How have French Jewish women reacted to the great traumas of the last century - the Holocaust, North African decolonization and the resulting migration of African Jews to France, the Arab-Israeli crisis and the aftermath of 9/11? Cairns's major new volume identifies the themes of books by French Jewish women from 1945 to the present day, gauging to what extent they are dominated by, informed by, or relatively indifferent to these threatening events. Thirty authors in particular serve as representatives of a great, and greatly diverse, pool: divided not only as Ashkenazim or Sephardim, but by origins scattered across Algeria, Egypt, Germany, Hungary, Morocco, Poland, Romania, Russia, Tunisia, and Turkey. Theirs is a transnational, doubly-diasporic, and thus particularly complex paradigm in which feminism, loyalty to family culture and to the traditions of Judaism often exists in tension with French Republican models of assimilation, non-differentiation, and gender-blindness. Lucille Cairns is Professor of French Literature at the University of Durham.
Eating Disorders in Contemporary French Women’s Writing examines the most common types of Eating Disorders (EDs) - anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa/bulimarexia, and binge eating disorder - as represented in contemporary French women’s literature. The primary corpus comprises 40 autobiographical (and very occasionally autofictional) texts complemented by ample reference, and sometimes challenge, to clinical, medically-researched based, or theoretical publications on EDs.
Writing Ireland is a provocative and wide-ranging examination of culture, literature and identity in nine-teenth- and twentieth-century Ireland. Moving beyond the reductionist reading of the historical moment as a backdrop to cultural production, the authors deploy contemporary theories of discourse and the constitution of the colonial subject to illuminate key texts in the cultural struggle between the colonizer and the colonized. The book opens with a consideration of the originary moment of the colonial relationsip of England and Ireland through re-reading of works by Shakespeare and Spenser. Cairns and Richards move then to the constitution of the modern discourse of Celticism in the nineteenth century. A fundamental re-reading of the period of the Literary Revival through the works of Yeats, Synge, Joyce and O'Casey locates them in a social moment illuminated by detailed considerations of poems, playwrights and polemicists such as D. P. Moran, Arthur Griffith, Patrick Pearse and Thomas MacDonagh. Writing Ireland examines the psychic, sexual and social costs of the decolonisation struggle in the society and culture of the Irish Free State and its successor. Beckett, Kavanagh and O'Faolain registered the enervation and paralysis consequent upon sustaining a repressive view of Irish identity. The book concludes in the contemporary moment, as Ireland's post-colonial culture enters crisis and writers like Seamus Heaney, Brian Friel, Tom Murphy and Seamus Deane grapple with the notion of alternative identities. Writing Ireland provides students of literature, history, cultural studies and Irish studies with a lucid analysis of Ireland's colonial and post-colonial situation on which an innovative methodology transcends disciplinary divisions."--
The challenges of teaching a successful introductory sociology course today demand materials from a publisher very different from the norm. Texts that are organized the way the discipline structures itself intellectually no longer connect with the majority of student learners. This is not an issue of pandering to students or otherwise seeking the lowest common denominator. On the contrary, it is a question of again making the practice of sociological thinking meaningful, rigorous, and relevant to today’s world of undergraduates. This comparatively concise, highly visual, and affordable book offers a refreshingly new way forward to reach students, using one of the most powerful tools in a sociologist’s teaching arsenal—the familiar stuff in students’ everyday lives throughout the world: the jeans they wear to class, the coffee they drink each morning, or the phones their professors tell them to put away during lectures. A focus on consumer culture, seeing the strange in the familiar, is not only interesting for students; it is also (the authors suggest) pedagogically superior to more traditional approaches. By engaging students through their stuff, this book moves beyond teaching about sociology to helping instructors teach the practice of sociological thinking. It moves beyond describing what sociology is, so that students can practice what sociological thinking can do. This pedagogy also posits a relationship between teacher and learner that is bi-directional. Many students feel a sense of authority in various areas of consumer culture, and they often enjoy sharing their knowledge with fellow students and with their instructor. Opening up the sociology classroom to discussion of these topics validates students’ expertise on their own life-worlds. Teachers, in turn, gain insight from the goods, services, and cultural expectations that shape students’ lives. While innovative, the book has been carefully crafted to make it as useful and flexible as possible for instructors aiming to build core sociological foundations in a single semester. A map on pages ii–iii identifies core sociological concepts covered so that a traditional syllabus as well as individual lectures can easily be maintained. Theory, method, and active learning exercises in every chapter constantly encourage the sociological imagination as well as the "doing" of sociology.
Poet and literature professor Scott Cairns ran headlong into his midlife crisis — a fairly common experience among men nearing the age of fifty—while walking on the beach with his Labrador. His was not a desperate attempt to recapture youth, filled with sports cars and younger women. Instead, Cairns realized his spiritual life was advancing at a snail's pace and time was running out. Midlife crisis for this this Baptist turned Eastern Orthodox manifested as a desperate need to seek out prayer. Originally published in 2007, this new, expanded edition of Short Trip to the Edge is the story of Scott's spiritual journey to the mystical island of Mt. Athos. With twenty monasteries and thirteen sketes scattered across its sloping terrain, the Holy Mountain was the perfect place for Scott to seek out a prayer father and discover the stillness of the true prayer life. Told with wit and exquisite prose, his narrative takes the reader from a beach in Virginia to the most holy Orthodox monasteries in the world to a monastery in Arizona and back again as Scott struggles to find his prayer path. Along the way, Cairns forged relationships with monks, priests, and fellow pilgrims. "Scott Cairns is not only one of the most vital poets of our time but also a prose writer of uncommon vision, and in Short Trip to the Edge, his account of his pilgrimage to the Holy Mountain of Athos, in northern Greece, he weaves together a personal history of faith, a wealth of learning, and the wisdom of the ages to create a book for spiritual seekers from every religious denomination. What better guide, and travel companion, than Scott Cairns? I would follow him to the edge – and beyond." — Christopher Merrill, author of Things of the Hidden God: Journey to the Holy Mountain "Mt Athos is 'the edge' in more ways than one, a place both beautiful and ruggedly challenging, alive with spiritual power that shares the same qualities. Cairns is the ideal guide — relaxed, invitingly conversational, and often amused, but always evoking the awe that these mysteries deserve." — Frederica Mathewes-Green "In Short Trip To The Edge, Scott Cairns pulls back the curtain and gives us a glimpse of the spiritual energy present on the Holy Mountain. He approaches his prose with the soul and skill of a poet. It is at once simple and profound—accessible and ineffable. Scott has the boldness to confront the deepest parts of our human nature with fierce honesty and humor. It's a place where "pilgrims are a mixed bag," holy relics make the heart race and true spirituality is an "acquired taste." The reader, (or should I say pilgrim) is invited to travel along a beautiful and potentially frightening road into the heart of silence, repentance and prayer. There is a palpable sense of being there: surrounded by a timeless chorus of voices chanting on The Holy Mountain, praying for the life of the world. One slowly loses the desire to arrive and begins to embrace the possibility of "always becoming." Scott Cairns pours out his soul in this brilliant and much needed book. It is well worth the taking this short trip to the edge!" —Jonathan Jackson, star of the hit ABC show Nashville and author of The Mystery Of Art "A Short Trip to the Edge is an exceptional and compelling book. Scott Cairns has a poet's eye and a story-tellers flair, so that mystical experience and profound theology are bodied forth in memorable images and vivid scenes, instead of being lost in abstraction. This book witnesses to the way ancient truths can become vivid, true and life-changing in the here and now. This is a short trip you will never forget." —Rev. Dr. Malcolm Guite, Girton College, Cambridge
Barbara Graham might have been a diabolical dame in a hard-boiled detective story--beautiful, sexy, and deadly. Charged alongside two male friends in the murder of an elderly widow during a botched robbery attempt, "Bloody Babs" became the third woman executed in California--after a 1953 trial that played out before standing-room-only crowds captured the imaginations of journalists, filmmakers, and death penalty opponents. Why, Kathleen A. Cairns asks, of all the capital cases in the twentieth century, did Graham's have such political resonance and staying power? Leaving aside the question of guilt or innocence--debated to this day--Cairns examines how Graham's case became a touchstone in the ongoing debate over capital punishment. While prosecutors positioned the accused woman as a femme fatale, the media came to offer a counternarrative for Graham's life highlighting her abusive and lonely beginnings. Cairns shows how Graham's case became crucial to the abolitionists of the time, who used instances of questionable guilt to raise awareness of the arbitrary and capricious nature of death penalty prosecutions. Critical in keeping capital punishment in the forefront of public consciousness until abolitionists homed in on a winning strategy, Graham's case illustrates the power of individual stories to shape wider perceptions and ultimately public policies.
First published in hardcover as Love’s Immensity, this powerful book of selections from the mystics East and West, rendered into poetry, is now available in paperback for the first time.
A new collection from one of our favorite poets. Fourteen “Idiot Psalms,” surrounded by dozens of other poems, make this his most challenging collection yet. “Idiot Psalm 1” O God Belovéd if obliquely so, dimly apprehended in the midst of this, the fraught obscuring fog of my insufficiently capacious ken, Ostensible Lover of our kind—while apparently aloof—allow that I might glimpse once more Your shadow in the land, avail for me, a second time, the sense of dire Presence in the pulsing hollow near the heart. Once more, O Lord, from Your Enormity incline your Face to shine upon Your servant, shy of immolation, if You will.
Democracy is very much an open question in the early twenty-first century. While voter participation declines in many traditional democracies, new movements for democracy are emerging around the world. This book brings the question of democracy out of the halls of political power and home to our daily lives, pitting "official democracy" and "democracy from below" against one another in a lively debate. For more information see www.democraticimagination.com.
Over the space of a few generations, women's relationship with food has changed dramatically. Yet – despite significant advances in gender equality – food and femininity remain closely connected in the public imagination as well as the emotional lives of women. While women encounter food-related pressures and pleasures as individuals, the social challenge to perform food femininities remains: as the nurturing mother, the talented home cook, the conscientious consumer, the svelte and health-savvy eater. In Food and Femininity, Kate Cairns and Josée Johnston explore these complex and often emotionally-charged tensions to demonstrate that food is essential to the understanding of femininity today. Drawing on extensive qualitative research in Toronto, they present the voices of over 100 food-oriented men and women from a range of race and class backgrounds. Their research reveals gendered expectations to purchase, prepare, and enjoy food within the context of time crunches, budget restrictions, political commitments, and the pressure to manage health and body weight. The book analyses how women navigate multiple aspects of foodwork for themselves and others, from planning meals, grocery shopping, and feeding children, to navigating conflicting preferences, nutritional and ethical advice, and the often-inequitable division of household labour. What emerges is a world in which women's choices continue to be closely scrutinized – a world where 'failing' at food is still perceived as a failure of femininity. A compelling rethink of contemporary femininity, this is an indispensable read for anyone interested in the sociology of food, gender studies and consumer culture.
“The extreme greatness of Christianity lies in the fact that it does not seek a supernatural remedy for suffering, but a supernatural use for it.” –Simone Weil “Like most people I, too, have been blindsided by personal grief now and again over the years. And I have an increasingly keen sense that, wherever I am, someone nearby is suffering now. For that reason, I lately have settled in to mull the matter over, gathering my troubled wits to undertake a difficult essay, more like what we used to call an assay, really—an earnest inquiry. I am thinking of it just now as a study in suffering, by which I hope to find some sense in affliction, hoping—just as I have come to hope about experience in general—to make something of it.” –from the book Is there meaning in our afflictions? With the thoughtfulness of a pilgrim and the prose of a poet, Scott Cairns takes us on a soul-baring journey through “the puzzlement of our afflictions.” Probing ancient Christian wisdom for revelation in his own pain, Cairns challenges us toward a radical revision of the full meaning and breadth of human suffering. Clear-eyed and unsparingly honest, this new addition to the literature of suffering is reminiscent of The Year of Magical Thinking as well as the works of C. S. Lewis. Cairns points us toward hope in the seasons of our afflictions, because “in those trials in our lives that we do not choose but press through—a stillness, a calm, and a hope become available to us.”
Watson traces Gertrude Stein's (1874-1946) growing fascination with the cognitive and political ramifications of conversation and how that interest influenced her writing over the course of her career.
This is a book about memory and meaning; these texts bring to light the reflections and stories that women have constructed around the objects they have treasured, which in the past may have been deemed unimportant. These objects contain each woman's life experience and act as a foundation for her values and for the development of her character. The objects are often passed along to other women or handed down to family members, thereby connecting generations of women and creating a collective women's history. Culled from interviews with over one hundred different women, these are rich, compell.
?Crack shot.? ?Enigma woman.? ?Good with ponies and pistols.? ?A much-married woman.? ø What if such an unconventional woman?and the press unanimously agreed that Nellie May Madison was indeed unconventional?were to get away with murder? Shortly after her husband?s bullet-riddled body was found in the couple?s Burbank apartment, police issued an all-points bulletin for the ?beautiful, dark-haired widow.? The ensuing drama unfolded with all the strange twists and turns of a noir crime novel.øøøøøø ø In this intriguing cultural history, Kathleen A. Cairns tells the true tale of the first woman sentenced to death in California, Nellie May Madison. Her story offers a glimpse into law and disorder in 1930s Los Angeles while bringing to life a remarkable character whose plight reflects on the status of woman, the workings of the media and the judiciary system, and the stratification of society in her time. An intriguing cultural history, Cairns?s re-creation of the case from murder to trial to aftermath casts an eye forward to our own love-hate affair with celebrity crimes and our abiding ambivalence about domestic violence abuse as a defense for murder.
Capable Workplace Learning is about Capable people, Capable Organisations and an underlying belief in the applicability of the concept of Capability to Work, Place and Learning. In this book, Cairns and Stephenson present a case for the development of human Capability, in life, in work, and in the lifespace. They trace the development of the Capability concept arguing that it embraces and goes beyond competence. They draw on over 35 years of experience of direct involvement in enhancing adult Capability through education at all levels.
In Citizens Plus, Alan Cairns unravels the historical record to clarify the current impasse in negotiations between Aboriginal peoples and the state. He considers the assimilationist policy assumptions of the imperial era, examines more recent government initiatives, and analyzes the emergence of the nation-to-nation paradigm given massive support by the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples. We are battered by contending visions, he argues - a revised assimilation policy that finds its support in the Canadian Alliance Party is countered by the nation-to-nation vision, which frames our future as coexisting solitudes. Citizens Plus stakes out a middle ground with its support for constitutional and institutional arrangements which will simultaneously recognize Aboriginal difference and reinforce a solidarity which binds us together in common citizenship. Selected as a BC Book for Everybody
This biography of Rose Elizabeth Bird is an overdue look at California's first female supreme court chief justice, against the backdrop of California's political and cultural climate in the 1970s and 1980s"--
It has long been recognised that there is an apparently paradoxical relationship between the revolutionary poetic style developed by Yeats, Eliot and Pound in the period during and after the First World War, and the reactionary politics with which they were associated in the 1920s and 1930s. Concentrating on their writings in the period up to the 1930s, this study, first published in 1982, helps to resolve the paradox and also provides a much needed reappraisal of the factors influencing their poetic and political development. The work of these poets has usually been seen as deriving from the tradition of continental symbolist poetics. Yeats, Eliot, Pound and the Politics of Poetry will be of interest to students of literature.
Challenging History in the Museum explores work with difficult, contested and sensitive heritages in a range of museum contexts. It is based on the Challenging History project, which brings together a wide range of heritage professionals, practitioners and academics to explore heritage and museum learning programmes in relation to difficult and controversial subjects. The book is divided into four sections. Part I, ’The Emotional Museum’ examines the balance between empathic and emotional engagement and an objective, rational understanding of ’history’. Part II, ’Challenging Collaborations’ explores the opportunities and pitfalls associated with collective, inclusive representations of our heritage. Part III, ’Ethics, Ownership, Identity’ questions who is best-qualified to identify, represent and ’own’ these histories. It challenges the concept of ownership and personal identification as a prerequisite to understanding, and investigates the ideas and controversies surrounding this premise. Part IV, ’Teaching Challenging History’ helps us to explore the ethics and complexities of how challenging histories are taught. The book draws on work countries around the world including Brazil, Cambodia, Canada, England, Germany, Japan, Northern Ireland, Norway, Scotland, South Africa, Spain and USA and crosses a number of disciplines: Museum and Heritage Studies, Cultural Policy Studies, Performance Studies, Media Studies and Critical Theory Studies. It will also be of interest to scholars of Cultural History and Art History.
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