Sociology History

Upon its first publication, A Different Mirror was hailed by critics and academics everywhere as a dramatic new retelling of our nation's past. Beginning with the colonization of the New World, it recounts the history of America in the voice of the non-Anglo peoples of the United States---Native Americans, African Americans, Jews, Irish Americans, Asian Americans, Latinos, and others---groups who helped create this country's rich mosaic culture.

When Kyle Shanahan became the NFL's youngest offensive coordinator in 2008, he had one prevailing rule: Tell me the why. If a colleague couldn't justify his position by providing the unassailable reasoning behind it, he was told to get the hell out of Shanahan's office. Shanahan and the members of his coaching tree—including Sean McVay, Mike McDaniel, Raheem Morris, and Matt LaFleur—came up in a sport where innovation was the exception, not the rule. There had been brilliant football minds before, from Paul Brown to Bill Walsh to Bill Belichick.

Dr. Elisabeth Kubler-Ross created her classic seminal work, On Death and Dying, to offer us a new perspective on the terminally ill. It is not a psychoanalytic study, nor is it a "how-to" manual for managing death. Rather, it refocuses on the patient as a human being and a teacher, in the hope that we will learn from him or her about the final stages of life.

For the last two centuries, groups of influential men have, in the professed interest of fiscal responsibility, crime reduction, and outright racism, attempted to control who was allowed to bear children. Their efforts, "eugenics," characterize a movement that over the last century swept across the world—from the US to Brazil, Japan, India, Australia, and beyond—in the form of marriage restrictions, asylum detention, and sterilization campaigns affected millions. German physicians and scientists adopted and then heightened these eugenics practices beginning in 1939.

Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google are the four most influential companies on the planet. Just about everyone thinks they know how they got there. Just about everyone is wrong. For all that's been written about the Four over the last two decades, no one has captured their power and staggering success as insightfully as Scott Galloway. Instead of buying the myths these companies broadcast, Galloway asks fundamental questions.

This book is about mutual aid: why it is so important, what it looks like, and how to do it. It provides a grassroots theory of mutual aid, describes how mutual aid is a crucial part of powerful movements for social justice, and offers concrete tools for organizing, such as how to work in groups, how to foster a collective decision-making process, how to prevent and address conflict, and how to deal with burnout.

Is religion a force for war, or a force for peace? Some of the most terrible wars in history have been caused and motivated by religion. Much of the violence that fills our screens today springs from the same source. Yet some of the bravest pacifists have also been deeply religious people, and many of the laws and institutions that work to soften or prevent war have deep religious roots. This Very Short Introduction provides an overview of the history of religion and war, and a framework for analyzing it.

J. D. Vance grew up in the hills of Kentucky. His family and friends were the people most of the world calls rednecks, hillbillies or white trash. In this deeply moving memoir, Vance tells the story of his family’s demons and of America’s problem with generational neglect. How his mother struggled against, but never fully escaped, the legacies of abuse, alcoholism, poverty and trauma. How his grandparents, ‘dirt poor and in love’, gave everything for their children to chase the American dream. How Vance beat the odds to graduate from Yale Law School.

Alfani argues that the position of the rich and super-rich in Western society has always been intrinsically fragile; their very presence has inspired social unease. In the Middle Ages, an excessive accumulation of wealth was considered sinful; the rich were expected not to appear to be wealthy. Eventually, the rich were deemed useful when they used their wealth to help their communities in times of crisis. Yet in the twenty-first century, the rich and the super-rich have been exceptionally reluctant to contribute to the common good in times of crisis.

In this erudite and enjoyable Los Angeles Times best seller, Joel Kotkin explores the history of cities around the globe. He argues that urban areas must be places where there is a shared feeling of sacredness, civic identity, and moral order. These exciting concentrations of ideas and energy have long been and should continue to be meaningful in our daily lives.

Before Harriet Tubman or Martin Luther King was identified with Moses, African Americans identified those who challenged racial oppression in America with Samson. In Black Samson: The Untold Story of an American Icon, Nyasha Junior and Jeremy Schipper tell the story of how this biblical character became an icon of African American literature.

SuperFreakonomics challenges the way we think all over again, exploring the hidden side of everything with such questions as: How is a street prostitute like a department-store Santa? What do hurricanes, heart attacks, and highway deaths have in common? Can eating kangaroo save the planet? Levitt and Dubner mix smart thinking and great storytelling like no one else.

The author of the "dazzling epic" (Lev Grossman, Time) Brilliant delivers an indelible view of the ways silence affects those who seek it and those who have it imposed upon them. Through her original, intertwined histories of the penitentiary and the monastery, Jane Brox illuminates the many ways silence is far more complex than any absolute; how it has influenced ideas of the self, soul, and society.

Throughout history, humans have been driven by the quest for two cherished ideals: community and freedom. The two don’t coexist easily. We value individuality and self-reliance, yet are utterly dependent on community for our most basic needs. In this intricately crafted and thought-provoking book, Sebastian Junger examines the tension that lies at the heart of what it means to be human.

Desvela los mecanismos ocultos de la dominación mundial con Globalismo: Ingeniería social y control total en el siglo XXI. El exitoso autor Agustín Laje desentraña magistralmente la malvada realidad de nuestro mundo moderno e ilumina las tinieblas de las fuerzas de poder que tratan de controlar a la humanidad.

For the last 100,000 years, we Sapiens have accumulated enormous power. But despite all our discoveries, inventions, and conquests, we now find ourselves in an existential crisis. The world is on the verge of ecological collapse. Misinformation abounds. And we are rushing headlong into the age of AI—a new information network that threatens to annihilate us. For all that we have accomplished, why are we so self-destructive?

Few events have had a more profound impact on the social and cultural upheavals of the Sixties than the psychedelic revolution spawned by the spread of LSD. This audiobook for the first time tells the full and astounding story - part of it hidden till now in secret Government files - of the role the mind-altering drug played in our recent turbulent history and the continuing influence it has on our time. And what a story it is, beginning with LSD’s discovery in 1943 as the most potent drug known to science.

Weaving together over 100 years of history with scenes from the contemporary landscape, Labor of Love offers a fresh feminist perspective on how we came to date the ways we do. This isn't a guide to "getting the guy". There are no ridiculous "rules" to follow. Instead Weigel helps us understand how looking for love shapes who we are and hopefully leads us closer to the happy ending that dating promises.

In this ambitious audiobook, best-selling author Sanjeev Sanyal chronicles the grand sweep of history from East Africa to Australia, conjuring the great cities of Angkor and Vijayanagar, medieval Arab empires, and Chinese "treasure fleets" in rich, vivid detail. He explores remote archaeological sites, maritime trading networks, and half-forgotten oral tales to challenge established historical narratives with fresh evidence. Shining new light on medieval geopolitics and long-lost cities, The Ocean of Churn is a mesmerizing journey into the heart of a vibrant civilization.

This is one man’s chronicle, at times indignant and at others reflective, of an extraordinary moment in the history of the world, a moment of crisis whose eventual resolution will have far-reaching consequences for our children and their children. The author is Professor Thomas Harrington. His primary field of study is Hispanic culture and history, with a focus on Catalonian language, history and nationalism. With a deep knowledge of the life of a particular region and language group, he cultivated a keen insight into the difference between what is authentic and organic to a social order ...