14302 results for "History"

I Dissent Great Opposing Opinions in Landmark Supreme Court Cases

Carmack Waterhouse Professor of Constitutional Law Mark Tushnet,Mark Tushnet
This is the Large Print Edition of I Dissent in paperback. From Dred Scott to Lawrence v. Texas and more, the most famous Supreme Court dissents, collected in one volume for the first time. For the first time, a collection of dissents from the most famous Supreme Court cases. If American history can truly be traced through the majority decisions in landmark Supreme Court cases, then what about the dissenting opinions? In issues of race, gender, privacy, workers' rights, and more, would advances have been impeded or failures rectified if the dissenting opinions were in fact the majority opinions? In offering thirteen famous dissents-from Marbury v. Madison and Brown v. Board of Education to Griswold v. Connecticut and Lawrence v. Texas, each edited with the judges' eloquence preserved-renowned Supreme Court scholar Mark Tushnet reminds us that court decisions are not pronouncements issued by the utterly objective, they are in fact political statements from highly intelligent but partisan people. Tushnet introduces readers to the very concept of dissent in the courts and then provides useful context for each case, filling in gaps in the Court's history and providing an overview of the issues at stake. After each case, he considers the impact the dissenting opinion would have had, if it had been the majority decision. Lively and accessible, I Dissent offers a radically fresh view of the judiciary in a collection that is essential reading for anyone interested in American history.
Beacon Press 2008-06 344 pages

Too Close to Call The Thirty-Six-Day Battle to Decide the 2000 Election

Jeffrey Toobin
From the best-selling author of A Vast Conspiracy and The Run of His Life comes Too Close to Call --the definitive story of the Bush-Gore presidential recount. A political and legal analyst of unparalleled journalistic skill, Jeffrey Toobin is the ideal writer to distill the events of the thirty-six anxiety-filled days that culminated in one of the most stunning Supreme Court decisions in history. Packed with news-making disclosures and written with the drive of a legal thriller, Too Close to Call takes us inside James Baker's private jet, through the locked gates to Al Gore's mansion, behind the covered-up windows of Katherine Harris's office, and even into the secret conference room of the United States Supreme Court. As the scene shifts from Washington to Austin and into the remote corners of the enduringly strange Sunshine State, Toobin's book will transform what you thought you knew about the most extraordinary political drama in American history. The Florida recount unfolded in a kaleidoscopic maze of bizarre concepts (chads, pregnant and otherwise), unfamiliar people in critically important positions (the Florida Supreme Court), and familiar people in surprising new places (the Miami relatives of Elián González, in a previously undisclosed role in this melodrama). With the rich characterization that is his trademark, Toobin portrays the prominent strategists who masterminded the campaigns--the Daleys and the Roves--and also the lesser-known but influential players who pulled the strings, as well as the judges and justices whose decisions determined the final outcome. Toobin gives both camps a treatment they have not yet received--remarkably evenhanded, nonpartisan, and entirely new. The post-election period posed a challenge to even the most zealous news junkie: how to keep up with what was happening and sort out the important from the trivial. Jeffrey Toobin has now done this--and then some. With clarity, insight, humor, and a deep understanding of the law, he deconstructs the events, the players, and the often Byzantine intricacies of our judicial system. A remarkable account of one of the most significant periods in our country's history, Too Close to Call is endlessly surprising, frequently poignant, and wholly addictive.
Random House Publishing Group 2002-10-08 320 pages

James Rhodes' playlist: the rebels and revolutionaries of sound

Rhodes, James
A visually stunning introduction to classical music from piano maestro and bestselling author James Rhodes. " Rhodes makes classical music accessible, relatable, and exciting . It is hard not to be swept up - Rhodes writes with such enthusiasm and thoughtfulness that readers will be dying to listen to the Spotify playlist he shares ... Rhodes makes history and music come alive. Surreal, psychedelic collages ... make the book an eye-popping visual experience as well. A dynamic and infectious introduction to classical music. " - Kirkus Bach. Mozart. Beethoven. Old guys with curly wigs, right? But trust me: those composers were the original rock stars. Let me introduce you to some of the most breathtaking and magnificent pieces of music ever created. We'll meet the rebels and revolutionaries who wrote them - did you know Beethoven peed into a chamber pot he kept under his piano? - and find out why they're responsible for every track on your phone today. The world of classical music is going to blow your mind. So take some time out to listen to the online playlist I've curated for you as you read. Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, Schubert, Rachmaninoff and Ravel: the perfect introduction to classical music. With jaw-dropping artwork and avant-garde design, this visually exquisite celebration of classical music is encased in a stunning slipcase and features a large fold-out poster as well as an accompanying online playlist of the pieces being discussed. It's the perfect gift for older children and adults alike who want to explore classical music, but aren't quite sure where to begin.
Wren & Rook 2019-10-03 72 pages

Specters of Marx - The State of the Debt, the Work of Mourning and the New International

Jacques Derrida
Published shortly after the fall of Communism in Eastern Europe and the dissolution of the Soviet regime, Specters of Marx is one of Derrida's most interesting and prophetic books. Whilst many in the West heralded the triumph of liberal democracy and "the end of history", Derrida takes several steps back to argue that whilst Communism may have disappeared in much of the world, the questions posed by Marx continue to haunt us. In his customary provocative style, he asks some uncomfortable questions: after the fall of Communism, can we preserve Marx's legacy of radicalism? How do we continue his philosophy of responsibility? Uncannily anticipating many of the challenges facing us today, Derrida argues that the capitalist system is plagued by a multitude of ills, including aggression, trade wars, debt, the exploitation of migrant labour and ethnic conflict. This Routledge Classics edition is a translation of the revised French edition and includes a debate between Derrida and Étienne Balibar on Marx and Marxism, published here in English for the first time. It also includes new corrections and additions to the text and footnotes made by Derrida after the book's initial publication in French. Translated by Peggy Kamuf and with a new Foreword by Peter Salmon, this Routledge Classics edition retains the original Editors' Introduction by Bernd Magnus and Stephen Cullenberg.
Routledge, Chapman & Hall, Incorporated 2026-02-16 320 pages

Skin shows: gothic horror and the technology of monsters

Halberstam, Jack
In this examination of the monster as cultural object, Judith Halberstam offers a rereading of the monstrous that revises our view of the Gothic. Moving from the nineteenth century and the works of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, Robert Louis Stevenson's Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, Bram Stoker's Dracula, and Oscar Wilde's the Picture of Dorian Gray to contemporary horror film exemplified by such movies as Silence of the Lambs, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and Candyman. Skin Shows understands the Gothic as a versatile technology, a means of producing monsters that is constantly being rewritten by historically and culturally conditioned fears generated by a shared sense of otherness and difference. Deploying feminist and queer approaches to the monstrous body, Halberstam views the Gothic as a broad-based cultural phenomenon that supports and sustains the economic, social, and sexual hierarchies of the time. She resists familiar psychoanalytic critiques and cautions against any interpretive attempt to reduce the affective power of the monstrous to a single factor. The nineteenth-century monster is shown, for example, as configuring otherness as an amalgam of race, class, gender, and sexuality. Invoking Foucault, Halberstam describes the history of monsters in terms of its shifting relation to the body and its representations. As a result, her readings of familiar texts are radically new. She locates psychoanalysis itself within the gothic tradition and sees sexuality as a beast created in nineteenth century literature. Excessive interpretability, Halberstam argues, whether in film, literature, or in the culture at large, is the actual hallmark of monstrosity.
Duke University Press 1995 215 pages

The Principle of Relativity

Albert Einstein,H. (Hermann) Minkowski,P. C. (Prasanta Chandra) Mahalanobis
Explore the groundbreaking theories that redefined our understanding of the universe in "The Principle of Relativity," featuring seminal works by Albert Einstein and Hermann Minkowski. This essential collection delves into the revolutionary concepts of relativity, space-time, and their profound impact on the world of physics. A cornerstone of scientific thought, this volume presents Einstein's original papers alongside Minkowski's pivotal contributions, providing direct access to the genesis of these paradigm-shifting ideas. Journey through the essays that laid the foundation for modern physics and continue to inspire scientists and thinkers today. "The Principle of Relativity" offers a unique glimpse into the history of science, showcasing the intellectual journey that reshaped our comprehension of gravity, motion, and the very fabric of reality. A timeless resource for anyone interested in the profound implications of relativity and its enduring legacy. This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.
Creative Media Partners, LLC 2025-03-29 236 pages

Jerusalem besieged: from ancient Canaan to modern Israel

Cline, Eric H.
" Jerusalem Besieged is a fascinating account of how and why a baffling array of peoples, ideologies, and religions have fought for some four thousand years over a city without either great wealth, size, or strategic importance. Cline guides us through the baffling, but always bloody, array of Jewish, Roman, Moslem, Crusader, Ottoman, Western, Arab, and Israeli fights for possession of such a symbolic prize in a manner that is both scholarly and engaging." -Victor Davis Hanson, Stanford University; author of The Other Greeks and Carnage and Culture "A beautifully lucid presentation of four thousand years of history in a single volume. Cline writes primarily as an archaeologist-avoiding polemic and offering evidence for any religious claims-yet he has also incorporated much journalistic material into this study. Jerusalem Besieged will enlighten anyone interested in the history of military conflict in and around Jerusalem." -Col. Rose Mary Sheldon, Virginia Military Institute "This groundbreaking study offers a fascinating synthesis of Jerusalem's military history from its first occupation into the modern era. Cline amply deploys primary source material to investigate assaults on Jerusalem of every sort, starting at the dawn of recorded history. Jerusalem Besieged is invaluable for framing the contemporary situation in the Middle East in the context of a very long and pertinent history." -Baruch Halpern, Pennsylvania State University A sweeping history of four thousand years of struggle for control of one city "[An] absorbing account of archaeological history, from the ancient Israelites' first conquest to today's second intifada. Cline clearly lays out the fascinating history behind the conflicts." -USA Today "A pleasure to read, this work makes this important but complicated subject fascinating." -Jewish Book World "Jerusalem Besieged is a fascinating account of how and why a baffling array of peoples, ideologies, and religions have fought for some four thousand years over a city without either great wealth, size, or strategic importance. Cline guides us through the baffling, but always bloody, array of Jewish, Roman, Moslem, Crusader, Ottoman, Western, Arab, and Israeli fights for possession of such a symbolic prize in a manner that is both scholarly and engaging." -Victor Davis Hanson, Stanford University; author of The Other Greeks and Carnage and Culture
University of Michigan Press 2004 410 pages

While America sleeps: self-delusion, military weakness, and the threat to peace today

Kagan, Donald
In While England Slept Winston Churchill revealed in 1938 how the inadequacy of Britain's military forces to cope with worldwide responsibilities in a peaceful but tense era crippled its ability to deter or even adequately prepare for World War II. In While America Sleeps , historians Donald and Frederick W. Kagan retrace Britain's international and defense policies during the years after World War I leading up to World War II, showing how self-delusion and an unwillingness to face the inescapable responsibilities on which their security and the peace of the world depended cost the British dearly. The Kagans then turn their attention to America and argue that our nation finds itself in a position similar to that of Britain in the 1920s. For all its emergency interventions the U.S. has not yet accepted its unique responsibility to take the lead in preserving the peace. Years of military cutbacks—the "peace dividend" following the buildup and triumph over Communism of the Reagan years—have weakened our armed forces and left us with too few armed forces to cover too many possible threats. This has caused us to bank everything on high tech "smart" weapons—some of which have not yet been invented and others that we are not acquiring or deploying—as opposed to the long-term commitment of money, fighting men and women, and planning that the deterrence of a major war would require. This failure to shape a policy and to commit the resources needed to maintain peace has cost valuable time in shaping a peaceful world and has placed America's long-term security in danger. The policies of the Bush and Clinton administrations have left us in a position where we cannot avoid war and keep the peace in areas vital to our security. Neither have the post-Cold War policies sent clear signals to would-be aggressors that the U.S. can and will resist them. Tensions in the Middle East, instability in eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union, the nuclear confrontation between India and Pakistan, the development of nuclear weapons and missile by North Korea, and the menacing threats and actions of China, with its immense population, resentful sense of grievance and years of military buildup, all hint that the current peaceful era will not last forever. Can we make it last as long as possible? Are we prepared to face its collapse? While America Sleeps is a sobering work of history that poses a thoughtful challenge to policy-makers.
St. Martin's Press 2000 483 pages

Voyagers to the West: a passage in the peopling of America on the Eve of the Revolution

Bailyn, Bernard,DeWolfe, Barbara Anne
Winner of the Pulitzer Prize and the Saloutos Prize of the Immigration History Society Bailyn's Pulitzer Prize-winning book uses an emigration roster that lists every person officially known to have left Britain for America from December 1773 to March 1776 to reconstruct the lives and motives of those who emigrated to the New World. " Voyagers to the West is a superb book. . . . It should be equally admired by and equally attractive to the general reader as to the professional historian."—R.C. Simmons, Journal of American Studies
Vintage Books, a division of Random House 1988-04-12 668 pages

Semantic mechanisms of humor

Raskin, Victor
GOAL This is the funniest book I have ever written - and the ambiguity here is deliberate. Much of this book is about deliberate ambiguity, described as unambiguously as possible, so the previous sentence is probably the fIrst, last, and only deliberately ambiguous sentence in the book. Deliberate ambiguity will be shown to underlie much, if not all, of verbal humor. Some of its forms are simple enough to be perceived as deliberately ambiguous on the surface; in others, the ambiguity results from a deep semantic analysis. Deep semantic analysis is the core of this approach to humor. The book is the fIrst ever application of modem linguistic theory to the study of humor and it puts forward a formal semantic theory of verbal humor. The goal of the theory is to formulate the necessary and sufficient conditions, in purely semantic terms, for a text to be funny. In other words, if a formal semantic analysis of a text yields a certain set of semantic proptrties which the text possesses, then the text is recognized as a joke. As any modem linguistic theory, this semantic theory of humor attempts to match a natural intuitive ability which the native speaker has, in this particular case, the ability to perceive a text as funny, i. e. , to distinguish a joke from a non-joke.
D. Reidel Pub. Co 1985 284 pages

Silences

Olsen, Tillie
First, published in 1978, Tulle Olsen's 'Silences' revolutionised literary studies and inspired an explosion of new creative voices. By exploring the social and economic conditions that make creativity possible, Olsen sheds new light into the gaps in the literary landscape and the canon. She reveals that working-class people, people of colour, and all women have in fact always written -- though their work has been officially ignored -- and she examines the forces they struggled against in order to create, forces that led in many cases to premature silence. With fascinating testimony from authors' diaries and letters, Olsen takes us inside the artistic process, examining the effects of poverty, family duties (especially motherhood), political and religious censorship, and rigid literary norms on writers ranging from Thomas Hardy and Herman Melville to Willa Cather, Virginia Woolf, and Sylvia Plath. For those disadvantaged by gender, class, or race, these obstacles loom even larger.In particular, Olsen makes the case that women writers have faced crushing odds, their talents underestimated, their achievements ignored, the themes of their writing scorned, their very attempt to write condemned as a breach of family duty -- and of feminine nature. And yet, as she shows, they have written. This special 25th anniversary edition includes an introduction tracing the impact of Silences on women's studies, women's writing, and women's publishing. It also provides a key document of Olsen's work: the famous reading lists that she assembled from her years of research in public libraries.
Feminist Press at the City University of New York 2003 320 pages

Dangerous Offenders The Elusive Target of Justice

Hauser Professor of Nonprofit Organizations Mark H Moore,Mark H. Moore,Susan R. Estrich,Robert Kingsley Professor of Law and Political Science Susan R Estrich,Daniel McGillis,William Spelman
Americans rank crime among the most urgent of social concerns. Overflowing prisons and public outcry have led many to propose that the criminal justice system could control crime more effectively by focusing on dangerous offenders. Recent social studies have suggested that serious criminality is highly concentrated and that high-rate offenders can be distinguished from others on the basis of prior criminal conduct, drug abuse, and employment record. Such studies urge judges to shift from rehabilitative sentencing to selective incapacitation, with longer prison sentences for convicted criminals who are deemed unusually dangerous. In response to these recommendations, some prosecutors' offices have established career criminal units designed to assure that repeat offenders will be prosecuted to the full measure of the law. Some police departments are experimenting with "perpetrator-oriented patrols" targeted on suspected high-rate offenders. The authors of this major book in criminal jurisprudence describe and analyze the intellectual and social challenge posed to public officials by this new thrust in criminal justice policy. They develop a framework for evaluating policies that focus on dangerous offenders. They first examine the general issues that arise as society considers the benefits and risks of concentrating on a particular category of criminals. They then outline how that approach might work at each stage of the criminal justice system--sentencing, pretrial detention, prosecution, and investigation. This cogently argued book provides much needed guidance on the crucial questions of whether sharpened attention to dangerous offenders is just, whether such a policy can be effective in managing the problem of crime, which applications seem particularly valuable, what the long-term risks to social institutions are, and what uncertainties must be monitored and resolved as the policy evolves.
Harvard University Press 2013-10 258 pages

The richness of life: the essential Stephen Jay Gould

Gould, Stephen Jay
"Nature is so wondrously complex and varied that almost anything possible does happen....I rejoice in its] multifariousness and leave the chimera of certainty to politicians and preachers." --from Ever Since Darwin Upon his death in 2002, Stephen Jay Gould stood at the pinnacle among observers of the natural world, recognized by Congress as a "living legend." His prodigious legacy--sixteen best-selling and prize-winning books, dozens of scientific papers, an unbroken series of three hundred essays in Natural History --combined to make Gould the most widely read science writer of our time. This indispensable collection of forty-eight pieces from his brilliant oeuvre includes selections from classics such as Ever Since Darwin and The Mismeasure of Man , plus articles and speeches never before published in book form. This volume, the last that will bear his name, spotlights his elegance, depth, and sheer pleasure in our world--a true celebration of an extraordinary mind.
W.W. Norton 2007 654 pages

Stella Adler on America's master playwrights: Eugene O'Neill, Thornton Wilder, Clifford Odets, William Saroyan, Tennessee Williams, William Inge, Arthur Miller, Edward Albee

Adler, Stella
Stella Adler was one of the most influential acting teachers of all time, a legendary force of nature whose generations of students include Marlon Brando, Karl Malden, Anthony Quinn, Diana Ross, Robert De Niro, Warren Beatty, Annette Benning, and Mark Ruffalo. This long-awaited companion to her book on the master European playwrights brings to life America’s most revered playwrights, whom she knew, loved, and worked with. Brilliantly edited by Barry Paris, Adler’s lectures on the giants of twentieth-century theater feature her indispensable insights into such classic plays as “Long Day’s Journey into Night,” “The Skin of Our Teeth,” “A Streetcar Named Desire,” “Come Back, Little Sheba,” “The Glass Menagerie,” and “Death of a Salesman,” while shedding new light on such lesser known gems as Tennessee Williams’s “The Lady of Larkspur Lotion” and Arthur Miller’s “After the Fall.” Illuminating, revelatory, inspiring—this is Stella Adler at her electrifying best.
Vintage Books 2013-09-10 400 pages

No joke: making Jewish humor

Wisse, Ruth R.
Humor is the most celebrated of all Jewish responses to modernity. In this book, Ruth Wisse evokes and applauds the genius of spontaneous Jewish joking--as well as the brilliance of comic masterworks by writers like Heinrich Heine, Sholem Aleichem, Isaac Babel, S. Y. Agnon, Isaac Bashevis Singer, and Philip Roth. At the same time, Wisse draws attention to the precarious conditions that call Jewish humor into being--and the price it may exact from its practitioners and audience. Wisse broadly traces modern Jewish humor around the world, teasing out its implications as she explores memorable and telling examples from German, Yiddish, English, Russian, and Hebrew
Princeton University Press 2013-06-02 279 pages

The jungle grows back: America and our imperiled world

Kagan, Robert
"A brilliant and visionary argument for America's role as the defender of peace and order throughout the world--and what is likely to happen if we abandon our long-term commitments. Recent years have brought deeply disturbing developments around the globe. American sentiment seems to be leaning increasingly toward going it alone or withdrawing in the face of such disarray. In this powerful, urgent essay, Robert Kagan elucidates the reasons that American withdrawal or a selfish unilateralism would be the worst possible response, based on a fundamental and dangerous misreading of the world. Like a jungle that keeps growing back after being cut down, the world has always been full of dangerous actors who, left unchecked, possess the desire and ability to make things worse. Kagan makes clear how the "realist" impulse to recognize our limitations and focus on our failures misunderstands the essential role America has played for decades in keeping the world's worst instability in check. A true realism, he argues, means understanding that the historical norm has always been toward chaos--that the jungle will grow back, if we let it"--
Alfred A. Knopf 2018 179 pages