In an unprecedented collaboration, two scholars investigate these masterpieces in their broad cultural context. This book is an illustrated, extensively documented, analytical tour de force.
Between 1770 and 1800, transformations in the relationship between metropolitan British society and its colonial holdings, and in the concept of the nation itself, left Britons with a new sense of themselves. Over the same period, the consolidation of the middle classes was accompanied by growing social constraints on sexuality and family life. Staging Governance locates the intersection of these two trends in the representation of British India on the London stage. Theatrical productions, especially those representing colonial life, pushed the limits of public discourse on sexuality and colonialism even as the government made efforts to shape and narrow them. At the same time, official discourse on colonial practices, such as the public trials of Clive and Hastings, became theatrical events themselves. Exploring this rapidly shifting world through a series of original readings of dramatic texts and important moments of oratory, Staging Governance demonstrates how the perceived crises of imperial and domestic Britain joined these spheres in the popular imagination. The economics of political and sexual exchange not only became entwined but functioned as mutual supports during a period of social, cultural, and political readjustment.
At the same time, official speeches and proceedings on colonial practices, such as the public trials of Clive and Hastings, became theatrical events themselves."--Jacket.
Staging Authority: Presentation and Power in Nineteenth-Century Europe is a comprehensive handbook on how the presentation, embodiment, and performance of authority changed in the long nineteenth century. It focuses on the diversification of authority: what new forms and expressions of authority arose in that critical century, how traditional authority figures responded and adapted to those changes, and how the public increasingly participated in constructing and validating authority. It pays particular attention to how spaces were transformed to offer new possibilities for the presentation of authority, and how the mediatization of presence affected traditional authority. The handbook’s fourteen chapters draw on innovative methodologies in cultural history and the aligned fields of the history of emotions, urban geography, persona studies, gender studies, media studies, and sound studies.
Staging Tianxia explores the ancient Chinese vision of world order known as tianxia (all under heaven) by focusing on the historical, performative, and rhetorical processes of expressive arts and cultural heritages that inform a vision of China as a historically multiethnic and cosmopolitan nation. Author Lanlan Kuang unites multimedia ethnographic research and theoretical insights from ethnomusicology, philosophy, religious studies, performance studies, and cognitive science, with a focus on Dunhuang bihua yuewu, a modern interpretation inserted into the Chinese classical dance and theatrical arts tradition. Staging Tianxia thus aims to redefine Silk Road studies and Dunhuangology, a transdisciplinary field dedicated to studying the texts and art of Dunhuang, a UNESCO World Heritage Site that connected China via the Silk Road with Central Asia, South Asia, Europe, and the Middle East. Staging Tianxia is a careful ethnographic study that looks at the importance of performance tradition and poetics in the arts and aesthetic theory of China.
The fifteen essays in this book explore the influence of imperialism in a range of urban centres, including London, Paris, Rome, Vienna, Marseilles, Glasgow and Seville. The first part on "imperial landscapes" is devoted to large-scale architectural schemes and monuments, including the Queen Victoria Memorial in London and the Vittoriano in Rome. In the second part, the focus is on imperial display throughout the city, from spectacular exhibitions and ceremonies, to more private displays of empire in suburban gardens. The final part considers the changing cultural and political identities in the imperial city, looking particularly at nationalism, masculinity and anti-imperialism.
The nineteenth century is notable for its newly proclaimed emperors, from Franz I of Austria and Napoleon I in 1804 through Agustin and Pedro, the emperors of Mexico and Brazil in 1822 to Victoria, empress of India in 1876. Monarchs such as Napoleon III, Maximilian of Mexico, and Wilhelm Iprojected an imperial aura with coronations, courts, medals, costumes, portraits, monuments, international exhibitions, festivals, architecture, and town planning. They relied on ancient history for legitimacy whilst partially espousing modernity. Projecting Imperial Power is the first book toconsider newly proclaimed emperors in six territories across three continents across the whole range of the nineteenth century.The first emperors' successors - Pedro II of Brazil, Franz Joseph of Austria, and Wilhelm II of Germany - expanded their panoply of power, until Pedro was forced to abdicate in 1889 and World War I brought the Austrian and German empires to an end. Britain invented an imperial myth for its Indianempire in the 20th century, until George VI relinquished the title of emperor in 1947. The imperial cities of Berlin, Paris, Vienna, and New Delhi bear witness to vanished empires.Using a wide range of source Projecting Imperial Power explains the imperial ambition behind these imperial cities. It discusses how the empires and their rulers are remembered today by examining how the imperial statues that were erected in huge numbers in the second part of the period are treatedtoday, and how this demonstrates the contested place of emperors in national cultural memory.
This is the first book to consider the relationship between British imperialism and music. With its unique ability to stimulate the emotions and to create mental images, music was used to dramatize, illustrate, and reinforce the components of the ideological cluster that constituted British imperialism in its heyday: patriotism, monarchism, hero-worship, Protestantism, racialism, and chivalry. It was also used to emphasize the inclusiveness of Britain by stressing the contributions of England, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland to the imperial project.
For many years, scholars struggled to write the history of the constitution and political structure of the Holy Roman Empire. This book argues that this was because the political and social order could not be understood without considering the rituals and symbols that held the Empire together. What determined the rules (and whether they were followed) depended on complex symbolic-ritual actions. By examining key moments in the political history of the Empire, the author shows that it was a vocabulary of symbols, not the actual written laws, that formed a political language indispensable in maintaining the common order.