Christianity, Metaphor, and the Urge to Truth explores the role of metaphor in Christian thought. In it Barry Stephenson challenges the secularized consciousness that often dismisses symbolic thinking, delving into foundational Christian concepts such as sin, atonement, Christology, and divine violence through the lens of metaphor theory and philosophical anthropology. Drawing on the insights of Hans Blumenberg, the book invites readers to reengage with the enduring relevance of religious ...

Ritual is part of what it means to be human. Like sports, music, and drama, ritual defines and enriches culture, putting those who practice it in touch with sources of value and meaning larger than themselves. Ritual is unavoidable, yet it holds a place in modern life that is decidedly ambiguous. What is ritual? What does it do? Is it useful? What are the various kinds of ritual? Is ritual tradition bound and conservative or innovative and transformational? Alongside description of a numbe...

Engineers from around the world recount in this volume their successes and failures in attempting to deal with unique and quixotic landscapes.

Authoritative and immediate, this is the classic account of the most powerful of the American Indian tribes. T.R. Fehrenbach traces the Comanches’ rise to power, from their prehistoric origins to their domination of the high plains for more than a century until their demise in the face of Anglo-American expansion.Master horseback riders who lived in teepees and hunted bison, the Comanches were stunning orators, disciplined warriors, and the finest makers of arrows. They lived by a ...

A fascinating dual biography of the women who founded today’s beauty industryThey were both born in the nineteenth century in humble circumstances–Helena Rubinstein in an orthodox Jewish household in Kraków, Poland, Elizabeth Arden on a farm outside Toronto. But by the 1930s, they were bitter rivals in New York, the rulers of dueling international beauty empires that would forever change the way women thought about cosmetics, salons, and wrinkles. This riveting bio...

FROM BEGINNING TO ENDWhy "rituals"?My thinking was set in motion by those who, knowing I was a parish minister for many years, have asked me for advice about ceremonies and celebrations. They wanted words to use at graduations, funerals, and the welcoming of children. They inquired about grace at family meals, the reaffirmation of wedding vows, and ways to heal wounds suffered in personal conflict. People requested help with the rituals of solitude, such as meditation, prayer...

In Superstitions, Max Cryer explains the origins of many of the things we commonly say and observe and why we continue to include them in our lives: kissing under the mistletoe, the unlucky number thirteen, the significance of the bridal bouquet, saying ‘bless you’ after sneezing, the hanging of a horseshoe, the danger in opals, the Leap Year proposal. So many aspects of our lives are coloured by superstition; now you can discover the reasons for them in this witty and informative book.

**A New York Times Bestseller“Each interview is a revelation.” —USA Today“As heartwarming as a holiday pumpkin pie and every bit as homey . . . what emerges in these compelling pages is hard-won wisdom and boundless humanity.” —Seattle Post-IntelligencerAs heard on NPR, a wondrous nationwide celebration of our shared humanity**StoryCorps founder and legendary radio producer Dave Isay selects the most memorable stories from StoryCor...

The bestselling, classic text on one anthropologist’s incredible experience living among the African Mbuti Pygmies, and what he learned from their culture, customs, and love of life.In this bestselling book, Colin Turnbull, a British cultural anthropologist, details the incredible Mbuti pygmy people and their love of the forest, and each other. Turnbull lived among the Mbuti people for three years as an observer, not a researcher, so he offers a charming and intima...

Food: The Key Concepts presents an exciting, coherent and interdisciplinary introduction to food studies for the beginning reader. Food Studies is an increasingly complex field, drawing on disciplines as diverse as Sociology, Anthropology and Cultural Studies at one end and Economics, Politics and Agricultural Science at the other.In order to clarify the issues, Food: The Key Concepts distills food choices down to three competing considerations: consumer identity; matters of conven...

A scientific and cultural exploration of the pursuit of altered states of consciousness in both humans and animals• Contains myriad studies and examples from the author's 20 years of research• By the foremost authority on the social and psychological effects of drug useHistory shows that people have always used intoxicants. In every age, in every part of the world, people have pursued intoxication with plants, alcohol, and other mind-altering substances. In fact, th...

An intimate biography of Richard Avedon, the legendary fashion and portrait photographer who “helped define America’s image of style, beauty and culture” (The New York Times), by his longtime collaborator and business partner Norma Stevens and award-winning author Steven M. L. Aronson.Richard Avedon was arguably the world’s most famous photographer—as artistically influential as he was commercially successful. Over six richly productive decades, he created...