Best of
Society

1994

Earth: Pleiadian Keys to the Living Library


Barbara Marciniak - 1994
    Earth: Pleiadian Keys to the Living Library is their handbook to inspired living, calling on us to restore and return value to the human being, and to recognize the Goddess energies and the power of blood as connections to our DNA and our heritage. Using wit, wisdom, and deep compassion, they entice us to explore the corridors of time through the concept of the Game Masters; to awaken the crucial codes for multidimensional perspective; and to redream the Living Library of Earth. Their teachings are significantly arranged in twelve chapters to trigger a deeper understanding of our ancestral lineage. Earth probes the memories hidden deep within us to reveal our crucial roles in the transformational process unfolding in our times.

Race Rebels: Culture, Politics, And The Black Working Class


Robin D.G. Kelley - 1994
    Race rebels, argues Kelley, have created strategies of resistance, movements, and entire subcultures. Here, for the first time, everyday race rebels are given the historiographical attention they deserve, from the Jim Crow era to the present.

Nihilism: The Root of the Revolution of the Modern Age


Seraphim Rose - 1994
    Seraphim) undertook to write a monumental chronicle of the abandonment of Truth in the modern age. Of the hundreds of pages of material he compiled for this work, only the present essay has come down to us in completed form. Here Fr. Seraphim reveals the core of all modern thought and life—the belief that all truth is relative—and shows how this belief has been translated into action in our century. Today, four decades after he wrote it, this essay is more timely than ever. It clearly explains why contemporary ideas, values, and attitudes—the “spirit of the age”—are shifting so rapidly in the direction of moral anarchy, as the philosophy of Nihilism enters more deeply into the fiber of society. Nietszche was right when he predicted that the 20th century would usher in “the triumph of Nihilism.”“Atheism, true ‘existential’ atheism burning with hatred of a seemingly unjust or unmerciful God, is a spiritual state; it is a real attempt to grapple with the true God.… Nietzsche, in calling himself Antichrist, proved thereby his intense hunger for Christ.”This new second edition contains a superb essay entitled “The Philosophy of the Absurd,” written by Fr. Seraphim at the same time that he was working on “Nihilism.”

The Contrary Farmer


Gene Logsdon - 1994
    One of Logsdon's principle contrarieties is the opinion that--popular images of the vanishing American farmer, notwithstanding--greater numbers of people in the U.S. will soon be growing and raising a greater share of their own food than at any time since the last century. Instead of vanishing, more and more farmers will be cottage farming, part-time. This detailed and personal account of how Logsdon's family uses the art and science of agriculture to achieve a reasonably happy and ecologically sane way of life in an example for all who seek a sustainable lifestyle. In The Contrary Farmer, Logsdon offers the tried-and-true, practical advice of a manual for the cottage farmer, as well as the subtler delights of a meditation in praise of work and pleasure. The Contrary Farmer will give its readers tools and tenets, but also hilarious commentaries and beautiful evocations of the Ohio countryside that Logsdon knows as his place in the universe.

The World Is As You Dream It: Teachings from the Amazon and Andes


John Perkins - 1994
    Perkins’ insider’s view leads him to crisis of conscience--to the realization that he must devote himself to work which will foster a world-wide awareness of the sanctity of indigenous peoples, their cultures, and their environments. Perkins’ books demonstrate how the age-old shamanic techniques of some of the world’s most primitive peoples have sparked a revolution in modern concepts about healing, the subconscious, and the powers each of us has to alter individual and communal reality.Deep in the rain forests and high in the Andes of Ecuador, native shamans teach the age-old technique of dream change, a tradition that has kept the cultures of the Otavalans, Salasacans, and Shuar alive despite centuries of conquest. Now these shamans are turning their wisdom and power to the problem of curing a new kind of illness--that created by the industrial world’s dream of dominating and exploiting nature. John Perkins tells the story of these remarkable shamans and of the U.S. medical doctors, psychologists, and scientists who have gone with him to learn the techniques of dream change. These shamanic teachings have sparked a revolution in modern concepts about healing, the subconscious, and the powers each of us has to alter individual and communal reality.

Free from Bondage God's Way: Galatians/Ephesians


Kay Arthur - 1994
    In this study, readers discover the matchless freedom available in Christ, see God's grace, and take up the armor necessary to stand strong and victorious.

Third and Indiana


Steve López - 1994
    Each time a life is lost in the carnage of the local drug wars, a boldly drawn chalk outline of a body appears on the street leading up to City hall: a teenaged dealer, a priest, a little girl with a jump rope. Ofelia Santoro rides her bicycle through the dark, decaying streets, looking for her fourteen-year-old-son, Gabriel. She's afraid of what she might find. Gabriel has fallen in with the most savage of the drug dealers, but now wants to get out--if he can. In this gritty, fast-moving novel, acclaimed Philadelphia Inquirer columnist Steve Lopez brings home the violence that is scarring America's vast urban wastelands, and the humanity that might save them.

All Life Is Problem Solving


Karl Popper - 1994
    This collection illuminates Popper's process of working out key formulations in his theory of science, and indicates his view of the state of the world at the end of the Cold War and after the collapse of communism.

Learned Hand: The Man and the Judge


Gerald Gunther - 1994
    The greatest judge never to be appointed to the Supreme Court, he is widely considered to be the peer of Justices Holmes, Brandeis, and Cardozo.

Welcome to the Jungle: New Positions in Black Cultural Studies


Kobena Mercer - 1994
    The ten essays collected here examine new forms of cultural expression in black film, photography and visual art exerging with a new generation of black British artists, and interprets this prolific creativity within a sociological framework that reveals fresh perspectives on the bewildering complexity of identity and diversity in an era of postmodernity. Kobena Mercer documents a wealth of insights opened up by the overlapping of Asian, African and Caribbean cultures that constitute Black Britain as a unique domain of diaspora.

West of the Thirties: Discoveries Among the Navajo and Hopi


Edward T. Hall - 1994
    This firsthand account illuminates the different logic of the Navajo and Hopi in a rough-and-tumble bygone world. 24 photos.

The Empty Raincoat: Making Sense of the Future


Charles B. Handy - 1994
    Endless growth can make a candyfloss economy, and capitalism must be its own sternest critic. Handy reaches here for a philosophy beyond the mechanics of business organisations, beyond material choices, to try and establish an alternative universe where the work ethics can contain a natural sense of continuity, connections and a sense of direction. We are now a world of shareholders, but everyone has a stake in the future. With warmth, wit and the most challenging insights, Charles Handy seeks to turn paradox into real progress.

Human Rights In A Changing World


Antonio Cassese - 1994
    

Dionysos Rising: The Birth of Cultural Revolution Out of the Spirit of Music


E. Michael Jones - 1994
    Michael Jones Following up his best-seller, Degenerate Moderns, Jones reveals how major figures connected with modern music projected their own immorality into the field of music which has been the main vehicle of cultural revolution in the West. For the first time ever, a unified theory of music and cultural revolution links the work of figures like Wagner, Nietzsche, Schönborg, Jagger and others to show the connection between the demise of classical music and the rise of rock 'n' roll. Beginning with Nietzsche's appropriation of Wagner's opera Tristan and Isolde, music became the instrument for cultural upheaval. What began at the barricades of Dresden in 1849 found its culmination at Woodstock and Altamont and the other Dionysian festivals of 1969. Jones shows the connection between the death of classical music and the rise of the African sensibility which Nietzsche saw as the antidote to Wagner prostrating himself before the cross in Parsifal. Nietzsche prophesied the end of the age of Christ/Socrates and the return of the spirit of music to philosophy. That return took place at the end of 1969 at an abandoned racetrack outside of San Francisco, and the world has never been the same."And a man who has not 'music' in him is apt to disintegrate states since music is equally suggestive of personal love or political concord." - G. Wilson Knight, The Shakespearean Tempest

Encountering Development: The Making and Unmaking of the Third World


Arturo Escobar - 1994
    The development apparatus generated categories powerful enough to shape the thinking even of its occasional critics while poverty and hunger became widespread. Development was not even partially deconstructed until the 1980s, when new tools for analyzing the representation of social reality were applied to specific Third World cases. Here Escobar deploys these new techniques in a provocative analysis of development discourse and practice in general, concluding with a discussion of alternative visions for a postdevelopment era.Escobar emphasizes the role of economists in development discourse--his case study of Colombia demonstrates that the economization of food resulted in ambitious plans, and more hunger. To depict the production of knowledge and power in other development fields, the author shows how peasants, women, and nature became objects of knowledge and targets of power under the gaze of experts.

Allah O Akbar: A Journey Through Militant Islam


Abbas - 1994
    Wherever in the world you are, the message is the same: 'God is Great.' It is also, however, the cry of fundamentalists throughout the lands of the faithful.Abbas, a member of the prestigious photo agency Magnum, has spent seven years travelling through the Islamic world to capture the diverse and striking images that make up this extraordinary personal diary. As a photojournalist he has covered major political events in the developing world including wars and revolutions, driven by a desire to understand and expose the intricacy of the internal strains pulling within Muslim societies. Abbas is undoubtedly one of the world's leading makers of the 'telling' picture, and the combined immediacy and subtlety of the photographic images create a constant visual stimulus.

The World System: Five Hundred Years or Five Thousand?


André Gunder Frank - 1994
    The idea of the 'world system' advanced by Immanuel Wallerstein has set the period of linkage in the early modern period. But some academics think this date is much too late and denies a much longer interconnection going back as much as five thousand years. Reframing the chronology of the world system exercises powerful influences on the writing of history. It integrates the areas of Asia and the East which were marginalized by Wallerstein into the heart of the debate and provides a much more convincing account of developments which cannot otherwise be explained. It undermines the primacy claimed for Europe as the major agent of economic change, an issue with implications far beyond the realm of history.

The Assassination of the Black Male Image


Earl Ofari Hutchinson - 1994
    Earl Ofari Hutchinson offers a searing, controversial indictment of our society’s attitudes toward black men.The black male image, he argues, has been battered, maligned, and assaulted by academics, the press, and Hollywood, as well as by some black rappers, comedians, feminists, filmmakers, and novelists—many of whom he accuses of reinforcing, and profiting from, ethnic and sexual stereotypes. Offering both a wide historical perspective and acute insights into such racially charged events as the O. J. Simpson trial, the Clarence Thomas hearings, and the Million Man March, Hutchinson brilliantly counters the image of the black male as a figure entrenched in crime, drugs, and violence. At the same time, he issues a deeply moving call to rethink the way we view African American men.

The Clinton Vision: Old Wine, New Bottles


Noam Chomsky - 1994
    Political Science. In this 1994 speech--the first of three released by AK Press, oddly enough, in association with the punk record label Epitaph--Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor Noam Chomsky shoots from the hip, criticizing the early days of the Clinton administration long before anyone had ever heard of Monica Lewinsky. Chomsky digs into Clinton's bungled health care plan, his business interests, his labor policies, and his involvement with the North American Free Trade Agreement. Despite being the world's foremost linguist, Chomsky is not exactly a charismatic speaker--he drones a bit and offers humor sparingly. His strong, simple words, though, and his big ideas are undeniably engrossing. He takes politics out of the ether and shows us how it affects our lives and the lives of those around us.

The Red Mirror: Children Of China's Cultural Revolution


Chihua Wen - 1994
    Now adults, survivors recall their childhood during the tumultuous years between 1965 and 1976, when Mao's death finally drew a curtain on a bitterly failed social and political experiment.A series of first-person narratives eloquently describes the life-long influence of this seminal period on China's children. Those who were teenagers in the late 1960s joined the Red Guards and the revolutionary rebel groups, following Mao's directives to make revolution, often to their own undoing. Those who were too young to participate directly were even more vulnerable. Although they had little understanding of the political firestorm that engulfed their parents, they were old enough to understand and feel the terror it brought. Vividly capturing the emotional intensity of the time, these stories explore what it was like to be caught up in revolutionary fervor, to be sent to the countryside, to be separated—either ideologically or physically—from one's parents, often forever.By undermining families and family structure, the Cultural Revolution created a generation of Chinese who view politics, the Communist Party, and life itself with deep cynicism. Presenting a spectrum of individual stories of people who saw the Cultural Revolution through the eyes of a child, The Red Mirror offers rare insights for understanding the crippling legacy of the Cultural Revolution.

Restless Mind, Quiet Thoughts: A Personal Journal


Paul Eppinger - 1994
    Although gifted and sensitive, his life contained a great deal of pain, and the book ends with Paul's death by suicide.

From Civil Rights to Black Liberation: Malcolm X and the Organization of Afro-America Unity


William W. Sales Jr. - 1994
    The author establishes the relevance of Malcolm's political legacy for the task of rebuilding the movement for Black liberation almost thity years after his assassination.

The Theosophical Enlightenment


Joscelyn Godwin - 1994
    The Theosophical Society, founded in 1875 by Helena P. Blavatsky, holds a crucial position as the place where all these currents temporarily united, before again diverging. The book's ambiguous title points to the author's thesis that Theosophy owed as much to the skeptical Enlightenment of the eighteenth century as it did to the concept of spiritual enlightenment with which it is more readily associated.The author respects his sources sufficiently to allow that their world, so different from that of academic reductionism, has a right to be exhibited on its own terms. At the same time he does not conceal the fact that he considers many of them deluded and deluding.In the context of theosophical history, this book is neither on the side of the blind votaries of Madame Blavatsky, nor on that of her enemies. It may, therefore, be expected to mildly annoy both sides.

Free Exchange


Pierre Bourdieu - 1994
    Their frank and open dialogue on contemporary art and culture ranges widely, from censorship and obscenity to the social conditions of artistic creativity. Among the examples they discuss are the controversies surrounding the exhibition of photographs by Robert Mapplethorpe and Andres Serrano, the debates concerning multiculturalism and ethnic diversity, and the uses of art as a means of contesting and disrupting symbolic domination. They also explore the central themes of Hans Haacke's work, which is used to illustrate the book.

Oscar Niemeyer and the Architecture of Brazil


David Kendrick Underwood - 1994
    The most comprehensive analysis in English of the architect's spectacular career.

Merry Christmas America: A Front Yard View of the Holidays


Christina Patoski - 1994
    In this fascinating collection of displays ranging from the conventional to the bizarre, Patoski offer something for everyone--an enchanting view of the holidays that could tempt even Scrooge to put a light in the window! 100 color photos.

The Mild Voice of Reason: Deliberative Democracy and American National Government


Joseph M. Bessette - 1994
    Rather, pressure from special interest groups, legislative bargaining, and the desire of incumbents to be reelected are thought to originate in American legislative politics. While not denying such influences, Joseph M. Bessette argues that the institutional framework created by the founding fathers continues to foster a government that is both democratic and deliberative, at least to some important degree.Drawing on original research, case studies of policymaking in Congress, and portraits of American lawmakers, Bessette demonstrates not only the limitations of nondeliberative explanations for how laws are made but also the continued vitality of genuine reasoning on the merits of public policy. Bessette discusses the contributions of the executive branch to policy deliberation, and looks at the controversial issue of the proper relationship of public opinion to policymaking.Informed by Bessette's nine years of public service in city and federal government, The Mild Voice of Reason offers important insights into the real workings of American democracy, articulates a set of standards by which to assess the workings of our governing institutions, and clarifies the forces that promote or inhibit the collective reasoning about common goals so necessary to the success of American democracy."No doubt the best-publicized recent book-length work on Congress is columnist George Will's diatribe in praise of term limits in which the core of his complaint is that Congress does not deliberate in its decision-making. Readers who are inclined to share that fantasy would do well to consult the work of Joseph M. Bessette. He turns up massive amounts of material attesting to the centrality of deliberation in congressional life."—Nelson W. Polsby, Presidential Studies Quarterly

The Making of Strategy: Rulers, States, and War


Williamson Murray - 1994
    Seventeen case studies analyze through a common framework how strategies have sought to implement a coherent course of action against their adversaries. 24 line drawings. 31 tables.

Why are Some People Healthy and Others Not?


Robert G. Evans - 1994
    In its aggregate, this volume will prove essential to an understanding of the underlying public health issues for the next several decades

Vision 2020


Ervin Laszlo - 1994
    This revised edition of the classic text of the period provides both the student and the specialist with an informative account of post-Roman English society.

Going, Going, Gone: Vanishing Americana


Susan Jonas - 1994
    Chronicling the demise of things we thought would always be a part of life -- from the smell of burning leaves to wedding-night virgins -- this compendium of pop culture and history has been praised for its lively text full of intriguing trivia and retro photographs of each subject in its heyday. Whether you're old enough to remember polio scares or too young to have used a typewriter, this provocative and amusing look at the way things were offers end-of- the-century proof that the only constant in life is change.