Clockwork Books
Clockwork Books publishes for an African audience first, but we believe that our stories resonate with readers further afield. We would especially like to find new global audiences for our titles.
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The ArtsJanuary 2025Refashioning the Renaissance
Everyday dress in Europe, 1500–1650
by Paula Hohti
How did ordinary men and women dress in early modern Europe? What fabrics and garments formed the essential elements of fashion for artisans and shopkeepers? Did they rely on affordable alternatives to the silks, jewellery, and decorations favoured by the wealthy elite? Or did those with modest means find innovative ways to express their fashion sense? This book provides new perspectives on early modern clothing and fashion history byinvestigating the consumption and meaning of fashionable clothing and accessories among the 'popular' classes. Through a close examination of the materials, craftsmanship and cultural significance of fashion items owned by and available to a broad group of consumers, it challenges conventional assumptions that the everyday dress of ordinary families was limited to a narrow selection of garments made of coarse textiles, often produced at home and resistant to change.
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Humanities & Social SciencesJune 2004Dress and globalisation
by Margaret Maynard, Christopher Breward, Bill Sherman
Dress and globalisation is the first work to survey dress around the world, drawing together issues of consumption, ethnicity, gender and the body, as well as anthropological accounts and studies of representation. It examines international western style dress, including jeans and business suits, headwear and hairdressing, ethnicity and so called 'ethnic chic', clothes for the tourist market, the politicisation of traditional dress, 'alternative' dressing, and T-shirts as temporary markers of identity. It also considers dress and environmental issues, touching on adventure gear, the 'green' consumer and the possible impact of 'smart' clothing. Dispelling the myth of universal 'world' attire, this book demonstrates that western-style clothing transcends geographical boundaries but along with other forms of dress, can form a montage of differing tastes, ethnic preferences and national and local imperatives. By discussing the nature of globalisation, this book shows that, if economics permit, all cultures are selective in their choice of what to wear. Dress and globalisation will be welcomed by students of dress history and cultural studies. ;
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Humanities & Social SciencesApril 2025Material masculinities
Men and goods in eighteenth-century England
by Ben Jackson
Material Masculinities examines the material and consumer practices of over 1000 men from the middling and upper ranks of eighteenth-century society, c.1650-1850. It draws upon evidence from over 35 archives and museum collections to detail how material objects were integral for men in forming identities and shaping experiences. For men of all social ranks, ages, and geographic locations, material knowledge was imperative for masculine social identities to operate in a commercial society. Before the centralised factory and widespread mass-produced goods, men personalised and repaired their goods; products were shaped by men's attitudes and concerns. Objects were tools in men's identity formation and the exercise of social and gendered power. There was a reciprocal relationship between men and goods in this period; men were active agents of material and commercial change driving product and aesthetic innovation.
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The ArtsNovember 2024'The industrialized designer'
Gender, identity and professionalization in Britain and the United States, 1930-80
by Leah Armstrong
What does it mean to be called an industrial designer? This book traces the remarkable rise of this professional identity in historical perspective from a position of anonymity in the early twentieth century, to mid-century professionalisation, to decline and disintegration by 1980. Drawing on new, extensive, original archival research, it uncovers the history of a profession in a state of re-invention, 1930-1980 in Britain and the United States. The book tests assumptions about the relationship between the professions in the two countries, bringing them into comparative historical perspective for the first time. The gendered dynamics of professionalisation and their interaction with the representation of the heroic male designer are interrogated and critically examined. Building on new gender perspectives to the history of the industrial design profession, the book calls for a re-examination of the limits and boundaries of what constitutes professional identity and work.
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Humanities & Social SciencesJune 2010The Material Renaissance
None
by Michelle O'Malley, Christopher Breward, Evelyn Welch, Bill Sherman
Despite the recent interests of economic and art historians in the workings of the market, we still know remarkably little about the everyday context for the exchange of objects and the meaning of demand in the lives of individuals in the Renaissance. Nor do we have much sense of the relationship between the creation and purchase of works of art and the production, buying and selling of other types of objects in Italy in the period. The material Renaissance addresses these issues of economic and social life. It develops the analysis of demand, supply and exchange first proposed by Richard Goldthwaite in his ground-breaking Wealth and the demand for art in Renaissance Italy, and expands our understanding of the particularities of exchange in this consumer-led period. Considering food, clothing and every-day furnishings, as well as books, goldsmiths' work, altarpieces and other luxury goods, the book draws on contemporary archival material to explore pricing, to investigate production from the point of view of demand, and to look at networks of exchange that relied not only on money but also on credit, payment in kind and gift giving. The material Renaissance establishes the dynamic social character of exchange. It demonstrates that the cost of goods, including the price of the most basic items, was largely contingent upon on the relationship between buyer and seller, shows that communities actively sought new goods and novel means of production long before Colbert encouraged such industrial enterprise in France and reveals the wide ownership of objects, even among the economically disadvantaged. ;
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Humanities & Social SciencesJuly 2024British Bangladeshi Muslims in the East End
The changing landscape of dress and language
by Fatima Rajina
Drawing on the everyday experiences of 43 British-Bangladeshi Muslims living in East London, this book explores stories of migration and belonging vis-à-vis dress and language. In narrating those stories, the book is framed within the broader socio-political conversations happening regarding Muslims in Britain and their 'place' in this society. Recent work on Muslims focuses on their religious identity and its formation, not paying attention to the role of dress and language. With the former, much of it tends to, obsessively, focus on Muslim women only. This book, alternatively, explores religious identity formation in addition to examining the British-Bangladeshi Muslim community's relationship with their ethnic identity vis-à-vis dress and language. As such, the analysis provides a rich, bottom-up analysis of the community, and readers will be able to understand a community holistically, away from the over-sensationalised community within broader socio-political context.
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Material cultureJanuary 2002The study of dress history
by Lou Taylor
Over the past ten years the study of dress history has finally achieved academic respectability. This book shows how the fields of dress history and dress studies are now benefitting from the adoption of new multi-disciplinary approaches and outlines the full range of these approaches which draw on material culture, ethnography, and cultural studies. Raises a series of frank and fresh issues surrounding approaches to the history of dress, including analysis of the academic gender and subject divides that have riven it in the past. Comprehensive, engaging and trenchant, this will become the benchmark volume in the study of dress history.
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Industrial / commercial art & designApril 2017History through material culture
by Series edited by Simon Trafford, Leonie Hannan, Sarah Longair
History through material culture is a unique, step-by-step guide for students and researchers who wish to use objects as historical sources. Responding to the significant, scholarly interest in historical material culture studies, this book makes clear how students and researchers ready to use these rich material sources can make important, valuable and original contributions to history. Written by two experienced museum practitioners and historians, the book recognises the theoretical and practical challenges of this approach and offers clear advice on methods to get the best out of material culture research. With a focus on the early modern and modern periods, this volume draws on examples from across the world and demonstrates how to use material culture to answer a range of enquiries, including social, economic, gender, cultural and global history.
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TelevisionSeptember 2004Terry Nation
by Jonathan Bignell, Andrew O'Day
This is the first in-depth study of the science fiction television devised and written by Terry Nation. Terry Nation was the inventor of the Daleks and wrote other serials for 'Doctor Who'; he also wrote the BBC's 1970s post-apocalyptic drama 'Survivors' and created the space adventure series 'Blake's 7'. Previously television science fiction in Britain has received little critical attention. This book fills that gap and places Nation's work in the context of its production. Using Terry Nation's science fiction work as a case study, the boundaries around the authorship and authority of the television writer are explored in detail. The authors make use of BBC's archival research and specially conducted interviews with television producers and other production staff, to discuss how the programmes that Terry Nation created and wrote were commissioned, produced and brought to the screen. The book makes an important contribution to the study of British television history and will be of interest to enthusiasts of Terry Nation's landmark drama series as well as students of Television Studies.
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History of art & design styles: c 1600 to c 1800October 2014Material goods, moving hands
Perceiving production in England, 1700–1830
by Kate Smith
In eighteenth-century Britain, greater numbers of people entered the marketplace and bought objects in ever-greater quantities. As consumers rather than producers, how did their understandings of manufacturing processes and the material world change? Material goods and moving hands combines material culture and visual culture approaches to explore the different ways in which manufacturers and retailers presented production to consumers during the eighteenth century. It shows how new relationships with production processes encouraged consumers, retailers, designers, manufacturers and workers to develop conflicting understandings of production. Objects then were not just markers of fashion and taste, they acted as important conduits through which people living in Georgian Britain could examine and discuss their material world and the processes and knowledge that rendered it.
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Humanities & Social SciencesDecember 2007Anglo–German relations during the Labour governments 1964–70
NATO strategy, détente and European integration
by Terry Macintyre
Speaking at West Point in 1962, Dean Acheson observed that Britain had lost an empire and had still to find a new role. This book explains why, in the following years, as Britain's Labour government contemplated withdrawal from east of Suez, ministers came to see that Britain's future role would be as a force within Europe. To this end, and in order to gain entry into the European Economic Community, a close relationship with the Federal Republic of Germany would be essential. This account of Anglo-German relations during the 1960s reveals fascinating insights into how both governments reacted to a series of complex issues and why, despite differences which might have led to strains, a good understanding was maintained. Terry Macintyre's innovative approach brings together material covering NATO strategy, détente and European integration, making the volume fascinating and essential reading for students and enthusiasts of contemporary British and German political history. This book makes an important contribution to what we know about Cold War history, and should help to redefine some of the views about the relationship between Britain and Germany during the 1960s. ;
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The ArtsJune 2017Terry Gilliam
by Peter Marks
Terry Gilliam presents a sustained examination of one of cinema's most challenging and lauded auteurs, proposing fresh ways of seeing Gilliam that go beyond reductive readings of him as a gifted but manic fantasist. Analysing Gilliam's work over nearly four decades, from the brilliant anarchy of his Monty Python animations through the nightmarish masterpiece Brazil to the provocative Gothic horror of Tideland, it critically examines the variety and richness of Gilliam's sometimes troubled but always provocative output. The book situates Gilliam within the competing cultural contexts of the British, European and American film industries, examining his regular struggles against aesthetic and commercial pressures. He emerges as a passionate, immensely creative director, whose work encompasses a dizzying array of material: anarchic satire, childhood and adult fantasy, dystopia, romantic comedy, surrealism, road movie, fairy tale and the Gothic. The book charts how Gilliam interweaves these genres and forms to create magical interfaces between reality and the illuminating, frightening but liberating worlds of the imagination. Scrutinising the neglected importance of literature and adaptation in Gilliam's career, this study also observes him through the lenses of auteurism, genre, performance, design and national culture, explaining how someone born in Minnesota and raised in California came to be one of British television and film's most compelling figures.
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The ArtsAugust 2009Terry Gilliam
by Peter Marks, Brian McFarlane, Neil Sinyard
Terry Gilliam presents a sustained examination of one of cinema's most challenging and lauded auteurs, proposing fresh ways of seeing Gilliam that go beyond reductive readings of him as a gifted but manic fantasist. Analysing Gilliam's work over nearly four decades, from the brilliant anarchy of his Monty Python animations through the nightmarish masterpiece Brazil to the provocative Gothic horror of Tideland, it critically examines the variety and richness of Gilliam's sometimes troubled but always provocative output. The book situates Gilliam within the competing cultural contexts of the British, European and American film industries, examining his regular struggles against aesthetic and commercial pressures. He emerges as a passionate, immensely creative director, whose work encompasses a dizzying array of material: anarchic satire, childhood and adult fantasy, dystopia, romantic comedy, surrealism, road movie, fairy tale and the Gothic. The book charts how Gilliam interweaves these genres and forms to create magical interfaces between reality and the illuminating, frightening but liberating worlds of the imagination. Scrutinising the neglected importance of literature and adaptation in Gilliam's career, this study also observes him through the lenses of auteurism, genre, performance, design and national culture, explaining how someone born in Minnesota and raised in California came to be one of British television and film's most compelling figures. ;
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The ArtsSeptember 2019Queer Objects
by Chris Brickell, Judith Collard
Queer lives give rise to a vast array of objects: the things we fill our houses with, the gifts we share with our friends, the commodities we consume at work and at play, the clothes and accessories we wear, and the analogue and digital technologies we use to communicate with one another. But what makes an object queer? The sixty-three chapters in Queer Objects consider this question in relation to lesbian, gay and transgender communities across time, cultures and space. In this unique international collaboration, well-known and newer writers traverse world history to write about items ranging from ancient Egyptian tomb paintings and Roman artefacts to political placards, snapshots, sex toys and the smartphone. Fabulous, captivating, transgressive.
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Humanities & Social SciencesOctober 2024Humanitarianism, empire and transnationalism, 1760-1995
Selective humanity in the Anglophone world
by Joy Damousi, Trevor Burnard, Alan Lester
This is the first book to examine the shifting relationship between humanitarianism and the expansion, consolidation and postcolonial transformation of the Anglophone world across three centuries, from the antislavery campaign of the late eighteenth century to the role of NGOs balancing humanitarianism and human rights in the late twentieth century. Contributors explore the trade-offs between humane concern and the altered context of colonial and postcolonial realpolitik. They also showcase an array of methodologies and sources with which to explore the relationship between humanitarianism and colonialism. These range from the biography of material objects to interviews as well as more conventional archival enquiry. They also include work with and for Indigenous people whose family histories have been defined in large part by 'humanitarian' interventions.
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Humanities & Social SciencesAugust 2023Spectacles and the Victorians
Measuring, defining and shaping visual capacity
by Gemma Almond-Brown
This is the first full-length study of spectacles in the Victorian period. It examines how the Victorians shaped our understanding of functional visual capacity and the concept of 20:20 vision. Demonstrating how this unique assistive device can connect the histories of medicine, technology and disability, it charts how technology has influenced our understanding of sensory perception, both through the diagnostic methods used to measure visual impairment and the utility of spectacles to ameliorate its effects. Taking a material culture approach, the book assesses how the design of spectacles thwarted ophthalmologists' attempts to medicalise their distribution and use, as well as creating a mainstream marketable device on the high street.
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Humanities & Social SciencesDecember 2021Crafting identities
Artisan culture in London, c. 1550–1640
by Jasmine Kilburn-Toppin, Christopher Breward, James Ryan
Crafting identities explores artisanal identity and culture in early modern London. It demonstrates that the social, intellectual and political status of London's crafts and craftsmen were embedded in particular material and spatial contexts. Through examination of a wide range of manuscript, visual and material culture sources, the book investigates for the first time how London's artisans physically shaped the built environment of the city and how the experience of negotiating urban spaces impacted directly on their distinctive individual and collective identities. Applying an innovative and interdisciplinary methodology to the examination of artisanal cultures, the book engages with the fields of social and cultural history and the histories of art, design and architecture. It will appeal to scholars of early modern social, cultural and urban history, as well as those interested in design and architectural history.
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