bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Instructing Women’s Voices in Conduct Literature
Authors: Kennerley David
Published: June 2020

This chapter explores the guidance regarding the use of the female voice that was a common feature of conduct literature in circulation in Britain between 1780 and 1850. Such works place a heavy emphasis on the restraint of the female voice, seeing it as an aural sign of a young woman’s modesty, diffidence, and chastity. Concomitantly, they characterised the technique, power, and skill displayed by many contemporary female singers’ voices (especially, but not exclusively, the professional singers of Italian opera) as signs of moral corruption and/or the neglect of feminine domestic and religious duties. However, this chapter stresses that this conduct literature was primarily written for a middle-class, evangelical readership. Consequently, it represents a particular perspective on the female voice, one that was certainly gathering steam in these years, but which was by no means universally dominant.
Epilogue
Authors: Kennerley David
Published: June 2020

The book concludes with an account of Clara Novello’s performance at the opening of the Crystal Palace at its new site at Sydenham in June 1854. A major media event, the opening ceremony climaxed with Novello singing the national anthem to great acclaim both from the listening crowds and from the national press, who praised the power, technical skill, and emotionally expressive force of her rendition. This moment, when the voice of the British female artist seemed so central to the national consciousness, forms a point from which to review the book’s major themes. Ultimately it concludes that, although there were powerful forces at work seeking to constrict women’s voices, in this period and far beyond, Novello’s performance signals the emergence by mid-century of a new, more empowering way of voicing femininity that began, gradually, to contest the most fundamental assumptions of modern patriarchy.
The Religious Secession
Authors: Roy Olivier
Published: June 2020

This chapter assesses the issuance of the encyclical Humanæ vitæ in July of 1968, which imposed on Catholics a stringent code of sexual morality in line with Pius XI's 1930 encyclical Casti connubii, or ‘chastity in marriage’. In particular, Humanæ vitæ rejected all forms of artificial contraception. Many Christians were expecting the Church to adapt to the tide of sexual liberation, but instead, just when birth control pills appeared on the European market, hence proposing an alternative to abortion, the pope issued an encyclical taking a stance against the changing mores. Sexual morality came to be the newest battlefront between religion and Europe's dominant culture, and became central to the way of life promoted by the Church. What once bridged the gap between believers and nonbelievers, namely a shared base of secularized Christian values, had faded or disappeared. This raises some serious questions: If the Church no longer recognizes the dominant culture in Europe today as Christian, who would take the liberty of claiming that Europe's identity is Christian? And how could this Christian identity be reclaimed without a battle for Europe's morals, which would be directed less against Islam than against European society itself? Not only does this change the position of the Catholic Church but it also alters the very meaning of what it is to be a believer in Europe.
Identity and Values
Authors: Roy Olivier
Published: June 2020

This chapter explores the ‘culture wars’ both in Europe and in the United States. In Europe, ‘values’ have probably never before been mentioned so frequently in discourse and political debates as they have since the 2000s. This trend actually dates to the American ‘culture wars’, which have been going on since the 1970s. The expression ‘culture wars’ denotes the war on values within American society, a war pitting liberal culture, which stands against discrimination and in favour of abortion rights, gun control, and some form of social security, against a ‘Christian right’ led by evangelical Protestants in the southern United States, whose core political issues are the fight against abortion and same-sex marriage, and who oppose gun control, universal health care, immigration, and affirmative action. Things are more complex in Europe because the two fronts do not coincide. In the debate on values, the internal front pits Christian conservatives against secularists of all persuasions, liberals and populists alike; the main issues revolve around abortion and same-sex marriage. The external front, on the other hand, puts the idea of ‘Europe’ in opposition to Islam: the issue is concerned with the cultural antagonism between Muslim immigrants and Europeans and with European societies' fear of becoming ‘Islamized’.
The Trump Doctrine
Authors: Neumann Peter R.
Published: June 2020

This chapter outlines Trump's counter-terrorism doctrine. It shows that Trump's approach is anchored in various strands of populism, nationalism, and the so-called Alternative Right. It represents a radical break with recent US approaches towards countering terrorism, especially of the Obama and Bush administrations. Trump is not interested in addressing underlying conditions, causes or conflicts, and believes that commitments in foreign countries are rarely helpful or necessary. He also thinks that terrorism is linked to immigration and that Islam is alien to America. In Trump's mind the solution to terrorism is self-evident: terrorist need to be killed, and Muslims kept out of the country.
Homeland
Authors: Neumann Peter R.
Published: June 2020

This chapter covers Trump's domestic approach towards counterterrorism. It shows that Trump's attitude towards right-wing extremism is one of the most disturbing aspects of his War on Terror. Although substantive changes to domestic counterterrorism laws and policies have been relatively minor, Trump has radically transformed the political environment in which homegrown radicalization and terrorism have played out. Contrary to previous administrations, Trump has actively promoted far-right narratives, making it clear that he considers the enemy to be "radical Islam" rather than terrorism per se. In doing so, the chapter argued that he has empowered the extreme Right and "enabled" a rising number of hate crimes and terrorist attacks, while undermining the trust of Muslim communities. He has deepened divisions, further polarization, and created the fertile ground in which domestic terrorism has been able to thrive.
Introduction
Authors: Decker Gregory J. , Shaftel Matthew R.
Published: June 2020

In the introduction to the volume, the editors assess the need for the collection and situate it within the current state of research in opera studies, especially focusing on the past 30 years, since the publication of Carolyn Abbate and Roger Parker’s Analyzing Opera: Verdi and Wagner (University of California Press). Although a number of books and individual articles that heed Abbate and Parker’s call to examine the music of opera within the context of its other constituent elements (e.g., plot, characterization, setting, performance) have appeared in the intervening time, the volume is the first contemporary English-language effort since that time to demonstrate this approach to analysis in action across an array of repertoire. The introduction also includes an overview of the chapters and their arrangement by authors’ semiotic focus: composer-created and work-specific structures, cultural and social codes, and narrative. Finally, the editors comment upon the broader themes that emerge from these essays.
The Romanesca as a Spiritual Sign in the Operas of Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven
Authors: Sánchez-Kisielewska Olga
Published: June 2020

This chapter explores the role of a musical pattern, the Romanesca schema, as a signifier of spiritual meanings in opera. It addresses the relationship between the Romanesca and the hymn topic and argues that the schema, semantically empty in its origins, acquired in the late eighteenth century connotations of ceremony, solemnity, alterity, and even transcendence. Several vignettes from operas by Haydn and Mozart illustrate how composers deployed the pattern in scenes depicting worship, prayers, and ritual actions. Beethoven’s Fidelio occupies the final section, a case study that shows the Romanesca interacting with other elements of the musical structure for expressive purposes. The chapter provides a novel interpretation of certain moments of the opera, suggesting that Beethoven relied on the sacred implications of the Romanesca—arguably available to historical listeners—to intensify the spiritual dimension of the drama.
Verdi’s Dramatic Use of Tonality, Topics, and Recurring Themes
Authors: Easley David B.
Published: June 2020

This chapter examines recurring musical themes, tonality, and musical topics in Verdi’s La traviata (1853) and Don Carlos (1867). It argues that both operas draw upon cultural codes to establish oppositions that propel their dramatic and musical narratives. In Don Carlos, the dramatic opposition of reality versus ideality unfolds within Elisabeth’s aria at the beginning of the final act. This is supplemented and reinforced with recurring themes that, while work-specific, gain much of their meaning as conventionalized musical topics. In La traviata, the dramatic opposition of love versus death unfolds as a foreground musical opposition contained within a single recurring theme, but also as a larger-scale tonal opposition that arises between the first and last acts of the opera. The goal of this chapter is to demonstrate the applicability of contextually based analytical models to Verdi’s operas, while also providing further evidence in support of his compositional and dramatic techniques.
Unity and Discontinuity in the Act 2 Finale of Le nozze di Figaro
Authors: Shaftel Matthew R.
Published: June 2020

The act 2 finale of Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro has been the subject of intense categorization and analysis for over a century. Often, these analyses attempt to explain this portion of the opera such that coherent musical structure and drama spring forth from an organic unity. But these analyses overlook the inherent discontinuities in the finale that drive the plot forward and necessitate the following two acts. This chapter explores the analytical history of the finale and offers an alternative view to its structure that prioritizes semiotic relationships among musical structure, topic, character, and plot. The questions raised here have implications for the goals of opera analysis more broadly.
Postmodern Opera 101
Authors: Chattah Juan
Published: June 2020

Reacting against traditional narrative strategies while engaging the dialectics embedded in both irony and nostalgia, postmodern aesthetics transform and subvert conventional models, transgressing the ideology behind musical conventions and appealing to a reconfiguration of normative conceptions. In this chapter, the author’s reading of Dennis Kam’s Opera 101 examines how the bifurcating narrative trajectories of the music and the libretto articulate a postmodern metanarrative that invite ironic and nostalgic interpretations. Within this work, nostalgia is anchored on intertextual references of firmly established operatic gestures, while irony is grounded in the dialectics of bifurcating narratives and supported by localized, surface-level indexical tropes. This chapter thus underscores that the postmodernist impulse in opera may be revealed by deploying analytical frameworks liberated from the traditional understanding of “narrative” and its associated normative aesthetics.
Neuropsychological Contributions to the Diagnosis of Mild Cognitive Impairment Associated With Alzheimer’s Disease
Authors: Eppig Joel , Werhane Madeleine , Edmonds Emily C. , Wood Lisa-Delano , Bangen Katherine J. , Jak Amy , Thomas Kelsey R. , Wong Christina , Weigand Alexandra , Bondi Mark W.
Published: June 2020

Mild cognitive impairment (MCI) has long been conceptualized as a transitional stage between normal aging and Alzheimer’s disease (AD) and other dementia subtypes, thus providing a potential window for early intervention in at-risk older adults. Nonetheless, effective intervention requires accurate identification of prodromal dementia, and the criteria for MCI have undergone significant evolution over the last 30 years to improve diagnostic sensitivity and specificity. There is increasing recognition of heterogeneous neuropsychological presentations in MCI. When traditional diagnostic criteria for the diagnosis of MCI have been applied a body of research employing statistical algorithms consistently demonstrated the existences of 3 to 4 unique MCI subtypes. Importantly, one subgroup that has emerged across studies involves a sizeable minority of participants that are cognitively normal on comprehensive neuropsychological assessment. These false-positives have highlighted the susceptibility of traditional Petersen/Winblad MCI criteria to diagnostic errors and demonstrated the need for developing of neuropsychological paradigms for MCI classification, and a new set of comprehensive MCI criteria using actuarial methods has been proposed. Accumulating evidence indicates that these comprehensive criteria pose an advantage over conventional criteria in the accurate identification of prodromal dementia and capture the neuropsychological and biological heterogeneity of MCI. Future research should expand on early work examining the association between empirical MCI subtypes and biological, neuroimaging, and genetic markers of AD.
Poincaré and the Prehistory of Mathematical Structuralism
Authors: Folina Janet
Published: June 2020

The view that mathematics is about abstract structure is quite deeply rooted in mathematical practice, with further philosophical views about the nature of structures emerging more recently. This essay argues, first, that Poincaré’s views about structure are properly philosophical, since they go beyond basic claims about the general subject matter of mathematics. Second, it proposes that these further views align Poincaré with a strong version of structuralism—one typically associated with realism. This raises a question since he is a constructivist about mathematics, supporting a broadly Kantian conception of mathematical knowledge and existence. There is thus an apparent tension in Poincaré’s philosophy of mathematics, and a third goal is to resolve this tension.
Origins of Gravitational Waves and Detectors
Authors: Moffat John W.
Published: June 2020

Civita criticized Einstein’s papers on gravitational waves: their energy momentum is frame dependent and therefore does not fit the covariance of Einstein’s gravity theory. Infeld and Rosen did not believe gravitational waves existed, and Einstein changed his mind on their existence repeatedly. Others did believe in them, such as Fock and Feynman. Weber constructed his “Weber bar” to detect gravitational waves, but when he claimed success, he was criticized. He then proposed using a Michelson-Morley type of interferometer with lasers to detect gravitational waves, as did Weiss. Merging black holes and neutron stars were proposed as detectable sources of gravitational waves. Taylor and Hulse, using the large Arecibo radio telescope, indirectly detected gravitational waves from inspiraling neutron stars. Primordial gravitational waves, still emanating from the Big Bang, were claimed to have been detected by BICEP2, but the waves were eventually shown to be a result of foreground dust.
Diversity and Ethnic Conflicts
Authors: Weissmark Mona Sue
Published: June 2020

This chapter evaluates the cultural, psychological, and moral issues surrounding revenge, justice, and forgiveness. Revenge is conceptualized as symbolic behavior showing wrongdoers that insults will be met with reprisal. Viewed through Fritz Heider’s lens, revenge is also an effort to change the underlying belief-attitude of the wrongdoer, often through aggressive retribution predicated on indignation and sometimes hatred. The legal system has sought to efficiently preempt, neutralize, and dilute these emotions by permitting victims a measure of legitimate revenge under the aegis of public order. However, as ethnic conflicts show, the legal system cannot abolish the zeal for revenge. In ethnic strife, each side perceives itself as the legitimate victim, removing claims for justice out of the realm of right or wrong and framing them mainly as issues of ethnic identification. A case in point is the author’s 1992–1993 study of the children of Nazis and the children of Holocaust survivors. The conference findings showed that the views and feelings the participants inherited from their parents created a barrier to establishing equal moral relations. One potential antidote to this conundrum resides in Immanuel Kant’s mandate: sapere aude, dare to know. One specific method for persuading individuals to pursue this mandate and eliminate belief perseverance is through an exercise in hypothetical reasoning, which trains people to live with ambiguity and multiple truths, and to develop flexibility in their belief systems. Ultimately, however, the finest balm for suffering and injustice is compassion.
Concluding Remarks
Authors: Weissmark Mona Sue
Published: June 2020

This concluding chapter highlights how diversity is a central feature of all social systems. Differences exist whether one is discussing individuals, groups, or nations. The chapter then looks at several statements by the United Nations Educational, Science and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) regarding human differences that proved to be controversial. The final UNESCO document declares that all peoples of the world possess equal faculties and any differences are due to historical, political, economic, social, and cultural factors, not biological factors. It also stresses that the solution to the problems between different races of people rests on the shoulders of the individual. The individual is responsible for creating a culture of peace, respect, and tolerance. Education, according to UNESCO, can transform minds and lives, and drives the development of an individual. Indeed, people’s ability to learn from mistakes confirms that human beings possess the flexibility required for development. The flexibility to change is important because environments can change and unexpected outcomes can occur. The chapter then looks at two types of education that are needed for the study of the science of diversity: the “banking method” of education and “problem-solving” education.
The Ammonites
Authors: Doak Brian R.
Published: June 2020

Cast as the incestuous ancestors of Lot and his daughters in Genesis 19, the Ammonites figure in moments of gritty intrigue at many points in the biblical narratives. Unlike some other groups whose identity the Bible presents in terms of “familial” relationship with Israel, the Ammonites appear only as political and religious enemies. The Ammonites occupied a small and delimited territory, and the pinnacle of their existence as “Ammonites” by name seems to have occurred between the eighth and sixth centuries bce. Excavation at some key sites of Ammonite occupation gives us more data than might be expected on Ammonite language, religion, and culture. Scholars debate the extent to which the Ammonites of the Bible correspond to real historical figures, and the biblical portrayal of Ammonite religion in a negative manner raises questions about the way assumptions about religion in the region have been colored by the biblical narrators.
Conclusion
Authors: Doak Brian R.
Published: June 2020

Ultimately, those who study the past are thrown back upon the problem of history, memory, and interpretation raised in the first chapter of this book: Are interpreters bound to see Israel’s neighbors as Israel saw them—filtered through the Hebrew Bible—or should they use the Bible as but one (flawed) source among many others available to reconstruct the reality of these other nations “as they really were,” giving them their rightful place in history as independent entities who wanted the same things ancient Israelites wanted (safety, autonomy, success, fertility, etc.)? Has the Bible been more of a hindrance than a help for reconstructing the region’s history? Or does the Bible show readers what they truly need to see on some other level, transcending history, in the realms of religion or spirituality? Whatever the case, readers should exercise caution in the face of making simplistic judgments about complex issues of the history, archaeology, language, and geography of the neighbors covered in this book, as well as Israel. There is so much that we do not know—so much left to learn.
To Set to Work Even with a Broken Heart
Authors: Jolaosho Omotayo
Published: June 2020

Part I investigates the tensions inherent to projects designed to demonstrate. “Demonstrate” has three apparently separate meanings: to present evidence, to explicate a process or task, or to participate in public protest. In fact, each of these definitions is a distinct facet of the task of “showing” or “calling attention” to an issue or act. The term “demonstrate” itself demonstrates the persistent and inescapable interweaving of these diverse objectives. In every case, demonstrations are representational, in that they aim to reveal particular truths through evidence; they are pedagogical, in that they aim to transmit knowledge and procedures; and they are revolutionary, in that they aspire to transform individual acts and social relations. The prioritization, negotiation, and synthesis of these three objectives inherently generate aesthetic and political complications that emerge in the chapters in this section.
Combat at Sea
Authors: Plank Geoffrey
Published: June 2020

Chapter 3 examines combat at sea. Boarding a ship on open water was difficult, and so naval planners and officers experimented to find other means of combat. They developed a variety of incendiary weapons and introduced battle lines and signaling devices to coordinate artillery fire. Beginning in the early sixteenth century, after guns were mounted on the decks of sailing ships, ship captains strove to evade hostile fire and direct the destruction of opposing vessels from a distance. Boarding declined in the sixteenth century, but seamen continued to fight on deck to defend their ships because ships under sail could still be seized from the inside by people already on board, including crew members, captives, and guests. Throughout the early modern era, piracy, mutinies, and insurrections on slaving vessels continued to challenge the authority and interests of ship captains and the evolving norms of naval combat.
Ocean-Spanning Wars, 1688–1776
Authors: Plank Geoffrey
Published: June 2020

Chapter 10 examines the pattern of transatlantic warfare that overtook much of the Atlantic world between 1688 and 1776. During these years the scale, extent, and duration of conflicts grew, and a repetitious sequence of imperial wars fostered a sense within many communities that war and peace were experiences shared on both sides of the ocean, binding people together across great distances, bridging economic, religious, and cultural divides. The Atlantic became a single political arena, with distinct eras defined by the rhythm of warfare. Eventually a desire to break free from the cycle of imperial struggle animated reformers and revolutionaries on nearly every shore of the Atlantic.
Revolution
Authors: Plank Geoffrey
Published: June 2020

Chapter 11 traces the common origins and consequences of revolutions in various regions of the Atlantic world. In Europe and much of the Americas, a new military ethic developed, promoting patriotic and loyal service and condemning mercenaries and foreign interventionists. Campaigners against the transatlantic slave trade sought to dissociate Europeans and Americans from African violence. In the Americas, revolutionary conflict fuelled racial and communal animosity. Revolutionaries and counterrevolutionaries sensed their own moral superiority and showed contempt for their opponents. Anger, fear, and the desire for vengeance fed on each other, in some places leading to genocidal violence. In the early nineteenth century the United States condemned British aid to indigenous American warriors and expressed general opposition to European military intervention in the newly independent American republics. National and imperial policies adopted in the revolutionary era broke the early modern pattern of transatlantic war.
Conclusion
Authors: Plank Geoffrey
Published: June 2020

The conclusion contrasts Atlantic warfare in the early modern era with the pattern that developed over the course of the nineteenth century. In the nineteenth century Europeans and their descendants continued to dominate the ocean and, in the Americas, they increasingly achieved supremacy on land. Improved transportation, mass migration from Europe, and economic growth facilitated this change, along with a tacit agreement among national states and empires that they would not ally themselves with indigenous peoples, slaves, or maroons outside their own internationally recognized territorial boundaries. Africans relied on European firearms and became vulnerable when weapon technologies changed in the second half of the century. The violence of the early modern era laid the foundations for the racial hierarchy that was erected in the nineteenth century, but in the earlier period warfare had not divided the peoples of the Atlantic world so simply.
Introduction
Authors: Moore Michael S.
Published: June 2020

This introductory chapter lays out the dramatic challenge neuroscience is taken to issue to our sense of who and what we are and to our responsibility for our choices and for our actions. Neuroscience is seen as the newest of a series of challenges issued to the criminal law, retributivist punishment, moral blameworthiness, and the common-sense psychology all of these presuppose. Backed by a better science of the human brain, neuroscience reissues the challenges to responsibility that have long been issued by academic psychology, be that psychology introspectionist, Freudian, behaviorist, genetic, or whatever.
Human Actions at the Root of Moral Wrongdoing and Criminal Law’s Actus Reus
Authors: Moore Michael S.
Published: June 2020

The basic condition of responsibility is that one acts (or in some cases, chooses not to act). The criminal law embeds this moral requirement for responsibility in its doctrines of actus reus. The acts that are necessary for responsibility all have the common feature that the actor have willed his bodily movements by virtue of which that actor attains his ends in acting, and that that willing caused his bodily movements willed. This is a version of what is known as the causal theory of action. It seemingly requires something that neuroscience is taken to deny, namely, that one’s choices cause the acts chosen to be done, and that such choices are not epiphenomenal with those actions.
Intention and Belief at the Root of Moral Culpability and Legal Mens Rea
Authors: Moore Michael S.
Published: June 2020

In addition to action, responsibility in morality and in the criminal law requires that a certain mental state accompany that action. In criminal law this is termed the requirement of mens rea, or “guilty mind.” The mens rea requirements of the criminal law and of morality are built entirely out of the concepts of intention and belief. These concepts are charted in some detail, both with respect to their nature and with respect to the content they must have to give an accused a “guilty mind.” The demands made on psychology by such use of intention and belief in the criminal law are also charted, particularly demands on the precision with which the brain sciences can ascertain the content of such mental states.
The Initiation of the Epiphenomenal Challenge in the Work of Benjamin Libet
Authors: Moore Michael S.
Published: June 2020

The claim that our deeds are merely epiphenomenal with our choices (rather than being the causal effects of those choices) did not originate with neuroscience. But neuroscience’s claim to have shown experimentally that such epiphenomenalism is true is original with neuroscience. The leading experiments here were done by the late Benjamin Libet, and the chapter offers various interpretations of Libet’s experimental work. Under one interpretation, Libet is said to have demonstrated experimentally the falsity of the thesis that human beings have free will. Under another interpretation, Libet’s findings are construed to be, not that choice is uncaused (“free”), but that choice does no causing of the acts that are chosen. Under yet another interpretation of Libet’s findings, what he is taken to establish is that it is consciousness of choosing that is epiphenomenal with the acts chosen, not choice itself. Reasons are given to reject either the truth of these claims or the relevance of such claims to responsibility.
Where Ideas Go to Die
Authors: McDevitt Michael
Published: June 2020

Where Ideas Go to Die explores the troubled relationship of US journalism and intellect. A defender of common sense, the press is irked at intellect yet often dependent on its critical autonomy. A postwar observation from Richard Hofstadter applies to contemporary journalists: “Men do not rise in the morning, grin at themselves in their mirrors, and say: ‘Ah, today I shall torment an intellectual and strangle an idea!’ ” The book nevertheless documents the prowess of news media in policing intellect. Control extends beyond suppression of ideas and ways of thinking to the aggressive rendering of dissent into deviance. The social control of intellect by journalism is accompanied by social control of journalism in newsrooms and in classrooms where norms are cultivated. Anti-intellectualism consequently operates like dark matter in media, a presence inferred by its effects rather than directly observed or acknowledged. When journalists anticipate a punitive public, the reified resentment is no more real than the fiction of omnipotent citizens in democratic theory, yet the audience imagined compels how intellect is rendered in the news as nuisance, deviance, or object of ridicule. Journalism’s contribution to the social control of ideas is poignantly democratic: audiences are cast in consequential roles that affirm their wisdom in a closed, self-referential system. The book concludes with a discussion about what intellectual journalism would look like. Interviews with 25 “dangerous professors” demonstrate how alliances in the academic-media nexus can seed intellect in newswork.
The Academic-Media Nexus
Authors: McDevitt Michael
Published: June 2020

The academic-media nexus represents a liminal space where intellectual work is regularly held up to public judgment. Three sources of control impinge on the nexus as a sphere for ideas that challenge orthodoxies: self-imposed instrumentalism of intellectuals; a new form of anti-intellectualism that features systemic surveillance of academic discourse; and the strategic communication of university administrations. The contemporary university is instrumental and strategic rather than anti-rationalist in the control of intellect. Still, mistrust of intellect thrives at private and public colleges, entrusted with preservation of cultural heritage. When faculty take risks in the public sphere, they should not assume that administrators will support them against populist blowback. A final section contemplates implications of risk-averse tactics for public perceptions of intellect and its contributions to political discourse and policy.
Policing Intellectual Transgressions
Authors: McDevitt Michael
Published: June 2020

Chapter 5 explicates how resentment and suspicion of intellect is condoned in the news. Feeling toward intellect is only consequential to the extent that it finds a voice, a rationale, and a medium for mobilization. Antipathy toward intellect embedded in the news explains how this sentiment is mobilized and aligned through the news in configurations such as moral panic, social drama, and reification of a punitive public. The news provides the grounding from which resentment and suspicion outside journalism gain traction in redress of ideational transgressions. A cyclical dynamic emerges in phases of latency and activation. The chapter proposes a recursive regime to account for journalism’s role in the activation of antipathy; alignment of anti-rationalism with populist anti-elitism in symbolic action; and return to equilibrium. Long after news media respond to an intellectual breach, residual resentment is left behind, awaiting reactivation when the climate is ripe.
The Classroom Environment
Authors: Snodgrass Jennifer
Published: June 2020

The classroom environment is more than just the way the desks are arranged and includes the conditions and circumstances that we bring, both as students and as educators. The effective classroom environment is a safe space that welcomes discussion, curiosity, dialogue, and discovery. The effective classroom is also not the setting for a power struggle between instructor and students as learning is shared in the positive classroom space. Several key elements help to create this safe environment, including respect and rapport, discussion and effective questioning, effective and meaningful collaboration, and appropriate technology. The effective classroom environment is established as soon as the first day of class, and how an instructor handles the first day is crucial for setting up a positive classroom experience.
Teaching Theory on the High School Level
Authors: Snodgrass Jennifer
Published: June 2020

Only 90 days separate a high school senior from a college freshman sitting in an 8:00 a.m. music theory course. However, in most cases, there is very little interaction between high school teachers and college-level music theory and aural skills instructors. High school music teachers are reaching hundreds of students each day in ensembles and classes and may be one of the greatest resources in better understanding freshmen music majors. These outstanding high school teachers are also extremely effective educators who place emphasis on material that goes well beyond music making and performance, instead focusing on literacy and listening and teaching to the masses. There is much to be learned from their time management skills, emphasis on aural skills and listening, methods of assessment, and integration of ensemble literature that can immediately be transferred to the undergraduate music core.
Pedagogy of Fundamentals and Diatonic Harmony
Authors: Snodgrass Jennifer
Published: June 2020

The earliest levels of the undergraduate music theory core might be some of the more challenging courses to teach. Because students enter the undergraduate theory core with a variety of backgrounds, experiences, and knowledge, instructors face the challenge of inspiring some students with new material while keeping the more experienced students involved. How can educators make this material both relevant and engaging for all students? Teaching the lower levels of written theory is more than just memorization of patterns and rules; it is an opportunity to engage students in creative music making from the very first day with an introduction that helps them understand why a certain element of music works. By participating in engaging and creative methods of learning scales, key signatures, intervals, triads, harmonic function, and voice leading, students are immersed in a music experience that is more than just printed notes on the page.
Pedagogy of Aural Skills
Authors: Snodgrass Jennifer
Published: June 2020

There is no academic class where the students and faculty can participate in an active musical experience like the traditional aural skills course. There is a new trend in aural skills pedagogy in that effective teachers are moving away from the focus on just sight singing and dictation to a focus on musical literacy. Topics such as improvisation and error detection are now being taught in the traditional aural skills core, and students are asked to engage with music through contextual listening and creative music making. Traditional methods of solmization and rhythmic reading are still considered to be effective in the aural skills classroom; however, instructors are using these systems in new ways, along with audiation, to create a musical experience that encourages sound before sight.
Expanding the Canvas
Authors: Friedwald Will
Published: June 2020

Throughout his career Nat Cole was always eager to try new things; even when he had perfected the King Cole Trio into one of the greatest jazz ensembles of all time, he was never content to let anything become formulaic. He got an indication of where his future would lie with his enormous unprecedented success with two new ballads, “For Sentimental Reasons” and “The Christmas Song.” He also made his formal concert hall debut at this time, in theaters and also classical music venues, including Carnegie Hall. By the end of 1947, changes in both his professional and personal lives meant that his first wife, Nadine Robinson, and his musical partner, Oscar Moore, were out of his life.
The Ends of the Earth
Authors: Friedwald Will
Published: June 2020

The 1960s began well. In 1961, Cole’s wife Maria gave birth to twin girls, and Cole sang at the Inaugural Gala for President John F. Kennedy (who later in the year made a surprise appearance at the debutante ball for Nat and Maria’s oldest child, Carole). Nat started the decade with his first concert album, Live at the Sands, and his most ambitious concept album, Wild Is Love, followed by an hour-long special for Canadian TV. In the early 1960s, he also recorded some of his most breathtakingly beautiful albums with a new collaborator, the young Ralph Carmichael, who joined him on The Magic of Christmas, the beautiful Touch of Your Lips, and Nat King Cole Sings/George Shearing Plays, which amounted to a three-way collaboration with the great British pianist, Carmichael, and Cole.
Requiem for a King
Authors: Friedwald Will
Published: June 2020

In 1962, Cole recorded the blockbuster hit “Ramblin’ Rose” and three full-length albums as well as his successful “singalong” album, Those Lazy-Hazy-Crazy Days of Summer. However, there was also trouble. His new management led him into a disastrous deal that was financially devastating, and his intimate relationship with a young singer in his touring backup group threatened his marriage. Artistically, he recorded two well-received albums, Where Did Everyone Go? and Nat King Cole Sings My Fair Lady. By summer 1964, Nat knew he was sick; he made his final film appearance, in Cat Ballou; completed his last album, L-O-V-E; and fulfilled an important engagement in San Francisco. In December, he received his diagnosis and checked into St. John’s Hospital in Los Angeles.
Nothing Is Forever
Authors: Bommarito Nicolas
Published: June 2020

This chapter describes how Buddhists often talk about impermanence, an idea that covers a range of meanings. They all, however, highlight aspects of reality that an individual must face in order to solve the problem at hand. The composite nature of things entails some harsh truths: Things that are put together eventually come apart. When something is made up of pieces, it is only a matter of time before those pieces go their own way. Part of understanding the composite nature of things means seeing their fragility, their temporary nature. A particularly stark reminder of impermanence is death. Contact with death often prompts revaluation; being reminded that one's time is limited can make one rethink how an individual is spending it. Indeed, impermanence means that death is inevitable. Thus, many Buddhist texts warn against thinking of this life, this body, and this world as a home. It is not just that things will end eventually, someday. Even when they seem to remain, they are in a constant state of flux. One way to understand this type of impermanence is to think about what it means for something to persist through time, to continue, to endure.
Living Selflessly
Authors: Bommarito Nicolas
Published: June 2020

This chapter details how the two truths and emptiness hold the key to living a more compassionate and engaged life. First, it is worth reflecting on the importance of conventions: Conventional truths are still truths and are relevantly different from conventionally false things. Realizing emptiness does not preclude genuine interaction with others on a conventional level. More important, internalizing the emptiness of all things brings with it an important ethical shift. It helps an individual to break out of the confines that the idea of a self imposes, allowing that individual to live a life that is less isolated and more compassionate. This ethical shift is central to a very important concept in many forms of Buddhism: the bodhisattva. This term is used to characterize a particular selfless ideal. The bodhisattva becomes someone who works toward helping others better see reality and live in accordance with it. They aim to solve the problem not just for themselves, but for all beings.
Solitude and Meditation
Authors: Bommarito Nicolas
Published: June 2020

This chapter describes the role of solitude and meditation in Buddhism. Solitude does play an important role in many Buddhist practices. The problem one is out to solve is very difficult and the intellectual, perceptual, and emotional habits that stand in the way are deep-seated. This means that attacking the problem requires focused time and energy. Establishing some distance from the diversions and pace of life allows the space to confront the problem in a sustained way. Many practices involve not only sustained focus, but also a greater degree of perceptual sensitivity to what is happening in the body and mind. It is not just being away from distractions that helps, but being away from the demands of the social world. Buddhists, particularly those who specialize in meditative practices, can take retreats that last for years. For those just starting out, such long periods of solitude can be dangerous. There is a reason that solitary confinement can be traumatic: Being suddenly alone for long stretches without preparation is psychologically risky.
Mindfulness of Breathing
Authors: Bommarito Nicolas
Published: June 2020

This chapter explores mindfulness. As a Buddhist technique, mindfulness involves sustained attention to particular things in special ways in order to change how an individual experiences the world. The Buddhist concept of mindfulness includes not just attention, but also what we would call memory. To represent this connection with memory, many scholars use the term “retention” instead. This captures the idea of not only fixing attention on something but also keeping it there. There is a wide range of mindfulness techniques. A very common beginning exercise is centered on breathing. Indeed, it is a technique that has become widely taught and practiced outside of Buddhist circles. As such, it will be important to highlight how it works when done as a distinctly Buddhist practice.
Mindfulness of Death
Authors: Bommarito Nicolas
Published: June 2020

This chapter studies Buddhist practices around death. Buddhist practice includes a wide range of reflections on death. Impermanence can be easy to accept as an abstract, intellectual idea, but death makes it personal and tangible. As such, these reflections can seem pretty grim. That is why it is important to remember their role in the larger contexts of Buddhist practice. They help an individual to get used to harsh truths about how the world is and change habitual responses to accommodate those truths. The idea is to reflect on the reality of death from a certain frame of mind—a diagnostic one intended to shed light on difficult aspects of reality and how one's intuitive responses deny or distort them. In a Buddhist context, the individual reflects on difficult things like death in order to better deal with it, to be able to forge a life in full view of such difficult facts.
Flesh and Bones
Authors: Bommarito Nicolas
Published: June 2020

This chapter discusses how many techniques in Buddhism involve reflecting in detail on physical bodies, both an individual’s own and those of others. These techniques typically emphasize the disgusting and repulsive aspects of each part of the human body. They also reveal ways in which the individual relates to their own body and subtle ways they are attracted to or repulsed by those of others. In traditional sources, women's bodies in particular are singled out for reflection and represented as impure and undesirable. As modern readers, this is one place where people are forced to consider the context of canonical Buddhist texts: Many were written by and for celibate monks in a cultural context where heterosexuality was assumed as the norm and women's status in society was far from equal to men's. There is no denying that today, such practices as written reinforce harmful body image norms and sexist attitudes. However, rather than pretending that such texts and practices do not exist, we are better off thinking about the underlying purpose of such reflections. This allows us to face up to uncomfortable historical facts while also illuminating how such practices might be adapted to be relevant in our own circumstances.
Gifts and Offerings
Authors: Bommarito Nicolas
Published: June 2020

This chapter describes the wide range of Buddhist practices that center on offerings and gifts. For Buddhists, generosity is fundamentally about not being attached to things. These things might be material wealth but can also be more abstract things like time, knowledge, or even recognition. A generous individual sees clearly that there is no persisting self through time, so rather than holding on to these things lets them go easily. Meanwhile, selfless giving is strongly emphasized in a practice associated with Japanese Buddhism where the individual helps others secretly, without anyone knowing. This is a way of making sure that the giving is totally free from any hint of desire for praise or recognition. This kind of generosity is not done to get thanks nor is it done to make others see how virtuous the individual is. It is done solely to benefit others.
Sacred Speech
Authors: Bommarito Nicolas
Published: June 2020

This chapter studies Buddhist practices that make use of sound in general and the human voice in particular. These practices are some of the most popular and widespread in the Buddhist world. They often involve saying a short series of syllables over and over. Sometimes these have linguistic meaning, sometimes not. Other practices involve recalling a particular Buddha by saying their name out loud. Though different in many ways, they all rely on the unique power of the human voice. The chapter then considers mantras. A particular mantra is a particular series of syllables that one repeats over and over. They might be repeated mentally but are usually repeated out loud, though sometimes quietly, as a barely audible murmur. Different mantras are supposed to invoke different buddhas, bodhisattvas, or even texts. This means that Buddhists bring them to mind or appeal to them.
Clearing Your Mind
Authors: Bommarito Nicolas
Published: June 2020

This chapter discusses Buddhist practices that aim at a direct experience of the world free from concepts and labels. As an important practice in some schools of Zen Buddhism, koans have many uses and functions, some of which involve moving beyond language and concepts. One important role koans play is as a tool for the teacher to verify that a student has had a certain experience—that they have realized and internalized certain facts about the world. This is not about whether or not they know these things intellectually, but whether they get them on a gut level. Another practice important in Zen is called zazen—literally sitting Zen. These techniques aim at getting into a particular calm and receptive state of mind, free from the misleading effects of thought and categorization. In this state, one can better realize that all experiences are empty; since they are relational and impermanent, they all contain the key to solving the problem.