This interdisciplinary book addresses the highly relevant debates about authenticity in North America, providing a contemporary re-examination of American culture, tourism and commodification of place. Blending social sciences and humanities research skills, it formulates an examination of the geography of authenticity in North America, and brings together studies of both rurality and urbanity across the country, exposing the many commonalities of these different landscapes. Relph stated that nostalgic places are inauthentic, yet within this work several chapters explore how festivals and visitor attractions, which cultivate place heritage appeal, are authenticated by tourists and communities, creating a shared sense of belonging. In a world of hyperreal simulacra, post-truth and fake news, this book bucks the trend by demonstrating that authenticity can be found everywhere: in a mouthful of food, in a few bars of a Beach Boys song, in a statue of a troll, in a diffuse magical atmosphere, in the weirdness of the ungentrified streets. Written by a range of leading experts, this book offers a contemporary view of American authenticity, tourism, identity and culture. It will be of great interest to upper-level students, researchers and academics in Tourism, Geography, History, Cultural Studies, American Studies and Film Studies.

The present volume brings to North American Native Studies – with its rich tradition and accumulated expertise in the Central European region – the new complexities and challenges of contemporary Native reality. The umbrella theme ‘Indigenous perspectives’ brings together researchers from a great variety of disciplines, focusing on issues such as democracy and human rights, international law, multiculturalism, peace and security, economic and scientific development, sustainability, literature, and arts and culture, as well as religion. The thirty-five topical and thought-provoking articles written in English, French and Spanish offer a solid platform for further critical investigations and a useful tool for classroom discussions in a wide variety of academic fields.

This study provides new information regarding the instruction of American Indian music in Oklahoma, and shows the effect of demographic variables of teachers and students on pedagogical context and practice.

There is no doubt that we are far away from the self-evident concepts of Sirius binary system (Samawaati wal-Arz), natural magnetism (Nuurun Alaa Nuur), upright rectangular universe (end of proof), immovable hexagonal world (asterisk), appearing pentagonal earth (star operator), three ascending stairs, Upright-West region of the appointed kaba, straight Middle-East region of Eartha 3D, four Galilean moons, visual binaries, four basic forces, four cardinal directions, nine planets as nine eye opening evidences, equal and opposite stages of journey of the manifested signs and two clear proofs of natural magnetic directions, and the like due to historically prevailing learning gaps objectively in the reading materials of basic sciences, natural sciences, and social sciences spoiling sanctity of education, significance of scientific certainty, and existential import of legitimacy as well as violating first generation— natural & environmental rights, second generation—essential & fundamental rights and social & cultural rights, third generation—un-interfering & inviolable rights and four foundational solidarity rights in Islam, and uncompromising constitutional rights of our fresh generation. Publication of the ‘The War of Authenticity’ along with Significant Crucial Instances is an experimentum crucis (crucial experiment) before responsible chairs, legitimate authorities, religious scholars, scientists, philosophers, astronomers, astrophysicists, so-called mystics, sufis, intelligent bureaus, crime detectives, diplomats, lawyers, judges, writers, publishers, journalists, media persons, political leaders, so-called imams, social reformers, and mankind in general with a view to manifest the existential imports of the searched out “equal and opposite” findings of an illiterate Indian Banii-Israa-iil (an ordinary Indian Muslim) in each and every aspect of human persons living in societies as well as three core normative teachings of Bhagvat Gita, namely, (1) do what is right, (2) choose what is good, and (3) sticking to what is truth. Failure or success to recognize and confirm the searched out “equal and opposite” findings of an ordinary Hindustani will provide significant crucial instances on the basis of which we can distinguish possessors of balanced good sense (innate idea of Rene Descartes) from cursed human persons of Peter Singer (tabula rasa of John Locke) removing all doubts.

This edited collection explores memories and experiences of genocide, civilian casualties, and other atrocities that occurred after the Second World War.

In Walking on the Pages of the Word of God Aron Engberg explores the religious language and identities of evangelical volunteer workers in contemporary Jerusalem. The volunteers are connected to Christian organizations which consider their work a natural consequence of the biblical promises to Israel and their responsibility to “bless the Jewish people”. Relying on ethnographic data of the discursive practices of the volunteers, the book explores a central puzzle of Zionist Christianity: the narrative production of Israel’s religious significance and its relationship to broader Christian language traditions. By focusing on the volunteers’ stories about themselves, the land and the Bible, Aron Engberg offers a convincing account about how the State of Israel is finding its way into evangelical identities.

Reprint of the original, first published in 1882.

This book explores the relationships between rock and roll, social protest, and authenticity to consider how rock and roll could function as social protest music. The author begins by discussing the nature and origins of rock and roll and the nature of social protest and social protest music within the wider context of the evolution of the commercial music industry and the social and technological infrastructure developed for the mass dissemination of popular music. This discussion is followed by an examination of the causes of the public disapproval originally expressed toward rock and roll, and how they illuminate its social protest and subversive quality. By further investigating the nature of authenticity and its relationship to social protest and to commercialization, the author considers how social protest and commercialization are antithetical. This conclusion, if correct, has broad implications for human culture in advanced industrial society.

The longing for authenticity, on an individual or collective level, connects the search for external expressions to internal orientations. What is largely referred to as production of authenticity is a reformulation of cultural values and norms within the ongoing process of modernity, impacted by globalization and contemporary transnational cultural flows. This collection interrogates the notion of authenticity from an anthropological point of view and considers authenticity in terms of how meaning is produced in and through discourses about authenticity. Incorporating case studies from four continents, the topics reach from art and colonialism to exoticism-primitivism, film, ritual and wilderness. Some contributors emphasise the dichotomy between the academic use of the term and the one deployed in public spaces and political projects. All, however, consider authenticity as something that can only be understood ethnographically, and not as a simple characteristic or category used to distinguish some behaviors, experiences or material things from other less authentic versions.