Recently added articles from The Journal of American Culture:
The Sub-Subaltern Monster: Imperialist Hegemony and the Cinematic Voodoo Zombie
Jun 01, 2008; Bishop, Kyle ... With the popular success of the first talkie horror films, Hollywood of the 1930s was anxious to find the next big-screen monster. Surprisingly, the creative efforts of filmmakers lead them not to the usual mythologies of Europe but rather to exotic Caribbean travel literature. Sensational books ...
Does Judgment at Nuremberg Accurately Depict the Nazi War Crimes Trial?
Jun 01, 2008; Gonshak, Henry ... The year 2007 was the sixtieth anniversary of the Nuremberg War Crimes Trials, in which the victorious Allies prosecuted high officials in the Nazi regime for what were labeled "crimes against humanity." Discussing the contemporary significance of the trials, Bradley F. Smith writes in Reaching ...
Climbing Jacob's Ladder: Reconstructing the Ladder in African American Spirituals
Jun 01, 2008; Hummon, David M ... And Jacob went out from Beersheba, and went toward Haran. And he lighted upon a certain place, and tarried there all night, because the sun was set; and he took of the stones of that place, and put them for his pillows, and lay down in that place to sleep. And he dreamed, and behold a ladder set ...
Honorable Mention Winner in the 2007 Best Graduate Student Paper Competition: The Media's Frontier Construction of President George W. Bush
Jun 01, 2008; Malphurs, Ryan ... In January 2006, President George W. Bush accepted unscreened questions from students at Kansas State University. David Sanger's New York Times article captured a unique exchange when a student asked a rather unusual and pointed question. The student, curious how the president might have ...
A Movable Feast: Ten Millennia of Food Globalization
Jun 01, 2008; Long, Lucy M ... A Movable Feast: Ten Millennia of Food Globalization Kenneth F. Kiple. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007. A Movable Feast: Ten Millennia of Food Globalization is an engaging, wonderfully detailed account of the global spread of foods over the past 10,000 years. Historian Dr ....
Act of Justice: Lincoln's Emancipation and the Law of War
Jun 01, 2008; Browne, Ray B ... Act of Justice: Lincoln's Emancipation and the Law of War Burrus M. Carnahan. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2007. Since the Civil War the question of why Lincoln did not free the slaves sooner than he did if his sympathy with and understanding of their plight was genuine ....
Celebrating Buster Keaton, 1993-2007
Jun 01, 2008; Welsh, Jim ... Two of the most distinctive creations of American culture would have to be American music (jazz, ragtime, and blues) and American silent comedy. Both are delightfully combined and celebrated in Eastern Kansas every autumn. The fans of Buster Keaton gathered once again in Iola, KS, at the end of ...
America Town: Building the Outposts of Empire
Jun 01, 2008; Moran, Joseph J ... America Town: Building the Outposts of Empire M.L. Gillem. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2007. Gillem is a historian, architect, and former military officer. He draws on his background to describe how the use of land on American military bases overseas affects the host ...
American Chestnut: The Life, Death and Rebirth of a Perfect Tree
Jun 01, 2008; Browne, Ray B ... American Chestnut: The Life, Death and Rebirth of a Perfect Tree Susan Freinkel. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2007. The perfect tree deserves and gets in this volume the perfect book. Those of us older than perhaps fifty years will remember the sad bliting and killing of our ...
American Culture in the 1980s
Jun 01, 2008; Neal, Arthur G ... American Culture in the 1980s Graham Thompson. Edinburgh University Press. 2007. The book leads off with a chronology of the major American cultural events of the 1980s. Throughout, case studies are developed to effectively illustrate and elaborate major themes. These include, for ...
Beautiful Democracy: Aesthetics and Anarchy in a Global Era
Jun 01, 2008; Browne, Ray B ... Beautiful Democracy: Aesthetics and Anarchy in a Global Era Russ Castronovo. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2007. Examinations of the liberalizing of aesthetics from the suppressing power of the elite are always interesting. This one is especially interesting and informative ...
Building a Century of Progress: The Architecture of Chicago's 1933-34 World's Fair
Jun 01, 2008; Sokol, David M ... Building a Century of Progress: The Architecture of Chicago's 1933-34 World's Fair Lisa D. Shrenk. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2007. Discussion of "The Century of Progress" world's fair is unthinkable without comparisons with "The Columbian Exposition," not only because ...
Brand NFL: Making and Selling America's Favorite Sport
Jun 01, 2008; Anderson, Roger ... Brand NFL: Making and Selling America's Favorite Sport Michael Oriard. Chapel Hill, NC: The University of North Carolina Press, 2007. Although there have been many books written about the National Football League, this study is unique in that the author not only played for the Kansas ...
Civil War America: Voices from the Home Front/On Alexander Gardner's Photographic Sketch Book of the Civil War/The Civil War's First Blood: Missouri, 1854-61
Jun 01, 2008; Browne, Ray B ... Civil War America: Voices from the Home Front James Marten. New York: Fordham University Press, 2007. On Alexander Gardner's Photographic Sketch Book of the Civil War Anthony W. Lee and Elizabeth Young. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2007. The Civil War's First Blood: ...
Cinema by the Bay
Jun 01, 2008; Ravalli, Richard ... Cinema by the Bay Sheerly Avni. New York: George Lucas Books, 2006. Cinema by the Bay is the first title from George Lucas Books, and as such it adequately represents some of the valuable contributions of previous Lucasfilm-related volumes as well as some of the drawbacks. A delightful ...
Cultural Amnesia: Necessary Memories from History and the Arts
Jun 01, 2008; Welsh, Jim ... Cultural Amnesia: Necessary Memories from History and the Arts Clive James. New York: W.W. Norton Co., 2007. This is a browse about book, written by a gifted stylist who is very widely read and who has a clear sense of what (or whom) should be considered important. Consider, for example, ...
Daily Life in Immigrant America, 1870-1920
Jun 01, 2008; Browne, Ray B ... Daily Life in Immigrant America, 1870-1920 June Granatir Alexander. Westport: Greenwod Press, 2007. In our day when, for one reason another cultures are restless, forced to move, or for economic or military conditions are being forced or allowed to move, this volume is an excellent ...
Dashing Diamond Dick and Other Classic Dime Novels/American Supernatural Tales
Jun 01, 2008; Browne, Ray B ... Dashing Diamond Dick and Other Classic Dime Novels J. Randolph Cox, Ed. New York: Penguin Books, 2007. American Supernatural Tales S.T. Joshi, Ed. New York: Penguin Books, 2007. The nineteenth century was saturated with the literature of Beadle's Dime Novels and subsequent ...
Deer Hunting with Jesus: Dispatches from America's Class War
Jun 01, 2008; Estes, Jack ... Deer Hunting with Jesus: Dispatches from America's Class War Joe Bageant. NY: Crown, 2007. Standing on the subway, reading Deer Hunting with Jesus, I was approached by a nice-looking middle-aged woman who told me that if I enjoyed that book, I might also be interested in the book she was ...
Disguised as Clark Kent: Jews, Comics, and the Creation of the Superhero
Jun 01, 2008; Lawrence, John Shelton ... Disguised as Clark Kent: Jews, Comics, and the Creation of the Superhero Danny Fingeroth. Foreword by Stan Lee: New York: Continuum, 2007. If we accept the Hebrew Bible as historical source, persons of Jewish identity have forever debated how that identity is or should be parsed into its ...