Drawing together intensive case studies from an international group of scholars, the editors explore the impact of colonial contact with other cultures on the material culture of both the colonized and the imperial nation.

Beethoven's Third Symphony, originally entitled "Bonaparte", now bears the title "Eroica" ("Heroic"). Napoleon promised an Enlightened Europe but ultimately Beethoven was disillusioned by him. This handbook treats the politics, aesthetics, reception, and musical meaning of this decisive work, which, because of its unique design, powerfully expanded the potential of symphonic expression. Beethoven's ideals, derived largely from the writings of Friedrich Schiller and clearly perceived already by the composer's contemporaries, are readily apparent in the music.

Drawing together an international group of scholars from a variety of disciplinary and cultural backgrounds, Colonialism and the Object explores the impact of colonial contact with other cultures on the material culture of both the colonized and the imperial nation. The book includes intensive case-studies of objects from India, Pakistan, New Zealand, China and Africa, all of which were collected by, or exhibited in, the institutions of the British Empire, and key chapters address issues of radical identity across cultural barriers, and the hybird styles of objects which can emerge when cultures meet. Colonialism and the Object is essential reading for all those interested in post-colonial theory, museum studies, material culture and design history.

Anthropologists of the senses have long argued that cultures differ in their sensory registers. This groundbreaking volume applies this idea to material culture and the social practices that endow objects with meanings in both colonial and postcolonial relationships. It challenges the privileged position of the sense of vision in the analysis of material culture. Contributors argue that vision can only be understood in relation to the other senses. In this they present another challenge to the assumed western five-sense model, and show how our understanding of material culture in both historical and contemporary contexts might be reconfigured if we consider the role of smell, taste, touch and sound, as well as sight, in making meanings about objects.

This pioneering study charts the one-way traffic of cultural and historical objects during five centuries of European colonialism. Former colonies consider this as a historical injustice that has not been undone.