These essays on the problems and functions of biography - particularly those of writers, thinkers and artists - investigate a subject of enduring importance for those interested in culture.

One of the most vibrant and exciting new areas of academia inquiry falls under the cross disciplinary category of cultural studies.

A practical, proven, hands-on program for discovering and using the true values and inner power that are the keys to a better, happier life What's the most important thing you will do in your lifetime? Make that first million? Raise a happy family? Find the cure for cancer? Each is a fine goal, but how do you know that it will bring you happiness? Bill Cohen, creator and teacher of a popular course called Life Mapping, shows us how to achieve personal fulfillment in our lives. In an era when it seems that few people take responsibility for their own actions, this book asserts that only by embracing responsibility can we find vital, satisfying answers -- and goes on to demonstrate step by step a practical program for identifying and removing the conflicts that separate us from our true selves.Developed over sixteen years, Life Mapping is an effective technique for determining our real beliefs and principles and then matching them to appropriate goals that support rather than undermine the integrity and spiritual power that is inherent in everyone. The author guides us through the entire process of creating unique, individualized Life Maps based on our own natures. Each one is different; this is no cookie-cutter prescription. But it isn't hard and it has already helped thousands to plan and organize their lives better, and find the balance and satisfaction that seem so elusive in the modern world.

In the fast changing world of today, we can all benefit from guidance in steering a course through the inevitable ups and downs of life. Life Mapping - so much more than just another self-development technique - can offer us a way forward that is uniquely suited to us as individuals. Simple to understand and fun to use, Life Mapping is both profound in its depth and great in its rewards. Your Life Map is a crystallisation of your best thoughts and feelings about your self, and a visual reminder of the best 'you' that you can imagine. In capturing this picture of your potential and holding it up as a beacon, your Life Map will help you define a vision of where you choose to go in life and supply a set of principles to help guide you there. An unchanging core in a fast changing world. The result will be a natural boost to your self-confidence, self-esteem and self-belief as your Life Map leads you to be pro-active in your attitudes, and effective in living your best life.

Why is music so important to most of us? How does music help us both in our everyday lives, and in the more specialist context of music therapy? This book suggests a new way of approaching these topical questions, drawing from Ansdell's long experience as a music therapist, and from the latest thinking on music in everyday life. Vibrant and moving examples from music therapy situations are twinned with the stories of 'ordinary' people who describe how music helps them within their everyday lives. Together this complementary material leads Ansdell to present a new interdisciplinary framework showing how musical experiences can help all of us build and negotiate identities, make intimate non-verbal relationships, belong together in community, and find moments of transcendence and meaning. How Music Helps is not just a book about music therapy. It has the more ambitious aim to promote (from a music therapist's perspective) a better understanding of 'music and change' in our personal and social life. Ansdell's theoretical synthesis links the tradition of Nordoff-Robbins music therapy and its recent developments in Community Music Therapy to contemporary music sociology and music studies. This book will be relevant to practitioners, academics, and researchers looking for a broad-based theoretical perspective to guide further study and policy in music, well-being, and health.

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During the twentieth century, electronic technology enabled the explosive development of new tools for the production, performance, dissemination and conservation of music. The era of the mechanical reproduction of music has, rather ironically, opened up new perspectives, which have contributed to the revitalisation of the performer’s role and the concept of music as performance. This book examines questions related to music that cannot be set in conventional notation, reporting and reflecting on current research and creative practice primarily in live electronic music. It studies compositions for which the musical text is problematic, that is, non-existent, incomplete, insufficiently precise or transmitted in a nontraditional format. Thus, at the core of this project is an absence. The objects of study lack a reliably precise graphical representation of the work as the composer or the composer/performer conceived or imagined it. How do we compose, perform and study music that cannot be set in conventional notation? The authors of this book examine this problem from the complementary perspectives of the composer, the performer, the musical assistant, the audio engineer, the computer scientist and the musicologist.

Mapping Canada’s Music is a selection of writings by the late Canadian music librarian and historian Helmut Kallmann (1922–2012). Most of the essays deal with aspects of Canadian music, but some are also autobiographical, including one written during retirement in which Kallmann recalls growing up in a middle-class Jewish family in 1930s Berlin under the spectre of Nazism. Of the seventeen selected writings by Kallmann, five have never before been published; many of the others are from difficult-to-locate sources. They include critical and research essays, reports, reflections, and memoirs. Each chapter is prefaced with an introduction by the editors. Two initial chapters offer a biography of Kallmann and an assessment of his contributions to Canadian music. The variety, breadth, and scope of these writings confirm Kallmann’s pioneering role in Canadian music research and the importance of his legacy to the cultural life of his adopted country. In the current climate of cuts to archival collections and services, the publication of these essays by and about a pre-eminent collector and historian serves as a timely reminder of the importance of cultural memory.