Sensuous Knowledge

Sensuous Knowledge

Author: Minna Salami

Publisher: Zed Books Ltd.

Published: 2020-03-25

Total Pages: 192

ISBN-13: 178699528X

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In Sensuous Knowledge, Minna Salami draws on Africa-centric, feminist-first and artistic traditions to help us rediscover inclusive and invigorating ways of experiencing the world afresh. Combining the playfulness of a storyteller with the insight of a social critic, the book pries apart the systems of power and privilege that have dominated ways of thinking for centuries – and which have led to so much division, prejudice and damage. And it puts forward a new, sensuous, approach to knowledge: one grounded in a host of global perspectives – from Black Feminism to personal narrative, pop culture to high art, Western philosophy to African mythology – together comprising a vision of hope for a fragmented world riven by crisis. Through the prism of this new knowledge, Salami offers fresh insights into the key cultural issues that affect women’s lives. How are we to view Sisterhood, Motherhood or even Womanhood itself? What is Power and why do we conceive of Beauty? How does one achieve Liberation? She asks women to break free of the prison made by ingrained male-centric biases, and build a house themselves – a home that can nurture us all. Sensuous Knowledge confirms Minna Salami as one the most important spokespeople of today, and the arrival of a blistering new literary voice.


The Spell of the Sensuous

The Spell of the Sensuous

Author: David Abram

Publisher: Vintage

Published: 2012-10-17

Total Pages: 344

ISBN-13: 0307830551

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Winner of the International Lannan Literary Award for Nonfiction Animal tracks, word magic, the speech of stones, the power of letters, and the taste of the wind all figure prominently in this intellectual tour de force that returns us to our senses and to the sensuous terrain that sustains us. This major work of ecological philosophy startles the senses out of habitual ways of perception. For a thousand generations, human beings viewed themselves as part of the wider community of nature, and they carried on active relationships not only with other people with other animals, plants, and natural objects (including mountains, rivers, winds, and weather patters) that we have only lately come to think of as "inanimate." How, then, did humans come to sever their ancient reciprocity with the natural world? What will it take for us to recover a sustaining relation with the breathing earth? In The Spell of the Sensuous David Abram draws on sources as diverse as the philosophy of Merleau-Ponty, Balinese shamanism, Apache storytelling, and his own experience as an accomplished sleight-of-hand of magician to reveal the subtle dependence of human cognition on the natural environment. He explores the character of perception and excavates the sensual foundations of language, which--even at its most abstract--echoes the calls and cries of the earth. On every page of this lyrical work, Abram weaves his arguments with a passion, a precision, and an intellectual daring that recall such writers as Loren Eisleley, Annie Dillard, and Barry Lopez.


Knowing Otherwise

Knowing Otherwise

Author: Alexis Shotwell

Publisher: Penn State Press

Published: 2015-09-10

Total Pages: 188

ISBN-13: 0271068051

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Prejudice is often not a conscious attitude: because of ingrained habits in relating to the world, one may act in prejudiced ways toward others without explicitly understanding the meaning of one’s actions. Similarly, one may know how to do certain things, like ride a bicycle, without being able to articulate in words what that knowledge is. These are examples of what Alexis Shotwell discusses in Knowing Otherwise as phenomena of “implicit understanding.” Presenting a systematic analysis of this concept, she highlights how this kind of understanding may be used to ground positive political and social change, such as combating racism in its less overt and more deep-rooted forms. Shotwell begins by distinguishing four basic types of implicit understanding: nonpropositional, skill-based, or practical knowledge; embodied knowledge; potentially propositional knowledge; and affective knowledge. She then develops the notion of a racialized and gendered “common sense,” drawing on Gramsci and critical race theorists, and clarifies the idea of embodied knowledge by showing how it operates in the realm of aesthetics. She also examines the role that both negative affects, like shame, and positive affects, like sympathy, can play in moving us away from racism and toward political solidarity and social justice. Finally, Shotwell looks at the politicized experience of one’s body in feminist and transgender theories of liberation in order to elucidate the role of situated sensuous knowledge in bringing about social change and political transformation.


Sensuous Geographies

Sensuous Geographies

Author: Paul Rodaway

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2002-09-11

Total Pages: 230

ISBN-13: 1134880707

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The contemporary challenge of postmodernity draws our attention to the nature of reality and the ways in which experience is constructed. Sensuous Geographies explores our immediate sensuous experience of the world. Touch, smell, hearing and sight - the four senses chiefly relevant to geographical experience - both receive and structure information. The process is mediated by historical, cultural and technological factors. Issues of definition are illustrated through a variety of sensuous geographies. Focusing on postmodern concerns with representation, the book brings insights from individual perceptions and cultural observations to an analysis of the senses, challenging us to reconsider the role of the sensuous as not merely the physical basis of understanding but as an integral part of the cultural definition of geographical knowledge.


Sensuous Seas

Sensuous Seas

Author: Eugene H. Kaplan

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2006-07-03

Total Pages: 286

ISBN-13: 140083564X

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Learning marine biology from a textbook is one thing. But take readers to the bottom of the sea in a submarine to discover living fossils or to coral reefs to observe a day in the life of an octopus, and the sea and its splendors come into focus, in brilliant colors and with immediacy. In Sensuous Seas, Eugene Kaplan offers readers an irresistibly irreverent voyage to the world of sea creatures, with a look at their habitats, their beauty and, yes, even their sex lives. A marine biologist who has built fish farms in Africa and established a marine laboratory in Jamaica, Kaplan takes us to oceans across the world to experience the lives of their inhabitants, from the horribly grotesque to the exquisitely beautiful. In chapters with titles such as "Fiddler on the Root" (reproductive rituals of fiddler crabs) and "Size Does Count" (why barnacles have the largest penis, comparatively, in the animal kingdom), Kaplan ventures inside coral reefs to study mating parrotfish; dives 740 feet in a submarine to find living fossils; explains what results from swallowing a piece of living octopus tentacle; and describes a shark attack on a friend. The book is a sensuous blend of sparkling prose and 150 beautiful illustrations that clarify the science. Each chapter opens with an exciting personal anecdote that leads into the scientific exploration of a distinct inhabitant of the sea world--allowing the reader to experience firsthand the incredible complexity of sea life. A one-of-a-kind memoir that unfolds in remarkable reaches of ocean few of us can ever visit for ourselves, Sensuous Seas brings the underwater world back to living room and classroom alike. Readers will be surprised at how much marine biology they have learned while being amused.


Sensual Excess

Sensual Excess

Author: Amber Jamilla Musser

Publisher: NYU Press

Published: 2018-11-06

Total Pages: 247

ISBN-13: 1479886513

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Reimagines black and brown sensuality to develop new modes of knowledge production In Sensual Excess, Amber Jamilla Musser imagines epistemologies of sensuality that emerge from fleshiness. To do so, she works against the framing of black and brown bodies as sexualized, objectified, and abject, and offers multiple ways of thinking with and through sensation and aesthetics. Each chapter draws our attention to particular aspects of pornotropic capture that black and brown bodies must always negotiate. Though these technologies differ according to the nature of their encounters with white supremacy, together they add to our understanding of the ways that structures of domination produce violence and work to contain bodies and pleasures within certain legible parameters. To do so, Sensual Excess analyzes moments of brown jouissance that exceed these constraints. These ruptures illuminate multiple epistemologies of selfhood and sensuality that offer frameworks for minoritarian knowledge production which is designed to enable one to sit with uncertainty. Through examinations of installations and performances like Judy Chicago’s The Dinner Party, Kara Walker’s A Subtlety, Patty Chang’s In Love and Nao Bustamante’s Neapolitan, Musser unpacks the relationships between racialized sexuality and consumption to interrogate foundational concepts in psychoanalytic theory, critical race studies, feminism, and queer theory. In so doing, Sensual Excess offers a project of knowledge production focused not on mastery, but on sensing and imagining otherwise, whatever and wherever that might be.


Sensuous Surfaces

Sensuous Surfaces

Author: Jonathan Hay

Publisher: Reaktion Books

Published: 2010-06-25

Total Pages: 442

ISBN-13: 1861898460

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With Sensuous Surfaces, Jonathan Hay offers one of the most richly illustrated and in-depth introductions to the decorative arts of Ming and Qing dynasty China to date. Examining an immense number of works, he explores the materials and techniques, as well as the effects of patronage and taste, that together have formed a loose system of informal rules that define the decorative arts in early modern China. Hay demonstrates how this system—by engaging the actual and metaphorical potential of surface—guided the production and use of decorative arts from the late sixteenth century through the middle of the nineteenth, a period of explosive growth. He shows how the understanding of decorative arts made a fundamental contribution to the sensory education of China’s early modern urban population. Enriching his study with 280 color plates, he ultimately offers an elegant meditation, not only on Ming and Qing art but on the importance of the erotic in the form and function of decorations of all eras.


Sensuous Magic

Sensuous Magic

Author: Patrick Califia-Rice

Publisher: Cleis Press

Published: 2001-11-09

Total Pages: 266

ISBN-13: 1573441309

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Mixing erotic vignettes with practical how-to suggestions and personal insight, 'Sensuous Magic' is Califia's classic beginner's guide to S/M for couples who harbour fantasies of erotic dominance and submission. Experienced players will appreciate the breadth of Califia's knowledge of safety and technique and his insights into the psychology of S/M. Novices will be reassured by Califia's honest, unpretentious approach.


The Power Book

The Power Book

Author: Joelle Avelino

Publisher: Ivy Kids

Published: 2019-10-01

Total Pages: 67

ISBN-13: 1782408304

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With this inspiring and brightly illustrated guide to power, learn about the different types of power, what it means to have power, and what you can do with your own power to create positive change in the world, no matter who or how old you are. What makes you the boss of me? What makes a king a king, or a queen a queen? Why can some people vote for their leaders, but other people can't? Does having lots of money make you powerful? Why are there fewer female scientists, leaders, and artists than men in history books? These are things that kids wonder about. The Power Book answers these and other questions in a relatable way for young people, including thought-provoking discussions on challenging topics, like war, bullying, racism, sexism, and homophobia. You will gain an understanding of your place in your family, your school, and the world, and will discover ways in which you can use your own power to shape the future. As you explore the many aspects of power, thinking points pose questions that spark self-reflection and quotes and stories from some of the greatest change-makers--such as Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., Emmeline Pankhurst, Rosa Parks, Malala Yousafzai, and Stephen Hawking--provide historical context and inspiration. Find more opportunities for learning at the back with a glossary of terms and suggestions for further reading. Gain a greater understanding of how power works, then learn how to harness it for good with The Power Book.


Morning Knowledge

Morning Knowledge

Author: Kevin Hart

Publisher:

Published: 2011-02

Total Pages: 102

ISBN-13: 9780268088088

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In Morning Knowledge, Kevin Hart grieves the passing of his father, while continuing his unique interlacing of the spiritual and the sensuous. A book of elegies and love poems, prayers and lullabies, a book in which poems sing about a museum of shadows and about rats and afternoons, all wrapped in quatrains, Morning Knowledge is a major book by a poet read and loved throughout the world.