Past Present Future

In Past, Present, and Future, Asimov has culled the best of his essays (some of which appear here for the first time) to form a fascinating journey through the world of astronomy, nuclear power, medicine, physics, history, music, film, politics, and other popular subjects. Our preeminent popularizer of science, Asimov takes on many of today's most discussed issues here - Star Wars, the Chernobyl disaster, genetic engineering, the creationism/evolution debate - with a flair, verve, and mastery that have won him innumerable readers. But he also includes many essays written in a personal vein, giving us disarmingly humorous accounts of his triple-bypass surgery and his "Hollywood Non-Career." An entertaining look at Asimov's committment to living in New York City (which he calls "Paradise") is afforded in "I Love New York." On a grand tour of the years ahead, in chapters like "Living on the Moon," "2084," "Should We Fear the Computer?" and "The New Learning," we are shown a future that is thrilling, fearsome, and, as the author insists, our present responsibility. Destined to take its place on the shelves of every Asimov fan, Past, Present, and Future is at once rational, argumentative, informal, and charming.

This title includes full-color photographs and facts on how time relates to the past, present and future as well as what people have done, are doing and will do.

Marriage globally is undergoing profound change, provoking widespread public comment and concern. Through the close ethnographic examination of case studies drawn from Africa, Asia, Europe and North America, Marriage in Past, Present and Future Tense places new and changing forms of marriage in comparative perspective as a transforming and also transformative social institution. In conditions of widespread socio-political inequality and instability, how are the personal, the familial and the political co-produced? How do marriages encapsulate the ways in which memories of past lives, present experience and imaginaries of the future are articulated? Exploring the ways that marriage draws together and distinguishes history and biography, ritual and law, economy and politics in intimate family life, this volume examines how familial and personal relations, and the ethical judgements they enfold, inform and configure social transformation. Contexts that have been partly shaped through civil wars, cold war and colonialism – as well as other forms of violent socio-political rupture – offer especially apt opportunities for tracing the interplay between marriage and politics. But rather than taking intimate family life and gendered practice as simply responsive to wider socio-political forces, this work explores how marriage may also create social change. Contributors consider the ways in which marital practice traverses the domains of politics, economics and religion, while marking a key site where the work of linking and distinguishing those domains is undertaken.

Debates about the role and nature of the state are at the heart of modern politics. However, the state itself remains notoriously difficult to define, and the term is subject to a range of different interpretations. In this book, distinguished state theorist Bob Jessop provides a critical introduction to the state as both a concept and a reality. He lucidly guides readers through all the major accounts of the state, and examines competing efforts to relate the state to other features of social organization. Essential themes in the analysis of the state are explored in full, including state formation, periodization, the re-scaling of the state and the state's future. Throughout, Jessop clearly defines key terms, from hegemony and coercion to government and governance. He also analyses what we mean when we speak about 'normal' and 'exceptional' states, and states that are 'failed' or 'rogue'. Combining an accessible style with expert sensitivity to the complexities of the state, this short introduction will be core reading for students and scholars of politics and sociology, as well as anyone interested in the changing role of the state in contemporary societies.

With color and black-and-white illustrations throughout, Hawaiian Language: Past, Present, Future presents aspects of Hawaiian and its history that are rarely treated in language classes. The major characters in this book make up a diverse cast: Dutch merchants, Captain Cook’s naturalist and philologist William Anderson, ‘Ōpūkaha‘ia (the inspiration for the Hawaiian Mission), the American lexicographer Noah Webster, philologists in New England, missionary-linguists and their Hawaiian consultants, and many minor players. The account begins in prehistory, placing the probable origins of the ancestor of Polynesian languages in mainland Asia. An evolving family tree reflects the linguistic changes that took place as these people moved east. The current versions are examined from a Hawaiian-centered point of view, comparing the sound system of the language with those of its major relatives in the Polynesian triangle. More recent historical topics begin with the first written samples of a Polynesian language in 1616, which led to the birth of the idea of a widespread language family. The next topic is how the Hawaiian alphabet was developed. The first efforts suffered from having too many letters, a problem that was solved in 1826 through brilliant reasoning by its framers and their Hawaiian consultants. The opposite problem was that the alphabet didn’t have enough letters: analysts either couldn’t hear or misinterpreted the glottal stop and long vowels. The end product of the development of the alphabet—literacy—is more complicated than some statistics would have us believe. As for its success or failure, both points of view, from contemporary observers, are presented. Still, it cannot be denied that literacy had a tremendous and lasting effect on Hawaiian culture. The last part of the book concentrates on the most-used Hawaiian reference works—dictionaries. It describes current projects that combine print and manuscript collections on a searchable website. These projects can include the growing body of manuscript and print material that is being made available through recent and ongoing research. As for the future, a proposed monolingual dictionary would allow users to avoid an English bridge to understanding, and move directly to a definition that includes Hawaiian cultural features and a Hawaiian worldview.

The humanities have been an integral part of humanitys cultural structure for centuries. In this book, a number of leading scholars reflect on the past, present and offer their perspectives for the future of the humanities. The first chapter (written by Jennifer Laubenthal, Jonathan Helmick and Kathleen Melago) describes the vitality of music for humanistic study. Next, Kevin Donnelly provides his perspectives and research of the humanities as they pertain to Australian history. Professor Donald Elder then extols the humanities from a historical perspective, investigating key crucial events that have taken place in America. Literacy and literacy instruction in the past, present and future are detailed by Professors Thompson and Coffey, while scholar Paul Horton examines the plight of the humanities in the vise of K-20 corporate education reform. Emerging technologies in humanities education is critically examined by Arjun Sabharwal while Gerald Cupchik explores the humanities, emotions and aesthetics in a singular fashion. The realms of pedagogy and knowledge are explored by Will Fitzhugh and Michael F. Shaughnessy, while Greg Eft paints a panorama of concerning the definition of beauty as it pertains to the humanities. Geni Flores then follows in a chapter that promotes and accentuates the importance of multiculturalism and diversity as instruments of social justice. Josh McVey interprets Scripture and its origins within the humanities while Anna Beck explores historical American theatre and provides a glimpse of this realm through various windows. Opal Greer sheds light on what we may be able to discern from the humanities past and envisions the realm of their future in universities and academia. Professor Elder contributes a second time to this manuscript, boldly going where not historian has gone before and examining the relevance of space history to this subject matter. Bringing the book to a close, Herbert London offers his perspective on the future of the humanities. Scholars, researchers, critics, historians, art lovers, and musicians as well as many involved in education will relish and enjoy this rich, robust exploration of the humanities and its relation to the past, present and future.

Mussolini's march on Rome; Hitler's speeches before waves of goose-stepping storm troopers; the horrors of the Holocaust; burning crosses and neo-Nazi skinhead hooligans. Few words are as evocative, and even fewer ideologies as pernicious, as fascism. And yet, the world continues to witness the success of political parties in countries such as Italy, France, Austria, Russia, and elsewhere resembling in various ways historical fascism. Why, despite its past, are people still attracted to fascism? Will it ever again be a major political force in the world? Where in the world is it most likely to erupt next? In Fascism: Past, Present, and Future, renowned historian Walter Laqueur illuminates the fascist phenomenon, from the emergence of Hitler and Mussolini, to Vladimir Zhirinovsky and his cohorts, to fascism's not so distant future. Laqueur describes how fascism's early achievements--the rise of Germany and Italy as leading powers in Europe, a reputation for being concerned about the fate of common people, the creation of more leisure for workers--won many converts. But what successes early fascist parties can claim, Laqueur points out, are certainly overwhelmed by its disasters: Hitler may have built the Autobahnen, but he also launched the war that destroyed them. Nevertheless, despite the Axis defeat, fascism was not forgotten: Laqueur tellingly uncovers contemporary adaptations of fascist tactics and strategies in the French ultra-nationalist Le Pen, the rise of skinheads and right-wing extremism, and Holocaust denial. He shows how single issues--such as immigrants and, more remarkably, the environment--have proven fruitful rallying points for neo-fascist protest movements. But he also reveals that European fascism has failed to attract broad and sustained support. Indeed, while skinhead bands like the "Klansman" and magazines such as "Zyklon B" grab headlines, fascism bereft of military force and war is at most fascism on the defense, promising to save Europe from an invasion of foreigners without offering a concrete future. Laqueur warns, however, that an increase in "clerical" fascism--such as the confluence of fascism and radical, Islamic fundamentalism--may come to dominate in parts of the Middle East and North Africa. The reason has little to do with religion: "Underneath the 'Holy Rage' is frustration and old-fashioned class struggle." Fascism was always a movement of protest and discontent, and there is in the contemporary world a great reservoir of protest. Among the likely candidates, Laqueur singles out certain parts of Eastern Europe and the Third World. In carefully plotting fascism's past, present, and future, Walter Laqueur offers a riveting, if sometimes disturbing, account of one of the twentieth century's most baneful political ideas, in a book that is both a masterly survey of the roots, the ideas, and the practices of fascism and an assessment of its prospects in the contemporary world.

relations. The essays were first produced for a conference at the University of Toronto in November 1991 on the history of intelligence. They appeared in the journal Intelligence and National Security, v.8, no.3 (July 1993). No index. The end of the Cold War has begun to open the once-secret Distributed in the US by ISBS. subject of intelligence to public view. Here, nine essays by contributors from the United States, Canada, and England examine the final days of the KGB, the career of Sir William Stephenson (A Man Called Intrepid), Soviet espionage in Canada during World War II, Canadian intelligence gathering, and other topics. They reflect on progress in the formulation of research strategies to advance our understanding of how intelligence services function and of their significance to foreign Annotation copyright by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR