Performance Books

I have been researching performance poetry as a historical predecessor to Slam poetry. I think I found something better than slam, and it is performance poetry. I have to recommend this CD of the someone who is called the original performance poet, Hedwig Gorski, because she made up the term to publicize what she started doing in the late 1970s. There is a great book out linked in this review that shows how she started with what she called in a recent interview as "neo-verse drama" coupled with "conceptual art." You don't hear about literary artists doing anything this new and daring anymore. Here is a link to the book if you want to read about something so bizarre and unexpected, that it will spin your ideas about poetry around 360 degrees.
Intoxication: Heathcliff on Powell Street
The band work like that in the "Clown" CD comes after the performance poetry theater events archived in the book. If anything, it sounds much more radio friendly and even entertaining. She comes "as close to singing as anyone can without really singing," a playwright wrote of Gorski vocals. It is really something that should be part of every slam poet's collection. Has anyone been thinking that all the slam poets are beginnig to sound the same? How about Def Poets? Are they all beginnning to deliver the same style of poems and voice inflections? I think so. That is why performance poetry is so much better than slam. Especially the one and only original performance poet, so-called, on the CD. Gotta hear it and own it before the CDs disappear. Really a treat.

This is a good primer for those interested in supplements and nutrients for living long, good physical, and mental health. The book doesn't go terribly deep into any one nutrient but does give clear, easy to understand information on the major nutrients, supplements, and "smart" drugs (also gives info on where to get them).

I find the recipe portion of the book a complete waste, but can see how some might find it useful.

If you know someone who is interested in taking supplements to live longer or healthier - then you need to get them this book - they will love it!

This is a great book for anyone that deals with athletes. Great source for answers to any questions !

Using eigenvector analysis of the input/output matrix of an economy the author is able to show, among other things, what sectors of the economy are exploiting other sectors by over pricing. A detailed review is contained in my book PQOLVOL1, available at the website era2000.net

Seton's method has been used to analyze issues in decontrol in Russia and Eastern Europe (Michael Kaser, The Economic Journal v. 100 (June 1990), 596-615), and to evaluate aspects of the South African economy (D. E. N. van Seventer and F. D. van Niekerk, The South African Journal of Economics, v. 59, No. 1, March 1991.

I have read the 1985 edition, but not the 1992 edition.

This is an author who is as much ahead of his time as William Vickrey was in his 1961 landmark paper.

EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION:COACHING BASKETBALL SUCCESSFULLY by Dr.Gil Smith is a compact manual designed for both coaches and athletes. Its initial appearance is enticing and readers do not wonder if they will have time to read it and put it aside for future reading. Compiled in seventy-seven pages, Dr. Smith's book may be read during one sitting, and re-read either in its entirety or with focus on selected information without time-stress. Devoid of wordiness and verbiage, this manual is entirely reader directed.

All information is reinforced at the end of each chapter by Communication Tryouts consisting of five questions that test readers' digestion of main points. These Tryouts may be checked with the author's Answer Keys. Dr. Smith has conveyed information on five major topics: "Coaches Know This," "Basics in Communication," "Clearly Stated (Almost) Everything You Need to Know About Messages," "The Learning Process," and "The Coach as Change Agent." To further reinforce content and fix main points, he has included brief descriptions of each chapter.

EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION:COACHING BASKETBALL SUCCESSFULLY by Gil Smith, Ph.D, and contributors Elinor A. Smith,Ph.D, and Michael Sachs,Ph.D, offer a "Must Own" Manual modeled for persons involved in or interested in basketball as coaches or participants.

Sandra E. Bowen
Retired College Professor
Author

All of the books written by Blaine and Lisa Ray are great. I have them used them with students from middle school to adults and they're an excellent tool. The price that they are sold at [..]. I would buy them there.

I found this book to be superbly written. The author covers all aspects of thyrister controlled converters and inverters. He has tremendous knowledge of the subjet.

After reading this book, I've come to completely understand particular characteristics of electric motors. Some examples are: the four quadrant operation of motors; dynamic and regenerative braking, and the difference between the two; and voltage control of motors.

Although I've worked with wound rotor motors I've never seen one with a "slip power energy recovery scheme". This book details such schemes which is very interesting.

The cycloconverter is shown throughout this book which I find extremely interesting. Siemens uses the cycloconverter in their marine electric propulsion systems. I now know more about the cycloconverter.

This is one outstanding book.

A magnificent accomplishment that spans fields, ideas, and phiiosophies and makes for compelling reading. Smart, insightful, funny, wide-ranging.

Sandra Gustafson's 2000 book, "Eloquence Is Power," seeks through historical reconstructions of key figures and key moments, to recuperate the dramatic influence of oratory in the formation of America. Complementing and complicating the established American mythos surrounding founding documents like the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, Gustafson explores the dynamic and dialectic of what she terms the 'performance semiotic' and its impact on American culture from its earliest figurations to the present day. Gustafson defines the performance semiotic as the historical interplay between speech and text, which 'performs social conflict,' setting the stage for a broader notion of cultural interplay between racial and gendered identities, and between religious and political sensibilities. Utilizing a broad spectrum of theoretical frameworks, Gustafson incorporates models of gender performativity, critical race studies, and generous historical contexts to situate her reevaluation of American history.

"Eloquence Is Power" cleverly constructs its arguments in the framework of the performance semiotic: each chapter focuses centrally on two, sometimes three key figures at a particular historical moment who enact the struggle for linguistic primacy and social control through, and increasingly, in the mutual involvement of orature and literature. Eschewing the popular teleological view of a cultural progression from `savage' speech to 'civilized' writing, Gustafson claims that not only are the two insistently linked throughout the history of early America, but that each develops with notable contributions from Euro-American, Native American, and African-American, and sources. The central question of the book concerns power relations and their respective derivations. In the religious and political realms that provide consistent loci of cultural tension for Gustafson, inspiration and textual precedent are both at odds and variously incorporated in disputes over who has legitimate authority.

Beginning with the friction between Anglicanism (text-centered) and Puritanism (speech-centered) and their early efforts at conversion of the Native Americans, Gustafson shows how the supposed universality of the prepared text and the supposed appeal to the individual from extempore speech form a paradigmatic conflict that is repeated throughout American history. The following chapters detail the ways in which gendered and racialized modes of access to divine and scriptural authority provisionally threaten, but are tenuously contained by public displays of white male power. Publicly enacted debates over the relevance of feminine piety to religious communities ensue in the interstices of the ongoing performance semiotic between the arenas of speech and text.

In her account of Euro-American encounters with racial others, Gustafson discusses the appropriation of 'savage' performances in the religious conversion of Native and African-American populations. Aspects of these include the gesticular performances, and ritual qualities of both Native and African religious ceremony, manifesting itself as mimicry with a difference in the mobility and adaptability, and even linguistic translations of Euro-American itinerant preachers and missionaries. Of course, the mimicry with a difference is primarily attributed to 'Othered' American subjects, as shown in Gustafson's discussions of the careers of Samson Occom and John Marrant, who incorporate Euro-American evangelical styles hybridized with Native custom to serve and alter the interests of Euro-American Christianity. Gustafson clearly delineates the methods by which colonial authority maintains a cautious relationship toward the potential ascendancy and potential threat posed by the exploited Native, the enslaved African, and the suppressed woman.

Turning to the American revolutionary moment, The mixing of oratorical and textual modes troubles and defies any teleological notion of American national development through the spread of print media alone. The two, for Gustafson, are mutually-sustaining, continually challenging and reinforcing each other. The primacy of the body as semantic vessel returns in the pre-revolutionary period as the Boston Massacre furnishes revolutionary orators, writers, and engravers with an occasion to exercise their eloquence against insupportable English forms of tyrannical control. Deftly, the argument shows how public sentiment in the years following the Boston Massacre and the tradition of annual oratorical remembrances elide the initial identification of racial scapegoats, turning all of the American casualties into martyrs in the struggle for American independence. In the aftermath of independence, Gustafson shows how nothing was cleanly resolved by either the Declaration or the Constitution, as public debate raged in the form of party politics concerning the appropriate form that the new American government should take, as well as in an examination of George Washington's presidency and beyond.

Gustafson's "Eloquence is Power" is a fascinating reassessment of early American history at the intersections of literature and orature. In recuperating the influence of women and ethnic minorities on the formation of the American public sphere, Gustafson offers an inclusive and important study. Professor Gustafson's prose is lucid and devoid of academic jargon, making her arguments easy to understand and follow throughout the book. "Eloquence is Power" is a book that is informative, accessible, and enjoyable.

This book gives helpful hints and reasons for all ages and stages of children's behavior. It helped me understand and motivate my students using the STEW method and taught me how and why their "cups" need to be emptied. Empty the Cup gave me "permission" to allow my students to share their ideas and rid themselves of much of their pent-up emotions and energies on mornings (or anytime) learning was the last thing on their young minds. If you ever get the opportunity to see and hear Dr. Mendes be sure to take it. He's even more inspiring in person.