Comprising an entire magazine feature and a sizable advertising budget, the newspaper’s initiative conveyed a serious attempt to engage the public in an intellectual exchange about the history of slavery in the United States and its lingering harms to our social fabric. It also seemed to avoid the superficiality of many public history initiatives, which all too often reduce over 400 complex years of slavery’s history and legacy to sweeping generalizations. Instead, the Times promised detailed thematic explorations of topics ranging from the first slave ship’s arrival in Jamestown, Virginia, in 1619 to the politics of race in the present day.At the same time, however, certain 1619 Project essayists infused this worthy line of inquiry with a heavy stream of ideological advocacy. Times reporter Nikole Hannah-Jones announced this political intention openly, pairing progressive activism with the initiative’s stated educational purposes.In assembling these essays, I make no claim of resolving what continues to be a vibrant and ongoing discussion. Neither should my work be viewed as the final arbiter of historical accuracy, though I do evaluate a number of factual and interpretive claims made by the project’s authors. Rather, the aim is to provide an accessible resource for readers wishing to navigate the scholarly disputes, offering my own interpretive take on claims pertaining to areas of history in which I have worked." -- Phil Magness

    NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY THE ECONOMIST With the wisdom, humor, curiosity, and sharp insights that have brought millions of readers to his New York Times column and his previous bestsellers, David Brooks has consistently illuminated our daily lives in surprising and original ways. In The Social Animal, he explored the neuroscience of human connection and how we can flourish together. Now, in The Road to Character, he focuses on the deeper values that should inform our lives.Looking to some of the world’s greatest thinkers and inspiring leaders, Brooks explores how, through internal struggle and a sense of their own limitations, they have built a strong inner character. Labor activist Frances Perkins understood the need to suppress parts of herself so that she could be an instrument in a larger cause. Dwight Eisenhower organized his life not around impulsive self-expression but considered self-restraint. Dorothy Day, a devout Catholic convert and champion of the poor, learned as a young woman the vocabulary of simplicity and surrender. Civil rights pioneers A. Philip Randolph and Bayard Rustin learned reticence and the logic of self-discipline, the need to distrust oneself even while waging a noble crusade.Blending psychology, politics, spirituality, and confessional, The Road to Character provides an opportunity for us to rethink our priorities, and strive to build rich inner lives marked by humility and moral depth.“Joy,” David Brooks writes, “is a byproduct experienced by people who are aiming for something else. But it comes.”

    Those ex-slaves were in their declining years by the time of the Great Depression, but Elizabeth Sparks, Elige Davison, and others like them nonetheless provided a priceless record of life under the yoke: where slaves lived, how they were treated, what they ate, how they worked, how they adjusted to freedom. Here, Belinda Hurmence presents the interviews of 21 former Virginia slaves. This is a companion volume to Hurmence's popular collections of North Carolina and South Carolina slave narratives, My Folks Don't Want Me to Talk About Slaveryand Before Freedom, When I Just Can Remember.

    Government openly defies the law, Christians are prosecuted as criminals, children "transition" to the opposite sex, the president supports our enemies—and 130 million Americans depend on mind-altering substances just to get through life.Turbocharged by the Obama presidency, long-coalescing forces of the political and cultural Left are bringing about their much-heralded “fundamental transformation of America.” That much everyone knows.But this revolution is also causing a fundamental transformation of Americans—in profoundly negative ways. In The Snapping of the American Mind, veteran journalist and bestselling author David Kupelian shows how the progressive Left—which today dominates America’s key institutions, from the news and entertainment media, to education, to government itself—is accomplishing much more than just enlarging government, redistributing wealth, and de-Christianizing the culture. With the Left’s wild celebration of sexual anarchy, its intimidating culture of political correctness, and its incomprehension of the fundamental sacredness of human life, it is also, whether intentionally or not, promoting widespread dependency, debauchery, family breakdown, crime, corruption, addiction, despair, and suicide.Surveying this growing chaos in American society, Kupelian exposes both the utopian revolutionaries and their extraordinary methods that have turned America’s most cherished values literally upside down—to the point that madness is celebrated and normality demonized.

    

    In this, the definitive comprehensive history of Philadelphia, the reader will discover a rich and colorful portrait of one of America's most vital, interesting, and illustrious cities.

    

    The classic account of modern British journalism, now updated and re-issued.

    You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery.

    But why have efforts to change the world by Christians so often failed or gone tragically awry? And how might Christians in the 21st century live in ways that have integrity with their traditions and are more truly transformative? In To Change the World, James Davison Hunter offers persuasive—and provocative—answers to these questions.Hunter begins with a penetrating appraisal of the most popular models of world-changing among Christians today, highlighting the ways they are inherently flawed and therefore incapable of generating the change to which they aspire. Because change implies power, all Christian eventually embrace strategies of political engagement. Hunter offers a trenchant critique of the political theologies of the Christian Right and Left and the Neo-Anabaptists, taking on many respected leaders, from Charles Colson to Jim Wallis and Stanley Hauerwas. Hunter argues that all too often these political theologies worsen the very problems they are designed to solve. What is really needed is a different paradigm of Christian engagement with the world, one that Hunter calls "faithful presence"—an ideal of Christian practice that is not only individual but institutional; a model that plays out not only in all relationships but in our work and all spheres of social life. He offers real-life examples, large and small, of what can be accomplished through the practice of "faithful presence." Such practices will be more fruitful, Hunter argues, more exemplary, and more deeply transfiguring than any more overtly ambitious attempts can ever be.Written with keen insight, deep faith, and profound historical grasp, To Change the World will forever change the way Christians view and talk about their role in the modern world.

    Boorstin explores the development of artistic innovation over 3,000 years. A hugely ambitious chronicle of the arts that Boorstin delivers with the scope that made his Discoverers a national bestseller.

    In addition to a useful scope and sequence for how a Latin-centered classical education can be accomplished in a home or private school, Campbell explains why the central principle behind classical education is the study of Latin and Greek.Campbell provides a short history of the modern classical movement, examines the predominant role of Latin in a classical education, and explains how the other pieces of the classical curriculum fit together. He provides the practical application to Tracy Lee Simmons' statement that a "Classical education is a curriculum grounded upon Greek, Latin, and the study of civilization from which the arose."In addition to chapters on Latin, Greek, and logic, Campbell covers the various content areas of classical education, such as English studies, classical studies, Christian and modern studies, with sections on arithmetic, science, and mathematics.But this is far from a purely theoretical book. In a chapter entitled, "Scope and Sequence," he gives a practical overview of what a Latin-based classical curriculum looks like from Kindergarten to 12th grade. With helpful charts and explanations, this book constitutes a manual for the Christian educator who wants a complete understanding of what is involved in a classical education.The most important section in the book, may well be the chapter titled "Multum non Multa." This is the principle sometimes expressed by the maxim, "Less is more." It is the idea that, rather than throwing multiple subjects at students and burying them under a mountain of unconnected disciplines, educators should instead employ an integrated focus on a few important core disciplines and related subject areas.The best education, Campbell points out, is simple but deep.

    While it embodies the entire system of his teaching, with much technical advice and critical comment for the student, it also contains inspiration for those to whom the happiness to be found through all the arts is important.No other American painter attracted such a large, intensely personal group of followers as Henri, whose death in 1929 brought to an end a life that has been completely devoted to art. He was an inspired artist and teacher who believed that everyone is vitally concerned in the happiness and wisdom to be found through the arts. Many of his paintings have been acquired by museums and private collectors. Among them are the Baltimore Museum of Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the National Gallery of Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Wichita Art Museum, and Yale University Art Gallery.

    It's an approach that can truly transform the spiritual lives of young people by applying the same one-to-one personal method that Jesus Himself used to form his twelve original disciples . . . only one of whom was lost!Fritz has worked with countless parishes, helping them make the shift to a small-group discipleship structure. You'll learn to avoid the many pitfalls and common mistakes parishes make, as well as ways you can easily build the volunteer base needed for a successful transition.He will help you create a comfortable environment that leads young people into self-reflection, as well as the critical role parents and the parish community play in youth formation.Finally, Fritz shares various resources that can help you accomplish your goal. But he warns: you're not running a program that has been pre-developed. Relationships and mentoring make disciples; programs do not.If you're troubled by the number of young people in your parish who leave the Faith year after year, then open these illuminating pages and learn the art of forming young disciples.

    He exposes the people and organizations that manipulate our perceptions and profit from our anxieties: politicians who win elections by heightening concerns about crime and drug use even as both are declining; advocacy groups that raise money by exaggerating the prevalence of particular diseases; TV news-magazines that monger a new scare every week to garner ratings.