There She Goes Again: Gender, Power, and Knowledge in Contemporary Film and Television Franchises (Rutgers UP, 2023) interrogates the representation of ostensibly powerful women in transmedia franchises, examining how presumed feminine traits—love, empathy, altruism, diplomacy—are alternately lauded and repudiated as possibilities for effecting long-lasting social change. By questioning how these franchises reimagine their protagonists over time, the book reflects on the role that gendered exceptionalism plays in social and political action, as well as what forms of knowledge and power are presumed distinctly feminine. The franchises explored in this book illustrate the ambivalent (post)feminist representation of women protagonists as uniquely gifted in ways both gendered and seemingly ungendered, and yet inherently bound to expressions of their femininity. At heart, There She Goes Again asks under what terms and in what contexts women protagonists are imagined, envisioned, embodied, and replicated in media. Especially now, in a period of gradually increasing representation, women protagonists demonstrate the importance of considering how we should define—and whether we need—feminine forms of knowledge and power.Peter C. Kunze is an assistant professor of communication at Tulane University. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/communications

It is hard to discuss the current film industry without acknowledging the impact of comic book adaptations, especially considering the blockbuster success of recent superhero movies. Yet transmedial adaptations are part of an evolution that can be traced to the turn of the last century, when comic strips such as “Little Nemo in Slumberland” and “Felix the Cat” were animated for the silver screen. Along with Barry Keith Grant, Scott Henderson (Dean and Head, Trent University Durham GTA) compiled a rich group of essays that represent diverse academic fields, including technoculture, film studies, theater, feminist studies, popular culture, and queer studies. Comics and Pop Culture: Adaptation from Panel to Frame (University of Texas Press, 2019) presents more than a dozen perspectives on this rich history and the effects of such adaptations. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/communications

Dr. Shweta Kishore and Dr Kunal Ray’s Resistance in Indian Documentary Film: Aesthetics, Culture and Practice (Edinburgh UP, 2024) is a unique collection of essays on documentary cinema and practice that brings together multiple modes of scholarly, reflective and autoethnographic writing on documentary by scholars and creative practitioners. It takes a holistic view of documentary culture as a field comprising not only films but practices such as circulation, curation, criticism, and education, that come together to create a particular ecology of resistance. Resistance is conceptualised as a multidimensional phenomenon comprising both documentary representation as well as practices and tangible actions through which people mobilize and adapt documentary for local, community and individual functions.Dr Kunal Ray is a writer and academic. He teaches literature and film at FLAME University, Pune. His writings on art and culture appear in The Hindu, The Indian Express, Hindustan Times amongst other publications. He has co-edited books on song-texts and food cultures in India. He is also the co-founder and co-editor of On Eating - A Multilingual Journal of Food & Eating.Dr Shweta Kishore lectures in Screen and Media at RMIT (Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology) University. She is the author of Indian Documentary Film and Filmmakers: Independence in Practice published by Edinburgh University Press in 2018. Her research on documentary theory and practice appears in journals such as Bioscope, Feminist Media Studies, Studies in Documentary Film and Senses of Cinema. She is also a documentary practitioner and curator committed to creating conversations between Indian and international moving image artists and audiences.Priyam Sinha recently graduated with a PhD from the National University of Singapore. Her interdisciplinary academic interests lie at the intersection of film studies, disability studies, production cultures, affect studies, anthropology of the body, creative media industries and cultural studies. She can be reached at https://twitter.com/PriyamSinha Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/communications

Dissecting 45 million tweets from the period that followed the Brexit referendum, Brexit, Tweeted: Polarization and Social Media Manipulation (Bristol University Press, 2024) by Dr. Marco Bastos presents an extensive analysis of social media manipulation.The book examines emerging changes in partisan politics, nationalist and populist values, as well as broader societal changes that are feeding into polarisation and echo-chamber communication. It pulls the curtain back on the techniques employed to interfere with, and potentially distort, the public discussion. Making complex data accessible to non-technical audiences, this unique post-mortem of the Brexit referendum contributes to our understanding of social media disinformation in the UK and beyond.This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose new book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/communications

How do families care for each when they are divided over generations by powerful geopolitical forces beyond their control? In this episode, Hanna Torsh speaks with Lynnette Arnold about her new book Living Together Across Borders: Communicative Care in Transnational Salvadoran Families (Oxford University Press, 2024). Lynnette also shares her tips for emerging scholars in the field about how to conduct research in changing and unstable times.For additional resources, show notes, and transcripts, go here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/communications

Screening Big Data: Films that Shape Our Algorithmic Literacy (Routledge, 2024) examines the influence of key films on public understanding of big data and the algorithmic systems that structure our digitally mediated lives.From star-powered blockbusters to civic-minded documentaries positioned to facilitate weighty debates about artificial intelligence, these texts frame our discourse and mediate our relationship to technology. Above all, they impact society’s abilities to regulate AI and navigate big tech’s political and economic manoeuvres to achieve market dominance and regulatory capture. Foregrounding data politics with close readings of key films like Moneyball, Minority Report, The Social Dilemma, and Coded Bias, in Screening Big Data by Dr. Gerald Sim reveals compelling ways in which films and tech industry–adjacent media define apprehension of AI. With the mid-2010s techlash in danger of fizzling out, Screening Big Data explores the relationship between this resistance and cultural infrastructure while highlighting the urgent need to refocus attention onto how technocentric media occupy the public imagination.This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose new book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/communications

Listener note: This interview contains discussions of suicide. Youth and Suicide in American Cinema: Context, Causes, and Consequences (Palgrave MacMillan, 2022) explores the depiction of suicide in American youth films from 1900 to 2019. Anchored in Sociology, this multidisciplinary study investigates the causes and consequences of suicide and uncovers the socio-cultural context for the development of youth, film, and suicide. While such cinematic portrayals seem to privilege external explanations of suicide versus internal or psychological ones, overall they are neither rich nor sensitive. Most are simplistic, limited or at the very least unbalanced. At times, they are flatly controversial. In light of this overall problematic depiction of suicide, this book offers a proactive approach to empower young audiences--a media literacy strategy to embrace while watching these films.A Fulbright grantee and an award-winning artist, Alessandra Seggi (PhD in Sociology and MA in Media Studies) teaches at Villanova University, Pennsylvania, USA.Ailin Zhou is a PhD student in Film & Digital Media at University of California, Santa Cruz. Her research interests include transnational Chinese cinema, Asian diasporic visual culture, contemporary art, and feminist and queer theories. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/communications

Academic writing isn’t known for its clarity. While graduate students might see reading and writing turgid academic prose as a badge of honor—a sign of membership in an exclusive community of experts—many readers are left feeling utterly defeated. In his latest book, Academic Writing as if Readers Matter (Princeton University Press, 2024), Fordham University Professor Leonard Cassuto prompts us to think more about the reader. For Cassuto, the key to better academic prose is to anticipate and respect the needs of the reader. Throughout the volume, Cassuto offers a range of advice on how to structure arguments, use metaphor, and integrate narrative. He also provides a thoughtful reflection on the value of academic knowledge for the broader public and how to square a rules-based approach to teaching writing with the inevitable evolution of language. This book will be of interest to graduate students, writing instructors, editors, and anyone who wants to learn how to make their writing clearer and more sympathetic to the needs of the reader. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/communications

Pong. The Legend of Zelda. Final Fantasy VII. Rock Band. Fortnite. Animal Crossing: New Horizons. For each of the 40 years of video game history, there is a defining game, a game that captured the zeitgeist and left a legacy for all games that followed. Through a series of entertaining, informative, and opinionated critical essays, author and tech journalist Jordan Minor investigates, in chronological order, the most innovative, genre-bending, and earth-shattering games from 1977 through 2022. Exploring development stories, critical reception, and legacy, Minor also looks at how gaming intersects with and eventually influences society at large while reveling in how uniquely and delightfully bizarre even the most famous games tend to be. From portly plumbers to armor-clad space marines and the speedy rodents in between, Video Game of the Year: A Year-By-Year Guide to the Best, Boldest, and Most Bizarre Games from Every Year Since 1977 (Abrams, 2023) paints individual portraits that, as a whole, give readers a stronger appreciation for the vibrant variety and long-lasting impact of this fresh, exciting, and massively popular art form. Illustrated throughout with retro-inspired imagery and featuring contributions from dozens of leading industry voices, including New York Times bestselling author Jason Schreier, Max Scoville, Rebekah Valentine, Blessing Adeoye Jr., and Devindra Hardawar, this year-by-year anthology is a loving reflection on the world’s most popular art form.Rudolf Inderst is a professor of Game Design with a focus on Digital Game Studies at the IU International University of Applied Science, department lead for Games at Swiss culture magazine Nahaufnahmen.ch, editor of “DiGRA D-A-CH Game Studies Watchlist”, a weekly messenger newsletter about Game Culture and curator of @gamestudies at tiktok. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/communications

Conducting Original Research for Your Library (Bloomsbury Libraries Unlimited, 2024) is a concise manual for professionals in the field, this book helps librarians master the skills to conduct, interpret, and analyze their own original research. Many working librarians discover that original research would help them advocate for their libraries, but some graduate programs teach only limited research skills. Designed for all librarians, this book is a practical guide to engaging with the research process, from identifying a problem to sharing findings with others. Authors Kaitlin Gerrity and Scott Lanning have packed this introductory guide and reference book with short, to-the-point information that librarians will refer to often at all stages of a research project. From research ethics to statistical significance and everything in between, this primer is the point-of-need resource for librarians in public, academic, and school libraries who wish to use original research to support the profession.NBN can get 20% off Conducting Original Research for Your Library by using the discount code NBN20 on the Blooomsbury.com US website.Caitlin Gerrity is an Associate Professor and Director of the School Library Endorsement Program in the Department of Library and Information Science at Southern Utah University.Scott Lanning is a LIS Professor an Assessment Librarian/Business, Computer Science and Math Librarian in the Department of Library & Information Science at Southern Utah University.Discuss in this episode is Philadelphia Alliance to Restore School Librarians (PARSL). In addition to connecting through the PARSL website, you can connect on Instagram and Facebook.Dr. Michael LaMagna is the Information Literacy Program & Library Services Coordinator and Professor of Library Services at Delaware County Community College. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/communications