Synopses & Reviews
Visit the
Unspun website which includes Table of Contents and the Introduction.
The World Wide Web has cut a wide path through our daily lives. As claims of "the Web changes everything" suffuse print media, television, movies, and even presidential campaign speeches, just how thoroughly do the users immersed in this new technology understand it? What, exactly, is the Web changing? And how might we participate in or even direct Web-related change?
Intended for readers new to studying the Internet, each chapter in Unspun addresses a different aspect of the "web revolution"--hypertext, multimedia, authorship, community, governance, identity, gender, race, cyberspace, political economy, and ideology--as it shapes and is shaped by economic, political, social, and cultural forces. The contributors particularly focus on the language of the Web, exploring concepts that are still emerging and therefore unstable and in flux. Unspun demonstrates how the tacit assumptions behind this rhetoric must be examined if we want to really know what we are saying when we talk about the Web.
Unspun will help readers more fully understand and become critically aware of the issues involved in living, as we do, in a wired society.
Contributors include: Jay Bolter, Sean Cubitt, Jodi Dean, Dawn Dietrich, Cynthia Fuchs, Matthew Kirschenbaum, Timothy Luke, Vincent Mosco, Lisa Nakamura, Russell Potter, Rob Shields, John Sloop, and Joseph Tabbi.
Review
"A lively and interesting overview of guns in American life; past, present, and future...Guns in America: A Reader will serve most promisingly as a long-awaited introduction to a complex and controversial issue."-Left History,
Review
"Every essay develops a cultural studies approach to understanding the World Wide Web that feels more unified in purpose than many other collections. Moreover, unlike most of the other collections that comprise the "new millennium" wave . . . , Swiss's book sustains its commitments to critical perspectives throughout. The wide range of interconnected topics makes for a valuable "re-introduction" to the World Wide Web."-Journal of Advanced Composition,
Review
"You will be enriched by stepping back and looking at the whole spectrum of possibilites presented in this book." -Technical Communication,
Synopsis
Firearms have long been at the core of our national narratives. From the Puritans' embrace of guns to beat back the "devilish Indian" to our guilty delight in the extralegal exploits of Dirty Harry, Americans have relied on the gun to right wrongs, both real and imagined.
The extent to which guns have been woven into our nation's mythology suggests that the current debate is only partly about guns themselves and equally about conflicting cultural values and competing national identities. Belying the gun debate are a host of related issues: contesting conceptions of community, the proper relationship between the individual and the state, and the locus of responsibility for maintaining order.
Guns in America documents and analyzes the history of firearms in America, exploring various aspects of gun manufacture, ownership, and use--and more importantly, the cultural and political implications which this history reveals.
Eschewing single-minded partisanship and emphasizing nuance and compromise, Jan E. Dizard and Robert Merrill Muth have assembled a diverse array of writings from all points on the ideological spectrum. The documents span the whole of American history, from Puritan sermons to contemporary NRA documents. The result is an indispensable panorama of the never-ending controversies over gun control, crime, hunting, and militias.
Synopsis
Documents and analyzes the history of firearms in America
Firearms have long been at the core of our national narratives. From the Puritans' embrace of guns to beat back the devilish Indian to our guilty delight in the extralegal exploits of Dirty Harry, Americans have relied on the gun to right wrongs, both real and imagined.
The extent to which guns have been woven into our nation's mythology suggests that the current debate is only partly about guns themselves and equally about conflicting cultural values and competing national identities. Belying the gun debate are a host of related issues: contesting conceptions of community, the proper relationship between the individual and the state, and the locus of responsibility for maintaining order.
Guns in America documents and analyzes the history of firearms in America, exploring various aspects of gun manufacture, ownership, and use--and more importantly, the cultural and political implications which this history reveals.
Eschewing single-minded partisanship and emphasizing nuance and compromise, Jan E. Dizard and Robert Merrill Muth have assembled a diverse array of writings from all points on the ideological spectrum. The documents span the whole of American history, from Puritan sermons to contemporary NRA documents. The result is an indispensable panorama of the never-ending controversies over gun control, crime, hunting, and militias.
About the Author
Jan E. Dizard is Charles Hamilton Houston Professor of American Culture at Amherst College. He is the author of numerous books, most recently
Going Wild: Hunting, Animal Rights, and the Contested Meaning of Nature.
Robert Merrill Muth has worked with the U.S.D.A. Forest Service for many years and is currently Assistant Professor of Natural Resource Policy and Administration at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst