"A life spent in making others happy is far better than life spent in heaping up riches that perish"--Preface.

Since the early 1970s southern fiction has been increasingly attentive to social issues, including the continuing struggles for racial justice and gender equality, the loss of a sense of social community, and the decline of a coherent regional identity. The essays in The World Is Our Home focus on writers who have explicitly addressed social and cultural issues in their fiction and drama, including Dorothy Allison, Horton Foote, Ernest J. Gaines, Jill McCorkle, Walker Percy, Lee Smith, William Styron, Alice Walker, and many others. The contributors provide valuable insights into the transformation of southern culture over the past thirty years and probe the social and cultural divisions that persist. The collection makes an important case for the centrality of social critique in contemporary southern fiction.

With the growing concern over healthcare in America, studies show that elderly African- Americans often come out on the losing end of the system due to lack of health insurance. Because of this growing population, taking care of elderly patients in the African-American community has become the responsibility of their family. If youre facing such a situation, your questions may be many and your answers few. Taking Care of Our Folks is a definitive guide to caring for your elderly relatives. Drawing on comprehensive and detailed research, this essential resource aims to ensure that elderly African-Americans receive culturally competent healthcare and live more productive, independent, and pain-free lives. Deborah Y. Liggan, MD, discusses the major health issues and offers case studies of how each illness affects this ethnic group. She offers up-to-date information on nutrition, pharmacology, technological advances, and self-help for each disease. Topics focus specifically on elderly African-Americans and include: Neurology of aging Cardiovascular problems Mental health and aging Approach to gastrointestinal problems Prominent cancers With clear and concise language, Taking Care of Our Folks will serve as an invaluable tool for caregivers and aging patients alike. Take the first step to competent and compassionate caregiving today!

This year marks the golden anniversary of the Art Ensemble of Chicago, the flagship band of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians. Formed in 1966 and flourishing until 2010, the Art Ensemble distinguished itself by its unique performance practices—members played hundreds of instruments on stage, recited poetry, performed theatrical sketches, and wore face paint, masks, lab coats, and traditional African and Asian dress. The group, which built a global audience and toured across six continents, presented their work as experimental performance art, in opposition to the jazz industry’s traditionalist aesthetics. In Message to Our Folks, Paul Steinbeck combines musical analysis and historical inquiry to give us the definitive study of the Art Ensemble. In the book, he proposes a new theory of group improvisation that explains how the band members were able to improvise together in so many different styles while also drawing on an extensive repertoire of notated compositions. Steinbeck examines the multimedia dimensions of the Art Ensemble’s performances and the ways in which their distinctive model of social relations kept the group performing together for four decades. Message to Our Folks is a striking and valuable contribution to our understanding of one of the world’s premier musical groups.