Books published by Indiana University Press

What does the good life mean in a "backward" place? As communist regimes denigrated widespread unemployment and consumer excess in Western countries, socialist Eastern European states simultaneously legitimized their power through their apparent ability to satisfy consumers' needs. Moving beyond binaries of production and consumption, the essays collected here examine the lessons consumption studies can offer about ethnic and national identity and the role of economic expertise in shaping consumer behavior. From Polish VCRs to Ukrainian fashion boutiques, tropical fruits in the GDR to cinemas in Belgrade, The Socialist Good Life explores what consumption means in a worker state where communist ideology emphasizes collective needs over individual pleasures.

The diary as a genre is found in all literate societies, and these autobiographical accounts are written by persons of all ranks and positions. The Diary offers an exploration of the form in its social, historical, and cultural-literary contexts with its own distinctive features, poetics, and rhetoric.

This latest philosophical text by John Sallis is inspired by the work of contemporary Chinese painter Cao Jun. It carries out a series of philosophical reflections on nature, art, and music by taking up Cao Jun's art and thought, with a focus on questions of the elemental.

Take a tour of the house where a microwave killed a gremlin, a typewriter made Jack a dull boy, a sewing machine fashioned Carrie's prom dress, and houseplants might kill you while you sleep. In Household Horror: Cinematic Fear and the Secret Life of Everyday Objects Marc Olivier highlights the wonder, fear, and terrifying dimension of objects in horror cinema.

Faces of Tradition in Chinese Performing Arts examines the key role of the individual in the development of traditional Chinese performing arts such as music and dance. These artists and their artistic works-the "faces of tradition"-come to represent and reconfigure broader fields of cultural production in China today. The contributors to this volume explore the ways in which performances and recordings, including singing competitions, textual anthologies, ethnographic videos, and CD albums, serve as discursive spaces where individuals engage with and redefine larger traditions and themselves. By focusing on the performance, scholarship, collection, and teaching of instrumental music, folksong, and classical dance from a variety of disciplines-these case studies highlight the importance of the individual in determining how traditions have been and are represented, maintained, and cultivated.

1. Images and narratives of African sexuality have a long origin in stereotype. This volume aims to present a multidimensional view of sex and sexuality on the African continent. 2. Spronk and Hendriks are up-and-coming scholars with interests in anthropology, ethnography, and sexuality in Africa. 3. IUP has a long-standing relationship with the International African Institute to produce a series of textbooks comprised of previously published material about various topics of current interest to Africanist students and scholars. This book is a part of that series and will find an audience with Africanist scholars in humanities and social science disciplines interested in questions surrounding sex and sexuality.

Russian womenOs wide-ranging cultural activities and contributions in the 19th and 20th centuries.

" -Forest History SocietyThis visionary and inspiring book is a cogent analysis of man's use and misuse of his environment and an impassioned plea for a feminist ecological revolution.

Using short tutorials and quick and simple experiments, How the World Looks to a Bee invites readers to test the science behind everyday phenomena for themselves. No science expierence required!

Motor City Movies, 1916-1925 is a broad textured look at Hollywood coming of age in a city with a burgeoning population and complex demographics. Richard Abel investigates the role of local Detroit organizations in producing, distributing, exhibiting, and publicizing films in an effort to make moviegoing part of everyday life.

When did the Arab-Israeli conflict begin? Some discussions focus on the 1967 war, some go back to the creation of the state of Israel in 1948, and others look to the beginning of the British Mandate in 1922. Alan Dowty, however, traces the earliest roots of the conflict to the Ottoman Empire in the 19th century, arguing that this historical approach highlights constant clashes between religious and ethnic groups in Palestine. He demonstrates that existing Arab residents viewed new Jewish settlers as European and shares evidence of overwhelming hostility to foreigners from European lands. He shows that Jewish settlers had tremendous incentive to minimize all obstacles to settlement, including the inconvenient hostility of the existing population. Dowty's thorough research reveals how events that occurred over 125 years ago shaped the implacable conflict that dominates the Middle East today.