Jay Prosser

Examining the powerful drive that leads men and women literally to shed their skins gubarand -- in mind and body -- to cross the boundary of sex, Prosser argues that sex change is, at best, a narrative -- thus transsexuals make for adept and absorbing authors.

The Body Narratives of Transsexuality

Second Skins

American Fiction of the 1990s: Reflections of History and Culture brings together essays from international experts to examine one of the most vital and energized decades in American literature. This volume reads the rich body of 1990s American fiction in the context of key cultural concerns of the period. The issues that the contributors identify as especially productive include: Immigration and America’s geographical borders, particularly those with Latin America Racial tensions, race relations and racial exchanges Historical memory and the recording of history Sex, scandal and the politicization of sexuality Postmodern technologies, terrorism and paranoia American Fiction of the 1990s examines texts by established authors such as Don DeLillo, Toni Morrison, Philip Roth and Thomas Pynchon, who write some of their most ambitious work in the period, but also by emergent writers, such as Sherman Alexie, Chang-Rae Lee, E. Annie Proulx, David Foster Wallace, and Jonathan Franzen. Offering new insight into both the literature and the culture of the period, as well as the interaction between the two in a way that furthers the New American Studies, this volume will be essential reading for students and lecturers of American literature and culture and late twentieth-century fiction. Contributors include: Timothy Aubry, Alex Blazer, Kasia Boddy, Stephen J. Burn, Andrew Dix, Brian Jarvis, Suzanne W. Jones, Peter Knight, A. Robert Lee, Stacey Olster, Derek Parker Royal, Krishna Sen, Zoe Trodd, Andrew Warnes and Nahem Yousaf.

Reflections of history and culture

American Fiction of the 1990s

Rosalind E. Krauss

Jane Gallop

Carol Mavor

Michael Fried

Shawn Michelle Smith

Gordon Hughes

Paola Cortés Rocca

Victor Burgin

Margaret Olin

Roland Barthes's 1980 book Camera Lucidais perhaps the most influential book ever published on photography. The terms studiumand punctum,coined by Barthes for two different ways of responding to photographs, are part of the standard lexicon for discussions of photography; Barthes's understanding of photographic time and the relationship he forges between photography and death have been invoked countless times in photographic discourse; and the current interest in vernacular photographs and the ubiquity of subjective, even novelistic, ways of writing about photography both owe something to Barthes. Photography Degree Zero,the first anthology of writings on Camera Lucida,goes beyond the usual critical orthodoxies to offer a range of perspectives on Barthes's important book. Photography Degree Zero(the title links Barthes's first book, Writing Degree Zero,to his last, Camera Lucida)includes essays written soon after Barthes's book appeared as well as more recent rereadings of it, some previously unpublished. The contributors' approaches range from psychoanalytical (in an essay drawing on the work of Lacan) to Buddhist (in an essay that compares the photographic flash to the mystic's light of revelation); they include a history of Barthes's writings on photography and an account of Camera Lucidaand its reception; two views of the book through the lens of race; and a provocative essay by Michael Fried and two responses to it. The variety of perspectives included in Photography Degree Zero,and the focus on Camera Lucidain the context of photography rather than literature or philosophy, serve to reopen a vital conversation on Barthes's influential work. Contributors: Geoffrey Batchen, Victor Burgin, Eduardo Cadava, Paolo Cortes-Rocca, James Elkins, Michael Fried, Jane Gallop, Gordon Hughes, Margaret Iverson, Rosalind E. Krauss, Carol Mavor, Margaret Olin, Jay Prosser, Shawn Michelle Smith

Reflections on Roland Barthes's Camera Lucida

Photography Degree Zero

Laura L. Doan

The Well of Loneliness was released in Britain in 1928 and was immediately controversial. This text gathers together classic essays on the book to provide an understanding of how views have changed.

Critical Perspectives on The Well of Loneliness

Palatable Poison

Nancy K. Miller

Geoffrey Batchen

Mick Gidley

A volume of essays by leading photography writers and critics, published to benefit Amnesty International, cites such examples as the work of Susan Sontag to question whether photography of disturbing images stirs empathy or voyeurism in its viewers, outlining how to look at photographs to become contextually informed. Original.

Photography in Crisis

Picturing Atrocity

A young boy, thin and ill, feeds his small brother in a ritualized act of desperation, half-stifling him. The boy will be treated, his father will get a job, and the family will be moved from their shack in the slums of Rio de Janeiro to a suburban house, courtesy of the American viewers of Gordon Parks's photographs in Life magazine. It all turned

Photography and Loss

Light in the Dark Room

Jay Prosser

Books

Your next favorite book is out there