Here is the definitive history of contemporary Europe, a controversial but authoritative and lively narrative that is destined to become the standard... account of the period from 1914 to the present. In this superb volume, esteemed historian Bernard Wasserstein offers the first serious, full-length history of a century of convulsive change. It is a history of barbarism and civilization, of cruelty and tenderness, of technological achievement and environmental blight, of imperial expansion and withdrawal, of authoritarian repression and of individual rebirth. Wasserstein provides both a narrative of the main contours of the political, diplomatic, and military history and an analysis the underpinnings of demographic, economic, and social developments. Drawing on the latest scholarly findings, including recent disclosures of intelligence materials and archival revelations that followed the fall of Communism in Eastern Europe, Wasserstein captures the essence of contemporary European history in an engaging narrative that is by turns grim, humorous, surprising, and enlightening.

This landmark book explores how Spain tried to come to terms with independent Indians on the frontiers of its American empire in the late 1700s."[An]... important new book. . . . It displays . . . a mastery of the literature and impressive erudition; a capacity for the patient teasing out of the truth from sources that are often incomplete and partisan; and a lucid narrative style that carries the reader along. . . . A formidable achievement."—J. H. Elliott, New York Review of Books "A stunning book that will be read for generations and lauded for its awesome research, judicious analysis, and graceful prose."—James Schofield Saeger, Lehigh University  

On December 14, 1955, Darrel Parker arrived at his Lincoln, Nebraska, home to find his wife, Nancy, strangled to death. Abandoning other potential... leads, the police quickly focused their investigation on the grieving husband. What followed was a tragic miscarriage of justice. "Barbarous Souls" tells the story of Darrel Parker's wrongful conviction for Nancy's murder and the decades-long struggle to clear his name.

Winner of the coveted Associacao Paulista de Criticos de Arte Prize: an anthology of the stories of the tribes of the Amazon.The indigenous tribes of... the Brazilian rainforests are on the verge of extinction. It was feared that the narratives which had sustained them over centuries might die with them. Betty Mindlin was determined to record these legends and the result is a startling piece of anthropology. Mindlin, inspired by the work of Claude Levi-Strauss, has shown that what often appears to be the creation of a fantastical, isolated imagination is just a fragment, part of a much larger whole. The stories recounted in Barbecued Husbands are as old as humanity: love and hate, jealousy and revenge, life after death, totems and taboos, erotic solitude, romantic love, mothers and daughters, masculinity. All this is discussed with an openness that would surprise a Western psychoanalyst. Most of the stories were narrated by tribespeople in their own languages and the translations were carefully checked with them before they appeared in print. The collaboration between the author and the narrator is close throughout, making this book a unique document and an important reference work. Reading like a novel, this is an oral history suffused with magic realism.

In this original and controversial book, historian and philosopher Reviel Netz explores the development of a controlling and pain-inducing... technology--barbed wire. Surveying its development from 1874 to 1954, Netz describes its use to control cattle during the colonization of the American West and to control people in Nazi concentration camps and the Russian Gulag. Physical control over space was no longer symbolic after 1874.This is a history told from the perspective of its victims. With vivid examples of the interconnectedness of humans, animals, and the environment, this dramatic account of barbed wire presents modern history through the lens of motion being prevented. Drawing together the history of humans and animals, Netz delivers a compelling new perspective on the issues of colonialism, capitalism, warfare, globalization, violence, and suffering. Theoretically sophisticated but written with a broad readership in mind, Barbed Wire calls for nothing less than a reconsideration of modernity.

From the devil's rope to no man's land, "a vital work of cultural criticism" (Publishers Weekly). No less than the internal combustion engine, the... transistor, or the silicon chip, barbed wire is a quintessentially modern invention, a product that has influenced the lives of millions of people across the globe since its invention in the late nineteenth century. Barbed Wire: A Political History demonstrates that the invention of barbed wire was a major breakthrough with far-reaching consequences. Cheap and mass-produced, barbed wire accomplished what no other product did before it, or has since done more effectively: the control of vast amounts of open space. Razac describes how barbed wire has been employed in the harnessing of nature, brutal mass warfare, political conquest and repression, and genocide. In a narrative that spans the history of the American Frontier, the trenches of World War I, the Holocaust, and beyond, Barbed Wire: A Political History looks unflinchingly at a central and fascinating strand of modern life.

What is the best way to understand black political ideology? Just listen to the everyday talk that emerges in public spaces, suggests Melissa... Harris-Lacewell. And listen this author has--to black college students talking about the Million Man March and welfare, to Southern, black Baptists discussing homosexuality in the church, to black men in a barbershop early on a Saturday morning, to the voices of hip-hop music and Black Entertainment Television. Using statistical, experimental, and ethnographic methods Barbershops, Bibles, and B.E.T offers a new perspective on the way public opinion and ideologies are formed at the grassroots level. The book makes an important contribution to our understanding of black politics by shifting the focus from the influence of national elites in opinion formation to the influence of local elites and people in daily interaction with each other. Arguing that African Americans use community dialogue to jointly develop understandings of their collective political interests, Harris-Lacewell identifies four political ideologies that constitute the framework of contemporary black political thought: Black Nationalism, Black Feminism, Black Conservatism and Liberal Integrationism. These ideologies, the book posits, help African Americans to understand persistent social and economic inequality, to identify the significance of race in that inequality, and to devise strategies for overcoming it.

“Nearly knocked me off my metaphoric stool.”
—Diann Blakely, Antioch Review“When Julie Sheehan takes the lyric poem out for a few drinks,... everyone winds up talking fast and loose. The lush, agreeably-out-of-style cocktails who take the stage in Bar Book . . . [pull] the reader through this artful, wry, and unlikely book’s tales of hearts on the rocks and hearts surviving.”—Mark Doty

Employing the metaphor-rich names and recipes of cocktails, an exuberant third collection from a “dancer of language” (Molly Peacock).In this wholly... original work, a barmaid grapples with the irreconcilable tensions in her work and personal life. At work, she’s torn between taking orders and keeping order. At home, she confronts the limits of a service ethos as exemplified by her failed marriage. Marguerite, the barmaid’s daughter, has a thing or two to say on the subject, for she, like her mother, is trying to create an instruction manual for understanding her own broken experience. Meanwhile, cocktails, barwares, and other bartenders chime in with their own points of view. from “Cracked Ice”: When I return, I’ll come in clapboard, stained chestnut, with lead-based paint on radiators, old fashioned, and a little bit insane but sturdy to a fault. A spalting grain on punky myrtle and no refrigerator when I return.

The most comprehensive book ever written on how to succeed on the California Essay Examination. Learn the secrets to passing the Bar Exam from a BARBRI... professor, author, and past Bar Exam grader. Now used in some BARBRI Essay Advantage Bar Review courses.The Bar Breaker is a revolutionary guide that represents a nearly decade of research in exam taking strategies and learning technologies. The Bar Breaker contains:Over 100 past Bar Exam questions and answers.Full analysis of answers, with model answers using time allocation techniques and the Exam Evaluator feedback system.10 strategies of successful Bar Exam writing.Includes: Torts, Community Property, Evidence, Criminal Law and Procedure,Constitutional Law, Contracts, Real Property, Civil Procedure, Corporations, Wills & Trusts, Professional Responsibility, Remedies and Agency & Partnership.Six Steps of Exam Taking.How to write a 90 answer.Top reading and outlining techniques.How to master headlining, visualization, and fact retention strategies.What Bar Examiners expect from you.How your exam will be graded.