Founded in 1956, Penn State University Press publishes rigorously reviewed, high-quality works of scholarship and books of regional and contemporary interest, with a focus on the humanities and social sciences. The publishing arm of the Pennsylvania State University and a division of the Penn State University Libraries, the Press promotes the advance of scholarship by disseminating knowledge—new information, interpretations, methods of analysis—widely in books, journals, and digital publications.
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A collection of essays examining literary discussions of the role of science, focusing on the interactions between processes of knowledge formation and the socioeconomic and political spheres.
Explores literature and film about petroleum as a genre of world literature, focusing on the ubiquity of oil as well as the cultural response to petroleum in postcolonial states.
Lippmann, Dewey, and Democracy in the Twenty-First Century
Almost one hundred years have passed since Walter Lippmann and John Dewey published their famous reflections on the "problems of the public," but their thoughts remain surprisingly relevant as resources for thinking through our current crisis-plagued predicament. This book takes stock of the reception history of Lippmann's and Dewey's ideas about ......
Explores the work of professional blues musician Lonnie Johnson, demonstrating how his recorded works reveal lyrical and musical themes that call into question critical assumptions about the genre.
Manifesting Illness and Impairment in Graphic Pathography
In Show Me Where It Hurts, Monica Chiu argues that graphic pathography-long-form comics by and about subjects who suffer from disease or are impaired-re-vitalizes and re-visions various negatively affected corporeal states through hand-drawn images. By the body and for the body, the medium is subversive and reparative, and it stands in ......
Applies contemporary rhetorical analysis to mathematical discourse, calling into question the commonly held view that math equals truth. Explores how mathematical innovation has historically relied on rhetorical practices of making meaning, such as analogy, metaphor, and invention.
A Renaissance Treatise on the Healing Properties of Gemstones
In early modern Europe precious and semiprecious stones were valued not only for their beauty and rarity but also for their medical and magical properties. Lorenzo de' Medici, Philip II of Spain, and Popes Leo X and Clement VII were all treated with expensive potions incorporating ground gems such as rubies, diamonds, and emeralds. Medical and ......
