Avatar, Southern Gateways, & Disney Princesses: Around the Internet
Happy Friday, readers! Here at UNC Press, we’re finishing up our book launch week–planning out our titles for Fall 2010. The books we plan to put on the shelves in 2010 have us very excited, and we know you’ll enjoy them.
In the meantime though, we thought it would be good to highlight some of the interesting events happening across the Internet recently, both in and out of the UNC Press world:
- First up, head over to the UNC Press Blog’s friend, First Peoples: New Directions in Indigenous Studies, for a thorough critique of Avatar, James Cameron’s high-grossing film, by Aboriginal Studies professor and fantasy writer Daniel Heath Justice. Justice’s writing is illuminating, pointing out the successes and eventual shortcomings of the Pocahontas-like story. Commenting on the movie’s examination of colonialism, Justice says, “[Avatar is] powerful in so many ways, but why do we need yet another story about Indigenous struggle told through a non-Native’s voice and perspective?” Take the time to read the entire post.
- Are you interested in UNC Tar Heel basketball? The history of blues music? How about the North Carolina coast, or the best recipe for Cherokee persimmon cake? If so, go now to UNC Press’ Southern Gateways page, where you can find all the information for the best South-centric titles from UNC Press.
- Disney’s Lump of Coal: Back to movie reviews, Anthea Butler brings the heat in her essay on the latest installment in the Disney Princess franchise. Writing on Religion Dispatches, Butler’s critique is scathing, saying, “Disney’s The Princess and the Frog picks up where Katrina left off. The movie is a wholesale desecration of New Orleans, Creole culture, Cajun culture, religion, zydeco, and even Louis Armstrong.” Anthea Butler’s book, Women in the Church of God in Christ: Making a Sanctified World, is a UNC Press publication.
- Finally, by popular request, here is a picture of a bespectacled dog reading a book.
Strangely, the book does not look dog-eared.