Friday, March 30, 2012
Thursday, March 29, 2012
Soldiers' Stories: Military Women in Cinema and Television since World War II
From Skirts Ahoy! to M*A*S*H, Private Benjamin, G.I. Jane, and JAG, films and television shows have grappled with the notion that military women are contradictory figures, unable to be both effective soldiers and appropriately feminine. In Soldiers’ Stories, Yvonne Tasker traces this perceived paradox across genres including musicals, screwball comedies, and action thrillers. She explains how, during the Second World War, women were portrayed as auxiliaries, temporary necessities of “total war.” Later, nursing, with its connotations of feminine care, offered a solution to the “gender problem.” From the 1940s through the 1970s, musicals, romances, and comedies exploited the humorous potential of the gender role reversal that the military woman was taken to represent. Since the 1970s, female soldiers have appeared most often in thrillers and legal and crime dramas, cast as isolated figures, sometimes victimized and sometimes heroic. Soldiers’ Stories is a comprehensive analysis of representations of military women in film and TV since the 1940s. Throughout, Tasker relates female soldiers’ provocative presence to contemporaneous political and cultural debates and to the ways that women’s labor and bodies are understood and valued.
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
Tuesday, March 27, 2012
Monday, March 26, 2012
Glamour : Women, History, Feminism
Tells the story of glamour. This book explores the changing meanings of the word, its relationship to femininity and fashion, and its place in twentieth century social history. It also examines with wit and insight the history and meaning of costume, cosmetics, perfume and fur.
Sunday, March 25, 2012
Glamour: History, Women, Feminism
This unique and fascinating book tells the story of glamour. It explores the changing meanings of the word, its relationship to femininity and fashion, and its place in twentieth century social history.
Saturday, March 24, 2012
Friday, March 23, 2012
The Corset: A Cultural History
An essential element of fashionable dress from the Renaissance into the 20th century, the corset has been viewed not only as an object of eroticism but also as an instrument of torture and subjugation. This is an exploration of the cultural history of the corset.
Thursday, March 22, 2012
John Piper, Myfanwy Piper: Lives in Art
An exuberant biography of John Piper, one of the best loved and capacious English artists, and his wife the librettist Myfanwy Piper, friend of and collaborator with Benjamin Britten. Together they were at the heart of art, architecture, opera, and the reshaping of the perception of 'Englishness' in the mid-20th century.
A Life Drawing: Autobiography of Shirley Hughes
Beginning with a small girl in West Kirby obsessed with Comics, Shirley Hughes' story takes us through World War II, and to a career which began with Art School in a blitzed Liverpool, led to Oxford and then to London, illustrated with her own art work.
Tuesday, March 20, 2012
Monday, March 19, 2012
Saturday, March 17, 2012
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