Results by title

The first volume to theorize and historicize contemporary artistic practices from Chile in the English language, Dismantling the Nation begins from a position of radical criticism against the nation-state of Chile and its capitalist, heteronormative, and extractivist rule. At a truly pivotal moment in the country’s history, when it is redefining what it wants to be, the works here propose a way of forging a feminist and decolonial future for Chile. The authors attend to practices from distinct locations in Chile, reconceptualizing geographical borders from a transnational and transdisciplinary perspective while engaging with ecocriticism and Indigenous epistemologies. This is an essential volume for anyone looking to understand the current social, political, and artistic movements in Chile.

Shows how policing shaped the trajectory of public housing in Chicago and paved the way for its eradication and privatization. 

Public housing should be a great public good, providing an essential basic need for people with lower incomes. Unfortunately, in the United States, policymakers turned their backs on public housing early on. Intended to be a utopia for the working poor, public housing in many cities became characterized by racial isolation, extreme poverty, and infrastructural breakdown, all of which left residents vulnerable to crime. State abandonment had one major exception, however: policing. In Policing the Project, geographer Madeleine Hamlin details how police played an important role in Chicago’s public housing from its origins in 1937 to the eve of its demolition at the turn of the millennium. 

Based on archival data as well as extensive interviews with former residents and police officers, Hamlin describes the progressive institutional entanglement of public housing and policing as it unfurled over the course of the twentieth century. Policing the Project transcends mere description of how policing impacted everyday life for public housing residents, instead considering how policing shaped the institution of public housing as a whole. Hamlin argues that policing conditioned public housing’s downfall: draining housing budgets while exacerbating rather than mitigating crime and violence. Thus, policing played an important role in shaping the dramatic transformation of Chicago’s housing landscape, which entailed widespread privatization and the displacement of tens of thousands of Black Chicagoans.

The Good Neighbor Policy was unique: a great power obligated itself not to use force in its dealings with twenty smaller powers and not to interfere in their domestic politics. It was a policy that lasted, with some perturbations, for twenty years: instituted by President Roosevelt in 1933 and carried out effectively from 1933 to 1943 by word and action, maintained during the Second World War largely as a result of British concern for continuance of Argentine beef exports, codified in the Charter of the Organization of American States in 1948, and reasserted by Truman and Acheson in 1950–51, it was covertly repudiated in Guatemala in 1954 by Eisenhower and the Dulles brothers, and not so secretly by Kennedy in the disastrous Bay of Pigs invasion of 1961. Openly shattered in the Dominican Republic by Johnson in 1965, it has since been completely abandoned in favor of the usual relationships between large and small powers.

Working with documents from the Public Records Office in London and the National Archives, with recently released materials from the U.S. Department of State, and with secondary sources, Bryce Wood describes the temptations laid before the leaders of one powerful state by its occasionally recalcitrant neighbors, and the ways of reacting that were found. Having told half the story in his The Making of the Good Neighbor Policy, Wood now concludes it in the present volume. One of the chief casualties is shown to be the Organization of American States, which since 1954 has found itself badly crippled in its work to promote harmony and continued cooperation among the member states.

Academic libraries are full of inspiring collections, resources, and services, but libraries are special because of the people who run them. And what people believe about and face in their culture impacts ideas, plans, and outcomes. Academic library workers face many contemporary challenges that contribute to toxic work cultures—the rapid change of higher education, diminishing resources, lack of diversity, power hierarchies—and addressing these problems requires innovative solutions, ongoing professional development, and effective leadership.
 
Toxic Dynamics: Disrupting, Dismantling, and Transforming Academic Library Culture provides practical solutions for confronting these complex issues and innovative ways to promote a healthy and sustainable work culture. It addresses critical and timely challenges such as faculty versus staff or us versus them mentality, unionization, gendered labor, organizational change, self-care, tenure, and promotion. Authors from all sizes and types of academic libraries provide evidence-based solutions to mitigate the negative effects of toxicity, change management strategies, and ways to confront and challenge values that harm library workers and their well-being.
 
By understanding the root causes of toxic cultures, recognizing their impact, and implementing solutions, leaders can create a more supportive and positive work environment and improve morale, retention, and productivity. Toxic Dynamics is an important resource for anyone interested in improving workplace culture and addressing issues related to toxicity and inequity, and for library leaders at all levels.