You may have to Search all our reviewed books and magazines, click the sign up button below to create a free account.
Go West! Ein autobiografischer Blick auf eine Band, die mühelos und widerspruchsfrei ganz unterschiedliche Gruppen von Fans miteinander vereint: von Intellektuellen, die sie als ambitionierte Konzeptkünstler bewundern, über Familien bis hin zur schwulen Partyszene. Kristof Magnusson nahm zum ersten Mal Popmusik im späten Grundschulalter wahr – und da waren die Pet Shop Boys für ihn der Inbegriff der Popmusik schlechthin. Später prägten sie seine musikalische Sozialisation in den Teenagerjahren und begleiteten seine Anfänge als Autor während der Studienzeit. Die Rolle der Pet Shop Boys als queere Identifikationsfiguren hat sich zwar im Laufe der vergangenen Jahrzehnte verändert, doch immer wieder war Magnusson beeindruckt davon, wie es der Band gelang, eingängige Charthits zu produzieren und dabei gleichzeitig clever und subversiv zu bleiben. So schließt sich ein Kreis, wenn Magnusson seinen Helden unvermittelt in der Berliner Eckkneipe »Oase« begegnet.
None
A book for our times: a moving meditation on the tension between loneliness and freedom, individualism and love. At no time before have so many people lived alone, and never has loneliness been so widely or keenly felt. Why, in a society of individualists, is living alone perceived as a shameful failure? And can we ever be happy on our own? Drawing on personal experience, as well as philosophy and sociology, Daniel Schreiber explores the tension between the desire for solitude and freedom, and the desire for companionship, intimacy, and love. Along the way he illuminates the role that friendships play in our lives—can they be a response to the loss of meaning in a world in crisis? A profoundly enlightening book on how we want to live, Alone spent almost a year on Germany’s bestseller list.
In recent decades, globalization has led to increased mobility and interconnectedness. For a growing number of people, contemporary life entails new local and transnational interdependencies which transform individual and collective allegiances. Contemporary literature often reflects these changes through its exploration of migrant experiences and transcultural identities. Calling into question traditional definitions of culture, many recent works of poetry and prose fiction go beyond the spatial boundaries of a given state, emphasizing instead the mixing and collision of languages, cultures, and identities. In doing so, they also challenge recent and contemporary discourses about cultural i...
In a world now full of commodified and westernised gymnastics sold as yoga, it's difficult for a person to find or even understand an actual yoga practice that is right for them and genuinely transformative. Fortunately for the people of Switzerland and the world, Susanne Daeppen has for over twenty years been dedicated to the practices of Yoga that have come directly from the great tradition via the scholarship of Tirumalai Krishnamacharya and his brilliant son, TKV Desikachar. With clarity and creativity, Susanne communicates directly from the heart of her own real experience of Yoga, with the passion and depth of a teacher of many years. Accompanied by stunning photography in the wild nature of Iceland by her partner Christoph Lauener, this book is a treasure: real Yoga for real people.
This volume looks at the representation of 9/11 and the resulting wars in European literature. In the face of inner-European divisions the texts under consideration take the terror attacks as a starting point to negotiate European as well as national identity. While the volume shows that these identity formations are frequently based on the construction of two Others—the US nation and a cultural-ethnic idea of Muslim communities—it also analyses examples which undermine such constructions. This much more self-critical strand in European literature unveils the Eurocentrism of a supposedly general humanistic value system through the use of complex aesthetic strategies. These strategies are in itself characteristic of the European reception as the Anglo-Irish, British, Dutch, Flemish, French, German, Italian, and Polish perspectives collected in this volume perceive of the terror attacks through the lens of continental media and semiotic theory.
“Turning to face north, face the north, we enter our own unconscious. Always, in retrospect, the journey north has the quality of dream.” Margaret Atwood, “True North” In this interdisciplinary collection, sixteen scholars from twelve countries explore the notion of the North as a realm of the supernatural. This region has long been associated with sorcerous inhabitants, mythical tribes, metaphysical forces of good and evil, and a range of supernatural qualities. It was both the sacred abode of the gods and a feared source of menacing invaders and otherworldly beings. Whether from the perspective of traditional Jewish lore or of contemporary black metal music, few motifs in European cultural history show such longevity and broad appeal. Contributors: Eleanor Rosamund Barraclough, Angela Byrne, Danielle Marie Cudmore, Stefan Donecker, Brenda S. Gardenour Walter, Silvije Habulinec, Erica Hill, Jay Johnston, Maria Kasyanova, Jan Leichsenring, Shane McCorristine, Jennifer E. Michaels, Ya’acov Sarig, Rudolf Simek, Athanasios Votsis, Brian Walter
Populärkulturelle Texte und Medien sind eine Ressource ästhetischer Erfahrung, zirkulieren omnipräsent im Gefüge der Unterhaltungsindustrie und spielen für Kinder und Jugendliche nicht zuletzt aufgrund der rasanten Distribution von Figuren und Stoffen in Medienverbünden eine zentrale Rolle. Sie stellen in ihrer Gesamtheit ein bedeutsames Medium der literarischen Sozialisation dar. Der schulische Literaturunterricht sollte diese elementaren Erfahrungen mit populärkulturellen Gegenständen aufgreifen und weiterentwickeln. Deshalb ist Populärkultur als Vor- und Umfeld des Literaturunterrichts ein wesentliches Handlungsfeld der Literatur- und Lesedidaktik, das weiter erschlossen werden m...
The economic crisis that emerged in America in 2008 unleashed a veritable epidemic of ill health around the world. However it was Iceland, whose population of three hundred thousand had the world's highest GDP per capita and counted itself the happiest of countries, that caught the worst cold. It has nearly killed them. No story from the economic crisis of 2008 is more evocative than I celand's. The names may be unfamiliar-Johanesson, Bjoergolfsson, Oddsson-but their exuberance, greed, and miscalculation have many counterparts on our shores. And however traumatic the collapse of individual companies may be in the United States, in Iceland's case an entire country melted down. All the wealth ...
The Pet Shop Boys came of age at a time of deep socio-political tension. From the rise of sexual politics and awareness to Thatcherite neoliberalism and the Cold War, this book explores the cultural and political impact of the band and offers a fascinating window into the late 20th and early 21st centuries. An archetypal 'gay band', it shows how their overt queerness influenced generations of LGBTQIA+ music lovers and artists alike. Covering the full oeuvre of The Pet Shop boys; their albums, films, stage productions and collaborations, chapters in this collection show how their work is suffused with political commentary on the past and present covering themes as broad as queer identity, the HIV/AIDs epidemic, globalization and Brexit. It also places them within the context of their times and considers them as activists, authors, social commentators, political actors and personalities to better understand what influenced them. Bringing together a range of perspectives and disciplines, The Pet Shop Boys and the Political provides a unique and untapped insight into a formative pop band of the modern era that has mirrored and shaped society over the past forty years.