Arthur Asa Berger's unique ability to translate difficult theories into accessible language makes this book an ideal introduction to cultural criticism. Berger covers the key theorists, concepts, and subject areas, from literary, sociological and psychoanalytical theories to semiotics and Marxism. Cultural Criticism breathes new life into the discipline by making these theories relevant to students' lives. The author illustrates his explanations with excerpts from classic works giving readers a sense of the important thinkers' styles and helping place them in their context. Berger also provides a comprehensive bibliography on cultural criticism for those who wish to explore the topics at greater length. Cultural Criticism is the perfect undergraduate supplemental text for such courses as media studies, literary criticism, and popular culture.

Leitch argues for the use of poststructural theory in cultural criticism. He maintains that deconstruction remains crucial for a truly critical approach to cultural studies.

'Secularization and Cultural Criticism' examines the responses of a wide range of thinkers to illustrate exactly why the problem of secularisation in the study of society and culture should matter once again.

More than 450 succinct entries from A to Z help readers make sense of the interdisciplinary knowledge of cultural criticism that includes film, psychoanalytic, deconstructive, poststructuralist, and postmodernist theory as well as philosophy, media studies, linguistics.

In Homegrown, cultural critics bell hooks and Amalia Mesa-Bains reflect on the innate solidarity between Black and Latino culture. Riffing on everything from home and family to multiculturalism and the mass media, hooks and Mesa-Bains invite readers to re-examine and confront the polarizing mainstream discourse about Black-Latino relationships that is too often negative in its emphasis on political splits between people of color. A work of activism through dialogue, Homegrown is a declaration of solidarity that rings true even ten years after its first publication. This new edition includes a new afterword, in which Mesa-Bains reflects on the changes, conflicts, and criticisms of the last decade.

In a departure, author Regis Debray redefines communication as the inescapable conditioning of civilization's meanings and messages by their technologies of transmission and lays the groundwork for a science of the transmission of cultural forms."

The bestselling author of No Logo shows how the global "free market" has exploited crises and shock for three decades, from Chile to Iraq In her groundbreaking reporting, Naomi Klein introduced the term "disaster capitalism." Whether covering Baghdad after the U.S. occupation, Sri Lanka in the wake of the tsunami, or New Orleans post-Katrina, she witnessed something remarkably similar. People still reeling from catastrophe were being hit again, this time with economic "shock treatment," losing their land and homes to rapid-fire corporate makeovers. The Shock Doctrine retells the story of the most dominant ideology of our time, Milton Friedman's free market economic revolution. In contrast to the popular myth of this movement's peaceful global victory, Klein shows how it has exploited moments of shock and extreme violence in order to implement its economic policies in so many parts of the world from Latin America and Eastern Europe to South Africa, Russia, and Iraq. At the core of disaster capitalism is the use of cataclysmic events to advance radical privatization combined with the privatization of the disaster response itself. Klein argues that by capitalizing on crises, created by nature or war, the disaster capitalism complex now exists as a booming new economy, and is the violent culmination of a radical economic project that has been incubating for fifty years.

Originally published in 1979, the central focus of this study is the concept of culture as employed by English literary intellectuals over the preceding 100 years, a period characterized by a constant process of re-definition and change. The tradition of criticism in which these intellectuals wrote represented the artistic imagination as a moral force in society and a fundamental mechanism for social change. The author traces this tradition through the writings of various English intellectuals, using the three main figures of Matthew Arnold, F. R. Leavis and Raymond Williams to elucidate the concept. She shows, through the writings of their contemporaries, how the concept was employed and modified, and her analysis ranges from J. S. Mill, John Ruskin and William Morris, through George Bernard Shaw, D. H. Lawrence, T. S. Eliot and R. H. Tawney to Richard Hoggard, Richard Wollheim and R. S. Peters. By discussing the questions of the role of art in society and examining their treatment by different groups of intellectuals, the author has supplied a basis for a forceful critique of the quality of life in modern industrial society. This book will be of interest to students of literature, cultural history and the sociology of culture.

We at Penguin Putnam mourn the death of Pauline Kael, a singularly unique voice in American letters. She will be sorely missed.In her decades-long career, Pauline Kael established herself as the most renowned and respected movie reviewer in the field. The breadth of her knowledge of film history and technique, her insight into the arts of acting and directing, and her unfailing wit and candor endeared her to movie lovers everywhere.For Keeps offers the best of Kael's reviews and other writings on movies from the collections that have marked her matchless career, starting with I Lost it at the Movies (1965), through Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, Deeper into Movies (a National Book Award winner), The Citizen Kane Book ("Raising Kane", the full text on the making of the movie, is included here), and all the others in a glorious run concluding with Movie Love in 1991. Once Kael retired from regular reviewing, her reputation only increased, and for the inimitable real thing, readers must turn to this volume to sample her perspicacity, fluency, and style. More than 275 reviews are arranged chronologically -in effect, a history of 30 years of movies. This ultimate compendium from America's most eloquent, passionate, and provocative critic is a boon to serious moviegoers and an indispensible companion to film in the age of technological and pop culture overload.