Natural Lives, Modern Times

Natural Lives, Modern Times PDF

Author: Bruce Stutz

Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press

Published: 1998-07-29

Total Pages: 404

ISBN-13: 9780812216585

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The Delaware River flows out of New York's Catskill Mountains and winds its way through woodland and rural farmland, through the great Water Gap ravine, and finally past one of the world's most industrialized riverfronts. Yet it remains one of the country's last undammed rivers, with a natural life as rich and varied as its human history. In Natural Lives, Modern Times, Bruce Stutz has written a thoroughly modern natural history, blending keen observations of the nature of the Delaware's enduring complex of river, glacial streams, marshlands, and forest with glimpses of history and folklore and with luminous portraits of those whose lives are sustained by the river. The Delaware was the waterway of the nation's first mercantile, philosophical, scientific, cultural, and industrial heartland, hosting immigrants from Europe, Africa, and the Mediterranean, all looking for new lives along the ancient river. In this always entertaining and often haunting intertwining of human and natural history, Bruce Stutz discovers those who regret what has been lost and those passionate about preserving what remains. Most of all, however, he lets us see what's at stake in a wonderfully diverse world. Not since Mark Twain has anyone taken such a freewheeling river journey.

Marking Modern Times

Marking Modern Times PDF

Author: Alexis McCrossen

Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Published: 2013-05

Total Pages: 272

ISBN-13: 022601486X

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In Marking Modern Times, Alexis McCrossen relates how the American preoccupation with time led people from across social classes to acquire watches and clocks, and expands our understanding of the ways we have standardized time and have made timekeepers serve as political, social, and cultural tools in a society that not merely values time, but regards access to it as a natural-born right.

German History in Modern Times

German History in Modern Times PDF

Author: William W. Hagen

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2012-02-13

Total Pages: 483

ISBN-13: 1316025225

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This history of German-speaking central Europe offers a very wide perspective, emphasizing a succession of many-layered communal identities. It highlights the interplay of individual, society, culture and political power, contrasting German with Western patterns. Rather than treating 'the Germans' as a collective whole whose national history amounts to a cumulative biography, the book presents the pre-modern era of the Holy Roman Empire; the nineteenth century; the 1914–45 era of war, dictatorship and genocide; and the Cold War and post-Cold War eras since 1945 as successive worlds of German life, thought and mentality. This book's 'Germany' is polycentric and multicultural, including the multinational Austrian Habsburg Empire and the German Jews. Its approach to National Socialism offers a conceptually new understanding of the Holocaust. The book's numerous illustrations reveal German self-presentations and styles of life, which often contrast with Western ideas of Germany.

When I Lived in Modern Times

When I Lived in Modern Times PDF

Author: Linda Grant

Publisher: Penguin

Published: 2002-12-31

Total Pages: 293

ISBN-13: 1101563397

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Winner of the Orange Prize for Fiction In the spring of 1946, Evelyn Sert stands on the deck of a ship bound for Palestine. For the twenty-year-old from London, it is a time of adventure and change when all things seem possible. Swept up in the spirited, chaotic churning of her new, strange country, she joins a kibbutz, then moves on to the teeming metropolis of Tel Aviv, to find her own home and a group of friends as eccentric and disparate as the city itself. She falls in love with a man who is not what he seems when she becomes an unwitting spy for a nation fighting to be born. When I Lived in Modern Times is "an unsentimental coming-of-age story of both a country and a young immigrant . . . that provides an unforgettable glimpse of a time and place rarely observed" (Publishers Weekly, starred review).

88 Natural Remedies

88 Natural Remedies PDF

Author:

Publisher: National Geographic Books

Published: 2013-10-01

Total Pages: 48

ISBN-13: 1426210477

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This National Geographic health book provides portable answers to treating common ailments using proven natural therapies. Runny nose, watery eyes, sinus headache? Don't reach for the Claritin. Instead, learn how to treat seasonal allergies with nasal lavage, a time-honored practice. Upset stomach? Forget chalky antacids; instead wear an acupressure wrist band or chew on a teaspoon of fennel, favored by Indians for combating the effects of spicy food. Fight insomnia with valerian root, the leading natural herb to promote quality sleep with no side effects. Sections include: · Acupressure (use a wrist band to relieve motion sickness, soothe sore feet, treat constipation, relieve wrist tension, alleviate headaches and neck tension, and more) · Aromatherapy (De-stress in the tub, relieve a headache, scent a room to create a mood, mix a body oil, make a compress, and more) · Ayurvedic Medicine (learn the Sanskrit history of "the science of life and longevity," how to evaluate practitioners, about ayurvedic "energy prints," and more) · Breath Therapy (Relax with Wu, Do the 4-7-8 relaxation breath, strengthen diaphragm muscles, use the 20-Cycle Breath to improve concentration, and more) · Herbs (Fennel, Peppermint, Valerian Root, Chamomile) · Hydrotherapy (drink the correct amount of water for your body, fight a cold, treat a bruise, rub away fatigue, soothe a sunburn, and more) · Massage Therapy (learn quickie massages to do on yourself to: release facial tension, relax your shoulders, help your hands, and release your lower back) · Meditation (specific exercises designed to focus on your breath, chant, focus on touch, be mindful) · Nasal Lavage and Steam Therapy (clears sinuses, relieves congestion) · Qigong (a five-minute meditation to focus your qi energy, learn and practice the simple eight postures of qigong) · Reflexology (follow instructions to perform a simple reflexology treatment that can be done anywhere to relax and invigorate your hands) · Shiatsu (learn how to choose a good shiatsu practitioner, follow instructions to perform a full body shiatsu routine on yourself) · Traditional Chinese Medicine (learn about herbs, heat, and cupping) · Yoga (learn or perfect your chair pose, tree pose, and cobra)

How to Survive the Modern World: Making sense of, and finding calm in, unsteady times

How to Survive the Modern World: Making sense of, and finding calm in, unsteady times PDF

Author: The School of Life

Publisher: School of Life Press

Published: 2021-10-07

Total Pages: 320

ISBN-13: 9781912891535

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A guide to modern times that explores the challenges living in the 21st century can pose to our mental wellbeing. The modern world has brought us a range of extraordinary benefits and joys, including technology, medicine and transport. But it can also feel as though modern times have plunged us ever deeper into greed, despair and agitation. Seldom has the world felt more privileged and resource-rich yet also worried, blinkered, furious, panicked and self-absorbed. How to Survive the Modern World is the ultimate guide to navigating our unusual times. It identifies a range of themes that present acute challenges to our mental wellbeing. The book tackles our relationship to the news media, our ideas of love and sex, our assumptions about money and our careers, our attitudes to animals and the natural world, our admiration for science and technology, our belief in individualism and secularism – and our suspicion of quiet and solitude. In all cases, the book helps us to understand how we got to where we are, digging deeply and fascinatingly into the history of ideas, while pointing us towards a saner individual and collective future. The emphasis isn’t just on understanding modern times but also on knowing how we can best relate to the difficulties these present. The book helps us to form a calmer, more authentic, more resilient and sometimes more light-hearted relationship to the follies and obsessions of our age. If modern times are (in part) something of a disease, this is both the diagnostic and the soothing, hope-filled cure.

Nature in the Middle Ages and the Early Modern Times

Nature in the Middle Ages and the Early Modern Times PDF

Author: Albrecht Classen

Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG

Published: 2024-07-01

Total Pages: 606

ISBN-13: 3111387631

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The study of pre-modern anthropology requires the close examination of the relationship between nature and human society, which has been both precarious and threatening as well as productive, soothing, inviting, and pleasurable. Much depends on the specific circumstances, as the works by philosophers, theologians, poets, artists, and medical practitioners have regularly demonstrated. It would not be good enough, as previous scholarship has commonly done, to examine simply what the various writers or artists had to say about nature. While modern scientists consider just the hard-core data of the objective world, cultural historians and literary scholars endeavor to comprehend the deeper meaning of the concept of nature presented by countless writers and artists. Only when we have a good grasp of the interactions between people and their natural environment, are we in a position to identify and interpret mental structures, social and economic relationships, medical and scientific concepts of human health, and the messages about all existence as depicted in major art works. In light of the current conditions threatening to bring upon us a global crisis, it matters centrally to take into consideration pre-modern discourses on nature and its enormous powers to understand the topoi and tropes determining the concepts through which we perceive nature. Nature thus proves to be a force far beyond all human comprehensibility, being both material and spiritual depending on our critical approaches.

Times of History, Times of Nature

Times of History, Times of Nature PDF

Author: Anders Ekström

Publisher: Berghahn Books

Published: 2022-02-11

Total Pages: 359

ISBN-13: 1800733240

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As climate change becomes an increasingly important part of public discourse, the relationship between time in nature and history is changing. Nature can no longer be considered a slow and immobile background to human history, and the future can no longer be viewed as open and detached from the past. Times of History, Times of Nature engages with this historical shift in temporal sensibilities through a combination of detailed case studies and synthesizing efforts. Focusing on the history of knowledge, media theory, and environmental humanities, this volume explores the rich and nuanced notions of time and temporality that have emerged in response to climate change.

The Well-Tempered City

The Well-Tempered City PDF

Author: Jonathan F. P. Rose

Publisher: HarperCollins

Published: 2016-09-13

Total Pages: 235

ISBN-13: 0062234749

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2017 PROSE Award Winner: Outstanding Scholarly Work by a Trade Publisher In the vein of Jane Jacobs’s The Death and Life of Great American Cities and Edward Glaeser’s Triumph of the City, Jonathan F. P. Rose—a visionary in urban development and renewal—champions the role of cities in addressing the environmental, economic, and social challenges of the twenty-first century. Cities are birthplaces of civilization; centers of culture, trade, and progress; cauldrons of opportunity—and the home of eighty percent of the world’s population by 2050. As the 21st century progresses, metropolitan areas will bear the brunt of global megatrends such as climate change, natural resource depletion, population growth, income inequality, mass migrations, education and health disparities, among many others. In The Well-Tempered City, Jonathan F. P. Rose—the man who “repairs the fabric of cities”—distills a lifetime of interdisciplinary research and firsthand experience into a five-pronged model for how to design and reshape our cities with the goal of equalizing their landscape of opportunity. Drawing from the musical concept of “temperament” as a way to achieve harmony, Rose argues that well-tempered cities can be infused with systems that bend the arc of their development toward equality, resilience, adaptability, well-being, and the ever-unfolding harmony between civilization and nature. These goals may never be fully achieved, but our cities will be richer and happier if we aspire to them, and if we infuse our every plan and constructive step with this intention. A celebration of the city and an impassioned argument for its role in addressing the important issues in these volatile times, The Well-Tempered City is a reasoned, hopeful blueprint for a thriving metropolis—and the future.

Leading a Worthy Life

Leading a Worthy Life PDF

Author: Leon R. Kass

Publisher: Encounter Books

Published: 2020-06-09

Total Pages: 345

ISBN-13: 1641770996

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Most American young people, like their ancestors, harbor desires for a worthy life: a life of meaning, a life that makes sense. But they are increasingly confused about what such a life might look like, and how they might, in the present age, be able to live one. With a once confident culture no longer offering authoritative guidance, the young are now at sea—regarding work, family, religion, and civic identity. The true, the good, and the beautiful have few defenders, and the higher cynicism mocks any innocent love of wisdom or love of country. We are supercompetent regarding efficiency and convenience; we are at a loss regarding what it’s all for. Yet because the old orthodoxies have crumbled, our “interesting time” paradoxically offers genuine opportunities for renewal and growth. The old Socratic question “How to live?” suddenly commands serious attention. Young Americans, if liberated from the prevailing cynicism, will readily embrace weighty questions and undertake serious quests for a flourishing life. All they (and we) need is encouragement. This book provides that necessary encouragement by illuminating crucial—and still available—aspects of a worthy life, and by defending them against their enemies. With chapters on love, family, and friendship; human excellence and human dignity; teaching, learning, and truth; and the great human aspirations of Western civilization, it offers help to both secular and religious readers, to people who are looking on their own for meaning and to people who are looking to deepen what they have been taught or to square it with the spirit of our times.