Wrestling with the Angel of Democracy

Wrestling with the Angel of Democracy PDF Author: Susan Griffin
Publisher: Shambhala Publications
ISBN: 0834825740
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 409

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Book Description
What does is it mean to be a citizen of the United States? Susan Griffin’s provocative investigation of that question takes us from the Declaration of Independence to the Iraq War, with many stops in between. Her conclusion: democracy is nothing less than a revolution of consciousness, and the revolution has just begun.

Wrestling with the Angel of Democracy

Wrestling with the Angel of Democracy PDF Author: Susan Griffin
Publisher: Shambhala Publications
ISBN: 0834825740
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 409

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Book Description
What does is it mean to be a citizen of the United States? Susan Griffin’s provocative investigation of that question takes us from the Declaration of Independence to the Iraq War, with many stops in between. Her conclusion: democracy is nothing less than a revolution of consciousness, and the revolution has just begun.

Wrestling With His Angel

Wrestling With His Angel PDF Author: Sidney Blumenthal
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1501153781
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 608

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Book Description
Explores how the sixteenth president rebounded from the disintegration of the Whig Party and took on the anti-Immigration party in Illinois to clear a path for a new Republican Party.

A Chorus of Stones

A Chorus of Stones PDF Author: Susan Griffin
Publisher: Open Road Media
ISBN: 1504012216
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 305

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Book Description
A brilliant and provocative exploration of the interconnection of private life and the large-scale horrors of war and devastation. A Pulitzer Prize and National Book Critics Circle Award finalist, and a winner of the Bay Area Book Reviewers Association Award, Susan Griffin’s A Chorus of Stones is an extraordinary reevaluation of history that explores the links between individual lives and catastrophic, world-altering violence. One of the most acclaimed and poetic voices of contemporary American feminism, Griffin delves into the perspective of those whose personal relationships and family histories were profoundly influenced by war and its often secret mechanisms: the bomb-maker and the bombing victim, the soldier and the pacifist, the grand architects who were shaped by personal experience and in turn reshaped the world. Declaring that “each solitary story belongs to a larger story”—and beginning with the brutal and heartbreaking circumstances of her own childhood—Griffin examines how the subtle dynamics of parenthood, childhood, and marriage interweave with the monumental violence of global conflict. She proffers a bold and powerful new understanding of the psychology of war through illuminating glimpses into the personal lives of Ernest Hemingway, Mahatma Gandhi, Heinrich Himmler, British officer Sir Hugh Trenchard, and other historic figures—as well as the munitions workers at Oak Ridge, a survivor of the Hiroshima bombing, and other humbler yet indispensible witnesses to history.

The Book of the Courtesans

The Book of the Courtesans PDF Author: Susan Griffin
Publisher: Crown
ISBN: 0767910826
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 288

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Book Description
From Pulitzer-Prize-nominated author Susan Griffin comes an unprecedented, provocative look at the dazzling world of the West’s first independent women, whose lively liaisons brought them unspoken influence, wealth, and freedom. While they charmed some of Europe’s most illustrious men honing their social skills as well as their sexual ones, the great courtesans gained riches, power, education, and sexual freedom in a time when other women were denied all of these. From Imperia of sixteenth-century Rome, who personified the Renaissance ideal of beauty; Mme. de Pompadour, the arbiter of all things fashionable in eighteenth-century Paris and Versailles; Liane de Pougy, known in France during the Belle Epoque as “Our National Courtesan”; to Sarah Bernhardt, who, following in her mother’s footsteps, supported herself in her early career with a second profession, The Book of the Courtesans tells the life stories and intricacies of the lavish lifestyles of these women. Unlike their geisha counterparts, courtesans neither lived in brothels nor bent their wills to suit their suitors. They were strong- willed, autonomous, and plucky. An open secret, their presence can be felt throughout our culture. The muses who enflamed the hearts and imaginations of our most celebrated artists, they were also artists in their own right. They wrote poetry and novels, invented the cancan at the Moulin Rouge, and presented celebrated acts at the Folies Bergères. They helped to influence and shape the sensibility of modern literature, painting, and fashion. When Greek sculptor Praxiteles wanted to depict Venus he used a famous courtesan as a model, as in later centuries Titian, Veronese, Raphael, Giorgione, and Boucher did when they painted goddesses. When Marcel Proust was a young man it was the courtesan Laure Hayman who took him under her wing, introducing him to the right people, and providing inspiration for one of literature’s greatest masterpieces. And they often had considerable political influence too. When King Louis XV needed advice on foreign affairs or appointments of state he turned to Jeanne du Barry as well as Pompadour. In her witty and insightful prose, as Griffin celebrates these alluring and fascinating women, she restores a lost legacy of women’s history. She gives us the stories of these amazing women who, starting from impoverished or unimpressive beginnings, garnered chateaux, fine coaches, fabulous collections of jewelry, and even aristocratic titles along the way. And through a brilliant exploration of their extraordinary abilities, skills, and talents which Griffin playfully categorizes as their virtues "Timing, Beauty, Cheek, Brilliance, Gaiety, Grace, and Charm" her book explains how, while helping themselves, through their often outrageous, always entertaining examples, the great courtesans not only enriched our cultural heritage but helped to liberate women from the social, sexual, and economic strictures that confined them. Intensively researched and beautifully crafted, The Book of the Courtesans delves into scintillating but often hidden worlds, telling stories gleaned from many sources, including courtesans’ memoirs, presented along with stunning rare photographs to create memorable portraits of some of the most pivotal figures in women’s history.

Wrestling with the Angel

Wrestling with the Angel PDF Author: Tracy McNulty
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 0231537603
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 321

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Book Description
Wrestling with the Angel is a meditation on contemporary political, legal, and social theory from a psychoanalytic perspective. It argues for the enabling function of formal and symbolic constraints in sustaining desire as a source of creativity, innovation, and social change. The book begins by calling for a richer understanding of the psychoanalytic concept of the symbolic and the resources it might offer for an examination of the social link and the political sphere. The symbolic is a crucial dimension of social coexistence but cannot be reduced to the social norms, rules, and practices with which it is so often collapsed. As a dimension of human life that is introduced by language—and thus inescapably "other" with respect to the laws of nature—the symbolic is an undeniable fact of human existence. Yet the same cannot be said of the forms and practices that represent and sustain it. In designating these laws, structures, and practices as "fictions," Jacques Lacan makes clear that the symbolic is a dimension of social life that has to be created and maintained and that can also be displaced, eradicated, or rendered dysfunctional. The symbolic fictions that structure and support the social tie are therefore historicizable, emerging at specific times and in particular contexts and losing their efficacy when circumstances change. They are also fragile and ephemeral, needing to be renewed and reinvented if they are not to become outmoded or ridiculous. Therefore the aim of this study is not to call for a return to traditional symbolic laws but to reflect on the relationship between the symbolic in its most elementary or structural form and the function of constraints and limits. McNulty analyzes examples of "experimental" (as opposed to "normative") articulations of the symbolic and their creative use of formal limits and constraints not as mere prohibitions or rules but as "enabling constraints" that favor the exercise of freedom. The first part examines practices that conceive of subjective freedom as enabled by the struggle with constraints or limits, from the transference that structures the "minimal social link" of psychoanalysis to constrained relationships between two or more people in the context of political and social movements. Examples discussed range from the spiritual practices and social legacies of Moses, Jesus, and Teresa of Avila to the political philosophy of Hannah Arendt and Jacques Rancière. The second part is devoted to legal and political debates surrounding the function of the written law. It isolates the law's function as a symbolic limit or constraint as distinct from its content and representational character. The analysis draws on Mosaic law traditions, the political theology of Paul, and twentieth-century treatments of written law in the work of Carl Schmitt, Walter Benjamin, Sigmund Freud, Pierre Legendre, and Alain Badiou. In conclusion, the study considers the relationship between will and constraint in Kant's aesthetic philosophy and in the experimental literary works of the collective Oulipo.

Wrestling with an Angel

Wrestling with an Angel PDF Author: Ehud Luz
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 0300129297
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 362

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Book Description
By regaining for the Jewish people the capacity to deploy force, Zionism posed moral dilemmas for the Jews that for many generations, living in exile, they had not had to confront. The return to full political life and the use of military force involved a profound revolution in the Jewish identity and aroused deep and painful misgivings. This thought-provoking book examines how the forging of a new moral stance on the use of force has affected Jewish identity in the Land of Israel and throughout the world. Drawing on historiography, philosophy, social commentary, ideological tracts, and belles lettres, Ehud Luz explores the ways that Zionist attitudes toward sovereignty were shaped by their Judaic heritage, in particular the prophetic literature and the halakhic (legal) tradition, which stressed the sanctity of human life and the strict prohibition against the shedding of innocent blood. Luz argues that despite secularization, Jewish tradition continues to influence the political life and national ethos of the Jews, and that the Jewish religious tradition is an important, sometimes even decisive factor in the way that political and cultural issues in Israel are resolved.

Transforming Terror

Transforming Terror PDF Author: Karin Lofthus Carrington
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 0520949455
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 390

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Book Description
This inspired collection offers a new paradigm for moving the world beyond violence as the first, and often only, response to violence. Through essays and poetry, prayers and meditations, Transforming Terror powerfully demonstrates that terrorist violence—defined here as any attack on unarmed civilians—can never be stopped by a return to the thinking that created it. A diverse array of contributors—writers, healers, spiritual and political leaders, scientists, and activists, including Desmond Tutu, Huston Smith, Riane Eisler, Daniel Ellsberg, Amos Oz, Fatema Mernissi, Fritjof Capra, George Lakoff, Mahmoud Darwish, Terry Tempest Williams, and Jack Kornfield—considers how we might transform the conditions that produce terrorist acts and bring true healing to the victims of these acts. Broadly encompassing both the Islamic and Western worlds, the book explores the nature of consciousness and offers a blueprint for change that makes peace possible. From unforgettable firsthand accounts of terrorism, the book draws us into awareness of our ecological and economic interdependence, the need for connectedness, and the innate human capacity for compassion.

Christian Register and Boston Observer...

Christian Register and Boston Observer... PDF Author:
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Unitarianism
Languages : en
Pages : 1446

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Book Description


Reclaiming the Feminist Vision

Reclaiming the Feminist Vision PDF Author: Janet L. Freedman
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 078647212X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 219

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Book Description
It's called consciousness-raising (CR). Asking questions about our experiences and sharing insights and analyses with others can be the basis for informed activism for positive social change. CR provided the entry point for feminists who shaped the women's liberation movement in the late 1960s and 1970s, and is now being revitalized across class, race and geography in face-to-face groups and on the internet. Reclaiming the Feminist Vision traces the origins, principles and impact of consciousness-raising; reveals how the process migrated to other settings, sometimes maintaining the original political intent and sometimes diluting it. The book calls for the renewal of the practice to help feminists regain their voices and their power in shaping social movement history.

Creating Sanctuary

Creating Sanctuary PDF Author: Sandra L Bloom
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1136739521
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 370

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Book Description
Creating Sanctuary is a description of a hospital-based program to treat adults who had been abused as children and the revolutionary knowledge about trauma and adversity that the program was based upon. This book focuses on the biological, psychological, and social aspects of trauma. Fifteen years later, Dr. Sandra Bloom has updated this classic work to include the groundbreaking Adverse Childhood Experiences Study that came out in 1998, information about Epigenetics, and new material about what we know about the brain and violence. This book is for courses in counseling, social work, and clinical psychology on mental health, trauma, and trauma theory.