ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses general problems in the electrodynamics of continuous media with spatial dispersion and some effects of special dispersion in optics. Taking spatial dispersion into account in crystal optics and in general in electrodynamics is hardly an essentially new approach, since it was known as early as the end of the last centiry. But it was only two to three decades ago that the study of crystal optics with spatial dispersion became a more or less independent field. At the same time, and even to a greater extent, the analysis of spatial dispersion emerged as an integral part of the modern electrodynamics of continuous media, plasma physics, solid-state theory, theory of metals etc. An important subject in the electrodynamics of a continuous medium is the propagation of electromagnetic waves produced by sources located outside the medium under consideration.
