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The American Road Trip And American Political Thought
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Book Synopsis The American Road Trip and American Political Thought by : Susan McWilliams Barndt
Download or read book The American Road Trip and American Political Thought written by Susan McWilliams Barndt and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2020-07-06 with total page 139 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Americans love road trips. They love to go on road trips. They love to read about road trips. They love to watch road trip stories unfold on television and film. Road trip stories are a consistent feature of the American landscape, a central part of American mythology, and an important piece of the American dream. In The American Road Trip and American Political Thought, Susan McWilliams argues that the American fascination with road trip stories is about more than mere escapism or wanderlust. She shows, in walking through stories like On the Road and The Grapes of Wrath, that American road trip stories are a key expression of American political thought. They are not just stories of personal journeys. They are stories of the American nation. McWilliams Barndt shows how Americans have long used road trip stories to raise and explore central questions about American politics in theory and practice. They talk about freedom and equality and diversity and take those vaunted American ideals for a test drive. American road trip stories are where the rubber meets the road in American political thought. The American Road Trip and American Political Thought includes explorations of a wide variety of American authors, from Walt Whitman and Henry David Thoreau to Erika Lopez and Cheryl Strayed, from Mark Twain and John Steinbeck to Solomon Northup and Hunter S. Thompson. It covers topics including gender, labor, place, race, and technology in American political life. This is a book that will change the way you think about the great American road trip and the great American story.
Book Synopsis Short Stories and Political Philosophy by : Kimberly Hurd Hale
Download or read book Short Stories and Political Philosophy written by Kimberly Hurd Hale and published by Lexington Books. This book was released on 2018-11-01 with total page 296 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book examines the intersection of fictional narratives and political philosophy, focusing specifically on the use of short stories to teach the classic works of political philosophy. It is a resource for scholars and teachers of politics, philosophy, and literature.
Book Synopsis American Political Thought by : Alan Pendleton Grimes
Download or read book American Political Thought written by Alan Pendleton Grimes and published by . This book was released on 1960 with total page 556 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Book Synopsis Citizenship and Civic Leadership in America by : Carol McNamara
Download or read book Citizenship and Civic Leadership in America written by Carol McNamara and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2022-03-14 with total page 327 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The purpose of this volume is to discuss the concept of citizenship—in terms of its origins, its meanings, and its contemporary place and relevance in American democracy, and within a global context. The authors in this collection wrestle with the connection of citizenship to major tensions between liberty and equality, dynamism and stability, and civic disagreement and social cohesion. The essays also raise fundamental questions about the relationship between citizenship and leadership, and invite further reflection on the features of citizenship and civic leadership under the American Constitution. Finally, this collection offers various suggestions about how to revitalize citizenship and civic leadership through an education that is conducive to a renewal of American civic practices and institutions.
Book Synopsis The Cambridge Companion to the Twentieth-Century American Novel and Politics by : Bryan Santin
Download or read book The Cambridge Companion to the Twentieth-Century American Novel and Politics written by Bryan Santin and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2023-10-31 with total page 397 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume analyzes how political movements, ideas, and events shaped the American novel.
Book Synopsis The Politics of Twin Peaks by : Amanda DiPaolo
Download or read book The Politics of Twin Peaks written by Amanda DiPaolo and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2019-02-14 with total page 213 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The strange and wonderful place of Twin Peaks captivated audiences for more than two decades before its long-awaited return to television in 2017. David Lynch and Mark Frost created a land that embodies the politics of American culture. With its focus on small-town America and life outside urban centers, rural and suburban values play a big part in the overall Twin Peaks narrative. More than just a soapy murder investigation or a mysterious puzzle to be solved, Twin Peaks and Twin Peaks: The Return are metaphors for the political years in which they are set. The Politics of Twin Peaks investigates the show’s engagement with American politics and identity. With a close relationship between the two, Twin Peaks is the rare cultural landmark in both film and television whose timelessness is defined by the fact that it can constantly be reinterpreted. Within that sometimes dreamlike Lynchian narrative, Twin Peaks hints at, sometimes explicitly and sometimes subtly, the political fault lines in the United States. In this edited collection, the politics inherent in Twin Peaks is approached from numerous points of view.
Book Synopsis Baudelaire Contra Benjamin by : Beibei Guan
Download or read book Baudelaire Contra Benjamin written by Beibei Guan and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2019-05-23 with total page 235 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book offers the first sustained argument against the philosophy of Walter Benjamin and his readings of Charles Baudelaire. More broadly, it is also a critique of politicized aesthetics and cultural Marxism, of which Benjamin is a pioneering and emblematic figure. Cristaudo and Beibei argue that Baudelaire was not mistaken in refusing to subject aesthetics to morality and politics. Baudelaire’s refusal was based on the recognition that existential matters, such as sickness, evil, death, sexual longing, melancholy, and beauty itself—all themes at the center of his poetry—are by nature intrinsically supra-political. By contrast, Benjamin’s faith in political redemption, while breaking with the enlightenment’s faith in progress, nevertheless conforms to another core element of faith of the enlightenment, via faith in the ability of morals and politics to liberate humanity. The authors make the case that Benjamin’s understanding of politics is severely deficient because it is not sufficiently versed in an understanding of economics or the nature of class interests, and that Marx’s own theory of economics is fundamentally deficient and creates an insurmountable problem for those deferring to a future industrial society free from capitalism.
Book Synopsis Flattering the Demos by : Marlene K. Sokolon
Download or read book Flattering the Demos written by Marlene K. Sokolon and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2018-10-31 with total page 182 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: To understand the movements of democratic society one must appreciate fictional narratives and not depend on rationalistic argumentation and scientific analyses. This volume examines the lessons and effects of storytelling in democratic culture and political life, as it articulates our aspirations, communicates our fears, and criticizes our reality.
Book Synopsis Wonder and Cruelty by : Steven Johnston
Download or read book Wonder and Cruelty written by Steven Johnston and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2018-12-11 with total page 125 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: It’s a Wonderful Life is an American film classic celebrated for its inspirational character. Famously shown during the holiday season, it brings families together in the spirit of mutual love and support. It tells the story of George Bailey, who turns suicidal one Christmas Eve after decades of frustration and sacrifice in which his dreams are repeatedly shattered for the good of others. George is convinced that his life is anything but wonderful. Enter Clarence, his guardian angel, who must find a way to get George to appreciate his family, friends, and all the good he does in life. Clarence does find a way and George returns to his family at film’s close. This might seem like a fairy-tale ending, but it is anything but convincing, which should come as no surprise since the film rehearses an ontological war between contending parties with rival conceptions of what it means to lead a meaningful life. It is a rather one-sided conflict as George finds himself more or less alone in the world. He has been trying to escape his hometown his entire life in order to pursue his Promethean vision in the wider world. To prevent this, God dispatches Clarence to get George to heel. He resorts to a kind of transcendental terrorism to force George to return home and believe it was his own idea. Yet what does it say about a form of life when it resorts to such means to prevail in an existential contest? From a Nietzschean perspective, it is possible to illuminate the film’s extraordinary cruelty. Despite appearances, George’s restoration is temporary at best and there is every reason to believe that eventually he will try to take his life again. Tragically, George must leave Bedford Falls and those who love him must insist that he go.
Book Synopsis Popular Culture and the Political Values of Neoliberalism by : George A. Gonzalez
Download or read book Popular Culture and the Political Values of Neoliberalism written by George A. Gonzalez and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2019-02-01 with total page 121 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Reality is made up of the Absolute and Causality. The absolute (most saliently philosophized about by Georg Hegel) is where normative values inhere. Causality can be described as the measurable effects of the normative values of the absolute and the laws of physics (also ostensibly a product of the absolute). Humans are special insofar as they access the higher aspects of the Absolute – altruism, compassion, love, humor, science, engineering, etc. The Absolute also contains what can be considered the less attractive values or impulses: greed, lust for power, hate, self-centeredness, conceit, etc. Predicating society on what I deem the lower (spirits) aspects of the absolute (most prominently, greed) results in personal, social dysfunction and ultimately the end of civilization. Conversely, a society based on justice is stable and vibrant. Justice is a classless society, free of gender and ethnic biases. My argument is based on popular culture – especially the Star Trek franchise. One implication of my thesis is that capitalist values generate psychological neurosis and societal instability – even catastrophe. Additionally, the political values that dominate the current neoliberalist world system (and especially the American government) are the other, the will to power – resulting in war, and global political instability. Popular culture is germane to philosophy and contemporary politics because television/movie creators frequently try to attract viewers by conveying authentic philosophical and political motifs. Conversely, viewers seek out authentic movies and television shows. This is in contrast to opinion surveys (for instance), as the formation of the data begins with the surveyor seeking to directly solicit an opinion – however impromptu or shallow
Book Synopsis American Political Thought by : Whittington
Download or read book American Political Thought written by Whittington and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2019-06-12 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Book Synopsis Human Nature and Politics in Utopian and Anti-Utopian Fiction by : Nivedita Bagchi
Download or read book Human Nature and Politics in Utopian and Anti-Utopian Fiction written by Nivedita Bagchi and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2018-10-15 with total page 101 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: While the interest in anti-utopias has exploded over the years, issues of human nature rarely make it into the discussion of these works of literature. Yet conceptions of human nature play a key role in both the utopian belief that the perfect political system can be achieved and in the anti-utopian conviction that an ideal state is neither possible nor desirable, and would simply lead to a repressive state. This book examines two well-known utopias and two anti-utopias to draw out their conceptions of human nature and show that these conceptions are directly related to their views on politics. It shows that utopians emphasize that human nature is knowable, predictable, and therefore, open to manipulation and/or suppression. Anti-utopians, on the other hand, make the claim that human nature is not entirely knowable or predictable. While they worry about the power of the state to manipulate human nature, they also make the case that the natural recalcitrance and unpredictability of human beings would lead inevitably to a search for freedom and individuality and, therefore, to a clash between the state and the individual in the supposedly ideal state. Ultimately, therefore, these anti-utopians suggest a new conception of human beings as people who value the power to choose their own ends and are unable to entirely suppress their desire for freedom. These two conceptions of human nature lead to two dramatically different conceptions of politics. Utopians see the possibility of manipulating human nature to create an ideal political system which synthesizes all political values and issues while anti-utopians reject both the possibility and desirability of an ideal political system and make the case for providing freedom of choice for all people.
Book Synopsis Theology and Geometry by : Leslie Marsh
Download or read book Theology and Geometry written by Leslie Marsh and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2020-01-29 with total page 203 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This collection, the first of its kind, brings together specially commissioned academic essays to mark fifty years since the death of John Kennedy Toole.
Book Synopsis The Idea of Fraternity in America by : Wilson Carey McWilliams
Download or read book The Idea of Fraternity in America written by Wilson Carey McWilliams and published by . This book was released on 2023-06 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "A complex, intellectually jarring, and valuable book, one which reveals how early America became her true self as we now know her." --Kirkus Reviews The United States is currently experiencing a crisis of citizenship and democracy. For many of us, there is a sense of forlornness caused by losing sight of human connectedness and the bonds of community. Originally published in 1973, and long out of print, The Idea of Fraternity in America is a resonant call to reclaim and restore the communal bonds of democracy by one of the most important political theorists of the twentieth century, Wilson Carey McWilliams. This sprawling and majestic book offers a comprehensive and original interpretation of the whole range of American historical and political thought, from seventeenth-century White Puritanism to twentieth-century Black American political thought. In one sense, it is a long and sustained reflection on the American political tradition, with side glances at other cultures and other traditions; in another sense, it is an impressive beginning to an original and comprehensive theory of politics, rooted in a new reading of a vast array of relevant sources. Speaking with a prescience unmatched by his contemporaries, McWilliams argues that in order to address the malaise of our modern democracy we must return to an ideal of our past: fraternity, a relation of affection founded on shared values and goals. This 50th anniversary edition, which offers a critique of the liberal tradition and a new social philosophy for the future, contains a new introduction from McWilliams's daughter, Susan McWilliams Barndt. She writes, "At a time when many Americans are wondering how we got to where we are today . . . this book demonstrates that there is in fact a lot of precedent for what feels so unprecedented in contemporary American politics."
Book Synopsis The United States Constitution in Film by : Eric T. Kasper
Download or read book The United States Constitution in Film written by Eric T. Kasper and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2018-10-15 with total page 315 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The U.S. Constitution is often depicted in popular films, teaching lessons about what this founding document means and what it requires. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington educates how a bill becomes a law. 12 Angry Men informs us about the rights of the accused. Selma explores the importance of civil rights, voting rights, and the freedom of speech. Lincoln shows us how to amend the Constitution. Not only have films like these been used to teach viewers about the Constitution; they also express the political beliefs of directors, producers, and actors, and they have been a reflection of what the public thinks generally, true or not, about the meaning of the Constitution. From the indictment of Warren Court rulings in Dirty Harry to the defense of the freedom of the press in All the President’s Men and The Post, filmmakers are often putting their stamp on what they believe the Constitution should mean and protect. These films can serve as a catalyst for nationwide conversations about the Constitution and as a way of either reinforcing or undermining the constitutional orthodoxies of their time. Put another way, these films are both symbols and products of the political tug of war over the interpretation of our nation’s blueprint for government and politics. To the contemporary student and the casual reader, popular films serve as an understandable way to explain the Constitution. This book examines several different areas of the Constitution to illuminate how films in each area have tried to engage the document and teach the viewer something about it. We expose myths where they exist in film, draw conclusions about how Hollywood’s constitutional lessons have changed over time, and ultimately compare these films to what the Constitution says and how the U.S. Supreme Court has interpreted it. Given the ever-present discussion of the Constitution in American politics and its importance to the structure of the U.S. government and citizens’ rights, there is no question that the popular perceptions of the document and how people acquire these perceptions are important and timely.
Book Synopsis The Coen Brothers and the Comedy of Democracy by : Sara MacDonald
Download or read book The Coen Brothers and the Comedy of Democracy written by Sara MacDonald and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2018-12-31 with total page 133 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Both critically and commercially successful filmmakers, the Coen brothers have written, produced, and directed numerous acclaimed films over the past three decades. Sara MacDonald and Barry Craig demonstrate that their comedies, in particular, which are often dismissed as mere entertainments, actually present substantial philosophic and political arguments. They examine five of the Coen brothers’ comedies: Raising Arizona, Fargo, The Big Lebowski, O Brother, Where Art Thou, and Hail Caesar!. In those works, they discover insightful engagements with such ideas as questions of human freedom, the relationship of reason to religion, and the nature of liberal democracy in the American regime. They demonstrate how sometimes explicitly, but generally implicitly, the Coens draw on thinkers such as Homer, Plato, Dante, and Hegel, while simultaneously presenting popular entertainment.
Book Synopsis The Final Frontier by : Joel R. Campbell
Download or read book The Final Frontier written by Joel R. Campbell and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2019-03-08 with total page 259 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The proposed book uses the Star Trek television/movie and Star Wars movie series to explain key international relations (IR) concepts and theories. It begins with an overview of the importance of science fiction in literature and film/television. It then presents the development of the Star Trek and Star Wars franchises, and discusses how their progression through time has illustrated key IR theories and concepts. As a bonus, it compares the two franchises to another recent science fiction franchise used to teach IR (Battlestar Galactica).
