4260 results for "World History"

Who Rules the World?

Noam Chomsky
A New York Times Bestseller With a New Afterword The world’s leading intellectual offers a probing examination of the nature of U.S. policies post-9/11, and the perils of valuing power above democracy and human rights. In an incisive, thorough analysis of the current international situation, Noam Chomsky examines the way that the United States, despite the rise of Europe and Asia, still largely sets the terms of global discourse. Drawing on a wide range of examples, from the sordid history of U.S. involvement with Cuba to the sanctions on Iran, he details how America’s rhetoric of freedom and human rights so often diverges from its actions. He delves deep into the conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Israel-Palestine, providing unexpected and nuanced insights into the workings of imperial power on our increasingly chaotic planet. And, in a new afterword, he addresses the election of Donald Trump and what it shows about American society. Fierce, unsparing, and meticulously documented, Who Rules the World? delivers the indispensable understanding of the central issues of our time that we have come to expect from Chomsky. An American Empire Project
Picador 2017-05-02 336 pages

Before European hegemony: the world system A. D. 1250-1350

Abu-Lughod, Janet L.
In this important study, Abu-Lughod presents a groundbreaking reinterpretation of global economic evolution, arguing that the modern world economy had its roots not in the sixteenth century, as is widely supposed, but in the thirteenth century economy--a system far different from the European world system which emerged from it. Using the city as the working unit of analysis, Before European Hegemony provides a new paradigm for understanding the evolution of world systems by tracing the rise of a system that, at its peak in the opening decades of the 14th century, involved a vast region stretching between northwest Europe and China. Writing in a clear and lively style, Abu-Lughod explores the reasons for the eventual decay of this system and the rise of European hegemony.
Oxford University Press 1989 443 pages

World of Our Fathers

Irving Howe
A new 30th Anniversary paperback edition of an award-winning classic. Winner of the National Book Award, 1976 World of Our Fathers traces the story of Eastern Europe's Jews to America over four decades. Beginning in the 1880s, it offers a rich portrayal of the East European Jewish experience in New York, and shows how the immigrant generation tried to maintain their Yiddish culture while becoming American. It is essential reading for those interested in understanding why these forebears to many of today's American Jews made the decision to leave their homelands, the challenges these new Jewish Americans faced, and how they experienced every aspect of immigrant life in the early part of the twentieth century. This invaluable contribution to Jewish literature and culture is now back in print in a new paperback edition, which includes a new foreword by noted author and literary critic Morris Dickstein.
Galahad Books 1994 714 pages

Survival in Auschwitz

Primo Levi
Survival in Auschwitz: If This Is a Man is a book written by the Italian author, Primo Levi. It describes his arrest as a member of the Italian anti-fascist resistance during the Second World War, and his incarceration in the Auschwitz concentration camp from February 1944 until the camp was liberated on 27 January 1945. Levi, then a 25-year-old chemist, spent 10 months in Auschwitz before the camp was liberated by the Red Army. Of the 650 Italian Jews in his shipment, Levi was one of only twenty who left the camps alive. The average life expectancy of a new entrant was three months. This truly amazing story offers a revealing glimpse into the realities of the Holocaust and its effects on our world.
Must Have Books 2021-02-27 136 pages

Take arms against a sea of troubles: the power of the reader's mind over a universe of death

Bloom, Harold
"The great poems, plays, novels, stories teach us how to go on living. . . . Your own mistakes, accidents, failures at otherness beat you down. Rise up at dawn and read something that matters as soon as you can." So Harold Bloom, the most famous literary critic of his generation, exhorts readers of his last book: one that praises the sustaining power of poetry. "Passionate. . . . Perhaps Bloom's most personal work, this is a fitting last testament to one of America's leading twentieth-century literary minds." -- Publishers Weekly "An extraordinary testimony to a long life spent in the company of poetry and an affecting last declaration of [Bloom's] passionate and deeply unfashionable faith in the capacity of the imagination to make the world feel habitable"--Seamus Perry, Literary Review "Reading, this stirring collection testifies, 'helps in staying alive.'"-- Kirkus Reviews , starred review This dazzling celebration of the power of poetry to sublimate death--completed weeks before Harold Bloom died--shows how literature renews life amid what Milton called "a universe of death." Bloom reads as a way of taking arms against the sea of life's troubles, taking readers on a grand tour of the poetic voices that have haunted him through a lifetime of reading. "High literature," he writes, "is a saving lie against time, loss of individuality, premature death." In passages of breathtaking intimacy, we see him awake late at night, reciting lines from Dante, Shakespeare, Milton, Montaigne, Blake, Wordsworth, Hart Crane, Jay Wright, and many others. He feels himself "edged by nothingness," uncomprehending, but still sustained by reading. Generous and clear‑eyed, this is among Harold Bloom's most ambitious and most moving books.
Yale University Press 2021-10-12 672 pages

Vengeance

George Jonas
In 1972, 11 Israeli athletes were murdered at the Munich Olympics. This is the chilling account of how they were avenged. First published in 1984, George Jonas’s #1 bestseller Vengeance has become a real-life espionage classic. The story of five ordinary young Israelis whose mission it was to hunt down and kill the terrorists responsible for the massacre of eleven athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympics, Vengeance plunges the reader into an explosive world of terrorism and political murder. This is an account of what happened when five idealistic volunteer agents were sent to track down and kill the central figures of the PLO's Munich operation, told from the point of view of "Avner," a member of the team chosen to avenge the monstrous crime, and the first Mossad agent to come out of "deep cover" to tell his story. His description of the mechanics, the horrors and the unrelenting suspense of this mission surpasses the wildest fabrications of today’s blockbuster movies and bestselling crime thrillers. As these men moved from country to country, changing identities and risking their lives, they soon became targets themselves—tracked, hunted and even killed. A profoundly human story, Vengeance explores firsthand the revulsion and doubt that came to torment the Israeli agents, inexorably changing their view of the mission and ultimately how they felt about themselves. It is also a stark examination of the timeless concerns that continue to plague our consciousness today: the nature of good and evil, and the difference between right and wrong.
HarperCollins 2005-11-28 408 pages

Abraham

Bruce Feiler
In this timely, provocative, and uplifting journey, the bestselling author of Walking the Bible searches for the man at the heart of the world's three monotheistic religions -- and today's deadliest conflicts. At a moment when the world is asking, “Can the religions get along?” one figure stands out as the shared ancestor of Jews, Christians, and Muslims. One man holds the key to our deepest fears -- and our possible reconciliation. Abraham. Bruce Feiler set out on a personal quest to better understand our common patriarch. Traveling in war zones, climbing through caves and ancient shrines, and sitting down with the world's leading religious minds, Feiler uncovers fascinating, little-known details of the man who defines faith for half the world. Both immediate and timeless, Abraham is a powerful, universal story, the first-ever interfaith portrait of the man God chose to be his partner. Thoughtful and inspiring, it offers a rare vision of hope that will redefine what we think about our neighbors, our future, and ourselves.
HarperCollins 2002-09-17 288 pages

The Candy Bombers The Untold Story of the Berlin Airlift and America's Finest Hour

Andrei Cherny
"What an exciting, inspiring, and wonderfully-written book this is....Each page has lessons for today, and it is also a thrilling narrative to read." --Walter Isaacson, #1 New York Times Bestselling Author of Steve Jobs The masterfully told story of the unlikely men who came together to make the Berlin Airlift one of the great military and humanitarian successes of American history. On the sixtieth anniversary of the Berlin Airlift, Andrei Cherny tells a remarkable story with profound implications for the world today. In the tradition of the best narrative storytellers, he brings together newly unclassified documents, unpublished letters and diaries, and fresh primary interviews to tell the story of the ill-assorted group of castoffs and second-stringers who not only saved millions of desperate people from a dire threat but changed how the world viewed the United States, and set in motion the chain of events that would ultimately lead to the dismantling of the Berlin Wall and to America's victory in the Cold War. On June 24, 1948, intent on furthering its domination of Europe, the Soviet Union cut off all access to West Berlin, prepared to starve the city into submission unless the Americans abandoned it. Soviet forces hugely outnumbered the Allies', and most of America's top officials considered the situation hopeless. But not all of them. Harry Truman, an accidental president, derided by his own party; Lucius Clay, a frustrated general, denied a combat command and relegated to the home front; Bill Tunner, a logistics expert downsized to a desk job in a corner of the Pentagon; James Forrestal, a secretary of defense beginning to mentally unravel; Hal Halvorsen, a lovesick pilot who had served far from the conflict, flying transport missions in the backwater of a global war--together these unlikely men improvised and stumbled their way into a uniquely American combination of military and moral force unprecedented in its time. This is the forgotten foundation tale of America in the modern world, the story of when Americans learned, for the first time, how to act at the summit of world power--a masterful and exciting work of historical narrative, and one with strong resonance for our time.
Penguin Publishing Group 2009-06 624 pages

The cruelty is the point: why Trump's America endures / Adam Serwer

Serwer, Adam
"To many, our most shocking political crises appear unprecedented--un-American, even. But they are not, writes The Atlantic's Adam Serwer in this prescient essay collection, which dissects the most devastating moments in recent memory to reveal deeply entrenched dynamics, patterns as old as the country itself. The January 6 insurrection, anti-immigrant sentiment, and American authoritarianism all have historic roots that explain their continued power with or without President Donald Trump--a fact borne out by what has happened since his departure from the White House. Serwer argues that Trump is not the cause, he is a symptom. Serwer's phrase "the cruelty is the point" became among the most-used descriptions of Trump's era, but as this book demonstrates, it resonates across centuries. The essays here combine revelatory reporting, searing analysis, and a clarity that's bracing. In this new, expanded version of his bestselling debut, Serwer elegantly dissects white supremacy's profound influence on our political system, looking at the persistence of the Lost Cause, the past and present of police unions, the mythology of migration, and the many faces of anti-Semitism. In so doing, he offers abundant proof that our past is present and demonstrates the devastating costs of continuing to pretend it's not. The Cruelty Is the Point dares us, the reader, to not look away."--
One World 2022-09-20 404 pages

Imperial grunts: the American military on the ground

Kaplan, Robert D.
Veteran correspondent Kaplan shows how American imperialism and the Global War on Terrorism are implemented on the ground, mission by mission, in the most exotic landscapes around the world. Kaplan takes us from the jungles of the southern Philippines to the dust bowls of Mongolia, from the forts of Afghanistan to the forests of South America--not to mention Iraq--to show us Army Special Forces, Marines, and other uniformed Americans carrying out the many facets of U.S. foreign policy: negotiating with tribal factions, storming terrorist redoubts, performing humanitarian missions and training foreign soldiers. Kaplan provides an insider's account of where America, including the culture of its officers and enlisted men, is headed. This book has the potential to change the way readers view the men and women of the military, war, and the global reach of America today.--From publisher description.
Random House 2005 421 pages

Daredevil omnibus. Vol. 3

Conway, Gerry,Gerber, Steve,Friedrich, Gary
Here come Daredevil and the Black Widow - in a historic era that will change both characters' lives forever! When Natasha Romanoff enters Matt Murdock's life, one of the greatest eras in the history of the Man Without Fear begins. This massive Omnibus presents their action-packed adventures together, scripted by Gerry Conway and Steve Gerber and featuring the iconic art of Gene Colan! But the Widow's entrance means a rocky road for Matt Murdock and Karen Page. A relocation to San Francisco will cement Matt's choice and open up a new world of adventure - with villains like Electro, Killgrave the Purple Man and Mr. Fear in tow! There's also a crossover adventure with the Avengers and X-Men, and a fight with Kraven the Hunter that turns cosmic! Enter: Moondragon - who mistakes DD for a thrall of Thanos! Collecting: Daredevil (1964) 75-119, Avengers (1963) 111, Amazing Adventures (1970) 1-8
Marvel Worldwide, Inc 2024-04-09 1160 pages

Purple Hearts

Michael Grant
New York Times bestselling author Michael Grant unleashes the gritty and powerful conclusion to the Front Line series and evokes the brutal truth of World War II: War is hell. An epic tale of historical reimagining, perfect for fans of Code Name Verity and Salt to the Sea. Courage, sacrifice, and fear have lead Rio, Frangie, and Rainy through front-line battles in North Africa and Sicily, and their missions are not over. These soldiers and thousands of Allies must fight their deadliest battle yet—for their country and their lives—as they descend into the freezing water and onto the treacherous sands of Omaha Beach. It is June 6, 1944. D-Day has arrived. No longer naive recruits, these soldier girls are now Silver Star recipients and battle-hardened. Others look to them for guidance and confidence, but this is a war that will leave sixty million dead. Flesh will turn to charcoal. Piles will be made of torn limbs. The women must find a way to lead while holding on to their own last shreds of belief in humanity. Praise for Silver Stars: "Exhaustive research, immersive storytelling, and emotional depth make for a superlative tale.” —Kirkus (starred review) Praise for Front Lines: “A gripping and heart-wrenching tale.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review) “A magnificent alternate history.” —Elizabeth Wein, New York Times bestselling author of Code Name Verity
HarperCollins 2019-01-29 576 pages

Being Heumann An Unrepentant Memoir of a Disability Rights Activist

Judith Heumann,Kristen Joiner
Soon to be an Apple feature movie directed by CODA’ s Sian Heder and starring BAFTA-nominated actress Ruth Madeley as Judy Heumann "This important book will help ensure that every person gets a chance to live up to their full potential and will always have a place at the table.”—Hillary Clinton "Her life story as an activist will enlighten readers everywhere.”—Gloria Steinem "Her fierce advocacy and work changing the laws around disability rights have undeniably paved the way for me to achieve what I have today. . . . A must-read.”—Ali Stroker, Tony Award–winning actress One of the most influential disability rights activists in US history tells her personal story of fighting for the right to receive an education, have a job, and just be human A story of fighting to belong in a world that wasn’t built for all of us and of one woman’s activism—from the streets of Brooklyn and San Francisco to inside the halls of Washington— Being Heumann recounts Judy Heumann’s lifelong battle to achieve respect, acceptance, and inclusion in society. Paralyzed from polio at eighteen months, Judy’s struggle for equality began early in life. From fighting to attend grade school after being described as a “fire hazard” to later winning a lawsuit against the New York City school system for denying her a teacher’s license because of her paralysis, Judy’s actions set a precedent that fundamentally improved rights for disabled people. As a young woman, Judy rolled her wheelchair through the doors of the US Department of Health, Education, and Welfare in San Francisco as a leader of the Section 504 Sit-In, the longest takeover of a governmental building in US history. Working with a community of over 150 disabled activists and allies, Judy successfully pressured the Carter administration to implement protections for disabled peoples’ rights, sparking a national movement and leading to the creation of the Americans with Disabilities Act. Candid, intimate, and irreverent, Judy Heumann’s memoir about resistance to exclusion invites readers to imagine and make real a world in which we all belong.
Beacon Press 2020-02-25 408 pages

The return of Marco Polo's world: war, strategy, and American interests in the twenty-first century

Kaplan, Robert D.
"A bracing assessment of U.S. foreign policy and world disorder over the past two decades, anchored by a major new Pentagon-commissioned essay about changing power dynamics among China, Eurasia, and America--from the renowned geopolitical analyst and bestselling author of The Revenge of Geography and The Coming Anarchy. In the late thirteenth century, Marco Polo began a decades-long trek from Venice to China. The strength of that Silk Road--the trade route between Europe and Asia--was a foundation of Kublai Khan's sprawling empire. Now, in the early twenty-first century, the Chinese regime has proposed a land-and-maritime Silk Road that duplicates exactly the route Marco Polo traveled. In the major lead essay, recently released by the Pentagon's Office of Net Assessment, Robert D. Kaplan lays out a blueprint of the world's changing power politics that recalls the late thirteenth century. As Europe fractures from changes in culture and migration, Eurasia coheres into a single conflict system. China is constructing a land bridge to Europe. Iran and India are trying to link the oil fields of Central Asia to the Indian Ocean. America's ability to influence the power balance in Eurasia is declining. This is Kaplan's first collection of essays since his classic The Coming Anarchy was published in 2000. Drawing on decades of firsthand experience as a foreign correspondent and military embed for The Atlantic, as well as encounters with preeminent realist thinkers, Kaplan outlines the timeless principles that should shape America's role in a turbulent world: a respect for the limits of Western-style democracy; a delineation between American interests and American values; an awareness of the psychological toll of warfare; a projection of power via a strong navy; and more. From Kaplan's immediate thoughts on President Trump ("On Foreign Policy, Donald Trump Is No Realist," 2016) to a frank examination of what will happen in the event of war with North Korea ("When North Korea Falls," 2006), The Return of Marco Polo's World is a vigorous and honest reckoning with the difficult choices the United States will face in the years ahead. "These essays constitute a truly pathbreaking, brilliant synthesis and analysis of geographic, political, technological, and economic trends with far-reaching consequences. The Return of Marco Polo's World is another work by Robert D. Kaplan that will be regarded as a classic."--General David Petraeus (U.S. Army, Ret.)"--
Random House 2018 280 pages

Killing Rommel

Pressfield, Steven
An unputdownable and incredibly evocative military novel full of thrilling battle scenes and flesh and blood characters from Steven Pressfield, author of The Sunday Times Bestseller Gates of Fire. \"A terrific read...this is historical fiction at its very best.\" -- JAMES HOLLAND \"A splendid tour-de-force...it should not be missed\" -- WASHINGTON POST \"Both a captivating history lesson and rousing guts-n-glory saga\" -- ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY \"Compelling...the narrative is a page turner\" -- ***** Reader review \"Mr Pressfield is a true craftsman in the best possible way. You LIVE the story while he is telling it\" -- ***** Reader review \"Simply a brilliant read\" -- ***** Reader review **************************************************** NORTH AFRICA, 1942. AN ELITE BRITISH ARMY UNIT IS ON A DEADLY MISSION. Autumn, 1942 - Hitler's legions have swept across Europe. Soviet Russia reels under the German onslaught while across the channel, Britain struggles on. And in North Africa , Field Marshall Erwin Rommel and his Afrika Korps have routed the 8th Army, threatening the oil fields of the Middle East. The war hangs in the balance... Out of this, the British hatch a desperate plan - to send a small, highly mobile fighting force behind enemy lines to strike a blow that will stop Rommel's army in its tracks. It is to be called the Long Range Desert Group and its exploits will become the stuff of legend. Based on real events, Steven Pressfield's bold novel brings to pulse-racing life the ingenuity and daring of this maverick commando unit - a disparate, dedicated 'band of brothers' who sacrificed so much for the sake of freedom...
Bantam 2009 410 pages

The silenced majority: stories of uprisings, occupations, resistance, and hope

Goodman, Amy
""Amy Goodman has taken investigative journalism to new heights of exciting, informative, and probing analysis."-Noam Chomsky Amy Goodman and Denis Moynihan began writing a weekly column, "Breaking the Sound Barrier," for King Features Syndicate in 2006. This timely new sequel to Goodman's New York Times bestseller of the same name gives voice to the many ordinary people standing up to corporate and government power-and refusing to be silent. The Silenced Majority pulls back the veil of corporate media reporting to dig deep into the politics of "climate apartheid," the implications of the Fukushima nuclear disaster, the movement to halt the execution of Troy Anthony Davis, and the globalization of dissent "From Tahrir Square to Liberty Plaza." Throughout Goodman and Moynihan show the power of ordinary people to change their media-and change the world. Amy Goodman is a multiple New York Times best-selling author and the host and executive producer of Democracy Now! a daily independent news program airing on more than one thousand television and radio stations. Time named Democracy Now! its "Pick of the Podcasts," along with NBC's Meet the Press. Goodman is the first journalist to receive the Right Livelihood Award, widely known as the "Alternative Nobel Prize." Denis Moynihan, since helping co-found Democracy Now! as an independent production company in 2002, has participated in the organization's growth, focusing primarily on distribution, infrastructure development, and coordinating complex live broadcasts from all continents (save Antarctica). He lives in Denver, Colorado. "--
Haymarket Books 2012 345 pages

When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit

Judith Kerr
"Nine-year-old Anna is living in Germany, and the year is 1933. It is one of the country's most troubled eras. But she's too busy with her schoolwork and friends to notice Adolf Hitler's face glaring from political posters plastered all over Berlin. And she's never even paid much attention to the fact that she's Jewish. Being Jewish, she thought, was just something that you inherited from your parents and grandparents, like the color of your hair. One day, she is forced to take notice. Her father is unaccountably, horrifyingly missing. Soon after, she and her brother, Max, are hurried out of Germany by their mother with alarming secrecy that Anna does not fully understand. At last, they are reunited in Switzerland, and Anna and family embark on an adventure that extends over the course of several years, and over the borders of many countries. Along the way, they learn new languages, new customs, how to cope with confusion, and how to be poor. They are refugees, and Anna soon discovers that it requires special skills to stay a few steps ahead of the Nazis. When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit avoids most of the details of the actual Holocaust. Instead it provides young readers with a gentle, yet important introduction to a devastating chapter in world history."--
Scholastic 1998 191 pages

2020: a reckoning

Klinenberg, Eric
The virus had the potential to kill, but the real threat to life came from us. In this global overview of different countries' responses to the pandemic of 2020, we see that the key factors that determined success or failure were not to do with geography, preparedness or vaccines. They were social: how much we trust each other and our government; whether we value the collective or the individual; whose lives matter to us and who we're willing to leave in harm's way. Through a deeply reported, character-driven account of seven lives - including a school principal, a bar manager, a transport worker and a political aide - in the global epicentre of the pandemic, New York, we see how different communities and sectors of society were affected by the decisions taken by governments and politicians. We see why some heeded the call for mask-wearing and social distancing while others rejected it, and how crucial factors such as race and age determined fates. Surrounding them is the panoramic overview: Klinenberg shows how leaders in London and Washington made the crisis so much more lethal than was necessary, while scientists, citizens and policy makers in Australia, Japan and Taiwan worked together to save lives, and how countries as various as South Korea, Germany and Brazil took their own particular paths. This book is both mirror and roadmap: a reflection of who we are at this crucial moment in world history, and a set of principles for how we might approach the next catastrophe differently.
The Bodley Head 2024-03-07 444 pages