Superheroes have been the major genre to emerge from comics and graphic novels, saturating popular culture with images of muscular men and sexy women. A major aspect of this genre is identity in the roles played by individuals, the development of identities through extended stories and in the ways the characters inspire audiences. This collection analyses stories from popular comics franchises such as Batman, Captain America, Ms Marvel and X-Men, alongside less well known comics such as Kabuki and Flex Mentallo. It explores what superhero narratives can reveal about our attitudes towards femininity, race, maternity, masculinity and queer culture. Using this approach, the volume asks questions such as why there are no black supervillains in mainstream comics, how second wave feminism and feminist film theory may help us to understand female comic book characters, the ways in which Flex Mentallo transcends the boundaries of straightness and gayness and how both fans and industry appropriate the sexual identity of superheroes. The book was originally published in a special issue of the Journal of Graphic Novels and Comics.

This volume presents advanced studies that consider the fundamental difference of urban center versus decentralization that operates in the cities of New York and Los Angeles, while comparing politics and culture in each area.

The fifth edition of this text presents a balanced review of the ecological arguments that the urban arena produces unique experiential and urban-based cultural effects while exploring the broader political and economic contexts that produce and modify the urban environment. In addition to examining the urban dimensions of such topics as community formation and continuity, minority and majority dynamics, ethnic experience, poverty, power, and crime, it provides an analysis of the spatial distribution of population and resources with regard to the metropolitanization of the urban form, and the interaction between urban concentration and development and underdevelopment. From a first chapter that begins with a discussion of some of the more micrological features of the urban experience, the text focuses on the significance of the more macrological cultural, social organizational, and political dimensions of urban change, in an historical span that includes the first cities and concludes with an exploration of the implications of cyberspace, transnationalism, and global terrorism for the future of urban sociology. While the work focuses primarily on the North American case, its analytical and integrated discussion makes it applicable to urban societies in general.

This valuable resource provides the most comprehensive and useful compilation of weather data available in print. Published every 10 years, Weather America provides immediate access to extensive data on over 2,000 weather stations across the nation, weath

Designed to reach a wide audience of scholars and policymakers, this new series contains studies on urban sprawl, crime, taxes, education, poverty, and related subjects. Contents of the second issue include: "Decentralized Employment and the Transformation of the American City" Edward Glaeser (Brookings Institution) and Matthew Kahn (Columbia University) "Urban Sprawl: Lessons from Urban Economics" Jan K. Brueckner (University of Illinois) "Can Boosting Minority Car-Ownership Rates Narrow Inter-Racial Employment Gaps? Steven Raphael (University of California, Berkeley) and Michael Stoll (UCLA) "The Effects of Urban Poverty on Educational Outcomes: Evidence from a Randomized Experiment" Jens Ludwig (Georgetown University), Helen F. Ladd (Duke University), and Greg J. Duncan (Northwestern University) "Explaining Recent Declines in Food Stamp Program Participation" Janet Currie and Jeffrey Grogger (UCLA and NBER) "Racial Minorities and the Geography of Self-Employment" Dan Black, Douglas Holtz-Eakin, and Stuart Rosenthal (Syracuse University)