The popular media of film and television surround us daily with images of evil - images that have often gone critically unexamined. In the belief that people in ever-increasing numbers are turning to the media for their understanding of evil, this lively and provocative collection of essays addresses the changing representation of evil in a broad spectrum of films and television programmes. Written in refreshingly accessible and de-jargonised prose, the essays bring to bear a variety of philosophical and critical perspectives on works ranging from the cinema of famed director Alfred Hitchcock and the preternatural horror films Halloween and Friday the 13th to the understated documentary Human Remains and the television coverage of the immediate post-9/11 period. The Changing Face of Evil in Film and Television is for anyone interested in the moving-image representation of that pervasive yet highly misunderstood thing we call evil.ContentsMartin F. NORDEN: Introduction Matthew SOAR: The Bite at the Beginning: Encoding Evil Through Film Title Design Linda BRADLEY SALAMON: Screening Evil in History: Rope, Compulsion, Scarface, Richard III Mike FRANK: The Radical Monism of Alfred Hitchcock Cynthia FREELAND: Natural Evil in the Horror Film: Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds Matt HILLS and Steven Jay SCHNEIDER: ?The Devil Made Me Do It!?: Representing Evil and Disarticulating Mind/Body in the Supernatural Serial Killer Film Thomas HIBBS: Virtue, Vice, and the Harry Potter UniverseRobin R. MEANS COLEMAN and Jasmine Nicole COBB: Training Day and The Shield: Evil Cops and the Taint of Blackness Martin F. NORDEN: The ?Uncanny? Relationship of Disability and Evil in Film and Television Carlo CELLI: Comedy and the Holocaust in Roberto Benigni's Life is Beautiful/La vita e bella Garnet C. BUTCHART:. On the Void: The Fascinating Object of Evil in Human RemainsJohn F. STONE:. The Perfidious President and ?The Beast?: Evil in Oliver Stone's NixonGary R. EDGERTON, William B. HART, and Frances HASSENCAHL: Televising 9/11 and Its Aftermath: The Framing of George W. Bush's Faith-Based Politics of Good and Evil Bibliography Notes on Contributors Index

Aestheticization of evil is a frequently used formula in cinema and television. However, the representation of evil as an aesthetic object pushes it out of morality. Moral judgments can be pushed aside when evil is aestheticized in movies or TV series because there is no real victim. Thus, situations such as murder or war can become a source of aesthetic pleasure. Narratives in cinema and television can sometimes be based on a simple good-evil dichotomy and sometimes they can be based on individual or social experiences of evil and follow a more complicated method. Despite the various ways evil is depicted, it is a moral framework in film and television that must be researched to study the implications of aestheticized evil on human nature and society. International Perspectives on Rethinking Evil in Film and Television examines the changing representations of evil on screen in the context of the commonness, normalization, aestheticization, marginalization, legitimization, or popularity of evil. The chapters provide an international perspective of the representations of evil through an exploration of the evil tales or villains in cinema and television. Through looking at these programs, this book highlights topics such as the philosophy of good and evil, the portrayal of heroes and villains, the appeal of evil, and evil’s correspondence with gender and violence. This book is ideal for sociologists, professionals, researchers and students working or studying in the field of cinema and television and practitioners, academicians, and anyone interested in the portrayal and aestheticization of evil in international film and television.

This book is the first book devoted to the history of hospital and asylum visiting and deflects attention from medical history's more traditionally studied constituencies, patients and doctors. Covering the eighteenth to the late twentieth centuries, and taking case studies from around the globe, the authors demonstrate that hospitals and asylums could be remarkably permeable institutions. However, policies towards visitors have varied from outright exclusion, as in the case of some isolation hospitals in Victorian Britain, to near open access in the first Chinese missionary hospitals. Historical studies of visitors and visiting, as a result, tell us much about the changing relationship between healthcare institutions and the communities they serve. These histories are particularly relevant at a time when service providers seek ways to involve patients' representatives in healthcare decision making; to control hospital super-bugs; and to make the hospital environment accessible yet safe and secure. With the re-emergence of restricted visiting, the subject remains one of the most emotive topics in the history of institutional medicine.

The face, being prominent and visible, is the foremost marker of a person’s identity as well as their major tool of communication. Facial disfigurements, congenital or acquired, not only erase these significant capacities, but since ancient times, they have been conjured up as outrageous and terrifying, often connoting evil or criminality in their associations – a dark secret being suggested "behind the mask," the disfigurement indicating punishment for sin. Complemented by an original poem by Kenneth Sherman and a plastic surgeon’s perspective on facial disfigurement, this book investigates the exploitation of these and further stereotypical tropes by literary authors, filmmakers, and showrunners, considering also the ways in which film, television, and the publishing industry have more recently tried to overcome negative codifications of facial disfigurement, in the search for an authentic self behind the veil of facial disfigurement. An exploration of fictional representations of the disfigured face, this book will appeal to scholars of sociology, cultural and media studies, American studies and literary studies with interests in representations of disfigurement and the Other.

Fantasy is often condemned as escapist, unsophisticated and superficial. This collection of new essays puts such easy dismissals to the test by examining the ways in which Fantasy narratives present diverse, politically relevant discourses--gender, race, religion or consumerism--and thereby serve as indicators of their real-world contexts. Through their depiction of other worlds allegedly disconnected from our own, these texts are able to actualize political attitudes. Instead of categorizing Fantasy either as conservative or progressive, the essays suggest that its generic peculiarity allows the emergence of productive forms of oscillation between these extremes. Covered are J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings, George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire sequence, J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter novels, the vampire TV series True Blood, and the dystopian computer game Fallout 3.

The 'evil child' has infiltrated the cultural imagination, taking on prominent roles in popular films, television shows and literature. This collection of essays from a global range of scholars examines a fascinating array of evil children and the cultural work that they perform, drawing upon sociohistorical, cinematic, and psychological approaches. The chapters explore a wide range of characters including Tom Riddle in the Harry Potter series, the possessed Regan in William Peter Blatty’s The Exorcist, the monstrous Ben in Doris Lessing’s The Fifth Child, the hostile fetuses of Rosemary’s Baby and Alien, and even the tiny terrors featured in the reality television series Supernanny. Contributors also analyse various themes and issues within film, literature and popular culture including ethics, representations of evil and critiques of society. This book was originally published as two special issues of Literature Interpretation Theory.

This book presents a collection of academic essays that take a fresh look at content and body transformation in the new media, highlighting how old hierarchies and canons of analysis must be revised. The movement of narratives and characterisations across forms, conventionally understood as adaptation, has commonly involved high-status classical forms (drama, epic, novel) being transformed into recorded and broadcast media (film, radio and television), or from the older recorded media to the newer ones. The advent of convergent digital platforms has further transformed hierarchies, and the formation of global conglomerates has created the commercial conditions for ever more lucrative exchanges between different media. Now source texts can move in any direction and take up any configuration, as emerging interacting fan bases drive innovation and new creative and commercial possibilities are deployed. Moreover, transformation may be not just a technology-driven creative practice and response, but at the very centre of the thematic worlds developed in those forms of story-telling which are currently popular: television series, video games, films and novels. The magic transformation of “your” money into “their” money is paralleled in contemporary media and culture by the centrality of transformation of one product to another as a media industry practice, as well as the transformation of bodies as a major theme both in the ensuing media products and in people’s identity practices in daily life.

Alongside superheroes, supervillains, too, have become one of today’s most popular and globally recognizable figures. However, it is not merely their popularity that marks their significance. Supervillains are also central to superhero storytelling to the extent that the superhero genre cannot survive without supervillains. Bringing together different approaches and critical perspectives across disciplines, author Nao Tomabechi troubles overly hero-centered works in comics studies to reconsider the modern American myths of the superheroes. Considering the likes of Lex Luthor, the Joker, Catwoman, Harley Quinn, Loki, Venom and more, Supervillians explores themes such as gender and sexuality, disability, and many forms of Otherness in relation to the notion of evil as it appears in the superhero genre. The book investigates how supervillains uphold and, at times, trouble dominant ideals expressed by the heroism of our superheroes.

The modern age with its emphasis on technical rationality has enabled a new and dangerous form of evil--administrative evil. Unmasking Administrative Evil discusses the overlooked relationship between evil and public affairs, as well as other fields and professions in public life. The authors argue that the tendency toward administrative evil, as manifested in acts of dehumanization and genocide, is deeply woven into the identity of public affairs. The common characteristic of administrative evil is that ordinary people within their normal professional and administrative roles can engage in acts of evil without being aware that they are doing anything wrong. Under conditions of moral inversion, people may even view their evil activity as good. In the face of what is now a clear and present danger in the United States, this book seeks to lay the groundwork for a more ethical and democratic public life; one that recognizes its potential for evil, and thereby creates greater possibilities for avoiding the hidden pathways that lead to state-sponsored dehumanization and destruction. What's new in the Fourth Edition of Unmasking Administrative Evil: UAE is updated and revised with new scholarship on administrative ethics, evil, and contemporary politics. The authors include new cases on the dangers of market-based governance, contracting out, and deregulation. There is an enhanced focus on the potential for administrative evil in the private sector. The authors have written a new Afterword on administrative approaches to the aftermath of evil, with the potential for expiation, healing, and reparations.

Masculinity and Patriarchal Villainy in the British Novel: From Hitler to Voldemort sits at the intersection of literary studies and masculinity studies, arguing that the villain, in many works of contemporary British fiction, is a patriarchal figure that embodies an excess of patriarchal power that needs to be controlled by the hero. The villains' stories are enactments of empowerment fantasies and cautionary tales against abusing patriarchal power. While providing readers with in-depth studies of some of the most popular contemporary fiction villans, Sara Martín shows how current representations of the villain are not only measured against previous literary characters but also against the real-life figure of the archvillain Adolf Hitler.