Culture and rhetoric

While some scholars have said that there is no such thing as culture and have urged to abandon the concept altogether, the contributors to this volume overcome this impasse by understanding cultures and their representations for what they ultimately are – rhetorical constructs. These senior, in...

Collaborative intimacies in music and dance

It foregrounds not only the role of performers but that of individuals and groups that make music and dance possible. It builds on previous ethnographically informed collections on sound and music, dance and movement. A third contribution of this book lies in the convergence of music...

Collaborative happiness

Collaborative Happiness looks at two urban cohousing communities: Kankanmori, in Tokyo; and Quayside Village, in Vancouver. In expanding beyond mainstream approaches to happiness focused exclusively on the individual, Quayside Village and Kankanmori provide an alternative model for how to under...

Cultural topographies of the new berlin

Offers an interdisciplinary investigation of the New Berlin Provides culturally-focused considerations of the New Berlin in a globalizing Europe and as a pillar of the European Union. Highlights the tensions between Berlin’s Creative City identification and its urban challenges.

A foreign affair

With six Academy Awards, four entries on the American Film Institute’s list of 100 greatest American movies, and more titles on the National Historic Register of classic films deemed worthy of preservation than any other director, Billy Wilder counts as one of the most accomplished filmmakers e...

Oswald spengler and the politics of decline

Re-evaluating the evolution Oswald Spengler’s political activities and his work, Oswald Spengler and the Politics of Decline explains the outcome of Spengler’s meta-historical considerations on world history and the practical demands of Realpolitik. This volume takes a novel approach to one of ...

Comrades of color

Combination of primary and secondary sources. Global range of perspectives from Cuba to South Africa to North Korea. Gives attention to question of race and racism in the Soviet bloc. Transnational study that puts East Germany into a global context beyond Europe.

The link with nature and divine meditations in asia

Peasant societies in many parts of the world regulate their relationship with the natural environment through earth gods who anchor a group of families not in genealogical terms, as in the case of ancestors, but in ecological terms. The articles in this volume illustrate the role of, and the cu...

Growing up in central australia

First ethnographic volume on the subject of Young Aboriginal Australians Today Regional ethnography with contributions from diverse disciplines Integration of scholarly and self-reflective accounts

Villages in the steppe

In this book, Akkermans provides a systematic overview of the Halaf culture in the Syrian portion of the valley of the Balikh River, a tributary of the Euphrates.

Globalization in southeast asia

The rapid postwar economic growth in the Southeast Asia region has led to a transformation of many of the societies there, together with the development of new types of anthropological research in the region. Local societies with originally quite different cultures have been incorporated into m...

Capricious borders

Detailed ethnographic study of the anthropology of Thrace in the Northern Greek-Turkish border areas. An exposition of the conflicted subjectivities of the Turkish minorities of contemporary Greece Examines the mechnanisms in place, which on the one hand, legalise the status of the m...

Youth gangs and street children

Presents an original and powerful ethnographic examination of children’s childhood with a focus on the child’s active participation in and acquisition of, cultural practices  Describes how the phenomenon that at times children themselves end up parenting their parents, generates contradi...

Local science vs global science

While science has achieved a remarkable understanding of nature, affording humans an astonishing technological capability, it has led, through Euro-American global domination, to the muting of other cultural views and values, even threatening their continued existence. There is a growing realiz...

An anthropological toolkit

Presenting 60 theoretical ideas, David Zeitlyn asks, ‘How to write about anthropological theory without making a specific theoretical argument?’ and ‘Is it possible to practice anthropology without arguing for a single specific approach?’ To answer, he gives a series of mini-essays about an ecl...

Social bodies

A proliferation of press headlines, social science texts and “ethical” concerns about the social implications of recent developments in human genetics and biomedicine have created a sense that, at least in European and American contexts, both the way we treat the human body and our attitudes to...

Post-ottoman coexistence

Examines the peaceful co-existence of religious and ethnic groups under the Ottoman Empire. Investigates the reasons behind the breakdown of tolerance and the legacy of division from ethno-nationalist conflict post-empire. A discussion of both historical and contemporary practices of...

The triumph of propaganda

The Nazis saw film as a major vehicle for both indoctrination and escapist pacification of the "masses"; in fact, Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels tried to create a German counter-Hollywood. This highly acclaimed study, by one of Germany's leading commentators and authors on cultural policy,...

The cult and science of public health

It explores the tensions that arise as a result of public health being both a science and a moral force in society It demonstrates the ways in which public health acts not only to constrain individual excess, but also to constrain the execesses of capitalism It uses the work of Durkh...

Work in a modern society

No other new studies on the history of work and labour in the German speaking world available Documents recent original research by German speaking scholars whose work is not easily accessible in English Relates historical findings to the present in which the restructuring of the wor...

Béla balázs: early film theory

Béla Balázs’s two works, Visible Man (1924) and The Spirit of Film (1930), are published here for the first time in full English translation. The essays offer the reader an insight into the work of a film theorist whose German-language publications have been hitherto unavailable to the film stu...

Orientpolitik, value, and civilization

This is the first collection of Franz Steiner's keynote papers on comparative economics and the classification of labor,complemented by major unpublished texts on politics, civilization, and cultural criticism. This enables a complete re-evaluation of Steiner's thought. His ideas on truth, valu...

Reconceiving the second sex

Extensive social science research, particularly by anthropologists, has explored women’s reproductive lives, their use of reproductive technologies, and their experiences as mothers and nurturers of children. Meanwhile, few if any volumes have explored men’s reproductive concerns or contributio...

After socialism

The collapse of Soviet influence and the disillusionment with socialism in the early 1990s led to ambitious programs of economic reform throughout Eastern Europe. The papers in this volume, written by anthropologists and sociologists with detailed first-hand knowledge of the rural areas concern...

Techniques, technology and civilization

Marcel Mauss's writings on techniques and technology are at the forefront of an important anthropological and sociological research tradition, and they also highlight the theoretical and ideological challenges surrounding this field of study. A selection of Mauss's texts — including his major s...

The imaginary revolution

The events of 1968 have been seen as a decisive turning point in the Western world. The author takes a critical look at "May 1968" and questions whether the events were in fact as "revolutionary" as French and foreign commentators have indicated. He concludes the student movement changed little...

Up close and personal

Combines rich personal accounts from twelve veteran anthropologists with reflexive analyses of the state of anthropology today Is a treatise on theory and method offering fresh insights into the production of anthropological knowledge, from the creation of key concepts to major paradigm ...

Differentiating development

Over the last two decades, anthropological studies have highlighted the problems of ‘development’ as a discursive regime, arguing that such initiatives are paradoxically used to consolidate inequality and perpetuate poverty. This volume constitutes a timely intervention in anthropological debat...

Shadowlands

Describes how Estonia has been profoundly shaped by the violent conflicts and shifting political fortunes of the last century. An innovative study tracing the tangled interaction of Estonian historical memory and national identity in a sweeping analysis extending from the Great War to th...

The anthropology of the fetus

Draws from recent and continuing field research on an important, relevant, and challenging topic. Brings together perspectives from across the four fields of anthropology. Written clearly and accessibly to engage non-specialists in archaeology, bioarchaeology, biological anthropology...

Transnational nomads

There is a tendency to consider all refugees as 'vulnerable victims': an attitude reinforced by the stream of images depicting refugees living in abject conditions. This groundbreaking study of Somalis in a Kenyan refugee camp reveals the inadequacy of such assumptions by describing the rich ...

Perspectives in motion

Through a diverse range of case studies from Oceania, Asia, and Europe, and interdisciplinary approaches, Perspectives in Motion explores visual approaches to performance in global cultural contexts, offering new critical and ethnographic frameworks for understanding and experiencing practices ...

Money counts

Taboo, truth and religion

Franz Steiner's study of Taboo is internationally recognized as a classic in its field. In a newly researched introductory chapter, based on a thorough study of Steiner's unpublished papers, this edition for the first time places the book in its context and offers a new reading of the text. Mor...

Borders in east and west

The different ways of understanding borders, through culture, politics, or even religion, is transforming and requires multi-disciplinary approaches the complexity of interactions and tensions that may arise. Borders in East and West focuses on the relationships between Europe and East Asia thr...

Urban pollution

Provides an ethnographic approach to urban pollution Explores the cultural meanings ascribed to concepts of “clean” and “dirty” Draws on a wide range of case studies in cities in both the North and the South

Anthropology and law

The relationship between Law and Anthropology can be considered as having been particularly intimate. In this book the authors defend their assertion that the two fields co-exist in a condition of "balanced reciprocity" wherein each makes important contributions to the successful practice and t...

Entertaining german culture

In an increasingly transnational production of film and television, Entertaining German Culture explores and contextually thematizes a radical shift in the past fifteen years towards a profound appreciation of German cultural and intellectual history in the international mainstream.

Jewish self-hate

This new edition makes Theodor Lessing’s seminal work Der Jüdische Selbsthaß accessible to English readers for the first time, supplemented with explanatory footnotes by translator Peter Appelbaum and illustrative essays by historian Sander L. Gilman and German scholar Paul Reitter.

Fault lines

Explores plans for urban development in Sicily prior to 2 earthquakes, in 1908 and 1968, and compares them with the urbanism which materialised from the ruins. Provides an insight into the role of environmental forces in the history of human habitats.

Lessons in perception

It draws together cognitive film theory and avant-garde film theory. It is written in an intentionally accessible way. Particular films are analysed which haven’t been explored elsewhere. It also features (I think) the most detailed analysis of Robert Breer’s aesthetic to date. T...

Music and postwar transitions in the 19th and 20th centuries

Music and Postwar Transitions takes a groundbreaking and much anticipated dive into the concept of postwar transitions and how these affect and are affected by the world of music. Leading scholars in the field explore new approaches to create a novel understanding of music and postwar periods.

The romani movement

The collapse of communism and the process of state building that ensued in the 1990s have highlighted the existence of significant minorities in many European states, particularly in Central Europe. In this context, the growing plight of Europe’s biggest minority, the Roma (Gypsies), has been p...

Rethinking holocaust justice

In the past two decades, the subject of post-Holocaust justice has experienced a surge of interest among historians and legal scholars. Rethinking Holocaust Justice offers a multifaceted approach to post-Holocaust justice, bringing together leading scholars from a variety of disciplines to expl...