Guest Contributor

Michel Pastoureau’s ‘Yellow: The History of a Color’ (By the Book)

Michel Pastoureau’s ‘Yellow: The History of a Color’ (By the Book)

Focusing on European societies, with comparisons from East Asia, India, Africa, and South America, Yellow tells the intriguing story of the color's evolving place in art, religion, fashion, literature, and science. Enjoy this excerpt of historian Michel Pastoureau's Yellow: The History of a Color, courtesy of Princeton University Press.

Abjection Incorporated: Mediating the Politics of Pleasure and Violence (By the Book)

Abjection Incorporated: Mediating the Politics of Pleasure and Violence (By the Book)

Escaping abjection's usual confines of psychoanalysis and aesthetic modernism, the contributors to Abjection Incorporated examine a range of media, including literature, photography, film, television, talking dolls, comics, and manga. Enjoy this generous excerpt, courtesy of Duke University Press.

PROTEST! A History of Social and Political Protest Graphics (By the Book)

PROTEST! A History of Social and Political Protest Graphics (By the Book)

From the French, Mexican, and Sandinista revolutions to the American civil rights movement, nuclear disarmament, and the Women's March of 2017, PROTEST!, by Liz McQuiston, documents the integral role of the visual arts in passionate efforts for change. Enjoy this excerpt, courtesy of Princeton University Press.

The City Beneath: A Century of Los Angeles Graffiti (By the Book)

The City Beneath: A Century of Los Angeles Graffiti (By the Book)

With discussions of characters like Leon Ray Livingston (a.k.a. "A-No. 1"), credited with consolidating the entire system of hobo communication in the 1910s, and Kathy Zuckerman, better known as the surf icon "Gidget", Susan A. Phillips' lavishly illustrated The City Beneath: A Century of Los Angeles Graffiti, excerpted here from Yale University Press, tells stories of small moments that collectively build into broad statements about power, memory, landscape, and history itself.