Browse Books
Beijing Film Academy Yearbook 2016
The Beijing Film Academy Yearbook is a collection of specially selected articles chosen from issues of the Journal of Beijing Film Academy. This volume collates articles published in the journal throughout 2016 and are translated for an English-speaking readership. Due to the increased academic focus on Chinese cinema the Beijing Film Academy Yearbook project aims to contribute to this research with a first-hand perspective in order to narrow the gap for cross-culture scholarly dialogue.
Broadcasting and National Imagination in Post-Communist Latvia
This book uses the case study of public television in post-communist Latvia to explore the question of how audiences respond to TV offerings and how their choices can be seen as an act of agency. Jānis Juzefovičs builds his book around Albert O. Hirschman’s classic concepts of exit voice and loyalty – the options available to a person within any system. He uses Hirschman’s ideas along with tools from social constructionism to assess how the publics of both the Latvian-speaking majority and the large Russian-speaking minority have responded to the role of public television in the nation-building efforts of the new Latvian state. Along the way he develops our understanding of public broadcasting more generally and the way it can be used to define a national 'we'.
Beijing Film Academy Yearbook 2015
The Blind
Images of animals are all around us. Yet the visibility offered by wildlife photography can't help but contribute to an image of the animal as fundamentally separate from the human. But how can we get closer to animals without making them aware of us or changing their relationship to their environment?
The Blind might be the answer. Developed for naturalists by the Institute of Critical Zoologists the Blind is a camouflage cloak that works on the principle that an object vanishes from sight if light rays striking it are not reflected but are instead forced to flow around as if it were not there. In fifty stunning colour photographs this volume shows the cloak tested in nature reserves grasslands and urban environments. By taking the human out of the picture The Blind offers an opportunity to explore how we see animals in photography.
Body and Mind in Motion
Bangladesh’s Changing Mediascape
With contributions from a diverse group of media and communications scholars from around the globe Bangladesh’s Changing Mediascape presents a pioneering study of the trends patterns and prospects shaping the contemporary Bangladeshi media. Among the many topics discussed here are the difference among specific media formats including television newspapers radio film and photography; policy issues; and the challenge that new media poses to governance in a developing nation faced with innumerable economic social and political problems. Eschewing the currently dominant development communication model the editors argue that market forces rather than planned state interventions will contribute to a more equitable communication environment.
Brian Ferneyhough
One of contemporary music’s most significant and controversial figures Brian Ferneyhough's complex and challenging music draws inspiration from painting literature and philosophy as well as music from the recent and distant past. His dense multi-layered compositions intrigue musicians while pushing performer and instrument to the limits of their abilities. A wide-ranging survey of his life and work to date Brian Ferneyhough examines the critical issues fundamental to understanding the composer as both musician and thinker. Debuting in celebration of Ferneyhough’s 70th birthday in 2013 this book balances critical analysis of the music and close scrutiny of its aesthetic and philosophical contexts making possible a more rounded view of the composer than has been available hitherto.
Broadcasting Diversity
Berlin School Glossary
Berlin School Glossary is the first major publication to mark the increasing international importance of a group of contemporary German and Austrian filmmakers initially known by the name the Berlin School: Christian Petzold Thomas Arslan Christoph Hochhäusler Jessica Hausner and others. The study elaborates on the innovative strategies and formal techniques that distinguish these films specifically questions of movement space spectatorship representation desire location and narrative. Abandoning the usual format of essay-length analyses of individual films and directors the volume is organized as an actual glossary with entries such as bad sex cars the cut endings familiar places forests ghosts hotels interiority landscapes siblings surveillance swimming pools and wind. This unique format combined with an informative introduction will be essential to scholars and fans of the German New Wave.
Black Swan Lake
Being Human
This feels like a time of environmental and moral crisis without parallel.... Not only do human beings seem not to believe in anything but despite exponential advances in information production we do not appear to know much either. This book is a guide for everyone who feels understandably perplexed.
The book considers issues as diverse as:
- the lure of alternative religions and belief systems
- the use of the rhetoric of economics to justify amoral decisionmaking
- Green politics and genetically-modifies crops
- New technology's power to preserve the status quo and
- the true impetus behind the Human Genome Project.
Presenting an explanation of recent findings in science and their relationship with society and politics this book seeks to give guidance towards responsible political action. Starting from themes developed in the companion volume The Search for Mind the author attempts to provide intellectual roots for the 'anti-capitalist' or 'anti-globalization' movement and in particular treats social protest as a form of knowledge-seeking.
The author brings to very topical and controversial concerns some much-needed clarity. Complete with reader-friendly summaries of current thought in the biological physical and social sciences this book is designed primarily for the popular market but will also appeal to those working or studying in these fields.
Beyond the Dance Floor
A pathbreaking study of the women who create electronic dance music Beyond the Dance Floor focuses on the largely neglected relationship between these women and the conceptions of gender and technology that continue to inform the male-dominated culture surrounding electronic music. In this volume Rebekah Farrugia explores a number of important issues including the politics of identity and representation the bonds formed by women within the DJ community and the role female DJs and producers play in this dance music culture as well as in the larger public sphere.
Though Farrugia primarily focuses on women's relationship to music-related technologies – including vinyl mp3s and digital production software – she also deftly extends her argument to the strategic use of the Internet and web design skills for purposes tied to publicity networking and music distribution.
Brit Wits
Humour as much as any other trait defines British cultural identity. It is 'crucial in the English sense of nation' argues humour scholar Andy Medhurst; 'To be properly English you must have a sense of humour' opines historian Antony Easthope. Author Zadie Smith perceives British humour as a national coping mechanism stating 'You don’t have to be funny to live here but it helps.' Sex Pistols frontman Johnny Rotten concurs commenting 'There’s a sense of comedy in the English that even in your grimmest moments you laugh.' Although humour invariably functions as a relief valve for the British it is also often deployed for the purposes of combat. From the court jesters of old to the rock wits of today British humorists – across the arts – have been the pioneers of rebellion chastising society’s hypocrites exploiters and phonies while simultaneously slighting the very institutions that maintain them.
The best of the British wits are (to steal a coinage from The Clash) 'bullshit detectors' with subversion on their minds and the jugulars of their enemies in their sights. Such subversive humour is held dear in British hearts and minds and it runs deep in their history. Historian Chris Rojek explains how the kind of foul-mouthed abusive language typical of British (punk) humour has its antecedents in prior idioms like the billingsgate oath: 'Humour often of an extraordinary coruscating and vehement type has been a characteristic of the British since at least feudal times when the ironic oaths against the monarchy and the sulfurous ‘Billingsgate’ uttered against the Church and anyone in power were widespread features of popular culture. Rojek proceeds to fast forward to 1977 citing the Sex Pistols’ 'Sod the Jubilee' campaign as a contemporary update of the Billingsgate oath. For Rojek the omnipresence of British caustic humour accounts for why the nation has historically been more inclined toward expressions of subversive rebellion than to violent revolution. 'Protest has been conducted not with guns and grenades but with biting comedy and graffiti' he observes.
As an outlet for venting and as an alternative means of protest Brit wit not surprisingly has developed distinctive communicative patterns with linguistic flair and creative flourishes starring as its key features. Far more than American humour for example British humour revels in colourful language in lyrical invective in surrogate mock warfare. One witnesses such humour daily in the Houses of Parliament where well-crafted barbs are traded across the aisle the thinly veiled insults cushioned by the creativity of the inherent humour. Such wit is equally evident throughout the history of British rock where rebellion has defined the rock impulse and comedic dissent has been a seemingly instinctual activity.
Berliner Chic
Since becoming the capital of reunited Germany Berlin has had a dose of global money and international style added to its already impressive cultural veneer. Once home to emperors and dictators peddlers and spies it is now a fashion showplace that attracts the young and hip. Moving beyond descriptions of Berlin's fashion industry and its ready-to-wear clothing Berliner Chic charts the turbulent stories of entrepreneurially-savvy manufacturers and cultural workers striving to establish their city as a fashion capital and being repeatedly interrupted by politics ideology and war. There are many stories to tell about Berlin's fashion industry and Berliner Chic tells them all with considerable expertise.
Beauty and the Beast
Recent years have seen an increased interest in issues of national identity and representation and cinema is a major medium where strands and layers of representational systems come together in cross-cultural dialogues. Beauty and the Beast provides an account of the specific development of depictions of Italy and the Italians in British cinema. Girelli draws upon cultural and social history to assess the ongoing function of “Italianness” in British film and its crucial role in defining and challenging British national identity. Drawing on British literary and filmic tradition to analyse the rise of specific images of the Italian Other this book makes original use of archival material such as WWII footage – and a selected corpus of significant British films.
Bringing Down the House
Beyond Auteurism
Broadcasters and Citizens in Europe
European media is experiencing a paradoxical form of growth: as media outlets surge and new technologies develop major broadcasting companies are consolidating like never before. In Broadcasters and Citizens in Europe an esteemed group of contributors look at what this paradox might mean for the European community. Are broadcasting audiences better informed than they were twenty years ago? And how has the advent of the European Union changed media practices? This essential volume explores a new media world in the context of a continent in flux.
“The book is a good source of information about institutional arrangements developed in European countries in the field of audio-visual policy. It gives an interesting and well-written account of how particular European countries and the European Union try to deal with different problems deriving from the ethical dilemma inscribed in the construction of media systems.”—Magdalena Rek Journal of Contemporary European Studies “Communication scholars will benefit from the focus on research from across Europe along with the theoretical implications. For media policy-makers and members of civic organisations the taxonomy of instruments will provide an overview for possible policy development. Finally the clarity with which this book is written will help college students understand the field of media and social responsibility.”— Jarim Kim Media International AustraliaBritish TV and Film Culture in the 1950s
Brecht in L.A.
Additionally Brecht in L.A. winner of the 2002 SWTA National New Play Contest (US) is already a critically acclaimed play which suggests that the work has the potential to be widely (and successfully) produced. And such productions will enhance the marketability of the book. A play influenced by Brecht is in itself not unique since many leading contemporary dramatists--such as Caryl Churchill Edward Bond Tony Kushner Heiner Muller and Howard Barker--have been affected by Brechtian dramaturgy. But a Brechtian-influenced play with Brecht as the lead character is unique. The play represents the only dramatic work in English which features Brecht himself as the title character.
Brecht in L.A. centering on Brecht while adapting/critiquing Brechtian dramatic form also provides a unique opportunity for the instructor who is teaching Brechtian theatre since--with just one text (which will includes endnotes and appendices)--the instructor can cover epic theatre the "Brecht debate" Brecht's biography and contradictions between Brecht's theatrical practices and his everyday life.
The book's wide-ranging audience will include theatre artists; playgoers; students of drama theatre English and performance studies; scholars; and readers interested in Brecht Hollywood and/or biography. Brecht in L.A. will also be an important addition to the considerable collections of books about Brecht which are carried by countless libraries.