Rhinestones and Twanging Tones: The Look and Sound of Country Music shows in glittering detail how most classic country stars traded in their overalls for sequined and spangled outfits that shone from a mile away, and strummed guitars that were often just as ornately bedecked, or customized by decades of road wear.

Long a symbol of American culture, the banjo actually originated in Africa before European-Americans adopted it. Karen Linn shows how the banjo--despite design innovations and several modernizing agendas--has failed to escape its image as a "half-barbaric" instrument symbolic of antimodernism and sentimentalism. Caught in the morass of American racial attitudes and often used to express ambivalence toward modern industrial society, the banjo stood in opposition to the "official" values of rationalism, modernism, and belief in the beneficence of material progress. Linn uses popular literature, visual arts, advertisements, film, performance practices, instrument construction and decoration, and song lyrics to illustrate how notions about the banjo have changed. Linn also traces the instrument from its African origins through the 1980s, alternating between themes of urban modernization and rural nostalgia. She examines the banjo fad of bourgeois Northerners during the late nineteenth century; the African-American banjo tradition and the commercially popular cultural image of the southern black banjo player; the banjo's use in ragtime and early jazz; and the image of the white Southerner and mountaineer as banjo player.

Posters included in pockets on endpapers; access to online media available.

Twenty-three-year-old Jennifer Clodfelter believes she is destined to be a country music star. When her passion, determination and homemade demo tape were rejected by every music label in Nashville, she refused to give up. In just three years, a combination of guts and raw talent have propelled her on a journey of fame beyond her best dream. Now Jennifer has all she ever wanted, only to discover that there is a dark side to the glitz and number one hits. She will have to decide whether to sing her pain to a loving audience or find the courage to face the music in the private studio of her heart.

“A free-wheeling vehicle . . . an unforgettable ride!”—The New York Times Cat’s Cradle is Kurt Vonnegut’s satirical commentary on modern man and his madness. An apocalyptic tale of this planet’s ultimate fate, it features a midget as the protagonist, a complete, original theology created by a calypso singer, and a vision of the future that is at once blackly fatalistic and hilariously funny. A book that left an indelible mark on an entire generation of readers, Cat’s Cradle is one of the twentieth century’s most important works—and Vonnegut at his very best. “[Vonnegut is] an unimitative and inimitable social satirist.”—Harper’s Magazine “Our finest black-humorist . . . We laugh in self-defense.”—Atlantic Monthly

Secondary Traumatic Stress (STS) is a trauma that can occur in anyone who witnesses the suffering of others or helps another through a traumatic experience. Those at risk include health care providers, first responders, people in journalism, law, teaching, correctional services, animal health care and those caring for loved ones at home, among others. STS can profoundly impact both your professional and personal life. Dismissing the symptoms only make matters worse. But STS does not need to be a life sentence. Overcoming traumatic stress is possible and can even be transformational as this heart-warming and sometimes humorous memoir suggests. This book provides information about STS, its symptoms and treatment, as well as ways to help prevent it.

The comprehensive collection of the late Storm Thorgerson's iconic designs for Pink Floyd