Jay-Z and Kanye West’s 2011 Watch the Throne is a self-avowed “luxury rap” album centered on Eurocentric conceptions of nobility, artistry, and haute couture. Critical Excess performs a close reading of the sonic and social commentary on this album, examining how the album alternately imagines and critiques the mutually reinforcing ideas of Europe, nobility, old money, art, and their standard bearer, whiteness. Reading the album alongside Black critical theory and work on the prophetic nature of music, Rollefson argues that through their performance of black excellence, opulence, and decadence, Jay-Z and Kanye West poured gas on the white resentment of the Obama presidency—a resentment that would ultimately spill over into public life, make audible the dog whistling of the Far Right, and embolden white supremacists to come out from under their rocks. Ultimately, Rollefson argues, Jay-Z and Kanye West’s performance of what Rollefson calls “critical excess” on this hip hop album exceeds the limits of conspicuous consumption and heralds the final stage of late capitalism—“the New Gilded Age.”

This lucidly written book looks at the interpretative audacity of five major "overreaders"Jacques Derrida, Gilles Deleuze, Emmanuel Levinas, Slavoj i ek and Stanley Cavelland asks what is at stake and what is to be gained by their approaches to literature and film."

Jay-Z and Kanye West's death dance for capitalism

Several ceramic parts have already proven their suitability for serial application in automobile engines in very impressive ways, especially in Japan, the USA and in Germany. However, there is still a lack of economical quality assurance concepts. Recently, a new generation of ceramic components, for the use in energy, transportation and environment systems, has been developed. The efforts are more and more system oriented in this field. The only possibility to manage this complex issue in the future will be interdisciplinary cooperation. Chemists, physicists, material scientists, process engineers, mechanical engineers and engine manufacturers will have to cooperate in a more intensive way than ever before. The R&D activities are still concentrating on gas turbines and reciprocating engines, but also on brakes, bearings, fuel cells, batteries, filters, membranes, sensors and actuators as well as on shaping and cutting tools for low expense machining of ceramic components. This book summarizes the scientific papers of the 7th International Symposium "Ceramic Materials and Components for Engines". Some of the most fascinating new applications of ceramic meterials in energy, transportation and environment systems are presented. The proceedings shall lead to new ideas for interdisciplinary activities in the future.

In engineering design and development, reliable and accurate computational methods are requested to replace or complement expensive and time consuming experimental trial and error work. Tremendous advancements have been achieved during recent years due to improved numerical solutions of non-linear partial differential equations and computer developments to achieve efficient and rapid calculations. Nevertheless, to further progress in computational methods will require developments in theoretical and predictive procedures – both basic and innovative – and in applied research. Accurate experimental investigations are needed to validate the numerical calculations. This book contains the edited versions of the papers presented at the Tenth International Conference on Advanced Computational Methods and Experimental Measurements in Heat Transfer and Mass Transfer held in Maribor, Slovenia in July 2008. The objective of this conference series is to provide a forum for presentation and discussion of advanced topics, new approaches and application of advanced computational methods and experimental measurements to heat and mass transfer problems. The contributed papers are grouped in the following appropriate sections to provide better access for readers: Natural and forced convection; Heat exchangers; Advances in computational methods; Heat recovery; Heat transfer; Modelling and experiments.