Download or read book The American Civilizing Process written by Stephen Mennell and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2013-04-24 with total page 427 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Since 9/11, the American government has presumed to speak and act in the name of ‘civilization’. But isthat how the rest of the world sees it? And if not, why not? Stephen Mennell leads up to such contemporary questions through a careful study of the whole span of American development, from the first settlers to the American Empire. He takes a novel approach, analysing the USA’s experience in the light of Norbert Elias’s theory of civilizing (and decivilizing) processes. Drawing comparisons between the USA and other countries of the world, the topics discussed include: American manners and lifestyles Violence in American society The impact of markets on American social character American expansion, from the frontier to empire The ‘curse of the American Dream’ and increasing inequality The religiosity of American life Mennell shows how the long-term experience of Americans has been of growing more and more powerful in relation to their neighbours. This has had all-pervasive effects on the way they see themselves, their perception of the rest of the world, and how the rest of the world sees them. Mennell’s compelling and provocative account will appeal to anyone concerned about America's role in the world today, including students and scholars of American politics and society.
Download or read book The Civilizing Process written by Norbert Elias and published by Wiley-Blackwell. This book was released on 2000-07-13 with total page 592 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Civilizing Process stands out as Norbert Elias' greatest work, tracing the "civilizing" of manners and personality in Western Europe since the late Middle Ages by demonstrating how the formation of states and the monopolization of power within them changed Western society forever.
Download or read book The American Civilizing Process written by and published by . This book was released on with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book On Civilization Power and Knowledge written by Norbert Elias and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 1998-02-17 with total page 312 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Norbert Elias has been described as among the great sociologists of the 20th century. A collection of his most important writings, this book sets out Elias' thinking during the course of his long career, with a discussion of how his work relates to that of other sociologists.
Download or read book Civilizing and Decivilizing Processes written by Christa Buschendorf and published by Cambridge Scholars Publishing. This book was released on 2011-01-18 with total page 345 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume collects new articles that explore the theoretical framework of figurational or relational sociology as represented by Norbert Elias and Pierre Bourdieu with regard to its relevance to American history, culture, and literature. The emphasis is put on Elias’s theory of the “civilizing process” and the question in how far his study of the European process of state formation and the correlative psycho-social changes is relevant to the analysis of the development of the American nation-state and the habitus of Americans. Leading scholars from the field of figurational sociology team up with an international cast of renowned Americanists to shed new light on a variety of issues from the domains of social theory, cultural history, and literary criticism. With Elias as a guide, drinking and democracy in the early republic, nineteenth-century Indian boarding schools, the fear of slave insurrections, and the modern-day black ghetto appear as steps in an open-ended and non-teleological civilizing process that weaves together changes in habitus and social structure. Without stumbling into the pitfalls of an ideology of “American exceptionalism,” the figurational approach to American studies allows the contributors of this pioneering collection to give new answers to the tenacious question of the United States’ peculiar characteristics. Adapting Elias’s analyses to US-American conditions, the authors provide fresh impulses for theorizing civilizing and decivilizing processes, thus transforming the field of both American studies and figurational sociology. The contributors are Jesse F. Battan, Christa Buschendorf, Rachel Hope Cleves, Winfried Fluck, Astrid Franke, Mary O. Furner, Günter Leypoldt, Stephen Mennell, Ruxandra Rădulescu, Kirsten Twelbeck, Johannes Voelz, Loïc Wacquant, and Cas Wouters.
Download or read book The Colonial civilizing Process in Dutch Formosa written by Chiu Hsin-Hui and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2008 with total page 375 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Focusing on Formosan agency in the encounter with Dutch colonialism and Chinese encroachment, this book reveals a fascinating picture of Taiwan in the early modern era.
Download or read book The Civilizing Process in America written by Stephen Mennell and published by . This book was released on 2007 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Sport and Leisure in the Civilizing Process written by Eric Dunning and published by Springer. This book was released on 2016-07-27 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How do figurational sociologists approach the subjects of sport and leisure? How does their approach differ from other approaches in the field? This major collection, edited by leading writers on sport and leisure, offers a superb introduction to the figurational sociology of sport and leisure. The distinctive features of the approach are clearly explained and contributors show how figurational sociology is applied in the analysis of concrete problems. However, the collection also gives space to critics of the figurational approach. Included here are contributions which claim that the approach is inaccurate, blinkered and irrelevant.
Download or read book The Better Angels of Our Nature written by Steven Pinker and published by Penguin Books. This book was released on 2012-09-25 with total page 834 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Faced with the ceaseless stream of news about war, crime, and terrorism, one could easily think this is the most violent age ever seen. Yet as bestselling author Pinker shows in this startling and engaging new work, just the opposite is true.
Download or read book Venezuelan Stick Fighting written by Michael J. Ryan and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2016-10-05 with total page 187 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Venezuelan Stick Fighting: The Civilizing Process in Martial Arts, Michael J. Ryan examines the modern and historical role of the secretive tradition of stick fighting within rural Venezuela. Despite profound political and economic changes from the early twentieth century to the modern day, traditional values, practices, and imaginaries associated with older forms of masculinity and sociality are still valued. Stick, knife, and machete fighting are understood as key means of instilling the values of fortitude and cunning in younger generations. Recommended for scholars of anthropology, social science, gender studies, and Latin American studies.
Download or read book Violence and Punishment written by Pieter Spierenburg and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2013-08-22 with total page 349 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This innovative book tells the fascinating tale of the long histories of violence, punishment, and the human body, and how they are all connected. Taking the decline of violence and the transformation of punishment as its guiding themes, the book highlights key dynamics of historical and social change, and charts how a refinement and civilizing of manners, and new forms of celebration and festival, accompanied the decline of violence. Pieter Spierenburg, a leading figure in historical criminology, skillfully extends his view over three continents, back to the middle ages and even beyond to the Stone Age. Ranging along the way from murder to etiquette, from social control to popular culture, from religion to death, and from honor to prisons, every chapter creatively uses the theories of Norbert Elias, while also engaging with the work of Foucault and Durkheim. The scope and rigor of the analysis will strongly interest scholars of criminology, history, and sociology, while the accessible style and the intriguing stories on which the book builds will appeal to anyone interested in the history of violence and punishment in civilization.
Download or read book Informalization written by Cas Wouters and published by SAGE. This book was released on 2007-10-29 with total page 283 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "This book shows that manners, far from being superficial adornments of behaviour, are thoroughly interwoven with our personalities and the structures of our societies. The concept of ‘informalization’ provides both an invaluable addition to Norbert Elias’s theory of civilizing processes and a most useful tool for understanding how changes in manners are related to shifts in the balances of power between social classes, sexes, and generations" - Johan Goudsblom, University of Amsterdam "Cas Wouters stakes out a powerful theory about changes in human relationships in the Western world over the past twelve decades... essential reading for anyone interested in the contemporary human condition." - Theory and Society "It is written in clear, unequivocal language, abounds with detail and replaces many normative statements about the alienating state of contemporary, capitalist, mass-consumption-oriented bureaucracy.... A nuanced, subtle and theoretically informed analysis of the sometimes quite chaotic civilising process of the last century′ - Figurations This original book explains the sweeping changes to twentieth-century regimes of manners and self. Broad in scope and deep in analytic reach, it provides a wealth of empirical evidence to demonstrate how changes in the code of manners and emotions in four countries (Germany, Netherlands, England and the US) have undergone increasing informalization. From the growing taboo toward the displays of superiority and inferiority and diminishing social and psychicogical distance between people, it reveals an ′emancipation of emotions′ and the new representation of emotion at the centre of personality. This thought-provoking book traces: The increasing permissiveness in public and private manners, such as introductions, the use of personal pronouns, social kissing, dancing, and dating. The ascent and integration of a wide variety of groups - including the working classes, women, youth and immigrants - and the sweeping changes this has imposed on relations of social inferiority and superiority. Shifts in self-regulation that require manners to seem ′natural′, at ease and authentic. Rising external social constraints towards being reflexive, showing presence of mind, considerateness, role-taking, and the ability to tolerate and control conflicts. Growing interdependence and social integration, declining power differences and the diminishing social and psychic distance between people. Continuing the analysis of Sex and Manners (SAGE, 2004), this book is a dazzling work of historical sociology.
Download or read book The Sociology of Norbert Elias written by Steven Loyal and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2004-03-18 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book provides a comprehensive and accessible introduction to the key aspects of Norbert Elias's work.
Download or read book Inventing Western Civilization written by Thomas C. Patterson and published by NYU Press. This book was released on 1997-01-01 with total page 157 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "In this wonderful book, Thomas Patterson effectively dethrones the concept of 'civilization' as an abstract good, transcending human society." --Martin Bernal Drawing on his extensive knowledge of early societies, Thomas C. Patterson shows how class, sexism, and racism have been integral to the appearance of "civilized" societies in Western Europe. He lays out clearly and simply how civilization, with its designs of "civilizing" and "being civilized," has been closely tied to the rise of capitalism in Western Europe and the development of social classes.
Download or read book Violence and Civilization written by Jonathan Fletcher and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2013-04-23 with total page 314 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book provides an introduction to the work of Norbert Elias. It is the first systematic appraisal of two central themes of his thought - violence and civilization. Although Elias is best known for his theory of civilizing processes, this study highlights the crucial importance of the concept of decivilizing processes. Fletcher argues that while Elias did not develop a theory of decivilizing processes, such a theory is logically implied in his perspective and is highly pertinent to an understanding of the most violent episodes of twentieth-century history, such as the Nazi genocides. Elias's original synthesis of sociology and psychology is examined through an analysis of several key texts including The Civilizing Process, The Established and the Outsiders and The Germans. Fletcher shows how Elias constructs his "figurational models" and applies these comparatively to specific historical examples drawn from England and Germany. Violence and Civilization is an excellent introduction to Elias's work. It will appeal to students of sociology, anthropology, and history interested in understanding the phenomenon of violence in the modern world.
Download or read book Punishment and Civilization written by John Pratt and published by SAGE. This book was released on 2002-07-10 with total page 227 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: `A lucid and fascinating account of how society initially comes to be viewed as ′civilized′ on the basis of how it punishes its offenders, and the various numances and contradictions that form the backdrop to that ′civilization′ prior to 1970 and the unraveling of that process thereafter. ...He [Pratt] has at the very least broadened the boundaries of the debate about the history of imprisonment in new and novel ways that will surely become a basis for future analysis′ - The Howard Journal of Criminal Justice ′In presenting and organizing such a wealth of historical material, John Pratt′s book will be welcomed by those who teach and study the history of the prison in the English-speaking world′ - Criminal Justice Punishment and Civilization examines how a framework of punishment that suited the values and standards of the civilized world came to be set in place from around 1800 to the late 20th century. In this book, John Pratt draws on research about prison architecture, clothing, diet, hygienic arrangements and changes in penal language to establish this. The author demonstrates that this did not mean, however, that such a framework of punishment was ′civilized′. Instead it meant that punishment in the civilized world became anonymous and remote. Prison brutalities and privations could be largely unchecked by a public that did not want to be involved. In the last few decades it has become clear that civilized societies have to tolerate new boundaries of punishment. This is not because of any development of ′civilized punishment′. Instead this is due to a shift in public mood and power: from public indifference to public involvement in penal development. Throughout this text theoretical ideas and concepts are accessibly introduced and illustrated with a wide range of examples from the UK, USA, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. It will be essential reading for students and academics of punishment, prisons and social theory.
Download or read book Dominance by Design written by Michael Adas and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2009 with total page 566 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Long before the United States became a major force in global affairs, Americans believed in their superiority over others due to their inventiveness, productivity, and economic and social well-being. U.S. expansionists assumed a mandate to civilize non-Western peoples by demanding submission to American technological prowess and design. As an integral part of America's national identity and sense of itself in the world, this civilizing mission provided the rationale to displace the Indians from much of our continent, to build an island empire in the Pacific and Caribbean, and to promote unilateral--at times military--interventionism throughout Asia. In our age of smart bombs and mobile warfare, technological aptitude remains preeminent in validating America's global mission. Michael Adas brilliantly pursues the history of this mission through America's foreign relations over nearly four centuries from North America to the Philippines, Vietnam, and the Persian Gulf. The belief that it is our right and destiny to remake foreign societies in our image has endured from the early decades of colonization to our current crusade to implant American-style democracy in the Muslim Middle East. Dominance by Design explores the critical ways in which technological superiority has undergirded the U.S.'s policies of unilateralism, preemption, and interventionism in foreign affairs and raised us from an impoverished frontier nation to a global power. Challenging the long-held assumptions and imperatives that sustain the civilizing mission, Adas gives us an essential guide to America's past and present role in the world as well as cautionary lessons for the future.
