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3 books match the query 'Seriality'

cover of Hoodlum Movies: Seriality and the Outlaw Biker Film Cycle, 1966-1972

Hoodlum Movies

Seriality and the Outlaw Biker Film Cycle, 1966-1972

Stanfield, Peter

Rutgers University Press, 2018

From The Wild Angels in 1966 until its conclusion in 1972, the cycle of outlaw motorcycle films contained forty-odd formulaic examples. All but one were made by independent companies that specialized in producing exploitation movies for drive-ins, neighborhood theaters, and rundown inner city theaters. Despised by critics, but welcomed by exhibitors denied first-run films, these cheaply and quickly produced movies were made to appeal to audiences of mobile youths. The films are repetitive, formulaic, and eminently forgettable, but there is a story to tell about all of the above, and it is one worth hearing. Hoodlum Movies is not only about the films, its focus is on why and how these films were made, who they were made for, and how the cycle developed through the second half of the 1960s and came to a shuddering halt in 1972.   
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cover of Programmed Viewership: Japanese Tele-Mediality, Seriality, and Film as a Social Medium

Programmed Viewership

Japanese Tele-Mediality, Seriality, and Film as a Social Medium

Rea Amit

University of Michigan Press, 2027

Programmed Viewership examines the concept of “program” in Japanese cinema as an organizing framework that links marketing and promotion, exhibition and distribution, and viewing practices in public and domestic spaces. Rea Amit defines “program” as the ideological infrastructure or platform that perpetuates habitual and ritualistic patterns in film production and reception. Amit takes a holistic approach to understanding more than a century of Japanese cinema through the analysis of material film ephemera, cinema theatre, film content, and viewership. This framework positions programming, rather than provenance, as the decisive factor that confers a film’s cultural and institutional identity. While earlier scholarship has gestured toward loosening the tie between cinematic identity and its nation of origin, Programmed Viewership extends this insight by emphasizing that production constitutes only one dimension of a broader programmatic system.

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cover of Seriality and Social Change

Seriality and Social Change

Peter Hitchcock

Seagull Books, 2025

Can revolution unfold in chapters? Seriality has long shaped how we read, think, and act; Peter Hitchcock explores how it structures both knowledge and social change.

From Karl Marx’s decision to publish Capital in serial form to contemporary adaptations in manga and graphic novels, Seriality and Social Change examines how serialization both democratizes knowledge and shapes the very process of social transformation. Peter Hitchcock delves into the paradox of the serial: while it can expand access to radical thought, it can also impose structural limits, slowing or containing the revolutionary potential it seeks to unleash.

Through a sweeping analysis that links literature and political economy, Hitchcock explores how serialized narratives frame, sustain, or even hinder movements for change. Does seriality mirror the mechanics of capitalism, or can it be a tool for subverting them? Engaging with this question across genres and forms, Seriality and Social Change invites readers to rethink how revolution is told and imagined over time.
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