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Oscar Wilde—the subject of my concluding chapter—is the true hero of the book. Were a reader to read only one chapter, it should probably be my chapter on Wilde, for...
Clothes are, and always have been, a vital part of our daily lives. Few things walk with us so closely. The garments that we wear literally mould themselves to our bodies, even becoming imbued with our DNA...
At the beginning of the twenty-first century, worldwide 1,200,000 people died in traffic accidents alone. A hundred years earlier, industrial accidents were already being counted in the millions. Economic costs...
The book is pretty expansive, and so I would imagine any lover of theatre would find something in the manuscript that grabs them. I intentionally wrote an academic book for a wide audience. It’s not a difficult read but at the same time, it really dives deep into the role of theatre in contemporary America...
The complexity of the procrastination economy is best displayed by the mobile culture on the commute. In chapter three, I examine this culture by analyzing the creative process behind Spotify’s...
The most important thing I’d like a casual reader or browser to engage with is the book’s companion website. Writing about music, theatre, and dance often feels restrictive—one can only...
In Battling Pornography, I locate the roots of anti-pornography sentiment in a series of interrelated social and political conditions that shaped women’s lives during the late 1960s and early 1970s....
The standard view of medicine holds that observant clinicians discover diseases in nature. Accordingly, psychiatrists are no different from other doctors. They, too, discern forms of pathology arising from dysfunctions...
Our understanding of world politics in the “modern” world (i.e. the past couple of centuries) has been dominated by the “inside/outside distinction.”On the one hand, “domestic” politics, the inside, involves...
I’m what is known in my field as a “dirt archaeologist.” I’ve been excavating archaeological sites in various places for 43 years, and I’m not ready to quit. Why do...
The theory of homicide I develop in the book first emerged because my initial hypothesis “died a horrible death” in the face of the evidence from Vermont and New Hampshire,...
Environmental conservation is essential to a prosperous, healthy lifestyle. It is a necessity and not a luxury. We are part of the environment: we evolved with nature and depend on...
C. Wright Mills argued that sociological research often springs from the intersection of personal biography and history. My book is no exception.I come from a family that bought organic foods...
Traditionally, the arts have been valued for providing a sphere of imaginary, virtual experience, in contrast to the reality of everyday life. But today, as our profiles and avatars stand...
The third and fifth chapters might be particularly engaging to the reader.The fifth chapter, “To Condemn a King,” encapsulates perfectly the many intellectual points that I take within my study.In...
Body Modern focuses on the history of a peculiar kind of imagery of the human body: the conceptual scientific illustration. Primarily found in America and Germany between 1915 and 1960,...
Quarks to Culture involves a new, big picture perspective of the universe. Now, by universe I do not mean the astronomical cosmos that the word usually refers to. I mean...
Did you live in a dormitory? Do you have fond memories of it, or were you plotting your escape from the moment you moved in? Many people live in residence...
I think that the reader interested in the pressing contemporary problem of emergency power and its excesses would find the introductory chapter most interesting. There I identify the longer history...
At its broadest level, Prosperity for All is about the changing meaning of consumer society over the past half century. I argue that whereas access to the benefits of consumer...
On a warm summer evening in Los Angeles, Franco Gonzales, an undocumented immigrant working as a dishwasher in a Chinese restaurant, was waiting alone at a bus stop. An armored...
This book is about image-architecture and the surprising apperceptive shifts that take place when today’s culture of ephemeral images and the stolid material traditions of architecture choose to embrace.Could you...
The word slumming, with all its problematic connotations, likely calls to mind the late-night excursions of white pleasure seekers to the cabarets of Prohibition-era Harlem. But the practice of slumming...
In the fall of 2008, the world’s largest particle accelerator, the Large Hadron Collider, or LHC, began operations for the first time. Circulating beams of protons under the Swiss and...
The preface provides a perspective for the book, as well as an explanation of the structure of each chapter, so that might be the appropriate place to start browsing.The prologue...
If the casual reader or bookshop-browser were to follow my grandfather’s advice, they would start at the end to see whether my book was worth reading. In this case, they...
In this book I grapple with a problem: Is human development directional? Does human evolution move in a particular direction? In recent decades the dominant view in the various sciences...
One of the most dramatic bubbles of the 2000s occurred in the art market, above all in contemporary art. For fine art overall, the most widely quoted index, the Mei...
The book is an interpretative look at the characteristic patterns of settlement and attitudes towards cities and urban life that are identified with American urbanization. It seeks to foster an...
Your browsing reader might be attracted by the striking cover of the book, which shows a dying man making his will, while a friend leans forward at his bedside, looking...
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