books tagged “culture”

books tagged “culture”

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The Age of Missing Information
by Bill McKibben

ISBN 0452269806 (0-452-26980-6)
Softcover, Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated

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Book summary:
"Highly personal and original . . . McKibben goes beyond Marshall McLuhan's theory that the medium is the message." -- The New York Times Imagine watching an entire day's worth of television on every single channel. Acclaimed environmental writer and culture critic Bill McKibben subjected himself to this sensory overload in an experiment to verify whether we are truly better informed than previous generations. Bombarded with newscasts and fluff pieces, game shows and talk shows, ads and infomercials, televangelist pleas and Brady Bunch episodes, McKibben processed twenty-four hours of programming on all ninety-three Fairfax, Virginia, cable stations. Then, as a counterpoint, he spent a day atop a quiet and remote mountain in the Adirondacks, exploring the unmediated man and making small yet vital discoveries about himself and the world around him. As relevant now as it was when originally written in 1992-and with new material from the author on the impact of the Internet age-this witty and astute book is certain to change the way you look at television and perceive media as a whole. "By turns humorous, wise, and troubling . . . a penetrating critique of technological society."- Cleveland Plain Dealer "Masterful . . . a unique, bizarre portrait of our life and times." - Los Angeles Times "Do yourself a favor: Put down the remote and pick up this book." - Houston Chronicle From the Trade Paperback edition. [via]
More editions of The Age of Missing Information:
- The Age of Missing Information: ISBN 0394589335 (0-394-58933-5)
  Hardcover, Random House Publishing Group
- The Age of Missing Information: ISBN 0452269806 (0-452-26980-6)
  Softcover, Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated
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Arco Test Your Cultural Literacy
by Diane Zahler, Kathy A. Zahler

ISBN 0671847163 (0-671-84716-3)
Softcover, Petersons

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Book summary:
A runaway smash hit in its first edition, this fascinating quiz book dared Americans to prove their knowledge of Western and global culture--and wound up a national bestseller. Now it's back to challenge and entertain a new crop of readers and to offer brand-new coverage of the key events and ideas that are reshaping today's world. Photographs and locator maps. [via]
More editions of Arco Test Your Cultural Literacy:
- Arco Test Your Cultural Literacy: ISBN 0671847163 (0-671-84716-3)
  Softcover, Petersons
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The Ascent of Man
by Jacob Bronowski

ISBN 0316109339 (0-316-10933-9)
Softcover, Little Brown & Co

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Book summary:
1973 7th printing hardcover with dust jacket as shown. Book and jacket in Fine condition. This is NOT a Book Club Edition. Jacket has new archival jacket cover. Original price $17.50 [via]
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Building a Bridge to the 18th Century: How the Past Can Improve Our Future
by Neil Postman

ISBN 0375701273 (0-375-70127-3)
Softcover, Vintage Books

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Book summary:
The problem with the world today, says Neil Postman, is that we've become so caught up in hurtling towards the future that we've lost our societal "narrative," a humane cultural tradition that creates "a sense of purpose and continuity"--in other words, something to believe in. "In order to have an agreeable encounter with the twenty-first century," he asserts, "we will have to take into it some good ideas. And in order to do that, we need to look back to take stock of the good ideas available to us." He finds rich source material in the Enlightenment, the salad days for philosophers such as Goethe, Voltaire, Diderot, Paine, and Jefferson, "the beginnings of much that is worthwhile about the modern world." Yet Building a Bridge to the Eighteenth Century is a call for cultural progress, not regression: "I am not suggesting that we become the eighteenth century," Postman notes, "only that we use it for what it is worth and all it is worth."
Chief among the values Postman cites is the development of the intellect; it plays a part in many of his recommendations, from the cultivation of a healthy skepticism towards overhyped technology to sweeping educational reforms that include replacing grammar instruction with logic and rhetoric and introducing courses on comparative religion and the history of science. He also lashes out at postmodernists who start with the premise that language "is a major factor in producing our perceptions, judgments, knowledge, and institutions" and conclude that language is therefore tenuously connected to reality at best. Enlightenment thinkers knew that language molded perception, he notes, but they also believed that "it is possible to use language to say things about the world that are true" and "to communicate ideas to oneself and to others." Postman is excessively curmudgeonly at times, as in his reference to philosopher Jean Baudrillard as "a Frenchman, of all things," or his remarks on the ancient Athenians: "I know they are the classic example of Dead White Males, but we should probably listen to them anyway." But for anybody with a stake in the culture wars, or who wants to apply the lessons of philosophy to the modern world, Building a Bridge to the Eighteenth Century will make for provocative reading. [via]
More editions of Building a Bridge to the 18th Century: How the Past Can Improve Our Future:
- Building a Bridge to the 18th Century: How the Past Can Improve Our Future: ISBN 0375401296 (0-375-40129-6)
  Hardcover, Alfred a Knopf Inc
- Building a Bridge to the 18th Century: How the Past Can Improve Our Future: ISBN 0375701273 (0-375-70127-3)
  Softcover, Vintage Books
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Bury Me Standing: The Gypsies and Their Journey
by Isabel Fonseca

ISBN 067973743X (0-679-73743-X)
Softcover, Random House Inc

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Book summary:
They travel endlessly and seem to appear almost everywhere, yet they are the world's most mysterious people: Gypsies. Isabel Fonseca has done the impossible, entering into their world, living and traveling with Gypsies during several long trips to Eastern Europe, and she has brought back an insightful, highly personal, and very readable account of who the Gypsies are and how they live. The Gypsies have a legendary aversion to "gadje," or outsiders, but Fonseca has lifted the curtain and written gracefully about their lives on the edge of society. [via]
More editions of Bury Me Standing: The Gypsies and Their Journey:
- Bury Me Standing : The Gypsies and Their Journey: ISBN 0679406786 (0-679-40678-6)
  Hardcover, Knopf Publishing Group
- Bury Me Standing: The Gypsies and Their Journey: ISBN 067973743X (0-679-73743-X)
  Softcover, Random House Inc
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Civilization and Its Discontents
by Sigmund Freud, James Strachey

ISBN 0393301583 (0-393-30158-3)
Softcover, W W Norton & Co Inc

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Book summary:
For the 75th anniversary, a new edition of the seminal work with an introduction by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Louis Menand.
Civilization and Its Discontents may be Sigmund Freud's best-known work. Originally published in 1930, it seeks to answer ultimate questions: What influences led to the creation of civilization? How did it come to be? What determines its course? In this seminal volume of twentieth-century thought, Freud elucidates the contest between aggression, indeed the death drive, and its adversary eros. He speaks to issues of human creativity and fulfillment, the place of beauty in culture, and the effects of repression.

Louis Menand, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning The Metaphysical Club, contributor to The New Yorker, and professor of English at Harvard University, reflects on the importance of this work in intellectual thought and why it has become such a landmark book for the history of ideas.

Not available in hardcover for decades, this beautifully rendered anniversary edition will be a welcome addition to readers' shelves. [via]
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Class
by Paul Fussell

ISBN 0345318161 (0-345-31816-1)
Softcover, Ballantine Books

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Book summary:
In Class Paul Fussell explodes the sacred American myth of social equality with eagle-eyed irreverence and iconoclastic wit. This bestselling, superbly researched, exquisitely observed guide to the signs, symbols, and customs of the American class system is always outrageously on the mark as Fussell shows us how our status is revealed by everything we do, say, and own. He describes the houses, objects, artifacts, speech, clothing styles, and intellectual proclivities of American classes from the top to the bottom and everybody -- you'll surely recognize yourself -- in between. Class is guaranteed to amuse and infuriate, whether your class is so high it's out of sight (literally) or you are, alas, a sinking victim of prole drift [via]
More editions of Class:
- Class: ISBN 0345318161 (0-345-31816-1)
  Softcover, Ballantine Books
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Class: A Guide Through the American Status System
by Paul Fussell, Martim De Avillez

ISBN 0671792253 (0-671-79225-3)
Softcover, Simon & Schuster

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Book summary:
In Class Paul Fussell explodes the sacred American myth of social equality with eagle-eyed irreverence and iconoclastic wit. This bestselling, superbly researched, exquisitely observed guide to the signs, symbols, and customs of the American class system is always outrageously on the mark as Fussell shows us how our status is revealed by everything we do, say, and own. He describes the houses, objects, artifacts, speech, clothing styles, and intellectual proclivities of American classes from the top to the bottom and everybody -- you'll surely recognize yourself -- in between. Class is guaranteed to amuse and infuriate, whether your class is so high it's out of sight (literally) or you are, alas, a sinking victim of prole drift. [via]
More editions of Class: A Guide Through the American Status System:
- Class: A Guide Through the American Status System: ISBN 0671449915 (0-671-44991-5)
  Hardcover, Simon & Schuster
- Class: A Guide Through the American Status System: ISBN 0671792253 (0-671-79225-3)
  Softcover, Simon & Schuster
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The Communist Manifesto
by Friedrich Engels, Gareth Stedman Jones, K. Marx

ISBN 0140447571 (0-14-044757-1)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA

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Book summary:
The perfect books for the true book lover, Penguin's Great Ideas series features twelve more groundbreaking works by some of history's most prodigious thinkers. Each volume is beautifully packaged with a unique type-driven design that highlights the bookmaker's art. Offering great literature in great packages at great prices, this series is ideal for those readers who want to explore and savor the Great Ideas that have shaped our world.

The Communist Manifesto changed the face of the twentieth century beyond recognition, inspiring millions to revolution, forming the basis of political systems that still dominate countless lives and continuing to ignite violent debate about class and capitalism today.

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The Communist Manifesto
by Frederic L. Bender, K. Marx

ISBN 0393956164 (0-393-95616-4)
Softcover, W W Norton & Co Inc

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Book summary:
This Norton Critical Edition offers a complete historical and philosophical introduction to Marx's Manifesto of the Communist Party.
It will assist students making their first approach to Marx's thought as well as those ready to study the Manifesto in more depth. For beginning students, this edition provides a carefully annotated text of the Manifesto and two introductory sections by Frederic Bender, a "Chronology of Events Leading to the Communist Manifesto" and "Historical and Theoretical Backgrounds of the Communist Manifesto." More experienced students will benefit from selections on the sources of Marx's thought, the significance of the Manifesto in the history of Marxism, and recent interpretations of the work. [via]
More editions of The Communist Manifesto:
- The Communist Manifesto: ISBN 0393025357 (0-393-02535-7)
  Hardcover, W.W. Norton
- The Communist Manifesto: ISBN 0393956164 (0-393-95616-4)
  Softcover, W W Norton & Co Inc
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The Communist Manifesto
by K. Marx

ISBN 0140444785 (0-14-044478-5)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA

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Book summary:
"A spectre is haunting Europe," Karl Marx and Frederic Engels wrote in 1848, "the spectre of Communism." This new edition of The Communist Manifesto, commemorating the 150th anniversary of its publication, includes an introduction by renowned historian Eric Hobsbawm which reminds us of the document's continued relevance. Marx and Engels's critique of capitalism and its deleterious effect on all aspects of life, from the increasing rift between the classes to the destruction of the nuclear family, has proven remarkably prescient. Their spectre, manifested in the Manifesto's vivid prose, continues to haunt the capitalist world, lingering as a ghostly apparition even after the collapse of those governments which claimed to be enacting its principles. [via]
More editions of The Communist Manifesto:
- The Communist Manifesto: ISBN 0671443879 (0-671-44387-9)
  Softcover, Pocket Books
- The Communist Manifesto: ISBN 0140444785 (0-14-044478-5)
  Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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The Communist Manifesto
by David McLellan, Friedrich Engels, Samuel Moore, K. Marx

ISBN 0192829548 (0-19-282954-8)
Softcover, Oxford Univ Pr

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Book summary:
"A spectre is haunting Europe," Karl Marx and Frederic Engels wrote in 1848, "the spectre of Communism." This new edition of The Communist Manifesto, commemorating the 150th anniversary of its publication, includes an introduction by renowned historian Eric Hobsbawm which reminds us of the document's continued relevance. Marx and Engels's critique of capitalism and its deleterious effect on all aspects of life, from the increasing rift between the classes to the destruction of the nuclear family, has proven remarkably prescient. Their spectre, manifested in the Manifesto's vivid prose, continues to haunt the capitalist world, lingering as a ghostly apparition even after the collapse of those governments which claimed to be enacting its principles. [via]
More editions of The Communist Manifesto:
- The Communist Manifesto: ISBN 0192829548 (0-19-282954-8)
  Softcover, Oxford Univ Pr
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Culture Matters: How Values Shape Human Progress
by Samuel P. Huntington, Lawrence E. Harrison

ISBN 0465031765 (0-465-03176-5)
Softcover, Perseus Books Group

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Book summary:
This collection of essays addresses a difficult question: Are some cultures better than others at creating freedom, prosperity, and justice? Although Culture Matters offers varying responses to this politically incorrect question, its editors, Lawrence E. Harrison and Samuel P. Huntington, as well as the bulk of its contributors, answer in some form of the affirmative. In an introduction, Harrison (author of Underdevelopment Is a State of Mind) writes in the third person of the movement he helps lead: "They are the intellectual heirs of Alexis de Tocqueville, who concluded that what made the American political system work was a culture congenial to democracy; Max Weber, who explained the rise of capitalism as essentially a cultural phenomenon rooted in religion; and Edward Banfield, who illuminated the cultural roots of poverty and authoritarianism in southern Italy, a case with universal applications." (The book, moreover, is dedicated to Banfield, "who has illuminated the path for so many of us.") For readers loath to make value judgments about cultures, Culture Matters may be tough going. But admirers of Trust by Francis Fukuyama, The Wealth and Poverty of Nations by David Landes, and any number of books by Thomas Sowell will find much to admire on these pages. Fukuyama and Landes, in fact, have written chapters--along with Barbara Crossette, Robert Edgerton, Nathan Glazer, Seymour Martin Lipset, Orlando Patterson, Lucian Pye, Jeffrey Sachs, and many others. In an especially compelling essay on Africa's continuing plight, Daniel Etounga-Manguelle asks, "What cultural reorientation is necessary so that in the concert of nations we [Africans] are no longer playing out of tune?"
And this is the point of the book: not to denigrate any particular culture, but to figure out how all people can improve their quality of life. In the words of Harrison, who pens the book's concluding essay, "It offers an important insight into why some countries and ethnic/religious groups have done better than others, not just in economic terms but also with respect to consolidation of democratic institutions and social justice. And those lessons of experience, which are increasingly finding practical application, particularly in Latin America, may help to illuminate the path to progress for that substantial majority of the world's people for whom prosperity, democracy, and social justice have remained out of reach." --John J. Miller [via]
More editions of Culture Matters: How Values Shape Human Progress:
- Culture Matters: How Values Shape Human Progress: ISBN 0465031757 (0-465-03175-7)
  Hardcover, Perseus Books Group
- Culture Matters: How Values Shape Human Progress: ISBN 0465031765 (0-465-03176-5)
  Softcover, Perseus Books Group
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Culture of Narcissism: American Life in an Age of Diminishing Expectations
by Christopher Lasch

ISBN 0393307387 (0-393-30738-7)
Softcover, W W Norton & Co Inc

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Book summary:
When The Culture of Narcissism was first published, it was clear that Christopher Lasch had identified something important: what was happening to American society in the wake of the decline of the family over the last century.
The book quickly became a bestseller. This edition includes a new afterword, "The Culture of Narcissism Revisited." [via]
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Disappearing Through the Skylight
by O.B. Hardison

ISBN 014011582X (0-14-011582-X)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA

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More editions of Disappearing Through the Skylight:
- Disappearing Through the Skylight: ISBN 014011582X (0-14-011582-X)
  Softcover, Penguin Group USA
Disappearing Through the Skylight: Culture and Technology in the Twentieth Century
by O.B. Hardison

ISBN 0670825050 (0-670-82505-0)
Hardcover, Penguin Group USA

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More editions of Disappearing Through the Skylight: Culture and Technology in the Twentieth Century:
- Disappearing Through the Skylight: Culture and Technology in the Twentieth Century: ISBN 0670825050 (0-670-82505-0)
  Hardcover, Penguin Group USA
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End of Faith: Religion, Terror, And the Future of Reason
by Sam Harris

ISBN 0393327655 (0-393-32765-5)
Softcover, W W Norton & Co Inc

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Book summary:
Sam Harris cranks out blunt, hard-hitting chapters to make his case for why faith itself is the most dangerous element of modern life. And if the devil's in the details, then you'll find Satan waiting at the back of the book in the very substantial notes section where Harris saves his more esoteric discussions to avoid sidetracking the urgency of his message.
Interestingly, Harris is not just focused on debunking religious faith, though he makes his compelling arguments with verve and intellectual clarity. The End of Faith is also a bit of a philosophical Swiss Army knife. Once he has presented his arguments on why, in an age of Weapons of Mass Destruction, belief is now a hazard of great proportions, he focuses on proposing alternate approaches to the mysteries of life. Harris recognizes the truth of the human condition, that we fear death, and we often crave "something more" we cannot easily define, and which is not met by accumulating more material possessions. But by attempting to provide the cure for the ills it defines, the book bites off a bit more than it can comfortably chew in its modest page count (however the rich Bibliography provides more than enough background for an intrigued reader to follow up for months on any particular strand of the author' musings.)
Harris' heart is not as much in the latter chapters, though, but in presenting his main premise. Simply stated, any belief system that speaks with assurance about the hereafter has the potential to place far less value on the here and now. And thus the corollary -- when death is simply a door translating us from one existence to another, it loses its sting and finality. Harris pointedly asks us to consider that those who do not fear death for themselves, and who also revere ancient scriptures instructing them to mete it out generously to others, may soon have these weapons in their own hands. If thoughts along the same line haunt you, this is your book.--Ed Dobeas [via]
More editions of End of Faith: Religion, Terror, And the Future of Reason:
- The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason: ISBN 0393035158 (0-393-03515-8)
  Hardcover, W W Norton & Co Inc
- End of Faith: Religion, Terror, And the Future of Reason: ISBN 0393327655 (0-393-32765-5)
  Softcover, W W Norton & Co Inc
The End of Nature
by Bill McKibben

ISBN 0394576012 (0-394-57601-2)
Hardcover, Random House Publishing Group

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More editions of The End of Nature:
- The End of Nature: ISBN 0394576012 (0-394-57601-2)
  Hardcover, Random House Publishing Group
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Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas: A Savage Journey to the Heart of the American Dream
by Hunter S. Thompson

ISBN 0679785892 (0-679-78589-2)
Softcover, Vintage Books

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Book summary:
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas is the ne plus ultra of Hunter S. Thompson and the whole gonzo clan he spawned. Written in the lurid afterglow of the 1960s, Fear and Loathing is a loosely connected series of mad dashes across the desert, trashed hotel rooms, and goofs on the brutish, naïve, or merely unhip, perpetrated by Thompson and his mammoth Samoan attorney. The pair start out high on a medicine cabinet's worth of elixirs, powders, and pills, and stay that way for 200 pages. They careen through an unsettling landscape of paranoia and alienation, but that doesn't mean the book isn't a riot. Here's a small taste: "By this time, the drink was beginning to cut the acid and my hallucinations were down to a tolerable level. The room service waiter had a vaguely reptilian cast to his features, but I was no longer seeing huge pterodactyls lumbering around the corridors in pools of fresh blood."
Though somewhat dated (it appeared serially in Rolling Stone throughout November 1971), Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas is a book of real vitality and Rabelaisian wit. A document of the counterculture after it was well past ripe and deep into rot, the book is a wild ride, a paranoid ramble that is thoroughly exhilarating and worth the trip. No pun intended. [via]
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Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and Other American Stories, Tie-In Edition
by Hunter S. Thompson

ISBN 0679602984 (0-679-60298-4)
Hardcover, Modern Library

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Book summary:
Dr. Thompson made the list of inspirational scribes when I polled in a recent writing workshop, and why not? Back in a spiffy Modern Library edition, replete with additional essays, I find in this iconographic work that HST both invoked--and provoked--an era that was not so much the '60s proper, but rather the mean, shadow-filled death of that time, which is still playing out. Thank God Thompson was there to explode the myth of "objective" journalism and help pave the way for the pens and voices that followed. [via]
More editions of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and Other American Stories, Tie-In Edition:
- Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and Other American Stories, Tie-In Edition: ISBN 0679602984 (0-679-60298-4)
  Hardcover, Modern Library
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The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion
by James George Frazer

ISBN 0140189319 (0-14-018931-9)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA

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Book summary:
Before Joseph Campbell became the world's most famous practitioner of comparative mythology, there was Sir James George Frazer. The Golden Bough was originally published in two volumes in 1890, but Frazer became so enamored of his topic that over the next few decades he expanded the work sixfold, then in 1922 cut it all down to a single thick edition suitable for mass distribution. The thesis on the origins of magic and religion that it elaborates "will be long and laborious," Frazer warns readers, "but may possess something of the charm of a voyage of discovery, in which we shall visit many strange lands, with strange foreign peoples, and still stranger customs." Chief among those customs--at least as the book is remembered in the popular imagination--is the sacrificial killing of god-kings to ensure bountiful harvests, which Frazer traces through several cultures, including in his elaborations the myths of Adonis, Osiris, and Balder.
While highly influential in its day, The Golden Bough has come under harsh critical scrutiny in subsequent decades, with many of its descriptions of regional folklore and legends deemed less than reliable. Furthermore, much of its tone is rooted in a philosophy of social Darwinism--sheer cultural imperialism, really--that finds its most explicit form in Frazer's rhetorical question: "If in the most backward state of human society now known to us we find magic thus conspicuously present and religion conspicuously absent, may we not reasonably conjecture that the civilised races of the world have also at some period of their history passed through a similar intellectual phase?" (The truly civilized races, he goes on to say later, though not particularly loudly, are the ones whose minds evolve beyond religious belief to embrace the rational structures of scientific thought.) Frazer was much too genteel to state plainly that "primitive" races believe in magic because they are too stupid and backwards to know any better; instead he remarks that "a savage hardly conceives the distinction commonly drawn by more advanced peoples between the natural and the supernatural." And he certainly was not about to make explicit the logical extension of his theories--"that Christian legend, dogma, and ritual" (to quote Robert Graves's summation of Frazer in The White Goddess) "are the refinement of a great body of primitive and barbarous beliefs." Whatever modern readers have come to think of the book, however, its historical significance and the eloquence with which Frazer attempts to develop what one might call a unifying theory of anthropology cannot be denied. --Ron Hogan [via]
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The Golden Bough : The Roots of Religion and Folklore
by James George Frazer

ISBN 0517336332 (0-517-33633-2)
Hardcover, Random House Value Publishing

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Book summary:
The only unabridged, illustrated edition of the classic exploration of the world of myth, folklore, and primitive customs is an inspiration to poets, students, and readers in general. [via]
More editions of The Golden Bough : The Roots of Religion and Folklore:
- The Golden Bough : The Roots of Religion and Folklore: ISBN 0517336332 (0-517-33633-2)
  Hardcover, Random House Value Publishing
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Great Cat Massacre
by Robert Darnton

ISBN 0465015565 (0-465-01556-5)
Softcover, Basic Books

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Book summary:
In this dazzling series of essays, Robert Darnton exhumes the strange and wonderful world views of the ordinary and extraordinary people inhabiting the cities, towns, and countryside of France in what we like to call The Age of Enlightenment.
[via]
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- Great Cat Massacre: ISBN 0465015565 (0-465-01556-5)
  Softcover, Basic Books
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The Great Cat Massacre: And Other Episodes in French Cultural History
by Robert Darnton

ISBN 0394729277 (0-394-72927-7)
Softcover, Random House Inc

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When the apprentices of a Paris printing shop in the 1730's held a series of mock trials and then hanged all the cats they could lay their hands on, why did they find it so hilariously funny that they choked with laughter when they reenacted it in pantomime some twenty times? Why in the 18th century version of "Little Red Riding Hood" did the wolf eat the child at the end? What did the anonymous townsman of Montpelier have in mind when he kept an exhaustive dossier on all the activities of his native city? These are some of the provocative questions Robert Darnton attempts to answer in this dazzling series of essays that probe the ways of thought in what we like to call "The Age of Enlightenment." [via]
More editions of The Great Cat Massacre: And Other Episodes in French Cultural History:
- The Great Cat Massacre and Other Episodes in French Cultural History: ISBN 0465027008 (0-465-02700-8)
  Hardcover, Perseus Books Group
- The Great Cat Massacre: And Other Episodes in French Cultural History: ISBN 0394729277 (0-394-72927-7)
  Softcover, Random House Inc
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Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution
by Steven Levy

ISBN 0141000511 (0-14-100051-1)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA

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Book summary:
Steven Levy's classic book explains why the misuse of the word "hackers" to describe computer criminals does a terrible disservice to many important shapers of the digital revolution. Levy follows members of an MIT model railroad club--a group of brilliant budding electrical engineers and computer innovators--from the late 1950s to the mid-1980s. These eccentric characters used the term "hack" to describe a clever way of improving the electronic system that ran their massive railroad. And as they started designing clever ways to improve computer systems, "hack" moved over with them. These maverick characters were often fanatics who did not always restrict themselves to the letter of the law and who devoted themselves to what became known as "The Hacker Ethic." The book traces the history of hackers, from finagling access to clunky computer-card-punching machines to uncovering the inner secrets of what would become the Internet. This story of brilliant, eccentric, flawed, and often funny people devoted to their dream of a better world will appeal to a wide audience. [via]
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The Hidden Power of Electronic Culture: How Media Shapes Faith, the Gospel, And Church
by Shane A. Hipps, Brian McLaren

ISBN 0310262747 (0-310-26274-7)
Softcover, Youth Specialties

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- The Hidden Power of Electronic Culture: How Media Shapes Faith, the Gospel, And Church: ISBN 0310262747 (0-310-26274-7)
  Softcover, Youth Specialties
How Now Shall We Live?
by Charles Colson

ISBN 0633004510 (0-633-00451-0)
Softcover, Lifeway Christian Resources

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The Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby
by Tom Wolfe

ISBN 0553380583 (0-553-38058-3)
Softcover, Bantam Dell Pub Group

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Book summary:
The "streamline baby" in Tom Wolfe's 1965 debut book is a hot rod, but the car's candy colors and wild lines can't match the prose style Wolfe devised to describe them. The title essay--Wolfe's first magazine article--launched the New Journalism, partly because its original title was "There Goes (Varoom! Varoom!) That Kandy-Kolored (Thphhhhhh!) Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby (Rahghhh!) Around the Bend (Brummmmmmmmmmmmmmm)..." His voice was more shocking than any subculture he uncovered. Until Wolfe (Ph.D., Yale), nobody struck gold by applying Ph.D.-speak to lowbrow subjects. Kurt Vonnegut famously called this an "excellent book by a genius who will do anything to get attention."
Now that everybody does what Wolfe did, his early essays smack less of genius. But attention must be paid to this pioneering peek into King Pop's tomb. The most startling thing is how soberly sensible most of the prose now appears, except for the title of the first essay, "Las Vegas (What?) Las Vegas (Can't Hear You! Too Noisy) Las Vegas!!!" which anticipates the far superior Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. Mostly, these articles seem like straightforward introductions to some of the signal figures of the early '60s: hot-rod designer Big Daddy Roth, surf guitarist Dick Dale, teen recording tycoon Phil Spector, Andy Warhol debutante Baby Jane Holzer, the Cassius Clay-era Muhammad Ali. We even glimpse the Beatles in a profile of the yappy DJ Murray the K in "The Fifth Beatle."
The last half of the book focuses more on New York and its denizens' endless combat for social status. The last piece, "The Big League Complex," is like a 1964 warm-up exercise for The Bonfire of the Vanities. --Tim Appelo [via]
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Learning to Bow: An American Teacher in a Japanese School
by Bruce S. Feiler

ISBN 039558521X (0-395-58521-X)
Hardcover, Houghton Mifflin

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Learning to Bow has been heralded as one of the funniest, liveliest, and most insightful books ever written about the clash of cultures between America and Japan. With warmth and candor, Bruce Feiler recounts the year he spent as a teacher in a small rural town. Beginning with a ritual outdoor bath and culminating in an all-night trek to the top of Mt. Fuji, Feiler teaches his students about American culture, while they teach him everything from how to properly address an envelope to how to date a Japanese girl.
[via]
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- Learning to Bow: An American Teacher in a Japanese School: ISBN 039558521X (0-395-58521-X)
  Hardcover, Houghton Mifflin
Learning to Bow: Inside the Heart of Japan
by Bruce S. Feiler

ISBN 0395647266 (0-395-64726-6)
Softcover, Houghton Mifflin

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- Learning to Bow: Inside the Heart of Japan: ISBN 0395647266 (0-395-64726-6)
  Softcover, Houghton Mifflin
Leisure: The Basis of Culture
by Josef Pieper

ISBN 0451626362 (0-451-62636-2)
Softcover, New Amer Library

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- Leisure: The Basis of Culture: ISBN 0451626362 (0-451-62636-2)
  Softcover, New Amer Library
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Madness and Civilization: A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason
by Michel Foucault

ISBN 067972110X (0-679-72110-X)
Softcover, Random House Inc

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Book summary:
No description available [via]
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- Madness and Civilization: A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason: ISBN 039471914X (0-394-71914-X)
  Hardcover, Vintage Books
- Madness and Civilization: A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason: ISBN 067972110X (0-679-72110-X)
  Softcover, Random House Inc
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Madness and Civilization
by M. FOUCAULT

ISBN 0415253853 (0-415-25385-3)
Softcover, Taylor and Francis

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In this classic account of madness, Michel Foucault shows once and for all why he is one of the most distinguished European philosophers since the end of World War II. Madness and Civilization, Foucault's first book and his finest accomplishment, will change the way in which you think about society. Evoking shock, pity and fascination, it might also make you question the way you think about yourself. [via]
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- Madness and Civilization: ISBN 0415253853 (0-415-25385-3)
  Softcover, Taylor and Francis
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Mondo 2000: A User's Guide to the New Edge Cyberpunk, Virtual Reality, Wetware, Designer Aphrodisiacs, Artificial Life, Techno-Erotic Paganism, an
by Rudy Rucker, R. U. Sirius, Queen Mu

ISBN 0060969288 (0-06-096928-8)
Softcover, Harpercollins

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An introduction to the coming revolution in art, technology, media, chemistry, science, and music discusses amino chemistry, manotechnology, high-tech paganism, teledildonics, and more. $75,000 ad/promo. [via]
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- Mondo 2000: A User's Guide to the New Edge Cyberpunk, Virtual Reality, Wetware, Designer Aphrodisiacs, Artificial Life, Techno-Erotic Paganism, an: ISBN 0060969288 (0-06-096928-8)
  Softcover, Harpercollins
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Not by Genes Alone : How Culture Transformed Human Evolution
by Peter J. Richerson, Robert Boyd

ISBN 0226712842 (0-226-71284-2)
Hardcover, University of Chicago Press

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Humans are a striking anomaly in the natural world. While we are similar to other mammals in many ways, our behavior sets us apart. Our unparalleled ability to adapt has allowed us to occupy virtually every habitat on earth using an incredible variety of tools and subsistence techniques. Our societies are larger, more complex, and more cooperative than any other mammal's. In this stunning exploration of human adaptation, Peter J. Richerson and Robert Boyd argue that only a Darwinian theory of cultural evolution can explain these unique characteristics.

Not by Genes Alone offers a radical interpretation of human evolution, arguing that our ecological dominance and our singular social systems stem from a psychology uniquely adapted to create complex culture. Richerson and Boyd illustrate here that culture is neither superorganic nor the handmaiden of the genes. Rather, it is essential to human adaptation, as much a part of human biology as bipedal locomotion. Drawing on work in the fields of anthropology, political science, sociology, and economicsand building their case with such fascinating examples as kayaks, corporations, clever knots, and yams that require twelve men to carry themRicherson and Boyd convincingly demonstrate that culture and biology are inextricably linked, and they show us how to think about their interaction in a way that yields a richer understanding of human nature.

In abandoning the nature-versus-nurture debate as fundamentally misconceived, Not by Genes Alone is a truly original and groundbreaking theory of the role of culture in evolution and a book to be reckoned with for generations to come.

I continue to be surprised by the number of educated people (many of them biologists) who think that offering explanations for human behavior in terms of culture somehow disproves the suggestion that human behavior can be explained in Darwinian evolutionary terms. Fortunately, we now have a book to which they may be directed for enlightenment . . . . It is a book full of good sense and the kinds of intellectual rigor and clarity of writing that we have come to expect from the Boyd/Richerson stable.Robin Dunbar, Nature

Not by Genes Alone is a valuable and very readable synthesis of a still embryonic but very important subject straddling the sciences and humanities.E. O. Wilson, Harvard University

[via]
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- Not by Genes Alone : How Culture Transformed Human Evolution: ISBN 0226712842 (0-226-71284-2)
  Hardcover, University of Chicago Press
Not by Genes Alone: How Culture Transformed Human Evolution
by Robert Boyd, Peter J. Richerson

ISBN 0226712125 (0-226-71212-5)
Softcover, Univ of Chicago Pr

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  Softcover, Univ of Chicago Pr
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The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals
by Michael Pollan

ISBN 0143038583 (0-14-303858-3)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA

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Book summary:
The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals [Paperback] [via]
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- The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals: ISBN 0143038583 (0-14-303858-3)
  Softcover, Penguin Group USA
People
by Peter Spier

ISBN 038524469X (0-385-24469-X)
Softcover, Random House Childrens Books

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A People's History of the United States
by Howard Zinn

ISBN 0582489482 (0-582-48948-2)
Softcover, Longman

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A People's History Of The United States: 1492-Present
by Howard Zinn

ISBN 0060937319 (0-06-093731-9)
Softcover, Harpercollins

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Known for its lively, clear prose as well as its scholarly research, "A People's History of the United States is the only volume to tell America's story from the point of view of -- and in the words of -- America's women, factory workers, African Americans, Native Americans, working poor, and immigrant laborers.Covering Christopher Columbus's arrival through President Clinton's first term, "A People's History of the United States features insightful analysis of the most important events in our history. Revised, updated, and featuring a new afterword by the author, this is "a brilliant and moving history of the American people" "(Library Journal). [via]
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The Progress Paradox : How Life Gets Better While People Feel Worse
by Gregg Easterbrook

ISBN 0679463038 (0-679-46303-8)
Hardcover, Random House Publishing Group

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  Hardcover, Random House Publishing Group
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The Russians
by Hedrick Smith

ISBN 0345317467 (0-345-31746-7)
Softcover, Random House Publishing Group

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Hedrick Smith has done what we all wish we could do: he has gone to Russia and spoken to the people. Over steaming samovars, in cramped flats, and on dirt-floors, he has spoken to peasants and bureaucrats, artists and officials. He has studied their customs and their governments and shares his fascinating insights and fresh perspectives with us. [via]
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- The Russians: ISBN 0345317467 (0-345-31746-7)
  Softcover, Random House Publishing Group
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Test Your Cultural Literacy
by Diane Zahler, Kathy A. Zahler

ISBN 0139037586 (0-13-903758-6)
Hardcover, Arco

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A runaway smash hit in its first edition, this fascinating quiz book dared Americans to prove their knowledge of Western and global culture--and wound up a national bestseller. Now it's back to challenge and entertain a new crop of readers and to offer brand-new coverage of the key events and ideas that are reshaping today's world. Photographs and locator maps. [via]
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  Hardcover, Arco
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Things Fall Apart
by Chinua Achebe

ISBN 0072435186 (0-07-243518-6)
Softcover, McGraw-Hill College

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Things Fall Apart tells two intertwining stories, both centering on Okonkwo, a "strong man" of an Ibo village in Nigeria. The first, a powerful fable of the immemorial conflict between the individual and society, traces Okonkwo's fall from grace with the tribal world. The second, as modern as the first is ancient, concerns the clash of cultures and the destruction of Okonkwo's world with the arrival of aggressive European missionaries. These perfectly harmonized twin dramas are informed by an awareness capable of encompassing at once the life of nature, human history, and the mysterious compulsions of the soul. [via]
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Things Fall Apart
by Fred Heiser

ISBN 0595232795 (0-595-23279-5)
Softcover, Iuniverse Inc

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The unthinkable happens when nuclear brinksmanship spirals off into to Armageddon. Billions die as governments disintegrate, great cities are annihilated and deeply laid plans to seize unlimited power swing into action.Tom McArthur: Once a carefree individualist, he was coaxed into a position of influence and leadership by unexpected opportunity and kept there by his sense of honor. He finds himself far from home and family, separated by hundreds of miles of impossible terrain, gangs of armed bandits and a hostile government.Lynn, his wife: Beautiful and intelligent, strong willed and voluptuous, she resents Tom's abandonment of her and their children for a distant political career. Now, with nothing but her courage, wits and willpower to work with, she must fight to keep herself and her children alive.Lance: Young, handsome and lonely, trained as the ultimate warrior, he drove himself into poverty and alcohol with the memory of an unspeakable evil he was party to. Will he find love and redemption or destroy those around him? Who will live? Who will die? What will emerge when things fall apart? [via]
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- Things Fall Apart: ISBN 0595232795 (0-595-23279-5)
  Softcover, Iuniverse Inc
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Velvet Elvis: Repainting the Christian Faith
by Rob Bell

ISBN 0310273080 (0-310-27308-0)
Softcover, Zondervan

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Book summary:
We have to test everything. I thank God for anybody anywhere who is pointing people to the mysteries of God. But those people would all tell you to think long and hard about what they are saying and doing and creating. Test it. Probe it. Do that to this book. Don't swallow it uncritically. Think about it. Wrestle with it. Just because I'm a Christian and I'm trying to articulate a Christian worldview doesn't mean I've got it nailed. I'm contributing to the discussion. God has spoken, and the rest is commentary, right? [via]
More editions of Velvet Elvis: Repainting the Christian Faith:
- Velvet Elvis: Repainting The Christian Faith: ISBN 031026345X (0-310-26345-X)
  Hardcover, Zondervan
- Velvet Elvis: Repainting the Christian Faith: ISBN 0310273080 (0-310-27308-0)
  Softcover, Zondervan

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