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The ArtsJune 2021The war that won't die
The Spanish Civil War in cinema
by David Archibald
The war that won't die charts the changing nature of cinematic depictions of the Spanish Civil War. In 1936, a significant number of artists, filmmakers and writers - from George Orwell and Pablo Picasso to Joris Ivens and Joan Miró - rallied to support the country's democratically-elected Republican government. The arts have played an important role in shaping popular understandings of the Spanish Civil War and this book examines the specific role cinema has played in this process. The book's focus is on fictional feature films produced within Spain and beyond its borders between the 1940s and the early years of the twenty-first century - including Hollywood blockbusters, East European films, the work of the avant garde in Paris and films produced under Franco's censorial dictatorship. The book will appeal to scholars and students of Film, Media and Hispanic Studies, but also to historians and, indeed, anyone interested in why the Spanish Civil War remains such a contested political topic.
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The ArtsJanuary 2019The war that won't die
The Spanish Civil War in cinema
by David Archibald
The war that won't die charts the changing nature of cinematic depictions of the Spanish Civil War. In 1936, a significant number of artists, filmmakers and writers - from George Orwell and Pablo Picasso to Joris Ivens and Joan Miró - rallied to support the country's democratically-elected Republican government. The arts have played an important role in shaping popular understandings of the Spanish Civil War and this book examines the specific role cinema has played in this process. The book's focus is on fictional feature films produced within Spain and beyond its borders between the 1940s and the early years of the twenty-first century - including Hollywood blockbusters, East European films, the work of the avant garde in Paris and films produced under Franco's censorial dictatorship. The book will appeal to scholars and students of Film, Media and Hispanic Studies, but also to historians and, indeed, anyone interested in why the Spanish Civil War remains such a contested political topic.
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Humanities & Social SciencesMarch 2017Martial races
The military, race and masculinity in British imperial culture, 1857–1914
by Heather Streets
This book explores how and why Scottish Highlanders, Punjabi Sikhs, and Nepalese Gurkhas became identified as the British Empire's fiercest, most manly soldiers in nineteenth century discourse. As 'martial races' these men were believed to possess a biological or cultural disposition to the racial and masculine qualities necessary for the arts of war. Because of this, they were used as icons to promote recruitment in British and Indian armies - a phenomenon with important social and political effects in India, in Britain, and in the armies of the Empire. Martial Races bridges regional studies of South Asia and Britain while straddling the fields of racial theory, masculinity, imperialism, identity politics, and military studies. Of particular importance is the way it exposes the historical instability of racial categories based on colour and its insistence that historically specific ideologies of masculinity helped form the logic of imperial defence, thus wedding gender theory with military studies in unique ways. Moreover, Martial Races challenges the marginalisation of the British Army in histories of Victorian popular culture, and demonstrates the army's enduring impact on the regional cultures of the Highlands, the Punjab and Nepal. This unique study will make fascinating reading for higher level students and experts in imperial history, military history and gender history.
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The ArtsSeptember 2024The renewal of post-war Manchester
Planning, architecture and the state
by Richard Brook
A compelling account of the project to transform post-war Manchester, revealing the clash between utopian vision and compromised reality. Urban renewal in Britain was thrilling in its vision, yet partial and incomplete in its implementation. For the first time, this deep study of a renewal city reveals the complex networks of actors behind physical change and stagnation in post-war Britain. Using the nested scales of region, city and case-study sites, the book explores the relationships between Whitehall legislation, its interpretation by local government planning officers and the on-the-ground impact through urban architectural projects. Each chapter highlights the connections between policy goals, global narratives and the design and construction of cities. The Cold War, decolonialisation, rising consumerism and the oil crisis all feature in a richly illustrated account of architecture and planning in post-war Manchester.
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Business, Economics & LawJuly 2025Medical care, humanitarianism and intimacy in the long Second World War, 1931-1953
by Marie-Luce Desgrandchamps, Laure Humbert, Bertrand Taithe, Raphaële Balu
This book offers a micro-global history of humanitarianism and medical care during the 'long' Second World War, which challenges the traditional and Eurocentric chronological boundaries of 1939/1945. It takes as its starting point the Japanese invasion of Manchuria in 1931, which led to the progressive dislocation of the League of Nations, with the Japanese, German and Soviet departures in the 1930s. It ends with the termination of the Korean War in 1953, and the subsequent dismantlement of the first United Coalition and UN Peace enforcement operation. It considers the slow, messy and ambivalent transformation of humanitarian actors' relations to the suffering of distant others through a study of humanitarian encounters, practices, spaces and affects. Paying close attention to a variety of actors, such as French colonial doctors, Swiss ICRC delegates, Egyptian relief workers, Chinese-style physicians, Peruvian and Ecuadorian nurses or American member of the Unitarian Service Committee, the book provides a more holistic story of humanitarianism.
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Humanities & Social SciencesJanuary 2022Exiting war
The British Empire and the 1918–20 moment
by Romain Fathi, Margaret Hutchison, Andrekos Varnava, Michael Walsh, Alan Lester
Exiting war explores a particular 1918-20 'moment' in the British Empire's history, between the First World War's armistices of 1918, and the peace treaties of 1919 and 1920. That moment, we argue, was a challenging and transformative time for the Empire. While British authorities successfully answered some of the post-war tests they faced, such as demobilisation, repatriation, and fighting the widespread effects of the Spanish flu, the racial, social, political and economic hallmarks of their imperialism set the scene for a wide range of expressions of loyalties and disloyalties, and anticolonial movements. The book documents and conceptualises this 1918-20 'moment' and its characteristics as a crucial three-year period of transformation for and within the Empire, examining these years for the significant shifts in the imperial relationship that occurred and as laying the foundation for later change in the imperial system.
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Humanities & Social SciencesJune 2025Humanitarianism and the Greater War, 1914–24
by Elisabeth Piller, Neville Wylie
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May 2022In the Shadow of War
Diary notes from Ukraine
by Christoph Brumme
"What can you learn in war? Do you become numb, do you get used to it at some point? Does war make you "hard", uncaring, above pain? No. These are just clichés. Every day brings new horrors. At best, one learns for some time to suppress strong feelings, because to give in to them would weaken one's life instinct." In a very stirring and shocking, but sometimes humorous language, Christoph Brumme tells of the situation in Ukraine, the everyday life of his family and friends, of fears, longings and political assessments. The diary entries of the war and the resistance of the Ukrainians, starting from the first signs of the impending war in mid-January 2022 until the printing of this book, 1st May 2022, impressively bear witness to the brutality of these events.
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June 2025Proxy war in Afghanistan
The politics of state-wrecking
by Abbas Farasoo
This book provides a compelling analysis of proxy warfare and its far-reaching implications for statehood, focusing on the conflict in Afghanistan. Introducing the innovative concept of "state-wrecking," it bridges theory and practice to unravel how external support for insurgent actors fuels violence, undermines territorial control and sovereignty, intensifies violence, and dismantles political legitimacy. The work shifts the discourse on proxy wars from the strategies of global powers to the procedural and structural impacts within target states. Grounded in rigorous empirical research, including interviews, archival data, and conflict analysis, the book critically examines the Pakistan-Taliban nexus and the limitations of US-led interventions. By blending a robust theoretical framework with in-depth case studies, it reveals how proxy dynamics shape conflicts, disrupt governance, and challenge international security. This is an essential resource for those seeking to understand the entanglements of modern warfare and the fragility of states under external influence.
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Literature & Literary StudiesJune 2021New slaveries in contemporary British literature and visual arts
by Pietro Deandrea
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The ArtsMarch 2017
Images of the army
The military in British art, 1815-1914
by J. W. M. Hichberger
In an age when engraving and photography were making artistic images available to a much wider public, artists were able to influence public attitudes more powerfully than ever before. This book examines works of art on military themes in relation to ruling-class ideologies about the army, war and the empire. The first part of the book is devoted to a chronological survey of battle painting, integrated with a study of contemporary military and political history. The chapters link the debate over the status and importance of battle painting to contemporary debates over the role of the army and its function at home and abroad. The second part discusses the intersection of ideologies about the army and military art, but is concerned with an examination of genre representations of soldiers. Another important theme which runs through the book is the relation of English to French military art. During the first eighty years of the period under review France was the cynosure of military artists, the school against which British critics measured their own, and the place from which innovations were imported and modified. In every generation after Waterloo battle painters visited France and often trained there. The book shows that military art, or the 'absence' of it, was one of the ways in which nationalist commentators articulated Britain's moral superiority. The final theme which underlies much of the book is the shifts which took place in the perception of heroes and hero-worship.
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Humanities & Social SciencesSeptember 2023Civil war London
Mobilizing for parliament, 1641–5
by Jordan S. Downs
This book looks at London's provision of financial and military support for parliament's war against King Charles I. It explores for the first time a series of episodic, circumstantial and unique mobilisations that spanned from late 1641 to early 1645 and which ultimately led to the establishment of the New Model Army. Based on research from two-dozen archives, Civil war London charts the successes and failures of efforts to move London's vast resources and in the process poses a number of challenges to longstanding notions about the capital's 'parliamentarian' makeup. It reveals interactions between London's Corporation, parochial communities and livery companies, between preachers and parishioners and between agitators, propagandists and common people. Within these tangled webs of political engagement reside the untold stories of the movement of money and men, but also of parliament's eventual success in the English Civil War.
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The ArtsJanuary 2026Useful Art
How activist artists can change the world
by John Byrne
This smart, provocative book reveals how Useful Art is changing the world. Does art have to be beautiful? What if it can be useful instead? In this cutting-edge book, John Byrne shows how the concept of 'Useful Art' is helping artists and communities fight back against the neoliberal takeover of our spaces, services and lives. Byrne demonstrates that networks of artist-led activism and community-based direct action can provide a collaborative playbook of impactful and inclusive alternatives. From Turner Prize-winning urban regeneration projects to bakeries, vegetable gardens and multi-use arts spaces, Useful Art has enormous potential for bringing people together, recovering and preserving local skills and knowledge and reclaiming artistic endeavour for real-world good. Exploring an international selection of projects, exhibitions and activism, this important new work champions the shift from aesthetics to use value, challenging traditional ways of seeing the world symbolically through art. Reaching beyond the financial logic of the art world, Byrne shows how Useful Art can offer an artistic toolkit for implementing radical change.
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Humanities & Social SciencesMarch 2017
Popular imperialism and the military, 1850-1950
by John M. MacKenzie
Colonial war played a vital part in transforming the reputation of the military and placing it on a standing equal to that of the navy. The book is concerned with the interactive culture of colonial warfare, with the representation of the military in popular media at home, and how these images affected attitudes towards war itself and wider intellectual and institutional forces. It sets out to relate the changing image of the military to these fundamental facts. For the dominant people they were an atavistic form of war, shorn of guilt by Social Darwinian and racial ideas, and rendered less dangerous by the increasing technological gap between Europe and the world. Attempts to justify and understand war were naturally important to dominant people, for the extension of imperial power was seldom a peaceful process. The entertainment value of war in the British imperial experience does seem to have taken new and more intensive forms from roughly the middle of the nineteenth century. Themes such as the delusive seduction of martial music, the sketch of the music hall song, powerful mythic texts of popular imperialism, and heroic myths of empire are discussed extensively. The first important British war correspondent was William Howard Russell (1820-1907) of The Times, in the Crimea. The 1870s saw a dramatic change in the representation of the officer in British battle painting. Up to that point it was the officer's courage, tactical wisdom and social prestige that were put on display.
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The ArtsFebruary 2022"I am Jugoslovenka!"
Feminist performance politics during and after Yugoslav Socialism
by Jasmina Tumbas, Amelia Jones, Marsha Meskimmon
"I am Jugoslovenka" argues that queer-feminist artistic and political resistance were paradoxically enabled by socialist Yugoslavia's unique history of patriarchy and women's emancipation. Spanning performance and conceptual art, video works, film and pop music, lesbian activism and press photos of female snipers in the Yugoslav wars, the book analyses feminist resistance in a range of performative actions that manifest the radical embodiment of Yugoslavia's anti-fascist, transnational and feminist legacies. It covers celebrated and lesser-known artists from the 1970s to today, including Marina Abramovic, Sanja Ivekovic, Vlasta Delimar, Tanja Ostojic, Selma Selman and Helena Janecic, along with music legends Lepa Brena and Esma Redzepova. "I am Jugoslovenka" tells a unique story of women's resistance through the intersection of feminism, socialism and nationalism in East European visual culture.
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The ArtsSeptember 2020Science in performance
Theatre and the politics of engagement
by Simon Parry
This electronic version has been made available under a Creative Commons (BY-NC-ND) open access license. This book is about science in theatre and performance. It explores how theatre and performance engage with emerging scientific themes from artificial intelligence to genetics and climate change. The book covers a wide range of performance forms from Broadway musicals to educational theatre, from Somali drama to grime videos. It features work by pioneering companies including Gob Squad, Headlong Theatre and Theatre of Debate as well as offering fresh analysis of global blockbusters such as Wicked and Urinetown. The book offers detailed description and analysis of theatre and performance practices as well as broader commentary on the politics of theatre as public engagement with science. Science in performance is essential reading for researchers, students and practitioners working between science and the arts within fields such as theatre and performance studies, science communication, interdisciplinary arts and health humanities.
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Humanities & Social SciencesJanuary 2022Reconstructing lives
Victims of war in the Middle East and Médecins Sans Frontières
by Vanja Kovacic, Bertrand Taithe
This book attempts to establish a more holistic approach to the rehabilitation of war-injured civilians, one that adjusts to the patients' long-term needs. Kovacic not only offers an insight into the daily realities of patients during and after rehabilitation, but seeks to develop a new way to perceive, respect and involve them in health care. Based on comprehensive interviews with patients and MSF staff, as well as extended field observations, Reconstructing lives follows Syrian and Iraqi war-injured civilians in their journey to recovery. From their improvised medical treatment in their home countries, to the MSF-run hospital in Amman Jordan, to their return home, Kovacic explores how individuals attempt to pick up the pieces of their previous lives, add new elements from their treatment and travel experiences, and finally establish a new reconstructed reality. The book explores how the interaction between MSF staff and their patients contributes to the immense task of healing that awaits victims of war. The reader visits the intimate medical and domestic spaces that usually remain closed to the outside observer, spaces rich with human contact, perceptions, emotions, conflicts and reconciliations.
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The ArtsMarch 2013Women, the arts and globalization
Eccentric experience
by Marsha Meskimmon, Amelia Jones, Dorothy C. Rowe, Dorothy Rowe, Marsha Meskimmon
Women, the arts and globalization: Eccentric experience is the first anthology to bring transnational feminist theory and criticism together with women's art practices to discuss the connections between aesthetics, gender and identity in a global world. The essays in Women, the Arts and Globalization demonstrate that women in the arts are rarely positioned at the centre of the art market, and the movement of women globally (as travelers or migrants, empowered artists/scholars or exiled practitioners), rarely corresponds with the dominant models of global exchange. Rather, contemporary women's art practices provide a fascinating instance of women's eccentric experiences of the myriad effects of globalization. Bringing scholarly essays on gender, art and globalization together with interviews and autobiographical accounts of personal experiences, the diversity of the book is relevant to artists, art historians, feminist theorists and humanities scholars interested in the impact of globalization on culture in the broadest sense. ;
