FILM STUDIES
Deleuze and the Cinemas of Performance: Powers of Affection.
By Elena del Rio, assistant professor of film studies, University of Alberta. Edinburgh University Press, £55.00. ISBN 9780748635252
This is the first study of the interface between Deleuzian theory and film performance, offering a reconsideration of the performing body that privileges the notion of affective force over the notion of visual form at the centre of former theories of spectacle and performativity.
HISTORY
Clothing: A Global History.
By Robert Ross, professor of African history, University of Leiden. Polity, £50.00 and £15.99. ISBN 9780745631868 and 1875
This book brings a global perspective to the subject of clothing, with many countries and all continents being discussed. It investigates the symbolic and message-bearing aspects of clothing and surveys practical matters of production and distribution.
William Crookes (1832-1919) and the Commercialization of Science
By William H. Brock, emeritus professor of the history of science, University of Leicester. Ashgate, £65.00. ISBN 9780754663225
The life of William Crookes was a long one of unbroken scientific and business activity. His extraordinary career provides a unique window into the world of Victorian and Edwardian science.
The Chinese Diaspora in the Pacific
Edited by Anthony Reid, professor and research leader of history, National University of Singapore
Ashgate, £80.00
ISBN 9780754657491
The essays reprinted here trace the history of Chinese emigration into the Pacific region, first as individuals, traders or exiles moving into the "Nanyang" (Southeast Asia), then as a mass migration across the ocean after the mid-19th century.
Peoples of the Pacific: The History of Oceania to 1870
Edited by Paul D'Arcy, fellow in the division of Pacific and Asian history, Australian National University. Ashgate, £80.00. ISBN 9780754662211
This attempts to show that the indigenous inhabitants of the Pacific Islands have a history that is as dynamic and complex as that of literate societies, and one that is much more retrievable through multidisciplinary approaches than we often perhaps realise.
Falling from Grace: Reversal of Fortune and the English Nobility 1075-1455
By J.S. Bothwell, lecturer in later medieval English history, University of Leicester. Manchester University Press, £60.00. ISBN 9780719075216
This study examines how members of the English medieval nobility and their families fell, usually dramatically and often violently, from position and power in the period 1075-1455.
Portmahomack: Monastery of the Picts
By Martin Carver, professor of archaeology, University of York. Edinburgh University Press, £24.99 and £75.00. ISBN 9780748624423 and 4416
This book, an illustrated account of the earliest Pictish Christian monastery, surveys one of the most important archaeological discoveries in Scotland in the past 30 years.
Bannockburn: The Scottish War and the British Isles 1307-1323
By Michael Brown, lecturer in Scottish history, University of St Andrews. Edinburgh University Press £19.99 and £60.00. ISBN 9780748633333 and 3326
This book analyses the road to Bannockburn, the campaign of 1314 and the aftermath of the fight. It demonstrates that in both its context and legacy the battle had a central significance in the shaping of nations and identities in the late medieval British Isles.
LITERATURE
The Culture of Cloth in Early Modern England: Textual Constructions of a National Identity
By Roze Hentschell, associate professor of English, Colorado State University. Ashgate, £50.00. ISBN 9780754663010
This study, which explores the intersections between the culture of the wool broadcloth industry and the imaginative literature of the early modern period, shows how the culture of the cloth industry was intrinsically connected to the development of emerging English nationalism.
Radical Comedy in Early Modern England: Contexts, Cultures, Performances
By Rick Bowers, professor of English, University of Alberta. Ashgate, £45.00. ISBN 9780754663805
This book explores the radical nature of early modern English comedy and uses comedy to track changes in human behaviour common to the Renaissance.
Anthony Burgess and Modernity
Edited by Alan Roughley, associate professor of English literature, Liverpool Hope University. Manchester University Press, £55.00. ISBN 9780719078866
A range of international scholars and critics explore the novels, music and linguistic productions of Anthony Burgess to explore and define how he contributed to modernist and postmodernist art.
PHILOSOPHY
God and Phenomenal Consciousness: A Novel Approach to Knowledge Arguments
By Yujin Nagasawa, lecturer in philosophy, University of Birmingham. Cambridge University Press, £45.00. ISBN 9780521879668
Yujin Nagasawa bridges debates in the philosophy of mind and the philosophy of religion, introducing some of the most powerful arguments against the existence of God and providing new objections to them.
I Was Wrong: The Meanings of Apologies
By Nick Smith, assistant professor of philosophy, University of New Hampshire. Cambridge University Press, £45.00 and £15.99. ISBN 9780521865524 and 684231
Nick Smith argues that we suffer from considerable confusion about the moral meanings and social functions of apologies. He explains how apologies have evolved from a confluence of diverse cultural and religious practices that do not translate easily into secular discourse or gender stereotypes.
POLITICS
The Politics of Official Apologies
By Melissa Nobles, associate professor of political science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Cambridge University Press, £40.00 and £19.99. ISBN 9780521872317 and 693851
This examines the political uses of official apologies in Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the US. It explores why minority groups seek such apologies and the various ways in which governments respond.
The Cultural Lives of Cause Lawyers
Edited by Austin Sarat, William Nelson Cromwell professor of jurisprudence and political science, Amherst College, and Stuart Scheingold, professor emeritus of political science, University of Washington. Cambridge University Press, £55.00 and £22.99. ISBN 9780521884488 and 711357
This book seeks to illuminate the cultural lives of cause lawyers by examining their representations in various popular media, the work they do as creators of cultural products and the way those representations and products are received and consumed by various audiences.
SOCIAL SCIENCES
Hacking
By Tim Jordan, lecturer in sociology, The Open University. Polity, £45.00 and £13.99. ISBN 9780745639710 and 97
In this introduction to the community of hackers and analysis of 21st-century societies, Tim Jordan provides an insight into the varied identities of hackers.
THEATRE STUDIES
Transnational Exchange in Early Modern Theater
Edited by Robert Henke, associate professor of drama and comparative literature and chair of comparative literature, Washington University in St Louis, and Eric Nicholson, professor of literature and theatre studies, Syracuse University in Florence. Ashgate, £55.00. ISBN 9780754662815
Emphasising a performative and stage-centred approach, this book considers early modern European theatre as an international phenomenon, looking at cultural relationships of exchange and reciprocity.
