Social Science - Popular Culture

In this delightful and original book, Jonathan Gottschall offers the first unified theory of storytelling. Drawing on neuroscience and evolutionary biology, The Storytelling Animal explores what stories reveal about human nature, how we process information, and think about the world. Humans live in landscapes...

The System of Objects is a tour de force--a theoretical letter-in-a-bottle tossed into the ocean in 1968, which brilliantly communicates to us all the live ideas of the day. Pressing Freudian and Saussurean categories into the service of a basically Marxist perspective, The System...

From the author of Future Shock, a striking way out of today's despair . . . a bracing, optimistic look at our new potentials. The Third Wave makes startling sense of the violent changes now battering our world. Its sweeping synthesis casts fresh light...

In a lecture given in 2023, Byung-Chul Han likened his thinking to music: like the Goldberg Variations, his books present variations on themes, though in his case the variations are articulated in the form of fundamental concepts. He also explained that his thinking is...

A history of New York's Yiddish popular culture from 1880 to the present.The Tourist's Guide to Lost Yiddish New York City offers a new look at over a century of New York's history of Yiddish popular culture. Henry H. Sapoznik-a Peabody Award-winning coproducer of...

The ultimate (unofficial) Survivor book for fans from the contestant-turned-host of Rob Has a Podcast. Rob Cesternino has probably talked more Survivor than any other person on the planet. After playing in Survivor: The Amazon and All-Stars, Rob built a community amongst Survivor's online...

From the author of the international bestseller Debt: The First 5,000 Years comes a revelatory account of the way bureaucracy rules our lives Where does the desire for endless rules, regulations, and bureaucracy come from? How did we come to spend so much of...

In this engrossing journey into the lives of psychopaths and their infamously crafty behaviors, the renowned psychologist Kevin Dutton reveals that there is a scale of "madness" along which we all sit. Incorporating the latest advances in brain scanning and neuroscience, Dutton demonstrates that...

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLERFULLY REVISED & UPDATED, WITH A NEW EPILOGUE"Delightful."--The EconomistThere's Santa Claus, Shakespeare, Mickey Mouse, the Bible, and then there's Star Wars. Nothing quite compares to sitting down with a young child and hearing the sound of John Williams's score as those...

For over two decades, writer, rabble-rouser, and bon vivant, Stuart Schuffman (aka Broke-Ass Stuart), has been chronicling life in San Francisco with grit, wit, and an open bar tab. Part memoir, part cultural archive, The Worst of Broke-Ass Stuart brings together twenty years of...

Thee Temple ov Psychick Youth (TOPY) will be remembered for its crucial influence on youth culture throughout the 1980s, popularizing tattooing, body piercing, "acid house" raves, and other ahead-of-the-curve cultic flirtations and investigations. Its leader was Genesis P-Orridge, co-founder of Psychick TV and Throbbing...

Featured in Rolling Stone, People Magazine, US Weekly, USA Today, The Financial Times, and more"Part tell-all book and part how-to guide, The Strategic Genius of Taylor Swift offers music fans and Swifties alike a chance to learn from one of the biggest pop stars...

OVER THE LAST SEVEN DECADES, some of rock 'n' roll's most celebrated figureheads have flirted with the imagery and theater of the Third Reich. From Keith Moon and Vivian Stanshall kitting themselves out in Nazi uniforms to Siouxsie Sioux and Sid Vicious brandishing swastikas...

Captures the emotional experience of Portland, OR A first-hand look at a city that people can't seem to stop talking about. It's a guidebook of sorts, but not to restaurants and sightseeing. Instead, Alexander Barrett is your friendly guide to the quirky characters and...

"Blending beautiful family history with her own personal memories, LaPointe's writing is a ballad against amnesia, and a call to action for healing, for decolonization, for hope." --Elle The author of the award-winning memoir Red Paint returns with a razor-sharp, clear-eyed collection of essays...

Longlisted for the Carnegie Medal for ExcellenceFinalist for the Washington State Book Awards "Blending beautiful family history with her own personal memories, LaPointe's writing is a ballad against amnesia, and a call to action for healing, for decolonization, for hope." --Elle The author of...

A continuation of PIHKAL, TIHKAL focuses on the family of psychoactive drugs in the tryptamine family and provides a blend of biography, botanical facts, scientific speculation, and psychological and political commentary written by renowned psychopharmacologist Alexander Shulgin and his wife Ann Shulgin.Author: Alexander Shulgin,Ann...

While cohorts of Gen Z have flocked to TikTok, some governments are fighting to have it banned. But where has it come from and what has enabled its incredible market penetration across various countries and demographics? Crystal Abidin draws on original empirical work, news...

After years of biopsies, best-selling author Sarah Thornton made the difficult decision to have a double mastectomy. But, after her reconstructive surgery, she was perplexed: What had she lost? And gained? An experienced sleuth, she resolved to venture behind the scenes to uncover the...

After years of biopsies, best-selling author Sarah Thornton made the difficult decision to have a double mastectomy. But, after her reconstructive surgery, she was perplexed: What had she lost? And gained? An experienced sleuth, she resolved to venture behind the scenes to uncover the...