Blown to Bits

Blown to Bits

Author: Harold Abelson

Publisher: Addison-Wesley Professional

Published: 2008

Total Pages: 389

ISBN-13: 0137135599

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'Blown to Bits' is about how the digital explosion is changing everything. The text explains the technology, why it creates so many surprises and why things often don't work the way we expect them to. It is also about things the information explosion is destroying: old assumptions about who is really in control of our lives.


Where I'm from

Where I'm from

Author: Steven Borsman

Publisher:

Published: 2011

Total Pages: 33

ISBN-13:

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"In the Fall of 2010 I gave an assignment in my Appalachian Literature class at Berea College, telling my students to write their own version of "Where I'm From" poem based on the writing prompt and poem by George Ella Lyon, one of the preeminent Appalachian poets. I was so impressed by the results of the assignment that I felt the poems needed to be preserved in a bound document. Thus, this little book. These students completely captured the complexities of this region and their poems contain all the joys and sorrows of living in Appalachia. I am proud that they were my students and I am very proud that together we produced this record of contemporary Appalachian Life" -- Silas House


Brands of Faith

Brands of Faith

Author: Mara Einstein

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2007-09-14

Total Pages: 256

ISBN-13: 1134130104

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Through a series of fascinating case studies of faith brands, marketing insider Mara Einstein has produced a lively account of the book in the commercialization of religion.


The Crazy Years

The Crazy Years

Author: Spider Robinson

Publisher: BenBella Books, Inc.

Published: 2009-06-01

Total Pages: 308

ISBN-13: 1935251546

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A collection of witty, irreverent essays on subjects running the gamut from the space program to airport bans on smoking are included in this anthology. Written by Spider Robinson, The Crazy Years takes its name from Robert A. Heinlein's designation of the last years of the 20th century and contains essays from Robinson's tenure as op-ed columnist for The Globe and Mail and from Galaxy Online. Environmentalists that place the survival of earth before the survival of humanity, the idiocy of computer designs, and the downsides of the Internet are among the subjects Robinson uses to take the world to task.


Patterns for College Writing

Patterns for College Writing

Author: Laurie G. Kirszner

Publisher: Macmillan

Published: 2011-12-22

Total Pages: 837

ISBN-13: 0312676840

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Laurie Kirszner and Stephen Mandell, authors with nearly thirty years of experience teaching college writing, know what works in the classroom and have a knack for picking just the right readings. In Patterns for College Writing, they provide students with exemplary rhetorical models and instructors with class-tested selections that balance classic and contemporary essays. Along with more examples of student writing than any other reader, Patterns has the most comprehensive coverage of active reading, research, and the writing process, with a five-chapter mini-rhetoric; the clearest explanations of the patterns of development; and the most thorough apparatus of any rhetorical reader, all reasons why Patterns for College Writing is the best-selling reader in the country. And the new edition includes exciting new readings and expanded coverage of critical reading, working with sources, and research. It is now available as an interactive Bedford e-book and in a variety of other e-book formats that can be downloaded to a computer, tablet, or e-reader. Read the preface.


First Timers and Old Timers

First Timers and Old Timers

Author: Kenneth L. Untiedt

Publisher: University of North Texas Press

Published: 2012

Total Pages: 366

ISBN-13: 1574414712

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"The Texas Folklore Society has been alive and kicking for over one hundred years now, and I don't really think there's any mystery as to what keeps the organization going strong. The secret to our longevity is simply the constant replenishment of our body of contributors. We are especially fortunate in recent years to have had papers given at our annual meetings by new members--young members, many of whom are college or even high school students. "These presentations are oftentimes given during sessions right alongside some of our oldest members. We've also had long-time members who've been around for years but had never yet given papers; thankfully, they finally took the opportunity to present their research, fulfilling the mission of the TFS: to collect, preserve, and present the lore of Texas and the Southwest. "You'll find in this book some of the best articles from those presentations. The first fruits of our youngest or newest members include Acayla Haile on the folklore of plants. Familiar and well-respected names like J. Rhett Rushing and Kenneth W. Davis discuss folklore about monsters and the classic 'widow's revenge' tale. These works--and the people who produced them--represent the secret behind the history of the Texas Folklore Society, as well as its future."--Kenneth L. Untiedt


The Dictator's Shadow

The Dictator's Shadow

Author: Heraldo Munoz

Publisher: Basic Books

Published: 2008-09-02

Total Pages: 370

ISBN-13: 0786726040

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Augusto Pinochet was the most important Third World dictator of the Cold War, and perhaps the most ruthless. In The Dictator's Shadow, United Nations Ambassador Heraldo Munoz takes advantage of his unmatched set of perspectives -- as a former revolutionary who fought the Pinochet regime, as a respected scholar, and as a diplomat -- to tell what this extraordinary figure meant to Chile, the United States, and the world. Pinochet's American backers saw his regime as a bulwark against Communism; his nation was a testing ground for U.S.-inspired economic theories. Countries desiring World Bank support were told to emulate Pinochet's free-market policies, and Chile's government pension even inspired President George W. Bush's plan to privatize Social Security. The other baggage -- the assassinations, tortures, people thrown out of airplanes, mass murders of political prisoners -- was simply the price to be paid for building a modern state. But the questions raised by Pinochet's rule still remain: Are such dictators somehow necessary? Horrifying but also inspiring, The Dictator's Shadow is a unique tale of how geopolitical rivalries can profoundly affect everyday life.


The Bardo of Waking Life

The Bardo of Waking Life

Author: Richard Grossinger

Publisher: North Atlantic Books

Published: 2011-05-31

Total Pages: 553

ISBN-13: 1583944060

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An avant garde set of improvisational essays, Richard Grossinger’s The Bardo of Waking Life is a meditation on the Tibetan Buddhist bardo realm which, in popular culture, is viewed as the bridge between lives, the state people enter after death and before rebirth. This book examines waking life and its history and language as if it were a bardo state rather than ultimate reality, and thus seeks a context for life (and dreams), even as it addresses more "mundane issues" including genetic theory, the war in Iraq and George W. Bush's presidency, North Korea, advertising, global warming, Prison Industrial Culture, childhood trauma, even country western music. Written with playfulness and precision, Bardo takes a new, probing approach to all the important questions of creation, destruction, and existence. In these intellectual field notes, Grossinger proves thematically fearless as he crosses quantum mechanics with totemic hexes and draws transcendental insight from the ephemeral space-time we call daily life. If, as Tibetan cosmology holds true, all conditional realms are bardos, then the state we all share is nothing less than the bardo of waking life.


Media Spectacle

Media Spectacle

Author: Douglas Kellner

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2003-08-29

Total Pages: 207

ISBN-13: 1134493959

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During the mid-1990s, the O.J. Simpson murder trial dominated the media in the United States and were circulated throughout the world via global communications networks. The case became a spectacle of race, gender, class and violence, bringing in elements of domestic melodrama, crime drama and legal drama. According to this fascinating new book, the Simpson case was just one example of what the author calls 'media spectacle' - a form of media culture that puts contemporary dreams, nightmares, fantasies and values on display. Through the analysis of several such media spectacles - including Elvis, The X Files, Michael Jordan, and the Bill Clinton sex scandals - Doug Kellner draws out important insights into media, journalism, the public sphere and politics in an era of new technologies. In this excellent follow up to his best selling Media Culture, Kellner's fascinating new volume delivers an informative read for students of sociology, culture and media.