Passions for Birds

Passions for Birds PDF Author: Sean Nixon
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
ISBN: 0228010470
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 200

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Book Description
Whether as sources of joy and pleasure to be fed, counted, and watched, as objects of sport to be hunted and killed, or as food to be harvested, wild birds evoke strong feelings. Sean Nixon traces the transformation of these human passions for wild birds from the early twentieth century through the 1970s, detailing humans’ close encounters with wild birds in Britain and the wider North Atlantic world. Drawing on a rich range of written sources, Passions for Birds reveals how emotional, subjective, and material attachments to wild birds were forged through a period of pronounced social and cultural change. Nixon demonstrates how, for all their differences, new traditions in birdwatching and conservation, field sports, and bird harvesting mobilized remarkably similar feelings towards birds. Striking similarities also emerged in the material forms that each of these practices used to bring birds closer to people – hides and traps, nets and ropes, and binoculars. Wide ranging in scope, Passions for Birds sheds new light on the ways in which wild birds helped shape humans throughout the twentieth century, as well as how birds themselves became burdened with multiple cultural meanings and social anxieties over time.

A Passion for Birds

A Passion for Birds PDF Author: Mark V. Barrow, Jr.
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691234655
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 339

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Book Description
In the decades following the Civil War--as industrialization, urbanization, and economic expansion increasingly reshaped the landscape--many Americans began seeking adventure and aesthetic gratification through avian pursuits. By the turn of the century, hundreds of thousands of middle-and upper-class devotees were rushing to join Audubon societies, purchase field guides, and keep records of the species they encountered in the wild. Mark Barrow vividly reconstructs this story not only through the experiences of birdwatchers, collectors, conservationists, and taxidermists, but also through those of a relatively new breed of bird enthusiast: the technically oriented ornithologist. In exploring how ornithologists struggled to forge a discipline and profession amidst an explosion of popular interest in natural history, A Passion for Birds provides the first book-length history of American ornithology from the death of John James Audubon to the Second World War. Barrow shows how efforts to form a scientific community distinct from popular birders met with only partial success. The founding of the American Ornithologists' Union in 1883 and the subsequent expansion of formal educational and employment opportunities in ornithology marked important milestones in this campaign. Yet by the middle of the twentieth century, when ornithology had finally achieved the status of a modern profession, its practitioners remained dependent on the services of birdwatchers and other amateur enthusiasts. Environmental issues also loom large in Barrow's account as he traces areas of both cooperation and conflict between ornithologists and wildlife conservationists. Recounting a colorful story based on the interactions among a wide variety of bird-lovers, this book will interest historians of science, environmental historians, ornithologists, birdwatchers, and anyone curious about the historical roots of today's birding boom.

The Birding Life

The Birding Life PDF Author: Larry Sheehan
Publisher: Clarkson Potter
ISBN: 030771635X
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 242

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Book Description
A book with 200 full-color photos and a series of anecdotes shows how bird enthusiasts showcase their love of birds in and around their homes. By the author of Living With Dogs.

Passions for Birds

Passions for Birds PDF Author: Sean Nixon
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
ISBN: 0228010470
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 200

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Book Description
Whether as sources of joy and pleasure to be fed, counted, and watched, as objects of sport to be hunted and killed, or as food to be harvested, wild birds evoke strong feelings. Sean Nixon traces the transformation of these human passions for wild birds from the early twentieth century through the 1970s, detailing humans’ close encounters with wild birds in Britain and the wider North Atlantic world. Drawing on a rich range of written sources, Passions for Birds reveals how emotional, subjective, and material attachments to wild birds were forged through a period of pronounced social and cultural change. Nixon demonstrates how, for all their differences, new traditions in birdwatching and conservation, field sports, and bird harvesting mobilized remarkably similar feelings towards birds. Striking similarities also emerged in the material forms that each of these practices used to bring birds closer to people – hides and traps, nets and ropes, and binoculars. Wide ranging in scope, Passions for Birds sheds new light on the ways in which wild birds helped shape humans throughout the twentieth century, as well as how birds themselves became burdened with multiple cultural meanings and social anxieties over time.

Birdmania

Birdmania PDF Author: Bernd Brunner
Publisher: Greystone Books Ltd
ISBN: 1771642785
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 295

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Book Description
"An exquisitely beautiful book ...These stories about birds are ultimately reflections on the curious nature of humanity itself" — Helen Macdonald, author of H Is for Hawk There is no denying that many people are crazy for birds. Packed with intriguing facts and exquisite and rare artwork, Birdmania showcases an eclectic and fascinating selection of bird devotees who would do anything for their feathered friends. In addition to well-known enthusiasts such as Aristotle, Charles Darwin, and Helen Macdonald, Brunner introduces readers to Karl Russ, the pioneer of "bird rooms", who had difficulty renting lodgings when landlords realized who he was; George Lupton, a wealthy Yorkshire lawyer, who commissioned the theft of uniquely patterned eggs every year for twenty years from the same unfortunate female guillemot who never had a chance to raise a chick; George Archibald, who performed mating dances for an endangered whooping crane called Tex to encourage her to lay; and Mervyn Shorthouse, who posed as a wheelchair-bound invalid to steal an estimated ten thousand eggs from the Natural History Museum in Tring. As this book illustrates, people who love birds, whether they are amateurs or professionals, are as captivating and varied as the birds that give flight to their dreams.

Life List

Life List PDF Author: Olivia Gentile
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
ISBN: 160819146X
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 352

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Book Description
After her four kids were nearly grown and she was about to turn 50, Phoebe Snetsinger was told she had less than a year to live. Snetsinger, a St. Louis housewife and avid backyard birder, decided to spend that year traveling the world in search of birds. As it turned out, her doctors were wrong, but Phoebe's passion had been ignited and she spent the next eighteen years crisscrossing the globe recklessly staking out her quarry. En route she contracted malaria in Zambia, nearly fell to her death in Zaire, and was kidnapped and gang raped on the outskirts of Port Moresby. Yet none of this curbed her enthusiasm. By the time she died in a bus accident while birding in Madagascar in 1999, Phoebe was world renowned and had seen more species-8,500 of the roughly 10,000-than anyone in history. A fascinating portrait of a hobbiest whose obsession contributed to both her success and her demise, Life List brings Phoebe Snetsinger and the wild world of amatuer ornithology to vivid life.

A Passion for Birds

A Passion for Birds PDF Author: Kiem Sian Ong
Publisher: Draco Publishing
ISBN: 9789810592318
Category : Birds
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
For more than a decade, Ong Kiem Sian has produced the most stunning images of birds of the region. Collected here are her most valuable and spectacular images.

Luminous Ecstasies and Passions

Luminous Ecstasies and Passions PDF Author: Love Ministries, Inc.
Publisher: Xlibris Corporation
ISBN: 1469112949
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 426

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Book Description
Richard Shining Thunder Francis was born March 1, 1952. When he was four, his family converted to the Jehovah's Witness cult, and he now describes this as "the most important and educational event in my life." He says, "Being a Witness until I was in my early twenties taught me many crucial core-lessons about religion and psychology. It is helpful to observe people operating erroneously, in order more directly to clarify, by contrast, a better way of life." When he was about twenty, Francis experienced a series of rapid, dynamic, radical shifts into an entirely new area of consciousness. In this state, he felt suffused by a Love so bottomless, so tranquil, so compassionate, and so omnipresent that it changed his life forever. After this illumination, he came to reject the image of God as jealous, violent, psychotic, or angry. He turned away from the ancient vision of God as a tribal war-god, who "belonged" only to his "chosen people". Francis rejected the idea of "Armageddon"-- the belief that God, very soon, is going to massacre the entire human race, except those who have joined the cult. "No more anti-human doctrine can be imagined. Jehovah will make Hitler's concentration-camps look like Sunday picnics in the park," notes Francis. He came to believe, by contrast, that God was Love itself, and that Love was God. Out of love and compassion for others, he wrote down his experiences and thoughts in a book, Jehovah Lives in Brooklyn: Jehovah's Witnesses as a Model of Fundamentalism. His wish: that his book can help others avoid the "black hole" of falling into a mind-controlling minority-religion, where they will waste much time and energy, and lose other valuable and precious components of their lives. "Joining such a group is dangerous to your mind," says Francis. "In the longer term, it can destroy your most prized friendships, and tear apart even your family. I've seen it happen over and over again." Francis does not hate Jehovah's Witnesses, nor does he take a common route of trying to beat them to death with the Bible. He is unconcerned with "disproving" their technical dogmas, and "proving" alternatives. Instead, he takes an overall psychosocial view of the cult, analyzing how behavioral and psychological changes transform one from a functional, independent man or woman into a servant to an international publishing empire-- all in the name of God. Jehovah's Witnesses distribute many books and magazines recycling their dogma and propaganda as part of their "worship." He reveals many "secrets" known only to members. For example, he notes that the Witnesses are so zealous in their sales-work because they really believe that God will kill them and their families if they do not sell the books and magazines written and published by the JW Organization. This is only one example of stunning revelations. He also describes how Jehovah's Witness converts come to believe in a world similar to that of the Middle Ages, where psychological and other problems are literally believed to be caused by "evil spirits." He discusses the place of such rabid superstitions among the Witnesses, and details his own liberation from such radical misperceptions. Unlike other authors, Francis has no "alternative religion" to which he wishes desperately to "convert" his readers. Francis himself "belongs" to no organized religion. He says, "The alternative to the cult-psychology of these groups is not found in the 'frying pan into the fire' strategy of joining another cult or restrictive religion. The alternative that really works is freedom. This is simple: It is just learning to live a good life, a life of compassion, service, friendship, and good works. It is the real and regular practice of Love that can liberate people. It is spirituality. Spirituality is what you do on the inside, while religion is merely what you do on the outside." Spirituality, Francis believes, is not just the memorization of texts, Scriptures, doctrines, or dogmas. "Spirituality is Love in action," Francis says. "Spirituality is service to the needy, kindness extended to others. It is also genuine friendship, a rare and precious component of life. This is not found among the Witnesses, for they will recognize as "friend" only those who closely and meticulously conform to the rules of the Organization." They have taken this idea so far that they now regard "independent thinking" as "dangerous," and possibly even sinful. "The Way of Love," says Francis, "does not follow the ideas of legalism-- that if you only obey mechanical laws, and embrace certain intellectual ideas, you will somehow 'automatically' find salvation. Salvation is actually quite a bit simpler than all that. The Way of Love states that the real value of any person's life is found in the quantity and quality of the Love which she has expressed." The idea that you can create or earn Love contradicts that it is a free gift, given willingly by a loving God. We are saved, not because of what we do, or who we are, but because God has chosen to save us, to love us unconditionally. So, Love is also salvation. Finding Love is finding grace, a condition of stainless and pristine being. By contrast, Francis points out, "The Witnesses feel that they must 'wrest salvation from the hands of a miserly and unwilling god'. Their god tolerates people, but does not actively love them. He does not rejoice in their presence. His royal dignity prohibits that. That is one of the sad consequences of viewing your god as a literal 'king' rather than choosing to embrace God as intimate friend." ******** Leaving a restrictive and controlling religion is never easy. Francis now works as an "exit counselor," which means that it is one of his specialties to aid people to recover from the cult-experience, which always leaves deep, but not necessarily harmful, scars. "The healing begins by a shift in perspective," he says. "Instead of seeing yourself as having lost friends and social stability, try to see the larger and more realistic perspective: You have actually rejoined the human race. You have gained countless potential friends, and no longer have to interrogate yourself--or them-- to determine whether or not they are 'acceptable.' Instead, for the first time, you have a joyful opportunity to open wide your heart, and arms, and to embrace ordinary people-- yes, including people even of other faiths." To the average person, this is quite ordinary. But to the ex-Jehovah's Witness, making a friend from an ordinary neighbor is an astonishing, mind-rocking feat. For JW internal society is meticulously structured to be totally isolated and insulated from all non-JW contacts, as it is taught that contact with ordinary people will "contaminate," corrupt, or spoil the believer's "purity." Actually, too much contact with normal people inevitably results in the Witness' exit from the Organization, as it results in a "normalization" process. The leaders seem terrified of "bad association," which they define as anyone, particularly any educated person-- who is outside the Organization. They continuously bombard members with horror-stories and veiled threats of "Jehovah's vengeance" against "evil-doers," including any member who has the audacity to have non-JW friends or associates. They view the world as one views a population infected with plague-- as disgusting, doomed, and dangerous. &nbs

Luminous Ecstasies and Passions

Luminous Ecstasies and Passions PDF Author: Richard Shiningthunder Francis
Publisher: Xlibris Corporation
ISBN: 0738841536
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 426

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Book Description


Turn Your Passion into Profit

Turn Your Passion into Profit PDF Author: Walt F.J. Goodridge
Publisher: a company called W
ISBN:
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 375

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Book Description
The formula is simple: take a passion--something you love to do, something you're good at, something you already have expertise and interest in--and use it as the basis of a way to generate income. This Passion Profit strategy could be your "plan Bquot; during an economic downturn (or pandemic)! Yes, you CAN make money doing what you love. Steps: 1. Find your purpose. 2. Discover your passion. 3. Create a product. 4. Market it for profit. (338 pages; 7" x 10"; ISBN:978-0974531328) Read more at www.passionprofit.com Read more at : https://www.waltgoodridge.com/books/

I Love Birds!

I Love Birds! PDF Author: Jennifer Ward
Publisher: Shambhala Publications
ISBN: 0834842165
Category : Family & Relationships
Languages : en
Pages : 193

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Book Description
Prowl for owls by ear, discover the science of feathers, and become familiar with the birds in your neighborhood and beyond—52 activities for kids ages 4 to 8 Calling all birders! It’s time to share the joy of birds with the kids in your life. I Love Birds! is chock-full of activities, information, and rich resources that will fuel discovery and inspire families. Through sensory, hands-on, and creative explorations that involve birding basics and the hows and whys of bird behavior, the activities here will engage children’s imagination and sense of wonder as they observe birds in the wild, become citizen scientists, and forge a deeper understanding, appreciation, and stewardship toward nature, our planet, and all things feathery.