Popular music in Chinese languages both reflects and influences how its audiences perceive themselves and their position in the world around them. This book analyses the role of popular music in... Show morePopular music in Chinese languages both reflects and influences how its audiences perceive themselves and their position in the world around them. This book analyses the role of popular music in identity formation through detailed comparisons of the pop star Faye Wong, the rock band Second Hand Rose and the electrofolk artist Xiao He, in five thematic chapters. Chapter 1, Place, follows the history of popular music through Shanghai, Hong Kong, Taipei and Beijing, concluding that language is defining. Chapter 2, Genre and Classification, argues that genre distinctions, and by extension class identities, are secondary to affiliations along region, gender, generation and marketability. The psycho-analytical approach of chapter 3, Sex, Gender, and Desire, explores how popular music reiterate and challenge stereotypes surrounding the passive beauty, coolness and brotherhood. Chapter 4, Theatricality, argues that theatrical performances negotiate the boundary between stage world and ordinary reality through make-believe and reflectiveness. Finally, chapter 5, Organizing Music, submits that music happens through reproduction, variation and selection, and in constant interaction with ecologies and collectives. In the end, this book itself strives to make these sounds, images and texts available for the incessant, piecemeal work of worldmaking. Show less
Alexandria, the capital of Egypt during the Hellenistic and Roman periods is often hailed as the ancient cosmopolitan center of Mediterranean par excellence. Since the foundation of the city by... Show moreAlexandria, the capital of Egypt during the Hellenistic and Roman periods is often hailed as the ancient cosmopolitan center of Mediterranean par excellence. Since the foundation of the city by Alexander the Great in 331 BC, several traditions- along with their representatives, mainly Greek and Egyptian- coexisted and interacted with each other, resulting in a multiculturalism in Alexandrian society. However, in the past scholarship, the Greek cultural aspect of the city has been extensively discussed, while the Egyptian part has never been fully overviewed and interpreted. Such interpretations caused in a large extent, from the one side, a deformed picture of the Alexandria’s Greek-ness, almost equal to this of a Greek “colony” separated from Egypt –Alexandria ad Aegyptum- and from the other side a blur picture about the role of the Egyptian tradition in the Greco-Egyptian interaction and the life of Alexandrian society. However, over the last decade an alternative framework of understanding has been developed in several case studies, while discoveries from the underwater missions indicate that the city had much more Egyptian characteristics than hitherto believed. Therefore, the thesis aims to provide an overview and interpretation of the Egyptian elements and influences in Alexandria, focusing on issues of ideology, culture, identity and public life. In this way, it has been attempted to offer a better understanding of the multicultural life of Alexandria in the Hellenistic and Roman periods. Show less
