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Connecting Social Problems and Popular Culture
By Karen Sternheimer. 2010
While popular culture receives a lot of attention as a central causal factor in contemporary social problems, Sternheimer (sociology, U.…
of Southern California) argues that in reality, although media does impact society, there are many more important factors contributing to America's serious social problems today. The author examines the history of media fears, who constructs media--and youth--phobia and why, and then analyzes a number of social problems--the dumbing down of America, family instability, violence, teen sex, teen pregnancy and single parenthood, the rising materialism of youth, eating disorders, substance abuse, misogyny, homophobia, and racism--and their causes. Annotation ©2009 Book News, Inc. , Portland, OR (booknews. com)Live at the Commodore
By Aaron Chapman. 2014
Vancouver's Commodore Ballroom is, like New York's CBGB's and Los Angeles's Whiskey a Go-Go, one of the most venerated rock…
clubs in the world; originally built in 1930, it's hosted a who's-who of music greats before they made it big: The Police, The Clash, Blondie, Talking Heads, Nirvana, New York Dolls, U2, and, more recently, Lady Gaga and the White Stripes. Filled with never-before-published photographs, posters, and paraphernalia, Live at the Commodore is a visceral, energetic portrait of one of the world's great rock venues.Aaron Chapman is a musician and journalist, and the author of Liquor, Lust, and the Law.Dr. Susan Taylor's Rx for Brown Skin
By Susan C. Taylor. 2003
Brown skin has a naturally warm, glowing complexion that ranges in shade from yellow to olive to dark brown and…
black (Asian, Latin, African-American, and Native American skin). The extra melanin that imparts these rich tones and helps protect skin from the sun can also make brown skin vulnerable to discoloration, uneven tone, scarring, and breakouts. This unique book will help you enhance and protect the health and beauty of your brown skin, as well as your hair and nails. Dr. Susan Taylor, a Harvard-trained dermatologist, bases her advice on more than twenty years of experience treating patients in private practice and at the Skin of Color Center in New York City, which she founded. Dr. Taylor explains how to: Attain and maintain flawless skin Avoid breakouts, discolorations, and ashen skin Prevent and camouflage scars Choose and use makeup for a perfect match year-round Style hair safely to avoid damage, hair loss, and skin irritation Detect and protect against skin cancer . . . and much more!Cultural Heritage and Peripheral Spaces in Singapore
By Tai Wei Lim. 2017
This book documents through first-hand experience and academic research the historical cultural and economic interactions affecting land use in…
Singapore Offering a unique study of nostalgia in Singaporean heritage it discusses the subjective nostalgic meanings and interpretations that users of peripheral heritage and green spaces in Singapore create and maintain through a combination of informal observations and interactions combined with research into local history and heritage It addresses the subjective meaning-making processes of individuals within the larger theoretical frameworks that structure understandings of changing land use and economical changes which impact on contemporary cityscapes centered around peripheral and de-privileged areas of Singapore s economic developmentRaquel
By Raquel Welch. 2010
She didn’t hatch out of an eagle’s nest, circaOne Million Years B. C. , clad in a skimpy fur bikini.…
She didn’t aspire to fame as a sex symbol. Yet, for many years after making her Hollywood entrance as every man’s fantasy, Raquel Welch was best known for her beauty and sex appeal. A private person, she allowed people to draw their own conclusions from her public image. Now, Raquel Welch is ready to speak her mind. And, with the luxury of hindsight and the benefit of experience, she has plenty to share about the art of being a woman—even men will find it enlightening to read about what makes her tick. InBeyond the Cleavage, Raquel Welch talks, woman to woman, about her views on all that comes with being a member of the female sex—love, sex, style, health, body image, career, family, forgiveness, aging, and coming of age. Looking back on her life, she lets women in on her childhood, dominated by a volatile father; her first love, marriage, and divorce; her early struggles as a single working mother in Hollywood; her battles for roles and respect as an actress; and her daring decision never to lie about her age. Looking forward, she offers women a compass to guide them at every crossroad of life, from menopause through the empty nest years, to dating younger men and beyond. Along with bringing baby boomers into her confidence—she offers essential tips for staying motivated and positive past fifty, as well as divulging her secrets for fabulous hair and makeup—she even talks to today’s younger generation of women about the importance of carrying themselves with dignity and self-respect. With warmth, humor, conviction, and honesty, Raquel reveals her approach to preventative aging, her life-changing commitment to yoga, her recipe for eating right, her skincare regimen, her flair for fashion, and much more. Deeply personal (Welch wrote every word herself—no ghostwriter),Beyond the Cleavageis Raquel Welch’s gift to every woman who longs to look and feel her best, and be at peace with herself.Heroes and Scoundrels: The Image of the Journalist in Popular Culture
By Matthew C. Ehrlich, Joe Saltzman. 1912
Whether it's the rule-defying lifer, the sharp-witted female newshound, or the irascible editor in chief, journalists in popular culture have…
shaped our views of the press and its role in a free society since mass culture arose over a century ago. Drawing on portrayals of journalists in television, film, radio, novels, comics, plays, and other media, Matthew C. Ehrlich and Joe Saltzman survey how popular media has depicted the profession across time. Their creative use of media artifacts provides thought-provoking forays into such fundamental issues as how pop culture mythologizes and demythologizes key events in journalism history and how it confronts issues of race, gender, and sexual orientation on the job. From Network to The Wire, from Lois Lane to Mikael Blomkvist, Heroes and Scoundrels reveals how portrayals of journalism's relationship to history, professionalism, power, image, and war influence our thinking and the very practice of democracy.Cinema Studies: The Key Concepts 4th Edition
By Susan Hayward. 2006
Cinema Studies: The Key Concepts is an essential guide for anyone interested in film. Providing accessible coverage of a comprehensive…
range of genres, movements, theories and production terms, this is a must-have guide to a fascinating area of study and arguably the greatest art form of modern times. Now fully revised and updated for its fourth edition, the book includes new topical entries such as: CGI Convergence Cult cinema Digital cinema/Post-digital cinema Dogme 95* Movement-image/Time-image Quota quickies 3-D technologyDon't Stop Believin'
By Robert K. Johnston, Craig Detweiler, Barry Taylor. 2012
Elvis Presley. Andy Warhol. Nike. Stephen King. Ellen DeGeneres. Sim City. Facebook. These American pop culture icons are just a…
few examples of entries you will find in this fascinating guide to religion and popular culture. Arranged chronologically from 1950 to the present, this accessible work explores the theological themes in 101 well-established figures and trends from film, television, video games, music, sports, art, fashion, and literature. This book is ideal for anyone who has an interest in popular culture and its impact on our spiritual lives. Contributors include such experts in the field as David Dark, Mark I. Pinsky, Lisa Swain, Steve Turner, Lauren Winner, and more.Media expansion into the digital realm and the continuing segregation of users into niches has led to a proliferation of…
cultural products targeted to and consumed by women. Though often dismissed as frivolous or excessively emotional, feminized culture in reality offers compelling insights into the American experience of the early twenty-first century. Elana Levine brings together writings from feminist critics that chart the current terrain of feminized pop cultural production. Analyzing everything from Fifty Shades of Grey to Pinterest to pregnancy apps, contributors examine the economic, technological, representational, and experiential dimensions of products and phenomena that speak to, and about, the feminine. As these essays show, the imperative of productivity currently permeating feminized pop culture has created a generation of texts that speak as much to women's roles as public and private workers as to an impulse for fantasy or escape. Incisive and compelling, Cupcakes, Pinterest, and Ladyporn sheds new light on contemporary women's engagement with an array of media forms in the context of postfeminist culture and neoliberalism.Structure, Audience and Soft Power in East Asian Pop Culture
By Chua Beng Huat. 2012
East Asian pop culture can be seen as an integrated cultural economy emerging from the rise of Japanese and Korean…
pop culture as an influential force in the distribution and reception networks of Chinese language pop culture embedded in the ethnic Chinese diaspora. Taking Singapore as a locus of pan-Asian Chineseness, Chua Beng Huat provides detailed analysis of the fragmented reception process of transcultural audiences and the processes of audiences' formation and exercise of consumer power and engagement with national politics. In an era where exercise of military power is increasingly restrained, pop culture has become an important component of soft power diplomacy and transcultural collaborations in a region that is still haunted by colonization and violence. The author notes that the aspirations behind national governments' efforts to use popular culture is limited by the fragmented nature of audiences who respond differently to the same products; by the danger of backlash from other members of the importing country's population that do not consume the popular culture products in question; and by the efforts of the primary consuming country, the People's Republic of China to shape products through co-production strategies and other indirect modes of intervention.East Asian Pop Culture
By Chua Beng Huat. 2008
The International group of contributors of this volume provides, collectively, a multi-layered analysis of the emerging East Asian media culture,…
using the Korean TV drama as its analytic vehicle. By closely examining the political economy of TV industry, audiences of the regional media flows in terms of gender subjectivity constructions, perceptions of colonial-postcolonial relationships, and nationalist responses to trans-national media culture exchanges, this volume highlights the multiple connectivities and implications of popular cultural flows and exchanges in East Asia.The Wisdom of Psychopaths
By Kevin Dutton. 2012
Psychopath. The word conjurs up images of serial killers, rapists, suicide bombers, gangsters. But think again: you could probably benefit…
from being a little more psychopathic yourself.Psychologist Kevin Dutton has made a speciality of psychopathy, and is on first-name terms with many notorious killers. But unlike those incarcerated psychopaths, and all those depicted in movies and crime fiction, most are not violent, he explains. In fact, says Prof Dutton, they have a lot of good things going for them. Psychopaths are fearless, confident, charismatic and focused--qualities tailor-made for success in today's society.The Wisdom of Psychopaths is an intellectual rollercoaster ride that combines lightning-hot science with unprecedented access to secret monasteries, Special Forces training camps, and high-security hospitals. In it, you will meet serial killers, war heroes, financiers, movie stars and attorneys--and discover that beneath the hype and popular characterization, psychopaths have something to teach us. Like the knobs on a mixing deck, psychopathy is graded. And finding the right combination of psychopathic traits, sampled and mixed at carefully calibrated volumes, can put us ahead of the game.John Fawcett's Ginger Snaps
By Ernest Mathijs. 2013
Few studies of Canadian cinema to date have engaged deeply with genre cinema and its connection to Canadian culture. Ernest…
Mathijs does just that in this volume, which traces the inception, production, and reception of Canada's internationally renowned horror film, Ginger Snaps (2000). This tongue-in-cheek Gothic film, which centres on two death-obsessed teenage sisters, draws a provocative connection between werewolf monstrosity and female adolescence and boasts a dedicated world-wide fan base.The first book-length study of this popular film, John Fawcett's Ginger Snaps is based on the author's privileged access to most of its cast and crew and to its enthusiasts around the world. Examining themes of genre, feminism, identity, and adolescent belonging, Mathijs concludes that Ginger Snaps deserves to be recognized as part of the Canadian canon, and that it is a model example of the kind of crossover cult film that remains unjustly undervalued by film scholars.Remote: Reflections on Life in the Shadow of Celebrity
By Phillip Lopate, David Shields. 1996
In this truly one-of-a-kind book, the author/narrator--a representative, in extremis, of contemporary American obsession with beauty, celebrity, transmitted image--finds himself…
suspended, fascinated, in the remoteness of our wall-to-wall mediascape. It is a remoteness that both perplexes and enthralls him. Through dazzling sleight of hand in which the public becomes private and the private becomes public, the entire book-clicking from confession to family-album photograph to family chronicle to sexual fantasy to pseudo-scholarly footnote to reportage to personal essay to stand-up comedy to cultural criticism to literary criticism to film criticism to prose-poem to litany to outtake-becomes both an anatomy of American culture and a searing self-portrait. David Shields reads his own life--reads our life--as if it were an allegory about remoteness and finds persuasive, hilarious, heartbreaking evidence wherever he goes.Culture Crash
By Scott Timberg. 2015
Change is no stranger to us in the twenty-first century. We must constantly adjust to an evolving world, to transformation…
and innovation. But for many thousands of creative artists, a torrent of recent changes has made it all but impossible to earn a living. A persistent economic recession, social shifts, and technological change have combined to put our artists--from graphic designers to indie-rock musicians, from architects to booksellers--out of work. This important book looks deeply and broadly into the roots of the crisis of the creative class in America and tells us why it matters. Scott Timberg considers the human cost as well as the unintended consequences of shuttered record stores, decimated newspapers, music piracy, and a general attitude of indifference. He identifies social tensions and contradictions--most concerning the artist's place in society--that have plunged the creative class into a fight for survival. Timberg shows how America's now-collapsing middlebrow culture--a culture once derided by intellectuals like Dwight Macdonald--appears, from today's vantage point, to have been at least a Silver Age. Timberg's reporting is essential reading for anyone who works in the world of culture, knows someone who does, or cares about the work creative artists produce.Ball Cap Nation
By James Lilliefors. 2009
As the country grows increasingly diverse and complicated, Americans seek, and occasionally find, a common thread to unite them. And,…
as Jim Lilliefors reveals in his new book, that common thread is what the baseball cap is made of - indeed, what has transformed it into America's National Hat. As fads go, it's no longer even a fad, but a part of the national identity that, for better or worse, is a symbol of America. It feeds an illusion that Americans cherish - that despite their differences, and no matter what position they play - when wearing a baseball cap, they're all part of the same team. Exploring every aspect of caps and their culture - including the history, manufacturing, and evolution of baseball caps; collecting and caring for caps; cap etiquette; and even cap urban legends - and packed with photos throughout, Ball Cap Nation is a delightful look at a uniquely American phenomenon.Culture in the Communication Age
By James Lull. 2000
What does it mean to live in the Communication Age? What has happened to culture in the Communication Age? What…
is the nature of culture today?Culture in the Communication Age brings together some of the world's leading thinkers from a range of academic disciplines to discuss what 'culture' means in the modern era. They describe key features of cultural life in the 'communication age', and consider the cultural implications of the rise of global communication, mass media, information technology, and popular culture. Individual chapters consider:* Cultures of the mind * Rethinking culture in a global context * Re-thinking Culture, from 'ways of life' to 'lifestyle' * Gender and Culture * Popular Culture and Media Spectacles * Visual Culture * Star Culture * Computers, the Internet and Virtual Cultures * Superculture in the Communication AgeAn Introduction to Theories of Popular Culture
By Dominic Strinati. 2004
An Introduction to Theories of Popular Culture is widely recognized as an immensely useful textbook for students taking courses in…
the major theories of popular culture. Strinati provides a critical assessment of the ways in which these theories have tried to understand and evaluate popular culture in modern societies. Among the theories and ideas the book introduces are: mann culture, the Frankfurt School and the culture industry, semiology and structuralism, Marxism, feminism, postmodernism and cultural populism. This new edition provides fresh material on Marxism and feminism, while a new final chapter assesses the significance of the theories explained in the book.Sexuality
By Jeffrey Weeks. 2003
We are almost programmed into thinking of our sexuality as a wholly natural feature of life. But sexual relations are…
but one form of social relations, as Jeffrey Weeks makes clear in his book. Drawing on the analyses of Michel Foucault, amongst others, the book examines the social, moral and political issues raised by contemporary forms of sexuality. Weeks provides an authoritative introduction to the sociology of sexuality, discussing its cultural and socio-historical construction, it's relationship with power and the State's involvement in its rationalisation and regulation. This second edition is also updates to include global and postcolonial perspectives on sexuality, queer theory, the internet and cybersex, AIDS as a global phenomenon and international debates on the politics of sexuality. This book is an indispensable introduction to this complex and expanding field.Brooklyn Bounce
By Jake Appleman. 2014
When the Brooklyn Nets played their first game at Barclays Center in downtown Brooklyn in the fall of 2012, they…
succeeded in bringing a major professional sports franchise back to Brooklyn for the first time since the Dodgers abandoned the borough in 1957. Now, Brooklyn Bounce chronicles the Nets' historic inaugural season in the borough, full of highs and lows--plenty of them entirely unexpected. Jake Appleman takes us inside the locker room and courtside, examining the team's transition from the New Jersey swamp to gentrified Brooklyn, from an opening night delayed by Hurricane Sandy to an epic seven-game playoff showdown with the Chicago Bulls. The Nets were the game's foremost paradox in 2013, a team that managed to be the most improved in the NBA, but also consistently disappointed. What made them interesting wasn't their style of play or even their unique collection of personalities; it was their constant state of reinvention and their evolving relationship with their new home: as the Barclays crowds would chant it, BROOOOOOK-LYN!