History: Fiction or Science? (Chronology, No. 1)

Book Description

Recorded history is a finely-woven magic fabric of intricate lies about events predating the sixteenth century. There is not a single piece of evidence that can be reliably and independently traced back earlier than the eleventh century. This book details events that are substantiated by hard facts and logic, and validated by new astronomical research and statistical analysis of ancient sources.

Customer Reviews:

Calculations are only as good as your numbers.......2007-08-03

Yes, we can all agree that mainstream history is nearly 100% BS due to politics, economics, ego, problems with dating techniques, and various conspiracies. Agreed. But, I've been researching the distinct possibility that human history (in terms of civilizations) are much more ancient than we've been told, so coming across this book was very interesting to me. I wondered how Fomenko could be wrong (if at all) because he is very persuasive in his presentations. Then it dawned on me. If at previous times in prehistory, due to the various catastrophies that are well documented (comets, asteroids, planetary disruptions, plasma discharge, pole reversals, etc) the Earth was in a different position in relation to the sun, different tilt on its axis, different orbit, different rotation (in terms of velocity and DIRECTION), and the continents were in different positions, then would this not cause the ancients to see the sky (constellations) differently? In other words, is Fomenko making erronious assumptions about the physics of the Earth in pre-history, which then corrupt his data with regards to dating the relevant astrology? The last event to seriously disrupt our planet occured roughly 3500 years ago, according to other good researchers, so is it possible Fomenko has been confused by this? The vastly different physics of our planet in the not so distant past may explain this confusion, which is not to say the "mainstream" version of history is correct; on the contrary. I am not an expert in these fields, but wanted to see if this idea could spark discussion.

Pants on fire?.......2007-07-19

Will people ever read before spamming? Yes, Jesuits could not rewrite world history alone, they had help. Anyway, Dr Prof Acad A.Fomenko does not point to jesuits as the driving force of world wide history manipulation in published volumes 1,2,3;, actually he barely mentions the poor devils. Check it with 'Search inside' feature, please. China is rarely mentioned either, in fact, Dr Fomenko is completely eurocentric. Right, his theory contradicts all mainstream schools of history, because in their actual state they are all built on blatantly erroneus chronology. You don't need a mysterious cabal (conspiracy) to falsify history, the falsification is its modus operandi. It is inherent to history(ians) to falsify (distort) events, as it is inherent to humans to boast as it is inherent to power (authority) to legimize itself by referrring to glorious past made to its own order. Dr Prof Fomenko and team have identified scores of instances of such manipulation in Russian, European, etc.. history, and delivered valid statistical proof thereof. His own 'reconstruction' is completely another story. Forget c14 as a valid method of dating. W.Libby has initially discovered a brilliant method of INDEPENDENT dating. Too bad, c14 method has become a joke after a forced marrige with dendrochronology with consensual chronological scale inbuilt. Radiocarbon method can't stand blind tests, but is so very productive as a rubberstamp.

Accepted History & Chronology Must Be Changed. .......2007-04-09

There is no doubt that history as most know it is a sham, & institution's version of History both University & Church is fradulent & inaccurate. Everything was established with an agenda, The real "Dark Ages" are now when we have access to incredible amounts of information past authorities & more important 'common folk' didn't have but our institutions & educators are slow to evolve because of what has ignorantly & arrogantly been taught for too long. This is on many subjects not just Chronology.

For anyone to question "Why would a Mathematician have anything credible to say of History?" The answer is from Dr. Fomenko's preface in the book: "It would be worthwhile to remind the reader that in the XVI-XVII century Chronology was considered to be a subdivision of Mathematics." These volumes could possibly be some of the most important works to date & should be read by everyone with an interest in History, especially professors & educators who have a duty to the public. I have read both books & must say that 'Chronology 1' has some very eye opening & revolutionary information. Even if these volumes are part true the implications are profound & opens the doors to further investigations & questions which must be done. I speak several different lanquages & must say the logic Dr. Fomenko uses with "inflection" of words & words being read from left to right in one region & right to left in another then written backwards, the removal of vowels & get down to basics of words, or different cities & locations having the same name etc. is correct. Vowel usage has always been optional & varied, actually complicating linquistics & study. The first thing one has to understand is that words never had a fixed spelling in history like we do now, the spelling of words was mutable & regional, as well as names & titles of people were vast, varied & changed, NOTHING WAS FIXED or understood linear. Matters of Life & Death as well as financial profiteering yesterday & today were & are made with ignorant, illogical & conspiratorial views of history & reality, it's time people get closer to the Truth & society collectively grow up.

Very Interesting.......2007-03-07

It is a good proposal and I believe it will mature into something even better in the future. I think it deserves to be read.

History as Science Fiction.......2007-01-10

Anatoly Fomenko has written a very intriguing book, full of pictures, charts, and computer 'proof' of his thesis: backwards of AD900 we don't really know what happened or when. Between AD900 and AD1600 there is more certainty, but there is still a lot of fuzzy ground, and things don't get reliable until we get past the 1600's where the printing press made it very difficult for the perpetrators of this timeline manipulation to change anything that had been committed to print. The Dark Ages did not happen. Books were burned for a reason. One organization has doubled the actual length of its existence by expanding the real chronology. Read why.

I had always wondered why Christ died about AD33 and yet men waited until the 11th century to form the Knights Templar, the Cathars, etc and go after the Holy Land by force. Why the 1000 year gap? Turns out there wasn't more than a 10-12 year gap and he proves it using astronomy. This also implies that the planet is not as old as we have been told, and current Christian and other creationist scientists are already championing that idea without being aware of Fomenko's book. The two groups, creationist scientists and the Russian mathematical analysts corroborate each other. Fascinating.

Of course, all this flies in the face of what we have been told traditionally is the 'proper' chronology of western civilization, and most readers will experience 'cognitive dissonance' in reading this book. It means that our history going backwards from AD1600 becomes progressively more incorrect and unreliable until it cannot be trusted at all... in the space of 700-800 years.

Naturally, the curious, open-minded reader will want to know WHO did this, WHY, and did any of the events we think of as really ancient ever happen?
Dr. Fomenko is a respected scientist/mathematician at Moscow State University who has already answered these questions to the satisfaction of his initially skeptical colleagues. Most of them are now believers, a few still refuse to believe (the usual diehards), and of course the western press has ignored Fomenko's work -- for obvious reasons when you read the book. The ones who perpetrated this chronology ruse have a lot to answer for. They are still with us. That's why this book is a well-kept secret.

I gave the book a 4-star rating because I was unable to check out some of his claims; those I checked were as he said. But if even 1/3 of his claims are true, this punches a big hole in what we think is our history, the meaning of western civilization, our educational process (for repeating the ruse as gospel), and the trustworthiness of the organization that perpetrated this ruse, well-intentioned or not.

This book relates to current research into a Young Earth paradigm, to John Keel's discoveries about our planet, and Fr Malachi Martin's insights (in his now out-of-print books). We are indeed sheep who are manipulated and kept ignorant -- for a reason. While knowing what these men have to say may be the "booby prize" (as in: 'what can you do with this knowledge?'), it will provide interesting reading. Didn't someone say: "...and the Truth will set you free."?? For you to judge if this book contains the truth.

Media/Society: Industries, Images and Audiences

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Life in all its strangeness
your superego
Shooting history on the wing

Media/Society: Industries, Images and Audiences
David R. Croteau , and William Hoynes
Manufacturer: Pine Forge Press
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Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0761987738

Book Description

Praise for the Second Edition

"Croteau and Hoynes have written the clearest, most comprehensive, and useful textbook I’ve seen on the media, American Society, and their interconnections. As sage as it is thoroughgoinga, it serves as an encyclopedic reference book as well as a cogent summation of what scholars know. My congratulations to the authors."

-- Todd Gitlin, Columbia University

"The most comprehensive and insightful book on the role of media in life and society. If students, scholars, and all those concerned about our culture had to pick one book to enlighten and inform them, this would be the book."

-- George Gerbner, Bell Atlantic Professor of Telecommunication, Temple University

In a society saturated by mass media, from newspapers and magazines, television and radio, to digital video projects and the worldwide web, most students possess a great deal of media knowledge and experience before they ever enter the classroom. What they often lack, however, is a broader framework for understanding the relationship between media and society. Media/Society: Industries, Images, and Audiences provides that context and helps students develop skills for critically evaluating both conventional wisdom and one’s own assumptions about the social role of the media.

The first two editions of Media/Society introduced thousands of students to a sociologically informed analysis of the media process. The Third Edition builds on this success with revised Internet resources, the latest data on the media industry, new examples from the independent media sector, and updated discussions of media policy, online media, and independent media. Media/Society is unique among media texts in that it offers:

A sociological approach that examines overarching relationships between the various components of the media process—the industry, its products, audiences, technology, and the broader social world
An integrated study of mass media that looks at media technologies, collective influences, and connections between mass media issues that are often treated as separate
An examination of how economic and political constraints affect the media and how audiences actively construct their own interpretations of media messages

Media/Society: Industries, Images and Audiences, Third Edition engages the reader with accessible analyses that are historically grounded but draw upon current media debates such as regulation of the Internet, concentration of media ownership, portrayals of gays in the media, and the growth of global media. Media/Society an outstanding text for courses in mass media and sociology.

Customer Reviews:

Life in all its strangeness.......2005-04-04

Unquestionably, the strength and courage shown by the modern day media has been the sole driving force in bringing forward the various viewpoints that would eventually change the world for better. It is like the words - "It sometimes takes a stranger for us to be able to look into justices' beautiful eyes". That is true at so many levels, both at an individual and personal level but also in terms of the relationship between the citizens of this world and the media. And therein lies the genesis of everlasting love as well, no matter how much doubt is cast by slander. However human nature is strange in that one often ends up hurting the most those that they actually love dearly. Words, in that context, are also strange since they can be sometimes be so vitriolic, if not being utterly cruel. There once was an ordinary man who sat in his home looking at his television screen, as if looking through it and asked for forgiveness and hoped that one day he would be forgiven by everyone he hurt. It was at times like this that he wished he could get himself to walk away from the television and return to his ordinary world of man and machines or even to his essence, not out of fear of retaliation but out of the pain he kept causing others. After all he was just a human being! He was such a person who could see the truth in every perspective and ideology and at the same time felt that the modern world would be writing its epitaph if it did not bravely face the reality of the every changing world. It was something as simple and pure as seeing the truth in the different ways of life chosen by different human beings who lived on this land even if he did not agree with all viewpoints. It is like being able to walk in every stranger's shoes and realizing that in essence some face of the ultimate truth shows itself no matter how different this truth looks at face value. It is analogous to the different faces of a diamond and that it would take a miracle to be able to see these myriad, if not infinite, faces of the same diamond in one glimpse. In this regard, the narrower the tunnel vision, the more mistrust there is against other viewpoints. That is the essence of life. Well, what can you say other than - "shine on you crazy diamond..."

your superego.......2005-03-07

Complete moral degredation of society, eh? Dimwit zealots interspersed with egotistical invaders of privacy and the silly immature masses of disgusting protoplasm seeking fun at others' expense, all trapped in the tragic duplicity and hypocrisy of their own self-glorified beliefs...the self-proclaimed intellectual class, the so-called saviors of modern society? Has the rabid journalistic and entertainment and advertising (aka the modern day devils) media gone berserk with no one around to save them from their mental illness except maybe their own slow but inevitable slide down into oblivion?

Shooting history on the wing.......2000-04-15

Media-disseminated messages flood our every waking second, affecting us in ways we often do not readily discern. Croteau and Hoynes take the reader on an exploration of these media forces in a sociological journey that walks then leaps from the birth of printed words for the masses to cyberspace for the individual. In the process, we learn a lot along the way. Not only about media, but, about ourselves. Unlike most college course texts in Media and Society (in sociology or journalism), "Media Society" is written in understandable English and is not ruefully Marxian in ideological slant. The work plays it straight down the middle. The authors' goal, to which they succeed, is to provide information that shows the complexity of social relationships in, around and through which information from all sources is sought and internalized by "receivers" then, through feedback, subtly affects the "senders" and subsequent messages as well. Surprisingly up-to-date in information, especially concerning the so-called New Media (a synthesis of current technologies, traditional entertainment programs-turned-political,and old news media). Croteau and Hoynes not only introduce the reader to the media mileau in society, they show how economics drive news coverage. At the same time they explain that media consolidations have not shrunk the markets as first feared, but have actually led--perhaps inadvertently--to an explosion of different, often smaller and more intimate media. The media pie, they attest, is growing bigger as the number of slices inexplicably increase. In later chapters, the authors do a commendable job acquainting the reader with communications theory, especially explaining how opinions are formed. My favorite chapter, given my predilections, are the chapters dealing with media and the political world (and the rest of the chapters in Part 4). The authors also enter the globalization fray by demonstrating not only how American pop culture is transforming traditional cultures (see Barber's McWorld v. Jihad for greater detail), but also how traditional cultures are influencing American pop culture in ways greater than we had intuited. Anyone interested in gaining a sense of how media is impacting his or her daily life and how we, as social beings, react to that impact, should certainly read this wonderful book.

The Archive and the Repertoire: Performing Cultural Memory in the Americas (A John Hope Franklin Center Book)

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A Vital Intervention
Read This Important New Book

The Archive and the Repertoire: Performing Cultural Memory in the Americas (A John Hope Franklin Center Book)
Diana Taylor
Manufacturer: Duke University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0822331233

Book Description

In The Archive and the Repertoire preeminent performance studies scholar Diana Taylor provides a new understanding of the vital role of performance in the Americas. From plays to official events to grassroots protests, performance, she argues, must be taken seriously as a means of storing and transmitting knowledge. Taylor reveals how the repertoire of embodied memoryâconveyed in gestures, the spoken word, movement, dance, song, and other performancesâoffers alternative perspectives to those derived from the written archive and is particularly useful to a reconsideration of historical processes of transnational contact. The Archive and the Repertoire invites a remapping of the Americas based on traditions of embodied practice.

Examining various genres of performance including demonstrations by the children of the disappeared in Argentina, the Peruvian theatre group Yuyachkani, and televised astrological readings by Univision personality Walter Mercado, Taylor explores how the archive and the repertoire work together to make political claims, transmit traumatic memory, and forge a new sense of cultural identity. Through her consideration of performances such as Coco Fusco and Guillermo GÃ³mez-PeÃ±a’s show Two Undiscovered Amerindians Visit . . . , Taylor illuminates how scenarios of discovery and conquest haunt the Americas, trapping even those who attempt to dismantle them. Meditating on events like those of September 11, 2001 and media representations of them, she examines both the crucial role of performance in contemporary culture and her own role as witness to and participant in hemispheric dramas. The Archive and the Repertoire is a compelling demonstration of the many ways that the study of performance enables a deeper understanding of the past and present, of ourselves and others.

Customer Reviews:

A Vital Intervention.......2006-02-15

Taylor's "The Archive and the Repertoire" is an absolute must-read for all scholars and students in performance studies, cultural studies, Latin American studies, and the social sciences in general.

Drawing on a diverse range of case studies from a Peruvian community theatre troupe to Univision astrologist Walter Mercado to her own firsthand account of witnessing 9/11, Taylor creates a new vocabulary for describing how cultures remember and re-enact with the body.

Although her insights are crucial for the future of performance studies and useful to senior scholars in the field, she writes with a clarity and personality that will engage undergraduate students as well.

VERY highly recommended.

Read This Important New Book.......2003-12-16

In her wonderful new book, Diana Taylor, a distinguished professor of both Spanish and performance studies, brings her areas of expertise into "conversation." Performances, she argues, are vital "acts of transfer" that transmit social knowledge, memory and a sense of identity in Latin/o American (and by extension other) cultures.
She writes, "I am not suggesting that we merely extend our analytic practice to other `Non-Western' areas. Rather, what I propose here is a real engagement between two fields that helps us rethink both." By working from the points of disconnection between area and performance studies Taylor creates a new framework for approaching performance as embodied social practice.

Shifting focus to "the live" requires new methodologies and Taylor creates exciting new theoretical tools to further this discussion. Since, in her view, much performance writing betrays the "embodiedness" it seeks to describe; Taylor coins terms that do not derive from literary sources. The repertoire of her title is her term for a "non-archival system of transfer" that can capture the ephemeral trace of performance. By providing her reader with a kind of archive of affect, Taylor makes the body central. She argues that the repertoire "allows for an alternative perspective on historical processes...by following traditions of embodied practice" instead of literary rhetoric. As an alternative to "narrative" she offers scenario, a term with a theatrical genealogy, meaning an open-ended " sketch or outline" as a way to connote colonial encounters. For example, Taylor wittily names the scenario in which we are encouraged to "overlook the displacement and disappearance of native peoples" at the root of the popular show Survivor, "Fantasy Island." Taylor expands on this theme in her second chapter, Scenarios of Discovery: Reflections on Performance and Ethnography. She writes, "Using scenario as a paradigm for understanding social structures and behaviors might allow us to draw from the repertoire as well as the archive."

Using these terms as "portable frameworks" and moving in and out of first person experience, Taylor explores a range of hemispheric performances. Chapters on the Mexican mestizaje, campy Latino American psychic Walter Mercado, and the ways that minority populations mourned Princess Diana, explore the hybrid spaces between perception and embodied culture. Taylor revisits the Argentinean "Dirty War"
(the topic of her book Disappearing Acts) in her chapter on H.I.J.O.S. -the children of the disappeared- and the "DNA of performance" that links them with their absent parents. Chapters on Brazilian performance artist Denise Stoklos, witnessing 9/11 and a 1998 Central Park performance of Rumba musicians interrupted by the NYPD, investigate the complex relations between hegemonic power and the anarchic spirit of live performance against a background of historic violence.

Customer Reviews:

Ghost Dancing Sacred Medicine and the Art of JD Challenger.......2001-04-27

Descriptive words of Ghost Dancing, joined with the timeless wisdom contained in the words of Native America. Couple this with the paintings of JD Challenger and you have an opportunity to not read about but really feel. This is not a book just narrating the past but speaks volumes to the future. This book called to me from the library shelf and I have ordered to place in a prominent place on my shelf. This is a book to share with others and come back to often.

Art for the Soul.......1999-10-07

JD challengers work was the first original art that I have purchased. When I saw his work in a gallery in Santa Fe, I was mesmorized by the character of his subjects. Ghost Dancing provides a good overview of many of his prints that are available.

Beautiful Visual Experience.......1999-02-28

The text of this book is extremely informative on the Ghost Dance Religion of Native Americans. It covers the origins of the religion, its climax and the results thereof. Adding to this educational context is the Beautifully compelling work of artist JD Challenger. His riviting paintings jump from the pages virtually reaching out from the book and pulling you in. I would highly recommend this book to anyone interested in learning more about Native Americans and most assuredly to anyone who loves art that emits emtional impact. I constantly go back to this book as a source of inspiration and to gain understanding of Native American's plight.

Excellent reproduction of JD's paintings........1998-07-10

The book is of the finest quality in printing and binding. The content is very educational and the reproductrion of JD's paintings is superb.

The Anthropology of Performance (PAJ Books)

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The Anthropology of Performance (PAJ Books)
Victor Turner
Manufacturer: PAJ Publications
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1555540015

Book Description

Considering social drama, ritual, and postmodern consciousness in relation to the idea of performance, Victor Turner explores the interplay of event, spectacle, audience, and culture and offers new insights into the nature of performance.

Dance of the Four Winds: Secrets of the Inca Medicine Wheel

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Indiana Jones move aside
Now one of my favorite books
good book good seler
Reality or fiction?
reads well

Dance of the Four Winds: Secrets of the Inca Medicine Wheel
Alberto Villoldo , and Erik Jendresen
Manufacturer: Destiny Books
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Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0892815140
Release Date: 1994-12-01

Book Description

Dance of the Four Winds recounts the adventures of the American psychologist Alberto Villoldo as he journeys to Peru to explore the visionary ceremonies of the native shamans. Here Quecha masters use the jungle plant ayahuasca to further their spiritual progress along the four paths of the Medecine Wheel. Entering a magical realm of enigmatic sorcerers and powerful animal totems, Villoldo confronts the hidden powers of his own mind as he unlocks the secrets of the human psyche.

Customer Reviews:

Indiana Jones move aside.......2007-09-08

One of the best books I ever read. Great insights! A book one can always return to and learn from. I highly recommend this and Villoldo's other books.

Now one of my favorite books.......2007-07-05

I absolutely loved reading this story, and haven't read any story as stimulating since The Celestine Prophesy.... the difference, of course being - that this book recounts true life experiences. This was an engaging, enjoyable read with many eye opening insights into other ways and worlds. I have vivid memories of the images and experiences described in this book. Fascinating!

good book good seler.......2006-06-29

a great and by-now classic book on the theme of shamanism by an anthopologist and psychologist. I LIKE THIS BOOK BECAUSE HE TRIES IN IT TO DECRIBE HIS PERSONAL EXPERIENCES IN COMMON WORDS

Reality or fiction?.......2005-05-04

For those seeking more info about Dr. Villoldo's lack of detail and other concerns regarding truthfulness in contemporary shamanism, please see "The Selling of the Shaman and the Problem of Informant Legitimacy" which appears in the Summer 1990 issue of 'Anthropological Research', Volume 46, Number 2. Dr. Villoldo is prominently featured.

reads well.......2002-12-19

In this book Villoldo, perhaps one of the most well known teachers of Inca shamanism in the West, describes his initial encounters with the shamanic world. The book is devoted to Villoldo's experiences with two Peruvian healers - don Ramon Silva (an ayahuascero from the Peruvian Amazon) and don Antonio Morales, (a Qero style healer and philosophy professor!). Villoldo's recounting of Peruvian healing practices is gripping and the final chapter, in which he describes the death of his teacher's teacher in a little cottage on the Peruvian altiplano, is simply breath-taking. I also quite liked the description of the "operation" which allowed V. to see energy patterns and his animal allies.

If V. only recounted his experiences with the old shamans, the book would have been superb. Unfortunately, he decided to insert into the book his own personal issues and musings on the nature of reality (which tend to go on and on) and which to me seem to be rather cliche-y. this guy is a doer, not a thinker and all the theory just detracted me from the magic of his experiences. V. also seems to be unduly impressed by his newly acquired Ph.D. in psychology (from a little known local college) as if a degree means anything these days.

Book Description

First published in 1983, this book studies how people are tied together and yet isolated by hidden threads of rhythm and walls of time. Time is treated as a language, organizer, and message system revealing people's feelings about each other and reflecting differences between cultures.

Customer Reviews:

A must-have for understanding cultural perceptions of time........2002-10-28

This book blew my mind back when it was first released, and on third or fourth read, there is still so much information to be gleaned from it.
Issues discussed:
Appointments by time vs. being late because a friend in need is more important.
Queueing for the bus vs. pushing and shoving to the front of the line.
Needing closure vs. pigeon-holing a half-completed but unimportant task, often for months or even years.
But most importantly, the book goes in great detail into how these cultural differences in the perception of time and sequence affect interactions between the races and between nations. I highly recommend Dance of Life not only for international travellers but also for anyone who has to deal with other cultures.

stone-headed stormtroopers.......2001-09-05

I am a scientist. how these reviewers in "prestige" journals bother normal researchers with their remarks like "seldom bothers to document" or "has constructed a system and world view which bears little relationship to accepted" and their "qualitatitive musings" of the humanitarian social sciences. Or natural sciences. Then they,perhaps, submit THEIR grants with YOUR ideas however...

It is greed, greed of greed and only greed and nothing else as greed. They want more grants, they want more senksual pleasures and excitement. And, more important, THEY DO NOT WANT TO THINK. Only for Money. Like storm-troopers of the Evil Empire. Me do thinks this is a good review of the book. Yours sincerely, Dr Vader.

Irritating Methodology, Extraordinary Insights.......2000-12-05

Hall seldom bothers to document, presents his musings as given, has constructed a system and world view which bears little relationship to accepted qualitatitive research in the social sciences. . . so why read this book? Because every chapter has an idea with unusual parallels either to developments in cognitive research, to human-computer interaction, or to linguistics, all of which came about post-publication! Astounding intuitions, oftentimes annoyingly documented.

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Hula Dancers and Tiki Gods

Hula Dancers & Tiki Gods
Chris Pfouts
Manufacturer: Schiffer Publishing
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0764312472

Book Description

The dream of pure freedom in the South Pacific islands has never died on the mainland; sometimes its more of an ache than a dream. Over time and through the mill of popular culture, the dream has been distilled into two enduring images: the hula dancer and the tiki god. This book displays over 500 color images of collectible hula dancers and tiki gods with which readers can have a little exotic fun and maybe catch a tropical thrill along the way. The hula dance provided an escape in its original culture, and here the dancers are shown in sections devoted to flat images, three-dimensions, crank girls, and Hollywoods versions from the twentieth century. The tiki gods that 1960s surfers wore for luck around their necks may have deeper meanings as well, and became the most important symbol of cool adulthood that mainland youngsters could imagine. Here lamps, figures, posters, and souvenirs all come together for entertainment and enjoyment. All dreamers of tropical pleasures will covet copies of this book to linger over. And the values guide will bring them quickly and happily back to reality.

Customer Reviews:

Hula Dancers and Tiki Gods.......2001-04-29

There's no way this book should be listed under Home and Garden. Someone tell me why it is. Hula Dancers and Tiki Gods boasts over 500 color images of Hawaiiana collectibles. Pfouts' purpose is clear: It's all about fun. He claims he's not out to teach anyone anything. And then he goes ahead and does it anyway. Hula Dancers offers a great store of information and photos. Pfouts gives a clear picture of how the hula dancer and the tiki god came to symbolize so much to so many. He covers a wide range of Hula collectibles through four sections: flat hula treasures that includes postcards, paintings, pulp art, cocktail napkins, carnival sideshow art, decals, playing cards, tattoos, etc; the three-dimensional section brings the lovely ladies to life as figurines, salt and pepper shakers, plaster sculptures, drinking vessels, killer lamps and more; the vintage crank girls in the third section offer the reader a rare chance to see dainty little ladies who shimmy with a quick twist and the Hollywood section show how movie posters, album covers, photos and sheet music brought the hula into greater public view. The tiki gods portion of the book offers up information and photos on everything tiki, including swizzel sticks, mugs, pendants, bookends and furniture to die for. Combined with his entertaining commentary and assessments on what some of these collectibles are worth today, Hula Dancers and Tiki Gods leaves a lasting impression of the depth and availability of Hawaiiana out there.

The Circus Age: Culture and Society under the American Big Top

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Great!
Fine Historical Work on the American Circus

The Circus Age: Culture and Society under the American Big Top
Janet M. Davis
Manufacturer: The University of North Carolina Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0807853992
Release Date: 2002-09-04

Book Description

A century ago, daily life ground to a halt when the circus rolled into town. Across America, banks closed, schools canceled classes, farmers left their fields, and factories shut down so that everyone could go to the show. In this entertaining and provocative book, Janet Davis links the flowering of the early-twentieth-century American railroad circus to such broader historical developments as the rise of big business, the breakdown of separate spheres for men and women, and the genesis of the United States' overseas empire. In the process, she casts the circus as a powerful force in consolidating the nation's identity as a modern industrial society and world power.

Davis explores the multiple "shows" that took place under the big top, from scripted performances to exhibitions of laborers assembling and tearing down tents to impromptu spectacles of audiences brawling, acrobats falling, and animals rampaging. Turning Victorian notions of gender, race, and nationhood topsy-turvy, the circus brought its vision of a rapidly changing world to spectators--rural as well as urban--across the nation. Even today, Davis contends, the influence of the circus continues to resonate in popular representations of gender, race, and the wider world.

Customer Reviews:

Great!.......2006-08-07

after reading "WATER FOR ELEPHANTS" I needed some circus history and this book was great. Love the pictures. This was a pleasure to read.

Fine Historical Work on the American Circus.......2004-06-16

Davis' book is a rare scholarly exploration of the history of the American circus. She makes smart conclusions about this Amercan instituion. Her work is well documented and a pleasure to read.

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Transcultural Cinema
David MacDougall
Manufacturer: Princeton University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0691012342

Book Description

David MacDougall is a pivotal figure in the development of ethnographic cinema and visual anthropology. As a filmmaker, he has directed in Africa, Australia, India, and Europe. His prize-winning films (many made jointly with his wife, Judith MacDougall) include The Wedding Camels, Lorang's Way, To Live with Herds, A Wife among Wives, Takeover, Photo Wallahs, and Tempus de Baristas. As a theorist, he articulates central issues in the relation of film to anthropology, and is one of the few documentary filmmakers who writes extensively on these concerns. The essays collected here address, for instance, the difference between films and written texts and between the position of the filmmaker and that of the anthropological writer.

In fact, these works provide an overview of the history of visual anthropology, as well as commentaries on specific subjects, such as point-of-view and subjectivity, reflexivity, the use of subtitles, and the role of the cinema subject. Refreshingly free of jargon, each piece belongs very much to the tradition of the essay in its personal engagement with exploring difficult issues. The author ultimately disputes the view that ethnographic filmmaking is merely a visual form of anthropology, maintaining instead that it is a radical anthropological practice, which challenges many of the basic assumptions of the discipline of anthropology itself. Although influential among filmmakers and critics, some of these essays were published in small journals and have been until now difficult to find. The three longest pieces, including the title essay, are new.

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