Social Sciences Media Studies

"Big Data" is on the covers of Science, Nature, The Economist, and Wired magazines, on the front pages of the Wall Street Journal and The New York Times. But despite the media hyperbole, as Christine Borgman points out in this examination of data and scholarly research, having the right data is usually better than having more data; little data can be just as valuable as big data. Borgman, an often-cited authority on scholarly communication, argues that data have no value or meaning in isolation; they exist within a knowledge infrastructure.

The ways of magic are revealed in nature.... The secrets are written in meandering streams and drifting clouds, whispered by the roaring ocean and cooling breeze, echoed through caves and rocks and forests. When you draw a heart in the sand, call on the four winds for assistance, or ask the rain to wash away a bad habit, you are practicing Earth magic. By working in harmony with nature, we can transform ourselves, our lives, and our world. This tried-and-true guide offers more than 100 spells, rites, and simple rituals you can perform using the powerful energy of the Earth.

Acclaimed scholar and sociologist Peter L. Berger carefully lays out an understanding of religion as a historical, societal mechanism in this classic work of social theory. Berger examines the roots of religious belief and its gradual dissolution in modern times, applying a general theoretical perspective to specific examples from religions throughout the ages. Building upon the author's previous work, The Social Construction of Reality, with Thomas Luckmann, this book makes Berger's case that human societies build a "sacred canopy" to protect, stabilize, and give meaning to their worldview.

Baltimore is the setting for (and typifies) one of the most penetrating examinations of bigotry and residential segregation ever published in the United States. Antero Pietila shows how continued discrimination practices toward African Americans and Jews have shaped the cities in which we now live. Eugenics, racial thinking, and white supremacist attitudes influenced even the federal government's actions toward housing in the 20th century, dooming American cities to ghettoization.

In this book in praise of wait times, award-winning author Jason Farman passionately argues that the delay between call and answer has always been an important part of the message. Traveling backward from our current era of Twitter and texts, Farman describes how societies have worked to eliminate waiting in communication and how they have interpreted those times' meanings. And in a rebuttal to the demand for instant communication, Farman makes a powerful case for why good things can come to those who wait.

As television began to overtake the political landscape in the 1960s, network broadcast companies, bolstered by powerful lobbying interests, dominated screens across the nation. Yet over the next three decades, the expansion of a different technology, cable, changed all of this. 24/7 Politics tells the story of how the cable industry worked with political leaders to create an entirely new approach to television, one that tethered politics to profits.

In this magisterial work, leading cultural critic Mary Eberstadt delivers a powerful new theory about the decline of religion in the Western world. The conventional wisdom is that the West first experienced religious decline, followed by the decline of the family. Eberstadt turns this standard account on its head. Marshalling an impressive array of research, Eberstadt shows that the reverse has also been true: the undermining of the family has further undermined Christianity itself.

From YouTube's Head of Culture and Trends, a rousing and illuminating behind-the-scenes exploration of Internet video's massive impact on our world. Whether your favorite YouTube video is a cat on a Roomba, 'Gangnam Style', the 'Bed Intruder' song, an ASAPscience explainer, Rebecca Black's 'Friday', or the 'Evolution of Dance', Kevin Allocca's Videocracy reveals how these beloved videos and famous trends - and many more - came to be and why they mean more than you might think.

Despite what major media sources say, violence against Native women is not an epidemic. An epidemic is biological and blameless. Violence against Native women is historical and political, bounded by oppression and colonial violence. This book, like all of Sarah Deer's work, is aimed at engaging the problem head-on - and ending it. The Beginning and End of Rape collects and expands the powerful writings in which Deer has advocated for cultural and legal reforms to protect Native women from endemic sexual violence and abuse.

Superstition: A Very Short Introduction explores the nature and history of superstition from antiquity to the present. For two millennia, superstition was a label derisively applied to foreign religions and unacceptable religious practices, and its primary purpose was used to separate groups and assert religious and social authority. After the Enlightenment, the superstition label was still used to define groups, but the new dividing line was between reason and unreason. Today, superstitious belief and behavior remain widespread, and highly educated people are not immune.

Reaching out to listeners of all religious backgrounds, Desmond Tutu shows us how to transform suffering into joy both in our lives and in our world. He tells us that God dreams of a world where laughter, love, and peace reign, and where we realize that we are all members of one family, God's family. In this extremely personal and liberating message, Father Tutu helps us "see with the eyes of the heart" and cultivate the qualities of forgiveness, humility, generosity, and courage.

Facebook, Google, X (Twitter) & Co., die "Big Tech" genannten IT-Riesen aus dem Silicon Valley, glauben, die Kommunikationsstandards von Milliarden Menschen über ihre Richtlinien und Standards vorschreiben zu können. Diese Anmaßung erfolgt ohne jede demokratische Legitimation. Durch ihre geradezu monopolistische Stellung bestimmen sie die Rahmenbedingungen öffentlicher Kommunikation. Mit dramatischen Konsequenzen: tausendfacher Rechtsbruch, digitale Massenvernichtung freier Rede und drastische Eingriffe in die Meinungsfreiheit sind die Folge.

In Black Feminism Reimagined, Jennifer C. Nash reframes Black feminism's engagement with intersectionality, often celebrated as its primary intellectual and political contribution to feminist theory. Charting the institutional history and contemporary uses of intersectionality in the academy, Nash outlines how women's studies has both elevated intersectionality to the discipline's primary program-building initiative and cast intersectionality as a threat to feminism's coherence.

By combining historical research, pop culture, art analyses, and original interviews, Cat Call explores the cat and its indivisible connection to femininity and teases out how this connection can help us better understand the relationship between myth, history, magic, womanhood in the digital age, and our beloved clawed companions.

El nou llibre del reconegut historiador i autor del fenomen global Sàpiens. Una obra que analitza com les xarxes d'informació han conformat el món i a nosaltres mateixos. A Nexus, Y. N. Harari contempla la humanitat des de l'àmplia perspectiva de la història per analitzar com les xarxes d'informació han conformat el nostre món i a nosaltres mateixos. Durant els últims 100.000 anys, els sàpiens hem acumulat un poder enorme.

Dissects the aftermath of the war in Southeast Asia, the refugee problem, the Vietnam/Cambodia conflict, and the Pol Pot regime.

Ever since its initial publication in 2008, The Transgender Child has been lauded as the most trusted source of information for families wanting to understand and affirm their transgender, gender-expansive, or nonbinary child. Utilized around the world and translated into multiple languages, The Transgender Child has won accolades from medical and mental health professionals, teachers, and, most especially, from parents. Authors Stephanie Brill and Rachel Pepper have now thoroughly revised and updated their ground-breaking classic.

Pandemics and war, social turmoil and corrupt governments, natural disasters and environmental collapse—it's hard not to watch the signs of the times and feel afraid. But we can journey through that fear to find hope. With the warnings of a prophet and the lively voice of a storyteller, Choctaw elder and author of Ladder to the Light Steven Charleston speaks to all who sense apocalyptic dread rising around and within.

Birth control offers women the opportunity to prevent pregnancy, plan and space their births, or have no births at all. And yet, in the United States, half of all pregnancies remain unintended, and access to birth control is beset by inequities in education, access, and coverage. Birth Control: What Everyone Needs to Know will offer more than a user's guide to available means of contraception: it will examine how supported family-planning infrastructure impacts society as a whole.

Now in its second edition, The Virtues of Captain America is updated to include all the new developments in Captain America's saga. This edition also offers new material on Sam Wilson—formerly Captain America's partner the Falcon who recently became Captain America himself—and how his interpretation of the role compares to Steve Rogers's.