![]() |
Welcome to Loot.co.za!
Sign in / Register |Wishlists & Gift Vouchers |Help | Advanced search
|
Your cart is empty |
||
|
Books > Reference & Interdisciplinary > Interdisciplinary studies > Cultural studies > General
Americans are familiarizing themselves with Japanese food, thanks especially sushi's wild popularity and ready availability. This timely book satisfies the new interest and taste for Japanese food, providing a host of knowledge on the foodstuffs, cooking styles, utensils, aesthetics, meals, etiquette, nutrition, and much more. Students and general readers are offered a holistic framing of the food in historical and cultural contexts. Recipes for both the novice and sophisticated cook complement the narrative. Japan's unique attitude toward food extends from the religious to the seasonal. This book offers a contextual framework for the Japanese food culture and relates Japan's history and geography to food. An exhaustive description of ingredients, beverages, sweets, and food sources is a boon to anyone exploring Japanese cuisine in the kitchen. The Japanese style of cooking, typical meals, holiday fare, and rituals--so different from Americans'--are engagingly presented and accessible to a wide audience. A timeline, glossary, resource guide, and illustrations make this a one-stop reference for Japanese food culture.
This volume explores post-2000s artistic engagements with Holocaust memory arguing that imagination plays an increasingly important role in keeping the memory of the Holocaust vivid for contemporary and future audiences.
The meaning of selfhood has become an urgent question, largely in reaction to the radical individualism in which many modern Western notions of selfhood have been cast. The 11 contributors to "Selves, People, and Persons" aim to reshape fundamental ideas of the self in such varied fields as theology, biology, psychoanalysis and political philosophy. Nearly all of them agree that selves are always to be understood in relation to the communities of which they are a part. The first section of the book focuses on basic issues in the philosophy of selfhood. Erazim Kohak's title essay explores American personalism while Harold H. Oliver argues that a self is always in the act of relation to some other. Lawrence E. Cahoone counters with reflections on the limits of this social and rational notion of selfhood and Edward W. James sketches a holistic view of the self in which the "either/or" of dualism can be transformed by a "both/and". The second group deals with selfhood in various cultures, beginning with Eliot Deutsch's exploration of how each tradition can enlarge its understanding of selfhood by incorporating elements from other traditions. John B. Carman examines the role of the self in Hindu "Bhakti", and Livia Kohn explores the role of spontaneity in Chinese views of selfhood. The problem of selfhood in theology, biology, psychoanlaysis and political theory comprises the final section: Krister Stendahl discusses the idea that our selfhood is understood primarily in terms of God's selfhood; Alfred I. Tauber examines biological ideas of organism in the work of Elie Metchnikoff; John E. Mack proposes that a spiritual point of view is now required in order to fully understand the psyche; and Bhikhu Parekh examines how the issue of violence is formulated and debated in liberal democracies.
This is an investigation of Yeats's experiments with the media of language and dance in his plays. He was allied to other artists of the 1890s in his fascination with the biblical dancer Salome and in his preoccupation with things Japanese, particularly "Noh" theatre with its central dance. The impact of Diaghilev's Ballets Russes also played its part in influencing Yeats's drama and he took interest in the "dance-as-meaning" debate. The book contains new data on Yeats's "At the Hawk's Well" dancer, Ito and new information on his personal acquaintance with music-hall and Ballets Russes from yet unpublished letters.
The Shape of Revelation explores the overlap between revelation and aesthetic form from the perspective of Judaism. It does so by setting the Jewish philosophy of Martin Buber and Franz Rosenzweig alongside its immediate visual environment in the aesthetics of early German modernism, most notably alongside "the spiritual in art" as it appears in the art and art theories of Wassily Kandinsky, Paul Klee, and Franz Marc. The modern shape of revelation-and "the spiritual in art" that emerges from this conversation-builds upon a vocabulary of form-creation, sheer presence, lyric pathos, rhythmic repetition, open spatial dynamism, and erotic pulse that was unique to Germany in the first quarter of the twentieth century. This study works to identify and critically assess the sensual root that is brought to bear upon the modern image of revelation and "the spiritual in art."
The academic study of diamonds is as multi-faceted as the precious stones themselves. Mineralogists and geographers have written about them, as have historians and economists and students of art and fashion. They each shine their light on a different aspect of this source of luminous radiance. But who would venture to describe the entire complicated worldwide system starting in the diamond mines and ending with the consumers of Western metropolises? In The Mazzel Ritual: Culture, Customs and Crime in the Diamond Trade, Russian-Israeli cultural anthropologist and criminologist Dina Siegel follows the route of a diamond from the mines of Africa to the shops of Europe and the United States, as it passes through countless hands and places and is smuggled, stolen, cut, polished, sold, exchanged and, finally, worn as jewelry. In the course of this long and exciting journey, a wide range of people face all sorts of risks and criminality, as well as various moral and ethical judgments. Siegel describes the range of ethnic groups that are active in the diamond trade and the culture and customs that are specific to this business. She analyses the dangers and threats to the industry and aims to uncover the strategies and tactics to deal with them. Finally, this story of risk, trust and crime examines the vulnerability of diamond production and distribution to illicit and criminal activities. This book is about the diamond business itself as well as about those involved in it. It tells the story of people who simply cannot stay away from this expensive and alluring commodity.
Food activism is core to the contemporary study of food - there are numerous foodscapes which exist within the umbrella definition of food activism from farmer's markets, organic food movements to Fair Trade. This highly original book focuses on one key emerging foodscape dominating the Italian alternative food network (AFN) scene: GAS (gruppi di acquisto solidale or solidarity-based purchase groups) and explores the innovative social dynamics underlying these networks and the reasons behind their success. Based on a detailed 'insider' ethnography, this study interprets the principles behind these movements and key themes such as collective buying, relationships with local producers and consumers, financial management, to the everyday political and practical negotiation involving GAS groups. Vitally, the author demonstrates how GAS processes are key to providing survival strategies for small farms, local food chains and sustainable agriculture as a whole. Beyond Alternative Food Networks offers a fresh and engaged approach to this area, demonstrating the capacity for individuals to join organised forms of alternative political ecologies and impact upon their local food systems and practices. These social groups help to create new economic circuits that help promote sustainability, both for the environment and labor practices. Beyond Alternative Food Networks provides original insight and in-depth analysis of the alternative food network now thriving in Italy, and highlights ways such networks become embedded in active citizenship practices, cooperative relationships, and social networks.
Praise for the First Edition: aOffers the most insightful and significant scholarly analysis
to date of the changes taking place in the economic aglobalizationa
of television production. A delight to read, laced with wit and
humor.a Praise for the Second Edition: aProvides both the record of a strange moment in history and a
contribution to contemporary cultural politics. This second,
revised edition brings the story right up to the present with a
compelling blend of the ancient and the modern.a "The Apprentice," "Project Runway," "The Bachelor," "My Life on the D-list," "Extreme Makeover," "American Idol," It is virtually impossible to turn on a television without coming across some sort of reality programming. Yet, while this genre has rapidly moved from the fringes of television culture to its lucrative core, critical attention has not kept pace. Beginning by unearthing its historical roots in early reality shows like "Candid Camera" and wending its way through "An American Family" and "The Real World" to the most recent crop of reality programs, Reality TV, now updated with eight new essays, is one of the first books to address the economic, visual, cultural, audience, and new media dimensions of reality television and has become the standard in the field. The essays provide a complex and comprehensive picture of how and why this genre emerged, what it means, how it differs from earlier television programming, and how it engages societies, industries, and individuals. Topics range from the blending of fact and fiction, to the uses of viewer labor and ainteractivity, a to issues of surveillance, gender performativity, hyper-commercialism, and generic parody. By spanning reality televisionas origins in the late 1940s to its current overwhelming popularity, Reality TV demonstrates both the tenacity of the format and its enduring ability to speak to our changing political and social desires and anxieties.
The cultural imagery of women is deeply ingrained in our consciousness. So deeply, in fact, that feminists see this as a fundamental threat to female autonomy because it enshrines procreative heterosexuality as well as the relations of domination and subordination between men and women. Diana Meyers' book is about this cultural imagery - and how, once it is internalized, it shapes perception, reflection, judgement, and desire. These intergral images have a deep impact not only on the individual psyche, but also on the social, political, and cultural syntax of society as a whole. Meyer's argues for the necessity of crafting a dissident, empowering, and 'emancipatory counter-imagery' for women. Rigorous, well written, and accessible, the reach of Gender in the mirror is arguably catholic, and addresses the interests or readers across an impressive range of intellectual disciplines.
In 2017, the new journal Internet Histories was founded. As part of the process of defining a new field, the journal editors approached leading scholars in this dynamic, interdisciplinary area. This book is thus a collection of eighteen short thought-provoking pieces, inviting discussion about Internet histories. They raise and suggest current and future issues in the scholarship, as well as exploring the challenges, opportunities, and tensions that underpin the research terrain. The book explores cultural, political, social, economic, and industrial dynamics, all part of a distinctive historiographical and theoretical approach which underpins this emerging field. The international specialists reflect upon the scholarly scene, laying out the field's research successes to date, as well as suggest the future possibilities that lie ahead in the field of Internet histories. While the emphasis is on researcher perspectives, interviews with leading luminaries of the Internet's development are also provided. As histories of the Internet become increasingly important, Internet Histories is a useful roadmap for those contemplating how we can write such works. One cannot write many histories of the 1990s or later without thinking of digital media - and we hope that Internet Histories will be an invaluable resource for such studies. This book was originally published as the first issue of the Internet Histories journal.
This is the first book to explore the relationship between tourism and spices. It examines the various layers of connection between spices and tourism in terms of destinations, attractions and cuisines. The book reveals how spice-producing destinations are employing spices in destination branding and encouraging spice farms to move towards tourism, while destinations not producing spices are employing spices and herbs in distinctive local cuisines. Both tangible and intangible spice heritages are highlighted as tools for developing destinations, creating attractions, inventing new forms of livelihoods and distinguishing local, regional and national cuisines. This volume will be useful for researchers and students in cultural tourism, culinary tourism, anthropology of food and food history.
Today Capitalism is generally accepted as the only viable socioeconomic system in spite of the stress, moral decay, drug abuse, and crime it fosters. Peeters shows that, before entering the present Materialistic Phase, Western society went through two other phases, the Religious and the Militaristic-Nationalistic Phase. He argues that current social problems arose because the behavior of most people was no longer determined by the laws of Church and State, but instead by the need to be productive and the desire to acquire money and material goods. Peeters shows that Materialism is, however, not the ultimate stage of development of society. A comparison of the three phases and Communism-a rival form of materialistic Phase-shows that Western society is going to enter a Fourth Phase, which Peeters asserts will occur around 2050. Peeters sets out to discover which prominent traits of today's ways of living and acting will be rejected during the transition toward the Fourth Phase and which new characteristics will emerge. The educational system, democracy, the goals of production and income inequality will all have to change when people adapt their aims to the requirements of the Post-Materialistic Phase. The challenge of the forces that now rule people's lives and the rejection of materialism will ultimately recreate a healthy, balanced society. Scholars and researchers in Future Studies as well as concerned citizens will find this a provacative analysis of today's problems and their possible resolution.
This book gives a detailed account of the holistic research carried out on the analytical data obtained historically on the products of the Nantgarw and Swansea porcelain manufactories which existed for a few years only during the second decade of the 19th Century. A background to the establishment of the two factories, which are linked through the persons of the enigmatic William Billingsley and his kiln manager, Samuel Walker, involves the sourcing of their raw materials and problems associated with the manufacture and distribution of the finished products. A description of the minerals and additives used in porcelain production is recounted to set the scene for the critical evaluation of the comprehensive analytical data which have been published on Nantgarw and Swansea porcelains. For the first time, the author has adopted a nondestructive technique, Raman spectroscopy, to interrogate perfect samples of Nantgarw and Swansea porcelain, as well as a selection of shards from an archaeological excavation carried out at a waste dump at the Nantgarw China Works site. Following these experiments, several questions relating to the porcelain bodies of Swansea and Nantgarw china can be answered and a protocol established for the preliminary evaluation of items of suspect attribution to confirm or not the correctness of their assignment to these Welsh porcelain factories.
Modernist writers were well aware of the new physics and its underlying concepts. Einstein's Wake shows how the most innovative scientific thinking was understood by non-specialists such as Joseph Conrad, Virginia Woolf, D. H. Lawrence, and T. S. Eliot, and how it entered into their literary works.
This book highlights the intersection between theory and lived experience, academic description and the personal narrative of Lou Sullivan. Sullivan puzzled in his diaries over the conundrum of his desire to transition from female to male in order to be a gay man. The reader will follow Sullivan as he struggles with his feelings of maleness, in his troubled relationship with his lover, Tom, through his many sexual escapades, and finally, as he begins taking hormones. Alongside the diaries is an engagement with body and gender theories, accessible to the introductory reader, yet also taking up current debates especially in transgender studies.
In recent years, the saliency of conflicts pitting different ethnic, racial and religious groups against one another has increased dramatically. The world of nation-states is much more diverse than previously realized; only a small number of the 185 independent countries are truly homogeneous. With the end of the cold war, the relative importance of ethnic conflicts as a threat to international peace and stability is far greater. An international set of scholars collaborate in this volume to explore policy alternatives which can contribute towards the accommodation of cultural diversity.
Federal restrictions on the sale and possession of some firearms were introduced during Prohibition when illegal rumrunners battling for territorial rights commonly used machine guns to destroy the opposition. More sweeping legislation was not passed until 1968, and from that time on the struggle has been between pro- and anti-control forces, with more controls created at state and local levels than at the federal level. However, the mood in Washington has turned, and the question now is how the country can be weaned away from the violence that pervades every aspect of living, from lawlessness to literature, entertainment, and even children's toys. This book traces the history of these gun control measures from the early days to our own violent age. This is a study of a part of American history that deals not just with gun control as such, but with basic concepts of personal liberty, government responsibility, and the fear of tyranny. All three of these influenced the people who took up arms in the American Revolution and who, for decades afterward, resisted every effort of the central government to substitute a standing army for the armed militia of the states. As the nation grew in size and population, the need for a standing army became apparent, and the nature of the militia changed from that of a purely state organization to an adjunct of the regular army. Still, the view that private individuals were entitled to purchase and keep firearms for their personal use persisted. That this was not a constitutional right was made clear by the Supreme Court in a series of cases beginning as early as 1876. Federal restrictions on the sale and possession of some firearms were introduced during Prohibition when illegal rumrunners battling for territorial rights commonly used machine guns to destroy the opposition. More sweeping legislation was not passed until 1968, and from that time on the struggle has been between pro- and anti-control forces, with more controls created at state and local levels than at the federal level. However, the mood in Washington has turned, and the question now is how the country can be weaned from the violence that pervades every aspect of living, from lawlessness to literature, entertainment, and even children's toys.
Why is talk about television forbidden at certain schools? Why does a mother feel guilty about watching Star Trek in front of her four-year-old child? Why would retired men turn to daytime soap operas for entertainment? Cliches about television mask the complexity of our relationship to media technologies. Through case studies, the author explains what audience research tells us about the uses of technologies in the domestic sphere and the classroom, the relationship between gender and genre, and the varied interpretation of media technologies and media forms. Television and New Media Audiences reviews the most important research on television audiences and recommends the use of ethnographic, longitudinal methods for the study of media consumption and computer use at home as well as in the workplace.
"Dance Ethnography and Global Perspectives" presents the work of dance scholars whose professional fieldwork spans several continents and includes studies of the dance and movement systems of varied global communities. It offers a selection of dance ethnographies that represent individual approaches to fieldwork through the medium of traditional dance from around the globe - Bali, Croatia, Japan, Mallorca, Okinawa, the Philippines, Serbia, the United Kingdom, and West Africa. This fascinating collection is divided into three parts that represent different theoretical approaches to the study of dance and identity through the methodology of ethnography. With backgrounds in a wide range of disciplines, such as religious studies, social and cultural anthropology, folklore, history, psychosocial work, and tourism, the authors include various media of film and photographs to enrich their methodologies.
Quietly but implacably, powerful transnational corporations are gaining power over our visual world. A 'global, visual content industry' increasingly controls images supplied to advertisers, marketers and designers, yet so far the process has, paradoxically, evaded the public eye. This book is the first to expose the interior workings of the visual content industry, which produces approximately 70% of the images that define consumer cultures. The corporate acquisition of major photographic and film archives, as well as the digital rights to much of the world's fine art, is having a profound effect on what we see. From stock photography to new technologies, this book powerfully engages with the historical and cultural issues relating to visual culture and new media. How has stock photography, the system of 'renting out' ready-made images, transformed the role of marketing and advertising? What impact are digital technologies having on the practices of industry professionals? How have software programs such as Photoshop enabled professionals to play 'God' with photographs and how does this influence our belief in the integrity of images?Combining original research on stock photography with a new theoretical take on the circulation of images in contemporary culture, The Image Factory provides a comprehensive and in-depth exploration of industrialized commercial photography, its uses and abuses.
The relationship between Germans and their non-German counterparts in Central and Eastern Europe has been a fundamental feature of European History. The 12 essays in this volume address key aspects of this complex and multifaceted relationship which has been marked by friendship and co-operation as well as enmity and strife. The topics range from medieval peasant settlement to present day relations between Germans and Poles. Central themes are national identity, the emergence and development of mixed communities and inter-cultural communication. The book is for departments of politics (courses on Soviet and East European studies, international relations and globalization); history (courses on modern European history, German history, military history, East European history); sociology (courses in population studies, refugee studies and nationalism); Jewish studies; and some general interest.
For the last twenty-five years, "Language, Discourse, Society" has
been the most intellectually challenging series in English. Its
titles range across the disciplines from linguistics to biology,
from literary criticism to law, combining vigorous scholarship and
theoretical analysis at the service of a broad political
engagement. This anniversary reader brings together a fascinating
group of thinkers from both sides of the Atlantic with an
introductory overview from the editors which considers the
development of theory and scholarship over the past two
decades.
This book is a rare and unusually reflective insider account of the transformational challenges of the cultural industries over the past 15 years. Opening with a fresh new perspective on music industry history, it explores how the industrial world evolves more by narrative plausibility than by precision, recognizing that corporate identity, purpose, and power can be both reinforced and subverted by modifications to various cultural master-plots and their traditional heroes and villains. Of most interest are the insights into the strategic struggles faced by corporate managers in the cultural industries, and by intellectual property policymakers dealing with the fascinating and seismic new millennium shifts in technology, communications, and related social behaviour. Illustrating how a satisfactory 'post-private' master-narrative for the digital age has yet to emerge, the book also makes a valuable contribution to loosening the industrial-political deadlock in the debate over copyright reform. It is essential reading for cultural industry practitioners, policymakers and scholars alike, indeed for anyone who takes an interest in the changing processes which affect the creation and dissemination of knowledge and culture.
Defining cultural history, Peter Burke claims, "is rather like trying to catch a cloud in a butterfly net." In this volume, Anna Green provides a coherent and accessible introduction to the major theories within this most diverse of historical fields. "Cultural History" explores the conceptual, affective and imaginative worlds of human consciousness, as reflected in elite intellectual and aesthetic works as well as everyday social beliefs and practices.
The relevance of culture has recently enjoyed increasing recognition for the study of European integration and a European identity. Appeals to a common European culture as well as appeals to different national cultures have been used respectively as a means to pursue political ends. Paying tribute to literature's role as an important constituent part of a culture, this collection of essays explores literary representations of Europe and its nation states and should be of particular value to anyone who is interested in cultural, political or literary studies in the European context. |
You may like...
A Taste for China - English Subjectivity…
Eugenia Zuroski Jenkins
Hardcover
R3,058
Discovery Miles 30 580
|