Perhaps nowhere else has literature been as conscious a collective endeavor as in China, and China's survival over three thousand years may owe more to its literary traditions than to its political history. This Very Short Introduction tells the...
This Very Short Introduction explores the historical impact of plague over the centuries, the ways in which it has been interpreted, and the powerful images it has left behind in art and literature. Paul Slack assesses its causes, which have often...
Father of the Enlightenment and the last guardian of the medieval world, Spinoza made a brilliant attempt to reconcile the conflicting moral and intellectual demands of his epoch and to present a vision of man as simultaneously bound by necessity...
A great deal of the world's history is the history of empires. Indeed it could be said that all history is colonial history, if one takes a broad enough definition and goes far enough back. And although the great historic imperial systems--the...
Steve Bruce conveys the essence of the field of sociology in this fascinating volume. A well-known populizer of the discipline, Bruce presents here an introduction to a way of thinking that will appeal to anyone interested in deepening their...
When Europeans first arrived in North America, between five and eight million indigenous people were already living there. But how did they come to be here? What were their agricultural, spiritual, and hunting practices? How did their societies...
Missionary, theologian, and religious genius, Paul is one of the most powerful human personalities in the history of the Church. E.P. Sanders, an influential Pauline scholar, analyzes the fundamental beliefs and vigorous contradictions in Paul's...
Lie detection, offender profiling, jury selection, insanity in the law, predicting the risk of re-offending, the minds of serial killers, and many other topics that fill news and fiction are all aspects of the rapidly developing area of scientific...
Are we born with our fears or do we learn them? Why do our fears persist? What purpose does anxiety serve? How common are anxiety disorders, and which treatments are most effective? What's happening in our brain when we feel fear? This Very Short...
Hegel is regarded as one of the most influential figures on modern political and intellectual development. After painting Hegel's life and times in broad strokes, Peter Singer goes on to tackle some of the more challenging aspects of Hegel's...