Asserting that literary theory needs a dose of common sense, this treatise attacks Saussurean linguistics as outmoded and discredited in its elimination of its subjects. It claims that postmodernist ideas of the individual rest on false linguistic and psychological premises.

Based on the highly successful course at the School of Visual Arts developed by the author, this book provides a comprehensive approach to the critical understanding of photography through an in-depth discussion of fifteen photographs and their contexts – historical, generic, biographical and aesthetic. This book presents an intensive course in looking at photographs, open to undergraduates and general audiences alike. Rexer argues that by concentrating on fifteen carefully chosen works it is possible to understand the history, development and contemporary situation of photography. Looking to images by photographers such as Roland Fischer, Nancy Rexroth and Ernest Cole, The Critical Eye is the only book to address the totality of issues involved in photography, from authorial self-consciousness to the role of the audience. Its subjects are not limited to art photography but include vernacular images, commercial genres and anthropology. With every chapter it seeks to link the history of photography to current practice. This highly illustrated and beautiful book provides a much-needed introduction to image production.

How the cerebral cortex operates near a critical phase transition point for optimum performance. Individual neurons have limited computational powers, but when they work together, it is almost like magic. Firing synchronously and then breaking off to improvise by themselves, they can be paradoxically both independent and interdependent. This happens near the critical point: when neurons are poised between a phase where activity is damped and a phase where it is amplified, where information processing is optimized, and complex emergent activity patterns arise. The claim that neurons in the cortex work best when they operate near the critical point is known as the criticality hypothesis. In this book John Beggs—one of the pioneers of this hypothesis—offers an introduction to the critical point and its relevance to the brain. Drawing on recent experimental evidence, Beggs first explains the main ideas underlying the criticality hypotheses and emergent phenomena. He then discusses the critical point and its two main consequences—first, scale-free properties that confer optimum information processing; and second, universality, or the idea that complex emergent phenomena, like that seen near the critical point, can be explained by relatively simple models that are applicable across species and scale. Finally, Beggs considers future directions for the field, including research on homeostatic regulation, quasicriticality, and the expansion of the cortex and intelligence. An appendix provides technical material; many chapters include exercises that use freely available code and data sets.

Essays by some of the world's leading educators provide a revolutionary portrait of new ideas and developments in education that can influence the possibility of social and political change. The authors take into account such diverse terrain as feminism, ecology, media, and individual liberty in their pursuit of new ideas that can inform the fundamental practice of education and promote a more humane civil society. The book consolidates recent thinking just as it reflects on emerging new lines of critical theory.

Intended to clearly and systematically demystify what is often considered the most challenging section of the SAT, The Critical Reader, 2nd Edition, provides a comprehensive review of the reading skills tested on the redesigned exam for students who are serious about raising their scores. Includes: -A chapter-by-chapter breakdown of question types, with in-depth explanations and numerous examples demonstrating how to work through each type. -Techniques for comprehending complex passages and identifying key information quickly and efficiently. -Extensive strategies for simplifying and answering paired supporting evidence questions as well as informational graphic questions. -A list of alternate definitions of common words, plus strategies for using context clues to decipher the meaning of unfamiliar vocabulary. To allow students to apply the strategies outlined in this book to College Board material while focusing on the specific areas in which they are seeking to improve, this book also includes a list of all the Reading questions from the Khan Academy exams/College Board Official Guide, 3rd Edition (2015), arranged both by category and by test. Note: If you are preparing for the AP English Language and Composition exam, a separate AP Edition is now available in beta form (multiple-choice reading only) at https://www.createspace.com/7045612.

The Critical Turn in Education traces the historical emergence and development of critical theories in the field of education, from the introduction of Marxist and other radical social theories in the 1960s to the contemporary critical landscape. The book begins by tracing the first waves of critical scholarship in the field through a close, contextual study of the intellectual and political projects of several core figures including, Paulo Freire, Samuel Bowles and Herbert Gintis, Michael Apple, and Henry Giroux. Later chapters offer a discussion of feminist critiques, the influx of postmodernist and poststructuralist ideas in education, and critical theories of race. While grounded in U.S. scholarship, The Critical Turn in Education contextualizes the development of critical ideas and political projects within a larger international history, and charts the ongoing theoretical debates that seek to explain the relationship between school and society. Today, much of the language of this critical turn has now become commonplace—words such as "hegemony," "ideology," and the term "critical" itself—but by providing a historical analysis, The Critical Turn in Education illuminates the complexity and nuance of these theoretical tools, which offer ways of understanding the intersections between individual identities and structural forces in an attempt to engage and overturn social injustice.