Virtual Displays

The Cultural Politics of Slam Poetry is the first critical book to take an in-depth look at slam, shedding light on the relationships that slam poets build with their audiences through race and identity performance and revealing how poets come to celebrate (and at times exploit) the politics of difference in American culture.

The poets represented here hail from the North and the South, and at times mirror each other uncannily. Among them are housewives, doctors, preachers, bankers, journalists, and teachers. Their verse reflects the day-to-day reality of war, death, and destruction, and it contemplates questions of faith, slavery, society, patriotism, and politics.

Raised in South Carolina and New York, Woodson always felt halfway home in each place. In vivid poems, she shares what it was like to grow up as an African American in the 1960s and 1970s, living with the remnants of Jim Crow and her growing awareness of the Civil Rights movement.

In Empowering Words, Karen A. Weyler explores how outsiders used ephemeral formats such as broadsides, pamphlets, and newspapers to publish poetry, captivity narratives, formal addresses, and other genres with wide appeal in early America.

Relative Histories focuses on the Asian American memoir that specifically recounts the story of at least three generations of the same family. This form of auto/biography concentrates as much on other members of one's family as on oneself, generally collapses the boundaries conventionally established between biography and autobiography, and in many cases--as Rocío G. Davis proposes for the auto/biographies of ethnic writers--crosses the frontier into history, promoting collective memory. Davis centers on how Asian American family memoirs expand the limits and function of life writing by reclaiming history and promoting community cohesion. She argues that identity is shaped by not only the stories we have been told, but also the stories we tell, making these narratives important examples of the ways we remember our family's past and tell our community's story. In the context of auto/biographical writing or filmmaking that explores specific ethnic experiences of diaspora, assimilation, and integration, this work considers two important aspects: These texts re-imagine the past by creating a work that exists both in history and as a historical document, making the creative process a form of re-enactment of the past itself. Each chapter centers on a thematic concern germane to the Asian American experience: the narrative of twentieth-century Asian wars and revolutions, which has become the subtext of a significant number of Asian American family memoirs (Pang-Mei Natasha Chang's Bound Feet and Western Dress, May-lee and Winberg Chai's The Girl from Purple Mountain, K. Connie Kang's Home Was The Land of Morning Calm, Doung Van Mai Elliott's The Sacred Willow); family experiences of travel and displacement within Asia in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, which unveil a history of multiple diasporas that are often elided after families immigrate to the United States (Helie Lee's Still Life With Rice, Jael Silliman's Jewish Portraits, Indian Frames, Mira Kamdar's Motiba's Tattoos); and the development of Chinatowns as family spaces (Maxine Hong Kingston's China Men, Lisa See's On Gold Mountain, Bruce Edward Hall's Tea that Burns). The final chapter analyzes the discursive possibilities of the filmed family memoir ("family portrait documentary"), examining Lise Yasui's A Family Gathering, Ruth Ozeki Lounsbury's Halving the Bones, and Ann Marie Fleming's The Magical Life of Long Tack Sam. Davis concludes the work with a metaliterary engagement with the history of her own Asian diasporic family as she demonstrates the profound interconnection between forms of life writing.

Writing Diaspora questions aspects of cultural politics, including the legacies of European imperialism and colonialism, the media, pedagogy, literature, literacy, sexuality, intellectual labor, the uses and abuses of theory, and popularized notions about "others."

Kimberly Nichele Brown examines how African American women since the 1970s have found ways to move beyond the "double consciousness" of the colonized text to develop a healthy subjectivity that attempts to disassociate black subjectivity from its connection to white culture

Davies traces political tensions in Lu Xun's works which reflect the larger conflict in modern Chinese thought between egalitarian and authoritarian impulses. During the last phase of Lu Xun's career, the so-called "years on the left," we see how fiercely he defended a literature in which the people would speak for themselves, and we come to understand why Lu Xun continues to inspire the debates shaping China today.

This new, expanded edition features exclusive, unpublished photos taken by the 23-year-old Ernesto on his journey across a continent, and a tender preface by Aleida Guevara, offering an insightful perspective on the man and the icon.

From Ovid's advice to use milk for illicit love notes, to John Gerard's dramatic escape from the tower of London aided by orange juice ink messages, to al-Qaeda's hidden instructions in pornographic movies, this book presents spellbinding stories of secret messaging that chart its evolution in sophistication and its impact on history.

"It's either a genuine confession by Jack the Ripper, or it's an extraordinary novel...Only you can decide."--Paul Begg, author of Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History In the Whitechapel neighborhood of London in 1888, five women were horribly mutilated and murdered by the infamous killer, Jack the Ripper. Though there were many suspects, the monster was never caught. This recently discovered memoir from the 1920s introduces a new suspect: James Willoughby Carnac, a little-known figure who claims to have been the Ripper. Carnac describes the events and geography of Whitechapel in 1888 with chilling accuracy, including details of the murders that appear to have been unavailable to the public at the time. He presents a credible motive for becoming Jack, and, for the first time ever, a reason for ending the killing spree. Ultimately, you, the reader, must decide if this is simply one of the earliest imaginings of the case--and a groundbreaking literary addition to the Ripper canon--or if it is the genuine autobiography of Jack the Ripper himself. "A text that will no doubt be debated for years to come."--Alan Hicken, Montacute Museum, Somerset, England "Intricate and creepy."--The Daily Express(UK) "Easily read and worth it for the ending."--Kirkus

Now 79 years old, Sister Abegail looks back over her life and recounts the remarkable events that led to her becoming the mother of dozens of children orphaned by the AIDS crisis in South Africa.

A founding member of Sonic Youth, fashion icon and role model for a generation of women, now tells her story--a memoir of life as an artist, of music, marriage, motherhood, independence and as one of the first women of rock and roll.

How to be a Poet combines advice, ideas and encouragement from experienced poets and editors in topical chapters to examine both the technical and creative dimensions of being a poet. It's a no-nonsense manual where we've replaced the spanners with lots of ink, elbow grease and edits.

Herbert Spencer was an English philosopher and prominent social theorist of the Victorian era. In his work The Philosophy of Style he argues that written language should be as easy to understand as possible, allowing for the most effective and efficient possible communication. His suggestions for sentence structure supported ideas on formalist rhetoric

The design of Dafoe's guided journal-featuring teacher and student sides-is intended to make it easy for writing instructors to work with their students on individual concepts. This guided journal contains models and exemplars, as well as encourages explorations in language.

Writing Your Self is a comprehensive resource for anyone who wants to explore personal material in their writing. It examines how many writers use personal subject matter in memoirs, poems, journals and novels.