Stanford University Press Blog

Are you getting Caught in Play?

Why is that we get caught up with stories about celebrities even when they have nothing to do with our lives? Why do we spend hours on video games or reading pulp fiction? The activity temporarily assumed a profound significance and the outside world began to fade. Although we are likely to enjoy these experiences in the realm of entertainment, we rarely think about what effect they might be having on us. Precisely because it is so pervasive, entertainment is difficult to understand and even to talk about. 

Peter Stromberg's Caught In Play: How Entertainment Works on You addresses these issues. A recent review of the book in Publishers Weekly describes it as a meta-narrative about being "caught up" in the entertainment world and finds that "Reading this smart commentary on the grand spectrum of entertainment is an addictive experience, a sharp example of the very phenomenon it illuminates."

Caught in Play looks closely at how we engage entertainment and at the ideas and practices it creates and sustains. Even Recent research in cognitive neuroscience and psychology is beginning to clarify some of this. Our brains, we are discovering, are hard wired to automatically imitate what we observe because of a system of specialized neurons called mirror neurons. When we watch a movie or a T.V. show, we become caught up in it and sometimes mimic what we see. As Stromberg's work reveals, entertainment tells us more about ourselves than we are willing to acknowledge: values of
pleasure, self-indulgence, and consumption.

So the next time you're being entertained, think about it: Are you getting caught up?

Pardis Mahdavi on elections in Iran and the Role of Women

Commenting on the continued protests surrounding the disputed presidential election in Iran, Pardis Mahadavi, author of Passionate Uprisings Iran's Sexual Revolution writes:

"Earlier today (Friday, June 17) thousands of protesters marched the streets of Tehran, pumping their fists into the air and chanting “Coup! Government resignation”. Some wore green (to indicate their allegiance to Mir Hossein Moussavi) many did not. Up until now, much of the recent media depictions of the situation in Iran paint a picture of a stolen election, and a discontented public demanding a recount at least, and the installation of their preferred candidate. While the election has presented frustrated Iranians with a catalyst and a reason to protest, what we are witnessing in Iran is not a simple protest over election fraud. Rather, disenchantment with the regime, and the desire to mobilize a civil rights type movement in Iran has been building for many years. This election, the overt nature of repression and fraudulent behavior has given many people the window they were looking for to mobilize a movement that goes beyond election politics. The protesters want change: they want to change the system of Islamic jurisprudence, and fundamentally, they want their rights back. While some might see the protests as “calming down” or “dying down”, the reality is that people have tasted the sweetness of voicing their discontent, and they have no plans of backing down easily."

From advocating for polygamy to enforcing the "morality police," Ahmadinejad has women in Iran fighting for their rights. An article in Salon.com takes a look at the women protesters and their courage, from verbal protest to dying in the streets, as was the case for Neda Agha-Soltani. who has become a symbol for the feminist movement. This article points out that though these types of protests have been going on for decades, this one is different because the world is watching.

Mahadavi remarks in this article, "There is a bit of neoliberal rhetoric. You know, we need to save these women, they're repressed and don't know it,' which is not the case. These women are finding agency in all sorts of pockets, in all sorts of ways. We can identify, but because the situation is so much more complicated than we realize, we really can't understand," she says.

Mahdavi's book Passionate Uprisings tells the stories of Iran's youth and their intertwined quests for sexual freedom, political reform, and a better future – but not a future without risk. The young people of Iran face serious consequences for their attempts to change their social atmosphere. Mahdavi's book shows how sexual politics and youth culture is changing the course of Iranian politics. 

The Invisible Minority: Korean-Americans and Race Relations

Nadia Kim, author of Imperial Citizens Koreans and Race from Seoul to LA, was interviewed recently by New America Media. The book Imperial Citizens examines the origins, nature, and extent of racial ideas about Koreans in relation to White and Black Americans, investigating how immigrants engage these ideas before they depart for the United States, as well as after they arrive. It shows how Korean history has shaped  race relations, from interactions with white soldiers in Korea to interactions with Americans in the US.

In her interview with New American Media, Kim addresses the fact that when Koreans enter the US they become part of our distinct way of life. She first addresses the fact that when Koreans enter the United States they are grouped into one large distinction: "Asians." This term is in fact offensive because it lumps all Asian minorities into the same group, some of which have long and complicated histories with each other. The fact that Koreans are indistinguishable from the Japanese is a disturbing fact because of the love/hate relationship between the two cultures as a result of historical colonization.

Koreans became an even less prominent group in the US because their communities were so tightly knit. Because Koreans do not have as extensive a history in the United States as other Asian groups, they can seem a little harder to reach. However, Kim makes it clear that Koreans did not fade into the American background so easily. She talks about what she refers to as "the unrest" or the 1992 riotsand the tensions afterwords. These riots were the point when Koreans became intertwined in the long history of white/black tension in the US. The riots were sensationalized in the US as a battle between Koreans and blacks and popularized as the "black riots" in South Korea. The media flashed pictures of Koreans on their roofs with guns and stores being looted. Though it was a time of great tension, the Unrest actually fostered an alliance between Korean and black churches. Cultural exchanges took place: scholarships were organized, and black pastors were invited on trips to South Korea.

What Kim calls the Unrest shows how the Koreans were thrust into the racial tensions already existing in the United States, and how Koreans are still severely misunderstood here. Kim's book and interview are gateways to understanding Korean racial history, because, as she puts it, Koreans remain an "invisible and foreign minority here."

What is Cheney Defending?

Shirley Anne Warshaw was interviewed by the Rorotoko blog about her new book, The Co-Presidency of Bush and Cheney.

"In the past month or so, we have seen former Vice President Cheney aggressively respond to charges by President Obama that the Bush administration exacerbated America’s friends and foes with its policies of torture, prisoner abuse, and inadequate trials."  Warshaw argues that this is because the policies of the Bush administration were very much Cheney's policies so it is only fitting that he is defending them.

Not only did Cheney have major influence over foreign policy but he also had all the legal arenas stacked with his supporters in order to push his agenda through the Justice Department. According to Warshaw, Cheney "had his hand in almost every area of domestic policy" by stacking the White House with his own staff of trusted insiders. The Bush/Cheney working relationship came to work so well because George Bush was focused on creating a moral and civil, faith-based society, leaving Cheney to take care of everything else.

Cheney staffed the administration with pro-business executives and "shaped the Bush administration’s energy, environmental, pro-business, and national security policies." From environmental regulations to government outsourcing, Cheney was bent on creating a business-friendly society.

Warshaw remarks, "I hope that The Co-Presidency of Bush and Cheney sheds new light on the limited agenda that George W. Bush had as president and the far larger agenda that Dick Cheney had as vice president – as well as the tools Cheney employed to move that agenda forward."

Assessing the Bomb

Lawrence Wittner has taken his vast knowledge of the history of nuclear weapons and nuclear disarmament and put it into a more conscise and updated book. His previous trilogy on the bomb, The Struggle Against the Bomb, is a long and detailed account of the movement to restrict the use of nuclear weapons. His new book, Confronting the Bomb, distills that information into a comprehensive account of the worldwide nuclear disarmament campaign. 

In a recent post on The Page 99 Test, Wittner applies the “page 99 test” to his new book, describing what the reader will find on page 99 and putting that in the context of the entire book. From the relatively obscure battles to those that are known across the globe, Confronting the Bomb recounts the history of the worldwide campaign against nuclear proliferation and its remarkable impact.

The book is based on massive research in the files of peace groups and in previously top secret government records, as well as on interviews with peace movement leaders and government officials: from Albert Einstein to Harry Truman to Mikhail Gorbachev. With this extensive base of information, several questions arise: How has the world avoided nuclear war since 1945? Why do nuclear countries adopt policies of nuclear restraint? If nuclear deterrence works, why bother with nuclear test bans or treaties?

Wittner attempts to answer these questions in Confronting the Bomb. The nuclear bomb–both its use and nonuse–is a subject that is fraught with difficult moral, political and diplomatic questions. Wittner’s new book makes the history more accessible, and in turn, may help to answer some of the questions that surround such an explosive subject.

Palestinian Identity in the Israeli Army: Fighting on the the wrong side?

Surrounded, by Rhoda Ann Kanaaneh, takes a close look at the Palestinians who choose to serve in the Israeli army. It takes up the question of why they join and how it reflects the cultural interaction between the Israelis and Arabs in Israel . In the last week, the book was reviewed in both  Jordan Times and the Jerusalem Post in Israel. It is a statement of the social and political implications of Arabs in Israel as a whole, even though it focuses on a small percentage of Palestinians who choose to fight for the Israeli army.

Surrounded contains over 70 interviews with soldiers and provides a unique perspective on their experiences in acceptance and integration into the Israeli military. Kanaaneh not only provides insights into how nationalism factors into wars and why they are fought, but provides an interesting viewpoint by which to view the ethnic tension and relations between Palestinians and Israelis. She first gives the reader a sense of what it is to live as an Arab in Israel and the identity issues that Arabs struggle with when living there. With the many different categories that Israeli Arabs identify with (Muslim, Druze, Christian), how do these soldiers view their relationship with a volatile and fractured state?

Kanaaneh grapples with these questions of identity as she assesses the status of the Arab soldiers in their own communities and compares the situation of the Palestinians in Israel not only with other Palestinians in West Bank and Gaza strip but with other colonial situations around the globe: Indians who served in the British army, Buffalo soldiers in America, and, more recently, the US speeding up citizenship processing for green card holders who served in Iraq. Throughout the book, questions of conflicted identity are highlighted, as are the relationships between ethnic discrimination and military conflict -- issues that are not just pertinent to Arabs and Israelis but of truly universal interest.

California - A nation-state within a state?

In a recent broadcast of the radio show Which Way, LA? Stanford University Press authors Jim Flanigan - Smile Southern California, You’re the Center of the Universe - and Abe Lowenthal - Global California, Rising to the Cosmopolitan Challenge -  share their insights on the current and future prospects for California. Can the most prosperous state in the US , the hub of agriculture, industry and innovation be regarded as a nation-state?

For Abe Lowenthal the answer is a resounding "Yes." Lowenthal’s ideas focus on the fact that California has all the qualities of an internationally active nation-state but lacks the ability to use them in order to further their international interests. Even though “California was born with international DNA" as he put it, it is inwardly focused.  The state has the opportunity to influence the federal government, has a large congressional delegation, and has the most internationally diverse population in the country, and has not harnessed the tools to become an actor on the international stage.

Although Flanigan’s book is focused on southern California, he makes the point that global trade is central to California’s economy in particular (the state is the country’s largest exporter and importer of goods and services) and that the state is crucial in developing US trade links with Latin America and China. With a growing population due to second generation immigrants, an entrepreneurial economy, and the largest university research complex in the country, California is primed for interacting at an international level. 

Both Flanigan and Lowenthal agree that the political elites of California should come together to leverage the state’s global clout rather than remaining partisan and focused on local issues only. Even in the current recession, California has the capacity to yield a lot of influence.

Flanigan leaves us with a reassuring note, in light of the current economic downturn. He admits that trade may be down and deficits high, but China and other Asian developing countries are not going to stop development. They’re going to continue to develop, and we’re going to have a role in it. Flanigan assures us that the economy and trade of California flourished wildly in the past and even though it’s at a standstill now, “you know it’ll come back.”

Shanghai's History opens up to the West

Marie-Claire Bergere’s book Shanghai, China’s Gateway to Modernity, is scheduled to be released in December of this year but is already generating discussion in academic circles.

In a recent  post in The China Beat, Jeffrey Wasserstrom commends Bergere on the first English language book of this topic.

Shanghai, China's Gateway to Modernity is the fist comprehensive history of Shanghai in any Western language. Bergere’s tale takes readers back to when Shanghai first opened up to the world as a trading hub. She narrates the city’s beginnings as a treaty port in the mid 1800’s, the capitalist boom after the 1911 revolution, the fifteen years of economic decline after Japanese invasion in 1937, and the city’s years under communism. Her account shows that Shanghai is in a sort of evolutionary process that was set into motion a century and a half ago.

Eclipsed for three decades by socialism, Bergere’s account vividly shows how Shanghai  is once again  a symbol of China’s quest for modernity. Her book describes the city’s long and fascinating cultural history. 

Look out for reviews and more news related to this book as we moved closer to publication.

Krepon identifies the “Top” of nuclear weapons literature

Michael Krepon, co-founder of the Stimson Institute,  Diplomat Scholar at University of Virginia and Stanford University Press author of the recent, Better Safe than Sorry, the Ironies of Living with the Bomb,  chose his Top Ten Books on Nuclear on Nuclear Weapons and Arms Control in an article in Foreign Policy.

Krepon’s own book Better Safe than Sorry places contemporary anxieties about nuclear proliferation in historical context. Krepon moves back in time providing context for today’s nuclear fears by examining past periods of nuclear danger. From the first and second nuclear ages, to the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, all the way to the discovery of Sadam Hussein’s nuclear weapon program, Krepon provides a comprehensive historical story of “the bomb.”

Using his knowledge and expertise on the subject, Krepon compiled in Foreign Policy a list of the top literature surrounding nuclear weapons; from The Acheson-Lilienthal Report (1946) to The Master of the Game, Paul Nitze and the Nuclear Peace (1988). Though Krepon admits some of the literature is a little dated, it nevertheless contributes to the ever-evolving discussion surrounding nuclear proliferation – perhaps aiding in and leading to his own contribution to the field.

Who's Controlling the Genie?

Robert Plotkin, Patent Lawyer and MIT, is the author of the newly released book “Genie Inside the Machine…” The book Is really innovative in bringing technological advances to the world of patent law.

A recent article in Technology in Review summarizes the book and states Plotkin’s assessment of the future in patented technology.

Genie in the machine describes how the digital age is expanding the possibilities of human invention. He gives the example of the Oral B toothbrush as a product of software design.  But there aren’t just toothbrushes in software production; Plotkin says there are many patents already granted to other products produced in part by software.

 The problem is that the patent system that has suited our industrial society for 100’s of years is now becoming outdated and doesn’t compensate for our technological advances. The problem became apparent in the 1990’s when software produces fought for control over the market and thousands of patents were granted. Plotkin says that the patent system has to be revolutionized so that trivial patents are not granted, stifling real ingenuity.

The author  does think that this is a problem that deserves our immediate attention. With hope for the future, Robert Plotkin assures you that this groundbreaking technology will not replace human ingenuity, but rather augment it, enabling people to boost their inventive abilities to previously undreamed-of heights.  Without talented individuals to communicate effectively with computers (or rub the lamp), the genie is useless.  “One slip of the tongue and you may find yourself turned into a toad rather than bathed in riches,” he explains.