Books published by EDINBURGH UNIVERSITY PRESS

In the first book-length study of Romanticism in relation to American film, Michelle Devereaux takes established theories of contemporary American independent cinema as a point of entry, exploring the underlying philosophical and aesthetic Romantic connections between a selection of seven films from four popular filmmakers: Wes Anderson, Sofia Coppola, Spike Jonze and Charlie Kaufman. Primarily dealing with questions of identity, imagination and the relation between self and world, these films also emphasise the anxieties of our own time: the nostalgia for an imaginary past, and the fear of an uncertain future.

Raymond Aron made major investigations into the dialectic between war and peace, and also developed a sophisticated theory of international relations. Despite this, his body of work has been overlooked compared to that of his more famous contemporaries. This book shines a light on both the man and his work on ideological critique, the philosophy of history, international relations and political economy. The book also discusses Aron's political legacy and argues that a number of his critiques and theories can help us address many of the problems and conflicts of the 21st century.

The September 11th attacks in 2001 and the subsequent 'War on Terror' have had a profound effect on American cinema, and the contemporary Western is no exception. In this book, John White explores how films such as Open Range, True Grit and Jane Got a Gun reinforce a conservative myth of America exceptionalism; endorsing the use of extreme force in dealing with enemies and highlighting the importance of defending the homeland. Placing their characters within a dark world of confusion and horror, these films reflect the United States' post-9/11 uncertainties, and the conflict between civilised values and the brutality employed to defend them.

Multiculturalism has recently been declared dead; at the same time, the value of diversity is still emphasised. How can we explain this? In this book, Alexej Ulbricht sets out to completely reassess liberal theories of multiculturalism, and argues that the 'backlash' is actually the strengthening of tendencies already present in liberal multiculturalism. Using the theories of Roberto Esposito, he argues that liberal multiculturalism is best understood as a series of immunitary processes. He examines three of these processes - using the work of Kymlicka, Parekh and Taylor - and looks to what cultural coexistence beyond immunity might be like.

Thomas Reid might not have published much on politics, but his manuscripts reveal that he was deeply concerned with social, political and economic issues throughout his career. Published here for the first time, Reid's Glasgow lecture notes and his papers to learned societies in Aberdeen and Glasgow show that he was an acute commentator on contemporary politics and that his theoretical ideas framed solutions to some of the practical political and economic problems of his day.

Drawing on case studies of films including Charlie Kaufman's Synecdoche, New York, Nuri Bilge Ceylan's Climates and John Akomfrah's The Nine Muses, this books asks to what extent is politics shaping art cinema? And, in turn, could art cinema possibly affect the political structure of the world as we know it?

This book focuses on Stanley Cavell's account of what makes Hollywood movies so magical, which proposes the remarkable thesis that most truly great Hollywood films reflect the struggle to become who we are that is foregrounded in the characteristically American theory of Emersonian perfectionism.

This book focuses on how the 'Reform Era' has been constructed in the work of the director Jia Zhangke, analysing the archetypal class figures of worker, peasant, soldier, intellectual and entrepreneur that are found in his films.

In 'Time, Existential Presence and the Cinematic Image', Sam B. Girgus relates Laura Mulvey's theory of delayed cinema to ideas on time and the relationship to the other in the writings of Jean-Luc Nancy, Emmanuel Levinas and Julia Kristeva, among others.

Dickens and Demolition' examines how tropes, characters, or extracts from Dickens' fiction were repurposed as a portable terminology in arguments for large-scale demolition and redevelopment projects in London during his lifetime.

This engaging introduction outlines the cultural and political contexts in which the avant-gardes operated, taking readers on a journey throughout the whole of Europe.

Deleuze turns to the cinema because its formal resources enable it to 'think' the relation between movement and duration in ways that philosophy cannot. Discover the nature of the philosophical problems that Deleuze turns to the cinema to resolve and how resources of the cinema enable him to do what philosophy alone cannot.

The first book-length study in English of a national corpus of state-sponsored informational film, this book traces how Danish shorts on topics including social welfare, industry, art and architecture were commissioned, funded, produced and reviewed from the inter-war period to the 1960s.

Nineteenth-Century Settler Emigration in British Literature and Art is the first book to undertake a comprehensive survey of the literature produced by nineteenth-century settler emigration.

With in-depth studies of Jean-Paul Sartre, Julia Kristeva, Alain Badiou and Jacques Ranciere, along with shorter analyses of Jean-Claude Milner and Quentin Meillassoux, Boncardo asks how StephaneMallarme became so politically significant for left-wing French intellectuals.

This book explains the current destruction of graves in the Islamic world and traces the ideological sources of iconoclasm in their historical perspective, from medieval theological and legal debates to contemporary Islamist movements including ISIS.

A radical re-interpretation of the nature of medieval Arabic love poetry in the classical age This book examines in detail the concept of the body in Arabic love poetry in the 'Udhri tradition. Avoiding familiar clichés about the purity of love in 'Udhri poetry - broadly speaking, an Arabic counterpart to the western medieval concept of unconsummated courtly love - it instead questions the traditional much-vaunted emphasis on chastity and the assumption that this poetry omits any concept of the body. Challenging this view, Jokha Alharthi re-appraises the relationship between love, poetry and Arab society in the 8th to 11th centuries. She focuses on the key differences between what the poetry itself says and the views of later sources about 'Udhri poets and their works. She also documents how the representation of the beloved in the 'Udhri ghazal was influenced by pre-Islamic poetry, showing how this tradition developed, with a series of overlapping historical layers. And she breaks new ground by examining how this poetry treats not only the body of the beloved but also that of her lover, the poet himself. Key Features  Challenges the stereotypical idea about the absence of the body in 'Udhri love poetry  Investigates the 'Udhri tradition through close readings of the classical 10th-century Arabic sources including anthologies such as the Kitab al-Aghani  Contributes to literary studies on the representations of the body  Includes close readings of difficult literary texts in classical Arabic including the work of 'Urwah b. Hizam, Majnun Layla, Qays b. Dharih, Jamil Buthaynah and Kuthayyir 'Azzah Jokha Alharthi is Associate Professor of Classical Arabic Literature at the Sultan Qaboos University, Muscat. She obtained her PhD in classical Arabic literature from the University of Edinburgh. She is the winner of the Man Booker International Prize 2019 for her novel Celestial Bodies (Sayyidat al-Qamar). To date, translation rights in the novel have been sold in 21 languages.

A broad, comparative and trans-Atlantic approach to the Age of Revolutions Cutting across disciplines and linguistic borders, this book highlights revolutionary movements in Europe, the United States, and the Caribbean between the mid-eighteenth century and the revolutions of 1848. The chapters in the book adopt transnational approaches to revolution to show how political uprisings often reverberated far beyond the borders of the states directly affected - in the form of narratives, metaphors, translations, letters, pamphlets and dialogues, as well as physical objects. Elizabeth Amann is Professor of Literary Studies at Ghent University Michael Boyden is a chair professor of English at Radboud University Nijmegen

Provides a deeper understanding of the comforts of reading literature By focusing on a number of significant moments in the interlocking histories of the book's two central concepts--literature and consolation--this study makes readers aware of the premises that underlie the assumption that literary writings can bring comfort. What is it in literary texts that provides this special experience? How does literature help us to understand what consolation means and the effects it can have on individual readers? The intersecting ideas of literature and consolation in Homer, Dante, Shakespeare and Flaubert through to Roland Barthes, Denise Riley and Julian Barnes, guide today's readers on how literature provides examples, food for thought and good companionship in times of grief and pain. Taking its cue from the rich history of consolatory thinking, the book shows how writers from different times have explored the potential of their writing to offer solace. The result of these explorations, this book argues, has shaped the history of Western literature decisively. Jürgen Pieters teaches Literary Theory at Ghent University, Belgium.

Understanding sound change through contemporary theory and historical evidence

This textbook will help intermediate students gain advanced levels of proficiency in Urdu. By learning about the mechanics of word-building through contextualising explanations and practical exercises, learners will develop their comprehension skills in reading, writing and speaking.

This one-stop introduction gives you an overview of Scotland's mixed legal system, from its historical roots to how the judicial system works today. The fourth edition is fully updated to cover the latest legislation, rules, case law, the Carloway and Bowen Reviews, and recent elections and referenda.

Drawing from his previous writings on the search for a new image of thought and the vitalist role of 'conceptual personae' in the history of philosophy, Gregg Lambert proposes a new geo-political image of thought that is uniquely commensurate with the globalisation of contemporary continental philosophy

Etienne Balibar, one of the foremost living French philosophers, builds on his landmark work 'Spinoza and Politics' with this exploration of Spinoza's ontology. Balibar situates Spinoza in relation to the major figures of Marx and Freud as a precursor to the more recent French thinker Gilbert Simondon's concept of the transindividual.