A collection of writings discussing the mutual influence between Scandinavian and European politics, culture and society both during and after the Viking Age.

The Cold War was not only about the imperial ambitions of the super powers, their military strategies, and antagonistic ideologies. It was also about conflicting worldviews and their correlates in the daily life of the societies involved. The term “Cold War Culture” is often used in a broad sense to describe media influences, social practices, and symbolic representations as they shape, and are shaped by, international relations. Yet, it remains in question whether — or to what extent — the Cold War Culture model can be applied to European societies, both in the East and the West. While every European country had to adapt to the constraints imposed by the Cold War, individual development was affected by specific conditions as detailed in these chapters. This volume offers an important contribution to the international debate on this issue of the Cold War impact on everyday life by providing a better understanding of its history and legacy in Eastern and Western Europe.

The Seven Years' War (1754–1763) was a pivotal event in the history of the Atlantic world. Perspectives on the significance of the war and its aftermath varied considerably from different cultural vantage points. Northern and western Indians, European imperial authorities, and their colonial counterparts understood and experienced the war (known in the United States as the French and Indian War) in various ways. In many instances the progress of the conflict was charted by cultural differences and the implications participants drew from cultural encounters. It is these cultural encounters, their meaning in the context of the Seven Years' War, and their impact on the war and its diplomatic settlement that are the subjects of this volume. Cultures in Conflict: The Seven Years' War in North America addresses the broad pattern of events that framed this conflict's causes, the intercultural dynamics of its conduct, and its profound impact on subsequent events—most notably the American Revolution and a protracted Anglo-Indian struggle for continental control. Warren R. Hofstra has gathered the best of contemporary scholarship on the war and its social and cultural history. The authors examine the viewpoints of British and French imperial authorities, the issues motivating Indian nations in the Ohio Valley, the matter of why and how French colonists fought, the diplomatic and social world of Iroquois Indians, and the responses of British colonists to the conflict. The result of these efforts is a dynamic historical approach in which cultural context provides a rationale for the well-established military and political narrative of the Seven Years' War. These synthetic and interpretive essays mark out new territory in our understanding of the Seven Years' War as we recognize its 250th anniversary.

American culture has been one of the most controversial exports of the United States: greeted with enthusiasm by some, with hostility by others. Yet, few societies escape its influence. However, not all changes should be interpreted simply as "Americanization." The shaping of the postwar world has been much more complex than this term implies as is shown in this volume that explores the links between Americanization and modernity in Western Europe and Japan. In considering the impact of products and images ranging from movies and music to fashion and architecture, a multi-disciplinary group of contributors asks how American culture has been employed internationally in the articulation of postwar identities - be they national or subnational, socially sanctioned or socially transgressive. Their essays on France, Italy, Germany and Japan move beyond the simple paradigms of colonization and democratic modernization, yet retain a sensitivity to the asymmetries in the postwar power relationships between these countries and the United States. An extensive introduction historically locates changing interpretations of American influences abroad and suggests the problems and promises of "Americanization" as an analytical tool. Its comparative focus and interdisciplinary scope will appeal to a wide range of students and scholars of cold war and post-cold war history.

Five specialists examine the historical relationship of culture and conflict in various regional societies. The authors use Adda B. Bozeman's theories on conflict and culture as the basis for their analyses of the causes, nature, and conduct of war and conflict in the Soviet Union, the Middle East, Sinic Asia (China, Japan, and Vietnam), Latin America, and Africa. Drs. Blank, Lawrence Grinter, Karl P. Magyar, Lewis B. Ware, and Bynum E. Weathers conclude that non-Western cultures and societies do not reject war but look at violence and conflict as a normal and legitimate aspect of sociopolitical behavior.

Built around key events, from the eviction of a self-managed social centre in Copenhagen in 2007 to the Climate Summit protests in 2009, this book contributes to anthropological literature on contemporary Euro-American politics foreshadowing recent waves of public dissent. Stine Krøijer explores political forms among left radical and anarchist activists in Northern Europe focusing on how forms of action engender time. Drawing on anthropological literature from both Scandinavia and the Amazon, this ethnography recasts theoretical concerns about body politics, political intentionality, aesthetics, and time.