New Books in Performing Arts

Anne Bogart, "The Art of Resonance" (Methuen Drama, 2021)

06 Oct 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Anne Bogart's The Art of Resonance (Methuen Drama, 2021) locates the essence of theatre in the experience of resonant vibration among performers an...

Panayotis F. League, "Echoes of the Great Catastrophe: Re-Sounding Anatolian Greekness in Diaspora" (U Michigan Press, 2021)

04 Oct 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Echoes of the Great Catastrophe: Re-sounding Anatolian Greekness in Diaspora (University of Michigan Press, 2021) explores the legacy of the Great C...

Mathias Clasen, "A Very Nervous Person's Guide to Horror Movies" (Oxford UP, 2021)

01 Oct 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Films about chainsaw killers, demonic possession, and ghostly intruders. Screaming audiences with sleepless nights or sweat-drenched nightmares in the...

Stephen Lee Naish, "Screen Captures: Film in the Age of Emergency" (New Star Books, 2021)

29 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Movies open a window into our collective soul. In Screen Captures: Film in the Age of Emergency (New Star Books, 2021), Stephen Lee Naish guides us ...

Shayna Maskell, "Politics as Sound: The Washington, DC, Hardcore Scene, 1978-1983" (U Illinois Press, 2021)

28 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Washington, DC is known as the birthplace of hardcore punk. The raw, innovative, new sound coming out of the nation’s capital in the late 1970s is e...

Dan Fox, "Limbo" (Fitzcarraldo, 2019)

27 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

In a world that demands faith in progress and growth, Limbo (Fitzcarraldo, 2019) is a companion for the stuck, the isolated, delayed, stranded and ...

M. W. Shores, "The Comic Storytelling of Western Japan: Satire and Social Mobility in Kamigata Rakugo" (Cambridge UP, 2021)

22 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Rakugo, a popular form of comic storytelling, has played a major role in Japanese culture and society. Developed during the Edo (1600–1868) and Meij...

Danish Sheikh, "Love and Reparation: A Theatrical Response to the Section 377 Litigation in India" (Seagull Books, 2021)

20 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Two plays about the legal battle to decriminalize homosexuality in India. On September 6, 2018, a decades-long battle to decriminalize queer intimacy ...

Mathias Clasen, "A Very Nervous Person's Guide to Horror Movies" (Oxford UP, 2021)

20 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Horror fans are attracted to movies designed to scare us, but others shudder already at the thought of the sweat-drenched nightmares that terrifying m...

Rachel Rojanski, "Yiddish in Israel: A History" (Indiana UP, 2020)

20 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Yiddish in Israel: A History (Indiana UP, 2020) challenges the commonly held view that Yiddish was suppressed or even banned by Israeli authorities f...

Kristian Petersen, "Muslims in the Movies: A Global Anthology" (Ilex Foundation, 2021)

17 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Kristian Petersen’s new edited volume Muslims in the Movies: A Global Anthology (Ilex Foundation and Harvard University Press, 2021), introduces t...

Paula Richman and Rustom Bharucha, "Performing the Ramayana Tradition: Enactments, Interpretations, and Arguments" (Oxford UP, 2021)

16 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Paula Richman and Rustom Bharucha's book Performing the Ramayana Tradition: Enactments, Interpretations, and Arguments (Oxford UP, 2021) examines d...

J. P. M. Drury and S. A. M. Drury, "Rhetoric, Politics, and Hamilton: an American Musical" (Peter Lang, 2021)

16 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Hamilton: An American Musical made its record-breaking Broadway debut in 2015—but the musical has reached far beyond typical Broadway audiences to ...

Bernard F. Dick, "Engulfed: The Death of Paramount Pictures and the Birth of Corporate Hollywood" (U Kentucky Press, 2021)

15 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

From Double Indemnity to The Godfather, the stories behind some of the greatest films ever made pale beside the story of the studio that made them. In...

Franz Nicolay, "Someone Should Pay for Your Pain" (Gibson House Press, 2021)

15 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Franz Nicolay's Someone Should Pay for Your Pain (Gibson House Press, 2021) is a moving, funny, and sometimes brutal novel about the life of a tour...

Martin Harris, "Leatherface Vs. Tricky Dick: The Texas Chain Saw Massacre as Political Satire" (Headpress, 2021)

15 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

The Watergate scandal was a horror show. What better way to satirize it than with a horror movie? The Texas Chain Saw Massacre written by Tobe Hoop...

Sara E. Lampert, "Starring Women: Celebrity, Patriarchy, and American Theater, 1790-1851" (U Illinois Press, 2020)

10 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Women performers played a vital role in the development of American and transatlantic entertainment, celebrity culture, and gender ideology. In Star...

Mary Gauthier, "Saved by a Song: The Art and Healing Power of Songwriting" (St. Martin's Essentials, 2021)

10 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Mary Gauthier was twelve years old when she was given her Aunt Jenny’s old guitar and taught herself to play with a Mel Bay basic guitar workbook. M...

Cameron Crookston, "The Cultural Impact of Rupaul's Drag Race: Why Are We All Gagging?" (Intellect, 2021)

06 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

In The Cultural Impact of RuPaul's Drag Race: Why are we all Gagging? (Intellect, 2021) Cameron Crookston has compiled chapters from scholars in th...

Jan Bardsley, "Maiko Masquerade: Crafting Geisha Girlhood in Japan" (U California Press, 2021)

06 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Maiko Masquerade: Crafting Geisha Girlhood in Japan (University of California Press, 2021) explores Japanese representations of the maiko, or appre...

Amelia Jones, "In Between Subjects: A Critical Genealogy of Queer Performance" (Routledge, 2020)

03 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

In Between Subjects: A Critical Genealogy of Queer Performance (Routledge, 2021) is a study of the connected ideas of "queer" and "gender performanc...

Robin Wallace: Inspired By Beethoven

01 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Baylor University musicologist and the author of Hearing Beethoven Robin Wallace chats with Howard about the magic of Beethoven, weaving personal sent...

Thomas O. Haakenson, "Grotesque Visions: The Science of Berlin Dada" (Bloomsbury, 2021)

31 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Thomas O. Haakenson's book Grotesque Visions: The Science of Berlin Dada (Bloomsbury, 2021) focuses on the radical avant-garde interventions of Salo...

Caseen Gaines, "Footnotes: The Black Artists Who Rewrote the Rules of the Great White Way" (Sourcebooks, 2021)

31 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Caseen Gaines' Footnotes: The Black Artists Who Rewrote the Rules of the Great White Way (Sourcebooks, 2021) is a rollicking, entertaining, and fasc...

Janaki Bakhle, "Two Men and Music: Nationalism in the Making of an Indian Classical Tradition" (Oxford UP, 2005)

25 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Janaki Bakhle's book Two Men and Music: Nationalism in the Making of an Indian Classical Tradition (Oxford UP, 2005) is a provocative account of the...

Naphtaly Shem-Tov, "Israeli Theatre: Mizrahi Jews and Self-Representation" (Routledge, 2021)

25 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Naphtaly Shem-Tov's book Israeli Theatre: Mizrahi Jews and Self-Representation (Routledge, 2021) introduces readers to the stagecraft produced by Mi...

Robert Lashley, "Green River Valley" (Blue Cactus Press, 2021)

20 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Green River Valley, Robert Lashley's third book of poetry, is a moving and complex tribute to the Hilltop neighborhood of Tacoma, Washington. Whether...

Lawrence La Fountain-Stokes, "Translocas: The Politics of Puerto Rican Drag and Trans Performance" (U Michigan Press, 2021)

16 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Translocas: The Politics of Puerto Rican Drag and Trans Performance (U Michigan Press, 2021) focuses on drag and transgender performance and activism...

Volodymyr Vynnychenko, "Disharmony and Other Plays" (CIUS Press, 2020)

13 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Volodymyr Vynnychenko is one of the most ambiguous and controversial Ukrainian writers of the twentieth century. In an intricate and highly entangled ...

Julia Jarcho, "Writing and the Modern Stage: Theater beyond Drama" (Cambridge UP, 2017)

11 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Julia Jarcho's Writing and the Modern Stage: Theater beyond Drama (Cambridge UP, 2017) is a fascinating argument for the centrality of writing in ex...

Páraic Kerrigan, "LGBTQ Visibility, Media and Sexuality in Ireland" (Routledge, 2020)

11 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

“We know what we want, and one day, our prince will come,” says Toby, the bicycle-shorts-wearing, double ententre-making, unacknowledgely-gay neig...

Patricia Bickers, "The Ends of Art Criticism" (Lund Humphries Publishers, 2021)

06 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Crisis? What Crisis? At a time where there are repeated claims of the impending demise of art criticism, The Ends of Art Criticism (Lund Humphries P...

Jill P. Ingram, "Festive Enterprise: The Business of Drama in Medieval and Renaissance England" (U Notre Dame Press, 2021)

06 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

In Festive Enterprise: The Business of Drama in Medieval and Renaissance England (University of Notre Dame Press, 2021), Dr. Jill Ingram merges th...

Angela Williams, "Hip Hop Harem: Women, Rap and Representation in the Middle East" (Peter Lang, 2020)

06 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Although hip hop culture has widely been acknowledged as a global phenomenon that has spread far beyond its roots in American African-Caribbean-Latinx...

Mark A. Johnson, "Rough Tactics: Black Performance in Political Spectacles, 1877-1932" (UP of Mississippi, 2021)

05 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

During the nadir of race relations in the United States South from 1877 to 1932, African Americans faced segregation, disfranchisement, and lynching. ...

Malcolm James, "Sonic Intimacy: Reggae Sound Systems, Jungle Pirate Radio and Grime YouTube Music Videos" (Bloomsbury, 2020)

04 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

How can music change the world? In Sonic Intimacy: Reggae Sound Systems, Jungle Pirate Radio and Grime YouTube Music Videos (Bloomsbury, 2020), Mal...

Frans-Willem Korsten, "Art as an Interface of Law and Justice: Affirmation, Disturbance, Disruption" (Hart Publishing, 2021)

04 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Art as an Interface of Law and Justice: Affirmation, Disturbance, Disruption (Hart Publishing, 2021) looks at the way in which the 'call for justice'...

Elizabeth B. Schwall, "Dancing with the Revolution: Power, Politics, and Privilege in Cuba" (UNC Press, 2021)

03 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

In Dancing with the Revolution: Power, Politics, and Privilege in Cuba (UNC Press, 2021), Elizabeth B. Schwall aligns culture and politics by focus...

Diana Deutsch, “Believing Your Ears: Examining Auditory Illusions” (Open Agenda, 2021)

02 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Believing Your Ears: Examining Auditory Illusions is based on an extensive filmed conversation between Howard Burton and Diana Deutsch, Professor of P...

Joseph Curtin, “The Science of Siren Songs: Stradivari Unveiled” (Open Agenda, 2021)

30 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

The Science of Siren Songs: Stradivari Unveiled is based on an in-depth filmed conversation between Howard Burton and master violinmaker and acoustici...

Jessica Hopper, "The First Collection of Criticism by a Living Female Rock Critic" (MCD x Fsg Originals, 2021)

30 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Throughout her career, spanning more than two decades, Jessica Hopper, a revered and pioneering music critic, has examined women recording and produci...

Chenshu Zhou, "Cinema Off Screen: Moviegoing in Socialist China" (U California Press, 2021)

28 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

At a time when what it means to watch movies keeps changing, this book offers a case study that rethinks the institutional, ideological, and cultural ...

Pablo Palomino, "The Invention of Latin American Music" (Oxford UP, 2020)

20 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Pablo Palomino's The Invention of Latin American Music (Oxford UP, 2020) reconstructs the transnational history of the category of Latin American m...

Andrew F. Jones, "Circuit Listening: Chinese Popular Music in the Global 1960s" (U Minnesota Press, 2020)

16 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Music from East Asia has recently been making its way round the world on waves created and mediated by new technologies and global interconnections. T...

Cynthia J. Becker, "Blackness in Morocco: Gnawa Identity Through Music and Visual Culture" (U Minnesota Press, 2020)

16 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

For more than thirteen centuries, caravans transported millions of enslaved people from Africa south of the Sahara into what is now the Kingdom of Mor...

Brooke McCorkle Okazaki, "Shonen Knife’s Happy Hour" (Bloomsbury, 2020)

15 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Brooke McCorkle Okazaki’s Shonen Knife’s Happy Hour, part of the 33 1/3 music history and culture series, is a joyful romp through the career of ...

Paola Hernández, "Staging Lives in Latin American Theater: Bodies, Objects, Archives" (Northwestern UP, 2021)

14 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Paola Hernandez's book Staging Lives in Latin American Theater: Bodies, Objects, Archives (Northwestern UP, 2021) looks at a wide range of document...

Ruth Ahnert et al., "The Network Turn: Changing Perspectives in the Humanities" (Cambridge UP, 2021)

14 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

We live in a networked world. Online social networking platforms and the World Wide Web have changed how society thinks about connectivity. Because of...

Candace Bailey, "Unbinding Gentility: Women Making Music in the Nineteenth-Century South" (U Illinois Press, 2021)

13 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Southern women of all classes, races, and walks of life practiced music during and after the Civil War. Dr. Candace Bailey examines the history of sou...

Jonathan Wright and Dawson Barrett, "Punks in Peoria: Making a Scene in the American Heartland" (U Illinois Press, 2021)

12 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

In Punks in Peoria: Making a Scene in the American Heartland (University of Illinois, 2021) Jonathan Wright and Dawson Barret explore do-it-yourse...

Ellen Seiter and Stefania Marghitu, "Teen TV" (Routledge, 2021)

09 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Stefania Marghitu's Teen TV (Routledge, 2021)explores the history of television's relationship to teens as a desired, but elusive audience, and the ...

Benjamin Steege, "An Unnatural Attitude: Phenomenology in Weimar Musical Thought" (U Chicago Press, 2021)

07 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

“What are we thinking about when we think about music in non-naturalistic terms?” asks Benjamin Steege—Assistant Professor of Music Theory, Col...

Rossen Djagalov, "From Internationalism to Postcolonialism: Literature and Cinema Between the Second and the Third Worlds" (McGill-Queen's UP, 2020)

06 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Would there have been a Third World without the Second? Perhaps, but it would have looked very different. Although most histories of these geopolitica...

Jeanne Pitre Soileau, "Yo' Mama, Mary Mack, and Boudreaux and Thibodeaux: Louisiana Children's Folklore and Play" (UP of Mississippi, 2016)

06 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Children’s folklore is simultaneously a conservator of tradition and a site for creativity and innovation. For over five decades, Dr. Jeanne Pitre S...

Frank Burke et al., "A Companion to Federico Fellini" (Wiley-Blackwell, 2020)

05 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Federico Fellini’s distinct style delighted generations of film viewers and inspired filmmakers and artists around the world. In Fellini’s Films ...

Caroline Seymour-Jorn, "Creating Spaces of Hope: Young Artists and the New Imagination in Egypt" (AU in Cairo Press, 2021)

30 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

It is now just over a decade since protests in Cairo's Tahrir Square started Egypt's chapter in the events of the Arab Spring. Much has been made in w...

Carey Purcell, "From Aphra Behn to Fun Home: A Cultural History of Feminist Theater" (Rowman & Littlefield, 2019)

25 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Theatre has long been considered a feminine interest for which women consistently purchase the majority of tickets, while the shows they are seeing ty...

Katherine K. Preston, "George Frederick Bristow" (U Illinois Press, 2020)

24 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

George Frederick Bristow, born in 1825, was a significant musical figure in the United States from the 1850s until his death in 1898. Now, almost one ...

Badia Ahad-legardy, "Afro-Nostalgia: Feeling Good in Contemporary Black Culture" (U Illinois Press, 2021)

23 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Nostalgia has received increasing attention for its role in shaping contemporary social and political life in the United States. Dr. Badia Ahad-Legard...

Gemma Commane, "Bad Girls, Dirty Bodies: Sex, Performance and Safe Femininity" (Bloomsbury, 2020)

22 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

What makes a woman 'bad' is commonly linked to certain 'qualities' or behaviours seen as morally or socially corrosive, dirty and disgusting. Bad Gir...

Richard Thompson, "Beeswing: Losing My Way and Finding My Voice 1967-1975" (Algonquin Books, 2021)

21 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Richard Thompson's Beeswing: Losing My Way and Finding My Voice 1967-1975 (Algonquin Books, 2021) gives fans of his music a tale as rollicking and e...

Susan Blakeley Klein, "Dancing the Dharma: Religious and Political Allegory in Japanese Noh Theater" (Harvard UP, 2020)

18 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Dancing the Dharma: Religious and Political Allegory in Japanese Noh Theater (Harvard UP, 2020) examines the theory and practice of allegory by explo...

Vernadette Vicuña Gonzalez, "Empire's Mistress, Starring Isabel Rosario Cooper" (Duke UP, 2021)

17 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Isabel Rosario Cooper, if mentioned at all by mainstream history books, is often a salacious footnote: the young Filipino mistress of General Douglas ...

Jessica Helfand, "Face: A Visual Odyssey" (MIT Press, 2019)

17 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Today I talked to Jessica Helfand about her new book Face: A Visual Odyssey (MIT Press, 2019) Helfand is a designer, artist, and author. She’s tau...

David Arditi, "Getting Signed: Record Contracts, Musicians, and Power in Society" (Palgrave Macmillan, 2020)

16 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

How does the record industry work? In Getting Signed: Record Contracts, Musicians, and Power in Society (Palgrave Macmillan, 2020), David Arditi, ...

Claudrena N. Harold, "When Sunday Comes: Gospel Music in the Soul and Hip-Hop Eras" (U Illinois Press, 2020)

16 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Gospel music evolved in often surprising directions during the post-Civil Rights era. Claudrena N. Harold's in-depth look at late-century gospel, Whe...

François Matarasso, "A Restless Art: How Participation Won, and Why it Matters" (CGF, 2019)

16 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

It is almost twenty years since contemporary art took a ‘participation turn’. Now, just about every museum or theatre company has a participation ...

Constance Congdon, "2 Washington Square" (Broadway Play Publishing, 2020)

15 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Constance Congdon's 2 Washington Square (Broadway Play Publishing, 2020) is a free-wheeling adaptation of Henry James' novel Washington Square se...

Douglas W. Shadle, "Antonín Dvořák's New World Symphony" (Oxford UP, 2021)

11 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Most music students have been taught that the New World Symphony was the first piece of classical music written in an American national style which ...

Robert C. Bartlett, "Against Demagogues: What Aristophanes Can Teach Us about the Perils of Populism and the Fate of Democracy" (U California Press, 2020)

10 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Political Theorist Robert Bartlett spoke with the New Books in Political Science podcast about two of his recent publications, which take on translati...

W. Patrick McCray, "Making Art Work: How Cold War Engineers and Artists Forged a New Creative Culture" (MIT Press, 2020)

09 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Artwork as opposed to experiment? Engineer versus artist? We often see two different cultural realms separated by impervious walls. But some fifty yea...

Jennifer Ponce de León, "Another Aesthetics Is Possible: Arts of Rebellion in the Fourth World War" (Duke UP, 2021)

09 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

In Another Aesthetics Is Possible: Arts of Rebellion in the Fourth World War (Duke UP, 2021), Jennifer Ponce de León examines the roles that art c...

Cécile Fromont, "Afro-Catholic Festivals in the Americas: Performance, Representation, and the Making of Black Atlantic Tradition" (Penn State, 2019)

09 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Edited by Dr. Cécile Fromont, Afro-Catholic Festivals in the Americas: Performance, Representation, and the Making of Black Atlantic Tradition (Pe...

Axel Englund, "Deviant Opera: Sex, Power, and Perversion on Stage" (U California Press, 2020)

07 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

In Deviant Opera: Sex, Power, and Perversion on Stage (University of California Press, 2020), Axel Englund examines an increasingly common trope in...

Louis Menand, "The Free World: Art and Thought in the Cold War" (FSG, 2021)

07 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

In his follow-up to the Pulitzer Prize–winning The Metaphysical Club, acclaimed scholar and critic Louis Menand, Professor of English at Harvard U...

Heather Berg, "Porn Work: Sex, Labor, and Late Capitalism" (UNC Press, 2021)

03 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Every porn scene is a record of people at work. But on-camera labor is only the beginning of the story. Porn Work takes readers behind the scenes to...

Erin Courtney, "Ann, Fran, and Mary Ann" (53rd State Press, 2020)

01 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Ann, Fran, & Mary Ann (53rd State Press, 2020) is a new play by Erin Courtney, one of the most exciting contemporary American playwrights. This is a...

Sergio Rigoletto, "Le norme traviate: Saggi sul genere e sulla sessualità nel cinema e nella televisione italiana" (Meltemi Publishers, 2020)

31 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

What does it mean to “upend a norm,” which is the translation of the title of Sergio Rigoletto’s recent study “Upended norms: essays on gender...

K. E. Goldschmitt, "Bossa Mundo: Brazilian Music in Transnational Media Industries" (Oxford UP, 2019)

28 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Bossa Mundo: Brazilian Music in Transnational Media Industries (Oxford University Press, 2020) takes on the circulation of Brazilian music in the Glo...

Pamela Hamilton, "Lady Be Good: The Life and Times of Dorothy Hale" (Koehler Books, 2021)

28 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

The name of Dorothy Hale is not well known these days. In the 1920s, she enjoyed a career on Broadway as a dancer, including in a leading role with Fr...

Benjamin Piekut, "Henry Cow: The World Is a Problem" (Duke UP, 2019)

28 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Benjamin Piekut's Henry Cow: The World is a Problem (Duke UP, 2019) provides a compelling case study of the problems and possibilities of collectiv...

Katrina Phillips, "Staging Indigeneity: Salvage Tourism and the Performance of Native American History" (UNC Press, 2021)

21 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

As tourists increasingly moved across the United States in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, a surprising number of communities looke...

David Monod, "Vaudeville and the Making of Modern Entertainment, 1890–1925" (UNC Press, 2020)

19 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Vaudeville is one of the most famous styles of theater in American history, a font of showbiz legend and the training ground for a generation of stars...

Simon Critchley, "Tragedy, the Greeks, and Us" (Vintage, 2020)

14 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Simon Critchley's Tragedy, the Greeks, and Us (Vintage, 2020) does not offer a comprehensive theory of tragedy. Instead, it takes issue with the bla...

Diana Souhami, "No Modernism Without Lesbians" (Head of Zeus Book, 2020)

13 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Diana Souhami talks about her new book No Modernism Without Lesbians, out 2020 with Head of Zeus books. A Sunday Times Book of the Year 2020. This ...

Kathleen Collins, "From Rabbit Ears to the Rabbit Hole: A Life with Television" (UP of Mississippi, 2021)

13 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

In her new book From Rabbit Ears to the Rabbit Hole: A Life with Television (University of Mississippi Press, 2021) TV scholar and fan Kathleen C...

Steve Dixon, "Cybernetic-Existentialism: Freedom, Systems, and Being-for-Others in Contemporary Arts and Performance" (Routledge, 2020)

11 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Like the transdiscipline of cybernetics, the philosophical movement known as Existentialism rose to prominence in the decade following World War II, w...

Kate Dossett, "Radical Black Theatre in the New Deal" (UNC Press, 2020)

10 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Kate Dossett's book Radical Black Theatre in the New Deal (UNC Press, 2020) turns conventional understandings of the Federal Theatre Project on its...

Michael L. Siciliano, "Creative Control: The Ambivalence of Work in the Culture Industries" (Columbia UP, 2021)

06 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

How should we understand creative work? In Creative Control: The Ambivalence of Work in the Culture Industries (Columbia UP, 2021), Michael Sicilia...

Amit Chaudhuri, "Finding the Raga: An Improvisation on Indian Music" (NYRB, 2021)

06 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Dismissal, in fact, is the default response to khayal (the preeminent genre of North Indian classical music), well before we get to know what khayal i...

Maureen Mahon, "Black Diamond Queens: African American Women and Rock and Roll" (Duke UP, 2020)

04 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Maureen Mahon’s book, Black Diamond Queens: African American Women and Rock and Roll (Duke University Press, 2020), focuses on the contributions t...

Philip Auslander, "In Concert: Performing Musical Persona" (U Michigan Press, 2021)

30 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Throughout In Concert: Performing Musical Persona (University of Michigan Press, 2021), Dr. Philip Auslander addresses not only the visual means by ...

Tara T. Green, "Reimagining the Middle Passage: Black Resistance in Literature, Television, and Song" (Ohio State UP, 2018)

30 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

From ships and novels to Mardi Gras, water, and television, how does the legacy of the Middle Passage, the leg of the Atlantic through which African p...

E. Patrick Johnson, "Sweet Tea: A Play" (Northwestern UP, 2011)

30 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

E. Patrick Johnson's Sweet Tea has been a monograph, a documentary film, a stage play, and now a published script from Northwestern University Press...

Jack Black, "Race, Racism and Political Correctness in Comedy: A Psychoanalytic Exploration" (Routledge, 2021)

28 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Jack Black, Race, Racism and Political Correctness in Comedy (Routledge 2021). In what ways is comedy subversive? This vital new book critically co...

Carrie Noland, "Merce Cunningham: After the Arbitrary" (U Chicago Press, 2020)

22 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Carrie Noland's Merce Cunningham: After the Arbitrary (University of Chicago Press, 2020) goes past conventional understandings of Cunningham that i...

Bill Nowlin, "Vinyl Ventures: My Fifty Years at Rounder Records" (Equinox, 2021)

20 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

In Vinyl Ventures: My Fifty Years at Rounder Records (Equinox, 2021), founder Bill Nowlin combines memoir with a history of the founding and evoluti...

Felicia Rose Chavez, "The Antiracist Writing Workshop: How to Decolonize the Creative Classroom" (Breakbeat Poets, 2020)

20 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Felicia Rose Chavez' The Anti-Racist Writing Workshop: How to Decolonize the Creative Classroom (Breakbeat Poets, 2020) is a practical and persuasi...

Joshua Bennett, "Owed" (Penguin, 2020)

19 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Owed (Penguin, 2020) is the second collection of poems by Dr. Joshua Bennett, poet, professor, and artist. This volume is a wide-ranging, celebrator...

R. Armstrong and R. Hughes "The Art of Experiment: Post-Pandemic Knowledge Practices for 21st-Century Architecture and Design" (Routledge, 2020)

19 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

The Art of Experiment: Post-Pandemic Knowledge Practices for 21st-Century Architecture and Design (Routledge, 2020) is a handbook for navigating our ...