Heroes and heroic discourse have gained new visibility in the twenty-first century. This is noted in recent research on the heroic, but it has been largely ignored that heroism is increasingly a global phenomenon both in terms of production and consumption. This edited collection aims to bridge this research void and brings together case studies by scholars from different parts of the world and diverse fields. They explore how transnational and transcultural processes of translation and adaptation shape notions of the heroic in non-Western and Western cultures alike. The book provides fresh perspectives on heroism studies and offers a new angle for global and postcolonial studies.

This book explores how British culture is negotiating heroes and heroisms in the twenty-first century. It posits a nexus between the heroic and the state of the nation and explores this idea through British television drama. Drawing on case studies including programmes such as The Last Kingdom, Spooks, Luther and Merlin, the book explores the aesthetic strategies of heroisation in television drama and contextualises the programmes within British public discourses at the time of their production, original broadcasting and first reception. British television drama is a cultural forum in which contemporary Britain’s problems, wishes and cultural values are revealed and debated. By revealing the tensions in contemporary notions of heroes and heroisms, television drama employs the heroic as a lens through which to scrutinise contemporary British society and its responses to crisis and change. Looking back on the development of heroic representations in British television drama over the last twenty years, this book’s analyses show how heroisation in television drama reacts to, and reveals shifts in, British structures of feeling in a time marked by insecurity. The book is ideal for readers interested in British cultural studies, studies of the heroic and popular culture.

The rhetoric of heroism pervades politics. Political leaders invoke their own heroic credentials, soldiers are celebrated at sporting events, ordinary citizens become state symbols (or symbols of opposition), and high profile celebrities embody a glamorized, humanitarian heroism. Using analytical tools drawn from international relations, gender studies, war studies, history, and comparative politics, this book examines the cultural and political phenomenon of heroism and its relationship to the process of creating, sustaining and challenging political communities. Arguing that heroism is socially constructed and relational, the contributors demonstrate that heroes and heroic narratives always serve particular interests in the ways that they create and uphold certain images of states and other political communities. Studying the heroes that have been sanctioned by a community tells us important things about that community, including how it sees itself, its values and its pressing needs at a particular moment. Conversely, understanding those who are presented in opposition to heroes (victims, demonized opponents), or who become the heroes of resistance movements, can also tell us a great deal about the politics of a state or a regime. Heroes are at once the institutionalization of political power, and yet amorphous--one can go from being a hero to a villain in short order. This book will appeal to scholars and students working on topics related to international relations, gender, security and war studies, comparative politics, state building, and political communities.

Home front heroism investigates how civilians were recognised and celebrated as heroic during the Second World War. Through a focus on London, this book explores how heroism was manufactured as civilians adopted roles in production, protection and defence, through the use of uniforms and medals, and through the way that civilians were injured and killed. This book makes a novel contribution to the study of heroism by exploring the spatial, material, corporeal and ritualistic dimensions of heroic representations. By tracing the different ways that home front heroism was cultivated on a national, local and personal level, this study promotes new ways of thinking about the meaning and value of heroism during periods of conflict. It will appeal to anyone interested in the social and cultural history of Second World War as well as the sociology and psychology of heroism.

Support certain conclusions about heroes: All cultures have them; all cultures need them; and who or what is considered heroic may vary from culture to culture. This book provides a survey and stimulates the consideration of continuity and change with regard to heroes.

The ideologies and practices of various populist movements are centered on issues of gender, especially idealized notions of masculinity. Offering cultural, political, and historical approaches from a range of interdisciplinary and international perspectives, The Culture and Politics of Populist Masculinities analyzes articulations and performances that link populism to masculinity. In particular, the collection studies political participation in the form of public debates, media, and popular culture. The authors emphasize that in order to understand what can be defined as populism, we need to look at the culture that it inhabits and the efforts to claim, challenge, and reclaim the popular. Writing from a wide range of international contexts, the contributors to The Culture and Politics of Populist Masculinities explore how populist masculinities are articulated and performed, whether there is something problematic about a specifically masculine populism, and whether there is hope for a pluralist, inclusive, even progressive form of masculine populism. Culture and Politics of Populist Masculinities’ international range of contributors explore how populist masculinities are articulated and performed, whether there is something problematic about a specifically masculine populism, and whether there is hope for a pluralist, inclusive, even progressive form of masculine populism.

Musical Culture and the Spirit of Irish Nationalism is the first comprehensive history of music’s relationship with Irish nationalist politics. Addressing rebel songs, traditional music and dance, national anthems and protest song, the book draws upon an unprecedented volume of material to explore music’s role in cultural and political nationalism in modern Ireland. From the nineteenth-century Young Irelanders, the Fenians, the Home Rule movement, Sinn Féin and the Anglo-Irish War to establishment politics in independent Ireland and civil rights protests in Northern Ireland, this wide-ranging survey considers music’s importance and its limitations across a variety of political movements.