Basic books mai 2024 (10 Ergebnisse)

Taschenbuch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - A "lively, wide-ranging" (TheTimes, UK)cultural history of the goddess of love Aphrodite was said to have been born from the sea, rising out of a froth of white foam. But long before the ancient Greeks conceived of this voluptuous blonde, she existed as an early spirit of fertility on the shores of Cyprusand thousands of years before that, as a ferocious warrior-goddess in the Middle East. Historian Bettany Hughes reveals the remarkable life story of one of antiquity's most potent myths. In Venus and Aphrodite,Hughes brings together ancient art, mythology, and archaeology to tell the story of human desire. From Mesopotamia to modern-day London, from Botticelli to Beyoncé, Hughes explains why this immortal goddess continues to entrance us todayand how we trivialize her power at our peril.…

Buch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - 'Deeply personal and infinitely digestible, Then I Am Myself the World is a remarkable must-read for anyone interested in knowing their mind."?Judson Brewer MD, PhD, New York Timesbestselling author of Unwinding Anxiety The world's leading investigator of consciousness argues that by understanding what consciousness doescause change in the worldwe can understand its origins and its future? In Then I Am Myself the World, Christof Koch explores the only thing we directly experience: consciousness. At the book's heart is integrated-information theory, the idea that the essence of consciousness is the ability to exert causal power over itself, to be an agent of change. Koch investigates the physical origins of consciousness in the brain and how this knowledge can be used to measure consciousness in natural and artificial systems. ?? ? Enabled by such tools, Koch reveals when and where consciousness exists, and uses that knowledge to confront major social and scientific questions: When does a fetus first become self-aware Can psychedelic and mystical experiences transform lives What happens to consciousness in near-death experiences Why will generative AI ultimately be able to do the very thing we can do, yet never feel any of it And do our experiences reveal a single, objective reality ?? This is an essential book for anyone who seeks to understand ourselves and the future we are creating.…

Buch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - A feminist exploration of single motherhood and a passionate call to reclaim the power of mothering In the United States, one child in five is raised by a single mother.?Yet the single mom is still cast as victim or welfare queen, sexually irresponsible or too independent for her own (or her children's) good.??? In Doing It All,journalist and single mother Ruby Russell tells a different story, of single mothering not defined by loss but whole and powerful in its own right.?She finds narratives of liberation in Victorian brothels and postwar British slums, in Black feminist theory and the grassroots activism of women fighting for welfare rights. Doing It All is a personal quest for empowerment, a fierce critique of the systems that leave single moms marginalized and exhausted, and a call to reclaim mothering as the life force of sustainable, connected, and radically responsible communities.…

Buch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - A "riveting" and "indispensable" (Alison Bechdel) cultural history of queer women's lives in the second half of the twentieth century, told through six iconic spaces For as long as queer women have existed, they've created gathering grounds where they can be themselves. From the intimate darkness of the lesbian bar to the sweaty camaraderie of the softball field, these spaces aren't a luxurythey're a necessity for queer women defining their identities. In A Place of Our Own, journalist June Thomas invites readers into six iconic lesbian spaces over the course of the last sixty years, including the rural commune, the sex toy boutique, the vacation spot, and the feminist bookstore. Thomas blends her own experiences with archival research and rare interviews with pioneering figures like Elaine Romagnoli, Susie Bright, and Jacqueline Woodson. She richly illustrates the lives of the business owners, entrepreneurs, activists, and dreamers who shaped the long struggle for queer liberation. Thomas illuminates what is gained and lost in the shift from the exclusive, tight-knit women's spaces of the '70s toward today's more inclusive yet more diffuse LGBTQ+ communities. At once a love letter, a time capsule, and a bridge between generations of queer women, A Place of Our Own brings the historyand timeless presentof the lesbian community to vivid life. …

Buch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - A concise, definitive history of the precarious relationship among the US, China, and Taiwan.'A rich and thoughtful book.' -New Yorker'A deeply researched and fascinating history.' -GuardianNamed a Best Book of 2024 by the New Statesman \* BBC History Magazine As tensions over Taiwan escalate, the United States and China stand on the brink of a catastrophic war. Resolving the impasse demands we understand how it began. In 1943, the Allies declared that Japanese-held Taiwan would return to China at the conclusion of World War II. The Chinese civil war led to a change of plans. The Communist Party came to power in China and the defeated Nationalist leader, Chiang Kai-shek, fled to Taiwan, where he was afforded US protection. The specter of conflict has loomed ever since. In The Struggle for Taiwan, Sulmaan Wasif Khan offers the first comprehensive history of the triangular relationship between the United States, China, and Taiwan, exploring America's ambivalent commitment to Taiwan's defense, China's bitterness about the separation, and Taiwan's impressive transformation into a flourishing democracy. War is not inevitable, Khan shows, but to avoid it, decision-makers must heed the lessons of the past. From the White Terror to the Taiwan Straits Crises, from the normalization of Sino-American relations to Trump-era rising tensions, The Struggle for Taiwan charts the paths to our present predicament to show what futures might be possible.…

Buch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - 'A must-read."?Avi Loeb, New York Timesbestselling author of Extraterrestrial One of the preeminent mathematicians of the past half century shows how physics and math were combined to give us the theory of gravity and the dizzying array of ideas and insights that has come from it Mathematics is far more than just the language of science. It is a critical underpinning of nature. The famed physicist Albert Einstein demonstrated this in 1915 when he showed that gravitylong considered an attractive force between massive objectswas actually a manifestation of the curvature, or geometry, of space and time. But in making this towering intellectual leap, Einstein needed the help of several mathematicians, including Marcel Grossmann, who introduced him to the geometrical framework upon which his theory rest. In The Gravity of Math, Steve Nadis and Shing-Tung Yau consider how math can drive and sometimes even anticipate discoveries in physics. Examining phenomena like black holes, gravitational waves, and the Big Bang, Nadis and Yau ask: Why do mathematical statements, derived solely from logic, provide the best descriptions of our physical world The Gravity of Math offers an insightful and compelling look into the power of mathematicswhose reach, like that of gravity, can extend to the edge of the universe.…

Buch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - An Economist Book of the YearA five-hundred-year history of printed books, told through the people who created them.'Almost every page-almost every paragraph-fizzes with facts, allusions, speculations, tidbits of etymology and gems of historical interest.' -Wall Street Journal Books have transformed humankind, yet we know little about the individuals who brought these fascinating objects into existence. Who were these renegade book-makers who changed the course of history through their experiments in the arts of printing, paper making, type designing, binding, advertising, and selling The Book-Makers offers a new way to understand the story of Western culture's most important object through a series of dynamic portraits of eighteen men and women who helped to define the book. From Wynkyn de Worde's cheap bestsellers produced in fifteenth-century London, to Nancy Cunard's avant-garde pamphlets made on her small press in Normandy; from Benjamin Franklin's inky entrepreneurialism, to the radical culture of contemporary zines, this is a celebration of the book with the people put back in.…

Buch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - The definitive history of the Capetians, the crusading dynasty that made the French crown the wealthiest and most powerful in medieval Europe and forged France as we know it today.'A joy to read from start to finish. This is not only the best history of the Capetian dynasty now available in English, it is also one of the most entertaining popular history books published in recent years.' -Dan Jones, Sunday Times In House of Lilies, historian Justine Firnhaber-Baker tells the epic story of the Capetian dynasty of medieval France, showing how their ideas about power, religion, and identity continue to shape European society and politics today. Reigning from 987 to 1328, the Capetians became the most powerful monarchy of the Middle Ages. Consolidating a fragmented realm that eventually stretched from the Rhône to the Pyrenees, they were the first royal house to adopt the fleur-de-lys, displaying this lily emblem to signify their divine favor and legitimate their rule. The Capetians were at the center of some of the most dramatic and far-reaching episodes in European history, including the Crusades, bloody waves of religious persecution, and a series of wars with England. The Capetian age saw the emergence of Gothic architecture, the romantic ideals of chivalry and courtly love, and the Church's role at the center of daily life. Evocatively interweaving these pivotal developments with the human stories of the men and women who drove them, House of Lilies is the definitive history of the dynasty that forged France-and Europe-as we know it.…

Buch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - An Instant New York Times Bestseller A major military historian explains how and why some societies chose to destroy their foes, and warns that similar wars of obliteration are possible in our time. "A profound book." Wall Street Journal War can settle disputes, topple tyrants, and bend the trajectory of civilizationsometimes to the breaking point. From Troy to Hiroshima, moments when war has ended in utter annihilation have reverberated through the centuries, signaling the end of political systems, cultures, and epochs. Though much has changed over the millennia, human nature remains the same. Modern societies are not immune from the horror of a war of extinction. In The End of Everything, military historian Victor Davis Hanson narrates a series of sieges and sackings that span the age of antiquity to the conquest of the New World to show how societies descend into barbarism and obliteration. In the stories of Thebes, Carthage, Constantinople, and Tenochtitlan, he depicts war's drama, violence, and folly. Highlighting the naivete that plagued the vanquished and the wrath that justified mass slaughter, Hanson delivers a sobering call to contemporary readers to heed the lessons of obliteration lest we blunder into catastrophe once again.…

Buch. Zustand: Neu. Neuware - A top historian offers a new history of Paris's Belle Époque, the luminous age of the Eiffel Tower and the Sacré-Cur Basilica, but also of social unrest and violent clashes over what it meant to be French From the wrought ironwork of the Eiffel Tower to the flourishing art nouveau movement, the Belle Époque is remembered as a golden age for Parisian culture. Beneath the veneer of elegance, however, fin de siècle Paris was a city at war with itself. In City of Light, City of Shadows, Mike Rapport uncovers a Paris riven by social anxieties and plagued by overlapping epidemics of poverty, political extremism, and anti-Semitism. As the Sacré-Cur and Eiffel Tower rose into the skies, redefining architecture and the Paris skyline, Paris's slums were plagued by disease and gang violence. The era, now remembered as a high point of French art and culture, was also an age of intense political violence, including anarchist bombings, organized right-wing mobs, and assassinations. Weaving together these stories of splendor and suffering with the fabric of the city itself, the book offers a brilliant account of Paris's Belle Époquerevealing the darkness that suffused the City of Light.…