An anthology of contemporary art theory from a Canadian perspective.

The changing nature of waged work in contemporary advanced industrial nations is one of the most significant aspects of political and economic debate. It is also the subject of intense debate among observers of gender. Capital Culture explores these changes focusing particularly on the gender relations between the men and women who work in the financial services sector. The multiple ways in which masculinities and femininities are constructed is revealed through the analysis of interviews with dealers, traders, analysts and corporate financiers. Drawing on a range of disciplinary approaches, the various ways in which gender segregation is established and maintained is explored. In fascinating detail, the everyday experiences of men and women working in a range of jobs and in different spaces, from the dealing rooms to the boardrooms, are examined. This volume is unique in focusing on men as well as women, showing that for men too there are multiple ways of doing gender at work.

American art museums flourished in the late twentieth century, and the impresario leading much of this growth was J. Carter Brown, director of the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC, from 1969 to 1992. Along with S. Dillon Ripley, who served as Smithsonian secretary for much of this time, Brown reinvented the museum experience in ways that had important consequences for the cultural life of Washington and its visitors as well as for American museums in general. In Capital Culture, distinguished historian Neil Harris provides a wide-ranging look at Brown’s achievement and the growth of museum culture during this crucial period. Harris combines his in-depth knowledge of American history and culture with extensive archival research, and he has interviewed dozens of key players to reveal how Brown’s showmanship transformed the National Gallery. At the time of the Cold War, Washington itself was growing into a global destination, with Brown as its devoted booster. Harris describes Brown’s major role in the birth of blockbuster exhibitions, such as the King Tut show of the late 1970s and the National Gallery’s immensely successful Treasure Houses of Britain, which helped inspire similarly popular exhibitions around the country. He recounts Brown’s role in creating the award-winning East Building by architect I. M. Pei and the subsequent renovation of the West building. Harris also explores the politics of exhibition planning, describing Brown's courtship of corporate leaders, politicians, and international dignitaries. In this monumental book Harris brings to life this dynamic era and exposes the creation of Brown's impressive but costly legacy, one that changed the face of American museums forever.

Singapore has been taken by many researchers as a fascinating living language policy and planning laboratory. Language and education policy in Singapore has been pivotal not only to the establishment and growth of schooling, but to the very project of nation building. Since their inception, ‘mother tongue’ policies have been established with two explicit goals. Firstly there is the development and training of human and intellectual capital for the expansion and networking of a Singaporean service and information economy. Secondly there is the maintenance of cultural heritage and values as a means for social cohesion and, indeed, the maintenance of community and regional social capital. These tasks have been fraught with tension and contradiction, both in relation to the conditions of rapid cultural, economic and political change in Asia and globally, but as well because of the tensions between the so called ‘world language English’ and Singapore’s three other official languages, Tamil, Malay and Mandarin. This has been complicated, of course, by the challenges of vibrant regional dialects and the emergence of Singlish as a powerful medium of community life.

The Entrepreneurial Culture highlights the subtle yet powerful influence of national cultural heritage on entrepreneurship ventures, using an alternative and fresh approach to explore the entrepreneurial culture of Chinese and Irish software firms. This book presents a unique analysis of entrepreneurship theory development, along with a single industry, cross-national study of entrepreneurship illustrating the impact of values from contrasting cultures. Specifically, Denise Tsang concentrates on the advantages associated with the diverse Chinese 'social' network and Irish 'personal' network (derived from the two nations' respective core cultural values) in relation to the strategies utilised by successful public and private firms emerging in the past two decades. Drawing upon data from China, Ireland and the USA, the author illustrates that the Chinese social network has led to a relationship-based approach in strategic areas such as team building, finance, marketing and recruitment during the early stage of firms' start-up. In contrast, the Irish 'personal' network is linked to a pragmatic and rational approach in the same strategic areas. This original work will provide fascinating reading for a wide-ranging audience, including academics, researchers, students, practitioners and policymakers specialising in entrepreneurship and/or international business.