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Studying for Social Work
by Mark Hughes Linda Burnett Ian Collinson Eileen BaldryThis essential guide to study skills takes social work students through every step of their degree journey, providing them with the academic tools they will need to thrive along the way. Inventively informed by the insights and reflections of qualifying students, the book offers effective guidance that is grounded in real experience of the social work degree. It is particularly suited to those in their early years of study and supports students as ′social workers in the making′. The book covers a comprehensive range of the core study skills, including: -Time management -Literature searches -Engaging with research -Responding to new styles of social work learning and teaching -Critical thinking -Academic writing and -Presentations With reflective questions, handy practical tips and links to helpful websites, this accessible handbook is the perfect study companion for every student on the path to professional qualification.
Studying for your Master’s Degree in Social Work (Critical Study Skills)
by Jane Bottomley Patricia CartneyAn essential guide for all students studying for a Master's degree in social work, whether they have come directly from their undergraduate studies or after a period of employment. This book focuses specifically on the skills needed to study social work at Master's level, helping students get to grips with the academic rigour required at this higher level of study. This includes research skills, writing style, tone, the emphasis on self-reflection and the need to communicate in both academic and professional contexts. Pedagogical features and activities provide opportunities to explore, analyse and reflect on what has been learnt. The book will help cultivate a social practice approach to writing, raise awareness of the choices available, and aid understanding so that readers can produce the types of discourse required at Master’s level in social work.
Studying for your Social Work Degree (Critical Study Skills)
by Jane Bottomley Steven Pryjmachuk Patricia CartneyStudying for your Social Work Degree is PERFECT for anyone wanting to train to become a social worker. After reading this fully comprehensive guide you will understand: the structure and culture of HE, and how social work fits into it what to expect, and what will be expected of you, as a university student teaching and assessment methods within social work, so that you can perform to the best of your ability in an academic environment how to manage your social work studies in an effective way and make the most of the resources available to you. The books in our Critical Study Skills series will help you gain the knowledge, skills and strategies you need to achieve your goals. They provide support in all areas important for university study, including institutional and disciplinary policy and practice, self-management, and research and communication. Packed with tasks and activities to help you improve your learning, including learner autonomy and critical thinking, and to guide you towards reflective practice in your study and work life. Uniquely, this book is written by an experienced social work lecturer and an English for Academic Purposes (EAP) lecturer.
Studying for your Social Work Degree (Transforming Social Work Practice Series)
by Hilary WalkerThis fully-revised new edition looks at how students can make the most from their time studying on the social work degree. Focusing on each of the three years of study, the author skilfully unpicks the critical thinking, reflection and study skills essential for the completion of the degree. There are sections on autonomous learning, writing academically, communication skills and developing critical analysis and argument. This second edition has more information on how students learn, what makes for excellence in social work research, and how students can successfully integrate their skills with their practice.
Stuff Brits Like: A Guide to What's Great about Great Britain
by Fraser McAlpineAs the lead writer for BBC Anglophenia, Fraser McAlpine (a man assembled from almost every region of the UK*) spends his life explaining Brits to foreigners. Now he lifts the lid on our Marmite pot of nations and takes you on a journey from the Isle of Wight to Inverness, Belfast to Bangor, exploring the joyful enthusiasms (and pet hates) of an endlessly multifarious Britain. Stuff Brits Like celebrates why we like puns and pedantry, decorum and drawing willies on things, Trainspotting and Downton Abbey, apologizing needlessly (sorry) and cocking a snook. We cheer both the underdog and the bad guy, we adore melancholy types like Morrissey and grumpy Eeyore... and we love being told off by scolds. Meet mythical beasts from the Scottish Nuckelavee to the Cornish Knocker; the branch of the WI called the Iron Maidens, and the British Cheese Board (yes, it is really called that); find out which eccentric Lord would only eat his meals in his swimming pool, why postboxes are bright red (it's health and safety gone mad) and the origin of weird traditions such as the Burning of the Clocks. Stuff Brits Like takes you through why Doctor Who could only have come from Britain, why cricket is a form of siege warfare in whites, and why we argue about the best five British films or what makes The Great British Guitar Band...
Stuff Mom Never Told You: The Feminist Past, Present, and Future
by Anney Reese Samantha McVeyThe concept of feminism has evolved and changed so much over the last few decades that it can be confusing for people to keep up. Luckily, Anney Reese and Samantha McVey break it all down every week on their popular iHeart podcast, Stuff Mom Never Told You.In this book—their first—they explore the history, strategy, and emotion that went into several milestones and emergent issues of the recent feminist movement. Starting with Billie Jean King’s famous “Battle of the Sexes” tennis match, they also talk about the Civil Rights movement and the women who helped shape it; the disturbing prevalence of major backlogs in rape kit testing; how LGBTQ rights and women’s right intersect; and how women have been critical to the advancement of disability rights, and more.Written with a sharp tongue, an infectious curiosity, and a deeply empathetic voice, Reese and McVey show the true breadth of what feminism can stand for, what it can achieve, and whom it can help lift up.
Stuff They Don't Want You to Know
by Noel Brown Ben Bowlin Matt Frederick“Interesting...Bowlin's calmly rational approach to the subject of conspiracy theories shows the importance of logic and evidence.”—Booklist"A page-turning book to give to someone who believes in pizza pedophilia or that the Illuminati rule the world."—Kirkus ReviewsThe co-hosts of the hit podcast Stuff They Don’t Want You to Know, Ben Bowlin, Matthew Frederick, & Noel Brown, discern conspiracy fact from fiction in this sharp, humorous, compulsively readable, and gorgeously illustrated book.In times of chaos and uncertainty, when trust is low and economic disparity is high, when political institutions are crumbling and cultural animosities are building, conspiracy theories find fertile ground. Many are wild, most are untrue, a few are hard to ignore, but all of them share one vital trait: there’s a seed of truth at their center. That seed carries the sordid, conspiracy-riddled history of our institutions and corporations woven into its DNA.Ben Bowlin, Matt Frederick, and Noel Brown host the popular iHeart Media podcast, Stuff They Don’t Want You To Know. They are experts at exploring, explaining, and interrogating today’s emergent conspiracies—from chem trails and biological testing to the secrets of lobbying and the indisputable evidence of UFOs.Written in a smart, witty, and conversational style, elevated with amazing illustrations, Stuff They Don’t Want You to Know is a vital book in understanding the nature of conspiracy and using truth as a powerful weapon against ignorance, misinformation, and lies.
Stuff White People Like
by Christian LanderWhite people love nothing better than sipping free-trade gourmet coffee, leafing through the SundayNew York Times, and listening to David Sedaris on NPR (ideally all at the same time). TheStuff White People Like 2010 Day-to-Day Calendarinvestigates, explains, and offers advice for finding social success with white people, all in a tongue-in-cheek manner. Whether explaining their obsession with snowboarding or why kitchen gadgets make them weak in the knees, this calendar has all the white stuff.
Stuffed and Starved
by Raj PatelCompletely updated and revised edition of one of the most widely-praised food books of recent years. It's a perverse fact of modern life: There are more starving people in the world than ever before, while there are also more people who are overweight. To find out how we got to this point and what we can do about it, Raj Patel launched a comprehensive investigation into the global food network. It took him from the colossal supermarkets of California to India's wrecked paddy-fields and Africa's bankrupt coffee farms, while along the way he ate genetically engineered soy beans and dodged flying objects in the protestor-packed streets of South Korea. What he found was shocking, from the false choices given us by supermarkets to a global epidemic of farmer suicides, and real reasons for famine in Asia and Africa. Yet he also found great cause for hope--in international resistance movements working to create a more democratic, sustainable and joyful food system. Going beyond ethical consumerism, Patel explains, from seed to store to plate, the steps to regain control of the global food economy, stop the exploitation of both farmers and consumers, and rebalance global sustenance.
Stuffocation: Why We've Had Enough of Stuff and Need Experience More Than Ever
by James WallmanStuffocation is a movement manifesto for "experiential" living, a call to arms to stop accumulating stuff and start accumulating experiences, and a road map for a new way forward with the potential to transform our lives.Reject materialism. Embrace experientialism. Live more with less. Stuffocation is one of the most pressing problems of the twenty-first century. We have more stuff than we could ever need, and it isn't making us happier. It's bad for the planet. It's cluttering up our homes. It's making us stressed--and it might even be killing us. A rising number of us are already turning our backs on all-you-can-get consumption. We are choosing access over ownership, and taking our business to companies like Zipcar, Spotify, and Netflix. Fed up with materialism, we are ready for a new way forward. Trend forecaster James Wallman traces our obsession with stuff back to the original Mad Men, who first created desire through advertising. He interviews anthropologists studying the clutter crisis, economists searching for new ways of measuring progress, and psychologists who link stuffocation to declining well-being. And he introduces us to the innovators who are already living more consciously and with more meaning by choosing experience over stuff. Experientialism does not mean giving up all of our possessions. It is a solution that is less extreme but equally fundamental. It's about transforming what we value. Stuffocation is a paradigm-shifting look at our habits and an inspiring call for living more with less. It's the one important book you won't be able to live without. What People Are Saying About Stuffocation "James Wallman deftly hits upon a major insight for our times: that acquiring 'stuff' and 'things' is not nearly as meaningful as collecting experiences. Some of the happiest days of my life were when I had nothing and lived on a houseboat. Without stuff to tie me down, I felt completely free."--Blake Mycoskie, founder of TOMS and author of the New York Times bestseller Start Something That Matters "Stuffocation is a must-read. We think that more stuff will make us happier, but as the book nicely shows, we're just plain wrong. A great mix of stories and science, Stuffocation reveals the downside of more, and what we can do about it."--Jonah Berger, author of the New York Times bestseller Contagious "In Stuffocation, James Wallman offers a deeply important message by weaving contemporary social science into very engaging stories. Reading the book is such a pleasure that you hardly recognize you're being told that you should change how you live your life."--Barry Schwartz, author of The Paradox of Choice "With a sociologist's eye and a storyteller's ear, James Wallman takes us on a tour of today's experience economy from the perspective not of businesses, nor even of consumers per se, but of everyday people. In doing so, he identifies the rise of a new value system among those who are consciously replacing materialism with what he rightly calls experientialism. Spot on."--B. Joseph Pine II and James H. Gilmore, authors of The Experience Economy "Stuffocation explains how less but better stuff and space can lead to more time, more experiences, more connecting with people, and therefore more happiness. Designed right, small is the new big."--Graham Hill, founder, LifeEdited.com and TreeHugger.comFrom the Hardcover edition.
Stumbling Blocks Before The Blind: Medieval Constructions Of A Disability
by Edward Wheatley<P>Stumbling Blocks Before the Blind presents the first comprehensive exploration of a disability in the Middle Ages, drawing on the literature, history, art history, and religious discourse of England and France. It relates current theories of disability to the cultural and institutional constructions of blindness in the eleventh through fifteenth centuries, examining the surprising differences in the treatment of blind people and the responses to blindness in these two countries. <P>The book shows that pernicious attitudes about blindness were partially offset by innovations and ameliorations---social; literary; and, to an extent, medical---that began to foster a fuller understanding and acceptance of blindness. A number of practices and institutions in France, both positive and negative---blinding as punishment, the foundation of hospices for the blind, and some medical treatment---resulted in not only attitudes that commodified human sight but also inhumane satire against the blind in French literature, both secular and religious. Anglo-Saxon and later medieval England differed markedly in all three of these areas, and the less prominent position of blind people in society resulted in noticeably fewer cruel representations in literature. This book will interest students of literature, history, art history, and religion because it will provide clear contexts for considering any medieval artifact relating to blindness---a literary text, a historical document, a theological treatise, or a work of art. <P>For some readers, the book will serve as an introduction to the field of disability studies, an area of increasing interest both within and outside of the academy. Edward Wheatley is Surtz Professor of Medieval Literature at Loyola University, Chicago.
Stumbling Toward Truth: Anthropologists at Work
by Philip R. DevitaThe essayists in Stumbling Toward Truth are anthropologists who have paused to share personal experiences that uncover important truths they've learned by living with and trying to understand others. The twenty-nine poignant fieldwork tales collected here reveal much about what anthropology can teach about others as well as ourselves, the spirit of the ethnographic enterprise, and issues of cross-cultural humanity and humaneness. Readers will discover from these once-private stories from around the world that much of what anthropologists learn about themselves and others is totally unanticipated. Oftentimes, cultural truths and unexpected realities are stumbled upon. These lessons, none for which social science training offered adequate preparation, remain perhaps the most memorable and critical of fieldwork.
Stunning and Other Plays
by David Adjmi"Nearly everything about David Adjmi's Stunning has an original ring to it, from the setting . . . to the brassy bleat of the dialogue." -Time Out New YorkThis volume of distinctive work includes Stunning, set in an insular Syrian Jewish community, where a teenage bride's world is disrupted by her intellectual African American housekeeper; Evildoers, about the collapse of two privileged couples; and Elective Affinities, a post-9/11 monologue.David Adjmi's work has been produced at Lincoln Center Theatre, Yale Repertory Theatre, Woolly Mammoth, and the Royal Court in London. He has received numerous commissions and is the recipient of a 2009 Kesselring Fellowship and a Bush Artist Fellowship.
Stuntwomen: The Untold Hollywood Story (Screen Classics)
by Mollie Gregory“Gives voice to the women who have risked their lives for a few (perilous) moments on the big screen. A fascinating look at a risky profession.” —The Washington PostThey’ve traded punches in knockdown brawls, crashed biplanes through barns, and raced to the rescue in fast cars. They add suspense and drama to the story, portraying the swimmer stalked by the menacing shark, the heroine dangling twenty feet below a soaring hot air balloon, or the woman leaping nine feet over a wall to escape a dog attack. Only an expert can make such feats of daring look easy, and stuntwomen with the skills to perform—and survive—great moments of action in movies have been hitting their mark in Hollywood since the beginning of film.Here, Mollie Gregory presents the first history of stuntwomen in the film industry from the silent era to the twenty-first century. In the early years of motion pictures, women were highly involved in all aspects of film production, but they were marginalized as movies became popular, and more important, profitable. Capable stuntwomen were replaced by men in wigs, and very few worked between the 1930s and 1960s. As late as the 1990s, men wore wigs and women’s clothes to double as actresses, and were even “painted down” for some performances, while men and women of color were regularly denied stunt work.For decades, stuntwomen have faced institutional discrimination, unequal pay, and sexual harassment even as they jumped from speeding trains and raced horse-drawn carriages away from burning buildings. Featuring sixty-five interviews, Stuntwomen showcases the absorbing stories and uncommon courage of women who make their living planning and performing action-packed sequences that keep viewers’ hearts racing.
Stupendous, Miserable City: Pasolini’s Rome
by John David RhodesJohn David Rhodes places the city of Rome at the center of this original and in-depth examination of the work of Italian director Pier Paolo Pasolini—but it&’s not the classical Rome you imagine. Stupendous, Miserable City situates Pasolini within the history of twentieth-century Roman urban development. The book focuses first on the Fascist period, when populations were moved out of the urban center and into public housing on the periphery of the city, called the borgate, and then turns to the progressive social housing experiments of the 1950s. These environments were the settings of most of Pasolini&’s films of the early to mid-1960s. Discussing films such as Accattone, Mamma Roma, and The Hawks and the Sparrows, Rhodes shows how Pasolini used the borgate to critique Roman urban planning and neorealism and to draw attention to the contemptuous treatment of Rome&’s poor. To Pasolini, the borgate, rich in human incident, linguistic difference, and squalor, &“were life&”—and now his passion can be appreciated fully for the first time. Carefully tracing Pasolini&’s surprising engagement with this part of Rome and looking beyond his films to explore the interrelatedness of all of Pasolini&’s artistic output in the 1950s and 1960s—including his poetry, fiction, and journalism—Rhodes opens up completely new ways of understanding Pasolini&’s work and proves how connected Pasolini was to the political and social upheavals in Italy at the time. John David Rhodes is lecturer in literature and visual culture at the University of Sussex.
Stupid Black Men: How to Play the Race Card - and Lose
by Larry ElderIS LIFE UNFAIR FOR BLACK AMERICANS? IS RACIAL EQUALITY THE ANSWER TO EVERY QUESTION OF PUBLIC POLICY? IS A HUGE GROUP OF CITIZENS BEING KEPT DOWN BY "THE MAN"? RADIO HOST AND BESTSELLING AUTHOR Larry Elder has made a career out of being a thorn in the side of the conventional-wisdom crowd. He deflates the pompous and points out the completely logical truths hidden behind the nutty rhetoric and out-of-control pandering of politicians and the so-called leaders of a variety of special-interest groups. In Stupid Black Men, he takes on the mind-set of those people who always capture the most media attention-as well as masses of public money-people who say that racism is the root of all problems and who end up hurting precisely those they claim to be helping. Whether they are demagogues like Al Sharpton, established politicians like Hillary Clinton, or entertainers like Danny Glover, no one escapes Elder's cogent arguments and rapier wit. His sometimes hilarious and always infuriating examples of wrong-headedness skewer not just politicians for their smugness and hypocrisy but also actors, educators, religious leaders, and the "mainscream media" for keeping the story in the headlines. But Elder has a positive message, too: though they are fewer-and generally not as loudmouthed-there are leaders and role models today who want to sweep away race-based whining and urge everyone in America to share in the hard work, smart thinking, and optimism that make this country great.
Stupid Black Men: How to Play the Race Card—and Lose
by Larry ElderIs life unfair for black Americans?Is racial equality the answer to every question of public policy?Are a huge group of citizens being kept down by "the man"?Radio host and bestselling author Larry Elder has made a career out of being a thorn-in-the-side of the conventional wisdom crowd. He deflates the pompous and points out the completely logical truths hidden behind the nutty rhetoric and out-of-control pandering of many of the politicians and so-called leaders of a variety of special interest groups. In Stupid Black Men, he takes on the mind-set that always captures the most media attention—as well as masses of public money—in this country: those who rail against racism as the root of all problems, and who end up hurting precisely those they claim to be helping. Whether they are demagogues like Al Sharpton, established politicians like Hillary Clinton, or entertainers like Danny Glover, no one escapes Elder's cogent arguments and rapier wit. His sometimes hilarious and always infuriating examples of wrong-headedness skewer not just politicians for their smugness and hypocrisy, but also actors, educators, religious leaders and the "mainscream media" for keeping the story in the headlines.But Elder has a positive message, too: though they are fewer—and generally not as loud-mouthed—there are leaders and role models today who want to sweep away race-based whining and urge everyone in America, to share in the hard work, smart thinking and optimism that make this country great.
Stupid Fucking Bird
by Anton Chekov Aaron PosnerAn aspiring young director rampages against the art created by his mother's generation. A nubile young actress wrestles with an aging Hollywood star for the affections of a renowned novelist. And everyone discovers just how disappointing love, art, and growing up can be. In this irreverent, contemporary, and very funny remix of Chekhov's The Seagull, Aaron Posner stages a timeless battle between young and old, past and present, in search of the true meaning of it all. Original songs composed by James Sugg draw the famously subtextual inner thoughts of Chekhov's characters explicitly to the surface. <p><p>STUPID FUCKING BIRD will tickle, tantalize, and incite you to consider how art, love, and revolution fuel your own pursuit of happiness.
Stupidity in Politics: Its Unavoidability and Potential (Routledge Studies in Social and Political Thought)
by Nobutaka OtobeStupidity permeates our perception and practice of politics. We frequently accuse politicians, bureaucrats, journalists, voters, "elites," and "the masses" for their stupidities. In fact, it is not only "populist politicians," "sensational journalism," and "uneducated voters" who are accused of stupidity. Similar accusations can be, and in fact have been, made concerning those who criticize them as well. It seems that stupidity is ubiquitous, unable to be contained within or attributed to one specific political position, personal trait, or even ignorance and erroneous reasoning Undertaking a theoretical investigation of stupidity, this book challenges the assumption that stupidity can be avoided. Otobe argues that the very ubiquity of stupidity implies its unavoidability - that we cannot contain it in such domains as error, ignorance, or "post-truth." What we witness is rather that one’s reasoning can be sound, evidence-based, and stupid. In revealing this unavoidability, he contends that stupidity is an ineluctable problem not only of politics, but also of thinking. We become stupid because we think: It is impossible to distinguish a priori stupid thought from upright, righteous thought. Moreover, the failure to address the unavoidability of stupidity leads political theory to the failure to acknowledge the productive moments that experiences of stupidity harbor within. Such productive moments constitute the potential of stupidity - that radical new ideas can emerge out of our seemingly banal and stupid thinking in our daily political activity.
Style and Ethics of Communication in Science and Engineering (Synthesis Lectures on Engineering, Science, and Technology)
by Jay D. Humphrey Jeffrey W. HolmesThis book serves as a valuable aid for scientists and engineers who seek to discover and disseminate knowledge so that it can be used to improve the human condition. This book can be used as a textbook for undergraduate or graduate courses on technical communication and ethics, a reference book for senior design courses, or a handbook for young investigators and beginning faculty members.In addition to presenting methods for writing clearly and concisely and improving oral or poster presentations, this compact book provides practical guidelines for preparing theses, dissertations, journal papers for publication, and proposals for research funding. Issues of authorship, peer review, plagiarism, recordkeeping, transparency, and copyright are addressed in detail, and case studies of research misconduct highlight the need for proactive attention to scientific integrity. Ample exercises cause the reader to stop and think. The authors motivate the reader to develop an effective, individual style of communication and a personal commitment to integrity, each of which are essential to success in the workplace.
Style and Form in the Hollywood Slasher Film
by Wickham ClaytonStyle and Form in the Hollywood Slasher Film fills a broad scholastic gap by analysing the elements of narrative and stylistic construction of films in the slasher subgenre of horror that have been produced and/or distributed in the Hollywood studio system from its initial boom in the late 1970s to the present.
Style: A Queer Cosmology (Postmillennial Pop #37)
by Taylor BlackAssembles texts, performances, and personae from American culture to assert the elemental natureof styleWhile “style” is equated with fashion or convention in common parlance, Style: A Queer Cosmology defines the term as a mode of expression that makes us more like ourselves and less like everyone else. Taylor Black’s interdisciplinary conceptual analysis assembles texts, performances, and personae from American culture that engage in ethical, creative, and performative modes of what he terms “abundant revelation.” Moving back and forth through time, this book sketches American cosmologies cultivated by iconic and subterranean American artists like Edgar Allan Poe, Flannery O’Connor, Nikki Giovanni, and Bob Dylan. Presiding throughout is the book’s conceptual guide: latter-day American and notorious homosexual Quentin Crisp, resurrected here as a philosopher of style.As a scholarly intervention, Style participates in the critical work of revival and attunement—revitalizing figures, terms, and ideas that have become too familiar. Returning to viewing the critic as a stylist, Style: A Queer Cosmology leans into the study of things and qualities that are immanent and elude paraphrase or social scientific categorization. Style is about the possible rather than the probable, singularity over universals, personality instead of identity, the emergent and not the new—the mystery of becoming.
Stylin': African-American Expressive Culture, from Its Beginnings to the Zoot Suit
by Shane White Graham WhiteFor over two centuries, in the North as well as the South, both within their own community and in the public arena, African Americans have presented their bodies in culturally distinctive ways. Shane White and Graham White consider the deeper significance of the ways in which African Americans have dressed, walked, danced, arranged their hair, and communicated in silent gestures. They ask what elaborate hair styles, bright colors, bandanas, long watch chains, and zoot suits, for example, have really meant, and discuss style itself as an expression of deep-seated cultural imperatives. Their wide-ranging exploration of black style from its African origins to the 1940s reveals a culture that differed from that of the dominant racial group in ways that were often subtle and elusive. A wealth of black-and-white illustrations show the range of African American experience in America, emanating from all parts of the country, from cities and farms, from slave plantations, and Chicago beauty contests. White and White argue that the politics of black style is, in fact, the politics of metaphor, always ambiguous because it is always indirect. To tease out these ambiguities, they examine extensive sources, including advertisements for runaway slaves, interviews recorded with surviving ex-slaves in the 1930s, autobiographies, travelers' accounts, photographs, paintings, prints, newspapers, and images drawn from popular culture, such as the stereotypes of Jim Crow and Zip Coon.
Styling Blackness in Chile: Music and Dance in the African Diaspora
by Juan Eduardo WolfChile had long forgotten about the existence of the country’s Black population when, in 2003, the music and dance called the tumbe carnaval appeared on the streets of the city of Arica. Featuring turbaned dancers accompanied by a lively rhythm played on hide-head drums, the tumbe resonated with cosmopolitan images of what the African Diaspora looks like, and so helped bring attention to a community seeking legal recognition from the Chilean government which denied its existence. Tumbe carnaval, however, was not the only type of music and dance that Afro-Chileans have participated in and identified with over the years. In Styling Blackness in Chile, Juan Eduardo Wolf explores the multiple ways that Black individuals in Arica have performed music and dance to frame their Blackness in relationship to other groups of performers—a process he calls styling. Combining ethnography and semiotic analysis, Wolf illustrates how styling Blackness as Criollo, Moreno, and Indígena through genres like the baile de tierra, morenos de paso, and caporales simultaneously offered individuals alternative ways of identifying and contributed to the invisibility of Afro-descendants in Chilean society. While the styling of the tumbe as Afro-descendant helped make Chile’s Black community visible once again, Wolf also notes that its success raises issues of representation as more people begin to perform the genre in ways that resonate less with local cultural memory and Afro-Chilean activists’ goals. At a moment when Chile’s government continues to discuss whether to recognize the Afro-Chilean population and Chilean society struggles to come to terms with an increase in Latin American Afro-descendant immigrants, Wolf’s book raises awareness of Blackness in Chile and the variety of Black music-dance throughout the African Diaspora, while also providing tools that ethnomusicologists and other scholars of expressive culture can use to study the role of music-dance in other cultural contexts.
Styling Blackness in Chile: Music and Dance in the African Diaspora
by Juan Eduardo WolfAn analysis of how Afro-Chilean performers of music and dance in Arica frame their Blackness in regards to other performers.Chile had long forgotten about the existence of the country’s Black population when, in 2003, the music and dance called the tumbe carnaval appeared on the streets of the city of Arica. Featuring turbaned dancers accompanied by a lively rhythm played on hide-head drums, the tumbe resonated with cosmopolitan images of what the African Diaspora looks like, and so helped bring attention to a community seeking legal recognition from the Chilean government which denied its existence.Tumbe carnaval, however, was not the only type of music and dance that Afro-Chileans have participated in and identified with over the years. In Styling Blackness in Chile, Juan Eduardo Wolf explores the multiple ways that Black individuals in Arica have performed music and dance to frame their Blackness in relationship to other groups of performers—a process he calls styling. Combining ethnography and semiotic analysis, Wolf illustrates how styling Blackness as Criollo, Moreno, and Indígena through genres like the baile de tierra, morenos de paso, and caporales simultaneously offered individuals alternative ways of identifying and contributed to the invisibility of Afro-descendants in Chilean society. While the styling of the tumbe as Afro-descendant helped make Chile’s Black community visible once again, Wolf also notes that its success raises issues of representation as more people begin to perform the genre in ways that resonate less with local cultural memory and Afro-Chilean activists’ goals. At a moment when Chile’s government continues to discuss whether to recognize the Afro-Chilean population and Chilean society struggles to come to terms with an increase in Latin American Afro-descendant immigrants, Wolf’s book raises awareness of Blackness in Chile and the variety of Black music-dance throughout the African Diaspora, while also providing tools that ethnomusicologists and other scholars of expressive culture can use to study the role of music-dance in other cultural contexts.“Wolf’s work is exemplary as he critically addresses twenty-first-century deliberations on identity and cultural diversity across the African diaspora.” —Yvonne Daniel, Smith College, Journal of American Folklore“Wolf’s text is a solid contribution to current narratives of self-determination and positioning of Chile’s Afro-descendant population. The book highlights the achievements that music and dance represent for social and cultural processes in Chile, which makes it useful to understanding other Afro-American narratives across the Americas.” —Fernando Palacios Mateos, Ethnomusicology“The book itself will not only prove useful for academics interested in the music of Chile, Latin America, the African Diaspora, Blackness, and in semiotics, but is also written in a style that is accessible to upper-level undergraduates and above.” —P. Judkins Wellington, City University of New York, Journal of Folklore Research