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Sounds Senses

yasser elhariry (ed.)

Sounds Senses is about what happens to the francophone postcolonial condition when sound is taken as a point of departure for engaging cultural production. Offering a synthetic overview of sound ... More

Sounds Senses is about what happens to the francophone postcolonial condition when sound is taken as a point of departure for engaging cultural production. Offering a synthetic overview of sound studies, it dismantles the retinal paradigms and oculocentrism of francophone postcolonial studies. By shifting the sensory hermeneutics of perception from the visual, the textual, and the graphemic to the sonic, the auditory, and the phonemic, the book places cultural production that privileges or otherwise exaggerates æstheticized sensorial experiences at the forefront of francophone postcolonialism. In the process, it introduces two primary theoretical thrusts—the unheard and the unintegrated—to the project of analyzing, extending, and rejuvenating francophone postcolonial studies. The book reevaluates francophone culture in relation to sound and the experience of sound, situating it along the fluid axes of paralingual utterance, audio-vision, voice, and narrative speakers. Through a range of case studies focusing on parafrancophonics, poetry, world music, cinema, the graphic novel, popular speech phenomenæ, and the poetics and politics of transcolonial identification, Sounds Senses demonstrates how francophone postcolonial culture is satiated with a glut of unexplored sonic significance.Less

With Fists Raised: Radical Art, Contemporary Activism, and the Iconoclasm of the Black Arts Movement

Tru Leverette (ed.)

There are deep black nationalist roots for many of the images and ideologies of contemporary racial justice efforts. This collection reconsiders the Black Aesthetic and the revolutionary art of the ... More

There are deep black nationalist roots for many of the images and ideologies of contemporary racial justice efforts. This collection reconsiders the Black Aesthetic and the revolutionary art of the Black Arts movement (BAM), forging connections between the recent past and contemporary social justice activism. Focusing on black literary and visual art of the Black Arts Movement, this collection highlights artists whose work diverged from narrow definitions of the Black Aesthetic and black nationalism. Adding to the reanimation of discourses surrounding BAM, this collection comes at a time when today’s racial justice efforts are mining earlier eras for their iconography, ideology, and implementation. As numerous contemporary activists ground their work in the legacies of mid-twentieth-century activism and adopt many of the grassroots techniques it fostered, this collection remembers and re-envisions the art that both supported and shaped that earlier era. It furthers contemporary conversations by exploring BAM’s implications for cultural and literary studies and its legacy for current social justice work and the multiple arts that support it.Less

Women, Citizenship, and Sexuality: The Transnational Lives of Renée Vivien, Romaine Brooks, and Natalie Barney

Melanie C. Hawthorne

Until well into the twentieth century, the claims to citizenship of women in the US and in Europe have come through men (father, husband); women had no citizenship of their own. The case studies of ... More

Until well into the twentieth century, the claims to citizenship of women in the US and in Europe have come through men (father, husband); women had no citizenship of their own. The case studies of three expatriate women (Renée Vivien, Romaine Brooks, and Natalie Barney) illustrate some of the consequences for women who lived independent lives. To begin with, the books traces the way that ideas about national belonging shaped gay male identity in the nineteenth century, before showing that such a discourse was not available to women and lesbians, including the three women who form the core of the book. In addition to questions of sexually non-conforming identity, women's mediated claim to citizenship limited their autonomy in practical ways (for example, they could be unilaterally expatriated). Consequently, the situation of the denizen may have been preferable to that of the citizen for women who lived between the lines. Drawing on the discourse of jurisprudence, the history of the passport, and original archival research on all three women, the books tells the story of women's evolving claims to citizenship in their own right.Less

Transcultural Italies: Mobility, Memory and Translation

Charles Burdett, Loredana Polezzi, and Barbara Spadaro (eds)

The history of Italians and of modern Italian culture stems from multiple experiences of mobility and migration: between the late nineteenth century and the early twentieth century 27 million ... More

The history of Italians and of modern Italian culture stems from multiple experiences of mobility and migration: between the late nineteenth century and the early twentieth century 27 million Italians migrated, and 60 to 80 million people worldwide now see their identity as connected with the Italian diaspora. Since the time of Italian unification a series of narratives about mobility has been produced both inside and outside the boundaries of Italy by agents such as the Italian state, international organizations, and migrant communities themselves. The essays in Transcultural Italies interrogate the inherently dynamic nature of Italian identity and culture. They do so by focusing on the key concepts and practices of mobility, memory, and translation. The essays represent a contrapuntal series of case studies that together offer a fresh perspective on the study of modern and contemporary Italy. The aim of the volume is to advance the transnational turn that is presently reshaping the field of Italian Studies and Modern Languages. The essays in the volume explore the meanings that ‘transnational’ and ‘transcultural’ assume when applied to the notion of Italian culture.Less

Introduction to a Poetics of Diversity: by Édouard Glissant

This book reproduces the texts of four lectures, followed by discussions, and two interviews with Lise Gauvin published in Introduction à une poétique du divers (1996); and also four further ... More

This book reproduces the texts of four lectures, followed by discussions, and two interviews with Lise Gauvin published in Introduction à une poétique du divers (1996); and also four further interviews from L’Imaginaire des langues (Lise Gauvin, 2010). It covers a wide range of topics but key recurring themes are creolization, language and langage, culture and identity, ‘monolingualism’, the ‘Chaos-world’ and the role of the writer. Migration and the various different kinds of migrants are also discussed, as is the difference between ‘atavistic’ and ‘composite’ communities, the art of translation, identity as a ‘rhizome’ rather than a single root, the Chaos-World and chaos theory, ‘trace thought’ as opposed to ‘systematic thought’, the relation between ‘place’ and the Whole-World, exoticism, utopias, a new definition of beauty as the realized quantity of differences, the status of literary genres and the possibility that literature as a whole will disappear. Four of the interviews (Chapters 6, 7, 8 and 9) relate to particular works that Glissant has published: Tout-monde, Le monde incrée, La Cohée du Lamentin, Une nouvelle région du monde. Many of these themes have been explored in his previous works, but here, because in all the chapters we see Glissant interacting with the questions and views of other people, they are presented in a particularly accessible form.Less

Treatise on the Whole-World: by Édouard Glissant

This exciting, challenging book covers a wide range of subject matter, but all linked together through the key ideas of diversity and ‘Relation’. It sees our modern world, shaped by immigration and ... More

This exciting, challenging book covers a wide range of subject matter, but all linked together through the key ideas of diversity and ‘Relation’. It sees our modern world, shaped by immigration and the aftermath of colonization, as a multiplicity of different communities interacting and evolving together, and argues passionately against all political and philosophical attempts to impose uniformity, universal or absolute values. This is the ‘Whole-World’, which includes not only these objective phenomena but also our consciousness of them. Glissant constantly stresses the unpredictable, ‘chaotic’ nature of the world, which, he claims, we must adapt to and not attempt to limit or control. ‘Creolization’ is not restricted to the Creole societies of the Caribbean but describes all societies in which different cultures with equal status interact to produce new configurations. This perspective produces brilliant new insights into the politicization of culture, but also language, poetry, our relationship to place and to landscapes, globalization, history, and other topics. The book is not written in the style conventionally associated with essays, but is a mixture of argument, proclamation, and poetic evocations of landscapes, lifestyles and people. Its structure is intentionally ‘chaotic’, returning several times to the same themes but seen from a slightly different point of view.Less

Humour in Contemporary France: Controversy, Consensus and Contradictions

Jonathan Ervine

This timely study sheds new light on debates about humour and multiculturalism in France, and is the first monograph about multiculturalism and humour in France to be published in either English or ... More

This timely study sheds new light on debates about humour and multiculturalism in France, and is the first monograph about multiculturalism and humour in France to be published in either English or French that analyses both debates about Charlie Hebdo and stand-up comedy. It will examine humour, freedom of expression and social cohesion in France at a crucial time in France’s recent history following the Charlie Hebdo attacks of January 2015. It will evaluate the state of French society and attitudes to humour in France in the aftermath of the events of January 2015. This book will argue that debates surrounding Charlie Hebdo, although significant, only provide part of the picture when it comes to understanding humour and multiculturalism in France. This monograph will fill significant gaps in French and international media coverage and academic writing, which has generally failed to adequately examine the broader picture that emerges when one examines career trajectories of notable contemporary French comedians. By addressing this failing, this book provides a more complete picture of humour, multiculturalism and Republican values in France. By focusing primarily on contemporary comedians in France, this book will explore competing uses of French Republican discourse in debates about humour, offensiveness and freedom of expression. Ultimately, this work will argue that studying humour and multiculturalism in France in often reveals a sense of national unease within the Republic at a time of considerable turmoil.Less

Making Waves: French Feminisms and their Legacies 1975-2015

Margaret Atack, Alison S. Fell, Diana Holmes, and Imogen Long (eds)

French feminisms were central to the theory and culture of Second Wave feminism as an international movement, and 1975 was a key year for the women’s movement in France. Forty years on, this book ... More

French feminisms were central to the theory and culture of Second Wave feminism as an international movement, and 1975 was a key year for the women’s movement in France. Forty years on, this book offers a critical review of the political activism and the cultural creativity of that moment, from the perspective of both preceding and subsequent ‘waves’ of feminism. It explores the importance and the legacies of 1975, and their strengths and limitations as new questions and new conjunctures have come into play. Edited and written by an international collective of feminist scholars, the book represents both a critical re-evaluation of a vital moment in women’s cultural and political history - and a new analysis of the relationship between Second Wave agendas and contemporary feminist politics and culture.Less

Transatlantic Studies: Latin America, Iberia, and Africa

Cecilia Enjuto-Rangel, Sebastiaan Faber, Pedro García-Caro, and Robert Patrick Newcomb (eds)

Transatlantic Studies: Latin America, Iberia, and Africa explores the field of Iberian and Latin American Transatlantic Studies to discuss its function within our pedagogical practices, to lay out ... More

Transatlantic Studies: Latin America, Iberia, and Africa explores the field of Iberian and Latin American Transatlantic Studies to discuss its function within our pedagogical practices, to lay out its research methodologies, to explain its theoretical underpinnings, and to showcase--and question--its potential through 35 essays by the field’s leading scholars and critics. A central aim of this volume is to make the case for an understanding of transatlantic cultural history over the last two centuries that transcends national and linguistic boundaries, as well as traditional academic configurations, focusing instead on the continuities and fractures between Latin America, the Iberian Peninsula, and Spanish and Portuguese-speaking Africa.Less

Dread Trident: Tabletop Role-Playing Games and the Modern Fantastic

Curtis D. Carbonell

Dread Trident examines the rise of imaginary worlds in tabletop role-playing games (TRPGs), such as Dungeons and Dragons. With the combination of analog and digital mechanisms, from traditional books ... More

Dread Trident examines the rise of imaginary worlds in tabletop role-playing games (TRPGs), such as Dungeons and Dragons. With the combination of analog and digital mechanisms, from traditional books to the internet, new ways of engaging the fantastic have become increasingly realized in recent years, and this book seeks an understanding of this phenomenon within the discourses of trans- and posthumanism, as well as within a gameist mode.  The book explores a number of case studies of foundational TRPGs. Dungeons and Dragons provides an illustration of pulp-driven fantasy, particularly in the way it harmonizes its many campaign settings into a functional multiverse. It also acts as a supreme example of depth within its archive of official and unofficial published material, stretching back four decades. Warhammer 40k and the Worlds of Darkness present an interesting dialogue between Gothic and science-fantasy elements. The Mythos of HP Lovecraft also features prominently in the book as an example of a realized world that spans the literary and gameist modes.  Realized fantasy worlds are becoming ever more popular as a way of experiencing a touch of the magical within modern life. Following Northrop Frye’s definition of irony, Dread Trident theorizes an ironic understanding of this process and in particular of its embodied forms.Less