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Mask
ISBN/GTIN

Product description

Object Lessons is a series of short, beautifully designed books about the hidden lives of ordinary things.

From the theater mask and masquerade to the masked criminal and the rise of facial recognition software, masks have long performed as an instrument for the protection and concealment of identity.

Even as they conceal and protect, masks - as faces - are an extension of the self. At the same time, they are a part of material culture: what are masks made of? What traces do they leave behind? Acknowledging that that mask-wearing has become increasingly weaponized and politicized, Sharrona Pearl looks at the politics of the mask, exploring how identity itself is read on this object.

By exploring who we do (and do not) seek to protect through different forms of masking, Sharrona Pearl's long history of masks helps us to better understand what it is we value.

Object Lessons is published in partnership with an essay series in The Atlantic.
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Details

Additional ISBN/GTIN9798765102428
Product TypeE-book
BindingE-book
FormatPDF
Format noteDRM Adobe
Publishing date30/05/2024
LanguageEnglish
File size1037 Kbytes
Article no.14343868
CatalogsVC
Data source no.5490210
Product groupBU562
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Recommendations for similar products

After reading my collegue's review, I decided to give it a shot, being sex-related sociology amongst my fields of interest.
Ania Srinivasan deals with thorny topics which feminists have been engaging for decades with, without coming across as condescending. On the contrary, her stance on the different issues is imbued with knowledge and humbleness of not having necessarily the final answer. Her intellectual honesty is just so outstanding that - no matter if you agree with her or not - you can't help but keep the book glued to your eyes!

I hope to hear more of her publishings soon
We're zooming in and out of T. Fleischmann's life in this dazzingly beautiful piece of literature, which is exactly what its title would suggest: a fragmentory reflection on what it means to have a trans body, and how it affects Fleischmann's way of existing in time, explored through a work that is part memoir, part travelogue and part essay about the artist Felix Gonzalez-Torres. Fleischmann choses to literally reject all kinds of metaphor, but they also don't feel the need to spell things out - that's why this book manages to invent an unusually poetic space where things remain just as they are, capable of carrying multiple meanings at once (queer experience being the main aspect this relates to, but not exclusively so). This is a text that is messy on purpose, that is hard to grasp and at the same perfectly precise; an ode to being complexely alive in the world.
Viola Davis impresses with intensity in cinema, for television and on stage. In 'Finding me' we accompany the actress through her childhood and to the roots of her strength.
It's a tough road full of adversity, setbacks and trauma.
Viola's powerful writing is breathtaking, relentlessly honest and full of wise insights.
I really love it.
It's admittedly slightly too late for this recommendation, but then again the Italian April is arguably more equal to the German May. An absolutely delightful holiday novel about four women escaping to a romantic Italian castle for some time to themselves - only to be literally spellbound by it. Read it for the lush Italian gardens and the irresistible spring airs - maby skim over some of the more dated romantic version of musical chairs.
It's admittedly slightly too late for this recommendation, but then again the Italian April is arguably more equal to the German May. An absolutely delightful holiday novel about four women escaping to a romantic Italian castle for some time to themselves - only to be literally spellbound by it. Read it for the lush Italian gardens and the irresistible spring airs - maby skim over some of the more dated romantic version of musical chairs.
Not many authors manage to be admired and thought of as somehow 'classic' with only three books under their belt but Jo Ann Beard is one of them. Her debut essay collection "Boys of My Youth" introduced her trademark style of autofictional, highly stylized and ruminative essays that centre around keen observations of beautiful quotidian lives. After having published a novel, this collection once again returns to the literary essay. Death, its reality and propensity for forcing clarity is the theme that runs through the book. The death of a beloved dog, of a friend, of oneself indeed. Beard collects beautiful details, seemingly small things and weaves an almost spiritual literary tapestry from her material. I found myself losing her sometimes but if you trust her, an astonishing hook, a breathtakingly turned sentence will always draw you back in.
After reading my collegue's review, I decided to give it a shot, being sex-related sociology amongst my fields of interest.
Ania Srinivasan deals with thorny topics which feminists have been engaging for decades with, without coming across as condescending. On the contrary, her stance on the different issues is imbued with knowledge and humbleness of not having necessarily the final answer. Her intellectual honesty is just so outstanding that - no matter if you agree with her or not - you can't help but keep the book glued to your eyes!

I hope to hear more of her publishings soon
Her way of writing is magnificent, first and foremost. The essays were very interesting and greatly researched. At the same time there was a good balance of personal experience and societal topics. Some of the themes I had already seen docs on or read something else about. Also it was quite America-Centric, which gave it some limits.
Auch wenn ich Zweigs Sprache bisweilen als etwas schwulstig und altertümlich empfinde und die Miniaturen ein gewisses Maß an Geschichtswissen voraussetzen, haben mich viele der Handlungen gepackt. Besonders Scotts dramatische Südpolexpedition war fast unerträglich spannend.
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In Kapuscinski's strange, genre-defying work, a choir of former courtiers whispers to him about the extravagances and eventual decline of the Ethiopian monarchy. The book sits somewhere between oral history and reportage but its strange magic is wrought through the voices of the disgraced king's servants, now in hiding and only to be met through secret doors. They describe the lavish palace, the absurd rituals and the absolute power of the king that everyone had to scrape under. Their flowery language of adoration and servitude masks hidden depths of resentment and glee. It is this contradiction, as well as the observations on possibly the last absolutist monarchy, that make this book the astonishing masterpiece it is.

Author

Sharrona Pearl is Associate Professor of Bioethics and History in the Health Care Administration Department at Drexel University, USA. She is the author of Do I Know You? From Face Blindness to Super Recognition (2023), Face/On: Face Transplants and the Ethics of the Other (2017), and About Faces: Physiognomy in Nineteenth-Century Britain (2010). Her writing has appeared in Public Books, Lilith Magazine, The Revealer, and The Washington Post, among others.