SOAS, University of London (The School of Oriental and African Studies)

A Colonial Economy in Crisis. Burma's Rice Cultivators and the World Depression of the 1930s

The book challenges the orthodox argument that rural populations which abandoned self-sufficiency to become single commodity producers, and were supposedly very vulnerable to the commodity price collapse of the 1930s Depression, did not suffer as much as has been supposed. It shows how the effects of the depression were complicated, varying between regions, between different kinds of economic actors, and over time, and shows how the 'victims' of the depression were not passive, working imaginatively to mitigate their circumstances.

A New History of Japanese Cinema. A Century of Narrative Film

Cinema, which first arrived in Japan in 1896 with the Kinetoscope prototype, came at the very time that Japan was transforming its economic base and society into that of a major international power. The first cinema, the Asakusa Denkikan, was opened in Tokyo in 1903 and within thirteen years three hundred cinemas had sprung up throughout the country. In A New History of Japanese Cinema: A Century of Narrative Film, Isolde Standish focuses on the historical development of Japanese film. She details an industry and an art form shaped by the competing and merging forces of traditional culture and of economic and technological innovation. Adopting a thematic, exploratory approach, Standish links the concept of Japanese cinema as a system of communication with some of the central discourses of the twentieth century: modernism, nationalism, humanism, resistance, and gender. After an introduction outlining the earliest years of cinema in Japan, Standish demonstrates cinema's symbolic position in Japanese society in the 1930s--as both a metaphor and a motor of modernity. Moving into the late thirties and early forties, Standish analyses cinema's relationship with the state-focusing in particular on the war and occupation periods. The book's coverage of the post-occupation period looks at "romance" films in particular. Avant-garde directors came to the fore during the 1960s and early seventies, and their work is discussed in depth. The book concludes with an investigation of genre and gender in mainstream films of recent years. In grappling with Japanese film history and criticism, most western commentators have concentrated on offering interpretations of what have come to be considered "classic" films. A New History of Japanese Cinema takes a genuinely innovative approach to the subject, and should prove an essential resource for many years to come. Includes an 8-page color plate section and an 8-page black and white plate section

Table Of Contents
Illustrations Preface and Acknowledgements Notes on Translations Introduction Chapter One–Cinema, Modernity and the Shôchiku Tokyo Studios Chapter Two–Cinema and Nationalism Chapter Three–Cinema and the State Chapter Four–Cinema and Humanism Chapter Five–Cinema and Transgression Chapter Six–Genres and Gender Reflections

Authors
Isolde Standish is Convenor of the Cinemas of Asia and Africa, at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London.

Abkhazian Folktales (with Grammatical Introduction, Translation, Notes, and Vocabulary)

The inspiration for this introduction to folk-texts in Abkhaz (North West Caucasian) was the late Helma van den Berg's parallel collection of folk-literature for the North East Caucasian Dargi people (Dargi Folktales, CNWS 2001). The small volume entitled 'Oral Tales of the Abkhazians' (in Abkhaz) published in 2000 by the Abkhazian folklorist Zurab Dzhap’ua (Dzhap’wa) provided the source for the selection of the twenty texts which are here presented in original Cyrillic-based script and accompanied by IPA-transcription, morphological analysis, morpheme-glosses, annotation and translation; the volume starts with an extensive grammatical sketch of Abkhaz and ends with a vocabulary. Included myths describe the creation of the world, an Abkhazian version of Noah and the flood, man's relations with the Prince of the Dead, and God's expulsion of the Devil from heaven. The Abkhazian version of the Greek Prometheus is Abrskj’yl, and five stories relate the cycle of his birth, exploissts and death; an appendix presents for comparison a poem by the Georgian Vazha-Pshavela on the fate of the Georgian equivalent to this hero, Amiran. It is hoped that this book will complement the eleven Abkhazian tales gathered from Abkhazians in Turkey and published with French translation by Georges Dumézil in his Etudes Abkhaz (1967) and that it will at the same time contribute to a better understanding in the English-speaking world of Abkhazian society through its legends.

ISBN 3895867977. Languages of the World/Text Collections 22. 340pp. 2005.

George Hewitt
SOAS, London

Cleft Constructions in Japanese Syntax

Cleft constructions are observed across languages and have been extensively examined within syntax as well as semantics and pragmatics. This is the first book-length coherent account of cleft constructions in Japanese. Working within a Principles and Parameters framework, with some reference to the Minimalist Program, Mika Kizu argues that these constructions should be analaysed on a par with with topicalization and head-internal relative clauses. Furthermore, based on one of the most interesting properties of the cleft construction, the syntactic phenomenon of 'connectivity', she proposes that long-distance cleft constructions in Japanese have peculair structures.; an analysis supported by empirical facts such as binding relations, weak crossover effects, interactions with another A'-dependency and clefting adjunct PPs. In raising the question of why languages such as Japanese observe particular structures whereas some other languages, such as English, do not, this treatment of cleft constructions has intriguing implications for current syntactic theories

Acknowledgements
List of Abbreviations
Foreword
PART 1: INTRODUCTION
Preliminaries
Background: English Cleft Constructions
Phenomenon of Interest: Japanese Cleft Constructions
Outline of the Book

PART 2: TOPICALIZATION AND CLEFT CONSTRUCTIONS
Introduction
Topicalization in Japanese: A Brief Overview
Our Assumptions about Topicalization
Parallelisms
Scrambling and Clefting
Summary

PART 3: NOMINALIZATIONS IN CLEFT CONSTRUCTIONS
Introduction
Properties of No
No in Presuppositional Clauses Versus Prenominal No
Relative Clauses and No-clauses of Clefts
The No-clauses as a CP
Summary

PART 4: RESUMPTIVE A-DEPENDENCIES
Introduction
Basic Facts and Proposal
Reconstruction in Long-distance Clefts
Properties of A-movement
Resumption
Residual Issues
Some Implications: Highest Clause Sensitivity
Summary

PART 5: ELLIPSIS IN CLEFT CONSTRUCTIONS
Introduction
Background and a Proposal
Basic Facts about Japanses Sluicing
Sluicing as a Cleft Construction
Other Issues in Japanese Sluicing
Some Consequences
Summary

PART 6: CONCLUSIONS
References
Index

MIKA KIZU studied at the University of California, Santa Cruz and completed her doctorate at McGill University. She is a Lecturer in the Department of East Asian Studies, University of Durham, UK.

Column to Volume: Formal Innovation in Chamba Statuary

Column to volume: Formal innovation in Chamba statuary investigates the appearance on world art markets during the 1970s of statues identified as Chamba from West Africa. Sought after for their artful execution, these statues were stylistically unlike anything previously documented from the region. Are they what the art market claimed? Who made them, when, where and why?

To answer these questions Richard Fardon and Christine Stelzig had to combine the findings of ethnographic research in Cameroon and Nigeria with museum and archival research and the testimonies of art dealers and collectors.

Profusely illustrated, Column to volume offers a comprehensive account of an important sculptural tradition in West Africa, as well as fascinating insights into the tribal branding, distribution, and copying, of African art works during the 1970s.

Identifying formal innovation in what had been described as a ‘tribal’ tradition, not least by tracing the individual sculptor responsible for the most valued Chamba statues, this account by Fardon and Stelzig will transform readers’ appreciation of Chamba sculpture.

More than this, their collaboration provides an instructive example of a fresh kind of inter-disciplinary and multi-sited investigation that integrates local contexts of use, collection histories, art markets and formal artistic appreciation to reflect the local and global contexts through which African artefacts circulated during the 20th century.

COLUM TO VOLUME Table of Contents
[Abridged, see below options to download the full TOC, Series Editors' Note and Richard Fardon's Preface.

Preface
1 | Introduction – a formal conundrum
2 | Volumetric statuary – a contemporary inventory
3 | Chamba under colonial regimes
4 | Columnar statuary – a historical inventory
5 | Resumé – columnar and volumetric statuary: form
6 | Chamba statuary in use
7 | Volumetric statuary – the innovator and his emulators
8 | In the African-art-world
9 | Conclusion – from column to volume -- and back?
Tables
Bibliography
Index

About the Authors
Richard Fardon, professor of anthropology in the University of London, teaches West African ethnography and anthropological theory at the School of Oriental and African Studies. He was for eight years Chairman of the University of London’s Centre of African Studies and is currently editor of the journal AFRICA. His forthcoming books include a companion volume to this, concerned with the masquerades of the Chamba and their neighbours, also to be published in the Afriscopes series.

Before attending the University of Leipzig where she received her doctorate, Christine Stelzig studied cultural anthropology and African history in Munich and Paris. She worked as an assistant for ethnographic museums in Munich, Paris and Berlin, and currently is active as an independent curator of African Art exhibitions. Dr Stelzig is the author of journal articles on African art, histories of collection and historical photographs. Her recent book, in German, is entitled Africa in the Berlin Museum of Ethnography 1873-1919. Acquisition, representation and construction of a continent.

Dispute Processes. ADR and the Primary Forms of Decision-Making

This wide-ranging study considers the primary forms of decision-making - negotiation, mediation, and umpiring - in the context of rapidly changing discourses and practices of civil justice across many jurisdictions. Much contemporary discussion in this field, and associated projects of institutional design, are taking place under the wide ranging but imprecise label of Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR). If a common linking theme is sought, the authors argue that this must lie in a general shift of priorities as between judgement and settlement in ideological terms. This new edition brings together and analyses a wide range of materials dealing with dispute processes and the current debates on civil justice. With the help of a selection of texts beyond those ordinarily found in the emerging alternative dispute resolution literature it provides a broad, comparative perspective on modes of handling civil disputes, with the principal focus on the central processes of negotiation and mediation.

Examines Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) from a comparative perspective 

Combines the theory and practice of ADR 

Draws on a wide variety of social science sources

Contents
1. Introduction; 2. Cultures of decision-making: precursors to the emergence of ADR; 3. The debates around civil justice and the movement towards procedural innovation; 4. Disputes and dispute processes; 5. Negotiations; 6. Mediation; 7. Umpiring; 8. Hybrid forms and processual experimentation; 9. The trajectory of alternative dispute resolution.

Intellectual Property Protection and Sustainable Development

This book provides an in-depth analysis of the links between intellectual property rights and sustainable development, two areas of the law have until recently been largely considered in isolation. However, recent developments indicate that there are an increasing number of links between intellectual property protection and sustainable development, which need to be addressed. This book examines some of the issues arising at the international level where a number of important legal instruments have been adopted in recent years. It also examines in detail the process of implementation in India.

This book focuses to a large extent on the patents system and examines in detail issues related to the use of plant genetic resources and biodiversity. It examines some of the impacts of the existing intellectual property rights regime on sustainable development. It also examines some of the challenges linked to the extension of intellectual property rights to new areas such as life patents and plant variety protection. Further, it analyses issues related to the protection of knowledge excluded from the existing intellectual property regime such as traditional knowledge. This book also examines some of the broader issues related to the links between intellectual property and sustainable development. In particular, it analyses the relevance of the concept of differential treatment in intellectual property rights agreements and analyses the links between human rights and intellectual property protection.

Islam, Memory, and Morality in Yemen. Ruling Families in Transition

Islam, Memory, and Morality in Yemen tells a story of a Yemeni hereditary elite which was overthrown in the 1962 revolution in North Yemen. For over a millennium, they had enjoyed exclusive rights to the leadership of the Imamate, the religiously sanctioned state. Following the violent removal from power of King Faysal of Iraq in 1958, the overthrow of the Yemeni Imamate - the longest lasting Hashimite rule in the Middle East - confirmed the decline of Hashimite power (held by ruling generations claiming descent from the Prophet Muhammad). However, rather than concentrating on recent political history, Islam, Memory, and Morality in Yemen highlights the personal predicament of those targeted by the revolution, in which they served as the foil for the new regime's moral and political ascendancy. Focusing on the cultural politics of memory, the book explores how members of the elite remember in the process of making sense of their current lives and formulating responses to adversity.

List of Figures and Illustrations
Acknowledgements
Foreword; F.Halliday
Glossary
Introduction: Locating Memory: The Politics of Incorporation and Differentiation
PART I: FRAMINGS
The House of the Prophet
The Zaydi Elite during the 20th Century Imamate
The Anatomy of Houses
PART II: GROWING TO BE 'ALID
Snapshots of Childhood
Performing Kinship
PART III: SELF-FASHIONING IN THE IDIOM OF TRADITION
The Politics of Motherhood
Marriage in the Age of Revolution
"Ulama of a Different Kind"
The Moral Economy of Taste
PART IV: ENGAGING DIFFERENCE
Defining through Defaming
Memory, Trauma, Self identification
History through the Looking-Glass
Conclusion: Frontiers of Memory
Appendices
Notes
Bibliography
Index

GABRIELE VOM BRUCK lectures in the Anthropology of the Middle East, Department of Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies, University of Edinburgh, UK.

Jewish Slavery in Antiquity

This book is the first comprehensive analysis of Jewish attitudes towards slavery in Hellenistic and Roman times. Against the traditional opinion that after the Babylonian Exile Jews refrained from employing slaves, Catherine Hezser shows that slavery remained a significant phenomenon of ancient Jewish everyday life and generated a discourse which resembled Graeco-Roman and early Christian views while at the same time preserving specifically Jewish nuances. Hezser examines the impact of domestic slavery on the ancient Jewish household and on family relationships. She discusses the perceived advantages of slaves over other types of labor and evaluates their role within the ancient Jewish economy. The ancient Jewish experience of slavery seems to have been so pervasive that slave images also entered theological discourse. Like their Graeco-Roman and Christian counterparts, ancient Jewish intellectuals did not advocate the abolition of slavery, but they used the biblical tradition and their own judgements to ameliorate the status quo.

Kabuki Heroes on the Osaka Stage 1780-1830

Kabuki Heroes celebrates the fanatical devotion surrounding Japanese urban theatre between 1780 and 1830, the intense inter-generational rivalries between actors, poets and artists and the colourful memorabilia, from scrapbooks to hymnbooks, that they gave birth to.

In particular, Kabuki Heroes follows the battle of minds and bodies between Kabuki’s two greatest performers – the ‘masterful’ Rikan and the 'start-up’ Shikan. Bringing together evidence from Britain and Japan, this special exhibition is a vivid reminder that the drama of pop culture runs through the centuries and across the globe.

Supported by the AHRC, ANA, Daiwa Anglo-Japanese Foundation, Japan Foundation and Toshiba International Foundation.

View an online tour about Kabuki theatre in Japan

Kupilikula. Governance and the Invisible Realm in Mozambique

On the Mueda plateau in northern Mozambique, sorcerers are said to feed on their victims, sometimes "making" lions or transforming into lions to literally devour their flesh. When the ruling FRELIMO party subscribed to socialism, it condemned sorcery beliefs and counter-sorcery practices as false consciousness, but since undertaking neoliberal reform, the party—still in power after three electoral cycles—has "tolerated tradition," leaving villagers to interpret and engage with events in the idiom of sorcery. Now, when the lions prowl plateau villages ,suspected sorcerers are often lynched.

In this historical ethnography of sorcery, Harry G. West draws on a decade of fieldwork and combines the perspectives of anthropology and political science to reveal how Muedans expect responsible authorities to monitor the invisible realm of sorcery and to overturn or, as Muedans call it, "kupilikula" sorcerers' destructive attacks by practicing a constructive form of counter-sorcery themselves. Kupilikula argues that, where neoliberal policies have fostered social division rather than security and prosperity, Muedans have, in fact, used sorcery discourse to assess and sometimes overturn reforms, advancing alternative visions of a world transformed.

Living Islam. Muslim Religious Experience in Pakistan's North-West Frontier

Popular representations of Pakistan’s North West Frontier have long featured simplistic images of tribal blood feuds, fanatical religion, and the seclusion of women. The rise to power of the radical Taliban regime in neighbouring Afghanistan enhanced the region's reputation as a place of anti-Western militancy. Magnus Marsden is an anthropologist who has immersed himself in the lives of the Frontier's villagers for more than ten years. His evocative study of the Chitral region challenges all these stereotypes. Through an exploration of the everyday experiences of both men and women, he shows that the life of a good Muslim in Chitral is above all a mindful life, enhanced by the creative force of poetry, dancing and critical debate. Challenging much that has been assumed about the Muslim world, this study makes a powerful contribution to the understanding of religion and politics both within and beyond the Muslim societies of southern Asia.

 A nuanced and penetrating insider-account of life as a Muslim in Pakistan’s troubled North-west Frontier. Challenges popular notion that Muslims in Pakistan are all sympathetic to fundamentalist principles.For anthropologists, students of religion and politics, and all those interested in the lives of real Muslims

Contents
1. Introduction; 2. Rowshan: Chitral village life; 3. Emotions upside-down: affection and Islam; 4. The play of the mind: debating village Muslims; 5. Mahfils and musicians: new Muslims in Markaz; 6. Rowshan's amulet making ulama; 7. To eat or not to eat: Ismai'lis and Sunnis in Rowshan; 8. Conclusion.

Party Politics in Taiwan. Party Change and the Democratic Evolution of Taiwan, 1991-2004

Dafydd Fell examines party change in the Asian third wave democracy of Taiwan during its critical period of democratic consolidation, right up to the Presidential elections held in March 2004.

From the Back Cover:

In 1991 Taiwan held its first fully democratic election. This first single volume of party politics in Taiwan analyzes the evolution of party competition in the country, looking at how Taiwan’s parties have adjusted to their new multi-party election environment. It features key chapters on:

the development of party politics in Taiwan
the impact of party change on social welfare, corruption and national identity
party politics in the DPP era.

Including interviews with high-ranking Taiwanese politicians and material on the 2004 Presidential election, this important work brings the literature up-to-date. It provides a valuable resource for scholars of Chinese and Taiwanese politics and a welcome addition to the field of regime transition and democratization.

Teachings of the Sikh Gurus. Selections from the Sikh Scriptures

Recognized masterpieces of Indian literature, the Guru Granth Sahib and the Dasam Granth are fundamental to the Sikh religion, not only in the physical layout of temples and in ceremonies of worship, but as infallible reference texts offering counsel and instruction.

Teachings of the Sikh Gurus presents a brand new selection of key passages from these sacred scriptures, translated into modern English by leading experts, Christopher Shackle and Arvind-pal Singh Mandair. Including six longer compositions and many shorter hymns thematically organised by topics such as Time and Impermanence, Self and Mind, Authority, and Ethics, the book’s accessible and carefully chosen extracts distil the essence of Sikhism’s remarkable textual and intellectual legacy, depicting how its message of universal tolerance suits the contemporary world. The detailed introduction and notes to the translations aid readers’ comprehension of the hymns’ form and content, as well as providing some historical context, making it an ideal introduction to Sikh literature.

The Court of the Caliphs

From a rebellion planned in a remote desert town to the founding of Baghdad in AD 762, the rule of the Abbasid dynasty was looked back on as the golden era of the Islamic Conquest.
The Caliphs formed the model for succeeding muslim regimes. From military conquests to patronizing poetry, building palaces, and the formal structure of the court - harems, viziers, eunuchs and the tales of the Arabian Nights - the Abbasid caliphate offered a historical ideal for later empires and their rulers to aspire to.
Yet the true story of this fascinating empire has been forgotten outside the academic world. And it deserves to be rescued: it is an epic story in every sense, with larger-than-life rulers, exotic slave girls, inventive tortures, and enough court intrigue to frighten a Borgia.

'This skilful and fascinating history of the regime steers the reader through a contradictory body of evidence: on one hand the professional historian's reticence, on the other, the racy harem stories that accreted to the Abassids...Kennedy guides us through this murky territory with intelligence and wit...This is one of the most rewarding books of history I've read this year.'

SB Kelly

The Dynamics of Language. An Introduction

For the whole of the last half-century, most theoretical syntacticians have assumed that knowledge of language is different from the tasks of speaking and understanding. There have been some dissenters, but, by and large, this view still holds sway.

This book takes a different view: it continues the task set in hand by Kempson et al (2001) of arguing that the common-sense intuition is correct that knowledge of language consists in being able to use it in speaking and understanding. The Dynamics of Language argues that interpretation is built up across as sequence of words relative to some context and that this is all that is needed to explain the structural properties of language. The dynamics of how interpretation is built up is the syntax of a language system. The authors' first task is to convey to a general linguistic audience with a minimum of formal apparatus, the substance of that formal system. Secondly, as linguists, they set themselves the task of applying the formal system to as broad an array of linguistic puzzles as possible, the languages analysed ranging from English to Japanese and Swahili.

"This book makes an uncommon achievement in successfully using detailed analyses of typologically diverse languages to address foundational questions about what it means to know a language and about the relation between speaking and understanding. This book will be of interest to anybody who is serious about the cognitive science of syntax and semantics."

Colin Phillips, University of Maryland, USA

"For anyone interested in the basic nature of natural language syntax, this book is a necessary, and enjoyable, read. The authors provide a new take on how interpretations are constructed by language users,and back up their general theoretical proposals with original analyses of an eclectic range of linguistic phenomena. The exposition
is clear and engaging–and challenging. You will have some of your assumptions shaken up; whether they fall back in place, or are radically rearranged, the experience is stimulating."

Caroline Heycock, University of Edinburgh, UK

The Qur'an. A New Translation

'Haleem knows the text by heart. His intimacy with it shows in the brevity and intuitive intelligence of his solutions.' - Tim Winter, Times Literary Supplement

Description

A major new translation of the supreme authority in Islam, published at a time of intense interest in the Islamic religion and the Muslim world.
The translation is accurate, easy to read and free from the archaisms, incoherence, and alien structures that mar most existing translations. It explains stylistic features peculiar to Arabic, and offers solutions to the difficulties of rendering these into English. Respect for the immediate context and different aspects of meaning produces greater clarity of meaning; dialogue addressed to the Prophet is identified to avoid confusion. Paragraphing and punctuation have been added to assist meaning and sentence structure. The beginning of each verse is marked in small superscript type in order not to interrupt the flow or distract the reader.
The introduction offers a brief history of the revelation and compilation of the Qur'an, its structure and stylistic features, and considers issues of interpretation in relation to militancy, intolerance, and the subjection of women.
Notes explain geographical, historical, and personal allusions and cross-referencing within the Qur'an.
Map.
Index in which Qur'anic material is arranged into topics for easy reference.

'Read! Your Lord is the Most Bountiful one who taught by the pen, who taught man what he did not know.'

The Qur'an, believed by Muslims to be the word of God, was revealed to the Prophet Muhammad 1400 years ago. It is the supreme authority in Islam and the living source of all Islamic teaching; it is a sacred text and a book of guidance, that sets out the creed, rituals, ethics, and laws of the Islamic religion. It has been one of the most influential books in the history of literature. Recognized as the greatest literary masterpiece in Arabic, it has nevertheless remained difficult to understand in its English translations. This new translation is written in a contemporary idiom that remains faithful to the original, making it easy to read while retaining its powers of eloquence. Archaisms and cryptic language are avoided, and the Arabic meaning preserved by respecting the context of the discourse. The message of the Qur'an was directly addressed to all people regardless of class, gender, or age, and this translation is equally accessible to everyone.

Readership: Anyone interested in, or studying, the Qur'an, Islam, Arabic Studies, Comparative Religion, Muslim society and culture, philosophy, cultural studies

Authors, editors, and contributors

Muhammad Abdel Haleem, Professor of Islamic Studies, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London

The Silicon Empire. Law, Culture and Commerce

Michael Likosky examines the continuities and discontinuities between colonial and present-day high tech transnational legal orders. His concern is specifically with the colonial characteristics of the legal order which underpins the global high tech economy. He distinguishes the democratic and human rights rhetoric of this economy from a reality wherein the legal order is often used to reproduce colonial-type relationships. Just as in the colonial period, the expansion of trans-border commerce overlaps with democratic demands and human rights in complex, multifaceted and paradoxical ways. Through a case study looking at Malaysia's Multimedia Super Corridor, a high tech national development plan and foreign direct investment scheme, he examines how the transnational leaders of the high tech economy along with the Malaysian political elite react when human rights problems threaten to derail commercial plans.

About the Author
Dr Michael B. Likosky is at the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London, UK.

Theories of Financial Disturbance. An Examination of Critical Theories of Finance from Adam Smith to the Present Day

Theories of Financial Disturbance, now available in paperback, examines how the operations of market-driven finance may initiate and transmit disturbances to the economy at large, by looking in detail at how various economists envisaged such disturbances occurring.
This book is more than just a study in the history of economic thought - it illustrates how economic debate focuses upon financial disturbance at times of financial instability, and then conveniently discards critical views when such instability recedes. Jan Toporowski looks at the development of critical theories from the views of Adam Smith and François Quesnay, and their reflection in recent new Keynesian ideas of Joseph Stiglitz and Ben Bernanke, through credit cycles in Alfred Marshall and Ralph Hawtrey, to the financial theories of Thorstein Veblen and Irving Fisher. Also studied are the theories of John Kenneth Galbraith, Michal Kalecki, John Maynard Keynes, Charles Kindleberger, Rosa Luxemburg, Hyman P. Minsky, Robert Shiller and Josef Steindl. Not least among the original features of this book are a discussion of Quesnay’s attitude towards interest, and a chapter devoted to the work of the Polish monetary economist Marek Breit, whose work inspired Kalecki.

Jan Toporowski’s fascinating work will find its audience in academics of finance and financial economics, bankers, financiers and policy makers concerned with financial stability as well as anyone looking for arguments on the imperfect functioning of finance.

Review

 "'Financial markets have an aura of disturbing instability. In this history of the thought of earlier economists who have studied the processes of finance, Jan Toporowski takes us on a fascinating journey to explore how they saw the impact of finance on the real economy. Not one for formal models, nor for rational expectations, Jan values historical experience and the insights and experience of earlier great thinkers.' - Charles A.E. Goodhart, CBE, London School of Economics and Political Science, UK 'Jan Toporowski's Theories of Financial Disturbance is a tour de force. With his substantial knowledge of financial markets, his deep conceptual understanding of relevant concepts and his exhaustive reading of the essential literature, he is ideally placed to tell an absorbing narrative of, as he writes, critical theories of finance from Adam Smith to the present days - and he has. In a world in which finance and industrial and commercial capital are so out of kilter with one another, Toporowski's lucid wisdom is required reading.' - G.C. Harcourt, Jesus College, Cambridge, UK" --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Paperback: 195 pages
Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing Ltd (26 April 2006)
Language English
ISBN-10: 1845427637
ISBN-13: 978-1845427634
Product Dimensions: 23 x 15.4 x 1.2 cm

Tongnaab: The History of a West African God

"Until recently, Ghanaian historiography has focused on the Asante and other Akan states, but has neglected the so—called stateless societies. In this well—researched book, Allman (Univ. of Illinois) and Parker (Univ. of London) have undertaken to fill the gap by shedding light on the Talensi of northern Ghana. They examine the spread of an indigenous god, Tongnaab, from its base in the Tong Hills to the south, where it became Nana Tongo in the Gold Coast, and Anatinga in western Nigeria. The authors argue that this cross—cultural ritual exchange must be understood in the context of British colonialism and ! anti—colonial resistance in the increasingly competitive ritual market place of West Africa. The British ordered the destruction of the great fetish and, in 1925, recognized the Yanii bo'ar shrine as the official Tongnaab, thus misunderstanding the complexity of the ritual practice in the Tong Hills, where Tongnaab had multiple sites. Despite the paucity of archival documentation and the problems posed by oral sources, the authors have contributed to the understanding of the structural transformations and social history of some rural communities in northern Ghana under colonial rule. Summing Up: Recommended. Upper—level undergraduates and above. —CHOICE, March 2007" —K. J. Ngalamulume, Bryn Mawr College
For many Africanist historians, traditional religion is simply a starting point for measuring the historic impact of Christianity and Islam. In Tongnaab, Jean Allman and John Parker challenge the distinction between tradition and modernity by tracing the movement and mutation of the powerful Talensi god and ancestor shrine, Tongnaab, from the savanna of northern Ghana through the forests and coastal plains of the south. Using a wide range of written, oral, and iconographic sources, Allman and Parker uncover the historical dynamics of cross-cultural religious belief and practice. They reveal how Tongnaab has been intertwined with many themes and events in West African history—the slave trade, colonial conquest and rule, capitalist agriculture and mining, labor migration, shifting ethnicities, the production of ethnographic knowledge, and the political projects that brought about the modern nation state. This rich and original book shows that indigenous religion has been at the center of dramatic social and economic changes stretching from the slave trade to the tourist trade.

Jean Allman teaches African History and directs the Center for African Studies at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. She is editor of Fashioning Africa: Power and the Politics of Dress (IUP, 2004).

John Parker teaches African History at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. He is author of Making the Town: Ga State and Society in Early Colonial Accra.

Women, Law and Human Rights. An African Perspective

Africa, with its mix of statute, custom and religion is at the centre of the debate about law and its impact on gender relations. The book shows how law disenfranchises women and considers issues of violence, reproductive rights and female genital cutting.

Women, Work and the Japanese Economic Miracle. The Case of the Cotton Textile Industry, 1945-1975

This book shows how, during the period of the Japanese economic miracle, a distinctive female employment system was developed alongside, and different from, the better known Japanese employment system which was applied to male employees. Women, Work and the Japanese Economic Miracle describes and analyses the place of female workers in the cotton textile industry, which was a crucially important industry with a large workforce. In presenting detailed data on such key issues as recruitment systems, management practices and the working experience of the women involved, it demonstrates the importance for Japan's postwar economy of harnessing female labour during these years.

'In placing the current situation of women in employment in its historical context, this book will be valuable to academics, students, to some extent general readers and, dare it be suggested, to Japanese companies and policy makers alike.' - Asian Affairs

'This volume... is a fascinating account of this well-known period in Japan's history. I would recommend it to anyone interested in the evolution of women and work, women's employment conditions, managerial strategies and the role of unions and the shap and form these take in a feminized industry' - International Review of Social History