First published in 2003. This is Volume II of eight in the Early Sociology of Culture collection and offers a sociological study on the commercialized recreation. Paul G. Cressey while serving as a case-worker and special investigator for the Juvenile Protective Association was requested during the summer of 1925 to report upon the new and then quite unfamiliar closed dance halls. This book is in a sense the outgrowth of those assignments.
Every summer, thousands of people assemble to live together to celebrate the Annual Gathering of the Rainbow Family. Participants establish temporary systems of water distribution and filtration, sanitation, health care, and meals provided freely to all who gather, and they develop sharing and trading systems, recreational opportunities, and educational experiences distinct to this creative social world. The Rainbow Family has invented itself as a unique modern culture without formal organization, providing the necessities of life freely to all who attend. The Annual Gathering of the Rainbow Family has been operating for more than forty years as an experiment in liberty that demonstrates how material organization, participation, and cultural connection can reshape social relationships and transform individual lives. Grounded in sociological theory and research, the book considers what kind of culture the material systems of Babylon reinforce and how society could facilitate the kind of social world and human welfare humans desire."
Offering a rich and insightful road map of Asian American history as it has evolved over more than 200 years, this book marks the first systematic attempt to take stock of this field of study. It examines, comments, and questions the changing assumptions and contexts underlying the experiences and contributions of an incredibly diverse population of Americans. Arriving and settling in this nation as early as the 1790s, with American-born generations stretching back more than a century, Asian Americans have become an integral part of the American experience; this cleverly organized book marks the trajectory of that journey, offering researchers invaluable information and interpretation. Part 1 offers a synoptic narrative history, a chronology, and a set of periodizations that reflect different ways of constructing the Asian American past. Part 2 presents lucid discussions of historical debates—such as interpreting the anti-Chinese movement of the late 1800s and the underlying causes of Japanese American internment during World War II—and such emerging themes as transnationalism and women and gender issues. Part 3 contains a historiographical essay and a wide-ranging compilation of book, film, and electronic resources for further study of core themes and groups, including Chinese, Japanese, Filipino, Hmong, Indian, Korean, Vietnamese, and others.
Gems traces the experience of the Italian immigrant and illustrates the ways in which sports helped Italian-Americans adapt to a new culture, assert pride in an ethnic identity, and even achieve social advancement. Employing historical, sociological, and anthropological studies, Gems explores how sports were instrumental in helping notions of identity evolve from the individual to the community, from the racial to the ethnic. In doing so, Sport and the Shaping of Italian-American Identity transcends the study of a particular ethnic group to speak to foundational values and characteristics of the American ethos.
This study uses sociological and historical methodologies to analyze the role of sport in the formation of urban identity in Chicago. The author traces the transformation of Chicago from a frontier town to a commercial behemoth, examining its role as an immigration, transportation, and entertainment hub. The author argues that, as a pioneering leader in American sport history, Chicago allowed teams and athletes to forge a unique national and global identity. This thorough and well-researched study makes a major contribution to debates on the social and psychological functions of sport culture.
Immigration, Incorporation and Transition is an intriguing collection of articles and essays. It was developed to commemorate the twenty-fi fth anniversary of The Journal of American Ethnic History. Its purpose, like that of the Immigration and Ethnic History Society, is to integrate interdisciplinary perspectives and exciting new scholarship on important themes and issues related to immigration and ethnic history.
«Strictly speaking», James Carey wrote, «there is no history of mass communication research.» This volume is a long-overdue response to Carey's comment about the field's ignorance of its own past. The collection includes essays of historiographical self-scrutiny, as well as new histories that trace the field's institutional evolution and cross-pollination with other academic disciplines. The volume treats the remembered past of mass communication research as crucial terrain where boundaries are marked off and futures plotted. The collection, intended for scholars and advanced graduate students, is an essential compass for the field.
Vietnam and the Colonial Condition of French Literature explores an aspect of modern French literature that has been consistently overlooked in literary histories: the relationship between the colonies—their cultures, languages, and people—and formal shifts in French literary production. Starting from the premise that neither cultural identity nor cultural production can be pure or homogenous, Leslie Barnes initiates a new discourse on the French literary canon by examining the work of three iconic French writers with personal connections to Vietnam: André Malraux, Marguerite Duras, and Linda Lê. In a thorough investigation of the authors’ linguistic, metaphysical, and textual experiences of colonialism, Barnes articulates a new way of reading French literature: not as an inward-looking, homogenous, monolingual tradition, but rather as a tradition of intersecting and interdependent peoples, cultures, and experiences. One of the few books to focus on Vietnam’s position within francophone literary scholarship, Barnes challenges traditional concepts of French cultural identity and offers a new perspective on canonicity and the division between “French” and “francophone” literature.
The first book to look at the structural, legal, and cultural aspects of J. Edgar Hoover's war on crime in the 1930s, a New Deal campaign which forged new links between citizenship, federal policing, and the ideal of centralized government. WAR ON CRIME reminds us of how and why our worship of violent celebrity hero G-men and gangsters came about and how we now are reaping the results. 10 photos.
