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Dinosaurs: a Very Short Introduction by David Norman
Category: History | Series: Very Short Introductions Ser.
Dinosaurs are fascinating creatures and their popularity seems never ending, fueled by films such as Jurassic Park and documentaries such as Walking with Dinosaurs. Yet dinosaurs (or more precisely non-avian dinosaurs) last trod the Earth 65 million years ago. All we know of them today are their fossili ...Show more
Fashion (A Very Short Introduction) by Rebecca Arnold
Category: Fashion | Series: Very Short Introductions Ser.
Fashion is a dynamic global industry that plays an important role in the economic, political, cultural, and social lives of an international audience. It spans high art and popular culture, and plays a significant role in material and visual culture. This book introduces fashion's myriad influences and ...Show more
Feminism by Margaret Walters
Category: Reference | Series: Very Short Introductions Ser.
How much have women's lives really changed? In the West women still come up against the 'glass ceiling' at work, most earning considerably less than their male counterparts. What are we to make of the now commonplace insistence that feminism deprives men of their rights and dignities? And how does one t ...Show more
Forests: a Very Short Introduction by Jaboury Ghazoul
Category: History | Series: Very Short Introductions Ser.
Since the dawn of human civilization, forests have provided us with food, resources, and energy. The history of human development is also one of forest loss and transformation, and yet even in our increasingly urbanized societies we remain surprisingly dependent on forests for a wide range ofgoods and s ...Show more
Foucault: A Very Short Introduction by Gary Gutting
Category: Philosophy | Series: Very Short Introductions Ser.
From aesthetics to the penal system, and from madness and civilization to avant-garde literature, Foucault was happy to reject old models of thinking and replace them with fresh versions that are still being debated today. A major influence on Queer Theory and gender studies (he was openly gay and died ...Show more
Free Will by Thomas Pink
Category: Non-Fiction | Series: Very Short Introductions Ser.
Every day we seem to make and act upon all kinds of choices: some trivial, others so consequential that they change the course of one's life, or even the course of history. But are these choices really free, or are we compelled to act the way we do by factors beyond our control? Is the feeling that we c ...Show more
French Revolution: A Very Short Introduction by Doyle, William (Emeritus Professor of History and Senior Research Fellow at the University of Bristol)
Category: No Category | Series: Very Short Introductions Ser.
Beginning with a discussion of familiar images of the French Revolution, garnered from Dickens, Baroness Orczy, and Tolstoy, as well as the legends of let them eat cake, and tricolours, Doyle leads the reader to the realization that we are still living with developments and consequences of the French Re ...Show more
Hollywood (A Very Short Introduction) by Peter Decherney
Category: History | Series: Very Short Introductions Ser.
In this engaging and readable book, Peter Decherney tells the story of Hollywood, from its nineteenth-century origins to the emergence of internet media empires. He recounts how the studio system rose out of the ashes of Thomas Edison's trust to create the handful of companies that havedominated global ...Show more
Lincoln: a Very Short Introduction by Allen C. Guelzo
Category: History | Series: Very Short Introductions Ser.
Beneath the surface of the apparently untutored and deceptively frank Abraham Lincoln ran private tunnels of self-taught study, a restless philosophical curiosity, and a profound grasp of the fundamentals of democracy. Now, in Lincoln: A Very Short Introduction, the award-winning Lincoln authority Allen ...Show more
MACHIAVELLI A VERY SHORT INTRODUCTION by SKINNER QUENTIN
Category: History | Series: Very Short Introductions Ser.
Niccolo Machiavelli taught that political leaders must be prepared to do evil so that good may come of it, and his name has been a byword ever since for duplicity and immorality. Is his sinister reputation deserved? In answering this question Quentin Skinner traces the course of Machiavelli'sadult life, ...Show more
Mathematics: a Very Short Introduction by GOWERS TIMOTHY
Category: Non-Fiction | Series: Very Short Introductions Ser.
The aim of this book is to explain, carefully but not technically, the differences between advanced, research-level mathematics, and the sort of mathematics we learn at school. The most fundamental differences are philosophical, and readers of this book will emerge with a clearer understandingof paradox ...Show more
Metaphysics - A Very Short Introduction by Stephen Mumford
Category: Non-Fiction | Series: Very Short Introductions Ser.
Metaphysics is traditionally one of the four main branches of philosophy, alongside ethics, logic and epistemology. It is an area that continues to attract and fascinate many people, even though it is generally thought to be highly complex and abstract. For some it is associated with the mystical or rel ...Show more