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An in-depth analysis of the climate impacts facing Boston and the city's efforts to mitigate and adapt to a changing climate.

This book explores fourteen international case studies of ''crimes of the powerful'', both contemporary and historical. As such, it explores a hidden and often unknown area of criminal and immoral activity beyond the more commonly studied field of conventional or ''street'' crimes. It offers a unique insight into different examples of criminality and immorality enacted by the powerful, including corporations, states and criminal networks. The case studies include little-known and more widely known events, offering a critical sociological or forensic analysis of each case. By doing so, the book explores what kinds of criminality or immorality the case exemplifies and identifies key contextual and legislative factors facilitating their occurrence and limiting the perpetrators'' accountability. The critical analytical approach situates the case studies within the wider context and considers the role of social, political and other factors, such as neoliberalism, colonialist histories, inequalities of race and gender and globalisation in their facilitation of particular kinds of immoral or criminal acts. Fundamentally, it explores the legacies of social harm produced by the case study events and how these have played out over time. Drawing upon themes like disasters, medico-crimes, genocide, corporate crime, organised crime, colonial crimes and internment, the book explores key concepts like critical criminology, sociology and legislation combined with critical social policy. It will also include corporate crime, white collar crime, professional crime and social harm. These concepts will be outlined and then applied in the case studies as a way of understanding and analytically engaging with the individual cases. Being highly topical, the book reflects a growing popular and academic interest in the social harms produced by the actions of the powerful relating to the legacies and consequences of colonialism, and the impacts of global inequalities, particularly in terms of race and gender. Offering a critical sociological perspective on these issues, the book presents a novel insight into criminality which has interdisciplinary relevance in diverse disciplines including criminology, sociology, social policy and law, geography, environmental studies, international politics and development, peace studies and critical gender studies.

Wittgenstein and Modernist Fiction: The Language of Acknowledgment shows how early twentieth-century economic and social upheaval prompted new ways of conceptualizing the purposes and powers of language. Scholars have long held that formally experimental novels written in the early twentieth century reflect how the period's material crises-from world wars to the spread of industrial capitalism-call into question the capacity of language to picture the world accurately. This book argues that this standard scholarly narrative tells only a partial story. Even as signal modernist works by Virginia Woolf, Nella Larsen, William Faulkner, and others move away from a view of language as a means of gaining knowledge, they also underscore its capacity to grant acknowledgment. They show how language might matter less as a medium for representing reality than as a tool for recognizing others. The book develops this claim by engaging with the philosophy of Ludwig Wittgenstein. Writing in 1945, in the preface to Philosophical Investigations, Wittgenstein laments, "e;It is not impossible that it should fall to the lot of this work, in its poverty and in the darkness of this time, to bring light into one brain or another-but, of course, it is not likely."e; Worrying that "e;the darkness"e; of this historical moment renders his words unintelligible, Wittgenstein echoes the linguistic skepticism that scholars have found in literary modernism. But the Investigations ultimately pushes back against such skeptical doubts by offering a vision of language as a set of shared human practices. Even when it comes to a word like "e;pain,"e; which seemingly gestures toward something absolutely private and individual, Wittgenstein indicates that we learn what "e;pain"e; means by familiarizing ourselves with the contexts in which people use the term. In his pioneering reading of the Investigations as a "e;modernist"e; work, Stanley Cavell argues that Wittgenstein's distinctive response to the problem of skepticism consists in the view that "e;other minds [are] not to be known, but acknowledged."e;The book argues that this concept of acknowledgment, as articulated implicitly by Wittgenstein and explicitly by Cavell, enables a broader reconceptualization of modernist fiction's stance toward the referential capacities of language, and it bears out this claim by reading a series of modernist novels through the lens of Wittgenstein's philosophy. From the residence halls of Cambridge to the farmsteads of rural Mississippians, the early decades of the twentieth century sowed serious doubts about the ability of individuals to find shared criteria for the meanings of words: the greater convenience of travel led to increased cross-cultural misunderstandings; technological developments facilitated new modes of race-, class-, and gender-based oppression, and two world wars irrevocably shattered an earlier generation's optimism about the inevitability of political and moral progress. In this light, Wittgenstein and Modernist Fiction contends that modernist representations of consciousness strive to capture the inner lives of socially marginalized figures, seeking to facilitate new forms of intimacy and community amongst those who have survived crushing losses and been subject to deeply isolating social forces.

This collection provides a panoramic view of practical philosophical insight, ranging across a spectrum of humanistic themes. These essays cast light on our perennially imperfect human condition. They are written from the complementary standpoints of a classical liberal scholar with one foot planted in the academy, and of a peripatetic pioneer whom The New York Times called "e;the world's most successful marketer of philosophical counseling."e; These writings, therefore, span space in which theory and praxis are mutually informative and seamlessly collaborative.The collection ranges from Alfred Korzybski's general semantics; Thomas Mann's prognosis for Western civilization; Hume's moral skepticism applied to globalization; Jungian synchronicity and encounters with Irvin Yalom; J.S. Mill's harm principle applied to cyberspace; Ayn Rand's prophetic apocalypse; philosophical practice as Dadaist activism; humanities-based therapies as remedies for culturally induced illnesses; biological roots of human conflict; deconstruction and critique of "e;sustainable development"e;; dangers and detriments of over-digitalized and hyper-virtualized lifestyles and learning methods; and calls for the re-emergence of philosophy from inactive academic entombment to pro-active modes of personal guidance, social influence, consumer advocacy, and political engagement. A unifying claim of this anthology is the cautionary tale that humanity's recurrent and conflict-ridden predicaments are only exacerbated by myopic analyses, toxic ideologies, and expedient prescriptions. While philosophy is scarcely a panacea for human afflictions, its proper exercise illuminates our understanding of them, thereby suggesting better as opposed to worse ways forward.Overall, the thrust of this collection can be viewed as a realization of John Dewey's forthright vision, expressed in 1917: "e;Philosophy recovers itself when it ceases to be a device for dealing with the problems of philosophers and becomes a method, cultivated by philosophers, for dealing with the problems of men."e; Indeed, these essays deal with problems of humanity writ large. They also constitute a compelling response to Mortimer Adler's clarion call in 1965, that philosophy "e;must cease to be an activity conducted by moles, each burrowing in its own hole, and become a public and cooperative enterprise."e; As these essays reveal, Marinoff has accomplished Adler's mission, transforming and returning philosophy to the agora, which in contemporary parlance amounts to the global village. That his popular books on philosophy for everyday life have sold millions of copies in dozens of languages has distracted some-perhaps too many-philosophers from exploring what he has written for a philosophical audience itself. This book helps remedy that distraction.

Media Sociology and Journalism is a dialogue on the kind of society we find ourselves in as defined through news media and politics, and as seen in contemporary sociological theory. As we work through opposing visions of the global pandemic and an economic depression as well as solutions to racial reckoning, we need to remember we are navigating inside a political and media storm that has raged around the world since the unexpected results of the 2016 U.S election and Brexit Referendum. Deregulation, climate change, forced migrations, and inequality are only some of the topics on which opposing alt right, progressives, and moderates are divided. Journalism, politics and contemporary sociological theory are examined through their interplay and respective strengths and weaknesses in assessing the tenacity of the many deeply opposing claims where each side takes the other's "truth" to be an existential threat. The relation between truth and democracy as a regime of power and type of society has always been fragile, often tenuous, and even irrelevant at times. We are nonetheless in a moment where journalists, politicians and social scientists are continually perplexed as to what to do with the denial of basic facts they are expected to trust in order to help create democracy. Post-truth attitudes, the rise of authoritarianism, fake news, conspiracy theories, neoliberalism, nihilism, white nationalism are all threats to democracy but so are repetitive mainstream journalistic narrative strategies that exclude subaltern subjects they report on as the first audience they imagine in writing reports and opinions. Case studies of immigration, urban poverty, and regulating cultural and religious difference are selected to show patterns of hospitality, conditional tolerance or recognition that journalists frame for audiences in ways that help define the public dialogue on welcoming, acceptance, or rejection of others. A dialogical critique of the gaps between how social actors are represented in journalism, politics and sociology versus how they might see themselves is the first step toward an alternative way of creating democratic society.

The book presents the first integrated study of the relationship between official Islamic leadership (muftiship), non-official Islamic authorities, grassroots Muslim communities and the state in post-Communist Eurasia, encompassing Lithuania, Belarus, Ukraine, the Volga-Urals, Crimea, the North Caucasus, Azerbaijan and ex-Soviet Central Asia. Its analysis is positioned within the current secularism/de-secularisation debate. The book is based on a wide range of primary and secondary sources, including the author's interviews with Islamic official and popular leaders and authorities, which she conducted over two decades in various parts of Eurasia. The book employs a history-based perspective and compares the nature and role of official Islamic leadership and the state-Muslim relations across Eurasia with those in both the Middle East and Western Europe. It argues that in most of the post-Soviet lands, the official Islamic leadership and its relations with the state have largely retained their particular national and broader Eurasian character, which distinguishes them from what prevails in the Middle East and Western Europe. At the same time, the increasing political 'Europeanisation' of Lithuania and Ukraine since 2014 and, to some extent, Belarus, has accounted for their divergence towards the Western model of state-Muslim relations. In conclusion, it analyses the impact of globalisation and the advance of global Salafism, in particular, on Islamic leadership and state-Muslim relations across post-Soviet Eurasia.

Violence exploding in public spaces, corruption by political figures and economic elites, the will of the people thwarted in both elections and votes in the senate, military misadventures abroad, and rampant economic inequality at home diminishing a shared sense of the common good - in sum, a republic in disarray. These descriptions are not only familiar from ancient Roman political and social life but are also recognizable to any United States citizen who follows the news and American civic life. On the Republic proceeds chronologically through the fall of the Roman Republic beginning in 133 BCE and continuing down to around 14 CE, providing a continuous narrative of the fall of the Roman Republic juxtaposed with the contemporary political landscape of the United States.On the Republic focuses on four constellations of lessons that represent the most significant things which the fall of the Roman Republic has to teach us at this time: the dangers of political violence, the inability of individuals and institutions to save us, the finality of the loss of freedom, and lastly the importance of civic virtue. In 20 short chapters, On the Republic explores how the United States now faces many of the same challenges that toppled the Roman Republic - political divisions, economic inequality, and creeping authoritarianism. How we respond to these challenges today will determine the future of American democracy.On the Republic is not a book about the fall of ancient Rome to so-called barbarians overrunning the border. It addresses the fall of a democratic society (the Roman Republic) into an autocracy (the Roman empire). This is not a book about sexual debauchery and gluttony, but a serious reading of political events that had serious consequences. On the Republic offers modern readers lessons that, while sobering, can also empower them to participate in political life in new ways. History is a means not to predict the future, but rather to stir the civic imagination of its readers.

Emerging Thoughts in Disability and Humanness examines the role of embodied disablement in providing an important but often circumvented analysis of the explicit and implicit nature of the legitimate human body, its symbolism, and responses that such bodies elicit from diverse local through global social and cultural entities. The various sections of the book introduce the theoretical and historical foundations for analyzing humanness, and the role of the atypical body in determining membership, meaning and worth; examine embodied criteria of "e;humanness"e; and offending corporeal characteristics; describe and analyze how offenders are identified and depicted in diverse contexts; delve into how these bodies are met with praxis and axiological responses from revision through exclusion; and invoke contemporary post-postmodernist marriages of varied disciplines as frameworks for returning creative substance into rethinking disability within the textured fabric of humanness.

During the Romantic period, Hannah Cowley (1743-1809) achieved fame both as a playwright and a poet, composing popular comedies and, as Anna Matilda, amorous Della Cruscan verse. But despite a recent surge of scholarly interest in her works, her controversial comedy The World as It Goes has never been published.This edition of The World as It Goes is based on the Larpent licensing holograph manuscript held by the Huntington Library (LA 548). The transcription of the play is supplemented with an introduction providing cultural, theatrical, historical and biographical contexts; contemporaneous reviews; and a note on the text.The World as It Goes satirizes English tourists visiting a southern French resort and the scoundrels who prey on them. The play's cast included some of the era's most popular comic actors: John Edwin, John Quick, Charles Lee Lewes, William Thomas Lewis (aka "e;Gentleman Lewis"e;), Ralph Wewitzer (who specialized in stereotypical foreigners), Isabella Mattocks (who specialized in "e;vulgar"e; characters) and the famously rotund Lydia Webb. Elizabeth Younge, acclaimed for her portrayals of sentimental wives and daughters, played Lady Danvers, and the future novelist and playwright Elizabeth Inchbald appeared in the role of Sidney Grubb.Before the premiere of The World as It Goes at Covent Garden, Cowley's comedies The Runaway (1776) and The Belle's Stratagem (1780) and her farce Who's the Dupe (1779) had been theatrical hits. But reviewers who admired her previous plays found The World as It Goes vulgar and morally offensive, and its sole performance on February 24, 1781, was disrupted by audience members who loudly objected to a ribald scene in a bedroom antechamber and repeatedly interrupted Younge as she attempted to deliver the epilogue, which contained a risqu reference to the transgender Chevalire D'Eon. Cowley heavily revised the play, but its second incarnation as Second Thoughts Are Best (performed March 24, 1781) was also a failure. The World as It Goes is Cowley's most bawdy, multigeneric and socially subversive comedy and features a valet masquerading as his master and aspiring to take a seat at Westminster; French and German swindlers; a seductive countess; a lecherous, nouveau-riche London "e;Citizen"e;; an antiquarian bluestocking modeled after Lady Anna Miller; a fatuous aristocrat who neglects the wife he adores to be seen as fashionable; and a French monk who attempts to rape an Englishwoman. Among the contemporaneous issues and cultural products addressed in the play, its prologue and epilogue are English tourism on the continent; the pantomime Harlequin Free-Mason (1780); the January 1781 French raid on Jersey Island; the Chevalire d'Eon's androgyny; the Gordon riots and Lord George Gordon's acquittal in the ensuing treason trial; the recent performances by the French ballet dancer Gatano Appoline Balthazar Vestris at the King's Theatre; anxieties about ambitious and oversexed male servants; bluestocking antiquarianism; the pretensions of the London merchant class; the pro-American revolution Bill of Rights Society and the London Association; James Graham's Celestial Bed; and prison ships ("e;Hulks"e;).The comedy's catastrophic failure influenced the manner in which Cowley handled controversial issues in her subsequent dramas and provides insights into late eighteenth-century anxieties and mores. Mortified by the damnation of The World as It Goes, she omitted it from her posthumous Works (1813), but she reworked some of its themes, situations and characters in her final play, The Town before You, which was staged in 1794. Although The Town before You, like The World as It Goes, portrays nefarious impostors, a philistine businessman, a spurious connoisseur and a wealthy female eccentric obsessed with classical art, it enjoyed a respectable run of nine nights.

Written in reverse, the chapters go backwards. The book starts from present (approximately Chapter 50, 2020, back 30 years, to Chapter 20, 1990). The story coincides with an imbedded "e;road itinerary."e; Years are rarely mentioned in the text; and, in most cases, only initials are used for all characters. People, places and things are all real in relation to the timeline. The work involves the interpolation of common conversations-from sources such as texting and emails-to shed light on the fallibility of human relations. To a large degree, and within reason, the length of conversations are meant to be overbearing, countered by other aspects of the writing. Ron Westray's father and grandfather's stories are imbedded in the work. His mother's free-verse-poetry is the muse/soul that binds the work together like a second, invisible narrator.

The book explores the era of space collaboration (from 1970 to the present). This period has been largely ignored by historians in favor of a focus on the earlier space race. The Apollo-Soyuz Test Project, a key program and catalyst for Detente, marked the transition to the new age of space collaboration, which continued through the Soviet Interkosmos missions, the Mir-Shuttle dockings of the early 1990s, and on through the International Space Station. Europeans, Americans, and Russians envisioned space collaboration as a way to reconfigure political and international relations. The shift toward collaboration was a resultofa new focus on safety, which displaced the earlier emphasis on risk-taking in the first phaseofthe space race, when military imperatives often overshadowed peaceful goals. Apollo-Soyuz (ignored by Cold War historians) was thus imagined as a test project for a docking mechanism that would allow a manned-capsule stranded in orbit to dock with another capsule and provide an escape hatch back to earth (it was actually inspired, in part, by the 1969 Hollywood film "e;Marooned"e; with Gene Hackman). The focus on engineering for safety grew outofthe broader concerns about environmental degradation and nuclear war that in turn reflected a growing sense in the 1970s and 1980softhe dangers associated with excessive risk-taking in politics and engineering. Few historians or social scientists have examined the social constructionofsafety and its use in engineering and politics.The book draws on the Russian AcademyofSciences Archives, Nixon and Reagan libraries and National Archives Collections, NASA headquarters library documents, and various memoirs and other published sources in English and Russian.

Brazil, the world's largest sugar producer, supplies 16 per cent of its energy consumption and approximately three quarters of its transport fuels with sugarcane-based ethanol. From ca. 2003 until 2014, the country under the Workers' Party government aimed at creating a global market for ethanol. The time seemed right to steer foreign policy towards this goal due to a benevolent structural environment with global discussions about energy security, climate change, and South-South cooperation. Within a neoclassical realist framework, this study examines why Brazil did not fully succeed in its ethanol diplomacy to create a global market for ethanol. The analysis covers three analytical levels: the bilateral with Brazil in power deficit, the bilateral with Brazil in power surplus, and the multilateral, represented in three empirical chapters, Brazil-US, Brazil-Mozambique, and Brazil's multilateral ethanol diplomacy, respectively. Each chapter finishes with a set of recommendations for political consideration. This study also demonstrates how the theoretical approach of neoclassical realism can combine foreign policy output with international politics outcome research and is useful to analyse policy outside the hard security realm. It offers a basis for further research towards an understanding of Brazil's overall foreign policy and the foreign policies of other emerging powers.

An exploration of the Animal Crossing virtual world, bringing together insights about law, commerce, psychology, sociology and creativity for scholars and non-specialist readers.

Raymond Aron is an exceptional figure among twentieth-century sociological and political thinkers. The book focuses on the sociological work of this author of the century, who analyzed his age both in its grand-scale political and socio-economic traits and in the complex social and political ramifications of its day-to-day life.

As the mission, relevance and intellectual orientation of development studies is increasingly being challenged, this collection of essays argues for the continued necessity to ground the field in a critical political economy approach informed by the contributions of Ashwani Saith.

The book is a story about three characters who go on a road trip and experience technology, organizations, and work life in 2030. Through their journey, the reader will encounter a new job entrant, one in the middle of his career, and another who is contemplating on what to do to finish strong. They all will think through key questions and resolve issues individually, from other people or situations encountered along the way. There are exciting learning opportunities relating to how the characters approach, think, and decide on what to do to get ahead in the Corporate America of the future. The book centers around the authors' individual passions around AI, future trends, and the changing nature of work. The simple story offers unique insights on what scenarios exist, how to manage the challenges, and capitalize on opportunities to achieve career success. The book hopes the story will get readers to think about what needs to be done to prepare for future careers. The featured lessons will help readers make the appropriate right steps towards a developmental journey and pathway towards a happy, healthy, and productive life ahead.

Artificial intelligence and robotics have defined and redefined work environments worldwide. Utilizing stories, news events, and academic research, the book highlights the new realities of business and leadership in the world of AI and provides meaningful insights to help executives and corporations manage and succeed.The business and academic communities would find the book insights useful in understanding the basic notion of artificial intelligence and its impact on an organization's success. The book discusses strategies that executives can use to best manage business in an AI environment. Written with an equally educational and fun approach, the book covers practical business strategies that will help managers succeed in an AI world.

The book explores the Gothic tradition in Swedish literature - including Swedish-language literature by Finland-Swedish writers. It aims to give an overview of the development of Swedish Gothic from the Romantic age until today, and to highlight the characteristic features of the Swedish tradition of Gothic in relation to transnational developments, in particular in relation to the Anglo-American tradition. By using a contextualising comparative perspective, it highlights the most prevalent and prominent feature of Swedish Gothic, the significance of the Nordic landscape, the wilderness and local folklore. In Swedish fiction, the Gothic castle is replaced by the wilderness, and the monster is representative of untamed nature and a barbaric past. The terror is not pointing to the medieval period but is located in pre-Christian, pagan times. Especially in today's Gothic narratives, the presence of mythical creatures and nature beings, such as trolls, tomtes, or vittras, enhances the Gothic atmosphere. Another domestic trend since the mid-nineteenth century, which has become increasingly popular in the last decade, is Gothic crime stories, where the formula of a modern detective story is combined with a Gothic mystery plot. In these stories, supernatural creatures and the interference of paranormal powers constantly obstruct the modern crime investigation. Another predominant feature of Swedish Gothic that will be expanded on is its use of gendered and female monsters. In these kinds of narratives, Swedish writers and filmmakers manipulated the established Gothic conventions of female Gothic in order to make societal anxieties and gender issues visible.Drawing on a theoretical framework of gender theory and intersectionality, mainly theories on gender, race and eco-criticism, in combination with a transnational perspective used in today's comparative literature, the book explores the characteristics of Swedish Gothic. It analyses and contextualises a selection of individual narratives to explore in what way representative Swedish writers modify, transform and domesticize the established Gothic conventions. One chapter is devoted to the significance of the Nordic wilderness and the use of local folklore. Next chapter explores the dominance of gendered female monsters and in what way female and male writers adapt the Gothic elements and aesthetics to a Swedish context. The last chapter on Gothic crime expands on the use of Gothic modes and aesthetics to explore the working of the human mind in relation to crime, repressed collective memories, and cultural taboos.

Gulf Gothic moves through deep time across languages and borders, presenting haunted, secret-laden narratives that emerge from the gulfs between people all along the Gulf of Mexico and on both sides of the Rio Grande. Collaborating in an interdisciplinary manner, literary and cultural critics Dolores Flores-Silva and Keith Cartwright chart the Gulf as a unified region and ground zero of North American (and global) transculturation.The Gulf of Mexico has been inadequately appreciated as the dynamic transnational region that it is (taking in the Gulf states of Mexico and the U.S., as well as western Cuba), a cultural matrix that nourished the spread of maize agriculture and the rise of a two-thousand-year-old literary historical tradition that has responded to traumas of colonial conquest and plantation slavery. In this study, the Gulf signifies metaphorically and symbolically-as undead space of contacts and supposed impasses between peoples-as well as topographically. Its gothic modalities carry an urgent charge that demands to be addressed in holistic formGulf Gothicaddresses modes of representing all that is blocked from free movement and aspiration. Here, the figure of La Llorona haunts boundary waters and shorelines, voicing much that has been occulted by colonial power and national narrative. La Llorona's Indigenous prototypes, plantation/hacienda atmospherics, and heated storm patterns show up repeatedly in variations of an originary undeadness unconstrained byattempted quarantines and border walls.The authors turn to cinematic horror and the double gaze of ancient Maya texts, to folk-fable and legal documents and popular song, as well as to works by Gloria Anzalda, Sandra Cisneros, Leslie Marmon Silko, Joy Harjo, LeAnne Howe, Kate Chopin, James Weldon Johnson, William Faulkner, Carlos Fuentes, Vicente Riva Palacio, Jesmyn Ward, and Fernanda Melchor, to attend to forces unbound by traditional gothic modalities and their foundational gulfs.

This book engages with decolonial social and cultural analyses of global entangled inequalities by focusing on their local articulations globally and, in particular, in Germany, Trinidad and Tobago and the United Kingdom.

Writing the notes for the exhibition catalogue, Becoming Tennessee Williams, a centenary exhibit at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center at the University of Texas (1 February-31 July 2011), Professor and Exhibition Curator Charlotte Cannin noted of Williams's work that he "e;reinvented the American theater,"e; and that "e;There is no more influential 20th-century American playwright than Tennessee Williams."e; "e;He inspired future generations of writers,"e; she continues, "e;as diverse as Suzan-Lori Parks, Tony Kushner, David Mamet and John Waters, and his plays remain among the most produced in the world."e; Of A Streetcar Named Desire in particular, critic Philip C. Kolin has said that it is, "e;One of the most influential plays in the twentieth century."e; Kolin's comment is not restricted to the United States or even to the English-speaking world. A Streetcar Named Desire made an immediate and profound impact on a Europe devastated by World War II, as much of it emerged from beneath the heavy boots of fascism. For Europe, A Streetcar Named Desire was of a piece with liberation, with political liberation, with literary liberation into new forms of expression, and with sexual emancipation. A Streetcar Named Desire suggested for many a new and more open way to live, and offered for writers a set of new possibilities for their art. And while the more sensational Williams may have helped attract large theater and finally film audiences, his endurance as arguably the greatest and most enduring of American dramatists will rest on his language, on his poetic theater, for, after all, as Williams himself has said of his work "e;Treatment is everything in a play of this type."e;Tennessee Williams, T-shirt Modernism and the Refashionings of Theater refocuses the work of Tennessee Williams against the larger fabric of cultural change in the post-World War II era in which he came to prominence, an era in which the rate of cultural change accelerated unprecedentedly as the late 40s became the 50s, the 50s the 60s, the 60s the 70s, etc. into periods of fragmentation and dislocation, a cultural unmooring we now generally (if too loosely) call postmodern, or, more accurately, perhaps, late modern. The study engages the Williams we thought we knew, as he grew, developed, reconfigured himself into a playwright we didn't, in his attempts to refashion himself amid the vortices of changing sexual mores, including the performance of masculinities and the queering of theater, the struggle for a literate, literary theater, and the place of the theatrical experience in his contemporary culture.

With its catalogue of hit songs, iconic characters, memorable quotes and familiar scenes, ''Grease'' is truly a behemoth of US and global popular culture. From the stage show''s debut in 1971, to the Hollywood film of 1978, to the numerous rereleases and anniversary celebrations of the twenty-first century, it has enjoyed, and continues to enjoy, success across a range of media. ''Grease''''s extended run on Broadway through the 1970s ensured it a prominent place within broader debates on the musical, 1950s nostalgia and American youth. Numerous stage revivals have followed, with theatres across the world revisiting Rydell High in front of sell-out audiences. Hollywood has time and again sought to recreate ''Grease'' the movie''s phenomenal box-office success with a procession of similarly themed rock and roll youth musicals (''Footloose'', ''Dirty Dancing'', the ''High School Musical'' franchise, to name a few). However, even as these productions enjoy their own renown, in terms of sheer longevity, prominence and popularity, ''Grease'' was, is and will remain ''the word'' when it comes to musical blockbusters. Bringing together a group of international scholars from diverse academic backgrounds, ''Grease Is the Word'' provides a series of fresh and detailed analyses of the cultural phenomenon ''Grease''. From the stage show''s first appearance in 1971 to twenty-first century responses to the ''Grease Megamix'', ''Grease Is the Word'' reflects on the musical''s impact and enduring legacy. With essays covering everything from production history, political representations, industrial impact, music, stars and reception, the book shines a spotlight on one of Broadway''s and Hollywood''s biggest commercial successes. By adopting a range of perspectives, and drawing on various visual, textual and archival sources, the contributors maintain a vibrant dialogue throughout, offering a timely reappraisal of a musical that continues to resonate with fans and commentators the world over. Written in an engaging, accessible manner, the book will appeal to students, academics, and anyone interested in American popular culture.

The gothic is a dark mirror of the fears and taboos of a culture. This collection brings together a dozen chilling tales of the nineteenth-century American South with non-fiction texts that illuminate them and ground them in their historical context. The tales are from writers with enduring, world-wide reputations (Edgar Allan Poe), and others whose work will be unknown to most readers. Indeed, one of the stories has not been reprinted for nearly a hundred years, and little is known about its author, E. Levi Brown.Similarly, the historical selections are from a range of authors, some canonical, others not, ranging from Thomas Jefferson and the great historian and sociologist W. E. B. DuBois to the relatively obscure Leona Sansay. Some of these readings are themselves as disturbingly gothic as any of the tales. Indeed, the boundaries between fiction and non-fiction are tenuous in the gothic South. It is our contention that southern gothic fiction is in many ways realistic fiction, and, even at its most grotesque and haunting, is closely linked to the realities of southern life.In America, and in the American South especially, the great fears, taboos, and boundaries often concern race. Even in stories where black people are not present, as in Poe''s "The Fall of the House of Usher" and "The System of Professor Tarr and Dr. Fether," slavery hangs in the background as a ghostly metaphor. Our background readings place the fiction in the context of the South and the Caribbean: the revolution in Haiti, Nat Turner''s rebellion, the realities of slavery and the myths spun by its apologists, the aftermath of the Civil War, and the brutalities of Jim Crow laws.The twelve Gothic tales of this collection span the nineteenth-century South and are from some of the most famous writers of the age, such as Edgar Allan Poe, to more recently rediscovered and now celebrated writers such as Kate Chopin and Charles Chesnutt, to the completely and unfairly obscure E. Levi Brown. Companion readings-some themselves quite chilling-are by celebrated writers and well-known historical figures, such as Thomas Jefferson, Charles Brockden Brown, Jacques Dessalines, and W. E. B DuBois. These readings place the fiction in the context of the South and the Caribbean: the revolution in Haiti, Nat Turner''s rebellion, the realities of slavery and the myths spun by its apologists, the aftermath of the Civil War, and the brutalities of Jim Crow laws.

The first dedicated study of the relation between cinema and the work of African American author Ralph Ellison (1913-1994).

This book presents the most comprehensive study of the Waffen-SS until this date. It draws on archival studies done in more than 20 archives in 13 different countries over a period of 5 years. The gathered material comprises a wide-ranging selection of data such as records from the SS, contemporary Allied documents, letters from soldiers, as well as diaries and memoirs. Other major groups of material derive from the investigations into war crimes, from intelligence services and other organisations with a stake in the SS soldiers' post-war networks and veteran societies. All this diverse data has made it possible to study the Waffen-SS not merely as a hierarchical organisation but as a living organisation made up by human beings. Based on this extensive material the book covers the entire history of the Waffen-SS and follows the post-war fate of the SS-veterans as well. The evolution of the Waffen-SS is analysed with special emphasis on the role of Nazi ideology, war crimes and atrocities, as well as the unique multi-ethnic and transnational character of the organization. The book describes the haphazard, opportunistic and sometimes chaotic growth of the Waffen-SS but also analyses how a constant focus on ideology and a continuous brutalization through commitment of war crimes had a considerable integrative power. The SS managed to form a strong ethos with lasting power both among many of the former SS-soldiers and a greater public audience, documented in the book's study of the post-war veterans' culture and the popular cultural memory of the Waffen-SS.

Since the new leadership came to power in 2012, China''s domestic governance and public diplomacy have experienced some profound changes. At home, a far-reaching anti-corruption campaign significantly restored the government''s credibility and reinforced public trust in the party-state''s governance model, leading to a surge of nationalist pride. Internationally, the previous diplomatic principle, hide our capacities and bide our time, gradually faded away with the emerging ideas like China''s ideas and China''s wisdom. Good governance and anti-corruption efforts were expected to enhance soft power overseas. The party-state successfully governed the state for decades relying on its controversial governance approaches. The country also has visibly demonstrated economic and social development. However, China''s growing influence has failed to be recognised as soft power, being viewed rather as sharp power most times. The monograph investigates whether China is mindful of exporting its political ideas and whether it considers its governance model to be the pillar of its soft power portfolio. The monograph also analyses how Australia, a western country with close economic ties with China, interprets China''s intended narrative regarding its governance model and development. The questions are addressed through framing analysis of media coverage and in-depth interviews with Australian public diplomacy experts. Most studies in this field focus on externally directed soft power initiatives and the monograph fills the void by drawing attention to domestic affairs. The monograph sheds a new light on the relationship between domestic governance, soft power, and sharp power by examining the congruity between China''s projection and Australia''s mediation and also draws implications about China''s public diplomacy and the future global order by sketching out Beijing''s ambitions and attempts.

Animal Presence and Human Identity in Modern Literature is an exploration of literary representations of the human-animal encounter in modernity that press human "being" to its limits. Texts studied include Shakespeare's King Lear, Eliot's Middlemarch, Wells's The Island of Doctor Moreau, Atwood's Surfacing, and Desai's Clear Light of Day.

International efforts to ensure that armed forces meet the requirements of IHL so that the protection of civilians and detainees in armed conflict is increased continue to face implementation challenges that compromise their effectiveness. This includes, for example, the operations of the International Criminal Court, or the nascent norm of Responsibility to Protect. Relying on initiatives such as these also means that before pressure can be brought to bear on those who violate IHL, irreparable damage is done to victims' lives and dignity. At the same time, the ICRC has grown to recognize that its traditional approach of informing militaries about IHL and emphasizing the incorporation of IHL principles into military policies, doctrines, and educational and training curricula, while healthy measures, are not by themselves sufficient to keep soldiers from not complying with IHL and injuring or killing civilians and detainees. Importantly, this recognition has been driven by empirical data on IHL training effectiveness, and it has been coupled with an understanding that soldiers need to internalize IHL principles to ensure they comply with them. The ICRC has realized that the role played by military leaders, both officers and NCOs, in establishing a sense of positive military identity and professionalism can lead to the development of a values-oriented culture that includes IHL compliance.Using case studies of empirical assessment in IHL and IHL-related training, as they have occurred over the last 20 years, this book illustrates for military leaders and both civilian and military IHL instructors the many different ways empirical assessment can be used to measure training effectiveness long before troops take to the field. The results of these assessments can also be used to support the deliberate creation of better IHL training curricula and programs, especially ones that emphasize the importance of relying on multidisciplinary teams supporting military leaders as they directly engage with their troops on the ethical and moral issues as well as the legal issues raised by armed conflict. This book also looks to the future and considers the potential of war video games to serve as an effective training platform for young soldiers.