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A classic text on deviance is updated and reissued.
Despite our cultures proclaimed respect for scientific reason, we live in a society that is no less bedazzled-and bedevilled-by myth than those of our remote ancestors. Roland Barthes first examined the mythical resonances of consumer products in the 1950s. Far from being demystified, consumerism has since morphed into a universal religion, its compulsory ritual of shopping essential to our economic survival. Myth has also invaded the political realm, as terrorists brandish black flags and recite theological mantras as they martyr themselves. Peter Conrads exhilarating book exposes the absurdity and occasional insanity of our godforsaken, demon-haunted contemporary culture. Conrad casts his ...
In this dazzling book, the story of the spectacular rise and subsequent waning of American influence across the world since 1945 is told by cultural critic and historian Peter Conrad. Politics, war and commerce form the inevitable backdrop to his tale, but Conrad also treats us to a kaleidoscopic presentation of America's unstoppable creativity: its output of great, good and enjoyably bad art, of jeans and jazz, fast food and fridges, space travel, comic books and motorbikes, technologies and therapies, along with the heroic, erotic or violent cinematic visions that have Americanized even our dreams.
Examining ADHD and its social and medical treatments around the world. Attention deficithyperactivity disorder (ADHD) has been a common psychiatric diagnosis in both children and adults since the 1980s and 1990s in the United States. But the diagnosis was much less common—even unknown—in other parts of the world. By the end of the twentieth century, this was no longer the case, and ADHD diagnosis and treatment became an increasingly widespread global phenomenon. As the diagnosis was adopted around the world, the definition and treatment of ADHD often changed in the context of different psychiatric professions, medical systems, and cultures. Global Perspectives on ADHD is the first book t...
This twentieth century retrospective studies modernism, literature, the visual arts, music, the performing arts, science, and psychoanalysis., and "sees the modern era as a whole."--Jacket.
Alfred Hitchcock relished his power to frighten us and believed the shocks he administered improved our psychological health. But he could never satisfactorily explain our curiosity to see forbidden things or the perverse desire to experience anxiety and dread that made his work so popular. In The Hitchcock Murders, Peter Conrad, one of Hitchcock's eager victims, undertakes the task on the master's behalf. At the age of thirteen, Conrad snuck into his first screening of Psycho, and he's been wary of showers and fruit cellars ever since. Thanks to Hitchcock, he's also suspicious of staircases, seagulls, and crop-dusting planes. Now he sets out to analyze the nature of Hitchcock's appeal to bo...
Peter Conrad, who was born in Tasmania, has produced an original and highly personal account of the role islands play in our dreams and nightmares. He visits every corner of the globe to explain why islands appeal to us.
Over the past half-century, the social terrain of health and illness has been transformed. What were once considered normal human events and common human problems—birth, aging, menopause, alcoholism, and obesity—are now viewed as medical conditions. For better or worse, medicine increasingly permeates aspects of daily life. Building on more than three decades of research, Peter Conrad explores the changing forces behind this trend with case studies of short stature, social anxiety, "male menopause," erectile dysfunction, adult ADHD, and sexual orientation. He examines the emergence of and changes in medicalization, the consequences of the expanding medical domain, and the implications fo...
A fresh, provocative look at one of the most enigmatic figures in the history of film by "one of our most acute cultural critics" (Paul Fussell) Orson Welles was a metamorphic man, a magical shape-changer who made up myths about himself and permitted others to add to their store. On different occasions, he likened himself to Christ--mankind's redeemer--and to Lucifer--the rebel angel who brought about the fall. His persona compounded the roles he played--kings, despots, generals, captains of industry, autocratic film directors--and the more or less fictitious exploits with which he regaled other people or which they attributed to him. Hailed in childhood as a genius, he remained mystified by...