A popular subject in sociology and cultural studies, divorce has been overlooked by literary critics. Spanning nearly a century during which the divorce rate skyrocketed, this study traces the treatment of divorce in the American novel.

DIVA cultural history of sexual content in television shows and TV advertising during the 1970s./div

Alfred Hitchcock's American films are not only among the most admired works in world cinema, they also offer some of our most acute responses to the changing shape of American society in the 1940s, 50s, and 60s. The authors of this anthology show how famous films such as Strangers on a Train, Vertigo, North by Northwest, and Rear Window, along with more obscure ones such as Rope, The Wrong Man, and Family Plot, register the ideologies and insurgencies, the normative assumptions and the cultural alternatives, that shaped these tumultuous decades. They argue that, just as these films occupy a visual landscape defined by the grand monuments of American civic life--Mt. Rushmore, the Statue of Liberty, the United Nations--they are also marked by their preoccupation with the social mores and private practices of mid-century America. Not only are big-city and suburban life the explicit subjects of films like Rear Window and Shadow of a Doubt, so are the forms of experience that emerge within these social spaces, whether the urban voyeurism examined by the former or the intertwining of banality and violence depicted in the latter. Indeed, just about every form of American life that was achieving social power at this time--the national security state; the science and art of psychoanalysis; the privileging of the free-wheeling, improvisatory self; the postwar codification and fissuring of gender roles; road-culture and its ancillary creation, the motel--is given detailed, critical, and mordant examination in Hitchcocks films. The Hitchcock who emerges is not merely the inspired technician and psychological excavator that critics of the past two generations have justly hailed; he is also a cultural critic of remarkable insight and undeniable prescience.

Since the 1970s, the study of emotions moved to the forefront of sociological analysis. This book brings the reader up to date on the theory and research that have proliferated in the analysis of human emotions. The first section of the book addresses the classification, the neurological underpinnings, and the effect of gender on emotions. The second reviews sociological theories of emotion. Section three covers theory and research on specific emotions: love, envy, empathy, anger, grief, etc. The final section shows how the study of emotions adds new insight into other subfields of sociology: the workplace, health, and more.

A treasure trove of extraordinary images celebrating the elegance and flair of style icon C.Z. Guest--a true tastemaker known for her classic, understated American look who continues to influence fashion today. Celebrated for her beauty and personal style, C.Z. Guest transcended eras to become an enduring figure of good taste, appearing on the cover of Time magazine in 1962. A grande dame of high society, she lived the good life and was photographed by such legends as Irving Penn, Cecil Beaton, John Rawlings, and Slim Aarons. Despite her patrician upbringing, C.Z. was surprisingly modern, exerting influence over America's cultural landscape for fifty years, whether attending her close friend Truman Capote's Black and White Ball, dancing at Studio 54, or partying at Andy Warhol's Factory. Exploring her continuing influence in the spheres of society, fashion, and interiors, C.Z. Guest is full of stunning images, from her days as a young bride, photographed by Henri Cartier-Bresson, to her family life on her Long Island estate, Templeton, to her accomplishments as a gardener and her impeccable gardens, to her prominence in society, keeping company with everyone from Diego Rivera, Cecil Beaton, and Diana Vreeland to the Duke and Duchess of Windsor. With insightful contributions by today's top tastemakers, this is the first book on C.Z. Guest and a must for devotees of fashion and style.