Clothing the body is one of the most complicated acts of daily existence. When a nun ponders red shoes, an architect knots his bowtie, a lesbian laces her Doc Marten’s, or a nude model disrobes, each is engaging in a process of identity-making that is both intensely personal and deeply social. In an increasingly material world, negotiating dress codes is a nuanced art, informed by shifting patterns of power and authority, play and performance, as well as gender, sexuality, class, ethnicity and race. Drawing on ethnographic knowledge to connect theory and practice, authors reveal links between material culture, social and economic forces and personal performance -- from trade beads to Barbie, and from Taiwanese producer to Nike consumer -- to explain clothing choices through time and across cultures. Conventional understandings of the self, subject and society are shown to be inadequate when examining the interconnections of cultural and transnational economic systems of production and consumption that have a profound effect on human choice. Social climates in which dress accrues meaning are increasingly global climates, where women’s bodies are commodified, gender categories are rigidly bound, and sweatshop labourers are slaves to boundless consumer appetite. This interdisciplinary book represents an important contribution to a fascinating and contested realm of human experience, and will be indispensable for anyone interested in the sociology, anthropology and psychology of fashion, cultural studies or the fashion industry.

The memoir of an American mother of an adopted Chinese baby girl is a cultural history of the events that led to the controversial 1980 one-child policy in China and the subsequent generation-long abandonment of Chinese daughters to American families. 18,000 first printing.

Argues that disproportionate rewards are distorting society

The author of Working and Hard Times examines the leading issue in American politics, presenting the feelings of nearly one hundred Americans on such issues as affirmative action, changing neighborhoods, secret prejudices, and more.

Germans are the largest single immigrant group in Minnesota history and perhaps its most invisible. Exploring this paradox, author Kathleen Neils Conzen recounts the struggles and triumphs of the Germans who transformed acres of wilderness into productive farms and brought to America their love of art, music, and sociability. She not only discusses the well-known enclaves in Brown and Stearns Counties but also looks at the smaller communities and the Twin Cities. In recent times, a renewed interest in German heritage can be seen in towns like New Ulm, home to the statue of Hermann the German and Heritagefest, the annual summer ethnic festival.

A distinguished legal scholar and civil rights activist employs a series of dramatic fables and dialogues to probe the foundations of America’s racial attitudes and raise disturbing questions about the nature of our society.

A gripping and comprehensive account of the genocide that occurred in Rwanda in 1994 analyzes the events that led up to the slaughter of the Tutsi minority and discusses the event's aftermath. Reprint. 35,000 first printing. Tour.

A study of race in America analyzes a range of black-white stereotypes and misconceptions, the ways in which blacks and whites interpret each other's behavior, and the divisive assumptions that damage racial harmony. Reprint. 30,000 first printing.

When did southern segregation begin? People often assume that segregation was a natural outcome of Reconstruction. In fact, scholars cannot agree on which events at the end of the nineteenth century mark the beginning of formalized Jim Crow. The 6 selections in this volume address the question of segregation’s origins and, amid the debate over when segregation began, also engage the issues of where, why, and how it became the norm for relations between black and white southerners. Concentrating on various issues—segregation’s antebellum antecedents, degrees of fluidity of racial interaction following emancipation, the complex relationship between race, gender, and class, and the diversity of segregation practices among the states—the selections illustrate the evolution of southern segregation from a diverse array of local practices to an inflexible American Apartheid.

Although never more than a small percentage of the Minnesota's population, Jews have made a remarkable contribution to the state in business, politics, and education.