Beautifully written in an engaging style, this book provides a new perspective on turn-of-the-century American culture that nuances and complicates our vision of that historical moment. I have no doubt that it will become a classic text in American studies, the history of American art, and the study of visual culture."—Kathleen Pyne, author of Art and the Higher Life: Painting and Evolutionary Thought in Late Nineteenth-Century America "Michael Leja, one of our most original and acute historians of American art, has written an indispensable and lively study of what we might call the modern anxiety of seeing. He traces our inherently skeptical view of the world back to the turn of the last century, a golden age of hucksters, swindlers, quacks, humbugs, rascals, cheats, and confidence men, and shows how artists as diverse as Eakins and Duchamp fit into this new culture of suspicion. Leja's book breathes fresh life into the period."—Michael Kimmelman "Bringing together the strangest of bedfellows-paintings by Thomas Eakins, spirit photographs, William Harnett's still lifes, occult philosophies, Duchamp readymades-Leja uncovers a deep culture of suspicion and skepticism in America around 1900. As Americans grappled with the complexities of modern life, 'seeing was not believing,' he argues in this deeply researched and brilliantly provocative study."—Wanda M. Corn, author of The Great American Thing: Modern Art and National Identity, 1915-1935
In the wake of World War II, the paintings of Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko, Barnett Newman, Willem de Kooning, and other New York School artists participated in a culture-wide initiative to reimagine the self. At a time when widely held beliefs about human nature and the human condition were coming to seem to many commentators increasingly outdated and inadequate, Abstract Expressionism gave compelling visual form to a new subjectivity - a new experience and idea of self. In this original and wide-ranging study, Michael Leja argues that the interest of these artists in tapping "primitive" and "unconscious" components of self aligns them with many contemporary essayists, Hollywood filmmakers, journalists, and popular philosophers who were turning, like the artists, to psychology, anthropology, and philosophy in the effort to reformulate individual identity. Taking Pollock's paintings and their reception as a case study, Leja shows that critics located in Pollock's abstract forms a web of metaphors - including spatial entrapment, conflicted production, energy flow, gendered opposition, and unconsciousness - that situated the paintings in mainstream cultural discourses on the individual's sense of self and identity. In this interpretative frame, the cultural and ideological character of the art is illuminated. According to Leja, Abstract Expressionism effectively enacted and represented the new, conflicted, layered subjectivity, a feature that helps to account for the support and interest it garnered from cultural and political institutions alike.
Surveys the representations and constructions of the human being in American art. Humans are organisms, but "the human being" is a term referring to a complicated, self-contradictory, and historically evolving set of concepts and practices. Humans explores competing versions, constructs, and ideas of the human being that have figured prominently in the arts of the United States. These essays consider a range of artworks from the colonial period to the present, examining how they have reflected, shaped, and modeled ideas of the human in American culture and politics. The book addresses to what extent artworks have conferred more humanity on some human beings than others, how art has shaped ideas about the relationships between humans and other beings and things, and in what ways different artistic constructions of the human being evolved, clashed, and intermingled over the course of American history. Humans both tells the history of a concept foundational to US civilization and proposes new means for its urgently needed rethinking.
Beautifully written in an engaging style, this book provides a new perspective on turn-of-the-century American culture that nuances and complicates our vision of that historical moment. I have no doubt that it will become a classic text in American studies, the history of American art, and the study of visual culture."—Kathleen Pyne, author of Art and the Higher Life: Painting and Evolutionary Thought in Late Nineteenth-Century America "Michael Leja, one of our most original and acute historians of American art, has written an indispensable and lively study of what we might call the modern anxiety of seeing. He traces our inherently skeptical view of the world back to the turn of the last century, a golden age of hucksters, swindlers, quacks, humbugs, rascals, cheats, and confidence men, and shows how artists as diverse as Eakins and Duchamp fit into this new culture of suspicion. Leja's book breathes fresh life into the period."—Michael Kimmelman "Bringing together the strangest of bedfellows-paintings by Thomas Eakins, spirit photographs, William Harnett's still lifes, occult philosophies, Duchamp readymades-Leja uncovers a deep culture of suspicion and skepticism in America around 1900. As Americans grappled with the complexities of modern life, 'seeing was not believing,' he argues in this deeply researched and brilliantly provocative study."—Wanda M. Corn, author of The Great American Thing: Modern Art and National Identity, 1915-1935
Explore pilgrimage routes, epigraphy, and the history of writing with an expert guide From the late 1970s through 1982, Michael E. Stone conducted a number of expeditions to the Sinai peninsula, searching for ancient inscriptions. In this book Stone describes his search, crowned by the discovery of the most ancient Armenian inscriptions known. Here Stone describes not only the inscriptions discovered along his journeys but also the Sinai, its past and present, its human inhabitants, its flora and fauna, and its history. Though once common, well-informed travel books to the Middle East with a broad academic interest and a specific focus have become rare. Stone’s diary of his expeditions in the Sinai fill this gap with vivid descriptions, poetry, and illustrations. Features An account of five expeditions into the Sinai Thirteen poems written by Stone Twenty-six figures and five maps
An original and ambitious approach to understanding the creative achievements of one of the most important American artists of the twentieth century. Totality offers a deeply researched and thoughtful account of the art of Barnett Newman (1905–1970). While Newman’s paintings are widely regarded as among the most significant statements of abstract expressionism—and emblematic of modernism at midcentury—they pose distinct challenges to formal description and historical evaluation. With this book, Michael Schreyach guides readers toward a transformed understanding of Newman’s profound body of work. Through a sequence of close readings, Schreyach examines six key terms—symbol, surface, self-evidence, space, standpoint, and scale—that illuminate the meaning of Newman’s claims for the “metaphysical” content of his art. Totality progresses from the meticulous analysis of the technical structure and visual appearance of specific works to critical and archivally documented arguments about Newman’s intentions. The result is an altogether original interpretation of the artist’s enterprise, as surprising as it is nuanced.
The Republic of Color delves deep into the history of color science in the United States to unearth its origins and examine the scope of its influence on the industrial transformation of turn-of-the-century America. For a nation in the grip of profound economic, cultural, and demographic crises, the standardization of color became a means of social reform—a way of sculpting the American population into one more amenable to the needs of the emerging industrial order. Delineating color was also a way to characterize the vagaries of human nature, and to create ideal structures through which those humans would act in a newly modern American republic. Michael Rossi’s compelling history goes far beyond the culture of the visual to show readers how the control and regulation of color shaped the social contours of modern America—and redefined the way we see the world.
Literary scholar Michael A. Chaney examines graphic novels to illustrate that in form and function they inform readers on how they ought to be read. His arguments result in an innovative analysis of the various knowledges that comics produce and the methods artists and writers employ to convey them. Theoretically eclectic, this study attends to the lessons taught by both the form and content of today's most celebrated graphic novels. Chaney analyzes the embedded lessons in comics and graphic novels through the form's central tropes: the iconic child storyteller and the inherent childishness of comics in American culture; the use of mirrors and masks as ciphers of the unconscious; embedded puzzles and games in otherwise story-driven comic narratives; and the form's self-reflexive propensity for showing its work. Comics reveal the labor that goes into producing them, embedding lessons on how to read the "work" as a whole. Throughout, Chaney draws from a range of theoretical insights from psychoanalysis and semiotics to theories of reception and production from film studies, art history, and media studies. Some of the major texts examined include Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis; Chris Ware's Jimmy Corrigan: The Smartest Kid on Earth; Joe Sacco's Palestine; David B.'s Epileptic; Kyle Baker's Nat Turner; and many more. As Chaney's examples show, graphic novels teach us even as they create meaning in their infinite relay between words and pictures.
This updated third edition of Legal Aspects of Corrections Management provides a current, informative, and reader-friendly discussion of the contemporary legal issues impacting corrections management. Through the use of case law, this text provides readers with a practical understanding of how the First, Fourth, Fifth, Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments relate to the day-to-day issues of running a prison, jail, and other corrections programs, such as probation and parole. The authors' combined corrections experience included such positions as General Counsel, Regional Counsel, and Correctional Program Officer, as well as working within corrections facilities. Their work involved advising corrections staff and management on the legal issues associated with policies and procedures. The authors also have extensive teaching experience in corrections law, the criminal justice system, and criminology. The benefits of such experiences are reflected in the comprehensive coverage of topics in this accessible and updated Third Edition. New to the Third Edition: -Cases and statistical information have been thoroughly updated. -Contains many new photos and figures throughout -New sections include: *Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act of 2000 (RLUIPA) *Double Jeopardy *DNA Collection *Searches of Non-Inmates *Legal Challenges to the Method of Execution *Standards of Employee Conduct *Fair Labor Standards Act *Portal-to-Portal Act *Title VII and Inmate-Created Hostile Work Environment *The Americans with Disabilities Act *Death Penalty for Juvenile Offenders Key Features: -Includes engaging real-world examples of common problems and occurrences in corrections to provide students and practitioners with a good understanding of the legal aspects of corrections management. -Provides insight into the legal steps that should be anticipated in a correctional lawsuit. -Provides an accessible and easy-to-understand collection of Supreme Court and significant lower court rulings on key issues in corrections. With the focus on Supreme Court cases, the text has applicability nationwide. -Focuses on constitutional issues affecting such areas as inmate correspondence, visiting, and religion (First Amendment); search and seizure, privacy (Fourth Amendment); due process (Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments); equal protection (Fourteenth Amendment); and the death penalty, conditions of confinement (cruel and unusual punishment), and health care (Eighth Amendment). -Includes coverage of statutory and administrative law, as well as chapters on probation and parole, jails, juveniles, privatization, and the loss of rights of convicted persons. -Includes examples of relevant documents, such as a civil complaint; a sample presentence investigation report; a listing of inmate rights and responsibilities; of misconduct charges; and of mission statements for departments of corrections.
Playing on the frequently used metaphors of the 'turn toward' or 'turn back' in scholarship on religion, The Turn Around Religion in America offers a model of religion that moves in a reciprocal relationship between these two poles. In particular, this volume dedicates itself to a reading of religion and of religious meaning that cannot be reduced to history or ideology on the one hand or to truth or spirit on the other, but is rather the product of the constant play between the historical particulars that manifest beliefs and the beliefs that take shape through them. Taking as their point of departure the foundational scholarship of Sacvan Bercovitch, the contributors locate the universal in the ongoing and particularized attempts of American authors from the seventeenth century forward to get it - whatever that 'it' might be - right. Examining authors as diverse as Pietro di Donato, Herman Melville, Miguel Algarin, Edward Taylor, Mark Twain, Robert Keayne, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Paule Marshall, Stephen Crane, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Joseph B. Soloveitchik, among many others-and a host of genres, from novels and poetry to sermons, philosophy, history, journalism, photography, theater, and cinema-the essays call for a discussion of religion's powers that does not seek to explain them as much as put them into conversation with each other. Central to this project is Bercovitch's emphasis on the rhetoric, ritual, typology, and symbology of religion and his recognition that with each aesthetic enactment of religion's power, we learn something new.
Diego Rivera, Dorothea Lange, Adolfo Pérez Esquivel: Art and activism have long been intertwined, and the political fallout has resulted in an artistic canon riddled with historical holes. One of the most glaring omissions from most listings of American art masters is Ad Reinhardt (1913–67). An artist who had significant ties to the American Communist movement and leftist political organizations, Reinhardt and his contributions to modern art have been largely pushed out of the spotlight for political reasons. But in this unprecedented in-depth study of Reinhardt’s life and work, Michael Corris returns the artist to his rightful place in the history of modern art and culture. A pioneering avant-garde artist with fierce political beliefs, Reinhardt immersed himself in the vibrant left-wing political and cultural circles of the 1930s and ’40s, only to be marginalized by the social and cultural conservatism that arose in postwar America. Corris examines Reinhardt’s work against this historical background, charting the development of his entire oeuvre, ranging from his abstract paintings to his popular graphic artwork, illustrations and cartoons. Ad Reinhardt also re-evaluates Reinhardt’s role and influence in the art world, chronicling his time as an artist and educator at the California School of Fine Arts, University of Wyoming, Yale University, and Hunter College, and examining his influence on younger artists who created successive avant-garde movements such as minimal and conceptual art. A long-awaited examination of a less-heralded American master, Ad Reinhardt is a fascinating portrait of an artist whose political radicalism infused his art with a poignant resonance that stretches, through this rediscovery, into the present.
If scholars no longer necessarily find the essence and origins of what came to be known as Christianity in the personality of a historical figure known as Jesus of Nazareth, it nevertheless remains the case that the study of early Christianity is dominated by an assumption of the force of Jesus's personality on divergent communities. In The Godman and the Sea, Michael J. Thate shifts the terms of this study by focusing on the Gospel of Mark, which ends when Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome discover a few days after the crucifixion that Jesus's tomb has been opened but the corpse is not there. Unlike the other gospels, Mark does not include the resurrection, portraying instead loss, puzzlement, and despair in the face of the empty tomb. Reading Mark's Gospel as an exemplary text, Thate examines what he considers to be retellings of other traumatic experiences—the stories of Jesus's exorcising demons out of a man and into a herd of swine, his stilling of the storm, and his walking on the water. Drawing widely on a diverse set of resources that include the canon of western fiction, classical literature, the psychological study of trauma, phenomenological philosophy, the new materialism, psychoanalytic theory, poststructural philosophy, and Hebrew Bible scholarship, as well as the expected catalog of New Testament tools of biblical criticism in general and Markan scholarship in particular, The Godman and the Sea is an experimental reading of the Gospel of Mark and the social force of the sea within its traumatized world. More fundamentally, however, it attempts to position this reading as a story of trauma, ecstasy, and what has become through the ruins of past pain.
The frogs, toads, salamanders, and newts that inhabit North America, numbering nearly 300 species, represent immense variation in form, habitat, distribution and ecology. This volume discusses the diversity of these animals in relation to the historical geography of the North American continent and portrays all of the formally recognized amphibian species to be found in the United States and Canada within a geographical context. Each species is presented with a color photograph, an account of its range, habitat and conservation status, and an up-to-date, full color range map that depicts its known occurrences in relation to the topography of the landscape. This volume reflects the enormous growth in interest about amphibians and increased intensity of scientific research into their biology and distribution that has occurred during the past two decades"--
Take your surgical skills to the next level with Cardiac Surgery, a volume in the Master Techniques in Surgery series! This outstanding resource distills vast stores of knowledge from the field’s most renowned surgeons into one definitive atlas. Richly illustrated, step-by-step guidance covers a full range of adult cardiac surgical techniques, and clearly demonstrates how to avoid and manage complications and achieve optimal outcomes.
Bringing Forth the New provides a headlong introduction into the world of Chinese contemporary visual art, opening from the art world onto the political, technological and economic vectors of recent Chinese history. Each chapter reads an important facet of recent Chinese history through the work of a significant artist. From examining trade war and intellectual property through the work of political pop painters such as Yu Youhan, to the development of gendered constructs in China through the work of Cui Xuiwen.
On March 29, 1971, a Canadian was found brutally murdered in a small Paris apartment. The victim, François Mario Bachand, was a radical member of the separatist Front de Libération du Québec (FLQ), the terrorist group that had been causing havoc in Canada, planting bombs and carrying out kidnappings. Bachand served a jail term in the early 1960s, and after his release he was considered a loose cannon, heartily despised by many associates. It was widely believed that the FLQ had killed one of its own. Twenty years after Bachand died in Paris, author Michael McLoughlin came across a single document in the National Archives of Canada that shed an eerie new light on the circumstances of Bachand's death. The murder, McLoughlin discovered, was not so simple after all. And the deeper he dug, the more complicated - and disturbing - the case became. Last Stop, Paris analyzes the shocking circumstances surrounding Bachand's murder. McLoughlin carefully reconstructs the secret meeting that determined Bachand's fate and the events that led to his assassination on the March day in Paris. It also follows the movements of the FLQ and the RCMP Security Service, and reveals the close international connections that tied revolutionary groups of the later 1960s and 1970s - from Cuba to Europe to the Middle East - to underground agents of the CIA, MI5, and French intelligence. A revealing look at the international web of terrorism and government intelligence, Last Stop, Paris is an explosive examination of the secrets, betrayals and violence that characterized the most tumultuous period in Canada's recent history.
During the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Americans were fascinated with fraud. P. T. Barnum artfully exploited the American yen for deception, and even Mark Twain championed it, arguing that lying was virtuous insofar as it provided the glue for all interpersonal intercourse. But deception was not used solely to delight, and many fell prey to the schemes of con men and the wiles of spirit mediums. As a result, a number of experimental psychologists set themselves the task of identifying and eliminating the illusions engendered by modern, commercial life. By the 1920s, however, many of these same psychologists had come to depend on deliberate misdirection and deceitful stimuli to support their own experiments. The Science of Deception explores this paradox, weaving together the story of deception in American commercial culture with its growing use in the discipline of psychology. Michael Pettit reveals how deception came to be something that psychologists not only studied but also employed to establish their authority. They developed a host of tools—the lie detector, psychotherapy, an array of personality tests, and more—for making deception more transparent in the courts and elsewhere. Pettit’s study illuminates the intimate connections between the scientific discipline and the marketplace during a crucial period in the development of market culture. With its broad research and engaging tales of treachery, The Science of Deception will appeal to scholars and general readers alike.
This is the first major study based on Soviet documents and revelations of the Soviet state security during the period 1939-1953—a period about which relatively little is known. The book documents the role of Stalin and the major players in massive crimes carried out during this period against the Soviet people. It also provides the first detailed biography of V. S. Abakumov, Minister of State Security, 1946-1951. Based on Glasnost revelations and recently released archival material, this study covers the operations of Soviet state security from Beriia's appointment in 1938 until Stalin's death. The book pays particular attention to the career of V. S. Abakumov, head of SMERSH counterintelligence during the war and minister in charge of the MGB (the predecessor of the KGB) from 1946 until his removal and arrest in July 1951. The author argues that terror remained the central feature of Stalin's rule even after the Great Terror and he provides examples of how he micromanaged the repressions. The book catalogs the major crimes committed by the security organs and the leading perpetrators and provides evidence that the crimes were similar to those for which the Nazi leaders were punished after the war. Subjects covered include Katyn and its aftermath, the arrest and execution of senior military officers, the killing of political prisoners near Orel in September 1941, and the deportations of various nationalities during the war. The post-war period saw the Aviator and Leningrad affairs as well as the anti-cosmopolitan campaign whose target was mainly Jewish intellectuals. Later chapters cover Abakumov's downfall, the hatching of the Mingrelian and Doctors plots and the events that followed Stalin's death. Finally, there are chapters on the fate of those who ran Stalin's machinery of terror in the last 13 years of his rule. These and other topics will be of concern to all students and scholars of Soviet history and those interested in secret police and intelligence operations.
This fascinating book highlights the artist’s early career as an illustrator and how it influenced his work as a painter and shaped his response to modernism.
Michael J. Coles, the cofounder of the Great American Cookie Company and the former CEO of Caribou Coffee, did not follow a conventional path into business. He does not have an Ivy League pedigree or an MBA from a top-ten business school. He grew up poor, starting work at the age of thirteen. He had many false starts and painful defeats, but Coles has a habit of defying expectations. His life and career have been about turning obstacles into opportunities, tragedies into triumphs, and poverty into philanthropy. In Time to Get Tough, Coles explains how he started a $100-million company with only $8,000, overcame a near-fatal motorcycle accident, ran for the U.S. Congress, and set three transcontinental cycling world records. His story also offers a firsthand perspective on the business, political, and philanthropic climate in the last quarter of the twentieth century and serves as an important case study for anyone interested in overcoming a seemingly insurmountable challenge. Readers will also discover practical leadership lessons and unconventional ways of approaching business.
Ida Kohlmeyer's unique talent evolved from her student years under Hans Hoffmann in the 50's abstract expressionist movement to the cluster series in the 1970s. This beautifully illustrated monograph is the first collection of her paintings and sculpture since her death in 1997. 104 colour plates
“An essential account of America’s greatest sculptor . . . [A] magnum opus.” —Marjorie Perloff, The Times Literary Supplement The landmark biography of the inscrutable and brilliant David Smith, the greatest American sculptor of the twentieth century. David Smith, a pioneer of Abstract Expressionism, did more than any other sculptor of his era to bring the plastic arts to the forefront of the American scene. Central to his project of reimagining sculptural experience was challenging the stability of any identity or position—Smith sought out the unbounded, unbalanced, and unexpected, creating works of art that seem to undergo radical shifts as the spectator moves from one point of view to another. So groundbreaking and prolific were his contributions to American art that by the time Smith was just forty years old, Clement Greenberg was already calling him “the greatest sculptor this country has produced.” Michael Brenson’s David Smith: The Art and Life of a Transformational Sculptor is the first biography of this epochal figure. It follows Smith from his upbringing in the Midwest, to his heady early years in Manhattan, to his decision to establish a permanent studio in Bolton Landing in upstate New York, where he would create many of his most significant works—among them the Cubis, Tanktotems, and Zigs. It explores his at times tempestuous personal life, marked by marriages, divorces, and fallings-out as well as by deep friendships with fellow artists like Helen Frankenthaler and Robert Motherwell. His wife Jean Freas described him as “salty and bombastic, jumbo and featherlight, thin-skinned and Mack Truck. And many more things.” This enormous, contradictory vitality was true of his work as well. He was a bricoleur, a master welder, a painter, a photographer, and a writer, and he entranced critics and attracted admirers wherever he showed his work. With this book, Brenson has contextualized Smith for a new generation and confirmed his singular place in the history of American art.
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