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Nasty, Brutish, and Short: Adventures in Philosophy with Kids
by Scott Hershovitz'Witty and learned ... Hershovitz intertwines parenting and philosophy, recounting his spirited arguments with his kids about infinity, morality, and the existence of God' Jordan Ellenberg, author of ShapeA funny, wise guide to the art of thinking, and why the smallest people have the answers to the biggest questions'Anyone can do philosophy, every kid does...'Some of the best philosophers in the world can be found in the most unlikely places: in preschools and playgrounds. They gather to debate questions about metaphysics and morality, even though they've never heard the words, and can't tie their shoelaces. As Scott Hershovitz shows in this delightful book, kids are astoundingly good philosophers. And, if we let ourselves pause to think along with them, we might discover that we are, too.Nasty, Brutish, and Short is a unique guide to the art of thinking, led by a celebrated philosophy professor and his two young sons. Together, Scott, Rex, and Hank take us on a romp through classic and contemporary philosophy, steered by questions like, does Hank have the right to drink Fanta? When is it okay to swear? And, does the number six exist? They explore weighty issues, like punishment and authority; sex, gender, and race; the nature of truth and knowledge; and the existence of God. And they call on a host of professional philosophers, famous and obscure, to help them along the way. Ultimately, they demonstrate that we shouldn't just support kids in their philosophical adventures: we should join them, so that we can rekindle our own innate, childlike wonder at the world. We'd all be better, more discerning thinkers for it.
Rotten Days in Late Summer
by Ralf Webb'This is poetry in the grand tradition of annihiliation by desire. It's what the young are always learning, and the old, if they are wise, never forget' Anne Boyer, author of The Undying'Brilliant . . . heralds the arrival of a frank and vital poetic voice' Sharlene Teo, author of Ponti'Frank and alert . . . an important voice in British poetry' Eley Williams, author of The Liar's Dictionary'Direct and heart-breaking' Alex Dimitrov, author of Love and Other Poems'A rare thing . . . razor-sharp' Julia Copus, author of This Rare Spirit: A Life of Charlotte MewIn Rotten Days in Late Summer, Ralf Webb turns poetry to an examination of the textures of class, youth, adulthood and death in the working communities of the West Country, from mobile home parks, boyish factory workers and saleswomen kept on the road for days at a time, to the yearnings of young love and the complexities of masculinity.Alongside individual poems, three sequences predominate: a series of 'Love Stories', charting a course through the dreams, lies and salt-baked limbs of multiple relationships; 'Diagnostics', which tells the story of the death from cancer of the poet's father; and 'Treetops', a virtuosic long poem weaving together grief and mental health struggles in an attempt to come to terms with the overwhelming data of a life.The world of these poems is close, dangerous, lustrous and difficult: a world in which whole existences are lived in the spin of almost-inescapable fates. In searching for the light within it, this prodigious debut collection announces the arrival of a major new voice in British poetry.
The Psychosis of Whiteness: Surviving the Insanity of a Racist World
by Kehinde Andrews'Witty, energising and refreshing' Jeffrey BoakyeTake a step through the looking-glass to a strange land, one where Piers Morgan is a voice worth listening to about race, where white people buy self-help books to help them cope with their whiteness, where Boris Johnson and Donald Trump are seen by the majority of the population as 'the right (white) man for the job'. Perhaps you know it. All the inhabitants seem to be afflicted by serious delusions, for example that racism doesn't exist and if it does it can be cured with a one-hour inclusion seminar, and bizarre collective hallucinations, like the widely held idea that Britain's only role in slavery was to abolish it.But there is a serious side too. Society cannot face up to the racism at its heart and in its history, so the delusions, irrationalities and hallucinations it conjures up to avoid doing so can only best be described as a psychosis, with the costs being borne by the sons and daughters of that racist history. Living in a racist world is like living in a world that bears no resemblance to reality. Black and brown people suffer from a greater number of mental health difficulties too, caused in no small part by trying to survive a racist society.Kehinde Andrews is your piercing, wry and not a little funny guide back to sanity, unpicking the absurd and outrageous lies society tells to keep up the status quo. The Psychosis of Whiteness is your lifeboat out of this topsy-turvy world.
The History of Sexuality: The Care of the Self (Penguin Modern Classics)
by Michel FoucaultThe third volume of Foucault's history of sexuality. A sociologist and historian of ideas, Foucault's other works include Madness and Civilization, The Archaeology of Knowledge, The Birth of the Clinic and Discipline and Punish.
The History of Sexuality: The Use of Pleasure (Penguin Modern Classics)
by Michel FoucaultThis book offers an account of the emergence of Christianity from the Ancient World. Here Foucault describes the stranger byways of Greek medicine (with its advice on the healthiest season for sex as well as on exercise and diet), the permitted ways of courting young boys, and the economists' ideas about the role of women. The book abounds in insights into the differences - and the continuities - between the Ancient, Christian and Modern worlds. But Foucault does far more than merely recreate a vanished era when sex was not a major moral issue (only Plato, like Saint Paul, saw puritanical restraint as the way of wisdom), but makes us rethink all our own assumptions about sex.
The History of Sexuality: The Will to Knowledge (Penguin Modern Classics)
by Michel FoucaultWhy has there been such an explosion of discussion about sex in the west since the 17th century? Here, one of France's greatest intellectuals explores the evolving social, economic and political forces that have shaped our attitudes to sex. In a book that is at once controversial and seductive, Foucault describes how we are in the process of making a science of sex which is devoted to the analysis of desire rather than the increase of pleasure.
How to Have Feminist Sex: A Fairly Graphic Guide
by Flo Perry'Funny, kind, generous and smart - I could have done with the wisdom of Flo Perry far sooner' Dolly AldertonWe talk about feminism in the workplace and we talk about dating after #MeToo, but women's own patriarchal conditioning can be the hardest enemy to defeat. When it comes to our sex lives, few of us are free of niggling fears and body image insecurities. Rather than enjoying and exploring our bodies uninhibited, we worry about our bikini lines, bulging tummies and whether we're doing it 'right'.Flo broaches everything from faking it to consent, stress to kink, and how losing your virginity isn't so different to eating your first chocolate croissant. Her mission is to get more people talking openly about what they do and don't want from every romantic encounter.
Imagine If...: Creating a Future for Us All
by Sir Ken RobinsonAn urgent manifesto for re-defining human potential in our turbulent times, from the bestselling author of The Element 'As we face an increasingly febrile future, the answer is not to do better what we've done before. We have to do something else . . . We must urgently re-imagine education and schools' Imagination and creativity are at the root of every uniquely human achievement and those achievements have brought us to this present moment. As we reckon with the extractive practices that have depleted our natural resources and threaten our survival as a species, Sir Ken Robinson argues that we must also find a better way of cultivating human potential in order to navigate our uncertain future. This incisive book distills the thought and expertise that underpinned Sir Ken's influential work as educator, speaker and adviser; grounded in his unwavering belief in the indispensable value of human potential. Imagine If . . . reframes the ongoing debate in a compelling new way, bringing fresh inspiration and much-needed clarity, and sets out the blueprint for creating new systems of education that are based on diversity, creativity and collaboration.
Building Jerusalem: The Rise and Fall of the Victorian City
by Tristram Hunt'History writing at its compulsive best' A. N. WilsonThis is a history of the ideas that shaped not only London, but Manchester, Glasgow, Liverpool, Leeds, Birmingham, Sheffield and other power-houses of 19th-century Britain. It charts the controversies and visions that fostered Britain's greatest civic renaissance.Tristram Hunt explores the horrors of the Victorian city, as seen by Dickens, Engels and Carlyle; the influence of the medieval Gothic ideal of faith, community and order espoused by Pugin and Ruskin; the pride in self-government, identified with the Saxons as opposed to the Normans; the identification with the city republics of the Italian renaissance - commerce, trade and patronage; the change from the civic to the municipal, and greater powers over health, education and housing; and finally at the end of the century, the retreat from the urban to the rural ideal, led by William Morris and the garden-city movement of Ebenezer Howard.
You, Your Child and School: Navigate Your Way To The Best Education
by Sir Ken Robinson Lou AronicaInternational bestselling authors of The ElementAs a parent, what should you look for in your children's education? How can you tell if their school is right for them, and what can you do if it isn't? In this important new book, Sir Ken Robinson, one of the world's most influential voices in education, offers clear principles and practical advice on how to support your child through the education system, or outside it.Dispelling myths, tackling controversies and weighing up the main choices, You, Your Child, and School is a key book for parents to learn about the kind of education their children really need and what they can do to make sure they get it.
Trans-Europe Express: Tours of a Lost Continent
by Owen Hatherley'A scathing, lively and timely look at the "European city", from one of our most provocative voices on culture and architecture today' Owen JonesA searching, timely account of the condition of contemporary Europe, told through the landscapes of its citiesOver the past twenty years European cities have become the envy of the world: a Kraftwerk Utopia of historic centres, supermodernist concert halls, imaginative public spaces and futuristic egalitarian housing estates which, interconnected by high-speed trains traversing open borders, have a combination of order and pleasure which is exceptionally unusual elsewhere.In Trans-Europe Express, Owen Hatherley sets out to explore the European city across the entire continent, to see what exactly makes it so different to the Anglo-Saxon norm - the unplanned, car-centred, developer-oriented spaces common to the US, Ireland, UK and Australia. Attempting to define the European city, Hatherley finds a continent divided both within the EU and outside it. 'The latest heir to Ruskin.' - Boyd Tonkin, Independent 'Hatherley is the most informed, opinionated and acerbic guide you could wish for.' - Hugh Pearman, Sunday Times 'Can one talk yet of vintage Hatherley? Yes, one can. Here are all the properties that have made him one of the most distinctive writers in England - not just 'architectural writers', but writers full stop: acuity, contrariness, observational rigour, frankness and beautifully wrought prose.' - Jonathan Meades
Basic Income: And How We Can Make It Happen
by Guy Standing'Basic Income is an idea whose time has come, and Guy Standing has pioneered our understanding of it...as we move into an age where work and leisure become blurred, and work dissociated from incomes, Standing's analysis is vital' Paul MasonShouldn't everyone receive a stake in society's wealth?Could we create a fairer world by granting a guaranteed income to all?What would this mean for our health, wealth and happiness?Basic Income is a regular cash transfer from the state, received by all individual citizens. It is an acknowledgement that everyone plays a part in generating the wealth currently enjoyed only by a few. Political parties across the world are now adopting it as official policy and the idea generates headlines every day. Guy Standing has been at the forefront of thought about Basic Income for the past thirty years, and in this book he covers in authoritative detail its effects on the economy, poverty, work and labour; dissects and disproves the standard arguments against Basic Income; explains what we can learn from pilots across the world and illustrates exactly why a Basic Income has now become such an urgent necessity.
Big Capital: Who Is London For?
by Anna MintonThe inside story of London's housing crisis, by the award-winning author of Ground ControlLondon is facing the worst housing crisis in modern times, with knock-on effects for the rest of the UK. Despite the desperate shortage of housing, tens, perhaps hundreds of thousands of affordable homes are being pulled down, replaced by luxury apartments aimed at foreign investors. In this ideological war, housing is no longer considered a public good. Instead, only market solutions are considered - and these respond to the needs of global capital, rather than the needs of ordinary people. In politically uncertain times, the housing crisis has become a key driver creating and fuelling the inequalities of a divided nation. Anna Minton cuts through the complexities, jargon and spin to give a clear-sighted account of how we got into this mess and how we can get out of it.
Nothing but a Circus: Misadventures among the Powerful
by Daniel Levin'Brilliant observations on the anthropology of power. You will laugh aloud and you won't put it down' Daniel KahnemanIn this eye-opening exploration of the human weaknesses for power, Daniel Levin takes us on a hilarious journey through the absurd world of our global elites, drawing unforgettable sketches of some of the puppets who stand guard, and the jugglers and conjurers employed within. Most spectacular of all, however, are the astonishing contortions performed by those closest to the top in order to maintain the illusion of integrity, decency, and public service. Based on the author's first hand experiences of dealing with governments and political institutions around the world, Nothing but a Circus offers a rare glimpse of the conversations that happen behind closed doors, observing the appalling lengths that people go to in order to justify their unscrupulous choices, from Dubai to Luanda, Moscow to Beijing, and at the heart of the UN and the US government.
What We Really Do All Day: Insights from the Centre for Time Use Research (Pelican Books)
by Jonathan Gershuny Oriel SullivanHow has the way we spend our time changed over the last fifty years?Are we really working more, sleeping less and addicted to our phones?What does this mean for our health, wealth and happiness?Everything we do happens in time and it feels like our lives are busier than ever before. Yet a detailed look at our daily activities reveals some surprising truths about the social and economic structure of the world we live in. This book delves into the unrivalled data collection and expertise of the Centre for Time Use Research to explore fifty-five years of change and what it means for us today.
Think Like an Anthropologist
by Matthew EngelkeWhat is anthropology? What can it tell us about culture and the world around us? And why do we need it? For well over one hundred years, social and cultural anthropologists have traversed the world from Melanesia to suburban England, Taipei to Wall Street, uncovering surprising facts, patterns, predilections and, sometimes, the inexplicable, in terms of how humans organize their lives and articulate their values. By weaving together theories and examples from around the world, Matthew Engelke brilliantly shows why anthropology matters: not only because it helps us understand other points of view, but also because in the process, it reveals something about ourselves too.
English Pastoral: An Inheritance
by James RebanksThe author of the beloved No.1 bestseller The Shepherd's Life returns with a stirring history of family, loss and the land over three generations on a Lake District farm'I can't imagine anyone starting to read English Pastoral and not being eager to read it all at once, as I did, and not being moved by the life and the landscape Rebanks describes so well. I was thrilled by it' Philip Pullman As a boy, James Rebanks's grandfather taught him to work the land the old way. Their family farm in the Lake District hills was part of an ancient agricultural landscape: a patchwork of crops and meadows, of pastures grazed with livestock, and hedgerows teeming with wildlife. And yet, by the time James inherited the farm, it was barely recognisable. The men and women had vanished from the fields; the old stone barns had crumbled; the skies had emptied of birds and their wind-blown song. English Pastoral is the story of an inheritance: one that affects us all. It tells of how rural landscapes around the world were brought close to collapse, and the age-old rhythms of work, weather, community and wild things were lost. And yet this elegy from the northern fells is also a song of hope: of how, guided by the past, one farmer began to salvage a tiny corner of England that was now his, doing his best to restore the life that had vanished and to leave a legacy for the future. This is a book about what it means to have love and pride in a place, and how, against all the odds, it may still be possible to build a new pastoral: not a utopia, but somewhere decent for us all.
When to Rob a Bank: A Rogue Economist's Guide to the World
by Steven D. Levitt Stephen J. DubnerWhy don't flight attendants get tipped? If you were a terrorist, how would you attack? And why does KFC always run out of fried chicken? Over the past decade, Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner have published more than 8,000 blog posts on Freakonomics.com. Now the very best of this writing has been carefully curated into one volume, the perfect solution for the millions of readers who love all things Freakonomics.Discover why taller people tend to make more money; why it's so hard to predict the Kentucky Derby winner; and why it might be time for a sex tax (if not a fat tax). You'll also learn a great deal about Levitt and Dubner's own quirks and passions. Surprising and erudite, eloquent and witty, Freaks and Friends demonstrates the brilliance that has made their books an international sensation.
Of Street Piemen (Penguin Little Black Classics #No. 26)
by Henry Mayhew'...a good bit of spice to give the critlings a flavour, and plenty of treacle to make the mince-meat look rich'Radical Victorian reformer Henry Mayhew walked the streets of London interviewing ordinary flower girls, market traders, piemen and costermongers to create the first ever work of mass social observation, and the ultimate account of urban life - including an extraordinary description of the city from a hot air balloon.Introducing Little Black Classics: 80 books for Penguin's 80th birthday. Little Black Classics celebrate the huge range and diversity of Penguin Classics, with books from around the world and across many centuries. They take us from a balloon ride over Victorian London to a garden of blossom in Japan, from Tierra del Fuego to 16th century California and the Russian steppe. Here are stories lyrical and savage; poems epic and intimate; essays satirical and inspirational; and ideas that have shaped the lives of millions.Henry Mayhew (1812-1887). Mayhew's London Labour and the London Poor is available in Penguin Classics.
The Shepherd's Life: A Tale of the Lake District
by James RebanksFrom James Rebanks, the Herdwick Shepherd, comes The Shepherd's Life, a story of the Lake District and its people which could redefine the literature of rural lifeSome people's lives are entirely their own creations. James Rebanks' isn't. The first son of a shepherd, who was the first son of a shepherd himself, he and his family have lived and worked in and around the Lake District for generations. Their way of life is ordered by the seasons and the work they demand, and has been for hundreds of years. A Viking would understand the work they do: sending the sheep to the fells in the summer and making the hay; the autumn fairs where the flocks are replenished; the gruelling toil of winter when the sheep must be kept alive, and the light-headedness that comes with spring, as the lambs are born and the sheep get ready to return to the fells.These modern dispatches from an ancient landscape tell the story of a deep-rooted attachment to place, describing a way of life that is little noticed and yet has profoundly shaped this landscape. In evocative and lucid prose, James Rebanks takes us through a shepherd's year, offering a unique account of rural life and a fundamental connection with the land that most of us have lost. It is a story of working lives, the people around him, his childhood, his parents and grandparents, a people who exist and endure even as the world changes around them. Many stories are of people working desperately hard to leave a place. This is the story of someone trying desperately hard to stay.James Rebanks is the Herdwick Shepherd, whose account of shepherding has a strong following on Twitter (@herdyshepherd1). His family has farmed in the same area for more than six hundred years.
Reefer Madness: ... and Other Tales from the American Underground
by Eric SchlosserFrom the author of Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser's Reefer Madness: and Other Tales from the American Underground follows the money to uncover made the country rich: porn, pot and exploitation.In three linked essays, Eric Schlosser uncovers how dirty dealings and secret vices are part of a global black market on which we all depend.Reefer Madness traces the history of the contemporary 'war on drugs' from its origins in Reagan's social conservatism through to its profound impact on civil society, creating a justice system that punishes marijuana offences more harshly than rape and murder.An Empire of the Obscene tells the story of Reuben Sturman, the billionaire 'Walt Disney of porn' who most effectively exploited economies of scale to create a business that now saturates America and the world with graphic sexual imagery.In the Strawberry Fields shows how public demand for a soft red fruit is causing mass migration from Central America and changing California's political economy forever.'An amazing secret history of America's favourite vices' Independent'A shocking journey through the underside of the world's mightiest economy' The Times'Schlosser tells us things we already suspect to be true, but don't dare think about' Daily Telegraph'Superb ... mind-blowing ... quite simply the non-fiction book of the year' The ListEric Schlosser is an author and investigative journalist based in New York. His first book, Fast Food Nation, was a major international bestseller. His work has appeared in the Atlantic Monthly, Rolling Stone and the Guardian.
Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Survive
by Jared DiamondFrom the author of Guns, Germs and Steel, Jared Diamond's Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Survive is a visionary study of the mysterious downfall of past civilizations.Now in a revised edition with a new afterword, Jared Diamond's Collapse uncovers the secret behind why some societies flourish, while others founder - and what this means for our future.What happened to the people who made the forlorn long-abandoned statues of Easter Island?What happened to the architects of the crumbling Maya pyramids?Will we go the same way, our skyscrapers one day standing derelict and overgrown like the temples at Angkor Wat?Bringing together new evidence from a startling range of sources and piecing together the myriad influences, from climate to culture, that make societies self-destruct, Jared Diamond's Collapse also shows how - unlike our ancestors - we can benefit from our knowledge of the past and learn to be survivors.'A grand sweep from a master storyteller of the human race' Daily Mail'Riveting, superb, terrifying' Observer'Gripping ... the book fulfils its huge ambition, and Diamond is the only man who could have written it' Economist'This book shines like all Diamond's work' Sunday TimesJared Diamond (b. 1937) is Professor of Geography at the University of California, Los Angeles. Until recently he was Professor of Physiology at the UCLA School of Medicine. He is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of the widely acclaimed Guns, Germs, and Steel: the Fates of Human Societies, which also is the winner of Britain's 1998 Rhone-Poulenc Science Book Prize.
The Life Project: The Extraordinary Story of Our Ordinary Lives
by Helen PearsonLONGLISTED FOR THE 2017 ORWELL PRIZEThe remarkable story of a unique series of studies that have touched the lives of almost everyone in Britain todayOn 3rd March 1946 a survey began that is, today, the longest-running study of human development in the world, growing to encompass six generations of children, 150,000 individuals and some of the best-studied people on the planet. The simple act of observing human life has changed the way we are born, schooled, parent and die, irrevocably altering our understanding of inequality and health. This is the tale of these studies; the scientists who created and sustain them, the remarkable discoveries that have come from them. The envy of scientists around the world, they are one of Britain's best-kept secrets.
The Inner Level: How More Equal Societies Reduce Stress, Restore Sanity and Improve Everyone’s Wellbeing
by Kate Pickett Richard WilkinsonWhy is the incidence of mental illness in the UK twice that in Germany? Why are Americans three times more likely than the Dutch to develop gambling problems? Why is child well-being so much worse in New Zealand than Japan? As this groundbreaking study demonstrates, the answer to all these hinges on inequality.In The Spirit Level Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett put inequality at the centre of public debateby showing conclusively that less-equal societies fare worse than more equal ones across everythingfrom education to life expectancy. The Inner Level now explains how inequality affects us individually,how it alters how we think, feel and behave. It sets out the overwhelming evidence that materialinequalities have powerful psychological effects: when the gap between rich and poor increases, so does the tendency to defi ne and value ourselves and others in terms of superiority and inferiority. A deep well of data and analysis is drawn upon to empirically show, for example, that low social status is associated with elevated levels of stress, and how rates of anxiety and depression are intimately related to the inequality which makes that status paramount.Wilkinson and Pickett describe how these responses to hierarchies evolved, and why the impacts ofinequality on us are so severe. In doing so, they challenge the conception that humans are innatelycompetitive and self-interested. They undermine, too, the idea that inequality is the product of 'natural' differences in individual ability. This book sheds new light on many of the most urgent problems facing societies today, but it is not just an index of our ills. It demonstrates that societies based on fundamental equalities, sharing and reciprocity generate much higher levels of well-being, and lays out the path towards them.
The Inner Level: How More Equal Societies Reduce Stress, Restore Sanity and Improve Everyone's Well-being (PDF)
by Richard Wilkinson Kate PickettRichard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett's The Spirit Level, now published in more than twenty languages, has been one of the most influential non-fiction books published in the last decade, showing conclusively how less equal societies fare worse than more equal ones across a whole range of social measures - health, education, levels of violence, life expectancy and child wellbeing - and initiating the enormous public attention now given to the impacts of inequality. Based on an equally impressive range of data and analysis, The Inner Level now shows the impact inequality has on individuals: how it affects us psychologically, makes social relations more stressful, undermines self-confidence and distorts natural differences in personal abilities. It demonstrates that societies based on fundamental equalities, sharing and reciprocity produce much higher levels of wellbeing than those based on excessive individualism, competitiveness and social aggression. Like its predecessor, The Inner Level will transform ideas of how we should organise the way we live together.