Research publications

Jamieson, Andrew. “The Egyptian branch of the Classical Association of Victoria and the development of Egyptology in Melbourne,” in Warfe, A. R. et al (eds.,). Dust, Demons and Pots: Studies in Honour of Colin A. Hope. Peeters Publishers, 2020.

This volume brings together fifty-four studies on ancient Egypt and its interconnections with neighbouring regions to celebrate the career of Colin Hope. Presented by friends, colleagues and former students, contributions to the volume offer original research and fieldwork discoveries informed by new interpretations and insights on contemporary issues in Egyptology. In recognition of Colin Hope's extensive research interests, the subjects of discussion are wide-ranging in their exploration of the art, archaeology, language and literature of Egypt from prehistory to the pharaonic period, the Roman period and later. Also included are studies on the reception of Egyptology and discussions on museum collections and material conservation. A feature of the volume is the range of studies that come from contexts within the Nile Valley proper and the desert regions beyond. Together, the contrasting perspectives reflect important directions in an ever-expanding discipline and in the long-standing contributions made to it by Colin Hope.

Kim, James H. and Chong-Gossard, James. “Female Agency in Euripides’ Hypsipyle,” in Finglass, P. J. and Coo, Lyndsay (eds.,). Female Characters in Fragmentary Greek Tragedy. Cambridge University Press, 2020.

How were women represented in Greek tragedy? This question lies at the heart of much modern scholarship on ancient drama, yet it has typically been approached using evidence drawn only from the thirty-two tragedies that survive complete – neglecting tragic fragments, especially those recently discovered and often very substantial fragmentary papyri from plays that had been thought lost. Drawing on the latest research on both gender in tragedy and on tragic fragments, the essays in this volume examine this question from a fresh perspective, shedding light on important mythological characters such as Pasiphae, Hypsipyle, and Europa, on themes such as violence, sisterhood, vengeance, and sex, and on the methodology of a discipline which needs to take fragmentary evidence to heart in order to gain a fuller understanding of ancient tragedy. All Greek is translated to ensure wide accessibility. More information...

Davis, Brent; Banou, Emilia; Hitchcock, Louise and Chapin, Anne. "Curation in the Bronze Age Aegean: Objects as Material Memories," in Borgna, E., Caloi, I., Carinci, F.M., Laffineur, R. (eds.,). MNHMH / MNEME: Past and Memory in the Aegean Bronze Age. Peeters Publishers, 2019.

Heywood, J. and Davis, Brent. "Painted Larnakes of the Late Minoan III Period: Funerary Iconography and the Stimulation of Memory," in Borgna, E., Caloi, I., Carinci, F.M., Laffineur, R. (eds.,). MNHMH / MNEME: Past and Memory in the Aegean Bronze Age. Peeters Publishers

Hitchcock, Louise; Maeir, A.M. and Harris-Schober, M. "Tomorrow never dies: Post-palatial memories of the aegean late bronze age in the Mediterranean," in Borgna, E., Caloi, I., Carinci, F.M., Laffineur, R. (eds.,). MNHMH / MNEME: Past and Memory in the Aegean Bronze Age. Peeters Publishers, 2019.

The 17th International Aegean Conference / Rencontre égéenne internationale MNEME was organised by the University of Udine, Department of Humanities and Cultural Heritage, and the Ca' Foscari University of Venice, Department of Humanities, starting from the many suggestions given by several studies which have been recently devoted to the perception of and confrontation with the past in ancient societies as well as to the manifold practices of memory including memorialising and memory keeping. More information...

Hitchcock, Louise et al. "The Late Bronze Age at Tell es-Safi/Gath and the site’s role in Southwestern Canaan," in Maeir, Aren M., Shai, Itzhaq and McKinny, Chris (eds.,). The Late Bronze and Early Iron Ages of Southern Canaan. De Gruyter, 2019

The fourteen papers in this volume represent the proceedings of a conference held at Bar-Ilan University in 2014 (with the additional of several invited papers not presented at the conference), which provide both overviews of Late Bronze Age finds from several important sites in Israel and surrounding countries, as well as several synthetic studies on the various issues relating to the period. These papers, by and large, represent a broad view of cutting edge research in the archaeology of the ancient Levant in general, and on the Late Bronze Age specifically. More information...

Lai, Karyn, Benitez, Rick and Kim, Hyun Jin (eds.,). Cultivating a Good Life in Early Chinese and Ancient Greek Philosophy: Perspectives and Reverberations. Bloomsbury Publishing, 2019.

This book engages in cross-tradition scholarship, investigating the processes associated with cultivating or nurturing the self in order to live good lives. Both Ancient Chinese and Greek philosophers provide accounts of the life lived well: a Confucian junzi, a Daoist sage and a Greek phronimos. By focusing on the processes rather than the aims of cultivating a good life, an international team of scholars investigate how a person develops and practices a way of life especially in these two traditions. More information...

Lange, Carsten Hjort and Vervaet, Frank. The Historiography of Late Republican Civil War. Brill, 2019.

The Historiography of Late Republican Civil War is part of a burgeoning new trend that focuses on the great impact of stasis and civil war on Roman society. This volume specifically concentrates on the Late Republic, a transformative period marked by social and political violence, stasis, factional strife, and civil war. Its constitutive chapters closely study developments and discussions concerning the concept of civil war in the late republican and early imperial historiography of the late Republic, from L. Cornelius Sulla Felix to the Severan dynasty. More information...

Van de Ven, Annelies and Jamieson, Andrew. "Beyond display Curriculum and community engagement with ancient Middle Eastern collections in a university museum," in Emberling, Geoff and Petit, Lucas P. (eds.,). Museums and the Ancient Middle East: Curatorial Practice and Audiences. Routledge, 2019

Museums and the Ancient Middle East is the first book to focus on contemporary exhibit practice in museums that present the ancient Middle East. Bringing together the latest thinking from a diverse and international group of leading curators, the book presents the views of those working in one particular community of practice: the art, archaeology, and history of the ancient Middle East. Drawing upon a remarkable group of case studies from many of the world's leading museums, including the British Museum, the Louvre, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Ashmolean Museum, and the Vorderasiatisches Museum in Berlin, this volume describes the tangible actions curators have taken to present a previously unseen side of the Middle East region and its history. More information...

Chong-Gossard, K.O. and Ng, Lin Li. "Euripidean women and internalized misogyny: Agones in Troades, Electra, and Andromache," in Pratt, Louise and Sampson, C. Michael (eds.,). Engaging Classical Texts in the Contemporary World: From Narratology to Reception. University of Michigan Press, 2018

Contemporary classicists often find themselves advocating for the value and relevance of Greco-Roman literature and culture, whether in the classroom, or social media, or newsprint and magazines. In this collection, twelve top scholars apply major critical approaches from other academic fields to open new channels for dialogue between ancient texts and the contemporary world. This volume considers perennial favourites of classical literature - the Iliad and Odyssey, Greek tragedy, Roman comedy, the Argonautica, and Ovid's Metamorphoses - and their influence on popular entertainment from Shakespeare's plays to Hollywood's toga films. More information...

Shai, Itzick; Chadwick, Jeffrey; Dagan, Amit; McKinny, Chris; Uziel, Joe and Hitchcock, Louise (eds.,). Tell it in Gath Studies in the History and Archaeology of Israel Essays in Honor of Aren M. Maeir on the Occasion of his Sixtieth Birthday. Zaphon, 2018. More information...

Jamieson, Andrew. "Long-stemmed vessels in the Euphrates River valley and evidence from an Early Bronze Age burial at Tell Qumluq, north Syria," in Batmaz A., Bedianashvili G., Michalewicz A. and Robinson A. (eds.,). Context and Connection: Studies on the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East in Honour of Antonion Sagona. Peeters-Leuven, 2018

Dedicated to Professor Antonio Sagona on the occasion of his 60th birthday, this Festschrift commemorates his many contributions to the archaeology of the ancient Near East. Featuring 64 chapters, Context and Connection is focused largely but not exclusively on work conducted in eastern Anatolia and the southern Caucasus, those regions to which Professor Sagona has devoted his career. With contributions from his colleagues, students and mentors - and much collaboration between them - the volume is divided into six sections: Reflections, Cultural connections, Landscape studies, Artefacts and architecture, Scientific partnerships and Retrospectives and overviews. More information...

Kim, Hyun Jin. Geopolitics in Late Antiquity: The Fate of Superpowers from China to Rome. Routledge, 2018

Geopolitics in Late Antiquity explores the geopolitical revolution which shook the foundations of the ancient world, the dawning of the millennium of Inner Asian dominance and virtual monopoly of world power (with interludes) that began with the rise of the Huns and then continued under the hegemony of various other steppe peoples. Kim examines first the geopolitical situation created by the rise of Inner Asian powers, and then the reactions of the great empires of Eurasia to this geopolitical challenge. More information...

Parkin, Tim. "The Ancient Family and the Law," in Hopwood, Nick; Flemming, Rebecca and Kassell, Lauren (eds.,). Reproduction Antiquity to the Present Day. Cambridge University Press, 2018

From contraception to cloning and pregnancy to populations, reproduction presents urgent challenges today. This field-defining history synthesises a vast amount of scholarship to take the long view. Spanning from antiquity to the present day, the book focuses on the Mediterranean, western Europe, North America and their empires. It combines history of science, technology and medicine with social, cultural and demographic accounts. Ranging from the most intimate experiences to planetary policy, it tells new stories and revises received ideas. More information...

Vennarucci, R.G., Van Oyen, A, and Tol, Gis. "Una comunità artigianale nella Toscana rurale: il sito di Marzuolo," in Nizzo, V. and Pizzo, A. (eds.,). Antico e non antico. Scritti multidisciplinari offerti a Giuseppe Pucci. Mimesis Editions, 2018. More information...

Kim, Hyun Jin. "Justin Martyr and Tatian: Christian Reactions to Encounters with Greco-Roman Culture and Imperial Persecution," in Poo, Mu-chou; Drake, H.A. and Raphals, lisa (eds.,). Old Society, New Belief: Religious transformation of China and Rome, ca. 1st-6th Centuries. OUP, 2017

This book brings together specialists in the history and religion of Rome and China with a twofold aim. First, it aims to show in some detail the similarities and differences each religion encountered in the process of merging into a new cultural environment. Second, by juxtaposing the familiar with the foreign, it also aims to capture aspects of this process that could otherwise be overlooked. This approach is based on the general proposition that, when a new religious belief begins to make contact with a society that has already had long honoured beliefs, certain areas of contention will inevitably ensue and changes on both sides have to take place. More information...

Kim, Hyun Jin; Vervaet, Frederik and Adali, Selim (eds.,). Eurasian Empires in Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages Contact and Exchange between the Graeco-Roman World, Inner Asia and China. Cambridge University Press, 2017

The great empires of the vast Eurasian continent have captured the imagination of many. Awe-inspiring names such as ancient Rome, Han and Tang China, Persia, Assyria, the Huns, the Kushans and the Franks have been the subject of countless scholarly books and works of literature. However, very rarely, if at all, have these vast pre-industrial empires been studied holistically from a comparative, interdisciplinary and above all Eurasian perspective. This collection of studies examines the history, literature and archaeology of these empires and others thus far treated separately as a single inter-connected subject of inquiry. It highlights in particular the critical role of Inner Asian empires and peoples in facilitating contacts and exchange across the Eurasian continent in antiquity and the early Middle Ages. More information...

Hitchcock, L. and Maeir, A.M. "Lost in Translation: Settlement Organization in Postpalatial Crete, a View from the East," in Letesson, Quentin and Knappett, Carl (eds.,). Minoan Architecture and Urbanism: New Perspectives on an Ancient Built Environment. OUP, 2017.

Minoan Crete is rightly famous for its idiosyncratic architecture, as well as its palaces and towns such as Knossos, Malia, Gournia, and Palaikastro. Indeed, these are often described as the first urban settlements of Bronze Age Europe. However, we still know relatively little about the dynamics of these early urban centres. How did they work? What role did the palaces have in their towns, and the towns in their landscapes? More information...

Hitchcock, Louise. "Gender and Violence in Archaeology: Final Commentary," in Jensen, Bo and Matić, Uroš (eds.,). Archaeologies of Gender and Violence. Oxbow Books, 2017

Uroš Matić and Bo Jensen have brought together a team of both young and senior researches from many different countries in this first volume that aims to explore the complex intersection between archaeology, gender and violence. Papers range from theoretical discussions on previous approaches to gender and violence and the ethical necessity to address these questions today, to case studies dealing on gender and violence from prehistoric to early medieval Europe, but also including studies on ancient Egypt, Persia and Peru. More information...

Davis, Brent and Valério, M. "Cypro-Minoan in Marking Systems of the Eastern and Central Mediterranean: New Insights into Old Problems," in Jasink, A.M., Weingarten, J. and Ferrara, S. (eds.,). Non-Scribal Communication Media in the Bronze Age Aegean and Surrounding Areas. Firenze University Press, 2017

This volume is intended to be the first in a series that will focus on the origin of script and the boundaries of non-scribal communication media in proto-literate and literate societies of the ancient Aegean. Over the last 30 years, the domain of scribes and bureaucrats has become much better known. Our goal now is to reach below the élite and scribal levels to interface with non-scribal operations conducted by people of the 'middling' sort. Who made these marks and to what purpose? Did they serve private or (semi-) official roles in Bronze Age Aegean society? The comparative study of such practices in the contemporary East (Cyprus, Anatolia, the Levant, and Egypt) can shed light on sub-elite activities in the Aegean and also provide evidence for cultural and economic exchange networks. More information...

Hitchcock, Louise; Maeir, A. and Dagan, A. "Entangling Aegean Ritual in Philistine Culture," in F. Blakolmer et al (eds). Metaphysis: Ritual, Myth and Symbolism in the Aegean Bronze Age (Aegaeum). Peeters, 2016

In Aegean prehistory, questions of ritual behaviour and underlying 'metaphysical' beliefs have become a widespread and multifaceted field of research based on a large variety of methodological approaches. At the METAPHYSIS conference a large range of issues of ritual, myth and symbolism in the Aegean Bronze Age were addressed, such as ritual places and ritual landscapes, sacral and sepulchral rituals, social and political ceremonies, ritual acts and performances, the supernatural realm, liminality, irrationality and magic, mythology, hybrid creatures, heroes/heroines, divinities, symbols, emblems and iconography, images of power, and cosmology. Thus, METAPHYSIS was dedicated to the complex relationship between humans and 'the other' - the broad scholarly interface between a popular ritual belief and the cult of deities, ie religion in its proper sense. More information...

Jamieson, Andrew and Kanjou, J. "Tell Qumluq (Aleppo)," in Kanjou, Y. and Tsuneki, A. (eds). A History of Syria in One Hundred Sites. Archaeopress, 2016

This volume presents the long history of Syria through a jouney of the most important and recently-excavated archaeological sites. The sites cover over 1.8 million years and all regions in Syria; 110 academics have contributed information on 103 excavations for this volume. Based on these contributions the volume offers a detailed summary of the history of Syria, a history as important as any in terms of the development of human society. It is hoped that this knowledge will offer not only an increased understanding of the country but also act as a deterrent to the destruction of Syrian cultural heritage and facilitate the protection of Syrian sites. More information...

Kemp, Jonathan. “東京 シフト Tokyo Shift,” in 東京 シフト Tokyo Shift. Kobune-sha, 2019.

The Shift Register project sets out to investigate examples of how technological and infrastructural activities reinforce the current conceptualisation (episteme) of Earth as a ‘planetary laboratory’. In a form of auto-destructive feedback, science and its technologies subject Earth to analysis and control to perform the image of its own knowledge, such that it both supplies the means of understanding the planet while simultaneously producing its own planetary-wide phenomena for further study. As critical practice Shift Register seeks to undermine and confound this image of the Earth through a series of publicly engaged activities that register and shift other and ‘unreal’ knowledge systems into discourse about the 'real' so as to reconfigure something of human ←→ earth dynamics. More information...

Kemp, Jonathan and Hughes, John. “Analysis of two mortar samples from the ruined site of a Sasanian palace and Il-khānid caravanserai, Bisotun, Iran,” in Burūjinī, Rasūl, Cantan, Susan and Keall, Edward J. (eds.,). Afarin Nameh: Essays on the archaeology of Iran in Honour of Mehdi Rahbar; Āfrīnʹnāmah. Iranian Research Institute of Cultural Heritage and Tourism, 2019.

Two mortar samples were collected from the ruins of the Sasanian Palace and Il-Khānid Caravanserai at Bisotun to establish whether lime was used in their building and, given the sites’ heterogeneity, to make a basic evaluation of their research potential for understanding both production methods and usefulness for dating and correlation with the site’s different build phases. Standard polished thin sections at 30 microns were analysed using a polarising transmitted light microscope and an initial characterization of the historic mortars is reported discussed. More information...

Sloggett, Robyn. “Unmasking Art Forgery: Scientific Approaches,” in Hufnagel, Saskia and Chappell, Duncan (eds.,). The Palgrave Handbook on Art Crime. Palgrave Macmillan, 2020.

This handbook showcases studies on art theft, fraud and forgeries, cultural heritage offences and related legal and ethical challenges. It has been authored by prominent scholars, practitioners and journalists in the field and includes both overviews of particular art crime issues as well as regional and national case studies. It is one of the first scholarly books in the current art crime literature that can be utilised as an immediate authoritative reference source or teaching tool. It also includes a bibliographic guide to the current literature across interdisciplinary boundaries. More information...

Tse, Nicole et al. “A Preliminary Investigation into the Behavior of Modern Artists’ Oil Paints in a Hot and Humid Climate,” in van den Berg, K.J. et al (eds.,). Conservation of Modern Oil Paintings. Springer Nature, 2019.

Artists’ oil paints have become increasingly complex and diverse in the 20th Century, applied by artists in a variety of ways. This has led to a number of issues that pose increasing difficulties to conservators and collection keepers. A deeper knowledge of the artists’ intent as well as processes associated with material changes in paintings is important to conservation, which is almost always a compromise between material preservation and aesthetics. This volume represents 46 peer-reviewed papers presented at the Conference of Modern Oil Paints held in Amsterdam in 2018. More information...

Kemp, Jonathan. "The crystal world," in Schubert, Theresa and Adamatzky, Andrew (eds.,). Experiencing the Unconventional: Science in Art. World Scientific, 2015.

The book presents art projects that resulted from unconventional explorations explorations of space, matter and sound, curious experiments with living substrates and their creative translations into sensorial experiences developed by established and emerging artists. Using electronic and digital art, bioart, sculpture and installations, sound and performance, the authors are removing boundaries between natural and artificial, real and imaginary, science and culture. The book aims to hybridise art projects and transdisciplinary approaches to a contemporary art practice by discovering a new understanding of media and adopting innovative approaches to materials in the Anthropocene. More information...

Alcalde, Angel. “El paramilitarismo en Weimar,” in Casquete, Jesús and Tajadura, Javier (eds.,). La Constitución de Weimar. Historia, política y derecho. Centro de Estudios Políticos y Constitucionales, 2020.

This chapter provides an analytical overview of paramilitary politics in Germany between the armistice of 1918 and the coming of the Third Reich in 1933. It shows how the use of paramilitary force accompanied the foundation of the Weimar democracy and how paramilitarism was instrumental in its destruction. The chapter differentiates four different phases and models in the history of paramilitarism: mercenary-reactionary paramilitarism, combat paramilitarism, party paramilitarism, and civil-war paramilitarism. By doing so, the chapter shows the adaptability of this historical phenomenon and the danger it poses to the stability of democratic regimes. More information...

Fedor, Julie and Sniegon, Tomas. “The Butovskii Shooting Range: History of an Unfinished Museum,” in Norris, Stephen M. (ed.,). Museums of Communism: New Memory Sites in Central and Eastern Europe. Indiana University Press, 2020.

How did communities come to terms with the collapse of communism? In order to guide the wider narrative, many former communist countries constructed museums dedicated to chronicling their experiences. Museums of Communism explores the complicated intersection of history, commemoration, and victimisation made evident in these museums constructed after 1991. While contributors from a diverse range of fields explore various museums and include nearly 90 photographs, a common denominator emerges: rather than focusing on artefacts and historical documents, these museums often privilege memories and stories. In doing so, the museums shift attention from experiences of guilt or collaboration to narratives of shared victimisation under communist rule. More information...

Leahy, Carla Pascoe and Bueskens, Petra (eds.,). Australian Mothering: Historical and Sociological Perspectives. Palgrave Macmillan, 2020.

Leahy, Carla Pascoe and Bueskens, Petra. “Contextualising Australian mothering and motherhood,” in Leahy, Carla Pascoe and Bueskens, Petra (eds.,). Australian Mothering: Historical and Sociological Perspectives. Palgrave Macmillan, 2020.

Leahy, Carla Pascoe and Bueskens, Petra. “Defining maternal studies in Australia: The birth of a field,” in Leahy, Carla Pascoe and Bueskens, Petra (eds.,). Australian Mothering: Historical and Sociological Perspectives. Palgrave Macmillan, 2020.

Leahy, Carla Pascoe. “Mothers-in-waiting: maternographies of pregnancy in Australia since 1945,” in Leahy, Carla Pascoe and Bueskens, Petra (eds.,). Australian Mothering: Historical and Sociological Perspectives. Palgrave Macmillan, 2020.

This collection defines the field of maternal studies in Australia for the first time. Leading motherhood researchers explore how mothering has evolved across Australian history as well as the joys and challenges of being a mother today… Utilising a matricentric feminist framework, Australian Mothering foregrounds the experiences, emotions and perspectives of mothers to better understand how Australian motherhood has developed historically and contemporaneously. Drawing upon their combined sociological and historical expertise, Bueskens and Pascoe Leahy have carefully curated a collection that presents compelling research on past and present perspectives on maternity in Australia. More information...

McGregor, Katharine, Dragojlovic, Ana and Loney, Hannah (eds.,). Gender, Violence and Power in Indonesia Across Time and Space. Routledge, 2020.

McGregor, Katharine. “Living in a Conflict Zone: Gendered Violence During the Japanese Occupation of the Netherlands East Indies,” in McGregor, Katharine, Dragojlovic, Ana and Loney, Hannah (eds.,). Gender, Violence and Power in Indonesia Across Time and Space. Routledge, 2020.

McGregor, Katharine and Loney, Hannah. “Introduction: Gendered Violence and the Making of Modern Indonesia,” in McGregor, Katharine, Dragojlovic, Ana and Loney, Hannah (eds.,). Gender, Violence and Power in Indonesia Across Time and Space. Routledge, 2020.

This book uses an interdisciplinary approach to chart how various forms of violence – domestic, military, legal and political – are not separate instances of violence, but rather embedded in structural inequalities brought about by colonialism, occupation and state violence. The book explores both case studies of individuals and of groups to examine experiences of violence within the context of gender and structures of power in modern Indonesian history and Indonesia-related diasporas. It argues that gendered violence is particularly important to consider in this region because of its complex history of armed conflict and authoritarian rule, the diversity of people that have been affected by violence, as well as the complexity of the religious and cultural communities involved. The book focuses in particular on textual narratives of violence, visualisations of violence, commemorations of violence and the politics of care. More information...

Alcalde, Angel. “The Demobilization of Francoist and Republican War Veterans, 1939-44: A Great Divergence?” in Matthews, James (ed.,). Spain at War. Society, Culture and Mobilization, 1936-44. Bloomsbury Publishing, 2019.

In spite of the unabated flood of books on the Spanish Civil War and its consequences, historians of Spain in the 20th century have focused relatively little on the interaction of society and culture, and their roles in wartime mobilisation. Spain at War addresses this omission through an examination of individual experiences of conflict and the mobilisation of society. This edited volume acknowledges the agency of low-ranking individuals and the impact of their choices upon the historical processes that shaped the conflict and its aftermath. More information...

Burnard, Trevor. "Plantations and the Great Divergence," in Roy, Tirthankar and Riello, Giorgio (eds.,). Global Economic History. Bloomsbury Academic, 2019

What are the problems addressed by the growing field of global economic history? What debates and methodologies does it engage with? As Global Economic History shows, there are many answers to these questions. Riello and Roy, alongside 20 leading academics from the US, UK, Europe, Australia and Japan, explain why a global perspective matters to economic history. More information...

Davidson, Jane and Damousi, Joy (eds.,). A Cultural History of the Emotions in the Modern and Post-Modern Age (1920-2000+): Volume 6. Bloomsbury Academic, 2019.

Across six volumes, A Cultural History of the Emotions explores how emotions have changed over the course of human history, but also how emotions have themselves created and changed history. Emotions underpin our everyday lives and shape our mental, physical and social well-being. This collection shows how emotions can offer a unique insight into the historical thought and function of different societies. More information...

Damousi, Joy and Smart, Judith (eds.,). Contesting Australian History. Essays in Honour of Marilyn Lake. Monash University Publishing, 2019.

One of Australia’s leading scholars and a highly distinguished professor of history, Marilyn Lake forged a career that spanned several decades across a number of universities. Her books and other scholarly writings have significantly advanced our understandings not only of Australian social, cultural and political history but also of the interdependence of that history with those of Britain, the US and the Asia-Pacific... The chapters in this book span the breadth of Lake’s scholarly influence on the directions historical research is taking today, and are based on papers by Australian colleagues and scholars presented at a Festschrift held at the University of Melbourne over two days in December 2016.

Edmonds, Penelope and Laidlaw, Zoe. ““The British Government Is Now Awaking”: How Humanitarian Quakers Repackaged and Circulated the 1837 Select Committee Report on Aborigines,” in Furphy, Samuel and Nettelbeck, Amanda (eds.,). Aboriginal Protection and Its Intermediaries in Britain’s Antipodean Colonies. Routledge. 2019.

This collection brings together world-leading and emerging scholars to explore how the concept of "protection" was applied to Indigenous peoples of Britain’s antipodean colonies. Tracing evolutions in protection from the 1830s until the end of the nineteenth century, the contributors map the changes and continuities that marked it as an inherently ambivalent mode of colonial practice. In doing so, they consider the place of different historical actors who were involved in the implementation of protective policy, who served as its intermediaries on the ground, or who responded as its intended “beneficiaries.” More information...

Fedor, Julie. "Soviet Narratives of Subversion and Redemption during the Second Cold War and Beyond: The Case of Father Dmitrii Dudko," in Glajar, Valentina; Lewis, Alison and Petrescu, Corina L. (eds.,). Cold War Spy Stories from Eastern Europe. University of Nebraska Press, 2019

During the Cold War, stories of espionage became popular on both sides of the Iron Curtain, capturing the imagination of readers and filmgoers alike as secret police quietly engaged in surveillance under the shroud of impenetrable secrecy. And curiously, in the post-Cold War period there are no signs of this enthusiasm diminishing. The opening of secret police archives in many Eastern European countries has provided the opportunity to excavate and narrate for the first time forgotten spy stories. Cold War Spy Stories from Eastern Europe brings together a wide range of accounts compiled from the East German Stasi, the Romanian Securitate, and the Ukrainian KGB files. More information...

Galway, Matthew. "Permanent Revolution," in Franceschini, Ivan and Sorace, Christian (eds.,). Afterlives of Chinese Communism: Political Concepts from Mao to X. Verso. 2019

Afterlives of Chinese Communism comprises essays from over fifty world-renowned scholars in the China field, from various disciplines and continents. It provides an indispensable guide for understanding how the Mao era continues to shape Chinese politics today. Each chapter discusses a concept or practice from the Mao period, what it attempted to do, and what has become of it since. The authors respond to the legacy of Maoism from numerous perspectives to consider what lessons Chinese communism can offer today, and whether there is a future for the egalitarian politics that it once promised. More information...

Keys, Barbara (ed.,). The Ideals of Global Sport: From Peace to Human Rights. University of Pennsylvania Press, 2019

"Sport has the power to change the world," South African president Nelson Mandela told the Sporting Club in Monte Carlo in 2000. Today, we are inundated with similar claims - from politicians, diplomats, intellectuals, journalists, athletes, and fans - about the many ways that international sports competitions make the world a better place. The Ideals of Global Sport investigates these grandiose claims, peeling away the hype to reveal the reality: that shockingly little evidence underpins these endlessly repeated assertions. The essays, written by scholars from many regions and disciplines and drawn from an exceptionally diverse array of sources, show that these bold claims were sometimes cleverly leveraged by activist groups to pressure sports bodies into supporting moral causes. But the essays methodically debunk sports organisations’ inflated proclamations about the record of their contributions to peace, mutual understanding, antiracism, and democracy. More information...

Kovesi, Catherine. "Defending the Right to Dress: Two Sumptuary Law Protests in Sixteenth-Century Milan," in Riello, Giorgio and Rublack, Ulinka (eds.,). The Right to Dress: Sumptuary Laws in a Global Perspective, c. 1200-1800. Cambridge University Press, 2019

This is the first global history of dress regulation and its place in broader debates around how human life and societies should be visualised and materialised. Leading scholars on Asian, Latin American, Ottoman and European history shed new light on how and why items of dress became key aspirational goods across society, how they were lobbied for and marketed, and whether or not sumptuary laws were implemented by cities, states and empires to restrict or channel trade and consumption. Their findings reveal the significance of sumptuary laws in medieval and early modern societies as a site of contestation between individuals and states and how dress as an expression of identity developed as a modern ‘right’. More information...

McGregor, Katharine. “The World Was Silent? Global Communities of Resistance to the 1965 Repression in the Cold War Era,” in Russell, Aidan (ed.,). Truth, Silence and Violence in Emerging States: Histories of the Unspoken. Routledge, 2019.

This book gives a comprehensive view of the ongoing evolutions and multiple faces of silence as a common strand in the struggles of state-building. It begins with chapters that examine the construction of “regimes of silence” as an act of power, and it continues through explorations of the ambiguous limits of speech within communities marked by this violence. It highlights national and transnational attempts to combat state silences, before concluding with a series of considerations of how these regimes of silence continue to be extrapolated in the gaps of records and written history. This volume explores histories of the composed silences of political violence across the emerging states of the late twentieth century, not solely as a present concern of aftermath or retrospection but as a diachronic social and political dimension of violence itself. More information...

Antonello, Alessandro. The Greening of Antarctica: Assembling an International Environment. Oxford University Press, 2018

In The Greening of Antarctica Alessandro Antonello investigates the development of an international regime of environmental protection and management between the signing of the Antarctic Treaty in 1959 and the signing of the Convention on the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources in 1980. In those two decades, the Antarctic Treaty parties and an international community of scientists reimagined what many considered a cold, sterile, and abiotic wilderness as a fragile and extensive regional ecosystem. Antonello investigates this change by analysing the negotiations and developments surrounding four environmental agreements: the Agreed Measures for the Conservation of Antarctic Fauna and Flora in 1964; the Convention for the Conservation of Antarctic Seals in 1972; a voluntary restraint resolution on Antarctic mining in 1977; and the Convention on the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources in 1980. More information...

Burnard, Trevor. “Toiling in the Fields: Valuing Female Slaves in Jamaica, 1674-1788,” in Berry, Daina Ramey and Harris, Leslie M. (eds.,). Sexuality and Slavery: Reclaiming Intimate Histories in the Americas. University of Georgia Press, 2018

In this groundbreaking collection, editors Daina Ramey Berry and Leslie M. Harris place sexuality at the centre of slavery studies in the Americas (the United States, the Caribbean, and South America). While scholars have marginalised or simply overlooked the importance of sexual practices in most mainstream studies of slavery, Berry and Harris argue here that sexual intimacy constituted a core terrain of struggle between slaveholders and the enslaved. These essays explore consensual sexual intimacy and expression within slave communities, as well as sexual relationships across lines of race, status, and power. Contributors explore sexuality as a tool of control, exploitation, and repression and as an expression of autonomy, resistance, and defiance. More information...

Damousi, Joy and O’Brien, Patricia (eds.,). League of Nations. Histories, Legacies and Impact. Melbourne University Publishing. 2018

League of Nations offers new perspectives on the history, legacies and impact of the League of Nations. The essays in this collection demonstrate how vastly diverse topics from film, education, Christian youth movements, colonial rule in the Pacific islands, national economic analyses, disarmament, humanitarianism and refugees as well as international relations, national sovereignty and domestic League of Nations associations - all led to Geneva. More information...

Edele, Mark. The Soviet Union: A short history. Wiley-Blackwell, 2018

In ten concise and compelling chapters, The Soviet Union covers the entire Soviet Union experience from the years 1904 to 1991 by putting the focus on three major themes: warfare, welfare, and empire. Throughout the book, Mark Edele - a noted expert on the topic - clearly demonstrates that the Soviet Union was more than simply “Russia.” Instead, it was a multi-ethnic empire. The author explains that there were many incarnations of Soviet society throughout its turbulent history, each one a representative of Soviet socialism. The text covers a wide range of topics: The end Romanov empire; The outbreak of World War I; The Bolshevik Revolution of 1917; The breakdown of the old empire and its re-constitution in the Civil War; The New Economic Policy; The rise of Stalin; The Soviet’s role in World War II; Post war normalisation; and Gorbachev’s attempt to end the Cold War. More information...

Nagasaki, R. (translator) and Goodman, David (author).『ラジオが夢見た市民社会—アメリカン・デモクラシーの栄光と挫折』 A Civil Society Radio Dreamed: The glory and failure of American democracy. Iwanami Shoten, 2018

In the 1930s, how did American radio broadcasting, which was a symbol of civil liberties, produce an information system suitable for a total war system? The book depicts the political nature of radio and media, and the cultural transformation of American society.

Goodman, David. “Gold and the public in the nineteenth-century gold rushes,” in Mountford, Benjamin and Tuffnell, Stephen (eds.,). A Global History of Gold Rushes. California World History Library series. University of California Press, 2018

Nothing set the world in motion like gold. Between the discovery of California placer gold in 1848 and the rush to Alaska fifty years later, the search for the precious yellow metal accelerated worldwide circulations of people, goods, capital, and technologies. A Global History of Gold Rushes brings together historians of the United States, Africa, Australasia, and the Pacific World to tell the rich story of these nineteenth century gold rushes from a global perspective. Gold was central to the growth of capitalism: it whetted the appetites of empire builders, mobilised the integration of global markets and economies, profoundly affected the environment, and transformed large-scale migration patterns. Together these essays tell the story of fifty years that changed the world. More information...

Goodman, David. “Propaganda and sound,” in Bull, Michael (ed.,). The Routledge Companion to Sound Studies. Routledge, 2018

The Routledge Companion to Sound Studies is an extensive volume presenting a comparative and historically informed understanding of the workings of sound in culture, while also mapping potential future directions for research in the field. Experts from a variety of disciplines within sound studies cover such diverse topics as politics, gender, media, race, literature and sport. Individual sections that consider the importance of sound in an increasingly mediated world; the role that sound media play in the construction of experience; and the ways in which sound has been theorised to produce a distinctive sensory contribution to knowledge. More information...

Kovesi, Catherine (ed.,). Luxury and the Ethics of Greed in Early Modern Italy. Vol. 14. Brepols Publishers, 2018

A new, scholarly, and lively appraisal of the twin paradigms of Luxury and Greed as they were debated, disseminated, enacted, and feigned in early modern Italy. This book unravels the complex interaction of the paradigms of luxury and greed which lie at the origins of modern consumption practices. In the Western world, the phenomenon of luxury and the ethical dilemmas it raised appeared, for the first time since antiquity, in early modern Italy. Here, luxury emerged as a core idea in the conceptualisation of consumption. Simultaneously, greed - which manifested in new and unrestrained consumption practices - came under close ethical scrutiny. As the buying power of new classes gained pace, these paradigms evolved as they continued both to influence, and be influenced by, other emerging global cultures through the early modern period. More information...

McGregor, Kate. “Historical justice and the case of the 1965 killings,” in Hefner, Robert W. (ed.,). Routledge Handbook of Contemporary Indonesia. Routledge, 2018

The Routledge Handbook of Contemporary Indonesia offers an overview of the modern making and contemporary dynamics of culture, society, and politics in this powerful Asian nation. It provides a comprehensive survey of key issues in Indonesian politics, economics, religion, and society... Bringing together original contributions by leading scholars of Indonesia in law, political science, history, anthropology, sociology, religious studies, and gender studies this Handbook provides an up-to-date, interdisciplinary, and academically rigorous exploration of Indonesia. It will be of interest to students, academics, policymakers, and others in search of reliable information on Indonesian politics, economics, religion, and society in an accessible format. More information...

McGregor, Kate; Melvin, Jess and Pohlman, Annie (eds.). The Indonesian Genocide of 1965: Causes, Dynamics and Legacies. Palgrave Macmillan, 2018

This collection of essays by Indonesian and foreign contributors offers new and highly original analyses of the mass violence in Indonesia which began in 1965 and its aftermath. Fifty years on from one the largest genocides of the twentieth century, they probe the causes, dynamics and legacies of this violence through the use of a wide range of sources and different scholarly lenses. More information...

McGregor, Kate. “The Making of a Transnational Activist: The Indonesian Human Rights Campaigner Carmel Budiardjo,”; Scalmer, Sean. “Empire and Activism: Gandhi, Imperialism, and the Global Career of Satyagraha,”; and Berger, Stefan and Scalmer, Sean. “The Transnational Activist: An Introduction,”; all in Berger, Stefan and Scalmer, Sean. (eds.,). The Transnational Activist: Transformations and Comparisons from the Anglo World since the Nineteenth Century. Palgrave Macmillan, 2018

This book provides the first historical and comparative study of the ‘transnational activist’. A range of important recent scholarship has considered the rise of global social movements, the presence of transnational networks, and the transfer or diffusion of political techniques. Much of this writing has registered the pivotal role of ‘transnational’ or ‘global’ activists. However, if the significance of the ‘transnational activist’ is now routinely acknowledged, then the history of this actor is still something of a mystery. Most commentators have associated the figure with contemporary history. Hence much of the debate around ‘transnational activism’ is ahistorical, and claims for novelty are not often based on developed historical comparison. As this volume argues, it is possible to identify the ‘transnational activist’ in earlier decades and even centuries. More information...

McIlvenna, Una. “Emotions in Public: Crowds, Mobs and Communities,” in Broomhalls, S. and Lynch, A. (eds.,). The Routledge History of Emotions in Europe 1100-1700. Routledge, 2018

The Routledge History of Emotions in Europe: 1100-1700 presents the state of the field of pre-modern emotions during this period, placing particular emphasis on theoretical and methodological aspects of current research. This book serves as a reference to existing research practices in emotions history and advances studies in the field across a range of scholarly approaches. It brings together the work of recognised experts and new voices, and represents a wide range of international and interdisciplinary perspectives from different schools of research practice, including art history, literature and culture, philosophy, linguistics, archaeology and music. More information...

Scalmer, Sean. “Nonviolent activism and the media: Gandhi and beyond,” in Meikle, Graham (ed.,). The Routledge Companion to Media and Activism. Routledge, 2018

The Routledge Companion to Media and Activism is a wide-ranging collection of 42 original and authoritative essays by leading contributors from a variety of academic disciplines. Introducing and exploring central debates about the diverse relationships between both media and protest, and communication and social change, the book offers readers a reliable and informed guide to understanding how media and activism influence one another. The expert contributors examine the tactics and strategies of protest movements, and how activists organise themselves and each other; they investigate the dilemmas of media coverage and the creation of alternative media spaces and platforms; and they emphasise the importance of creativity and art in social change. More information...

Scalmer, Sean. “TLO 6: Examine historical evidence, scholarship and changing representations of the past,” in Clark, Jennifer and Nye, Adele (eds.,). Teaching the Discipline of History in an Age of Standards. Springer, 2018

This book discusses the discipline standards of History in Australian universities in order to help historians understand the Threshold Learning Outcomes and to assist in their practical application. It is divided into two sections: The first offers a scholarly exploration of contemporary issues in history teaching, while the second section discusses each of the Threshold Learning Outcomes and provides real-world examples of quality pedagogical practice. More information...

Silverstein, Jordy. “‘There Are Current Lessons from the Holocaust’: Making Meaning from Jewish Histories of the Holocaust,” in Clark, Anna and Peck, Carla (eds.,). Contemplating Historical Consciousness: Notes from the Field. Berghahn, 2018

The last several decades have witnessed an explosion of new empirical research into representations of the past and the conditions of their production, prompting claims that we have entered a new era in which the past has become more “present” than ever before. Contemplating Historical Consciousness brings together leading historians, ethnographers, and other scholars who give illuminating reflections on the aims, methods, and conceptualisation of their own research as well as the successes and failures they have encountered. This rich collective account provides valuable perspectives for current scholars while charting new avenues for future research. More information...

Spinks, Jenny. “Monstrous Births and Diabolical Seed,” in Hopwood, Nick; Flemming, Rebecca and Kassell, Lauren (eds.,). Reproduction: Antiquity to the Present Day. Cambridge university Press, 2018

From contraception to cloning and pregnancy to populations, reproduction presents urgent challenges today. This field-defining history synthesises a vast amount of scholarship to take the long view. Spanning from antiquity to the present day, the book focuses on the Mediterranean, western Europe, North America and their empires. It combines history of science, technology and medicine with social, cultural and demographic accounts. Ranging from the most intimate experiences to planetary policy, it tells new stories and revises received ideas. An international team of scholars asks how modern ‘reproduction’ - an abstract process of perpetuating living organisms – replaced the old ‘generation’ – the active making of humans and beasts, plants and even minerals. Striking illustrations invite readers to explore artefacts, from an ancient Egyptian fertility figurine to the announcement of the first test-tube baby. Authoritative and accessible, Reproduction offers students and non-specialists an essential starting point and sets fresh agendas for research. More information...

Tomsic, Mary. “Sharing a Personal Past: #iwasarefugee #iamarefugee on Instagram,” in Lydon, Jane (ed.,). Visualising Human Rights. University of Western Australia Publishing, 2018

When the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) was proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly in Paris on 10 December 1948, photography was considered a ‘universal language’ that would communicate across barriers of race and culture. 70 years later it is timely to examine the cultural impact of the framework of human rights through visual culture. More information...

Burnard, Trevor. "Slavery and the Enlightenment in Jamaica and the British Empire, 1760-1772: The Afterlife of Tacky’s Rebellion and the Origins of British Abolitionism," in Tricoire, D. (ed.,). Enlightened Colonialism: Civilization Narratives and Imperial Politics in the Age of Reason. Palgrave Macmillan 2017

This book expands the debate on whether Enlightenment provided the cultural and intellectual origins of modern colonialism by exploring political and social practices. It brings together studies about the overseas empires of Britain, France, Spain, and Portugal as well as the continental empires of Russia and Austria and explores the interaction and assimilationism between European, indigenous, creole, and mix-raced elites. This book further qualifies the postcolonial thesis and shows its limits. To reach these goals, it links text analysis and political history on a global comparative scale. Focusing on imperial agents, their narratives of progress, and their political aims and strategies, it asks whether Enlightenment gave birth to a new colonialism between 1760 and 1820. More information...

Lang, Birgit; Damousi, Joy and Lewis, Alison. A history of the case study: sexology, psychoanalysis, literature. Manchester University Press, 2017

This collection tells the story of the case study genre at a time when it became the genre par excellence for discussing human sexuality across the humanities and life sciences.It is a transcontinental journey from the imperial world of fin-de-siècle Central Europe to the interwar metropolises of Weimar Germany and to the United States of America in the post-war years. More information...

Edele, Mark. Stalin’s Defectors: How Red Army Soldiers Became Hitler’s Collaborators, 1941-1945. OUP, 2017

Stalin’s Defectors is the first systematic study of the phenomenon of frontline surrender to the Germans in the Soviet Union’s ‘Great Patriotic War’ against the Nazis in 1941-1945. No other Allied army in the Second World War had such a large share of defectors among its prisoners of war. Based on a broad range of sources, this volume investigates the extent, the context, the scenarios, the reasons, the aftermath, and the historiography of frontline defection. More information...

Ellinghaus, Katherine. Blood Will Tell Native Americans and Assimilation Policy. University of Nebraska Press, 2017

Blood Will Tell reveals the underlying centrality of “blood” that shaped official ideas about who was eligible to be defined as Indian by the General Allotment Act in the United States. Katherine Ellinghaus traces the idea of blood quantum and how the concept came to dominate Native identity and national status between 1887 and 1934 and how related exclusionary policies functioned to dispossess Native people of their land. The U.S. government’s unspoken assumption at the time was that Natives of mixed descent were undeserving of tribal status and benefits, notwithstanding that Native Americans of mixed descent played crucial roles in the national implementation of allotment policy. More information...

Scalmer, Sean. On the Stump: Campaign Oratory and Democracy in the United States, Britain, and Australia. Temple University Press, 2017

In his engaging book On the Stump, Sean Scalmer provides the first comprehensive, transnational history of the “stump speech.” He traces the development and transformation of campaign oratory, as well as how national elections and public life and culture have been shaped by debate over the past century. Scalmer presents an eloquent study of how "stumping" careers were made, sustained, remembered, and exploited, to capture the complex rhythms of political change over the years. On the Stump examines the distinctive dramatic and performative styles of celebrity orators including Davy Crockett, Henry Clay, and William Gladstone. Ultimately, Scalmer recovers the history of the stump speech and its historical significance in order to better understand how political change is forged.

Griffen-Foley, Bridget and Scalmer, Sean (eds.,). Public Opinion, Campaign Politics and Media Audiences New Australian Perspectives. Melbourne University Publishing, 2017

This timely book investigates the fascinating landscape of media-driven politics through the prisms of ‘public opinion’, political campaigning, and audiences. From Indigenous voting rights and climate change to talkback radio and right-wing populism, Public Opinion, Campaign Politics and Media Audiences showcases new research in political science, history and media studies. Contributors scrutinise the relationship between polls, party policy and voting behaviour, and evaluate the roles of oratory and the media in electioneering and political communication across Australia, Britain and the United States. More information...

Tomsic, Mary. Beyond the Silver Screen, A History of Women, Filmmaking and Film Culture in Australia 1920-1990. Melbourne University Press, 2017

Beyond the Silver Screen tells the history of women’s engagement with filmmaking and film culture in twentieth-century Australia. In doing so, it explores an array of often hidden ways women in Australia have creatively worked with film. Beyond the Silver Screen examines film in a broad sense, considering feature filmmaking alongside government documentaries and political films. It also focuses on women’s work regulating films and supporting film culture through organising film societies and workshops to encourage female filmmakers. As such, it tells a new narrative of Australian film history. More information...

Zika, Charles; Hesson, Angela and Martin, Matthew (eds.,). Love: Art of Emotion 1400-1800. National Gallery of Victoria, 2017

Love, in the early modern era, was not so much a single emotion as an intricate constellation of feelings, experienced and expressed by the individual as well as broader society. From romantic desire to religious devotion, from patriotism to narcissism to nostalgia, Love: Art of Emotion 1400-1800 explores notions of public display and private sentiment, ostentation and intimacy. More information...

Burnard, Trevor and Garrigus, John. The Plantation Machine: Atlantic Capitalism in French Saint-Domingue and British Jamaica. University of Pennsylvania Press, 2016

The core of The Plantation Machine addresses the Seven Years’ War and its aftermath. The events of that period, notably a slave poisoning scare in Saint-Domingue and a near-simultaneous slave revolt in Jamaica, cemented white dominance in both colonies. Burnard and Garrigus argue that local political concerns, not emerging racial ideologies, explain the rise of distinctive forms of racism in these two societies. The American Revolution provided another imperial crisis for the beneficiaries of the plantation machine, but by the 1780s whites in each place were prospering as never before - and blacks were suffering in new and disturbing ways. The result was that Jamaica and Saint-Domingue became vitally important parts of the late eighteenth-century American empires of Britain and France. More information...

Damousi, Joy and Hamilton, Paula (eds.,). A cultural history of sound, memory, and the senses. Routledge, 2016

The past 20 years have witnessed a turn towards the sensuous, particularly the aural, as a viable space for critical exploration in History and other Humanities disciplines. This has been informed by a heightened awareness of the role that the senses play in shaping modern identity and understanding of place; and increasingly, how the senses are central to the memory of past experiences and their representation. The result has been a broadening of our historical imagination, which has previously taken the visual for granted and ignored the other senses… This volume builds on scholarship produced over the last twenty years and explores these dimensions by coupling the history of sound and the senses in distinctive ways: through a study of the sound of violence; the sound of voice mediated by technologies and the expression of memory through the senses. More information...

Damousi, Joy; Scalmer, Sean; Goot, Murray and Archer, Robyn (eds.,). The Conscription Conflict and the Great War. Monash University Publishing, 2016

While the Great War raged, Australians were twice asked to vote on the question of military conscription for overseas service. The recourse to popular referendum on such an issue at such a time was without precedent anywhere in the world... But while the memory of the conscription campaigns once loomed large, it has increasingly been overshadowed by a preoccupation with the sacrifice and heroism of Australian soldiers. This volume redresses the balance. Across nine chapters, distinguished scholars consider the origins, unfolding, and consequences of the conscription campaigns, comparing local events with experiences in Britain, the United States, and other countries. A corrective to the ‘militarisation’ of Australian history, it is also a major new exploration of a unique and defining episode in Australia’s past.

McIlvenna, Una. Scandal and Reputation at the Court of Catherine de Medici. Routledge, 2016

Scandal and Reputation at the Court of Catherine de Medici explores Catherine de Medici’s ‘flying squadron’, the legendary ladies-in-waiting of the sixteenth-century French queen mother who were alleged to have been ordered to seduce politically influential men for their mistress’s own Machiavellian purposes. Branded a ‘cabal of cuckoldry’ by a contemporary critic, these women were involved in scandals that have encouraged a perception, which continues in much academic literature, of the late Valois court as debauched and corrupt. More information...

McPhee, Peter. The French Revolution (2nd edition, revised). Melbourne University Publishing, 2016

There are three key questions the book investigates. First, why was there a revolution in 1789? Second, why did the revolution continue after 1789, culminating in civil war, foreign invasion and terror? Third, what was the significance of the revolution? Was the French Revolution a major turning-point in French, even world history, or instead just a protracted period of violent upheaval and warfare which wrecked millions of lives? More information...

Scalmer, Sean and Altman, Dennis (eds.,). How to Vote Progressive in Australia Labor Or Green?. Monash University Publishing, 2016

Red or Green? Traditionally, Australian progressives have supported the Australian Labor Party; increasingly, the Greens appeal. What are the key differences between the parties? Is greater collaboration desirable? Is it likely? This volume brings together a range of party leaders, veterans, and academic experts to tackle these important questions. Deliberately pluralistic, it encompasses strongly divergent views. Dedicated to progressive change, it aims both to capture and to advance a vital public debate.

Spinks, Jenny and Zika, Charles (eds.,). Disaster, Death and the Emotions in the Shadow of the Apocalypse, 1400-1700. Palgrave Macmillan, 2016

In late medieval and early modern Europe, textual and visual records of disaster and mass death allow us to encounter the intense emotions generated through the religious, providential and apocalyptic frameworks that provided these events with meaning. This collection brings together historians, art historians, and literary specialists in a cross-disciplinary collection shaped by new developments in the history of emotions. It offers a rich range of analytical frameworks and case studies, from the emotional language of divine providence to individual and communal experiences of disaster. More information...

Collins, Harry, Evans, Robert, Durant, Darrin and Weinel, Martin. Experts and the Will of the People: Society, Populism and Science. Springer Nature, 2020.

The rise of populism in the West has led to attacks on the legitimacy of scientific expertise in political decision making. This book explores the differences between populism and pluralist democracy and their relationship with science. Pluralist democracy is characterised by respect for minority choices and a system of checks and balances that prevents power being concentrated in one group, while populism treats minorities as traitorous so as to concentrate power in the government. The book argues that scientific expertise – and science more generally – should be understood as one of the checks and balances in pluralist democracies. More information...

Kennedy, Jenny, Arnold, Michael, Gibbs, Martin, Nansen, Bjorn and Wilken, Rowan. Digital Domesticity: Media, Materiality, and Home Life. Oxford University Press, 2020.

At the turn of the twenty-first century, typical households were equipped with a landline telephone, a desktop computer connected to a dial-up modem, and a shared television set. Television, radio and newspapers were the dominant mass media. Today, homes are now network hubs for all manner of digital technologies, from mobile devices littering lounge rooms to Bluetooth toothbrushes in bathrooms – and tomorrow, these too will be replaced with objects once inconceivable. Tracing the origins of these digital developments, the authors advance media domestication research through an ecology-based approach to the abundance and materiality of media in the home. The book locates digital domesticity through phases of adoption and dwelling, to management and housekeeping, to obsolescence and disposal. More information...

Durant, Darrin. “The Third Wave in Science and Technology Studies,” in Caudill, D.S., Conley, S., Gorman, M.E. and Weinel, M. (eds.,). The Third Wave in Science and Technology Studies: Future Research Directions on Expertise and Experience. Palgrave Macmillan, 2019.

This book analyses future directions in the study of expertise and experience with the aim of engendering more critical discourse on the general discipline of science and technology studies. The Third Wave has garnered attention in journals and in international workshops, where scholars delivered papers explicating the theoretical foundations and practical applications of the Third Wave. This book arose out of those workshops, and is the next step in the popularisation of the Third Wave. The chapters address the novel concept of interactional experts, the use of imitation games, appropriating scientific expertise in law and policy settings, and recent theoretical developments in the Third Wave. More information...

Wiesenfeldt, Gerhard . “The ‘Duytsche Mathematique’ and Leiden Family Networks, 1600-1620,” in Dijksterhuis, Fokko Jan; Weber, Andreas and Zuidervaart, Huib J. (eds.,). Locations of Knowledge in Dutch Contexts. Brill, 2019.

Locations of Knowledge in Dutch Contexts brings together scholars who shed light on the ways locations gave shape to scientific knowledge practices in the Dutch Republic and the Kingdom of the Netherlands. This interdisciplinary volume uses four hundred years of Dutch history as a laboratory to investigate spatialised understandings of the history of knowledge. By conceptualising locations of knowing as time-specific configurations of actors, artefacts, and activities, contributors to this volume not only examine cities as specific kind of locations, but also analyse the regionally and globally networked and transformative character of locations. More information...

Arnold, Michael et al. “Managing the consumption of death and digital media: The funeral director as market intermediary,” in Kaul, Adam and Skinner, Jonathan (eds.,). Leisure and Death: An Anthropological Tour of Risk, Death, and Dying. University of Colorado Press, 2018.

This anthropological study examines the relationship between leisure and death, specifically how leisure practices are used to meditate upon – and mediate – life. Considering travellers who seek enjoyment but encounter death and dying, tourists who accidentally face their own mortality while vacationing, those who intentionally seek out pleasure activities that pertain to mortality and risk, and those who use everyday leisure practices like social media or dogwalking to cope with death, Leisure and Death delves into one of the most provocative subsets of contemporary cultural anthropology. More information...

Fine, Cordelia, Donovan, C. and Kennett, J. “Reliable and Unreliable Judgments about Reasons,” in Star, Daniel (ed.,).The Oxford Handbook of Reasons and Normativity. Oxford University Press, 2018.

The Oxford Handbook of Reasons and Normativity maps a central terrain of philosophy, and provides an authoritative guide to it. Few concepts have received as much attention in recent philosophy as the concept of a reason to do or believe something. And one of the most contested ideas in philosophy is normativity, the ‘ought’ in claims that we ought to do or believe something. This is the first volume to provide broad coverage of the study of reasons and normativity across multiple philosophical subfields. In addition to focusing on reasons in ethics, epistemology, and the philosophy of mind, action, and language, the Handbook explores philosophical work on the nature of normativity in general. More information...

Arnold, Michael et al. Death and Digital Media. Routledge, 2017.

Death and Digital Media provides a critical overview of how people mourn, commemorate and interact with the dead through digital media. It maps the historical and shifting landscape of digital death, considering a wide range of social, commercial and institutional responses to technological innovations. The authors examine multiple digital platforms and offer a series of case studies drawn from North America, Europe and Australia. The book delivers fresh insight and analysis from an interdisciplinary perspective, drawing on anthropology, sociology, science and technology studies, human-computer interaction, and media studies. It is key reading for students and scholars in these disciplines, as well as for professionals working in bereavement support capacities. More information...

Arnold, Michael et al. “Researching Death Online,” in Hjorth, L., Horst, H., Galloway, A. and Bell, G. (eds.,). The Routledge Companion to Digital Ethnography. Routledge, 2017.

With the increase of digital and networked media in everyday life, researchers have increasingly turned their gaze to the symbolic and cultural elements of technologies. From studying online game communities, locative and social media to YouTube and mobile media, ethnographic approaches to digital and networked media have helped to elucidate the dynamic cultural and social dimensions of media practice. The Routledge Companion to Digital Ethnography provides an authoritative, up-to-date, intellectually broad, and conceptually cutting-edge guide to this emergent and diverse area. More information...

Camilleri, Kristian and Schlosshauer, M. “Bohr and the problem of the quantum-to-classical transition,” in Niels Bohr and the Philosophy of Physics Twenty-First-Century Perspectives. Bloomsbury, 2017.

Niels Bohr and Philosophy of Physics: Twenty-First Century Perspectives examines the philosophical views, influences and legacy of the Nobel Prize physicist and philosophical spokesman of the quantum revolution, Niels Bohr. The sixteen contributions in this collection by some of the best contemporary philosophers and physicists writing on Bohr’s philosophy today all carefully distinguish his subtle and unique interpretation of quantum mechanics from views often imputed to him under the banner of the "Copenhagen Interpretation." More information...

Fine, Cordelia. Testosterone Rex: Myths of Sex, Science, and Society. W. W. Norton & Company, 2017.

In Testosterone Rex, psychologist Cordelia Fine wittily explains why past and present sex roles are only serving suggestions for the future, revealing a much more dynamic situation through an entertaining and well-documented exploration of the latest research that draws on evolutionary science, psychology, neuroscience, endocrinology, and philosophy. She uses stories from daily life, scientific research, and common sense to break through the din of cultural assumptions. Testosterone, for instance, is not the potent hormonal essence of masculinity; the presumed, built-in preferences of each sex, from toys to financial risk taking, are turned on their heads. More information...

Wiesenfeldt, Gerhard. “The Practical Tradition of Dutch Newtonianism,” in Boran, E. and Feingold, M. (eds.,). Reading Newton in Early Modern Europe. Brill, 2017.

Reading Newton in Early Modern Europe investigates how Sir Isaac Newton’s Principia was read, interpreted and remodelled for a variety of readerships in eighteenth-century Europe. The editors, Mordechai Feingold and Elizabethanne Boran, have brought together papers which explore how, when, where and why the Principia was appropriated by readers in Italy, Spain, the Netherlands, England and Ireland. Particular focus is laid on the methods of transmission of Newtonian ideas via university textbooks and popular works written for educated laymen and women. More information...

Arnold, Michael et al. “Methodological and ethical concerns associated with digital ethnography in domestic environments: Participant burden and burdensome technologies,” in Warr, D., Guillemin, M., Cox, S., Waycott, J. (eds.,). Ethics and Visual Research Methods: Theory, Methodology, and Practice. Palgrave Macmillan, 2016.

This collection presents stories from the field that were gathered from researchers using a breadth of visual methods. Visual methods refer to the use of still or moving images either as forms of data, to explore research topics and explorations of artistic practice. In addition to well-established visual methods, such as photo-voice and photo-elicitation, the possibilities for visual methods are flourishing through the proliferation of visual culture and developments in digital technologies. More information...

Arnold, Michael et al. “Overcoming the tyranny of distance? High speed broadband and the significance of place,” in Griffiths, M. and Barbour, K. (eds.,). Making Publics, Making Places. University of Adelaide Press, 2016.

This book focuses on the surprising generative possibilities which digital and smart technologies offer media consumers, citizens, institutions and governments in making publics and places, across topics as diverse as Twitter audiences, rural news, the elasticity of the public sphere, Weibo, cultural heritage and responsive spaces in smart cities. Multidisciplinary perspectives engage with critical questions in new media scholarship. General readers, curious about how technologies are enabling social, public and civic participation, will enjoy the book’s mix of fresh approaches and insights. More information...

Durant, Darrin. “The undead linear model of expertise,” in Heazle, Michael and Kane, John (eds.,). Policy Legitimacy, Science and Political Authority Knowledge and action in liberal democracies. Routledge, 2016.

This book examines the tensions between political authority and expert authority in the formation of public policy in liberal democracies. It aims to illustrate and better understand the nature of these tensions rather than to argue specific ways of resolving them. The various chapters explore the complexity of interaction between the two forms of authority in different policy domains in order to identify both common elements and differences. The policy domains covered include: climate geoengineering discourses; environmental health; biotechnology; nuclear power; whaling; economic management; and the use of force. More information...

Arnold, Michael et al. “Remembering Zyzz – Distributed Memories on Distributed Networks,” in Hajek, A., Lohmeier, C. and Pentzold, C. (eds.,). Memory in a Mediated World: Remembrance and Reconstruction. Palgrave Macmillan, 2015.

Considering both retrospective memories and the prospective employment of memories, Memory in a Mediated World examines troubled times that demand resolution, recovery and restoration. Its contributions provide empirically grounded analyses of how media are employed by individuals and social groups to connect the past, the present and the future. More information...

Lawford-Smith, Holly. Not In Their Name: Are Citizens Culpable For Their States' Actions? Oxford University Press, 2019

The idea of popular sovereignty is dominant in classical political theory. It is a commonplace assumption that democratic publics both authorise and have control over what their states do; that their states act in their name and on their behalf. Not In Their Name approaches these assumptions from the perspective of social metaphysics, asking whether the state is a collective agent, and whether ordinary citizens are members of that agent. If it is, and they are, there is a clear case for democratic collective culpability. More information...

Young, Garry. "Enacting Immorality Within Gamespace," in Attrill-Smith, Alison; Fullwood, Chris; Keep, Melanie and Kuss, Daria (eds.,). Oxford Handbook of Cyberpsychology. Oxford University Press, 2019

The Oxford Handbook of Cyberpsychology explores a wide range of cyberpsychological processes and activities through the research and writings of some of the world's leading cyberpsychology experts. The book is divided into eight sections covering topics as varied as online research methods, self-presentation and impression management, technology across the lifespan, interaction and interactivity, online groups and communities, social media, health and technology, video gaming and cybercrime and cybersecurity. More information...

Goswick, Dana. "Are Modal Facts Brute Facts?," in Vintiadis, Elly and Mekios, Constantinos (eds.,). Brute Facts. Oxford University Press, 2018

Brute facts are facts that don't have explanations. Such facts appear in our explanations, inform many people's views about the structure of the world, and are part of philosophical interpretations in metaphysics and the philosophy of science. Yet, despite the considerable literature on explanation, the question of bruteness has been left largely unexamined. The chapters in Brute Facts address this gap in academic thought by exploring the central considerations which surround this topic. More information...

Halliday, Dan. Inheritance of Wealth Justice, Equality, and the Right to Bequeath. OUP, 2018

Daniel Halliday examines the moral grounding of the right to bequeath or transfer wealth. He engages with contemporary concerns about wealth inequality, class hierarchy, and taxation, while also drawing on the history of the egalitarian, utilitarian, and liberal traditions in political philosophy. He presents an egalitarian case for restricting inherited wealth, arguing that unrestricted inheritance is unjust to the extent that it enables and enhances the intergenerational replication of inequality. More information...

Jones, Karen and Schroeter, Francois (eds.,). The many moral rationalisms. Oxford University Press, 2018. Also Schroeter, Laura; Schroeter, Francois, and Jones, Karen. "Introduction" and Schroeter, Laura and Schroeter, Francois. “Reasons and Justifiability” in the same book.

Moral rationalism takes human reason and human rationality to be the key elements in an explanation of the nature of morality, moral judgment, and moral knowledge. This volume explores the resources of this rich philosophical tradition. Thirteen original essays, framed by the editors' introduction, critically examine the four core theses of moral rationalism: (i) the psychological thesis that reason is the source of moral judgment, (ii) the metaphysical thesis that moral requirements are constituted by the deliverances of practical reason, (iii) the epistemological thesis that moral requirements are knowable a priori, and (iv) the normative thesis that moral requirements entail valid reasons for action. More information...

Jones, Karen and Schroeter, Francois. "Moral Expertise," in McPherson, Tristram and Plunkett, David (eds.,). The Routledge Handbook of Metaethics. Routledge, 2018. Also Schroeter, Laura and Schroeter, Francois. "Metasemantics and Metaethics" in the same book.

This Handbook surveys the contemporary state of the burgeoning field of metaethics. Forty-four chapters, all written exclusively for this volume, provide expert introductions to: the central research programs that frame metaethical discussions; the central explanatory challenges, resources, and strategies that inform contemporary work in those research programs; debates over the status of metaethics, and the appropriate methods to use in metaethical inquiry. This is essential reading for anyone with a serious interest in metaethics, from those coming to it for the first time to those actively pursuing research in the field. More information...

Peden, Knox. "Badiou's Concept of History," in Bartlett, A.J. and Clemens, Justin (ed.,). Badiou and His Interlocutors: Lectures, Interviews and Responses. Bloomsbury Publishing, 2018

This is a unique collection presenting work by Alain Badiou and commentaries on his philosophical theories. It includes three lectures by Badiou, on contemporary politics, the infinite, cinema and theatre and two extensive interviews with Badiou - one concerning the state of the contemporary situation and one wide ranging interview on all facets of his work and engagements. It also includes six interventions on aspects of Badiou's work by established scholars in the field, addressing his concept of history, Lacan, Cinema, poetry, and feminism; and four original essays by young and established scholars in Australia and New Zealand addressing the key concerns of Badiou's 2015 visit to the Antipodal region and the work he presented there. More information...

Peden, Knox. "Grace and equality, fried and rancière (and kant)," in Abbott, Mathew (ed.,). Michael Fried and Philosophy: Modernism, Intention, and Theatricality. Routledge, 2018

This volume brings philosophers, art historians, intellectual historians, and literary scholars together to argue for the philosophical significance of Michael Fried's art history and criticism. It demonstrates that Fried's work on modernism, artistic intention, the ontology of art, theatricality, and anti-theatricality can throw new light on problems in and beyond philosophical aesthetics. Featuring an essay by Fried and articles from world-leading scholars, this collection engages with philosophical themes from Fried’s texts. More information...

Restall, Greg. "Truth-Tellers in Bradwardine's Theory of Truth," in Uckelman S., Rode C., Loewe B. and Kann C. (eds.,). Modern Views of Medieval Logic Volume 16. Peeters, 2018

While for a long time the study of medieval logic focused on editorial projects and reconstructions of central medieval doctrines such as the theories of signification, supposition, consequences, and obligations, nowadays the spectrum of analysis has broadened and is increasingly informed by modern logical research, whose perspective is then applied to medieval logic. Promoting this tendency, logicians and researchers concerned with semantics in the Gesellschaft für Philosophie des Mittelalters und der Renaissance (GPMR) founded a working group bringing together medieval logic and modern applied logic. The present volume is a seminal document of these interests and activities. It analyses theories in medieval logic which are useful for solving questions of recent logic and explains crucial parts of medieval logic, philosophy, and theology by applying techniques of present-day logic. More information...

Sankey, Howard. "Kuhn, relativism and realism," in Saatsi, J. (ed.,). The Routledge Handbook of Scientific Realism. Routledge, 2018

The Routledge Handbook of Scientific Realism is an outstanding reference source - the first collection of its kind - to the key issues, positions, and arguments in this important topic. Its thirty-four chapters, written by a team of international experts, are divided into five parts: Historical development of the realist stance; Classic debate: core issues and positions; Perspectives on contemporary debates; The realism debate in disciplinary context; Broader reflections. In these sections, the core issues and debates presented, analysed, and set into broader historical and disciplinary contexts. More information...

Sankey, Howard. "The Demise of the Incommensurability Thesis," in Mizrahi, Moti (ed.,). The Kuhnian Image of Science: Time for a Decisive Transformation? Rowman & Littlefield International, 2018

More than 50 years after the publication of Thomas Kuhn's seminal book, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, this volume assesses the adequacy of the Kuhnian model in explaining certain aspects of science, particularly the social and epistemic aspects of science. One argument put forward is that there are no good reasons to accept Kuhn's incommensurability thesis, according to which scientific revolutions involve the replacement of theories with conceptually incompatible ones. More information...

Singer, Peter. "Philosophy, Controversy, and Freedom of Speech," in Downs, Donald and Surprenant, Chris. (eds.,). Value and Limits of Academic Speech: Philosophical, Political, and Legal Perspectives. Rutledge, 2018

The essays in this collection, written by prominent philosophers, political scientists, sociologists, and legal scholars, examine the issues at the forefront of the crisis of free speech in higher education. The contributors address the broader historical, cultural, legal, and normative contexts of the current crisis, and take care to analyse the role of "due process" in protecting academic freedom and individuals accused of misconduct. Additionally, the volume is unique in that it advances practical remedies to campus censorship, as the editors and many of the contributors have participated in movements to remedy limitations on free speech and open inquiry. More information...

Jones, Karen. "'But I Was Counting on You!'," in Faulkner, P. And Simpson, T. (eds.,). The Philosophy of Trust. Oxford University Press, 2017

Trust is central to our social lives. We know by trusting what others tell us. We act on that basis, and on the basis of trust in their promises and implicit commitments. So trust underpins both epistemic and practical cooperation and is key to philosophical debates on the conditions of its possibility... But trust is not merely central to our lives instrumentally; trusting relations are themselves of great value, and in trusting others, we realise distinctive forms of value. What are these forms of value, and how is trust central to our lives? These questions are explored and developed in this volume, which collects fifteen new essays on the philosophy of trust. They develop and extend existing philosophical discussion of trust and will provide a reference point for future work on trust. More information...

Peden, Knox. "To Have Done with Alienation (Or: How to Orient Oneself in Ideology)," in Nesbitt, Nick (ed.,). The Concept in Crisis: 'Reading Capital' Today. Duke University Press, 2017

The publication of Reading Capital - by Louis Althusser, Étienne Balibar, Roger Establet, Pierre Macherey, and Jacques Rancière - in 1965 marked a key intervention in Marxist philosophy and critical theory, bringing forth a stunning array of concepts that continue to inspire philosophical reflection of the highest magnitude. The Concept in Crisis reconsiders the volume’s reading of Marx and renews its call for a critique of capitalism and culture for the twenty-first century. More information...

Whitty, Monica and Young, Garry. Cyberpsychology The Study of Individuals, Society and Digital Technologies. John Wiley & Sons, 2017

An important new BPS Textbook in Psychology exploring the interactions between individuals, societies, and digital technologies. The book outlines key theories and empirical research within cyberpsychology and provides critical assessments of this rapidly changing field; it identifies areas in need of further research and ways to use digital technologies as a research tool; it covers topics such as online identity, online relationships and dating, pornography, children’s use of the internet, cyberbullying, online games and gambling, and deception and online crime; and the book is engaging and accessible for students at the undergraduate and graduate level with real life examples, activities, and discussion questions. More information...

Sankey, Howard. "Subject and Object in Scientific Realism," in Angelova, P., Andreev, J. and Lensky, E. (eds.,). Das Interpretative Universum: Dimitri Ginev Zum 60. Geburtstag Gewidmet. Konigshausen and Neumann, 2017

More information...

Halliday, Daniel. "Inheritance and Hypothetical Insurance," in Waluchow, W. and Sciaraffa, S. (eds.,). The Legacy of Ronald Dworkin. Oxford University Press, 2016

This book assembles leading legal, political, and moral philosophers to examine the legacy of the work of Ronald Dworkin. They provide the most comprehensive critical treatment of Dworkin's accomplishments focusing on his work in all branches of philosophy, including his theory of value, political philosophy, philosophy of international law, and legal philosophy. More information...

Inkpin, Andrew. Disclosing the World: On the Phenomenology of Language. MIT Press, 2016

In this book, Andrew Inkpin considers the disclosive function of language - what language does in revealing or disclosing the world. His approach to this question is a phenomenological one, centering on the need to accord with the various experiences speakers can have of language. With this aim in mind, he develops a phenomenological conception of language with important implications for both the philosophy of language and recent work in the embodied-embedded-enactive-extended (4e) tradition of cognitive science. More information...

Inkpin, Andrew. "Phenomenology of language in a 4e world," in Reynolds, Jack and Sebold, Richard (eds.,). Phenomenology and Science: Confrontations and Convergences. Palgrave Macmillan, 2016

This book investigates the complex, sometimes fraught relationship between phenomenology and the natural sciences. The contributors attempt to subvert and complicate the divide that has historically tended to characterise the relationship between the two fields. Phenomenology has traditionally been understood as methodologically distinct from scientific practice, and thus removed from any claim that philosophy is strictly continuous with science. More information...

Lawford-Smith, Holly. "Difference-Making and Individuals' Climate-Related Obligations," in Heyward, C. And Rosa, D. (eds.,). Climate Justice in a Non-Ideal World. Oxford University Press, 2016

The first part of the book discusses those facets of the debate on climate justice that become relevant due to the shortcomings of current global action on climate change. The second part makes specific suggestions for adjusting current policies and negotiating procedures in ways that are feasible in the relatively short term while still decreasing the distance between current climate policy and the ideal. The chapters in the third and final part reflect upon how philosophical work can be brought to bear on the debates in climate science, communication, and politics. More information...

Lawford-Smith, Holly and Collins, S. "The Transfer of Duties: From Individuals To States And Back Again," in Brady, M. And Fricker, M. (Ads.,). The Epistemic Life of Groups. Oxford University Press, 2016

Groups engage in epistemic activity all the time - whether it be the active collective inquiry of scientific research groups or crime detection units, or the evidential deliberations of tribunals and juries, or the informational efforts of the voting population in general - and yet in philosophy there is still relatively little epistemology of groups to help explore these epistemic practices and their various dimensions of social and philosophical significance. The aim of this book is to address this lack, by presenting original essays in the field of collective epistemology, exploring these regions of epistemic practice and their significance for Epistemology, Political Philosophy, Ethics, and the Philosophy of Science. More information...

Peden, Knox. "Althusser's Spinozism and the Problem of Theology," in Hamza, Agon (ed.,). Althusser and Theology: Religion, Politics and Philosophy. Brill, 2016

Religion has always been an object of philosophical analysis, as well as a platform for political practice. One cannot imagine a form of philosophical thinking without its relation to a religion, whether it negates or affirms the latter. In different philosophical orientations, religion also serves as a condition for philosophy. Althusser and Theology intends not so much to fill a gap in Althusser scholarship as to make an important contribution to the contemporary radical left movement. In this regard, Althusser and Theology is of significant importance in the current debates on the Left concerning its relation to theology. More information...

Young, Garry. Resolving the Gamer's Dilemma: Examining the Moral and Psychological Differences between Virtual Murder and Virtual Paedophilia. Springer, 2016

This book explores the gamer’s dilemma, which lies at the heart of theorising about the morality of certain video game content. The dilemma is as follows: given that gaming content involves virtual characters within a virtual environment, the moral permission of virtual murder would also appear to morally permit virtual paedophilia. Yet most gamers and members of wider society would not want to play, endorse, or find in any way morally acceptable the enactment of virtual paedophilia within a video game. Yet by accepting the moral permissibility of virtual murder they leave themselves vulnerable to having to accept the moral permissibility of virtual paedophilia. More information...

Abramovich, Dvir. Fragments of Hell: Israeli Holocaust Literature. Academic Studies Press, 2019

In this compelling and engaging book, Dvir Abramovich introduces readers to several landmark novels, poems and stories that have become classics in the Israeli Holocaust canon. Discussed are iconic writers such as Aharon Appelfeld, Dan Pagis, Etgar Keret, Yoram Kaniuk, Uri Tzvi Greenberg and Ka-Tzetnik, and their attempts to come to terms with the unprecedented trauma and its aftereffects. Scholarly, yet deeply accessible to both students and to the public, this illuminating volume offers a wide-ranging introduction to the intersection between literature and the Shoah, and the linguistic, stylistic and ethical difficulties inherent in representing this catastrophe in fiction. Exploring narratives by survivors and by those who wrote about the European genocide from a distance, each chapter contains a compassionate and thoughtful analysis of the author’s individual opus, accompanied by a comprehensive exploration of their biography and the major themes that underpin their corpus. The rich and sophisticated discussions and interpretations contained in this masterful set of essays are sure to become essential reading for those seeking to better understand the responses by Hebrew writers to the immense tragedy that befell their people. More information...

Abramovich, Dvir. A Touch of Genius: Portraits and Literary Masterpieces. Hybrid Publishers, 2017

In a collection of passionate, sparkling essays, one of Australia's leading literary critics presents a fresh and exciting ode to Jewish fiction. Rescuing some brilliant texts from the dustbin of oblivion or from culture's short-memory, Abramovich, writing with affection and authority, offers gems of critical appreciation and in-depth discussion of masterpieces and iconic authors such as Nobel Prize Winner S.Y. Agnon, Israel's most celebrated living author Amos Oz, the mesmerising Paul Celan, the incomparable David Grossman, the extraordinary Susan Fromberg Schaeffer, the Israeli 'Agatha Christie', and the early pioneers of Hebrew letters. Sharing his lifetime joy of reading and engagement with the written word, and showcasing his scholarly erudition, Abramovich effortlessly muses on the nature of writing, and takes readers on an intellectual and philosophical journey through grand thematic landscapes such as memory, the Holocaust, identity, man's relationship with God, imagination, family, marriage death and suffering. A celebration and a tribute to old favourites, this delightful volume of reflections and meditations is sure to ignite a fire in the discerning readers' minds, and motivate them to go back to those classics with a renewed sense of excitement. More information...

Abramovich, Dvir. Flashpoints: Israel, anti-Semitism and the Holocaust. Hybrid Publishers, 2014

Never one to shy away from controversy, Abramovich's thought-provoking collection of essays and intelligent writings are sure to arouse heated discussion. Mercilessly tackling everything from Mel Gibson's anti-Semitic rants, The Holocaust, Iran's pursuit of nuclear weapons and the UN's anti-Israel stance, Flashpoints offers unique perspectives on Israel, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the Jewish world. Whether you agree with him or not, one thing is certain: Abramovich's pieces will lead you on a journey of exploration and reflection, challenging what many people hold true about topics that are as relevant today as ever. More information...