Jeff Birkenstein

Anna Froula

Karen Randell

A collection of analyses focusing on popular culture as a profound discursive site of anxiety and discussion about 9/11 and demystifies the day's events.

Film, Popular Culture and the War on Terror

Reframing 9/11

Terry Gilliam has been making movies for more than forty years, and this volume analyzes a selection of his thrilling directorial work, from his early films with Monty Python to The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnussus (2009). The frenetic genius, auteur, and social critic continues to create indelible images on screen--if, that is, he can get funding for his next project. Featuring eleven original essays from an international group of scholars, this collection argues that when Gilliam makes a movie, he goes to war: against Hollywood caution and convention, against American hyper-consumerism and imperial militarism, against narrative vapidity and spoon-fed mediocrity, and against the brutalizing notion and cruel vision of the "American Dream."

It's a Mad World

The Cinema of Terry Gilliam

September 11th, 2001 remains a focal point of American consciousness, a site demanding ongoing excavation, a site at which to mark before and after "everything" changed. In ways both real and intangible the entire sequence of events of that day continues to resonate in an endlessly proliferating aftermath of meanings that continue to evolve. Presenting a collection of analyses by an international body of scholars that examines America's recent history, this book focuses on popular culture as a profound discursive site of anxiety and discussion about 9/11 and demystifies the day's events in order to contextualize them into a historically grounded series of narratives that recognizes the complex relations of a globalized world. Essays in Reframing 9/11 share a collective drive to encourage new and original approaches for understanding the issues both within and beyond the official political rhetoric of the events of the "The Global War on Terror" and issues of national security.

Film, Popular Culture and the "War on Terror"

Terry Gilliam has been making movies for more than forty years, and this volume analyses a selection of his thrilling directorial work, from his early films with Monty Python to The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnussus (2009). This collection argues that when Gilliam makes a movie, he goes to war: against Hollywood caution and convention.

Karen A. Ritzenhoff

Elena Caoduro

Mediated Terrorism in the 21st Century offers new interpretations of figures emerging from representations of terrorism and counterterrorism: the male hero, female agent, religious leader, victim/perpetrator, and survivor. This collection of essays by a broad array of international scholars reflects the altered image-making processes that have developed from George W. Bush’s “war on terror.” Building on current literature on media and terrorism, this volume analyzes the most recent technological developments that have impacted the way we experience terrorism: online videos, social media, cartoons, media feeds, and drones. The authors address different time periods, different terrorist groups, and explore the way filmmakers and television producers from the USA, Europe, South Africa, and the Middle East are documenting modern wars in popular culture.

Mediated Terrorism in the 21st Century

How can love be understood globally as a problematic transgression rather than the narrative of "happy endings" that Hollywood has offered? The contributors utilize varying methodologies of textual analysis, psychoanalytic models, and cultural critique and engage with a broad range of films to explore issues of gender identity and spectatorship.

Karen Randell

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