By choosing to locate her study among Meratus Dayaks, a marginal and marginalized group in the deep rainforest of South Kalimantan, Indonesia, Tsing deliberately sets into motion the familiar and stubborn urban fantasies of self and other. Unusual encounters with her remarkably creative and unconventional Meratus friends and teachers, however, provide the opportunity to rethink notions of tradition, community, culture, power, and gender--and the doing of anthropology. Tsing's masterful weaving of ethnography and theory, as well as her humor and lucidity, allow for an extraordinary reading experience for students, scholars, and anyone interested in the complexities of culture.Engaging Meratus in wider conversations involving Indonesian bureaucrats, family planners, experts in international development, Javanese soldiers, American and French feminists, Asian-Americans, right-to-life advocates, and Western intellectuals, Tsing looks not for consensus and coherence in Meratus culture but rather allows individual Meratus men and women to return our gaze. Bearing the fruit from the lively contemporary conversations between anthropology and cultural studies, In the Realm of the Diamond Queen will prove to be a model for thinking and writing about gender, power, and the politics of identity.

    The news is full of archaeology: treasures found (British king under parking lot) and treasures lost (looters, bulldozers, natural disaster, and war). Archaeological research tantalizes us with possibilities (are modern humans really part Neandertal?). Where are the archaeologists behind these stories? What kind of work do they actually do, and why does it matter?Marilyn Johnson’s Lives in Ruins is an absorbing and entertaining look at the lives of contemporary archaeologists as they sweat under the sun for clues to the puzzle of our past. Johnson digs and drinks alongside archaeologists, chases them through the Mediterranean, the Caribbean, and even Machu Picchu, and excavates their lives. Her subjects share stories we rarely read in history books, about slaves and Ice Age hunters, ordinary soldiers of the American Revolution, children of the first century, Chinese woman warriors, sunken fleets, mummies.What drives these archaeologists is not the money (meager) or the jobs (scarce) or the working conditions (dangerous), but their passion for the stories that would otherwise be buried and lost.

    Hoberman's masterful and majestic exploration of the Reagan years as seen through the unforgettable movies of the era The third book in a brilliant and ambitious trilogy, celebrated cultural and film critic J.Hoberman's Make My Day is a major new work of film and pop culture history. In it he chronicles the Reagan years, from the waning days of the Watergate scandal when disaster films like Earthquake ruled the box office to the nostalgia of feel-good movies like Rocky and Star Wars, and the delirium of the 1984 presidential campaign and beyond.Bookended by the Bicentennial celebrations and the Iran-Contra affair, the period of Reagan's ascendance brought such movie events as Jaws, Apocalypse Now, Blade Runner, Ghostbusters, Blue Velvet, and Back to the Future, as well as the birth of MTV, the Strategic Defense Initiative, and the Second Cold War.An exploration of the synergy between American politics and popular culture, Make My Day is the concluding volume of Hoberman's Found Illusions trilogy, of which the first volume, The Dream Life, was described by Slate's David Edelstein as "one of the most vital cultural histories I've ever read." Reagan, a supporting player in Hoberman's previous volumes, here takes center stage as the peer of Indiana Jones and John Rambo, the embodiment of a Hollywood that, even then, no longer existed.

    The story of a young man who finds himself somewhat unexpectedly a fine arts major in college, a fledgling sculptor in Chicago, a gadabout painter in Hoboken, and who eventually winds up a writer sometimes called "a born storyteller".The author of more than fifty books, Pinkwater now chronicles his own early life.

    Photographs and personal accounts detail the struggles and pleasures—including the government’s eviction of the tunnel people and Amtrak’s offering them alternative housing—of Vietnam veterans, macrobiotic hippies, crack addicts, Cuban refugees, convicted killers, computer programmers, philosophical recluses, and criminal runaways. Humorous and compassionate, it also describes what has happened to these individuals 13 years since they’ve left.

    Curator of kitsch and unabashed aficionada of pop culture, Halliday offers bemused, self-deprecating narration of events from guerrilla theater in Romania to drug-induced Apocalypse Now reenactments in Vietnam to a perhaps more surreal collagen-implant demonstration at a Paris fashion show emceed by Lauren Bacall. On layover in Amsterdam, Halliday finds unlikely trouble in the red-light districteliciting the ire of a tiny, violent madam, and is forced to explain tampons to soldiers in Kashmir"they re for ladies. Bleeding ladies"that, she admits, "might have looked like white cotton bullets lined up in their box." A self-admittedly bumbling vacationer, Halliday shareswith razor-sharp wit and to hilarious effectthe travel stories most are too self-conscious to tell. Includes line drawings by the author."

    Today there is just one. Us. Homo sapiens. How did our species succeed in the battle for dominance? Why did our foraging ancestors come together to create cities and kingdoms? How did we come to believe in gods, nations and human rights; to trust money, books and laws; and to be enslaved by bureaucracy, timetables and consumerism? And what will our world be like in the millennia to come? In Sapiens, Dr Yuval Noah Harari spans the whole of human history, from the very first humans to walk the earth to the radical – and sometimes devastating – breakthroughs of the Cognitive, Agricultural and Scientific Revolutions. Drawing on insights from biology, anthropology, paleontology and economics, he explores how the currents of history have shaped our human societies, the animals and plants around us, and even our personalities. Have we become happier as history has unfolded? Can we ever free our behaviour from the heritage of our ancestors? And what, if anything, can we do to influence the course of the centuries to come? Bold, wide-ranging and provocative, Sapiens challenges everything we thought we knew about being human: our thoughts, our actions, our power ... and our future.

    She, a white American anthropologist, joins forces with an African-Brazilian shantytown activist to change the violence and despair they see around them. Their pledge to the residents to create a top-quality educational center for girls becomes a turbulent journey that takes us from the shantytowns of Northeastern Brazil to urban Seattle to high-society London. With the author, we experience a world of drug dealers, street urchins, and capoeiristas, English socialites, power-hungry "do-gooders," and wise teachers. This is a true story of insight and inspiration, courage, passion, and intrigue.

    Based on interviews with top German, French and American executives and on over 30 years of research on intercultural relations, this text examines key cross-cultural concepts to break through the misunderstandings and mis-communication between business personnel from these and other countries.

    An insult dunk tank clown is shot. Masked gunmen rob his carnival. And a young showman friend dies on the road.It's a new classic American road story as he hitchhikes to shows in California, New Jersey, New York, Chicago, Alaska, Minnesota, Oklahoma, Texas, Georgia, and Florida where he works in a freak show.He becomes the #1 hitchhiker in the USA and a top agent at the State Fair of Texas.He travels to the lawless foothills of Mexico to see the new face of the American carny. He exposes the truths about immigration, labor abuse, and living between two worlds. Comerford finds carnival people seeking meaning and love in their lives, and the answers always seem to be somewhere down the road.

    Completely updated and revised by preeminent historian J. M. Roberts, this volume features ninety up-to-date maps, new sections, and extremely well-written and accessible articles throughout. Truly global and comprehensive, it succeeds in conveying the staggering diversity of the human experience across a vast range of climates and conditions. This is the one book for anyone interested in the variety and grandeur of history’s march.

    She found that navigating the basics of everyday life—from buying a cell phone and filing taxes to education and childcare—was much more complicated and stressful than anything she encountered in her homeland. At first, she attributed her crippling anxiety to the difficulty of adapting to a freewheeling new culture. But as she got to know Americans better, she discovered they shared her deep apprehension. To understand why life is so different in the U.S. and Finland, Partanen began to look closely at both.In The Nordic Theory of Everything, Partanen compares and contrasts life in the United States with life in the Nordic region, focusing on four key relationships—parents and children, men and women, employees and employers, and government and citizens. She debunks criticism that Nordic countries are socialist “nanny states,” revealing instead that it is we Americans who are far more enmeshed in unhealthy dependencies than we realize. As Partanen explains step by step, the Nordic approach allows citizens to enjoy more individual freedom and independence than we do.Partanen wants to open Americans’ eyes to how much better things can be—to show her beloved new country what it can learn from her homeland to reinvigorate and fulfill the promise of the American dream—to provide the opportunity to live a healthy, safe, economically secure, upwardly mobile life for everyone. Offering insights, advice, and solutions, The Nordic Theory of Everything makes a convincing argument that we can rebuild our society, rekindle our optimism, and restore true freedom to our relationships and lives.

    We must learn more about Vietnamese culture and Vietnamese paradigms in order to untangle the muddled debates about our own. Realizing that we must do this is the first and most important lesson of Vietnam. And it is one we Americans have been exasperatingly slow to learn. We remain far too ready to assume that other people are, or want to be, or should be, like us.

    The book focuses on how to save the ancient water resources which have been neglected for quite a long time in India. This book holds a place in the list of best thirty books that have been published so far. This book has been translated in almost all Indian languages and quite a few foreign languages as well. There also exists a Braille version of this book. When it got published, it attracted the attention of a huge chunk of people and around two lac copies of books are known to have reached people across various places. The book, basically a report based book talks about how every household in arid regions could have their own water harvesting facility, a technique that has been in place for centuries. His approach towards life was something we do not find easily in the modern times. Moreover, this book has no copyright and can be reprinted and republished as and when one wants to. It is intriguing as to how this book could have had such an impact on the public, and on the society as a whole.

    K. Singh served in the Indian Army for forty-two years, retiring as Chief of Army Staff on 31 May 2012. His distinguished career saw him on the front lines of combat in the Indo-Pak War of 1971 which led to the creation of Bangladesh and in Sri Lanka as part of the Indian Peace Keeping Force. Considered one of the worlds foremost experts in counter-insurgency operations, he is also known for the principled stand he took on many issues during his tenure, from arms procurement to the deployment of the army against the Maoists.Trained at the National Defence Academy and the Indian Military Academy, VK Singh served in regions (and in roles) crucial to Indias security. From his early days as company commander on the Line of Control in Poonch, to commanding elite formationsVictor Force in Jammu and Kashmir and the vast Eastern Command that shares international boundaries with Nepal, Bhutan, China, Myanmar and Bangladesh to his experience of military operations and exercises such as Blue Star, Brasstacks and Trident, General Singhs story makes for fascinating reading. Candid, compelling and occasionally controversial, this is the story of a straight-talking soldier not afraid to stand by his convictionsInteresting Facts About the BookGives the reader hitherto untold stories about the Generals experiences during the IPKF operation in Sri Lanka, the 1971 Bangladesh War with Pakistan, Operation Bluestar and anti-insurgency operations in Kashmir and the NortheastReveals information about bribery and corruption scandals in the armed forces during his tenure as Chief of Army StaffGives the full story about various lobbies who tried to victimize him over the issue of his falsified date of birthGives a worrying picture of how senior officers in the armed forces are constantly harassed by top bureaucrats.About the AuthorA third-generation army officer, General V. K. Singh served with both the 2nd and 25th Battalion of the Rajput Regiment. A highly decorated soldier, he was the twenty-fourth Chief of the Indian Army. In the course of his tenure he took a principled stand on multiple issues and this often brought him into conflict with powerful lobbies both inside and outside government. Writer and filmmaker Kunal Verma has produced many critically acclaimed films for the Indian armed forces that include The Standard Bearerson the NDA and a documentary on the Kargil War. He has also authored The Long Road to Siachen: The Question Whyand the Northeast Trilogy.