Continuing our tour of Chicago’s outdoor architectural sites with the Guide to Chicago’s Twenty-First-Century Architecture, by the Chicago Architecture Center and John Hill. See here for the first entry in the series. Photo: BalloggPhoto.comPing Tom Memorial Park Boathouse and Fieldhouse 300 West 19th Street, 1700 South Wentworth Chicago’s historic role as the country’s railroad hub offers plenty of opportunities for reimagining old rail property. For example, Ping Tom Memorial Park sits on a former rail yard alongside the Chicago River. From the Guide: “The southern half opened in 1999 per a ..read more

Acquiring Editor: Dominique J. Moore Series Editors: Jane Desmond and Virginia R, Dominguez The University of Illinois Press and The International Forum for U.S. Studies (IFUSS) are pleased to sponsor the series Global Studies of the United States. IFUSS is a research center founded by Desmond and Dominguez whose goal, since 1995, has been to foreground the extraordinary amount of scholarly expertise on the United States produced by academics outside the US. Despite the so-called “transnational turn” in US Studies, works by scholars based outside the United States still remain under ..read more

Architecture in Chicago brings the awe. But maybe you want to mix in some nature while visiting the city. Thankfully, the Guide to Chicago’s Twenty-First-Century Architecture pays special attention to sites offering fresh air and outdoorsy vibrations. This is the first in a series of architecture-oriented posts highlighting where to find oases amidst the steel, glass, and concrete. Photo: Eric Allix Rogers, CAC Archive Nature Boardwalk at Lincoln Park Zoo North Stockton Drive between West LaSalle Drive and West Dickens Avenue The Lincoln Park Zoo and its environs have changed a lot since your ..read more

We are pleased to announce that the audiobook of  Unlikely Angel: The Songs of Dolly Parton by Lydia R. Hamessley is an Earphones Award Winner from AudioFile Magazine. The audiobook, read by Janet Metzger, was published by Tantor Media in September 2021. The award is given by AudioFile Magazine to “truly exceptional titles that excel in narrative voice and style, characterizations, suitability to audio, and enhancement of the text.” The post Audiobook of Unlikely Angel wins Earphones Award appeared first on Illinois Press Blog ..read more

November’s free ebook is here! We’re giving away Ritual Soundings: Women Performers and World Religions by Sarah Weiss. The women of communities in Hindu India and Christian Orthodox Finland alike offer lamentations and mockery during wedding rituals. Around the world, women actively claim agency through performance during such ritual events. In Ritual Soundings, Sarah Weiss reads deeply into and across the ethnographic details of multiple studies while offering a robust framework for studying music and world religion.  Her meta-ethnography reveals surprising patterns of similarity betwe ..read more

We are pleased to announce Between Fitness and Death: Disability and Slavery in the Caribbean by Stefanie Hunt-Kennedy has been awarded the Outstanding Book Award of 2021 from the Disability History Association. The Disability History Association described the book as as “an insightful and powerful study” that looks to early modern West Indian slavery and the legal exploitation of black bodies to argue that “slavery disabled the human.” It is “methodologically rich,” “elegantly and thoroughly researched, argued, and written,” and expands scholarly capacities for attending to the interconnecti ..read more

Whatever industry group planted National Chocolate Day on October 28 did a great job. There’s no better positioning than a few days before Halloween. It’s the holiday dedicated to candy of all kinds—the holiday where, let’s be honest, chocolate bars are the best items you can get. Admittedly, chocolate does not face overwhelming competition from Bit O’ Honey and dots on wax paper. The only true challenge comes from the likes of Sour Patch Kids and Starbursts. That is to say, products manufactured precisely to the strange metabolisms of grade schoolers. But the majority of trick-or-treaters rum ..read more

Welcome to the 2021 Society for Ethnomusicology virtual exhibit! Enjoy journals, books, author interviews, and more. Use promo code SEM21 for 50% off all ethnomusicology books on our website October 27-31, 2021. And, when you buy three books, you’ll get a free copy of the journal Jazz & Culture. Proud Publisher of the Official Journal of the SEM, Ethnomusicology As the official journal of the Society for Ethnomusicology,  Ethnomusicology is the premier publication in the field. Its scholarly articles represent current theoretical perspectives and research in eth ..read more

Peter J. Hoesing, author of Kusamira Music in Uganda: Spirit Mediumship and Ritual Healing, answers questions on his scholarly influences, discoveries, and reader takeaways in his book. Q: Why did you decide to write this book?  There’s a rich African Studies literature across anthropology, history, religious studies, and philosophy on ways of knowing and being in this region, but so few of them address music as a lens for these repertories of knowledge and action. Chicago Studies in Ethnomusicology has done some fantastic publishing with other ethnomusicologists working with trance and ..read more

Disruptive Archives: Feminist Memories of Resistance in Latin America’s Dirty Wars by Viviana Beatriz MacManus was recognized by the National Women’s Studies Association with an Honorable Mention for the 2021 Gloria E. Anzaldúa Book Prize. The NWSA Gloria E. Anzaldúa Book Prize is award for groundbreaking scholarship in women’s studies that makes significant multicultural feminist contributions to women of color/transnational scholarship. Congratulations Dr. MacManus! The post Disruptive Archives receives honorable mention for Gloria E. Anzaldúa Book Prize. appeared first on Illinois Press Bl ..read more