Air Travel Fiction and Film

Air Travel Fiction and Film: Cloud People explores how, over the past four decades, fiction and film have transformed our perceptions and representations of contemporary air travel. Adopting an interdisciplinary approach, the book provides a comprehensive analysis of a wide range of international cultural productions, and elucidates the paradigms and narratives that constitute our current imaginary of air mobility. Erica Durante advances the hypothesis that fiction and film have converted the Airworldthe world of airplanes and airport infrastructuresinto a pivotal anthropological place that is endowed with social significance and identity, suggesting that the assimilation of the sky into our cultural imaginary and lifestyle has metamorphosed human society into Cloud People. In its examination of the representations of air travel as an epicenter of today's world, the book not only illustrates a novel perspective on contemporary fiction, but fills an important gap in the study of globalization within literary and film studies.

Studies air travel from a range of perspectives including sociology, anthropology, architecture, and contemporary philosophy in addition to literature and cinema Establishes how contemporary lifestyle patterns and infrastructure has evolved and how this is illustrated in our air travel practices Highlights the outcomes of globalization in narratives of developed countries as well as the Global South

Auteur

Erica Durante is Visiting Associate Professor of Latin American and Caribbean Studies at Brown University, USA. She is the author of two books, several edited books, and numerous articles in the fields of Comparative Literature and Global Studies.

Texte du rabat

Air Travel Fiction and Film: Cloud People explores how, over the past four decades, fiction and film have transformed our perceptions and representations of contemporary air travel. Adopting an interdisciplinary approach, the book provides a comprehensive analysis of a wide range of international cultural productions, and elucidates the paradigms and narratives that constitute our current imaginary of air mobility. Erica Durante advances the hypothesis that fiction and film have converted the Airworld the world of airplanes and airport infrastructures into a pivotal anthropological place that is endowed with social significance and identity, suggesting that the assimilation of the sky into our cultural imaginary and lifestyle has metamorphosed human society into Cloud People. In its examination of the representations of air travel as an epicenter of today s world, the book not only illustrates a novel perspective on contemporary fiction, but fills an important gap in the study of globalization within literary and film studies.

Contenu

1. Introduction.- 2. Airworld as an In-Between Space.- 3. Time Out of Control.- 4. Luxury in the Sky with More than Diamonds.- 5. Cloud People: Identities and Paradoxes.- 6. Connections, Disconnections, and Reconnections.-7. Coda: Flying Over.