Steven C. Caton's Books

Yemen Chronicle

An Anthropology of War and Mediation

By: Steven C. Caton

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Yemen Chronicle

An Anthropology of War and Mediation

By: Steven C. Caton

A report like no other from the heart of the Arab Middle East In 1979, Steven C. Caton went to a remote area of Yemen to do fieldwork on the famous oral poetry of its tribes. The recent hostage crisis in Iran made life perilous for a young American in the Middle East; worse, he was soon embroiled in a dangerous local conflict. Yemen Chronicle is Caton's touchingly candid acount of the extraordinary events that ensued. One day a neighboring sheikh came angrily to the sanctuary village where Caton lived, claiming that a man there had abducted his daughter and another girl. This was cause for war, and even though the culprit was captured and mediation efforts launched, tribal hostilities simmered for months. A man who was helping to resolve the dispute befriended Caton, showing him how the poems recited by the belligerents were connected to larger Arab conflicts and giving him refuge when the sanctuary was attacked. Then, unexpectedly, Caton himself was arrested and jailed for being an American spy. It was 2001 before Caton could return toYemen to untangle the story of why he had been imprisoned and what had happened to the missing girls. Placing his contradictory experiences in their full context, Yemen Chronicle is not only an invaluable assessment of classical ethnographic procedures but also a profound meditation on the political, cultural, and sexual components of modern Arab culture.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

354

Publisher

Hill and Wang

Published Date

ISBN 10

1466807733

ISBN 13

9781466807730

Lawrence of Arabia

A Film's Anthropology

By: Steven C. Caton

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Lawrence of Arabia

A Film's Anthropology

By: Steven C. Caton

Combining ethnography, film criticism, and his extensive knowledge of the Middle East, Steven C. Caton presents an innovative and fascinating examination of the classic film, Lawrence of Arabia. Caton is interested in why this epic film has been so compelling for so many people for more than three decades. In seeking an answer he draws from situations in his own life, biographies of the film's key participants, and analyses of issues relating to class, gender, colonialism, and cultural differences. The result is a many-prismed book that poses important questions of ethnographic representation and the discourse of power. Caton's approach is dialectical, and his readings of the film are situated within different historical periods, from the early 1960s to the present. Among the subjects he highlights are travel and colonialism in fieldwork and filmmaking, orientalism in the representation of the Other, and the film's ambiguous handling of masculinity and homosexuality. Caton looks at his own reactions to the film at various stages in his life and offers a thought-provoking account of the film's reception by today's high school and college students. This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press's mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1999. Combining ethnography, film criticism, and his extensive knowledge of the Middle East, Steven C. Caton presents an innovative and fascinating examination of the classic film, Lawrence of Arabia. Caton is interested in why this epic film has been so

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

319

Publisher

Univ of California Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0520919890

ISBN 13

9780520919891

Peaks of Yemen I Summon

Poetry as Cultural Practice in a North Yemeni Tribe

By: Steven C. Caton

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Peaks of Yemen I Summon

Poetry as Cultural Practice in a North Yemeni Tribe

By: Steven C. Caton

In this first full-scale ethnographic study of Yemeni tribal poetry, Steven Caton reveals an astonishingly rich folkloric system where poetry is both a creation of art and a political and social act. Almost always spoken or chanted, Yemeni tribal poetry is cast in an idiom considered colloquial and "ungrammatical," yet admired for its wit and spontaneity. In Yemeni society, the poet has power over people. By eloquence the poet can stir or, if his poetic talents are truly outstanding, motivate an audience to do his bidding. Yemeni tribesmen think, in fact, that poetry's transformative effect is too essential not to use for pressing public issues. Drawing on his three years of field research in North Yemen, Caton illustrates the significance of poetry in Yemeni society by analyzing three verse genres and their use in weddings, war mediations, and political discourse on the state. Moreover, Caton provides the first anthropology of poetics. Challenging Western cultural assumptions that political poetry can rarely rise above doggerel, Caton develops a model of poetry as cultural practice. To compose a poem is to construct oneself as a peacemaker, as a warrior, as a Muslim. Thus the poet engages in constitutive social practice. Because of its highly interdisciplinary approach, this book will interest a wide range of readers including anthropologists, linguists, folklorists, literary critics, and scholars of Middle Eastern society, language, and culture.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

380

Publisher

Univ of California Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0520913728

ISBN 13

9780520913721

Yemen Chronicle

An Anthropology of War and Mediation

By: Steven C. Caton

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Yemen Chronicle

An Anthropology of War and Mediation

By: Steven C. Caton

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

354

Publisher

Hill and Wang

Published Date

ISBN 10

1466807733

ISBN 13

9781466807730

Lawrence of Arabia

A Film's Anthropology

By: Steven C. Caton

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Lawrence of Arabia

A Film's Anthropology

By: Steven C. Caton

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

319

Publisher

Univ of California Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0520919890

ISBN 13

9780520919891

Book's by Steven C. Caton

Yemen Chronicle

Yemen Chronicle

Lawrence of Arabia

Lawrence of Arabia

Peaks of Yemen I Summon

Peaks of Yemen I Summon

Yemen Chronicle

Yemen Chronicle

Lawrence of Arabia

Lawrence of Arabia

Username

Password

Username

Password

Password again

Birthday

Email