Every business person knows that the old approaches to selling just don't work any more. Focused on applying the principles of the Tao to dealing with others, this book shows readers how to succeed in a new and unfamiliar customer-driven world. "The Tao of Sales" guides readers along a transformational path so that they think and act in harmony with the changing times in which we live.

Selling Spirituality shows how spirituality today functions as a powerful commodity in the global marketplace, promising to soothe away the ills of modern life whilst functioning as a silent form of economic, cultural and political restraint.

Popular culture permeates every aspect of our lives: from the music we listen to, the films and television shows we watch and the books we read. But who decides what counts as popular culture? Why is it so important? And how do we go about studying it? This book provides a comprehensive introduction to popular culture and examines the problems and possibilities of studying this fast changing field. Employing a unique approach, Bowman uses techniques of deconstruction to unpick, analyse and deconstruct contemporary examples of popular culture. The book looks at music, Hollywood film and the self-help movement to question claims behind the importance of popular culture and encourage readers to form their own interpretations of the culture they experience every day. With theory interwoven throughout, but in a way that is barely noticeable to the reader, the book provides covers the important theoretical work in the field, whilst directing the reader through ways to avoid common pitfalls in studying theory. An innovative user guide and glossary explain essential terms and ideas, making difficult concepts relevant, accessible and interesting. This witty, thought-provoking book provides a clear, novel introduction to popular culture for all students of cultural studies, media studies and sociology.

Many people set out to achieve a dream-starting a business or learning to play the piano or publishing a book-but they don't succeed, and the dream fizzles away. In many cases, these people have lots of skills and expertise, such as deep knowledge of the business or career they are interested in, so why don't they succeed? Paul Levesque and Art McNeil have discovered that making a dream come true requires cultivating skills of a higher order-macroskills-that inevitably spell the difference between success and failure no matter what the specifics of a person's dreams are. These are the skills Dreamcrafting outlines in detail.

Slavoj Žižek is widely regarded as one of the world's most important contemporary thinkers. His work has contributed dramatically to the reinvention and revivification of many key theoretical and political debates. Indeed, his vociferous and challenging body of work amounts to a sustained, ground-breaking, terrain-shifting and far reaching intervention into a large number of academic disciplines, intellectual fields and cultural debates. The Truth of Žižek addresses the rigorous critical assessment demanded by this broad and increasingly influential corpus. This timely and compelling collection of essays from an international team of leading Žižekian scholars addresses the full range of Žižek's theoretical interventions, assessing critically the political, philosophical, psychoanalytical, cultural and institutional stakes of his work. Each chapter engages with and challenges Žižek's thought to explicate a key aspect of his work, clarifying its importance and challenging its claims through rigorous critique. By focusing on Žižek's contributions to these disciplines, fields and debates, this collection sets out to diagnose and assess the emergence of a ' Žižekian moment' within contemporary intellectual, cultural and political events. The Truth of Žižek provides the first sustained engagement with and assessment of the significant impact of Žižek's work. This compelling and valuable collection of essays from cutting edge scholars picks up the gauntlet thrown down by Žižek: the demand that his readers respond with 'the coldness and cruelty of true friendship.'

Since Martin Luther, vocations or callings have had a close relationship with daily work. It is a give-and-take relationship in which the meaning of a vocation typically negotiates with the kinds of work available (and vice-versa) at any given time. While "vocation language" still has currency in Western culture, today's predominant meaning of vocation has little to do with the actual work performed on a job. Jeffrey Scholes contends that recent theological treatments of the Protestant concept of vocation, both academic and popular, often unwittingly collude with consumer culture to circulate a concept of vocation that is detached from the material conditions of work. The result is a consumer-friendly vocation that is rendered impotent to inform and, if necessary, challenge the political norms of the workplace. For example, he classifies Rick Warren's concept of "purpose" in his best-selling book, The Purpose-Driven Life, as a functional equivalent of vocation that acts in this way. Other popular uses of vocation along with insights culled from traditional theology and consumer culture studies help Scholes reveal the current state of vocations in the West. Using recent scholarship in the field of political theology, he argues that resisting commodification is a possibility and a prerequisite for a "political vocation," if it is at all able to engage the norms that regulate and undermine the pursuit of justice in many modern workplaces.

Providing developments and advancements concerning the thought of Calvin O. Schrag, this book includes the first full-length interview with the American continental philosopher and covers his long and illustrative philosophical contribution to thinking about the consequences of communication. The influence of Schrag's work is significant and broad, and these nine thought-provoking pieces by leading scholars whose work has been influenced by his philosophy presents the best contemporary thought on communicative praxis. Encompassing questions of democracy, the public and private spheres, and relations inside organizational structures, to questions of giving and ethics, rhetoric and narrative, suffering and love, this is a wellspring of insight and provocation for both those already familiar with Schrag's work and those seeking a keen invitation to his many critical reflections.