational underachievement among ethnic minorities. Rather, so questionable is multiculturalisM's endorsement of biological classifications, so relativistic and moralistic are its arguments on cultural differences, and so negligent its analysis of human reasoning that it has become a political pawn. Read "Against the Multicultural Agenda" to discover what is wrong with the multicultural agenda and what is powerfully persuasive about the alternative--critical thinking.

Bringing together a variety of critical approaches and interdisciplinary perspectives, this work reflects the continuing vitality and breadth of George Sand scholarship around the world. It contains twenty-eight papers and a keynote address presented at the Seventh International George Sand Conference. Contributors include leading European, American, and Asian scholars in the field. The volume opens with essays by Henri Peyre and Marilyn French focusing on George Sand's relation to her own period and society and her continuing relevance to modern readers. The next three sections are devoted to an examination of Sand's work in specific genres: the novel, travel writing, and autobiography. Other subject areas addressed include the relation of text to personal ideology, political views, and sexual politics and identity. The remaining chapters explore Sand's relationships with her contemporaries, including Alfred de Musset, Balzac, Flaubert, and Alexandre Dumas fils. Presenting the best in current scholarship in the field, this work will be of interest for studies and courses relating to nineteenth century women writers, French literature, women's studies, cultural and social history, and related subjects.

In the age of globalization, digitization, and media convergence, traditional hierarchies between media are breaking down. This book offers new approaches to understanding the politics and their underlying ideologies that are reshaping our global media landscape, including questions of audience participation and transmedia storytelling.

Cool Shades provides the first in-depth exploration of the enduring appeal of sunglasses in visual culture, both historically and today. Ubiquitous in fashion, advertising, film and graphic design, sunglasses are the ultimate signifier of 'cool' in mass culture; a powerful attribute pervading much fashion and pop cultural imagery which has received little scholarly attention until now. Accessible and highly engaging, this book offers an original history of how sunglasses became a fashion accessory in the early twentieth century, and addresses the complex variety of meanings they have the power to articulate, through associations with vision, light, glamour, darkness, fashion, speed and technology in the context of modernity. Cool Shades will be of great interest to students of fashion, design, visual and material culture, cultural studies and sociology, as well as general readers fascinated by this iconic fashion staple.

Christianity has been spread in Africa by Africans. It is the story of peoples seizing control of their own spiritual destinies-rather than the commonplace notion that the continent's Christian churches represent colonial and capitalist powers that helped subdue Africans to European domination. In short, once introduced, Christianity took on a powerful life of its own and spun out of the control of those who would retain ownership of doctrine and practice. East African Expressions of Christianity examines the experiences of African Christians as they explored the new faith, interpreted it in the context of their own values, appropriated it for themselves, and forged their own distinctive churches. Prominent Tanzanian and American historians, anthropologists, political scientists, and church people examine the translation of religious meanings across cultural boundaries; the religious and social appeal of the new faith; and the vital roles played by African evangelists, teachers, and translators in the spread of Christianity and the development of an African church.

This book explores the increased necessity of organizations to encourage human talent in the globalized economy, with particular emphasis on the impact in Eastern Europe. Featuring contributions presented at the 7th Annual Griffiths School of Management International Conference on Business and Ethics (GSMAC) organized by Emanuel University of Oradea, this book presents in-depth analysis of the economic, social and religious implications of the transition from low cost of labor to increased human talent in Eastern Europe and offers multiple theoretical and practical solutions. In 2004, Klaus Schwab, president and founder of the World Economic Forum, stated that the old era of capitalism and socialism is being replaced by a new era of "talentalism". The true competitive advantage of organizations and nations is increasingly becoming human talent, defined as the ability to "have new ideas that have value". Nations and organizations are exploring ways to reform their education systems and organizational structures in order to train, foster and encourage human talent. In Eastern Europe since the fall of communism in 1989, the competitive advantage of the region has been low cost of labor. However, since the integration within the European Union, millions of Eastern Europeans have left their home countries rendering the "low-wage competitive advantage" almost obsolete. In addition, the migration of able-working individuals has left behind mainly children and pensioners, placing a disproportionately heavy burden upon public and government services. It is within this context that the contents of this book explore the impact of the increased need of high human talent on Eastern European countries. Featuring contributions around topics such as poverty, healthcare management, cross-border cooperation, education systems, and religious influence on economic development, this book will be of interest of scholars, researchers, students and policy-makers interested in the business development and economic growth of Eastern Europe.

Current research in Sociology of Disability has a tendency to assume that very little written in this area until the last 20 years. However, this is not always the case. In part the lack of awareness of older writing occurs because of the ease of computerized searching for recent references or a sense that newer is better. It also reflects the assumption that Sociology as a field has ignored either disability as a social phenomenon or treated it solely as a medical phenomenon. While theorists and introductory textbooks have tended [and still tend] to ignore disability as a non-medical phenomenon and especially as a structured source of inequality, that does not mean that no attention was paid to disability in the earlier years. Rather, interest in disability from a sociological point of view exists as early as the late 1800s. The purpose of this volume is to explore that literature, with an eye towards encouraging current scholars not to ask "the same old" questions but to use the older writings as a basis for revolutionary as well as evolutionary thinking. What do the older writings tell us about what questions we should be asking, and what research we should be doing, today?

This innovative book offers help to managers and firms as they deal with cross-cultural issues in their operations. As newly independent nations offer new market opportunities for international firms, cross-cultural issues are presenting new competitive problems. Increasingly, both new and experienced firms are encountering difficulties and often committing costly blunders as they attempt to deal with the cultural issues. In an insightful text that is both theoretical and practical, the author offers an interesting staffing and structural alternative to help firms regain and maintain their competitive edge.

An in-depth look at the cultural environment of the emerging global economy provides insight into the cultural-issue problems facing all businesses. While the problems are crucial for internationally operating business firms, domestically operating firms are also beginning to encounter critical cross-cultural problems. Maddox notes a number of costly blunders made by firms and analyzes the different reasons for these blunders. The critical role of the cultural integration function in organizations in dealing with these problems is explored, along with the inadequacy of continuing or merely increasing past efforts. A new organizational structure response is proposed as an alternative to the old way of dealing with the problem.

This challenging and insightful work wrestles with the difficult treatment problems confronting both culturally and socially oppressed clients and psychotherapists in a society where diversity has often been resisted. The authors question long-held assumptions within the profession and urge recognition of new ethnic, racial, and gender realities which significantly impact therapies. Recognizing the implications of cultural diversity in the society, the authors-clinicians seek to broaden health professionals' awareness of clients' needs and to promote the requisite empathy. They describe how ethnic, racial, and gender issues affect psychotherapy's progress and outcomes. Specific concerns about such key factors as self-esteem, gender roles, and social regard are addressed in a context supportive of diversity enhancement rather than one seeking uniformity. Case studies offer highly valuable resource material and, through the authors' explication, insights into their challenging perspectives on this highly important health service.

Fiction is fascinating. All it provides us with is black letters on white pages, yet while we read we do not have the impression that we are merely perceiving abstract characters. Instead, we see the protagonists before our inner eye and hear their voices. Descriptions of sumptuous meals make our mouths water, we feel physically repelled by depictions of violence or are aroused by the erotic details of sexual conquests. We submerge ourselves in the fictional world that no longer stays on the paper but comes to life in our imagination. Reading turns into an out-of-the-body experience or, rather, an in-another-body experience, for we perceive the portrayed world not only through the protagonist's eyes but also through his ears, nose, tongue, and skin. In other words, we move through the literary text as if through a virtual reality. How does literature achieve this trick? How does it turn mere letters into vividly experienced worlds? This study argues that techniques of sensuous writing contribute decisively to bringing the text to life in the reader's imagination. In detailed interpretations of British novels of the 1980s and 1990s by writers such as John Berger, John Banville, Salman Rushdie, Jeanette Winterson, or J. M. Coetzee, it uncovers literary strategies for turning the sensuous experience into words and for conveying it to the reader, demonstrating how we make sense in, and of, literature. Both readers interested in the contemporary novel and in the sensuousness of the reading experience will profit from this innovative study that not only analyses the interest of contemporary authors in the senses but also pin-points literary entry points for the sensuous force of reading.

The melting pot is a myth, according to Fernandez, who shows that the United States is and always has been a "banquet of cultures." As he argues, the best way to deal with the more than 20 million new immigrants since 1965 is to accept, recognize, and eagerly explore the differences among the American people.

Fernandez seeks to forge a positive national consensus based on two building blocks. First, the nation's many ethnic groups can be a powerful source of unprecedented economic, artistic, and scientific creativity. Secondly, the nation's many ethnic groups offer a way to erase the black/white dichotomy which, masks the shared injustices of millions of European, Asian, African, Native, and Latino Americans. This is a provocative analysis of how we arrived at our current ethnic and racial dilemmas and what can be done to move beyond them. Scholars and students of American immigration and social policy as well as concerned citizens will find the book equally rewarding.

From the Civil War in Lebanon to the Iranian Revolution of 1978-79, from the dismantling of the Ba'athist regime in Iraq to the virtual splintering of the country; and from the chaos in Afghanistan to the victimisation of the Hazaras by the Taliban. Shi'i communities around the world have suffered from wars, revolutions and hostility. These problems, in different ways, have all involved a configuration of complicated events, a heritage of historical factors and interntional power politics that defy simplistic explanations. Here, Lloyd Ridgeon brings together an investigation of the nature of contemporary Shi'ism. He and his collaborators here focus on the creation of identities- showing the diversity of thought within the Shi'i world. They demonstrate the transnational nature of Shi'i networs and the forces of tradition and modernity influencing current developments in Shi'i identity both in the Middle East and in the West. This volume looks at both the attempts of authorities to construct a cohesive Shi'i identity (by using, for example, Iranian school books as an indicator of sanctioned facets of what it means to be Iranian) as well as the ways in which identity is created and developed by minority groups in the Diaspora. It also offers an analysis of the Hazaras of Afghanistan- so often overlooked when attempts to understand Afghanistan are made. It is this ethnic minority, which was so marginalised and victimised under the Taliban that offers an example of the trend of the rise of Islamism amongst the Shi'a. Moreover, by looking further afield to the Shi'a of Senegal, and asking the question of whether the Alevis of Turkey comprise part of the global Shi'i community, this book emphasizes the ways in which traditional patterns of social organisation are being transformed. Shi'i Islam and Identity highlights these global networks, and shows that it is inaccurate to speak of a 'Shi'i Crescnt'; rather, Shi'i worlds range from Senegal, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Lebanon, Iran and Iraq, to Turkey, Albania and to European capitals such as London and Berlin. This book is thus of interest to those looking at modern religion and its contemporary forms, as well as those researching Shi'ism more specifically.

Intellectuals today cringe when a politician speaks of the Second Coming, the millennium, or the Antichrist. Certain questions naturally arise about those who literally expect the end of the world in our day: Why do they think this? Why do some people believe them? How do their exhortations work to persuade an audience and to move that audience to actions and commitments? These are the motivating questions of Contemporary Apocalyptic Rhetoric, which describes "apocalyptic" as a rhetorical genre of discourse. Barry Brummett first recasts insights drawn from past scholarly and theological studies to demonstrate their relevance to contemporary apocalyptic, then examines a variety of "real" apocalyptic to illustrate the ways in which these rhetorical discourses actually work. The discussion focuses on those strategies, arguments, and stylistic features that are peculiar to apocalyptic and that support its social and political claims. Following an introductory first chapter, Chapter Two describes how apocalyptic rhetoric links a psychological context to an esoteric "grand order" underlying all of time and the cosmos. Chapter Three compares premillennial and postmillennial apocalyptic on three dimensions to show the different approaches they take to reach their audiences. Chapter Four describes specific rhetorical techniques designed to maintain a mystic persona and urge social and political commitments on audiences. The final two chapters apply the author's theories to secular and religious apocalyptic, both premillennial (Hal Lindsey and Ravi Batra) and postmillennial (Francis Fukuyama). Contemporary Apocalyptic Rhetoric will appeal to readers across many disciplines, includingcommunications, religion, sociology, and psychology.

With the advent of AIDS, the proliferation of gangs and drugs, and the uneasy sensation that Big Brother is actually watching us, the dark side of urban living seems to be overshadowing the brighter side of pleasure, liberation, and opportunity.

The Urbanization of Injustice chronicles these bleak urban images, while taking to task exclusivist politics, globalization theory, and superficial environmentalism. Exploring the links between urbanism, power, and justice, The Urbanization of Injustice presents the thoughts and theories of Edward Soja, David Harvey, Marshall Bermann, Doreen Masey, Sharon Zukin, Susan Fainstein, Ira Katznelson, Nell Smith, and Michael Keith in one cohesive volume, bringing us one step closer to genuinely humane and socially just urban practices.

This volume draws contributors from around the globe who represent the full range of approaches to scholarship in nineteenth-century French studies: historical, literary, cultural, art historical, philosophical, and comparative. The theme of the volume - Birth and Death - is one with particular resonance for nineteenth-century French studies, since the nineteenth century is commonly perceived as an age of new life and renovation. It is the epoch that witnessed an efflorescence of industrial and artistic progress, the birth of the individual and the birth of the novel, and the creation of an urban population in the major demographic shift from the rural provinces to Paris. At the same time, however, it is the century of Decadence and degeneration theory, marked by a prominent morbid aesthetic in the artistic sphere and a fascination with criminality, moral decay and the pathologization of racial and sexual minorities in the scientific discourses. It is also the century in which reflection on processes of artistic creation begins to problematize concepts of mimetic representation, the function of the author and the status of the text. In the context of the dialectical quality of nineteenth-century French culture, caught between an obsession with the new and innovative and a paranoid sense of its own encroaching decay, the twin themes of birth and death open onto a variety of issues - literary, social, historical, artistic - which are explored, interrogated and reassessed in the essays contained in this volume.