With sharp analytic insight, Peter Heather explores the dynamics of migration and social and economic interaction that changed two vastly different worlds—the undeveloped barbarian world and the sophisticated Roman Empire—into remarkably similar societies and states. The book's vivid narrative begins at the time of Christ, when the Mediterranean circle, newly united under the Romans, hosted a politically sophisticated, economically advanced, and culturally developed civilization—one with philosophy, banking, professional armies, literature, stunning architecture, even garbage collection. The rest of Europe, meanwhile, was home to subsistence farmers living in small groups, dominated largely by Germanic speakers. Although having some iron tools and weapons, these mostly illiterate peoples worked mainly in wood and never built in stone. The farther east one went, the simpler it became: fewer iron tools and ever less productive economies. And yet ten centuries later, from the Atlantic to the Urals, the European world had turned. Slavic speakers had largely superseded Germanic speakers in central and Eastern Europe, literacy was growing, Christianity had spread, and most fundamentally, Mediterranean supremacy was broken. The emergence of larger and stronger states in the north and east had, by the year 1000, brought patterns of human organization into much greater homogeneity across the continent. Barbarian Europe was barbarian no longer. Bringing the whole of first millennium European history together for the first time, and challenging current arguments that migration played but a tiny role in this unfolding narrative, Empires and Barbarians views the destruction of the ancient world order in the light of modern migration and globalization patterns. The result is a compelling, nuanced, and integrated view of how the foundations of modern Europe were laid.

    "There is no body to be found. The birds may come and circle for a while... but they soon go elsewhere. When they are gone, the 'nothing,' the 'no-body' that was there, suddenly appears. That is Zen. It was there all the time but the scavengers missed it, because it was not their kind of prey." This gets at the humor, paradox, and joy that one feels in Merton's discoveries of Zen during the last years of his life, a joy very much present in this collection of essays. Exploring the relationship between Christianity and Zen, especially through his dialogue with the great Zen teacher D.T. Suzuki, the book makes an excellent introduction to a comparative study of these two traditions, as well as giving the reader a strong taste of the mature Merton. Never does one feel him losing his own faith in these pages; rather one feels that faith getting deeply clarified and affirmed. Just as the body of "Zen" cannot be found by the scavengers, so too, Merton suggests, with the eternal truth of Christ.

    Although he initially finds it difficult to adjust, Dan is soon having fun wherever he goes—and recording all of his adventures in a diary. With the help of his Japanese foster brother and sister, Daisuke and Mari, Dan visits a Ninja village, tries new foods, learns brush painting, and shares the inside scoop on Japanese school life. Readers of all ages will love experiencing life in Japan from a kid's point of view!Dan's adventures include:•My First Week of School•Visiting a Ninja Village•Fun with Origami•Practicing Aikido•Making Mochi•And much more…

    Then a box arrives for her and inside are two little Japanese dolls. Nona thinks that they must feel lonely too, so far away from home. Then, Nona has an idea - she will build her dolls the perfect house!

    Original line drawings. of color photos.

    Alongside it are the remains of three people.The journal reveals the story of Hiromi, a sixteen-year-old girl who’d grown up in the United States before living in Japan in the midst of World War II. One day, while collecting star sand—tiny star-shaped fossils—Hiromi finds two army deserters hiding in the seaside cavern—one American, one Japanese. The soldiers don’t speak the same language, but they’ve reached an agreement based on a shared hope: to cause no more harm and survive. Hiromi resolves to care for the men—feeding them and nursing their ailments—despite the risk that, if caught, she’ll die alongside them as a traitor. But when a fourth person joins in on their secret, they must face a threat from within. The diary abruptly ends, leaving everyone’s fate a mystery.Decades later, in 2011, a young female university student decides to finally determine who died in that cave and who lived. Her search will lead her to the lone survivor—and bring closure to a gripping tale of heroism at a time when committing to peace was the most dangerous act of all.

    For centuries, Japan had isolated itself from the outside world by refusing to trade with other countries and even refusing to help shipwrecked sailors, foreign or Japanese. The country's people still lived under a feudal system like that of Europe in the Middle Ages. But everything began to change when American Commodore Perry and his troops sailed to the Land of the Rising Sun, bringing with them new science and technology, and a new way of life.NOTE: Blumberg's "Shipwrecked! The True Adventure of a Japanese Boy" is a companion volume.

    Westerners are flocking to China in increasing numbers to chase their dreams even as Chinese emigrants seek their own dreams abroad, and life as an outsider in China has many sides to it - weird, fascinating and appalling... Edited by Tom Carter, this anthology falls under the genre of travel writing, yet travel is just the beginning of the adventure here.MEDIA REVIEWS"Great vignettes from world class writers...a celebration of the outsider's experience in China, in all of its juiciness and fetid rancour." --Time Out Shanghai"Excellent. Concise and truthful." --South China Morning Post"Although other anthologies have featured outstanding journalism about China by Western writers, Carter's collection is the first to focus on the wide-ranging experiences of foreigners living in China." --China Daily"The authors, mostly experienced writers who have traveled widely in China, offer tales beyond those of the usual laowai experience." --Shanghai Daily"The majority of stories are individual gems and an enjoyably diverse range of issues are found in the book." --Time Out Hong Kong"The moral of this collection appears to be that though almost everything has changed, one basic thing - the allure of China to a certain kind of Westerner - remains curiously consistent." --Taipei Times"Funny, poignant, and wry...the outcome is a depth and variety about the expat experience and life in China that is almost unsurpassed." --Asian Review of Books"Fast-moving romps through a rapidly-changing changing society." --Caixin"An eminently dip-into-able, informative and enjoyable collection." --That's Shanghai"One might be tempted to classify it as a travel book of sorts; what is being traversed and recollected throughout is not the lay of the land, but rather, the contours of confusion, excitement and isolation that every China expat has, at one point, had to clamber across and conquer." --The Beijinger"A surprisingly refreshing, instead of rehashing, collection of essays, written by professionals, instead of amateurs...at times hilarious, at times beautiful, but always relatable..." --China.Org"(Editor) Tom Carter has pulled together an impressive cast of writers, established and amateur alike." --Beijing Cream"If there is an overarching message to take from the book, it is that holy !@#$ China changes quickly." --Shanghaiist"The vignettes lead the reader through a variety of emotions; some will tug at your heartstrings, others will leave you chuckling in understanding, and a few will really make you think." --Shanghai City Weekend"Presents a more realistic China." --Li Jihong for Shanghai Review of Books"As a Chinese writer with a certain cynicism, I did not expect to find anything truly surprising. But surprised I was, and my own stereotypical presumptions stand corrected." --Xujun Eberlein for Los Angeles Review of Books"The result is a highly readable, often humorous, and at times brilliant book that is unerringly direct: the authors gathered together here do not shy away from troublesome issues." --Asian Correspondent"The title dis-serves them...the range, humor and insights in this book place it among the best of its kind." --Asia Sentinel

    A recognized classic of cultural anthropology, this book explores the political, religious, and economic life of Japan from the seventh century through the mid-twentieth, as well as personal family life.

    Its strategic location and natural resources both allowed Singapore to profit from global commerce and also made the island an attractive conquest for the world's naval powers, resulting in centuries of stunting colonialization. In Singapore: Unlikely Power, John Curtis Perry provides an evenhanded and authoritative history of the island nation that ranges from its Malay origins to the present day. Singapore development has been aided by its greatest natural blessing-a natural deepwater port, shielded by mountain ranges from oceanic storms and which sits along one of the most strategic straits in the world, cementing the island's place as a major shipping entrepot throughout modern history. Perry traces the succession of colonizers, beginning with China in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries and followed by the island's most famous colonizer, Britain, which ruled Singapore until the 1960s excluding the Japanese occupation of World War II. After setting a historical context, Perry turns to the era of independence beginning in the 1960s. Plagued with corruption, inequality, lack of an educated population, Singapore improbably vaulted from essentially third-world status into a first world dynamo over the course of three decades-with much credit due longtime leader Lee Kuan Yew, Singapore's first prime minister who led the country for over three decades, who embraced the colonial past, established close ties with former foe Japan, and adopted a resolutely pragmatist approach to economic development. His efforts were successful, and Singapore today is a model regime for other developing states. Singapore's stunning transformation from a poor and corrupt colonial backwater into an economic powerhouse renowned for its wealth, order, and rectitude is one of the great-and most surprising-success stories of modern era. Singapore is an accessible, comprehensive, and indeed colorful overview of one of the most influential political-economic models in the world and is an enlightening read for anyone interested in how Singapore achieved the unachievable.

    Like everything he writes, it is new, stimulating and sparkles like champagne.Braudel's technique, it has been said, is that of a pointilliste. Myriads of separate details, sharp glimpses of reality experienced by real people, are seen miraculously to orchestrate themselves into broad rhythms that underlie and transcend the excitements and struggles of particular periods. Braudel sees the past as we see the present — only in a longer perspective and over a wider field.The perspective is that of the possible, of the actual material limitations to human life in any given time or place. It is the every¬day, the habitual — the obvious that is so obvious it has hitherto been neglected by historians — that Braudel claims for a new and vast and enriching province of history. Food and drink, dress and housing, demography and family structure, energy and technology, money and credit, and, above all, the growth of towns, that powerful agent of social and economic development, are described in all the richness and complexity of real life.The intensely visual quality of Braudel's understanding of history is brought into sharper focus by the remarkable series of illustrations that of themselves would make this book incomparableFERNAND BRAUDEL was born in 1902, received a degree in history in 1923, and subsequently taught in Algeria, Paris and Sao Paulo. He spent five years as a prisoner of war in Germany, during which time he wrote his grand thesis, The Mediterranean and the Mediterranean World in the Age of Philip II, which was published in 1949. In 1946 he became a member of the editorial board of Annates, the famous journal founded by Marc Bloch and Lucian Febvre, whom he succeeded at the College de France in 1949. He has been a member of the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes and since 1962 has been chief administrator of the Maison des Sciences de l'Homme. Professor Braudel holds honorary doctor¬ates from universities all over the world.Jacket painting: Detail from Breughel the Elder's The Fall of Icarus, from the Musees Royaux des Beaux-Arts, Brussels. (Giraudon)"Braudel deserves a Nobel Prize. . . . [This is] the most remarkable picture of human life in the centuries before the human condition was radically changed by the growth of industry that has yet been presented. A book of great originality, a masterpiece."—J. H. Plumb, The Washington Post"Braudel's books enthrall. ... He is brilliant in demonstrating how most history is written on the backs of most people."—John Leonard, The New York Times"Even a preliminary glance at The Structures of Everyday Life shows a book that has no obvious compeer either in scope of reference or level of accessibility to the general reader. ... Its broad authority remains deeply impressive."—Richard Holmes, Harper's"Here is vast erudition, beautifully arranged, presented with grace of style, with humility before life's complexity and warm humanist feeling. Braudel's subject is nothing less than every¬day life all over the world before the industrial revolution.... He succeeds triumphantly in his first purpose: 'if not to see everything, at least to locate everything, and on the requisite world scale.'"—Angus Calder, The Standard"On neither side of the Atlantic does there live a man or woman with so much knowledge of the past as Braudel, or with a greater sense of its aptness to the intellectual occasion in hand....You can't pick up this big fat book without having your attention transfixed by something or other, if only the great gallery of pictures. They are a masterpiece in themselves."—Peter Laslett, The Guardian"This new book is unarguably a brilliant survey of demog¬raphy, urbanisation, transport, technology, food, clothing, housing, money and business, social classes, state power and international trade in the fifteenth to the eighteenth centuries."—Theodore Zeldin, The Listener-----By examining in detail the material life of preindustrial peoples around the world, Fernand Braudel significantly changed the way historians view their subject. Volume I describes food and drink, dress and housing, demography and family structure, energy and technology, money and credit, and the growth of towns.

    This was the work of an elite group known as Unit 731, led by Japan's answer to Joseph Mengele, Dr Shiro Ishii.Under their initiative, thousands of individuals were held captive and infected with virulent strains of anthrax, plague, cholera, and other epidemic and viral diseases. Soon entire Chinese villages were being hit with biological bombs. Even American POWs were targeted. All told, more than 250,000 people were infected, and the vast majority died. Yet, after the war, US occupation forces under General Douglas MacArthur struck a deal with these doctors that shielded them from accountability.Provocative, alarming and utterly compelling, A Plague Upon Humanity draws on important original research to expose one of the most shameful chapters in human history.

    Based on the author's own experiences and on stories passed down from generation to generation, the book chronicles the disappearing world—and courageous rebirth—of this little-understood people.Kayano describes with disarming simplicity and frankness the personal conflicts he faced as a result of the tensions between a traditional and a modern society and his lifelong efforts to fortify a living Ainu culture. A master storyteller, he paints a vivid picture of the Ainus' ecologically sensitive lifestyle, which revolved around bear hunting, fishing, farming, and woodcutting.Unlike the few existing ethnographies of the Ainu, this account is the first written by an insider intimately tied to his own culture yet familiar with the ways of outsiders. Speaking with a rare directness to the Ainu and universal human experience, this book will interest all readers concerned with the fate of indigenous peoples.

    Taisen Deshimaru was born in Japan of an old samurai family, and he recieved from the Great Master Kodo Sawaki the Transmission of Mind to Mind when Sawaki died. In 1967, Deshimaru-Roshi went to France and taught as a missionary general of the Sato Zen School until his death in 1982. In Europe he learned how to make Oriental concepts understandable to the Western mind. One of the results of that experience was this book: a series of lessons, question-and-answer sessions, and koans (riddles or anecdotes that point out general principles) that provide practical wisdom for all students of the martial arts--kendo, aikido, iai-do, jodo, or archery--as well as for the general reader interested in Zen.

    Traditional right-to-left manga format, with a full-color prologue.