Diversity in Our Collections

Selection of published travel accounts from ancient times to the early twentieth-century

This dictionary contains a wealth of information on the food materials, food ethos, cuisine and recipes of India. It draws upon literature, archaeology, historical writing, botany and genetics to situate Indian foods in time and place. The country's oldest literatures, Sanskrit, Pali, Tamil and Kannada, have been drawn upon extensively, as have the often illuminating accounts of visitors to India.

Time in Indian Music is the first major study of rhythm, metre, and form in North Indian rag, or classical, music. Martin Clayton presents a theoretical model for the organization of time in this repertory, a model which is related explicitly to other spheres of Indian thought and culture as well as to current ideas on musical time in alternative repertories - including that of Western music.

K-Pop: Popular Music, Cultural Amnesia, and Economic Innovation in South Korea seeks at once to describe and explain the emergence of export-oriented South Korean popular music and to make sense of larger South Korean economic and cultural transformations.

Thailand is rapidly industrializing, dramatically improving the living standards of its people, and gradually developing a more democratic society. Despite such profound changes, traditional Thai culture has not only survived, but has also, in many respects, prospered. Although famous for its food, and despite its increasing popularity as a tourist destination, Thailand remains relatively unknown to most Westerners.

This book covers four eras of Thailand: the prehistoric period; the period characterized by the culture of the kingdom of Dvaravati; the centuries of Khmer dominance; and, as classical Khmer civilization waned, the period of the struggle for identity. A systematic and elucidating history of pre-fourteenth-century Thailand in a volume indispensable to historians of art, religion, politics, and society.

Stories centering on the lovelorn ghost (Mae Nak) and the magical monk (Somdet To) are central to Thai Buddhism. Historically important and emotionally resonant, these characters appeal to every class of follower. Metaphorically and rhetorically powerful, they invite constant reimagining across time. Focusing on representations of the ghost and monk from the late eighteenth century to the present, Justin Thomas McDaniel builds a case for interpreting modern Thai Buddhist practice through the movements of these transformative figures.

Arranged in chronological order, this collection of scholarly essays covers the history of the area from pre-historic times to the current peace negotiations.

Colin Shindler's remarkable history begins in 1948, as waves of immigrants arrived in Israel from war-torn Europe to establish new cities, new institutions, and a new culture founded on the Hebrew language. Optimistic beginnings were soon replaced with the sobering reality of wars with Arab neighbours, internal ideological differences, and ongoing confrontation with the Palestinians.

Israel's brief, turbulent history and the Arab-Israeli conflict are always taken into account in the narrative; however, the emphasis here is nonpolitical and encompassing of the heterogenous culture of its citizens, including Jews, Arabs, Druze, and others. The predominant Jewish culture itself is multicultural, with immigrants from all over the world.

Beyond Hummus and Falafel is the story of how food has come to play a central role in how Palestinian citizens of Israel negotiate life and a shared cultural identity within a tense political context. At the household level, Palestinian women govern food culture in the home, replicating tradition and acting as agents of change and modernization, carefully adopting and adapting mainstream Jewish culinary practices and technologies in the kitchen. Food is at the center of how Arab culture minorities define and shape the boundaries and substance of their identity within Israel.

Grassfields Stories from Cameroon is an anthology of short stories. It comprises animal trickster tales, bird survival tales, and human-interest stories. The compendium is a reflection of the mores, cultures, and value systems of the indigenous peoples of the Northwest Province of Cameroon.

The Sacred Door and Other Stories: Cameroon Folktales of the Beba offers readers a selection of folktales infused with riddles, proverbs, songs, myths, and legends, using various narrative techniques that capture the vibrancy of Beba oral traditions.

By examining key themes such as colonialism, religion, slavery, nationalism and the economy, the authors show how Nigeria's history has been swayed by the vicissitudes of the world around it, and how Nigerians have adapted to meet these challenges. This book offers a unique portrayal of a resilient people living in a country with immense, but unrealized, potential.

This book covers various aspects of culture in Nigeria, including lifecycle, religion, women, superstitions & folklore, sports, holidays & festivals, and etiquette.

Juju music originated more than fifty years ago among the Yoruba of Nigeria. This history and ethnography of juju is the first detailed account of the evolution and social significance of a West African popular music. Enhanced with maps, color photographs of musicians and dance parties, musical transcriptions, interviews with musicians, and a glossary of Yoruba terms, Juju is an invaluable contribution to scholarship and a boon to fans who want to discover the roots of this vibrant music.

Vol. 1. From aboriginal times to the end of slavery. Vol. 2. From the ending of slavery to the twenty-first century.

The Natural History of the Bahamas offers the most comprehensive coverage of the terrestrial and coastal flora and fauna on the islands of the Bahamas archipelago, as well as of the region's natural history and ecology. Readers will gain an appreciation for the importance of conserving the diverse lifeforms on these special Caribbean islands. A detailed introduction to the history, geology, and climate of the islands.

Need to know it all? Our all-inclusive culture report for Bahamas will get up to speed on all aspects of culture in Bahamas, including lifecycle, religion, women, superstitions & folklore, sports, holidays & festivals, and etiquette.

Surveys the history, topography, people, and culture of the Bahamas, with an emphasis on the country's current economy, industry, and place in the political world.

Fifth Business and Alligator Pie. Stephen Leacock, Grey Owl, and Morley Callaghan: these treasured Canadian books and authors were all nurtured by the Macmillan Company of Canada, one of the country's foremost twentieth-century publishing houses. The Literary Legacy of the Macmillan Company of Canada is a unique look at the contribution of publishers and editors to the formation of the Canadian literary canon.

Famous for its natural beauty, Canada is underappreciated for its vibrant multiculturalism and racial diversity. This program journeys to Quebec and British Columbia to study social, economic, and cultural issues in those provinces. Conversations with local residents—including bilingual students in Montreal and three generations of Japanese fishermen in Vancouver—highlight the complexities and the rewards of the Canadian experience.

Explores the history of Costa Rica and discusses its people, culture, political system, economy, and geography. Includes maps, photographs, and a glossary.

Need to know it all? Our all-inclusive culture report for Costa Rica will get up to speed on all aspects of culture in Costa Rica, including lifecycle, religion, women, superstitions & folklore, sports, holidays & festivals, and etiquette.

Sick explores contemporary issues of gender, empowerment, access to resources, and fair trade as she examines how Costa Rican coffee-producing households cope with the complexities of a globalizing world economy. Using a commodity approach, she integrates household, regional, and global processes. Farmers of the Golden Bean challenges previous assumptions about the nature of economic change and the sustainability of household producers in the global economy.

Shamanism--the practice of entering a trance state to experience visions of a reality beyond the ordinary and to gain esoteric knowledge--has been an important part of life for indigenous societies throughout the Americas from prehistoric times until the present. Much has been written about shamanism in both scholarly and popular literature, but few authors have linked it to another significant visual realm--art. In this pioneering study, Rebecca R. Stone considers how deep familiarity with, and profound respect for, the extra-ordinary visionary experiences of shamanism profoundly affected the artistic output of indigenous cultures in Central and South America before the European invasions of the sixteenth century.

In war-torn Central America there is a country with no dictator and no army, a country at peace with itself and its neighbors. It is the oldest democracy in Latin America. This film explores the history of Costa Rica and the reasons it has been able to exist as a neutral country firmly committed to social welfare and free elections. Costa Ricans live without an army, preferring to invest their resources in hospitals and schools rather than machine guns and tanks. The film explores the issue of Costa Rica's neutrality in the face of its dependence on U.S. aid.

The life histories and testimonies of nine Salvadoran women from different generations shape this intimate portrayal of contemporary El Salvador. The authors interviewed a grandmother, mother, and granddaughter from three Salvadoran families: La Familia Nuñez, members of the upper class; La Familia Rivas, from El Salvador's growing middle class; and La Familia García, from the campo, the Salvadoran peasantry. The voices we hear convey a deep sense of the world of Salvadoran women and how life is lived in that Central American country today.

El Salvador today -- Pre-Columbian El Salvador -- The Colonial Period, 1524-1821 -- The struggle for the nation, 1821-1871 -- Coffee and militarization, 1871-1932 -- La matanza and beyond, 1932-1972 -- Revolution, 1972-1992 -- Reconstruction, 1992-2008.

Montgomery offers a detailed account of the evolution of the war, a clear analysis of why Duarte's promises for peace and prosperity could not be fulfilled, and an evaluation of the electoral victory of the oligarchy in 1989. Final chapters offer an assessment of El Salvador's prospects for peace.

The low–slung mountains and rural villages of eastern El Salvador are home to one of the most joyous yet little-known regional musics of Latin America. Called chanchona—“big pig,” the local name for the string bass—it is music made by and for country people. When the family group Los Hermanos Lovo fled the civil war of the 1980s and 1990s, they took their homegrown music with them to Washington, D.C. There, the lively sounds of the cumbia are as much an invitation to dance as a way of creating a sense of “home” and cultural solidarity.

An anthropological study of food. It focuses on taste and flavour using an original interpretation of Alfred Gell's theory of the 'art nexus'. Grounded in ethnography, it explores the notion of cooking as an embodied skill and artistic practice. It examines the integral role and concept of 'flavour' in everyday life.

This text traces the last 500 years of Mexican history, from the indigenous empires that were devastated by the Spanish conquest through the election of 2006 and its aftermath.

The aim of this book is to engender Mexican folk art and locate women at its centre by studying the processes of creation, distribution, and consumption, as well as examining iconographic aspects, and elements of class and ethnicity, from the perspective of gender. The author will demonstrate that the topic provides unique insights into Mexican culture, and has enormous relevance within and without the country, given the fact that much folk art is made for the United States and Europe, either in terms of the tourists who buy it on coming to Mexico, or that which is exported.

In Mexico toy-making continues to be one of the most fascinating of traditional arts. For those artisans who dedicate themselves to the creation of toys, work and play are a single process. In the colorful toys they produce, we see the fantasy, wit, and imagination of artists who play while they work. Abracadabra features over one hundred colorful toys made throughout Mexico, including carved and painted wooden figures, clay miniatures, pinwheels, rocking horses, and stick puppets. Among the materials used are recycled cardboard, chewing gum, tin and wire, tree bark, and mud.

This book investigates how archaeological knowledge is used for both maintaining and contesting nation-building and state-hegemony in Ecuador. Specifically, Hugo Benavides analyzes how the pre-Hispanic site of Cochasqui has become a source of competing narratives of Native American, Spanish, and Ecuadorian occupations, which serve the differing needs of the nation-state and different national populations at large.

Culture and Customs of Ecuador celebrates the extraordinary cultural, geographic, and ethnic diversity that has made this small country one of Latin America's most unique. Through this overview of its history, religious institutions, literature, social customs, cinema, media, and visual and performing arts, Ecuador emerges as a vibrant microcosm of Latin America.

Musical genres, musical instruments, and even songs can often capture the essence of a country's national character. In Whose National Music?, the first book-length study of Ecuadorian popular music, Ketty Wong explores Ecuadorians' views of their national identity in the twentieth and early twenty-first centuries through an examination of the music labels they use.

The author uses four different facets of the social life of food--diet, cuisine, discourse, & practice--to draw a richly detailed & compelling portrait of one South American community.

The sixteen essays in this volume expand the groundbreaking work of Gene Brucker, the historian in recent decades who has been most responsible for the discovery and exploration of these pre-modern qualities of the Florentine Renaissance.

Organized by month of the year Where To Go When: Italy offers a illustrated tour of Italy, unearthing the best of every region month by month. Whether you're looking for a fun family holiday or a cultural weekend in the city, Where To Go When: Italy suggests suitable locations and the best month of the year to visit each one.

Offering a thorough history of Italian cultural movements, political trends and literary texts over the last century and a half, this text also examines the cultural and political situation in Italy today.

This book discusses the rise of Italian fashion since 1945, the development of the Italian Look from the late 1970s to the present, and the many great designers who have contributed to Italy's fashion triumphs

This book presents a compelling and artfully told narrative about family and food in late 20th-century Florence. Based on solid research, Counihan examines how family, and especially gender have changed in Florence since the end of World War II to the present, giving us a portrait of the changing nature of modern life as exemplified through food and foodways.

Perched above the confluence of two great rivers, the Sava and Danube, Belgrade has been home to many civilizations: Celts, Romans, Byzantines, Bulgars, Magyars, Ottomans and Serbs. A Turkish fortress, the focus for a Serbian principality, an intellectual and artistic center, the city grew until it became capital of Yugoslavia. Now it is one of the largest cities in south-eastern Europe and capital of the Republic of Serbia. Despite many challenges, Belgrade has resisted assimilation and created a unique cultural identity out of its many contrasting sides, sometimes with surprising consequences.

This culture report for Serbia will get up to speed on all aspects of culture in Serbia, including lifecycle, religion, women, superstitions and folklore, sports, holidays and festivals, and etiquette.

Shifting Serbias: kings, tsars, despots and patriarchs, from the beginning to the eighteenth century -- Serbia takes root: the liberators, Karageorge and Prince Milos, 1804-1839 -- Serbia becomes a state: from autonomy to independence, 1839-1878 -- Independent Serbia: rival dynasties and political parties, 1878-1914 -- Serbia at war: between destruction and Yugoslavia, 1914-1918 -- Serbia into Yugoslavia: between the two world wars: 1918-1941 -- Fragments of Serbia: victims, resisters and collaborators, 1941-1945 -- Serbia under Tito: part of a wider communist plan, 1945-1980 -- Serbia after Broz: from Tito's apotheosis to Milošević's consecration, 1980-1989 -- Serbia in darkness, : the Milošević years, the 1990s.

The nonviolent overthrow of Balkan dictator Slobodan Milošević in October 2000 is celebrated as democracy promotion at its best. This perceived political success has been used to justify an industry tasked with "exporting" democracy to countries like Belarus, Ukraine, Tunisia, and Egypt. Yet the true extent of the West's involvement in Milošević's overthrow remained unclear until now. Engineering Revolution uses declassified CIA documents and personal interviews with diplomats, aid providers, and policymakers, as well as thousands of pages of internal NGO documents, to explore what proponents consider one of the greatest successes of the democracy promotion enterprise.

Ana Hofman examines the negotiation of the gender performances in Serbian rural areas as a result of the socialist gender policy and creation of the new "femininity" in the public sphere. She focuses on the stage performances of female amateur groups at the Village Gatherings, state-sponsored events held from the 1970's through the mid-1990s in the southeastern Serbian region of Niško Polje.