Books published by Cambria Press

This highly acclaimed book brings the cumulative results of a century and a half of kinship studies in anthropology into the focus of current debates on the origin of modern humans in Africa and on an entangled bit of human evolutionary history commonly subsumed under the heading of the "peopling of the Americas." This erudite study is based on a database of some 2,500 kinship vocabularies representing roughly 600 African languages, 140 Australian languages, 500 Austronesian languages, 200 Papuan languages, 350 languages of Eurasia (excluding Indo-Europeans), 440 North and Middle American Indian languages, and 200 South American languages. This valuable reference will take the reader to the dawn of kinship studies in the 19th century Western science in order to elicit the wider context of anthropological interest in kinship systems and the interdisciplinary salience of the phenomenon of kinship. The book also examines the founder of kinship studies in anthropology, American lawyer and Iroquois ethnographer, Lewis Henry Morgan, and the circumstances of his life that generated his interest in human kinship. The study ventures into the intricacies of scientific and quasi-scientific debates in the 19th century, and treats 19th century science as embedded in a myth featuring divinity, humanity and animality as principal characters. This account is divided into four sections, each of which is structured as a triad (philosophy, psychology and physiology; logic, semiotics and reproduction; religion, hermeneutics and evolution; law, grammar and speech). This far-reaching historical journey aims at formulating an idea of what human kinship might be all about, especially in the light of the widespread uncertainties about this question caused by the constructivist turn in anthropology. Eventually our ideas regarding human origins, ancient population dispersals and the homeland of modern humans are inextricably linked to our ideas about kinship. As a book that brings together evolutionary and sociocultural anthropology, The Genius of Kinship will be a critical addition for all Anthropology collections.

Worldwide newspaper headlines in recent years have covered political unrest in many East Asian nations. Citizens in these nations have become more vocal about their governments and the populace's role in those governments. Democracy is not the dominant form of government in many of these nations. However, as nations have evolved, social change and economic developments have brought increasingly pro-democratic forces to the forefront. Examining the forces of economic growth and social modernization and their impact on democratization provides the basis of this timely study. Using China, Japan, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, and Vietnam as case studies, this book delves into these nations' Confucian cultural heritage and how that heritage allows for careful comparison of variables which affect societal values. Will East Asian nations embrace democracy? Will the nations already democratic become stronger? This book offers insightful responses to these critical questions. Democratization in East Asia is an important addition for collections in political science and Asian studies.

examines Thai-Chinese relations, dating back to the first Thai dynasty (Sukhothai) to the present (Ratanakosin). The study explores the Thai domestic policies that have affected the Chinese population since World War II and assimilation policies of the Thai government towards the Chinese. This book also analyzes both Skinner's and Chan and Tong's arguments, and their main idea in the context of the present day environment and situation for the ethnic Chinese. This research supports the Skinnerian paradigm, which asserts that "a majority of the descendants of Chinese immigrants in each generation merge with Thai society and become indistinguishable from the indigenous population to the extent that fourth-generation Chinese are practically non-existent." The validation of the Skinnerian paradigm rejects Chan and Tong's hypothesis, which claims that Skinner has "overemphasized the forces of assimilation" and that the Chinese in Thailand have not assimilated but retained their Chinese identity. To support Skinner's assertion and reject Chan and Tong's argument, this book presents rich empirical data collected via surveys conducted with the ethnic Chinese in Thailand from 2003-2004. This study uncovers that the forces of assimilation occur at two levels. On the first level, the Chinese in Thailand possess natural attributes which facilitate social and cultural integration and assimilation into Thai society. On the second level, government pro-assimilation policies, driven by the bilateral relations between Thailand and China and the political situation in both countries, are also responsible for the assimilation of the Chinese in Thailand. As the most current in-depth study on the Chinese in Thailand, The Chinese Émigrés of Thailand in the Twentieth Century is a critical addition for all collections in Asian Studies as well as Ethnic and Immigrant Studies.

The fact that domestic violence is a serious and ongoing social problem has been well recognized since the women's movement made the hitherto private experience of violence against women in the home into a political issue in the 1960s and 1970s. In Australia, a major national prevalence study of violence against women conducted by the Australian Bureau of Statistics in 1996 found that 23% of women who had ever been married or in a de facto relationship-1.1 million women-had experienced violence from their partner at some stage during the relationship. Feminist legal scholarship, however, has highlighted the many failures of criminal law to respond adequately to women's experiences of domestic violence. Civil remedies for violence and abuse seem to offer better possibilities: there is a lower standard of proof, and the woman is the subject of her own action rather than merely being the object of proceedings. The availability of civil remedies has, in many cases, resulted from feminist campaigns to fill the gaps in protection left by the criminal law. It has also been argued that civil actions provide scope to change public discourses and legal understandings of violence against women. Listening to women's stories might force a revision of traditional conceptions and myths about what constitutes violence, its causes and effects, and "appropriate" reactions to it. This study investigates the ways in which women's experiences of domestic violence are heard and understood in civil court settings, and examines women's experiences of telling their stories (or at least attempting to do so) in those settings. The two areas on which the study focuses are intervention order proceedings in State Magistrates' Courts, and residence, contact, and property matters in the federal Family Court in Australia. The relevant legislation in the two jurisdictions is either partly or wholly a product of feminist legal activism. The study, therefore, seeks to determine whether the feminist claim that the criminal law silences women also pertains in the context of new civil claims specifically designed to respond to women's experiences. The general history and theory of law reform suggests that reforms often strike problems in the process of implementation. But because law does not operate monolithically, the exact nature of those problems is not necessarily predictable. In the context of this study, implementation problems may arise from social and legal discourses about domestic violence and about victims of violence which tend to operate constantly across the legal system, and/or they may arise from the particular rules and structures found in each institutional setting. There is thus a need for detailed examination and analysis of how these various elements operate and interact in different court settings. In undertaking this task, the study has two objectives. First, it draws conclusions about the nature of implementation problems in the two jurisdictions in order to inform future feminist activism around violence against women. Secondly, it makes a more general point about the importance of procedure in feminist legal theory and praxis. In Australia in particular, feminist legal scholars and advocates have placed a heavy emphasis on doctrinal revision and have largely ignored issues of implementation. The study argues that procedure (conceived broadly to encompass the what, where, how, and who of legal proceedings) crucially shapes women's experience of the legal process, and is neglected by feminists at their peril. This book will be of interest to feminist jurisprudence and law and society scholars and researchers, and to activists and advocates in the field of domestic violence.

provides an important and timely contribution to an emergent body of work, reflecting increasing interest in the internationalisation of education and the transnational mobility of students worldwide. The last two decades have seen the dramatic expansion and consolidation of what has astutely been called an 'international education industry', involving the increased marketisation and branding of education at the national and institutional levels, the development of educational courses geared towards attracting international students, the establishment of 'offshore' schools and university campuses by Western institutions in Asia, and, most conspicuously, the mobility of nearly 3 million international students as they seek out valuable and internationally recognised academic credentials outside their home countries. These students are cognisant of an emergent global map of 'cultural capital', and the means by which this cultural capital can be converted into economic capital in an international, knowledge-based labour market. Drawing on the work of Pierre Bourdieu and other more recent contributors to the geography and sociology of education, this innovative book sets out an agenda for examining and understanding the transnational mobility of international students and the important national and institutional contexts within which they move. Its striking conclusions are based on substantive empirical research in Canada and Hong Kong, involving in-depth interviews with transnational students and a number of institutional actors directly involved in the internationalization of education. Education, Migration, and Cultural Capital in the Chinese Diaspora would be of significant interest to academics working in the fields of human geography, sociology, social anthropology, migration studies, and education, and is also a valuable text for any educational practitioners involved in the process of 'internationalisation'.

In this outstanding collection of essays, editors Neil Murphy and Wai-chew Sim seek not so much to demarcate the field of British Asian fiction, but to offer due acknowledgment of the artistic merit of the works of selected authors and simultaneously register their cultural significance. This volume demonstrates in situ the virtues of commentary that engages in a substantial manner with formal and aesthetic considerations, even as it implicates the discourses of alterity that dominate contemporary cultural criticism. Additionally, the essays delineate the complex subject positions explored by authors and texts, and focus on the way writers negotiate the exigencies of their location within and between different social formations. If it is the case that British literature can no longer be discussed in monocultural terms because of the impact of the writers under consideration, it is also the case that the diverse trans-cultural positions they explore are often less specified than proclaimed. Addressing difference, commensurability, and form-related notions of "truth-content," these essays enlarge our understanding of the range of British (and affiliated) identities, as well as the cultural contexts from which they arose. Working as academics and critics from Singapore, a useful vantage point, Murphy and Sim have extended the parameters of "British Asian" to include, not just writers from South Asia as is traditionally the case, but writers whose parents, or who themselves, have migrated to Britain from other regions of Asia, for example, Japan, Hong Kong, and Malaysia. This initiative has made it possible for professors Murphy and Sim to bring together, first, an interestingly varied group of authors, among them those who came to prominence in the 1980s--Salman Rushdie, Timothy Mo, Kazuo Ishiguro---as well as their younger contemporaries--Meera Syal, Romesh Gunesekera, Monica Ali, Hari Kunzru, Ooi Yang-May; and, second, a broad and diverse range of novels that span Timothy Mo's Sour Sweet (1982) and Tariq Ali's A Sultan in Palermo (2005), the fourth volume in his Islam quintet.

Characters in the literary tradition of American naturalism are usually perceived as passive, lacking in will, weak, and predetermined. They are constantly seen as the victims of heredity and environment, and their lives are shaped according to these strong forces that operate upon them. This interesting book examines the representation of female characters in American naturalism and argues that women in American naturalism are often represented as femmes fatales. Since heredity and environment are the determining factors in their lives, they are victims who have no control. However, with characters such as Trina Sieppe in Frank Norris's McTeague, Caroline Meeber in Theodore Dreiser's Sister Carrie, Edna Pontellier in Kate Chopin's The Awakening, and Helga Crane in Nella Larsen's Quicksand, these women victims gradually turn themselves into victimizers in order to conquer both heredity and environment. They consciously and deliberately use the only power they have that can help them overcome the naturalistic world in which they are entrapped--the power of the feminine. The book explains who exactly the femme fatale that has been born out of American naturalism is, and explores images of women in American realism who precede the femme fatale of American naturalism. This study examines characters like Trina Sieppe, Caroline Meeber, Edna Pontellier, and Helga Crane. It analyzes these women's backgrounds, their demeanors, their temperaments, their experiences, and their settings, and explains how and when each woman decides to use her sexuality. There is also a brief discussion of other femmes fatales in American naturalism, such as Stephen Crane's Maggie: A Girl of the Streets. Although the perception of women in nineteenth-century American literature has always had its place in discussions of literary texts, this book is unique in its argument that women in American naturalism are neither weak nor passive, but rather are strong and daring women who try diligently to find a means of fighting back. This book is an important addition to collections in literature and Women's studies.

The early twenty-first century witnessed remarkable attempts by Africa's political leadership to promote regional integration as a means of fast-tracking economic progress, facilitating peace and security, consolidating democratic gains, and promoting the general welfare of the African people. The transition of the Organization of Unity (OAU) to the African Union (AU), as well as the foisting of a new economic blueprint for the continent-the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD), combined with the growing role of the regional economic communities (RECs) in harmonizing and creating subregional norms and standards in the political and economic arena suggests a new trend towards regionalism in Africa. Indeed, in the new regional integration architecture, the RECs are considered to be the building blocks of the integration process led by the African Union. This new impetus of a regional development strategy was largely prompted by the slow pace of economic progress on the continent, the increasing marginalization of Africa in the global economy, and the need to create regional resources and standards that would benefit the continent in all spheres of social life. A painful realization became obvious that small micro-states in Africa sticking to their political independence and sovereignty would hardly make much progress in an increasingly globalised world. A macro-states' approach of regional integration has assumed Africa's new strategy to intervene in and integrate with a globalizing world. The current regional trend in Africa has received very little scholarly attention especially in a systematic and comprehensive way. This is due partly to the fact that the processes are currently unfolding and there is still uncertainty in the outcomes. Poor documentation and the dearth of primary materials (especially from the regional institutions) also contribute to the lack of scholarly work in this area. This study assembles the voices of some of the most seasoned African and Africanist scholars who have constantly, in one way or another, interacted with the integration process in Africa and kept abreast of the developments therein, and seeks to capture those developments in a nuanced manner in the economic, political and social spheres. The essence of this book is to analyze those processes--teasing out the issues, problems, challenges and major policy recommendations, with tentative conclusions on Africa's regional development trajectory. The book therefore fills major knowledge and policy gaps in Africa's regional development agenda. This book is a landmark contribution in a systematic attempt to comprehend Africa's regional development strategy led by the African Union. It examines the background, nuances, and dimensions of the process, which include the basis and historiography of pan-Africanism, the transition of the OAU to the AU, the issue of popular participation in development, the NEPAD and APRM initiatives, the evolving regional peace and security architecture, and the efforts of regional institutions to facilitate democracy, human rights, rule of law and good governance on the continent. The book underscores the fact that formidable obstacles and challenges abound in the trajectory, politics, and processes of this regional development paradigm, especially as Africa navigates an uncertain future in a deeply divided and unequal yet globalised World. The book constitutes a major reference material and compendium for a wide range of readers--students and scholars of African affairs and African development, policy makers both in Africa and the western countries, regional and international institutions and organizations, and all those interested in the past, present and future of Africa's development process.

This book examines the conductor's methods in terms of the realization of expressive potential in a selected body of works. This examination encompasses analytical, technical, and expressive gestural aspects of the art and craft of conducting. The author also discusses the idea of meaning in music and ways, both musical and extramusical, in which meaning arises in performance. In this unique study, the author also considers how the use of physical gestures may have an impact upon the realization of expressive potential in a given work and, in particular, upon those works selected for discussion. Central to this process is the notion that there is something "behind the notes." Text-based modes of analysis do not afford access to music as it is created by the actions of performers and conductors. The author argues that this music often has strong extroversive associations. Inquiry limited to the text neither helps the interpreter to realise fully the expressive or communicative potential of that work, nor does it fully consider the impact of expressive issues on performance. Thus, the conductor acts as a mediator in this process, taking the work and all relevant information surrounding it into account as it is prepared for performance. It is within this context that the author examines John Corigliano's Overture from Gazebo Dances, Karel Husa's Introduction and Fanfare from Music for Prague 1968, Edward Gregson's Celebration, and Morning Music by Richard Rodney Bennett, with regard to their expressive potential and adopts topical analysis in a general way as a point of departure in an attempt to relate this potential to physical gestures, facial expressions, and body language in the art and craft of conducting. In addition, the author considers the applicability of the analytical tools developed in the study to the actual practice of performance with regard to the works discussed, and attempts to show the relationship between the analysis of a given work, the physical manifestation of what that analysis uncovers, and the realisation of expressive potential in performance. This book will help readers better understand the relationship between the conductor's physical gestures, body language and facial expressions, and the expressive potential of selected works for the wind orchestra. As a book that clearly reflects the author's passion, it will be a welcome addition for collections in music.

Until now, important research on the historical records of comets and meteor showers from China, Japan, and Korea has remained the exclusive preserve of those with expertise in the relevant languages. With a compilation like the present volume the authors hope to ameliorate that situation. Applying the same rigorous selection criteria and style of presentation as in the previous catalogue, assembled and translated here are some 1,500 additional observations of comets and meteor showers from China, Japan, and Korea spanning nearly three millennia. With the publication of this volume, most of the important historical records of East Asian astronomical observations are now accessible in English. The introductions and appendices provide all the required information on specialized terminology, recording conventions, and nomenclature the reader will need to make use of the records. In addition to being an invaluable resource for professional astronomers, East Asian astronomical records have materially aided the research of scholars in fields as diverse as mythology, medieval iconography, ancient chronology, and the oral history of pre-literate societies. The book should be of great interest to cultural astronomers, as well as to those engaged in historical and comparative research.

This collection of essays is impressive in its breadth, ranging over English (Shakespeare, Stoppard, Churchill, Ravenhill, Penhall), Irish (MacNamara, Johnston), American (O'Neill, Stein, Kushner, Lynn), and Continental (Beckett, Weiss, Jelinek) dramatists; furthermore, many of the plays given extended treatment--King Lear, The Emperor Jones, Waiting for Godot, Endgame, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, The Investigation, Top Girls, and Angels in America--are frequently anthologized and/or taught. And because each of these essays was written by a different author, the range of theorists and critics drawn upon (Lyotard, Jameson, McHale, Hutcheon, Derrida, Barthes, Baudrillard, Levinas, Hassan, etc.) is so extensive as to provide a veritable overview of postmodern theory as it might usefully be applied to the theatre.