Dancing in the Streets
Title | Dancing in the Streets PDF eBook |
Author | Barbara Ehrenreich |
Publisher | Metropolitan Books |
Pages | 338 |
Release | 2007-12-26 |
Genre | History |
ISBN | 1429904658 |
From the bestselling social commentator and cultural historian comes Barbara Ehrenreich's fascinating exploration of one of humanity's oldest traditions: the celebration of communal joy In the acclaimed Blood Rites, Barbara Ehrenreich delved into the origins of our species' attraction to war. Here, she explores the opposite impulse, one that has been so effectively suppressed that we lack even a term for it: the desire for collective joy, historically expressed in ecstatic revels of feasting, costuming, and dancing. Ehrenreich uncovers the origins of communal celebration in human biology and culture. Although sixteenth-century Europeans viewed mass festivities as foreign and "savage," Ehrenreich shows that they were indigenous to the West, from the ancient Greeks' worship of Dionysus to the medieval practice of Christianity as a "danced religion." Ultimately, church officials drove the festivities into the streets, the prelude to widespread reformation: Protestants criminalized carnival, Wahhabist Muslims battled ecstatic Sufism, European colonizers wiped out native dance rites. The elites' fear that such gatherings would undermine social hierarchies was justified: the festive tradition inspired French revolutionary crowds and uprisings from the Caribbean to the American plains. Yet outbreaks of group revelry persist, as Ehrenreich shows, pointing to the 1960s rock-and-roll rebellion and the more recent "carnivalization" of sports. Original, exhilarating, and deeply optimistic, Dancing in the Streets concludes that we are innately social beings, impelled to share our joy and therefore able to envision, even create, a more peaceable future. "Fascinating . . . An admirably lucid, level-headed history of outbreaks of joy from Dionysus to the Grateful Dead."—Terry Eagleton, The Nation
George W. Bush and the Redemptive Dream
Title | George W. Bush and the Redemptive Dream PDF eBook |
Author | Dan P. McAdams |
Publisher | Oxford University Press |
Pages | 286 |
Release | 2010-11-24 |
Genre | Psychology |
ISBN | 0199831122 |
George W. Bush remains a highly controversial figure, a man for whom millions of Americans have very strong feelings. Dan McAdams' book offers an astute psychological portrait of Bush, one of the first biographies to appear since he left office as well as the first to draw systematically from personality science to analyze his life. McAdams, an international leader in personality psychology and the narrative study of lives, focuses on several key events in Bush's life, such as the death of his sister at age 7, his commitment to sobriety on his 40th birthday, and his reaction to the terrorist attacks of September 11, and his decision to invade Iraq. He sheds light on Bush's life goals, the story he constructed to make sense of his life, and the psychological dynamics that account for his behavior. Although there are many popular biographies of George W. Bush, McAdams' is the first true psychological analysis based on established theories and the latest research. Short and focused, written in an engaging style, this book offers a truly penetrating look at our forty-third president.
Of All the Stupid Things
Title | Of All the Stupid Things PDF eBook |
Author | Alexandra Diaz |
Publisher | Egmont USA |
Pages | 308 |
Release | 2010-12-28 |
Genre | Juvenile Fiction |
ISBN | 1606842927 |
When a rumor starts circulating that Tara's boyfriend Brent has been sleeping with one of the guy cheerleaders, the innuendo doesn't just hurt Tara. It marks the beginning of the end for an inseparable trio of friends. Tara's training for a marathon, but also running from her fear of abandonment after being deserted by her father. Whitney Blaire seems to have everything, but an empty mansion and absentee parents leave this beauty to look for meaning in all the wrong places. And Pinkie has a compulsive need to mother everyone to make up for the mom she's never stopped missing. This friendship that promised to last forever is starting to break under the pressure of the girls' differences. And then new-girl Riley arrives in school with her long black hair, athletic body, and her blasé attitude, and suddenly Tara starts to feel things she's never felt before for a girl--and to reassess her feelings about Brent and what he may/may not have done. Is Tara gay--or does she just love Riley? And can her deepest friendships survive when all of the rules have changed?
Bunny
Title | Bunny PDF eBook |
Author | Mona Awad |
Publisher | Penguin |
Pages | 311 |
Release | 2019-06-11 |
Genre | Fiction |
ISBN | 0525559744 |
NATIONAL BESTSELLER Soon to be a major motion picture "Jon Swift + Witches of Eastwick + Kelly 'Get In Trouble' Link + Mean Girls + Creative Writing Degree Hell! No punches pulled, no hilarities dodged, no meme unmangled! O Bunny you are sooo genius!" —Margaret Atwood, via Twitter "A wild, audacious and ultimately unforgettable novel." —Michael Schaub, Los Angeles Times "Awad is a stone-cold genius." —Ann Bauer, The Washington Post The Vegetarian meets Heathers in this darkly funny, seductively strange novel from the acclaimed author of 13 Ways of Looking at a Fat Girl and Rouge "We were just these innocent girls in the night trying to make something beautiful. We nearly died. We very nearly did, didn't we?" Samantha Heather Mackey couldn't be more of an outsider in her small, highly selective MFA program at New England's Warren University. A scholarship student who prefers the company of her dark imagination to that of most people, she is utterly repelled by the rest of her fiction writing cohort--a clique of unbearably twee rich girls who call each other "Bunny," and seem to move and speak as one. But everything changes when Samantha receives an invitation to the Bunnies' fabled "Smut Salon," and finds herself inexplicably drawn to their front door--ditching her only friend, Ava, in the process. As Samantha plunges deeper and deeper into the Bunnies' sinister yet saccharine world, beginning to take part in the ritualistic off-campus "Workshop" where they conjure their monstrous creations, the edges of reality begin to blur. Soon, her friendships with Ava and the Bunnies will be brought into deadly collision. The spellbinding new novel from one of our most fearless chroniclers of the female experience, Bunny is a down-the-rabbit-hole tale of loneliness and belonging, friendship and desire, and the fantastic and terrible power of the imagination. Named a Best Book of 2019 by TIME, Vogue, Electric Literature, and The New York Public Library
The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake
Title | The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake PDF eBook |
Author | Aimee Bender |
Publisher | Random House |
Pages | 306 |
Release | 2011 |
Genre | Family secrets |
ISBN | 009953827X |
Being able to taste people's emotions in food may at first be horrifying. But young, unassuming Rose Edelstein grows up learning to harness her gift as she becomes aware that there are secrets even her taste buds cannot discern.
Finding Mother God
Title | Finding Mother God PDF eBook |
Author | Carol Lynn Pearson |
Publisher | Gibbs Smith |
Pages | 160 |
Release | 2020-09 |
Genre | Poetry |
ISBN | 9781423656685 |
Honoring the female part of the divine, from a refreshingly modern perspective. Call Her Goddess--call her God the Mother--call her the Feminine Principle--Her children need Her, and our world deeply suffers the pains of Her absence. Through the warmth and the wit of poetry, this book is an invitation for all--women, men, of any religion or of no religion--to welcome Her home and set a permanent place for Her at the family table. Carol Lynn Pearson's poetry are accessible, thoughtful, and thought-provoking--the perfect balance of wisdom, humility, and humor. Carol Lynn Pearson has been a professional writer, speaker, and performer for many years. In addition to her volumes of poetry, she is well known for such books as The Ghost of Eternal Polygamy; Goodbye, I Love You, her autobiography; Consider the Butterfly, which was a finalist in the inspiration/spiritual category of the 2002 Independent Publishers Book Awards; and a series of inspirational books that began with The Lesson. Carol Lynn has been a guest on such programs as The Oprah Winfrey Show and Good Morning, America and has been featured in People magazine. She has a master of arts in theater, is the mother of four grown children, and lives in Walnut Creek, California. You can visit her at www.clpearson.com.
Bored, Lonely, Angry, Stupid
Title | Bored, Lonely, Angry, Stupid PDF eBook |
Author | Luke Fernandez |
Publisher | Harvard University Press |
Pages | 473 |
Release | 2020-07-07 |
Genre | Computers |
ISBN | 0674244729 |
An Entrepreneur Best Book of the Year Facebook makes us lonely. Selfies breed narcissism. On Twitter, hostility reigns. Pundits and psychologists warn that digital technologies substantially alter our emotional states, but in this lively investigation of changing feelings about technology, we learn that the gadgets we use don’t just affect how we feel—they can profoundly change our sense of self. When we say we’re bored, we don’t mean the same thing as a Victorian dandy. Could it be that political punditry has helped shape a new kind of anger? Luke Fernandez and Susan Matt take us back in time to consider how our feelings of loneliness, boredom, vanity, and anger have evolved in tandem with new technologies. “Technologies have been shaping [our] emotional culture for more than a century, argue computer scientist Luke Fernandez and historian Susan Matt in this original study. Marshalling archival sources and interviews, they trace how norms (say, around loneliness) have shifted with technological change.” —Nature “A powerful story of how new forms of technology are continually integrated into the human experience.” —Publishers Weekly