Author Description

In an attempt to bridge the gap between theory and practice in postmodern studies, the essays that make up this volume illuminate some of the issues central to this provocative analytic approach. These works apply theory to practical subjects and, in the process, articulate new theoretical positions. Originally appearing in the pioneering, peer-reviewed electronic journal Postmodern Culture, these essays are collected here for the first time in one volume. Topics include the relations between food and the symbolic, AIDS and individuality, Marxist politics in the context of postmodernism, the consequences of technology for publishing, the idea of genre in hypertext and the new cinema, the limits of the networked body, the construction of ethnicity and gender in new literary work, and the politics of culture in Russian and Latin America. Idiosyncratic, risky, and inventive, the contributors bring fresh and unusual energy to an anthology that will delight anyone interested in the application of postmodernist analysis to language, art, and culture.