|
|
Books > Social sciences > Politics & government > General
As the candidacies of Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders have proven,
Americans are mad as hell about the problems facing our country.
George Noory hears these problems every night, all night, and this
is how he would deal with them. This is Mad as Hell. --- I'm angry
because sometimes I feel like a stranger in America. We live in a
dangerous world that is sorely in need of an effective political
system that deals with the ongoing destruction of the middle class,
an aging population, permeable borders, technology out of control,
and shocking, mindless violence and wars. But we can bring back the
America that makes us proud. It will take hard work and pulling
together as a society. People are stressed because they don't know
where the world is heading or where it is taking them. With a radio
show heard by millions, I consider myself not an entertainer or
someone to dictate how we should live, but a facilitator who can
help guide the path chosen. I have been called a voice in the
darkness. The concepts I deal with are not only on the cutting edge
of science and technology, but with subjects as provocative as
aliens and angels, as challenging as supervolcanos and the fire and
brimstone of the End Time. Join me by reading why I am mad . . .
and maybe you will get as angry as I am about conditions in the
country we love.
Southeast Asian Affairs is the only one of its kind: a
comprehensive annual review devoted to the international relations,
politics, and economies of the region and its nation-states. The
collected volumes of Southeast Asian Affairs have become a
compendium documenting the dynamic evolution of regional and
national developments in Southeast Asia from the end of the
'second' Vietnam War to the alarms and struggles of today. Over the
years, the editors have drawn on the talents and expertise not only
of ISEAS' own professional research staff and visiting fellows, but
have also reached out to tap leading scholars and analysts
elsewhere in Southeast and East Asia, Australia and New Zealand,
North America, and Europe. A full list of contributors over forty
years reads like a kind of who's who in Southeast Asian Studies.
Distinguished Austrian sociologist Reinhold Knoll's letters to his
grandchildren, written daily during the Covid-19 pandemic, evolved
into an obituary of European culture, politics, and society. They
also embody a gesture of thanks to the United States, which took a
different path from Europe and then saved it in World War I and
World War II. Like Beethoven's piano sonatas, some of Professor
Knoll's letters are light and humorous while others plumb the
depths of the human psyche. But each brings the past into the
present, often enhanced by Viennese ironic wit, with recondite and
penetrating observations on enlightenment and revolution, art and
music, social thought, the devolution of the museum, the status of
the church, migration, fashions in pedagogy, and the role of
technology in society. This is the remarkable work of a balanced
conscience in troubled times. America owes most of its cultural and
spiritual traditions to the erstwhile European stewardship of a
legacy that goes back to Athens, Jerusalem, and Rome - the subject,
verb, and predicate of our human story, - though Europe now finds
itself in a crisis of confidence with profound warnings for the
American reader.
Studs Terkel was an American icon who had no use for America's cult
of celebrity. He was a leftist who valued human beings over
political dogma. In scores of books and thousands of radio and
television broadcasts, Studs paid attention - and respect - to
"ordinary" human beings of all classes and colours, as they talked
about their lives as workers, dreamers, survivors. Alan Wieder's
Studs Terkel: Politics, Culture, But Mostly Conversation is the
first comprehensive book about this man. Drawing from over fifty
interviews of people who knew and worked with Studs, Alan Wieder
creates a multi-dimensional portrait of a run-of-the-mill guy from
Chicago who, in public life, became an acclaimed author and
raconteur, while managing, in his private life, to remain a mensch.
We see Studs, the eminent oral historian, the inveterate and
selfless supporter of radical causes, especially civil rights. We
see the actor, the writer, the radio host, the jazz lover, whose
early work in television earned him a notorious place on the
McCarthy blacklist. We also see Studs the family man and devoted
husband to his adored wife, Ida. Studs Terkel: Politics, Culture,
But Mostly Conversation allows us to realize the importance of
reaching through our own daily realities - increasingly clogged
with disembodied, impersonal interaction - to find value in actual
face-time with real humans. Wieder's book also shows us why such
contact might be crucial to those of us in movements rising up
against global tyranny and injustice. The book is simply the best
introduction available to this remarkable man. Reading it will lead
people to Terkel's enormous body of work, with benefits they will
cherish thr
Artistic expression is a longstanding aspect of mankind and our
society. While art can simply be appreciated for aesthetic artistic
value, it can be utilized for other various multidisciplinary
purposes. Music as a Platform for Political Communication is a
comprehensive reference source for the latest scholarly
perspectives on delivering political messages to society through
musical platforms and venues. Highlighting innovative research
topics on an international scale, such as electron campaigns,
social justice, and protests, this book is ideally designed for
academics, professionals, practitioners, graduate students, and
researchers interested in discovering how musical expression is
shaping the realm of political communication.
Are you tired of hearing about the complexities of the economy,
unemployment, foreign policy, etc? Are you frustrated by
politicians telling you the challenges America faces are too
difficult for you to understand? I was too So, I decided to dive
headlong into each issue and find the real truth behind the 'so
called' complexities, and what I found may surprise you. The issues
of today aren't mind boggling. They aren't huge algorithms. What
they are is straightforward challenges, which we can solve with
good old fashioned common sense solutions. The problem is most
politicians can't balance a check book, let alone the national
budget. They're also too busy running for re-election instead of
working for their constituents. In order to make this topic easy to
understand and to bring it closer to home, we'll follow Harold
Barnes and his son Joshua as they go on an unexpected journey that
starts with the writing of a Civics paper for school. The innocent
and straightforward questions of a sixteen year old boy ignite
their neighborhood, and then their state, into a political
firestorm that eventually becomes The Franklin Party. If you want
to recapture your pride in America and the spirit it was founded
on, read this book.
The crisis of multiculturalism in the West and the failure of the
Arab uprisings in the Middle East have pushed the question of how
to live peacefully within a diverse society to the forefront of
global discussion. Against this backdrop, Indonesia has taken on a
particular importance: with a population of 265 million people
(87.7 percent of whom are Muslim), Indonesia is both the largest
Muslim-majority country in the world and the third-largest
democracy. In light of its return to electoral democracy from the
authoritarianism of the former New Order regime, some analysts have
argued that Indonesia offers clear proof of the compatibility of
Islam and democracy. Skeptics argue, however, that the growing
religious intolerance that has marred the country's political
transition discredits any claim of the country to democratic
exemplarity. Based on a twenty-month project carried out in several
regions of Indonesia, Indonesian Pluralities: Islam, Citizenship,
and Democracy shows that, in assessing the quality and dynamics of
democracy and citizenship in Indonesia today, we must examine not
only elections and official politics, but also the less formal, yet
more pervasive, processes of social recognition at work in this
deeply plural society. The contributors demonstrate that, in fact,
citizen ethics are not static discourses but living traditions that
co-evolve in relation to broader patterns of politics, gender,
religious resurgence, and ethnicity in society. Indonesian
Pluralities offers important insights on the state of Indonesian
politics and society more than twenty years after its return to
democracy. It will appeal to political scholars, public analysts,
and those interested in Islam, Southeast Asia, citizenship, and
peace and conflict studies around the world. Contributors: Robert
W. Hefner, Erica M. Larson, Kelli Swazey, Mohammad Iqbal Ahnaf,
Marthen Tahun, Alimatul Qibtiyah, and Zainal Abidin Bagir
El Salvador is widely considered one of the most successful United
Nations peacebuilding efforts, but record homicide rates, political
polarization, socioeconomic exclusion, and corruption have
diminished the quality of peace for many of its citizens. In
Captured Peace: Elites and Peacebuilding in El Salvador, Christine
J. Wade adapts the concept of elite capture to expand on the idea
of "captured peace," explaining how local elites commandeered
political, social, and economic affairs before war's end and then
used the peace accords to deepen their control in these spheres.
While much scholarship has focused on the role of gangs in
Salvadoran unrest, Wade draws on an exhaustive range of sources to
demonstrate how day-to-day violence is inextricable from the
economic and political dimensions. In this in-depth analysis of
postwar politics in El Salvador, she highlights the local actors'
primary role in peacebuilding and demonstrates the political
advantage an incumbent party-in this case, the Nationalist
Republican Alliance (ARENA-has throughout the peace process and the
consequences of this to the quality of peace that results.
Twenty Years at Hull House, by the acclaimed memoir of social
reformer Jane Addams, is presented here complete with all
sixty-three of the original illustrations and the biographical
notes. A landmark autobiography in terms of opening the eyes of
Americans to the plight of the industrial revolution, Twenty Years
at Hull House has been applauded for its unflinching descriptions
of the poverty and degradation of the era. Jane Addams also details
the grave ill-health she suffered during and after her childhood,
giving the reader insight into the adversity which she would
re-purpose into a drive to alleviate the suffering of others. The
process by which Addams founded Hull House in Chicago is detailed;
the sheer scale and severity of the poverty in the city she and
others witnessed, the search for the perfect location, and the
numerous difficulties she and her fellow activists encountered
while establishing and maintaining the house are detailed.
Based on ethnographic studies conducted in several African
countries, this volume analyses the phenomenon of deliverance -
which is promoted both in charismatic churches and in Islam as a
weapon against witchcraft - in order to clarify the political
dimensions of spiritual warfare in contemporary African societies.
Deliverance from evil is part and parcel of the contemporary
discourse on the struggle against witchcraft in most African
contexts. However, contributors show how its importance extends
beyond this, highlighting a pluralism of approaches to deliverance
in geographically distant religious movements, which coexist in
Africa. Against this background, the book reflects on the
responsibilities of Pentecostal deliverance politics within the
condition of 'epistemic anxiety' of contemporary African societies
- to shed light on complex relational dimensions in which
individual deliverance is part of a wider social and spiritual
struggle. Spanning across the study of religion, healing and
politics, this book contributes to ongoing debates about witchcraft
and deliverance in Africa.
Sometimes presumed to be a mere relic of British colonialism, the
Anglican Church in Burma (Myanmar) has its own complex identity,
intricately interwoven with beliefs and traditions that predate the
arrival of Christianity. In this essential volume, Edward Jarvis
succinctly reconstructs this history and demonstrates how Burma's
unique voice adds vital context to the study of Anglicanism's
predicament and the future of worldwide Christianity. Over the past
two hundred years, the Anglican Church in Burma has seen empires
rise and fall. Anglican Christians survived the brutal Japanese
occupation, experienced rampant poverty and environmental disaster,
and began a tortuous and frustrating quest for peace and freedom
under a lawless dictatorship. Using a range of sources, including
archival documents and the firsthand accounts of Anglicans from a
variety of backgrounds, Jarvis tells the story of the church's life
beyond empire, exploring how Christians of non-Western heritage
remade the church after a significant part of its liturgical
documents and literature was destroyed in World War Two and how,
more recently, the church has gained attention for its alignment
with influential conservative and orthodox movements within
Anglicanism. Comprehensive and concise, this fascinating history
will appeal to scholars and students of religious studies, World
Christianity, church history, and the history of missions and
theology as well as to clergy, seminarians, and those interested in
the current crises and future direction of Anglicanism.
|
|