The Minutemen and Their World


Book Description

The Bancroft Prize–winning classic of American history now in a revised and expanded edition with a new preface and afterword by the author. On April 19, 1775, the American Revolution began at the Old North Bridge in Concord, Massachusetts. The “shot heard round the world” catapulted this sleepy New England town into the height of revolutionary fervor, and Concord went on to become the intellectual capital of the new republic. The town—future home to Emerson, Thoreau, and Hawthorne—soon came to symbolize devotion to liberty, intellectual freedom, and the stubborn integrity of rural life. In The Minutemen and Their World, Robert A. Gross has written a remarkably subtle and detailed reconstruction of the lives and community of this special place, and a compelling interpretation of the American Revolution as a social movement.




The Island at the Center of the World


Book Description

In a riveting, groundbreaking narrative, Russell Shorto tells the story of New Netherland, the Dutch colony which pre-dated the Pilgrims and established ideals of tolerance and individual rights that shaped American history. "Astonishing . . . A book that will permanently alter the way we regard our collective past." --The New York Times When the British wrested New Amsterdam from the Dutch in 1664, the truth about its thriving, polyglot society began to disappear into myths about an island purchased for 24 dollars and a cartoonish peg-legged governor. But the story of the Dutch colony of New Netherland was merely lost, not destroyed: 12,000 pages of its records–recently declared a national treasure–are now being translated. Russell Shorto draws on this remarkable archive in The Island at the Center of the World, which has been hailed by The New York Times as “a book that will permanently alter the way we regard our collective past.” The Dutch colony pre-dated the “original” thirteen colonies, yet it seems strikingly familiar. Its capital was cosmopolitan and multi-ethnic, and its citizens valued free trade, individual rights, and religious freedom. Their champion was a progressive, young lawyer named Adriaen van der Donck, who emerges in these pages as a forgotten American patriot and whose political vision brought him into conflict with Peter Stuyvesant, the autocratic director of the Dutch colony. The struggle between these two strong-willed men laid the foundation for New York City and helped shape American culture. The Island at the Center of the World uncovers a lost world and offers a surprising new perspective on our own.




Between Their World and Ours


Book Description

Autism has reached epidemic proportions. The latest studies suggest that as many as one in 150 children ages ten and younger may be affected by autism---a total of 300,000 children in the United States alone. Adults included, there are more than a million people in the United States suffering from autistic disorders. Since autism has had a bleak prognosis, and since the isolation of autistic children is so painful to parents, Karen Zelan's accounts of her breakthroughs with autistic children in Between Their World and Ours present a particularly hopeful perspective. Zelan illustrates how diagnostic labels reflect the preconceptions and prejudices of the diagnostician, but reveal nothing about the unique person who carries the label and his potential as a human being. Describing nine of the forty-five autists with whom she has worked, Zelan documents how psychotherapy with autistic youth helps them to overcome their problems in communicating, playing, feeling, thinking, and interacting with people more companionably. Her riveting narratives, showing her growing understanding of her young patients, capture how it is to be autistic. She describes the ways these young people meet the challenges of being the way the are. Her work demonstrates how the social context in which autistic children find themselves can make a significant difference in their development, their self-esteem, and their ability to think through problems in living. Zelan, a gifted and intuitive psychotherapist, shows how the autist's sense of self emerges during childhood. She details how these autistic children's first friendships originate, the pitfalls and pleasures they experience in relating to their peers, their dreams, and their fears of social contact. These real-life stories reveal what worked with autistic children and why. Zelan offers prescriptive suggestions for parents and teachers based on her discoveries, demonstrating humane ways of dealing with the often troubling problems of autism and of closing the gap between their world and ours.




Waves


Book Description

A vibrant celebration of surfers in and out of the water from an award-winning photographer Professional photographer Thom Gilbert spent four years among surfer royalty at the top of their game—in Spain, New York, California, and Hawaii—with his camera trained not only on tiny figures disappearing in the waves, but also on the surfers’ faces and bodies back on land. He returned from the beaches with intimate portraits of the world’s best—from the newest talent to the oldest and most revered—and also with dramatic action shots and revealing images of the culture around this sport and lifestyle. The book features not only 300 photographs, but some Q&As with, and hand-written contributions from, prominent figures in the scene. Ultimately, Waves is an ode to surfing and to the men and women who live it every day.




Education to Better Their World


Book Description

In his most visionary book, internationally renowned educator Marc Prensky presents a compelling alternative to how and what we teach our children. Drawing on emerging world trends, he elaborates a comprehensive vision for K–12 education that includes new goals, new means, a new curriculum, a new kind of teaching, and a new use of technology. “Marc Prensky—one of the smartest people working in educational reform today—offers us a lucid, inspiring, optimistic, doable, and crucial blueprint for how we can build a future with the schools children desperately need in our modern, high-risk, highly complex, fast-changing, and imperiled world.” —James Paul Gee, Mary Lou Fulton Presidential Professor of Literacy Studies, Regents’ Professor, Arizona State University “Marc Prensky was always ahead of his time. Education to better their world continues this trend in spades. This book is a goldmine and a powerful wakeup call that the future is already here—in pockets right now but a harbinger of what is rapidly emerging. Read the book and make yourself part of the future today. As we are finding in our own work, students are agents of change—in pedagogy, in learning environments, and of society itself. Exciting possibilities await!” —Michael Fullan, Professor Emeritus, OISE/University of Toronto “Marc Prensky’s answer to the question ‘What is the purpose of education?’—that education should now empower youth to improve their communities and the world—would unleash the energy, creativity, and compassion of students and teachers in ways we have never imagined. We need the better world Prensky envisions and we need it now.” —Milton Chen, The George Lucas Educational Foundation “Prensky offers perhaps the most compelling case and model yet articulated by anyone for today’s globally-empowered children. A must-read book for all educators and anyone who cares about education.” —James Tracey, Head of School, Rocky Hill School, RI “Wow. As a takeaway it is good—very good.” —John Seeley Brown “A great book. Filled with ‘food for thought’, common sense, provocative ideas and fun to read.” —Nieves Segovia, Presidenta, Institucion Educativa SEK (SEK International Schools)




American Milliners and their World


Book Description

Studies of millinery tend to focus on hats, rather than the extraordinarily skilled workers who create them. American Milliners and their World sets out to redress the balance, examining the position of the milliner in American society from the 18th to the 20th century. Concentrating on the struggle of female hat-makers to claim their social place, it investigates how they were influenced by changing attitudes towards women in the workplace. Drawing on diaries, etiquette books, trade journals and contemporary literature, Stewart illustrates how making hats became big business, but milliners' working conditions failed to improve. Taking the reader from the Industrial Revolution of the 1760s to the sexual revolution of the 1960s, and from Belle Epoque feathers to elegant cloches and Jackie Kennedy's pillbox hat, the book offers a new insight into the rise and fall of a fashionable industry. Beautifully illustrated and packed with original research, American Milliners and their World blends fashion history and anthropology to tell the forgotten stories of the women behind some of the most iconic hats of the last three centuries.




How Successful Leaders Do Business with Their World


Book Description

In this rigorously researched book Stephen Barden presents compelling evidence that top leaders learn from a very early age to 'do business with the world' by using their power and authority to partner with it, rather than impose themselves on it. Based on interviews with military, corporate and educational leaders, How Successful Leaders Do Business with Their World offers powerful insight into how these findings can be applied in practice. The book illustrates how the assumptions leaders formed as children, and the way they learned to 'make space for themselves', directly links to the way they exercise their leadership as adults. Barden uses these findings and insights, as well as studies from his own corporate leadership career and coaching practice, to describe a set of common assumptions held by successful leaders. The book clearly outlines several key concepts - the Navigational Stance, the Partnering Stance, the Oppositional Stance and the Navigational Compass - illustrates each with relevant examples and makes recommendations for applying these insights in practice. How Successful Leaders Do Business with Their World will be a valuable asset for coaches, leaders, HR and L&D professionals, and all professionals working with leaders. To learn more about the author and his work, please visit stephenbarden.org.




Medieval Monks and Their World: Ideas and Realities


Book Description

This volume examines the world of the medieval monk. The first section of the volume is organized around the theme of monks and the world and explores the intersections between the secular and sacred. The second section is concerned with the ideological or intellectual lives of medieval monks. These essays examine the ideas that were important to monks and that shaped the intellectual discourse of the Middle Ages. Contributors include: David R. Blanks, Constance B. Bouchard, Darlene L. Brooks Hedstrom, Daniel F. Callahan, M.A. Claussen, John J. Contreni, Edith Wilks Dolnikowski, Michael Frassetto, Amy Livingstone, Kathleen Mitchell, and Steven A. Stofferahn.




What College Students Know and Believe about Their World


Book Description

Freshmen and seniors in four-year colleges and students in two-year institutions were surveyed nationally in 1980 to determine their understanding of the world and world issues. The survey, which was based on a sample of about 3,000 undergraduates at 185 institutions, included a test of global understanding and three questionnaires on students' backgrounds and interests, their foreign language backgrounds and proficiency and their attitudes toward foreign nations and world issues. The performance of the students on the test revealed a considerable lack of knowledge of topics the test developers felt were important. All three groups did well on questions concerned with population, physical geography, and arts and culture. Their weakest performance was on questions having to do with energy and religion. Significantly, many students were uninformed about issues that have been widely reported and discussed in the news media. Even those students who were above-average scorers had serious misconceptions about many key world issues and facts, including: the causes of inadequate nutrition; and whether the comparative world membership of Islam predominates or has a significant minority. About 90 percent of the seniors reported in the language questionnaire that they had learned or studied a foreign language, but relatively few felt that they could put their language education to much use. The development and content of the questions in the test and the questionnaires, as well as results and interpretation are covered. (SW)




Demystifying Shamans and Their World


Book Description

Shamanism can be described as a group of techniques by which its practitioners enter the “spirit world,” purportedly obtaining information that is used to help and to heal members of their social group. Despite a resurgence of interest in shamanism and shamanic states of consciousness, these phenomena are neither well-defined nor sufficiently understood. This multi-disciplinary study draws on the fields of psychology, philosophy and anthropology with the aim of demystifying shamanism. The authors analyse conflicting perspectives regarding shamanism, the epistemology of shamanic states of consciousness, and the nature of the mental imagery encountered during these states.