Showing titles in Media Studies

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, the landscape of television began an unprecedented transformation. While the networks continued to chase the lowest common denominator, a wave of new shows, first on premium cable channels like HBO and then basic cable networks like FX and AMC, dramatically stretched television’s narrative inventiveness, emotional resonance, and artistic ambition. Just as the Big Novel had in the 1960s and the subversive films of New Hollywood had in 1970s, television shows became the place to go to see stories of the triumph and betrayals of the American Dream.

Received opinion holds that art is culturally determined and relative. We are told that whether a picture, a movement, a text, or sound qualifies as a "work of art" largely depends on social attitudes and convention. Drawing on examples ranging from Paleolithic cave paintings to modern pop music and building on the ideas of James Joyce, Oscar Wilde, Gilles Deleuze, Carl Jung, and others, J.F. Martel argues that art is an inborn human phenomenon that precedes the formation of culture and even society.

Early one morning in the summer of 1999, authorities in the tiny West Texas town of Tulia began a roundup of suspected drug dealers. By the time the sweep was done, over 40 people had been arrested and one of every five black adults in town was behind bars, all accused of dealing cocaine to the same undercover officer, Tom Coleman.

First published in 1991, Backlash made headlines and became a best-selling classic for its thoroughgoing debunking of a decade-long antifeminist backlash against women’s advances. As Faludi writes in a new preface for this edition, much has changed in the intervening years. This startling and essential book helps explain why women’s freedoms are still so demonized and threatened - and urges us to choose a different future.

In the age of Trump, our society is defined by fear. Indeed, three out of four Americans say they feel more fearful today than they did only a couple decades ago. But are we living in exceptionally perilous times? In his best-selling work The Culture of Fear, sociologist Barry Glassner demonstrates it is our perception of danger that has increased, not the actual level of risk.

There's nothing more interesting than the predictions of how the world will someday end. Many people have contributed various theories as to how this will come about, but none of them are pointing out the obvious: Google is going to be leading the charge toward our demise. In The Transhuman and Occult Apocalypse: How Google Will Solve the Problem of Humanity, Isaac Weishaupt provides this unique foresight into what he sees as what could be the tragic error in integrating too much technology into our daily lives.

America need look no further than its own lauded leaders for a war criminal whose offenses rival those of the most heinous dictators in recent history: Henry Kissinger. Employing evidence based on firsthand testimony, unpublished documents, and new information uncovered by the Freedom of Information Act, and using only what would hold up in international courts of law, The Trial of Henry Kissinger outlines atrocities authorized by the former secretary of state in Indochina, Bangladesh, Chile, Cyprus, and more.

The assassination of John F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963, continues to inspire interest ranging from well-meaning speculation to bizarre conspiracy theories and controversial filmmaking. But in this landmark audiobook, reissued with a new afterword for the 40th anniversary of the assassination, Gerald Posner examines all of the available evidence and reaches the only possible conclusion: Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone.

In the much-anticipated follow-up to her critically-acclaimed, Word Up: Little Languaging Hacks for Big Change, Dani Katz focuses her Quantum Languaging word wizardry on societal overhaul. Equal parts cultural critique and (r)evolutionary handbook, The Language of Betterarchy offers tangible tools to unify the populace, and evolve our culture for the “better” with our every word.

The plot to assassinate President John F. Kennedy has been shrouded in secrecy and deceit, leading most Americans to doubt the veracity of the Warren Commission's findings. Now, after forty years, Barr McClellan exposes the secret, high-level conspiracy in Texas that led to Kennedy's death and L.B.J.'s succession as President.

What is paranoia? What makes us mistrustful? How can this be overcome? Daniel Freeman, Professor of Psychology at Oxford, has spent thirty years at the vanguard of paranoia research and treatment. This remarkable and moving book tells the story of that journey. For decades, conventional wisdom held that paranoia was only experienced by people with severe mental health problems and little could be done to rectify its disastrous effects.

In They Knew, New York Times bestselling author Sarah Kendzior explores the United States’ “culture of conspiracy,” putting forth a timely and unflinching argument: uncritical faith in broken institutions is as dangerous as false narratives peddled by propagandists. Conspiracy theories are on the rise because officials refuse to enforce accountability for real conspiracies.

Jeff Sharlet is the only journalist to have reported from inside the C Street House, the Fellowship residence known simply by its Washington, D.C., address. The house has lately been the scene of notorious political scandal, but more crucially, it is home to efforts to transform the very fabric of American democracy. And now, after laying bare its tenants' past in The Family, Sharlet reports from deep within fundamentalism in today's world.

From taking the knee to transgender rights, wedge issues are everywhere in modern life - dividing opinions, polarising debate and tearing friendships and families apart. Even something as seemingly innocuous as wearing a facemask can provoke vicious disagreement. But how did we get here, and what does it mean for society going forward? In this gripping series, acclaimed writer and journalist Jon Ronson searches for the origin stories of the hostilities - the pebbles thrown in the pond, creating the ripples that led to where we are today.

Groundbreaking scientific analysis that breaks the JFK assassination wide open! Did a shot from the "grassy knoll" kill President Kennedy? If so, was Oswald part of a conspiracy or an innocent patsy? Why have scientific experts who examined the evidence failed to put such questions to rest? In 2001, scientist Dr. Donald Byron Thomas published a peer-reviewed article that revived the debate over the finding by the House Select Committee on Assassinations that there had indeed been a shot from the grassy knoll, caught on a police dictabelt recording.

America is suffering from an information glut. Most Americans are no longer clear about what news is worth remembering or how any of it connects to anything else. Thus, Americans are rapidly becoming the least knowledgeable people in the industrial world. Author and academic Neil Postman and television journalist Steve Powers tell you how to become a discerning viewer.

When Moya Bailey first coined the term misogynoir, she defined it as the ways anti-Black and misogynistic representation shape broader ideas about Black women, particularly in visual culture and digital spaces. She had no idea that the term would go viral, touching a cultural nerve and quickly entering into the lexicon. Misogynoir now has its own Wikipedia page and hashtag, and has been featured on Comedy Central’s The Daily Show and CNN’s Cuomo Prime Time.

When asked to name the world’s first major nuclear accident, most people cite the Three Mile Island incident or the Chernobyl disaster. Revealed in this book is one of American history’s best-kept secrets: the world’s first nuclear reactor accident to claim fatalities happened on United States soil. Chronicled here for the first time is the strange tale of SL-1, a military test reactor located in Idaho’s Lost River Desert that exploded on the night of January 3, 1961, killing the three-man maintenance crew on duty.

Women have been told that being pretty comes at the expense of being taken seriously. If a woman is physically attractive, there is often a presumption that she lacks the substance and smarts necessary to provide leadership. This narrative implies that being pretty and being capable are mutually exclusive. But in Pretty Powerful, Fox News political commentator and legal analyst Eboni Williams rejects that narrative. She says that to accept the false notion that beauty and power are mutually exclusive is to leave an incredibly powerful tool on the table.

There are some places where so many seemingly unexplainable things happen that it is really hard to believe that there’s not some kind of explanation to make sense of it all. The Skinwalker Ranch is such a place. Unbelievable and still unexplained paranormal activities set the Skinwalker Ranch apart.