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In exile and migration, the things that forcibly displaced people take with them become mobile testimonies of defiance, mourning, creativity, and rejuvenation. Through a series of scholarly essays and autobiographical vignettes, this richly illustrated volume draws on such observations to examine the meanings that possessions assume when they are wrenched from their original contexts. The contributors to this collection shine an intimate spotlight on those who are driven from their homes by conflict and forced into exile by authoritarian regimes. In so doing, the contributors underscore the necessity for civil societies to support academic freedom and the work done by critical thinkers worldwide.
What we now call "the good life" first appeared in California during the 1930s. Motels, home trailers, drive-ins, barbecues, beach life and surfing, sports from polo and tennis and golf to mountain climbing and skiing, "sportswear" (a word coined at the time), and sun suits were all a part of the good life--perhaps California's most distinctive influence of the 1930s. In The Dream Endures, Kevin Starr shows how the good life prospered in California--in pursuits such as film, fiction, leisure, and architecture--and helped to define American culture and society then and for years to come. Starr previously chronicled how Californians absorbed the thousand natural shocks of the Great Depression-...
In an ethnography that challenges standard approaches to understanding the poor and disempowered, Jennie M. Smith's descriptions of peasant activity change what constitutes a democratic society. Through their civil institutions and artistic expression, Haitian peasants, widely known as some of the world's most impoverished, politically disempowered, and illiterate citizens, debate the meanings of development, democracy, and the public good.Smith offers a historically grounded overview of how the Haitian state and certain foreign powers have sought to develop rural Haiti and relates how Haitian peasants have responded to such efforts through words and deeds. The author argues that songs calle...
Edward Weston (1886–1958) was one of the most celebrated photographers of the twentieth century. Jean Charlot (1898–1979), a classically trained French artist best known for his murals, woodcuts, and paintings celebrating Mexican culture, played a key role as a participant and chronicler of the Mexican Renaissance. This book, based on letters that Weston and Charlot exchanged from the early 1920s until Weston’s death in 1958, documents a friendship that says as much about art—about photography and fresco, practice, criticism, and history—as it does about the intersection of a number of fascinating characters, the ups and downs of the correspondents’ daily lives, the pursuit of their dreams and aspirations, and the support and encouragement they gave each other. Lew Andrews crafts a multivalent narrative that reconfigures our understanding of Weston, Charlot, and their era, shedding new light on specific events and artwork. While giving us rare insight into the everyday life of these artists, this work also supplies an important chapter in the history of twentieth-century art and photography, seen close up and from the inside.
The Seductions of Biography is an important volume which sheds new light on a flourishing literary form, the biography. In postmodern culture, new methods and intentions emerge, as well as new obstacles, towards our understanding of biography as a genre. This book provides a thorough exploration of this genre, from a wide range of postmodern perspectives. The Seductions of Biography brings together a number of essays which reflect in culturally critical as well as autobiographical terms on current themes and practices of contemporary biography. Issues addressed by these essays focus on the postmodern dilemma itself--as new voices from excluded communities make themselves heard in biographica...
Before the 1930s, landscapes of the American Southwest represented the migrantÕs dream of a stable and bountiful homeland. Around the time of the Great Depression, however, the Southwest suddenly became integrated into a much larger economic and cultural system. Audrey Goodman examines howÑsince that timeÑthese southwestern landscapes have come to reveal the resulting fragmentation of identity and community. Through analyzing a variety of texts and images, Goodman illuminates the ways that modern forces such as militarization, environmental degradation, internal migration, and an increased border patrol presence have shattered the perception of a secure homeland in the Southwest. The dece...
Feminist Anthropology surveys the history of feminist anthropology and offers students and scholars a fascinating collection of both classic and contemporary articles, grouped to highlight key themes from the past and present. Offers vibrant examples of feminist ethnographic work rather than synthetic overviews of the field. Each section is framed by a theoretical and bibliographic essay. Includes a thoughtful introduction to the volume that provides context and discusses the intellectual “foremothers” of the field, including Margaret Mead, Ruth Landes, Phyllis Kaberry, and Zora Neale Hurston.
Ideal for researching the status and activities of Third World women For quick, reliable coverage of women's issues in developing countries, here is a concise reference work written by a team of more than 80 international experts. The Encyclopedia comprises 68 essays that cover the entire Third World, from Africa to Asia, from the Near East to South and Central America, from the South Pacific to the Caribbean. The women authors are acknowledged experts from Harvard University, the World Bank, the United Nations Development Fund for Women, the University of Nairobi, the International Labor Organization, and other institutions, who summarize the most recent scholarship on a wide range of impor...