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The Abject of Desire approaches the aestheticization of the unaesthetic via a range of different topics and genres in twentieth-century Anglophone literature and culture. The "experience of disgust", which Winfried Menninghaus describes as "an acute crisis of self-preservation", is correlated with conceptualizations of gender in theories of the abject/abjection. In view of this general crisis of identity in the experience of disgust, the contributions to this volume discuss examples of the aestheticization of the unaesthetic in cultural representations and locate conceptual (re)codings of the body, gender, and identity with regard to the abject as an immediate and uncompromising experience o...
Celebrities depend upon fans to sustain their popularity and livelihood, and fans are happy to oblige. With social media they can follow their favorite (or least favorite) celebrities’ every move, and get glimpses into their lives, homes, and behind-the-scenes work. Fans interact with celebrities now more than ever, and often feel that they have a claim on their time, attention, and accountability. In Fame and Fandom, the contributors examine this tumultuous dynamic and bring together celebrity studies and fan studies like never before. In case studies including Supernatural, Harry Styles, YouTube influencers, film location sites, Keanu Reeves, and celebrities as fans, readers find new approaches to fan/celebrity encounters and parasocial relationships. This is the go-to volume on the symbiotic relationship between fame and fandom.
This collection of essays examines the potential connections between speculative fiction and actual social change. Through a variety of approaches, the contributors explore whether consumers of science fiction and fantasy narratives can experience a real shift in their worldviews as a result of that consumption. Topics include the utopian vision of California in Ursula K. LeGuin's Always Coming Home, the changing role of women in science fiction pulp magazines, and the representation of progress and social change in popular graphic novels.
Recent discussions on Byzantine art have been dominated by the question of representing realia. Among these, however, the way works of art reflect the daily life of women have not received much space or attention. The present book studies various images representing women's status and her performative tasks, and their significance from the fourth century to the fall of the Empire, through analysis of archaeological evidence and works of art. It addresses a wide range of questions, some pertaining both to pictorial traditions and to their late antique antecedents, others peculiar to changing and evolving Byzantine culture and mentality. The first chapter deals with the imagery of childbearing...
In Individuals and Materials in the Greco-Roman Cults of Isis Valentino Gasparini and Richard Veymiers present a collection of reflections on the individuals and groups which animated one of Antiquity’s most dynamic, significant and popular religious phenomena: the reception of the cults of Isis and other Egyptian gods throughout the Hellenistic and Roman worlds. These communities, whose members seem to share the same religious identity, for a long time have been studied in a monolithic way through the prism of the Cumontian category of the “Oriental religions”. The 26 contributions of this book, divided into three sections devoted to the “agents”, their “images” and their “practices”, shed new light on this religious movement that appears much more heterogeneous and colorful than previously recognized.
Preliminary material -- HISTORICAL CONDITIONS -- TYPE AND STYLE OF THE EGYPTIAN AND EGYPTIANIZING MONUMENTS OF IMPERIAL ROME -- THE SETTING OF THE EGYPTIAN AND EGYPTIANIZING MONUMENTS IN IMPERIAL ROME -- CATALOGUE RAISONNÉ -- APPENDIX I -- APPENDIX II -- APPENDIX III -- APPENDIX IV -- ADDENDA -- CAPTIONS TO THE FIGURES -- INDEX OF PROPER NAMES -- INDEX OF MUSEUMS -- Plates I-CCXXX and Plans.
A brilliant tinkerer/inventor and a lawyer/marketing genius partnered to create Singer, a retail colossus that over 120 years grew into a universally recognized brand synonymous with quality and value. Following World War II, four successive CEOs made a series of catastrophic decisions in their efforts to redefine the company as competing in industries other than sewing. Of the four, one was forced out and subsequently murdered, one died of an unexpected heart attack just as he was about to defend the company from a takeover, one succeeded in the takeover, then dismembered the company before going to prison, and one played investors, tax authorities, securities regulators, and banks against each other until he suddenly just vanished. The machinations of these four comprised a quarter-century-long soap opera, with power struggles, hostile takeovers, tax evasion, fraud, and even flight to China just a few steps ahead of the authorities.
Cultural identity in the classical world is explored from a variety of angles.
Pope John Paul II was one of the pivotal figures of the last century, the spiritual head of more than one billion believers and a world statesman of immense stature and influence. Yet he remains a mystery - theologically, politically, and personally. Through unprecedented access to both the Pope himself and those close to him, veteran New York Times correspondent and award-winning author Tad Szulc delivers the definitive biography of John Paul II. This strikingly intimate portrait highlights the Polishness that shaped the Pope's mysticism and pragmatism, while providing a behind-the-scenes look at the significant events of his public and private life, including: the inside story of the negot...