|

| The
New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture: Volume 1: Religion
- Publisher's Marketing:
"Evangelical Protestant groups have dominated religious
life in the South since the early nineteenth century. Even
as the conservative Protestantism typically associated with
the South has risen in social and political prominence throughout
the United States in recent decades, however, religious
culture in the South itself has grown increasingly diverse.
The region has seen a surge of immigration from other parts
of the United States as well as from Latin America, Asia,
and the Middle East, bringing increased visibility to Catholicism,
Islam, and Asian religions in the once solidly Protestant
Christian South.
In this volume of "The New Encyclopedia of Southern
Culture, contributors have revised entries from the original
"Encyclopedia on topics ranging from religious broadcasting
to snake handling and added new entries on such topics as
Asian religions, Latino religion, New Age religion, Islam,
Native American religion, and social activism. With the
contributions of more than 60 authorities in the field--including
Paul Harvey, Loyal Jones, Wayne Flynt, and Samuel F. Weber--this
volume is an accessibly written, up-to-date reference to
religious culture in the American South."
Call number: Reference F209 .N47 2006
|
The
New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture: Volume 2: Geography
- Publisher's Marketing:
"The location of "the South" is hardly a settled
or static geographic concept. Culturally speaking, are Florida
and Arkansas really part of the same region? Is Texas considered
part of the South or the West? This volume of "The New
Encyclopedia of Southern Culture" grapples with the contestable
issue of where the cultural South is located, both on maps
and in the minds of Americans.
Richard Pillsbury's introductory essay explores the evolution
of geographic patterns of life within the region--agricultural
practices, urban patterns, residential buildings, religious
preferences, foodways, and language. The entries that follow
address general topics of cultural geographic interest,
such as Appalachia, exiles and expatriates, Latino and Jewish
populations, migration patterns, and the profound Disneyfication
of central Florida. Entries with a more concentrated focus
examine major cities, such as Atlanta, New Orleans, and
Memphis; the influence of black and white southern migrants
on northern cities; and individual subregions, such as the
Piedmont, Piney Woods, Tidewater, and Delta. Putting together
the disparate pieces that make up the place called "the
South," this volume sets the scene for the discussions
in all the other volumes of "The New Encyclopedia of
Southern Culture.""
Call number: Reference F209 .N47 2006
|
The
New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture: Volume 3:; History -
Publisher's Marketing: "Providing
a chronological and interpretive spine to the twenty-four
volumes of "The New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture,"
this volume broadly surveys history in the American South
from the Paleoindian period (approximately 8000 B.C.E.) to
the present. In 118 essays, contributors cover the turbulent
past of the region that has witnessed frequent racial conflict,
a bloody Civil War fought and lost on its soil, massive in-
and out-migration, major economic transformations, and a civil
rights movement that brought fundamental change to the social
order.
Charles Reagan Wilson's overview essay examines the evolution
of southern history and the way our understanding of southern
culture has unfolded over time and in response to a variety
of events and social forces--not just as the opposite of
the North but also in the larger context of the Atlantic
World. Longer thematic essays cover major eras and events,
such as early settlement, slave culture, Reconstruction,
the New Deal, and the rise of the New South. Brief topical
entries cover individuals--including figures from the Civil
War, the civil rights movement, and twentieth-century politics--and
organizations such as the Southern Christian Leadership
Conference, Daughters of the Confederacy, and Citizens'
Councils, among others. Together, these essays offer a sweeping
reference to the rich history of the region."
Call number: Reference F209 .N47 2006
|
|
The New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture: Volume 4: Myth,
Manners, and Memory - Publisher's
Marketing: "This volume of "The New Encyclopedia
of Southern Culture" addresses the cultural, social,
and intellectual terrain of myth, manners, and historical
memory in the American South. Evaluating how a distinct
southern identity has been created, recreated, and performed
through memories that blur the line between fact and fiction,
this volume paints a broad, multihued picture of the region
seen through the lenses of belief and cultural practice."
Call number: Reference F209 .N47 2006
|
| The
New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture: Volume 5: Language
- Publisher's Marketing:
"The fifth volume of The New Encyclopedia of Southern
Culture explores language and dialect in the South, including
English, Native American languages, and other non-English
languages spoken over time by the region's immigrant communities.
The patchwork of English dialects is also fully presented,
from African American English, Gullah, and Cajun English
to the English spoken in Appalachia, the Ozarks, the Outer
Banks, the Chesapeake Bay Islands, Charleston, and elsewhere.
Topical entries discuss ongoing changes in the pronunciation,
vocabulary, and grammar of English in the increasingly mobile
South, as well as naming patterns, storytelling, preaching
styles, and politeness, all of which deal with ways language
is woven into southern culture."
Call number: Reference F209 .N47 2006
|
The
New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture: Volume 6:Ethnicity
- Publisher's Marketing:
"Moving beyond racial designations of "black,"
"white," and "Indian," this volume of
The New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture complicates and
enriches our understanding of "southernness" by
demonstrating the extent to which it exists as a fabric
of many cultures. This exploration of southern ethnicities
examines the ways people "perform" their cultural
identities through, among other things, dress, dance, and
family tradition. Contributors identify 88 major ethnic
groups that have lived in the South from the Mississippian
Period (1000-1600 C.E.) to the present."
Call number: Reference F209 .N47 2006
|
XHTML/CSS
Basics for Web Writers - Publisher's
Marketing: ""XHTML/CSS Basics for Web Writers"
is an hands-on textbook for Web writing and Web page design
and construction. This book is designed for students with
verying levels of experience in creating Web Sites, from aboslute
beginners to those who need to update their skills for standards-complaint
design. It takes students through the Web design process,
from assembling and inventorying information for a Web site
to writing the text, locating graphics, and creating page
design. The text focuses principally on using Web code, specifically
XHTML and Cascading Style Sheets (CSS). "XHTML/CSS Basics
for Web Writers "topics:
* Information gathering and site planning
* Guide to process of Web writing
* Basic XHTML page construction and basic Cascading Style
Sheet format
* Text tags and styles
* Using the styling Web images
* Using CSS color and background properties
* Using XHTML and CSS for site navigation
* Web site design
* CSS Web page layout
* Using multimedia on Web pages
* XML overview"
donation
Call number: TK5105.888 .B379 2007
|
| Go!
Technology in Action (3RD ed.)
Call number: QA76.5 .E92 2007
Call number: QA76.5 .E92 2007 CD-ROM
donation |
Key
Constitutional Concepts - Publisher's
Marketing: "This documentary begins by introducing
the Constitution and why it was created. These three 20-minute
videos examine key constitutional concepts. The first explains
why the nation's framers created the Constitution. The second
describes the protection of individual rights by highlighting
the Supreme Court case of Gideon v. Wainwright, affirming
the right to an attorney. The last explores the separation
of powers by examining the Supreme Court case of Youngstown
v. Sawyer; a challenge to President Truman's decision to
take over steel mills during the Korean War."
Call number: KF5130.S9 K3 2006 DVD
|
| Our
Constitution: A Conversation - Publisher's
Marketing: "In this DVD, taped on June 5, 2005
at the Supreme Court, Justices Sandra Day O'Connor and Stephen
Breyer answer questions on the Constitution from a group
of high school students. They explain why we need a written
Constitution, separation of powers, federalism, individual
rights, and more."
Call number: KF5130.S9 O9 2005 DVD
|
Mandate:
The President and the People - Publisher's
Marketing: "Narrated by veteran CBS News correspondent
Lesley Stahl, Mandate examines the long and complex relationship
between the presidency and public opinion. Leading historians,
political scientists, and public figures offer insight into
presidents and the presidency from George Washington through
FDR."
Call number: KF5050.S9 M2 2006 DVD
|
| Delivering
Justice: Dialing for Dollars - Publisher's
Marketing: "Telemarketing fraud costs Americans
millions of dollars each year. And when it comes to phony
investment "opportunities," older Americans are
prime targets. This free, 15-minute DVD tells the story
of such a scam and the lives that are ruined by criminals.
The film provides tips on how to protect yourself from investment
fraud and tells you what to do if you've been victimized.
"Dialing for Dollars" is a High Noon film presented
by the U.S. Postal Inspection Service."
Call number: HF 5415.1265 .D5 2004 DVD
|
Work-at-Home
Scams: They Just Don't Pay - Publisher's
Marketing: "Working at home has become attractive
to many stay-at-home moms, college students, and retirees.
While some jobs are legitimate, others just don't deliver
on their promises. This free, short film tells the story
of a new type of work-at-home scam and how a young mother
gets caught up in it. It also provides tips on how you can
avoid being duped by criminals and what to do if you've
been victimized. This High Noon Film is presented by the
U.S. Postal Inspection Service."
Call number: HV6697 .W67 2004 DVD
|
| New
Perspectives on Computer Concepts: Comprehensive with CDROM
(9TH ed.)
Call number: QA76.5 .P3256 2007
donation |
| Database
Systems: Design, Implementation, and Management,
Fifth Edition - Publisher's
Marketing: "Database Systems: Design, Implementation,
and Management, Fifth Edition takes you clearly and effectively
through the entire process of database development and implementation.
The most comprehensive and detailed coverage of database
basics is complemented with ample exercises and problems
at the end of each chapter to encourage hands-on learning,
and a two-chapter step-by-step running case. Because the
Internet has become so firmly established as an extension
of the everyday business data environment, this revised
edition contains two new chapters, "Databases in Electronic
Commerce" and "Web Database Development,"
that stress the need for solid planning and management in
order to maximize the resources that the Internet provides."
Call number: QA76.9 .D26 R62 2002
donation |
| C
How to Program with CDROM (5TH ed.) -
Publisher's Marketing: "The
Deitels' groundbreaking "How to Program" series
offers unparalleled breadth and depth of programming concepts
and intermediate-level topics for further study. The books
in this series feature hundreds of complete, working programs
with thousands of lines of code. Includes strong treatment
of structured algorithm and program development in ANSI/ISO
C with 150 working C programs. New chapters added for C99
and game programming with the Allegro C Library. Includes
rich, 300-page treatment of object-oriented programming
in C++. Presents each new concept in the context of a complete,
working program, immediately followed by one or more windows
showing the program' s input/output dialog. Enhances the
"Live-Code Approach" with syntax coloring. Provides
Helpful Programming Tips, all marked by icons: Good Programming
Practices, Common Programming Errors, Error-Prevention Tips,
Performance Tips, Portability Tips, Software Engineering
Observations, Look and Feel Observations. A valuable reference
for programmers and anyone interested in learning the C
programming language."
Call number: QA76.73 .C15 D44 2007
Call number: QA76.73 .C15 D44 2007 CD-ROM
|
| Go!
with XHTML Comprehensive - Publisher's
Marketing: "Designed for full-semester course
on XHTML, Web design, Web programming, or for a computer
applications course with a Web component. Teach the course
YOU want in LESS TIME! The primary goal of the GO! Series,
aside from teaching computer applications, is ease of implementation,
with an approach that is based on clearly-defined projects
for students."
Call number: QA76.76 .H94 D88 2007
|
| Writing
for the Web: A Practical Guide -
Publisher's Marketing: "Taking
a rhetorical approach," "Writing for the Web:
A Practical Guide" "discusses how invention, arrangement,
and purpose-driven content can make Web writers more authentic
and effective. Written for a wide range of audiences, it
introduces readers to sound Web writing principles and discusses
how technologies, interfaces, and data are impacted by the
choices the writer makes. Exercises, assignments, and case
scenarios encourage readers to practice skills such as captioning
photos, incorporating links and writing FAQ pages. Realistic
projects help readers learn how to organize content, define
writing purpose and craft clear messages that will be powerful
enough to impact Web site visitors and their behavior. Focuses
on planning and writing for audience-driven purposes and
discusses the concepts of identity, content development
and emotional appeal throughout. Offers a flexible organization
that focuses on how to organize content, define writing
purpose and craft clear messages that will be powerful enough
to impact Web site visitors and their behavior. Asks writers
to explore professional, creative, and experimental approaches
to writing and understand how technologies, interfaces,
information, ideas, and data are affected by the choices
that writers make. Provides clear explanations of basic
computer use and Internet infrastructure and helps everyone
get up to speed on the vocabulary, concepts, and basic technology
structures Web writers need to know. Anyone interested in
Web writing."
Call number: TK5105.888 .J46 2007
|
| Web
Development: A Visual-Spatial Approach
- Publisher's Marketing:
"An excellent reference for, professionals and experienced
designers, this text takes a holistic approach to web development.
At the heart of the text is the belief that keeping the
user’ s needs in mind during development process will
create more effective sites. It addresses "planning,"
"structure, navigation, content, design," and
"usability "while focusing on their interconnectedness
within web development. Both traditional and contemporary
theoretical approaches are discussed including rhetorical
theory, visual-spatial thinking, and user-centered design.
A number of real world examples including screen captures
of actual sites, advice from practicing professionals and
ready to use materials make this book a must-have for anyone
interested in effective web development. Provides an overview
of the web development process and planning phases. Covers
the basics of document markup and publishing. Looks at critical
factors in overall development relating to site structure;
navigation systems; research & content development;
visual design; interface design; and usability & accessibility.
Includes examples of architectures, navigation, interface
designs, usability tests, accessibility standards, and content
development. Appropriate for advanced technical writing
courses in Multimedia and Web Design. An excellent resource
for anyone interested in developing effective websites."
Call number: TK5105.888 .B34 2007
|
| Defying
Dementia: Understanding and Preventing Alzheimer's and Related
Disorders - Publisher's Marketing:
"How do we motivate individuals to take action or change
behavior in response to a possible threat that has not yet
materialized? When the threat is dementia, argues longtime
neurologist Robert Levine, it is an issue of considerable
importance. The earlier the campaign is initiated to defeat
this lurking foe, the greater the chances the combatant
will emerge victorious. Written to encourage such defensive
action, Levine's book is meant both as a guide and a reference
to understanding and preventing dementia. It is intended
for lay people interested in learning about dementia and
the measures that can be taken to repel its onslaught, as
well as for caregivers and family members of impaired patients.
Defying Dementia is presented in two sections. First, Levine
explains the various types of dementia, its increasing incidence
and current treatments, and the treatments being tested
and on the horizon. The role of physiology and fresh insights
from the field of genetics are included. The second section
focuses on methods that can be incorporated into a healthy
lifestyle to help avoid dementia. Vignettes illustrate how
dementia in its many forms can be recognized as it emerges.
"With proper actions on our part, we can achieve mastery,"
Levine writes. "The transformation may not be easy,
but recognizing the scourge that dementia is, and the way
it devours the humanity of its victims, may inspire us to
move ahead. Preparation is the key word; building solid
defenses over time. And while any moment is worthwhile to
begin this task, the earlier the better.""
Call number: RC521 .L48 2006
|
Ancient
Egyptian Masonry: The Building Craft -
Publisher's Marketing: "Out
of all the books on Egypt, this one reveals much of the highly
detailed methods the Egyptians used in building their stone
constructions.
We often marvel at the incredible structures they built,
not knowing exactly how it was done. The Great Pyramid's
construction still remains a mystery to many people as far
as the lifting of the stones to such great heights is concerned.
To this day interesting theories abound, but no absolute
proof, or a recreation of the true methods used, have ever
been demonstrated. The authors openly state that their explanation
of the Great Pyramid's construction is not the final answer
and that many mysteries still remain, yet do a fascinating
job in detailing how the huge stones were dressed and laid
out.
Even though the ancient Egyptians did not have high speed
drills, they still had used drills that were adequate enough
to do such absolutely perfect work -- as depicted in a 5th
Dynasty temple in Abusir (found later in the book). Many
mysteries are cleared up in this incredibly detailed book,
which includes over 250 sketches and pictures that back
up the author's claims.
Any serious researcher into ancient Egyptian structures
should not be without this book. It seems at first glance
that many of the incredible monuments of Egypt were built
and raised almost by magic. The structures are absolutely
awe-inspiring, but the authors strip away much of the "magic"
to reveal how hard work, creative ingenuity, and an advanced
knowledge of mathematics and physics account for some of
the amazing architectural feats performed in early Egypt.
At the same time, when a mystery still remains for the authors,
they do not hesitate in admitting it."
Call number: TH16 .C6 1999
|
| The
Great Wall: China Against the World, 1000 BC - AD 2000
- Publisher's Marketing:
"A new and important history of the epic story of the
Great Wall of China that guides the reader through the conquests
and cataclysms of the Chinese empire, from the second millennium
BC the present day. Over 2,200 years old and 4,300 miles
long, the Great Wall of China has made an overwhelmingly
confident physical statement about the country it spans:
about China's age-old sense of being an advanced civilization
anxious to draw a clear line between itself and the "barbarians"
at its borders. But behind the wall's intimidating exterior
-- and the myths that have clustered around it -- is a complex
history that has both defined and undermined China. It is
this history that Julia Lovell explores in her enthralling
book. "The Great Wall" is an epic tale that stretches
over two millennia as it follows the rise and fall of the
great Chinese ruling dynasties. Full of astonishing details
and extraordinary characters -- from emperors to engineers,
statesmen to soldiers -- this is essential reading for anyone
who wants to understand China's past, present, and future."
Call number: DS793.G67 L584 2006
|
Cadfael:
Series 3 - Vendor's
Marketing: "Based on Ellis Peter's CADFAEL series
of novels, this popular television series (which airs as
part of PBS' MYSTERY! lineup in the US) stars Derek Jacobi
as the eponymous clergyman. It follows Cadfael, a monk who,
in his youth, was a crusader, sailor, and adventurer, but
who has now settled down at Shrewsbury Abbey as its resident
gardener, botanist, and herbalist. However, from time to
time, there are mysteries to be solved around the Abbey,
forcing Cadfael to put his startling sleuthing skills into
use. Includes the entire third season of the series: A RAVEN
IN THE FOREGATE, A MORBID TASTE FOR BONES, and THE ROSE
RENT."
Call number: PN1992.8 CadRave DVD
Call number: PN1992.8 CadRose DVD
Call number: PN1992.8 CadMorb DVD
|
Diary
of a Mad Black Woman - The Play - Vendor's
Marketing: "This dramatic production stars Tyler
Perry (who also wrote the play and who has gone on to feature
in a film adaptation) as the cross-dressing, strong-willed
grandma Medea. Helen has just been thrown out by her wealthy,
cheating husband after 18 years of marriage, and now must
look to her mom and her sassy grandmother for help her on
the path to self-discovery."
Call number: PN2220 .D537 2005 DVD
|
| Dr.
Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas! / Horton Hears a
Who! - Vendor's Marketing:
"With the talents of Chuck Jones, Boris Karloff,
and Dr. Seuss combined, there was almost no way this could
be anything but an instant classic. Watched regularly every
holiday season and beloved by children and cynical adults
alike, this animated gem is just that and more. Boris Karloff
narrates and stars as the odious Mr. Grinch, the sinister
green monster who plots to steal all the Christmas presents
in the town of Whoville. All goes well with his dastardly
plan until little Cindy Loo Who (who was no more than two)
gums up the works with her innocent Christmas spirit. Jones
directed, with Karloff supplying the sweetly sinister narration
and voice of the Grinch. The story is from the book by Dr.
Seuss. Thurl Ravenscroft (of "Tony the Tiger"
breakfast commercial fame) provides the memorable bass singing
voice for the tune "You're a Mean One, Mister Grinch."
Filled with close attention to comic detail, memorable characterizations,
and delightful wordplay, this is essential holiday viewing
for the whole family."
Call number: PN1997 HowTheGr DVD
|
Nova
- Secrets Of Lost Empires II: Medieval Siege -
Vendor's Marketing: "Experience
the chaos of medieval battle and the architectural production
of war know as Trebuchet and it's effects on the history
and warfare of England. Narrated by Stacy Keach."
Call number: U873 .S43 2004 DVD
|
Frida
- Vendor's Marketing:
"Brilliant colors that bring Frida Kahlo's Mexico
City to vibrant life combine with a captivating performance
by Salma Hayek to make director Julie Taymor's FRIDA a fascinating
film. Starting and ending with Frida on her deathbed, the
film spans the famous painter's life from her teenage years
to her death at the young age of 47. From start to finish,
Frida is portrayed as a relentlessly energized, self-righteous,
headstrong, asserted woman. She had liberal views and a
socialist political stance. She was bisexual and promiscuous.
She drank and abused painkillers, sang and danced, and fearlessly
poured her pain and beauty into her paintings. At the age
of 18, Frida was horribly injured in a bus accident. Though
she learned to walk again, she lived her life in physical
agony, enduring multiple surgeries, and eventually needing
a wheelchair. Yet her condition did not stop her from having
an exciting, tumultuous life as the wife of famed artist
and womanizer Diego Rivera, who mentored her in her own
work and encouraged her passions. While Frida's life is
the main focus, her work is always present and the action
of the film often fades into paintings and vice versa. However,
the film only hints at the recognition and worldwide display
that her painting received after her death. Taymor has created
a lively and dramatically emotive film with FRIDA, capturing
her endearing resiliency with color, music, and, of course,
art."
Call number: PN1997 Frida DVD
|
Flags
of Our Fathers - Vendor's Marketing:
"Clint Eastwood's early-21st-century output
has endeared him to Academy Awards voters, and he makes
another bid for their attention with this tale of the flag-raising
at Iwo Jima. Eastwood cuts back and forth between the battle
that led to the flag being firmly planted in enemy soil,
and the tour undertaken by three of the flag-planting Marines
(played by Ryan Phillippe, Jesse Bradford, and Adam Beach)
in the aftermath of World War II. The re-creation of Iwo
Jima features impressive APOCALYPSE NOW-style battle scenes,
the air full of thick plumes of smoke, zinging bullets,
and pounding explosions. But the most interesting part of
the movie comes as the three men are paraded in front of
the American public, as they vacillate between embarrassment
and anger at the public relations campaign they find themselves
embroiled in, while also pleading with the public to help
provide funds for the soldiers who are still at war. Eastwood
uses a script co-written by CRASH director Paul Haggis and
a source book written by James Bradley, the son of John
"Doc" Bradley (played by Phillippe in the film),
to tell this affecting tale. Tom Stern, who worked with
Eastwood on MILLION DOLLAR BABY, employs his skills as a
cinematographer once again, deftly coupling vast panoramic
battle scenes with darkly contemplative moments between
the touring soldiers. Fascinatingly, the director's next
jaunt behind the lens was LETTERS FROM IWO JIMA, which provided
the Japanese perspective on this famous event."
Call number: PN1997 FlagsOf DVD
|
The
Good Shepherd - Vendor's Marketing:
"With THE GOOD SHEPHERD, Robert De Niro (A BRONX
TALE) makes an ambitious return to the director’s
chair. A labor of love for Oscar-winning screenwriter Eric
Roth (FORREST GUMP), the film tells an epic, fictionalized
account of how the Central Intelligence Agency was born.
Matt Damon plays Edward Wilson, a reserved young man who
graduated from Yale in the late 1930s. His membership in
the exclusive, hidden Skull and Bones society led him away
from poetry and into a relationship with the federal government,
who recruited him to help them on several covert operations.
Roth’s script alternates between Wilson’s gradual
emergence as a genuine government operative in the early
1940s and the infamous Bay of Pigs conflict in the early
1960s. Along the way, he has a sweet romance with a pretty
deaf girl (a sparkling Tammy Blanchard) and ends up marrying
the woman he impregnates (Angelina Jolie) out of a strong
sense of duty. Throughout the film, the emergence of a mysterious
tape haunts Wilson, who is determined to uncover the truth
behind a leak in his secret organization. Production designer
Jeannine Claudia Oppewall (L.A. CONFIDENTIAL, CATCH ME IF
YOU CAN) and costume designer Ann Roth (THE ENGLISH PATIENT,
THE TALENTED MR. RIPLEY) faithfully recreate these earlier
periods in American history, while the imagery of Oscar-winning
cinematographer Robert Richardson (J.F.K., THE AVIATOR)
casts a warm, stately glow upon De Niro’s assembled
cast of luminaries (including Alec Baldwin, Michael Gambon,
William Hurt, Billy Crudup, and Joe Pesci)."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 GoodShep DVD
|
The
Last King of Scotland - Vendor's
Marketing: "Forest Whitaker delivers a ferociously
commanding performance as bloodthirsty Ugandan president
Idi Amin in Kevin MacDonald’s THE LAST KING OF SCOTLAND.
Adapted from the novel by Giles Foden, the film recounts
Amin’s horrific reign through the eyes of a fictional
character, Nick Garrigan (James McAvoy), a young doctor
from Scotland who travels to Uganda hoping to do some good.
Nick is more sanguine about new president Amin than is his
counterpart Sarah Merrit (Gillian Armstrong), whose experience
causes her to be skeptical of Amin’s bombastic declarations.
After an automobile accident, Nick is called in to treat
the president’s wounds. His authoritative behavior
impresses Amin, who charms Nick into becoming his personal
physician. Nick embraces his newfound life of luxury, but
he is unable to grasp the reality of the situation. When
he does finally realize the atrocities Amin is inflicting
upon his people (and is also capable of inflicting on Nick),
the terrified doctor tries to make a frantic escape before
it's too late. MacDonald, director of the acclaimed documentaries
ONE DAY IN SEPTEMBER and TOUCHING THE VOID, makes a startlingly
assured transition into fictional filmmaking with THE LAST
KING OF SCOTLAND. Working with cinematographer Anthony Dod
Mantle (THE CELEBRATION) and editor Justine Wright, MacDonald
brings 1970s Uganda to pulsating life, perfectly recreating
that tumultuous era. But ultimately the film belongs to
Whitaker: as he shifts from charming to maniacal in the
space of a short, unexpected breath, he infuses Amin with
startling humanity."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 LastKing DVD
|
Boiling
Point: How Politicians, Big Oil and Coal, Journalists and
Activists Are Fueling the Climate Crisis--and What We Can
Do to Avert Disaster - Publisher's
Marketing: "In Boiling Point, Pulitzer Prize-winning
journalist Ross Gelbspan argues that, unchecked, climate change
will swamp every other issue facing us today. Indeed, what
began as an initial response of many institutions-denial and
delay-has now grown into a crime against humanity. Gelbspan's
previous book, The Heat Is On, exposed the financing of climate-change
skeptics by the oil and coal companies. In Boiling Point,
he reveals exactly how the fossil fuel industry is directing
the Bush administration's energy and climate policies -payback
for helping Bush get elected. Even more surprisingly, Gelbspan
points a finger at both the media and environmental activists
for unwittingly worsening the crisis. Finally, he offers a
concrete plan for averting a full-blown climate catastrophe.
According to Gelbspan, a proper approach to climate change
could solve many other problems in our social, political,
and economic lives. It would dramatically reduce our reliance
on oil, and with it our exposure to instability in the Middle
East. It would create millions of jobs and raise living
standards in poor countries whose populations are affected
by climate-driven disease epidemics and whose borders are
overrun by environmental refugees. It would also expand
the global economy and lead to a far wealthier and more
peaceful world. A passionate call-to-arms and a thoughtful
roadmap for change, Boiling Point reveals what's at stake
for our fragile planet."
Call number: QC981.8 .G56 G44 2005
|
| The
Out-Of-Sync Child - Publisher's
Marketing: "NEWLY REVISED AND UPDATED
"The Out-of-Sync Child" broke new ground by identifying
Sensory Processing Disorder, a common but frequently misdiagnosed
problem in which the central nervous system misinterprets
messages from the senses. This newly revised edition features
additional information from recent research on vision and
hearing deficits, motor skill problems, nutrition and picky
eaters, ADHA, autism, and other related disorders."
Call number: RJ496.B7 K72 2005
|
| Sensational
Kids: Hope and Help for Children with Sensory Processing
Disorder - Publisher's Marketing:
"Imagine, for a moment, that you are a parent of a
child with no visible disability, but whose experiences
of everyday life present constant challenges. What may be
typical activities for most people-eating, dressing, making
friends, taking a spelling test, responding to a hug-are
a struggle, often resulting in social, emotional, and academic
problems.
This is the bewildering and largely uncharted world of Sensory
Processing Disorder-a complex brain disorder affecting one
in twenty children. These children experience sensations-
taste, touch, sound, sight, smell, movement and body awareness-vastly
differently from other children their ages.They may feel
attacked by the slightest touch, fail to register bumps
and bruises, or be unable to figure out where they are in
space without constantly touching others. While SPD is more
widely recognized than it once was, parents of these sensational
children have been searching for ways to help their children
navigate in the world. Dr. Lucy Miller, the best-known SPD
researcher in the world, is that voice: warm, clear, and
upbeat, Dr. Miller identifies the disorder and its four
major subtypes, provides insight into assessment and diagnosis,
and suggests treatment options and strategies, including
the importance of occupational therapy and parental involvement.
Portraits of five children illustrate the different ways
in which SPD may manifest itself as well as how families
cope, while offering hope and advice to parents on how to
be the best possible advocates for their children.
Comprehensive and compassionate, "Sensational Children"
is the book no parent, teacher, or caregiver of children
with SPD should be without."
Call number: RJ496 .S44 M55 2006
|
| Raising
a Sensory Smart Child: The Definitive Handbook for Helping
Your Child with Sensoryintegration Issues
- Publisher's Marketing:
"Children with Sensory Integration (SI) Dysfunction--a
condition that does not allow the body to properly process
sensations--often display delayed mother, speech, and social
skills. Now as awareness of this condition reaches an all-time
high, this comprehensive guidebook offers cutting-edge advice
to parents of SI children. Written by an occupational therapist
and a parent with a child with SI dysfunction, "Raising
a Sensory Smart Child makes it easy for readers to recognize
and understand their child's sensory issues and to find
the best treatment for their child's needs."
Call number: HQ773.6 .B53 2005
|
| How
Proust Can Change Your Life - Publisher's
Marketing: "Alain de Botton combines two unlikely
genres--literary biography and self-help manual--in the
hilarious and unexpectedly practical How Proust Can Change
Your Life.
Who would have thought that Marcel Proust, one of the most
important writers of our century, could provide us with
such a rich source of insight into how best to live life?
Proust understood that the essence and value of life was
the sum of its everyday parts. As relevant today as they
were at the turn of the century, Proust's life and work
are transformed here into a no-nonsense guide to, among
other things, enjoying your vacation, reviving a relationship,
achieving original and uncliched articulation, being a good
host, recognizing love, and understanding why you should
never sleep with someone on a first date. It took de Botton
to find the inspirational in Proust's essays, letters and
fiction and, perhaps even more surprising, to draw out a
vivid and clarifying portrait of the master from between
the lines of his work.
Here is Proust as we have never seen or read him before:
witty, intelligent, pragmatic. He might well change your
life."
Call number: PQ2631 .R63 Z54917 1997
|
The
Swamp: The Everglades, Florida, and the Politics of Paradise
- Publisher's Marketing:
"The Everglades was once reviled as a liquid wasteland,
and Americans dreamed of draining it. Now it is revered as
a national treasure, and Americans have launched the largest
environmental project in history to try to save it. "The
Swamp" is the stunning story of the destruction and possible
resurrection of the Everglades, the saga of man's abuse of
nature in southern Florida and his unprecedented efforts to
make amends. Michael Grunwald, a prize-winning national reporter
for "The Washington Post," takes readers on a riveting
journey from the Ice Ages to the present, illuminating the
natural, social and political history of one of America's
most beguiling but least understood patches of land.
The Everglades was America's last frontier, a wild country
long after the West was won. Grunwald chronicles how a series
of visionaries tried to drain and "reclaim" it,
and how Mother Nature refused to bend to their will; in
the most harrowing tale, a 1928 hurricane drowned 2,500
people in the Everglades. But the Army Corps of Engineers
finally tamed the beast with levees and canals, converting
half the Everglades into sprawling suburbs and sugar plantations.
And though the southern Everglades was preserved as a national
park, it soon deteriorated into an ecological mess. The
River of Grass stopped flowing, and 90 percent of its wading
birds vanished.
Now America wants its swamp back. Grunwald shows how a
new breed of visionaries transformed Everglades politics,
producing the $8 billion rescue plan. That plan is already
the blueprint for a new worldwide era of ecosystem restoration.
And this book is a cautionary tale for that era. Through
gripping narrative and dogged reporting, Grunwaldshows how
the Everglades is still threatened by the same hubris, greed
and well-intentioned folly that led to its decline."
Call number: F317.E9 G78 2007
|
| Stories
of Deliverence: Speaking with Men and Women Who Rescue Jews
from the Holocaust - Publisher's
Marketing: "When Marek Halter was five years
old, he and his family fled from the Warsaw Ghetto with
the help of two Polish Catholics. Fifty-three years later,
now a distinguished French writer and social commentator,
Halter returned to Warsaw, and from there went on a quest
across Europe, seeking out and interviewing gentiles who
had risked their own lives to save the lives of Jews in
Nazi-occupied Europe. From his research with Holocaust survivors,
Halter developed a list of "the Just" - those
who, according to Jewish tradition, must exist in each generation
in order to save the world from destruction. Halter's encounters
with these heroes and with those they saved are described
in a series of little stories, interspersed with his own
memories and observations. These "just" men and
women range from obscure peasants to such notables as former
West German chancellor Willy Brandt, the post-Communist
leader of Lithuania, and the present Pope. The material
of this book also forms the subject of a film directed by
Halter, Tzedek: The Righteous."
Call number: D804.65 .H3513 1998
|
| Children
with a Star: Jewish Youth in Nazi Europe
- Publisher's Marketing:
"This powerful and moving book tells for the first
time the history of the children who lived and died in the
shadow of the Holocaust. Drawing on oral histories, archival
records, letters and diaries, Dwork evokes and analyzes
the feelings, activities, and perceptions of Jewish children
in Nazi Europe. Illustrated."
Call number: D804.3 .D86 1991
|
| Holocaust:
A History - Publisher's Marketing:
"Unrivaled in scope, "Holocaust" is a story
of all Europe, of the vast sweep of events in which this
great atrocity was rooted, from the Middle Ages to the modern
era."
Call number: D804.3 .D87 2003
|
| The
Art of the Handwritten Note: A Guide to Reclaiming Civilized
Communication - Publisher's
Marketing: "When you receive the daily mail
do you jump to open the handwritten envelopes first because
you can't wait to see who has written and why? Or do you
hold those letters aside to savor and enjoy after you are
done sorting your bills and tossing the junk mail? Whatever
your approach, you no doubt recognize the importance of
the note that comes in a unique envelope with distinct handwriting
and possibly a decoration or two. Indeed, in an age when
even birthday greetings are sent by e-mail, the personal
letter is appreciated more than ever before.
For those who enjoy writing notes, or those who value doing
so but find themselves intimidated by the task, acclaimed
calligrapher Margaret Shepherd has created both an epistolary
tribute and rescue manual. Just as you cherish receiving
personal mail, you can take pleasure in crafting correspondence.
Love, gratitude, condolences, congratulations-for every
emotion and occasion, a snippet of heartfelt prose is included,
sure to loosen the most stymied letter writer.
Not only providing inspiration for the content of the missives,
"The Art of the Handwritten Note gives thorough instruction
in the specific details that give so many men and women
the jitters when it comes to correspondence that can't (or
shouldn't) be produced on a keyboard. From overcoming illegible
penmanship to mastering the challenge of keeping straight
margins, avoiding smeared ink, and choosing stationery that
is appropriate but suits your style, this is a powerful
little guide to conveying thoughts in an enduring-and noteworthy-way."
Call number: PE1483 .S425 2002
|
| The
White Man's Burden: Why the West's Efforts to Aid the Rest
Have Done So Much Ill and So Little Good - Publisher's
Marketing: "An informed and excoriating attack
on the tragic waste, futility, and hubris of the West's
efforts to date to improve the lot of the so-called developing
world, with constructive suggestions on how to move forward.
William Easterly's "The White Man's Burden" is
about what its author calls the twin tragedies of global
poverty. The first, of course, is that so many are seemingly
fated to live horribly stunted, miserable lives and die
such early deaths. The second is that after fifty years
and more than $2.3 trillion in aid from the West to address
the first tragedy, it has shockingly little to show for
it. We'll never solve the first tragedy, Easterly argues,
unless we figure out the second.
The ironies are many: We preach a gospel of freedom and
individual accountability, yet we intrude in the inner workings
of other countries through bloated aid bureaucracies like
the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank that
are accountable to no one for the effects of their prescriptions.
We take credit for the economic success stories of the last
fifty years, like South Korea and Taiwan, when in fact we
deserve very little. However, we reject all accountability
for pouring more than half a trillion dollars into Africa
and other regions and trying one "big new idea"
after another, to no avail. Most of the places in which
we've meddled are in fact no better off or are even worse
off than they were before. Could it be that we don't know
as much as we think we do about the magic spells that will
open the door to the road to wealth?
Absolutely, William Easterly thunders in this angry, irreverent,
and important book. He contrasts two approaches: (1) the
ineffective planners'approach to development-never able
to marshal enough knowledge or motivation to get the overambitious
plans implemented to attain the plan's arbitrary targets
and (2) a more constructive searchers' approach-always on
the lookout for piecemeal improvements to poor peoples'
well-being, with a system to get more aid resources to those
who find things that work. Once we shift power and money
from planners to searchers, there's much we can do that's
focused and pragmatic to improve the lot of millions, such
as public health, sanitation, education, roads, and nutrition
initiatives. We need to face our own history of ineptitude
and learn our lessons, especially at a time when the question
of our ability to "build democracy," to transplant
the institutions of our civil society into foreign soil
so that they take root, has become one of the most pressing
we face."
Call number: HC59.7 .E22 2006
|
| Wigfield:
The Can-Do Town That Just May Not by Amy Sedaris,
Paul Dinello, and Stephen Colbert ; photographs by Todd
Oldham - Publisher's
Marketing: "A hilarious illustrated satire of
a Lake Wobegon gone hideously wrong and the earnest reporter
who hopes to save it from extinction Wigfield is a town
in danger. Built directly in front of a massive dam, this
bucolic hideaway will soon be flooded when the dam is torn
down by the state government to restore the salmon run.
Wigfield's only hope lies in the self-righteous, self-aggrandizing,
self-involved "journalist" Russell Hokes, who
arrives hoping to capture the quiet dignity of the disappearing
American Small Town. However, Wigfield is neither quiet
nor dignified. And as the date of Wigfield's destruction
draws nearer, Hokes casts about like a cork in a typhoon
desperate to find something about Wigfield worth documenting--or
saving. Told through interviews with its many colorful residents,
and accompanied by photos of the authors in character, Wigfield
is a razor-sharp satire by three major talents."
Call number: PS3619 .E34 W5 2003
|
| Air
Pollution: Problems and Solutions - Publisher's
Marketing: "Society has a profound impact on
the progress and acceptance of new science--and vice versa.
For instance, over the past five years, events indicate
that citizens' views have helped change the locus of the
research and development carried out by both the U.S. Department
of Agriculture and by the Environmental Protection Agency.
Likewise, citizen actions have influenced the direction
of the activities of organizations such as the World Bank
in their efforts to improve agriculture and living conditions
in the developing nations of the world."
Call number: TD883 .K47 2006
|
| The
Politics of Air Pollution: Urban Growth, Ecological Modernization,
and Symbolic Inclusion - Publisher's
Marketing: "Who has been at the political forefront
of clean air policy development in the United States? "In
the Politics of Air Pollution, George A. Gonzalez argues
that the answer is neither the federal governent, nor environmental
groups, but rather locally oriented economic elites in conjuction
with state and local governments. These local growth coalitions,
composed of mostly large landholders, land developers, and
the owners of regional media and utility firms, support
clean air policies insofar as they contribute to the creation
of a positive investment climate and, in turn, bring about
greater profits through increased land values and an expanded
local consumer base."
Call number: HC110.A4 G66 2005
|
| Fresh
Air for Life: How to Win Your Unseen War Against Indoor
Air Pollution - Publisher's
Marketing: "Urgent News for all of us who really
care about our health, our family, and our home sweet home!
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) ranked indoor
air pollution among the top five most significant environmental
dangers to the public. Their research concluded that indoor
air can be two to ten times (and sometimes as much as 100
times!) more polluted than outside air. Dr. Somersall takes
you through the "Concerns you can no Longer Ignore,
the Consequences You can't Afford.""
Call number: RA577.5 .S67 2006
|
Inventing
Pollution: Coal, Smoke and Culture in Britain since 1800
- Publisher's Marketing:
"A far-reaching study, which looks at the origins of
the very concept of pollution. Far from viewing coal smoke
as pollution, most people of 19-century Britain viewed it
as a valuable disinfectant. Inventing Pollution looks at
the radically new understanding of pollution that emerged
in the lat part of the century and gave way to new ways
of thinking about the environment."
Call number: TD883.7 .G7 T48 2006
|
Compost
- Publisher's Marketing:
"The most practical book that all gardeners have been
waiting for, this fun and informative guide shows how to
make the best compost using ingredients that are easily
found around the house."
Call number: TD796.5 .T46 2007
|
| Arts
and Crafts of Ancient China
Call number: TT101 .M67 2007
|
The
Lady & Sons Just Desserts: More Than 120 Sweet Temptations
from Savannah's Favorite Restaurant -
Publisher's Marketing: ""As
Paula Deen will tell y'all, there's just no satisfying way
to finish a delicious meal without a scrumptious, mouthwatering
dessert!" In this beautiful hardcover edition of "The
Lady & Sons Just Desserts," Paula -- author, restaurateur,
and Food Network star -- devotes her trademark southern
charm to a tempting collection of more than 120 delightful
recipes, guaranteed to indulge any sweet tooth. Whether
you're baking for the holidays or an after-dinner treat,
there are crowd-pleasers here for any occasion.
These are the classic down-home recipes that have made
Paula beloved to her fans everywhere, from her signature
Gooey Butter Cake and Key Lime Grits Pie to Pecan Shortbread
Bars, Hidden Mint Cookies, and Iron Skillet Brownies. Whether
you're whipping up an Old South Jelly Roll Cake for a weekday
treat or baking the Apple Butter Pumpkin Pie or Christmas
Nut Pie for a holiday celebration, these treats are as easy
to create as they are to enjoy. The Basic 1-2-3-4 Cake --
in coconut (Jamie's favorite), caramel (Bobby's favorite),
or chocolate -- makes a wonderful birthday surprise, and
the Tennessee Banana-Black Walnut Cake with Caramel Frosting
is a southern favorite sure to become one of yours as well.
There is also a wide array of cookies, bars, and candy,
including Savannah Cheesecake Cookies, Orange Brownies,
Chocolate Brickle, and Creamy Caramels. Even the most time-pressed
cook will find it a snap to create these from-scratch recipes,
using Paula's tips for reliable convenience ingredients
and time-tested shortcuts that will impress and delight
family and friends.
Filled with warm baking memories and family stories, "The
Lady & Sons Just Desserts" isalready a kitchen
classic. There are also helpful baking tips for measuring
ingredients, storing leftovers, and even cutting a few calories,
as well as tasty flavor variations and unique serving suggestions
throughout. So bring the folks together to create your own
memorable meals and occasions and remember to save room
for dessert!"
Call number: TX773 .D2966 2006
|
We
Are Their Heaven: Why the Dead Never Leave Us
- Publisher's Marketing:
"What happens to our loved ones when they die?
Is there a heaven?
Is there a true connection and communication between the
living and the dead?
Allison DuBois invites us into her world where she delivers
messages from our lost loved ones. She convinces us that
those who have passed away are constantly with us, providing
comfort, love, and support. They are as eager to reach us
as we are to stay connected with them.
But the dead have a language of their own. They communicate
through signs, dreams, songs, coincidences, and messages
delivered in unexpected ways. Allison takes us on an odyssey
of these signs — how to recognise them, how to read
them, and how to interpret them. In these pages, you will
meet people who have had both heartbreaking and heartwarming
communication with the other side, providing comforting
proof that our deceased loved ones stay with us and continue
to share in the joys of our lives.
Contributor Bio: Allison DuBois
Allison DuBois' unique story, the inspiration for the hit
international TV series "Medium", started during
her senior year at an Arizona university while she was interning
at the D.A.'s office. Soon after, researchers at the university
validated her ability through a series of tests. Allison
donates her time to missing persons and criminal cases for
agencies across America."
Call number: BF1283 .D82 A3 2007
|
| The
World Doesn't End - Publisher's
Marketing: "In this collection, winner of the
1990 Pulitzer Prize, Charles Simic puns, pulls pranks. He
can be jazzy and streetwise. Or cloak himself in antiquity.
Simic has new eyes, and in these wonderful poems and poems-in-prose
he lets the reader see through them."
Call number: PS3569 .I4725 W67 1989a
|
| The
Art of Travel - Publisher's
Marketing: "Any Baedeker will tell us "where
we ought to travel, but only Alain de Botton will tell us
"how and "why. With the same intelligence and
insouciant charm he brought to How Proust Can Save Your
Life," de Botton considers the pleasures of anticipation;
the allure of the exotic, and the value of noticing everything
from a seascape in Barbados to the takeoffs at Heathrow.
Even as de Botton takes the reader along on his own peregrinations,
he also cites such distinguished fellow-travelers as Baudelaire,
Wordsworth, Van Gogh, the biologist Alexander von Humboldt,
and the 18th-century eccentric Xavier de Maistre, who catalogued
the wonders of his bedroom. The Art of Travel is a wise
and utterly original book. Don't leave home without it."
Call number: G151 .D4 2004
|
J.K.
Lasser's Your Income Tax (2007) -
Publisher's Marketing: " Basics
of Filing (Chap. 1) including:
Which form to file – Chap. 1 Filing as Head of Household
– Chap. 1
Filing for your children – Chap. 1 Filing for married
couples – Chap. 1 What Must You Report as Income? (Chaps.
2– 11) including:
Fringe Benefits – Chap. 3 Capital gains & losses
– Chap. 5
Traditional & Roth IRAs – Chap. 8 Rental Income
– Chap. 9 What Deductions Can You Claim? (Chaps. 12–
21) including:
Moving expenses – Chap. 12 Casualty Loss – Chap.
18
Charitable deductions – Chap. 14 Who is a dependent?
– Chap. 21 How Much Tax Do You Owe? (Chaps. 22–
27)including:
The AMT – Chap. 23 Your child's tax – Chap. 24
Personal tax credits – Chap. 25 Estimated taxes –
Chap. 27 Strategies to Save You Taxes (Chaps. 28– 39)
including:
Tax-free residence sales – Chap. 29 Investing in securities
– Chap. 30
Armed forces rules – Chap. 35 Tax credits for education
– Chap. 33 Planning Ideas for Your Business (Chaps.
40– 45) including:
Home office deduction – Chap. 40 Keogh, Simple, or SEP
– Chap. 41
Auto expenses – Chap. 43 Self-employment tax –
Chap. 45 Now That You're Done (Chaps. 46– 49) including:
Electronic filing – Chap. 46 Filing extensions –
Chap. 46
IRS Audits – Chap. 48 Amended returns – Chap.
47
The Most Trusted Name in Tax
For over 70 years, more than 39 million Americans have
trusted J.K. Lasser to help them save money at tax time
Now with USABLE FORMS ONLINE FREE ONLINE BONUSESAND TAX
PREP GUIDANCE FOR ALL YOUR TAX NEEDS COVERS ALL 2006 TAX
LAW CHANGES
Easy-to-Use Format Explains Complex Tax Laws
FILING TIPS and FILING INSTRUCTIONShelp you prepare your
2006 return
PLANNING REMINDERS highlight year-end tax strategies for
2006 and planning opportunities for 2007 and later years
CAUTIONS point out potential pitfalls toavoid and areas
where you might expectIRS opposition
LAW ALERTS indicate recent changes in the tax law and pending
legislation before Congress
COURT DECISIONS highlight key rulings from the Tax Court
and other federal courts
IRS ALERTS highlight key rulings andannouncements from
the IRS"
Call number: HJ4652 .J3 2007
|
| Blizzard
of One: Poems - Publisher's
Marketing: "Strand's poems occupy a place that
exists between abstraction and the sensuous particulars
of experience. It is a place created by a voice that moves
with unerring ease between the commonplace and the sublime.
The poems are filled with "the weather of leavetaking,"
but they are also unexpectedly funny. The erasure of self
and the depredations of time are seen as sources of sorrow,
but also as grounds for celebration. This is one of the
difficult truths these poems dramatize with stoicism and
wit. The winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry, Blizzard
of One is an extraordinary book--the summation of the work
of a lifetime by one of our very few true masters of the
art of poetry."
Call number: PS3569 .T69 B57 2000
|
| Wild
Iris - Publisher's
Marketing: "This collection of stunningly beautiful
poems encompasses the natural, human, and spiritual realms,
and is bound together by the universal themes of time and
mortality. With clarity and sureness of craft, Gluck's poetry
questions, explores, and finally celebrates the ordeal of
being alive."
Call number: PS3557 .L8 W5 1992
|
The
Real Pepsi Challenge: The Inspirational Story of Breaking
the Color Barrier in American Business - Publisher's
Marketing: "In America's long march toward racial
equality, small acts of courage by men and women whose names
we don't recall have contributed mightily to our nation's
struggle to achieve its own ideals. This moving book details
the story of one such little-noted chapter.
In the late 1940s and early 1950s, as Jackie Robinson changed
the face of baseball, a group of African-American businessmen
-- twelve at its peak -- changed the face of American business
by being among the first black Americans to work at professional
jobs in Corporate America and to target black consumers
as a distinct market.
The corporation was Pepsi-Cola, led by the charismatic
and socially progressive Walter Mack, a visionary business
leader. Though Mack was a guarded idealist, his consent
for a campaign aimed at black consumers was primarily motivated
by the pursuit of profits -- and the campaign succeeded,
boosting Pepsi's earnings and market share. But America
succeeded as well, as longstanding stereotypes were chipped
away and African- Americans were recognized as both talented
employees and valued customers. It was a significant step
in our becoming a more inclusive society.
On one level, "The Real Pepsi Challenge," whose
author is an editor and writer for "The Wall Street
Journal," is a straightforward business book about
the birth of niche marketing. But, as we quickly learn,
it is a truly inspirational story, recalling a time when
we as a nation first learned to see the strength of our
diversity. It is far more than a history of marketing in
America; it is a key chapter in the social history of our
nation.
Until these men came along, typical advertisements depicted
African-Americans as one-dimensionalcharacters: Aunt Jemimas
and Uncle Bens. But thereafter, Pepsi-Cola took a different
approach, portraying American blacks for what they were
increasingly becoming -- accomplished middle-class citizens.
While such portrayals seem commonplace to us today, they
were revolutionary in their time, and the men who brought
them into existence risked day-to-day professional indignities
parallel to those that Jackie Robinson suffered for breaking
baseball's color line. As they crossed the country in the
course of their jobs, they faced the cruelty of American
racial attitudes. Jim Crow laws often limited where they
could eat and sleep while on the road, and they faced resistance
even within their own company. Yet these men succeeded as
businessmen, and all went on to success in other professions
as well, including medicine, journalism, education, and
international diplomacy.
Happily, six of these pioneers lived to tell their stories
to the author. Their voices, full of pride, good humor,
and sharp recollection, enrich these pages and give voice
to the continuing American saga."
Call number: HD9349 .S634 P462 2007
|
Boys
Get Anorexia Too: Coping with Male Eating Disorders in the
Family - Publisher's Marketing:
"Eating disorders are usually associated with females
but there are an increasing number of males affected by anorexia
and bulimia. Often there is a link between male eating disorders
and athletic prowess, and the quest for physical perfection
can result in damaging behaviours associated with diet, supplements
and exercise.
This unique and important book combines a mine of information
with a readable and engaging case study. The author was
shocked and horrified when her son developed anorexia at
the age of twelve. Having a research background, she naturally
turned her attention to finding out as much as she could
about how best to combat this terrifying illness. Her son
is now fully recovered and has supported this book that
not only describes their experiences, but also provides
a practical guide on how to cope with male eating disorders.
A much needed resource for other parents in similar situations,
the book will also be of interest to people working in health
centres, clinics and hospitals. It will also be invaluable
for youth support groups, teachers and sports coaching staff,
who are often the first to be aware of concerns about eating
disorders in young men."
Call number: RC552 .A5 L375 2006
|
| Fit
In!: The Unofficial Guide to Corporate Culture -
Publisher's Marketing: "Every
corporation is different -- and so are you. For job seekers
and managers, FIT IN! The Unofficial Guide to Corporate
Culture is your map to navigating the back doors and underground
paths to corporate success. Now human identity expert Mark
Williams has done the unthinkable and spilled the beans,
identifying the "10 Fit Factors" that define a
company's culture. "
Call number: HD58.7 .W545 2007
|
| Between
Worlds: The Making of an American Life - Publisher's
Marketing: "A rising star of the Democratic
Party tells the fascinating story of the ways his multicultural
heritage and political education have shaped his dreams
for America and given him vital lessons in the art of successful
negotiating.
Bill Richardson, the governor of New Mexico, may be the
most charismatic figure in the Democratic Party today and
one of its best natural politicians whose name isn't Bill
Clinton. He is the man Colin Powell has called for advice,
and the man George Stephanopoulos once called the Red Adair
of diplomacy in homage to his ability to put out international
fires. He has been nominated four times for the Nobel Peace
Prize and is counted as one of our most knowledgeable politicians
on Iraq and Saddam Hussein; on Afghanistan, the Taliban,
and Al-Qaeda; on North Korea; on energy policy; on Latin
American affairs; on domestic politics; and on Hispanic
America.
Richardson's background as the son of an American businessman
father and a Mexican mother has offered him an unusual starting
point from which to seek a life in public service, but one
of his most interesting roles has been that of global troubleshooter.
What he has to say about how to negotiate to get what you
want shows his true colors: He can be blunt, but charming;
tough, but respectful; realistic, but hopeful. Through his
work as a hostage negotiator sitting across the table from
the likes of Saddam Hussein, Fidel Castro, and many others-as
well as his toil on Capitol Hill, in the United Nations,
and New Mexico's state government-he has learned the vital
importance of preparation: know as much as possible about
your adversary; test your partner's truthfulness; know how
much you can concede; never lieand always be direct.
"Between Worlds" is the surprising story of
one of our most seasoned and captivating national figures."
Call number: F801.4 .R53 A3 2005
|
Leadership
- Publisher's Marketing:
"Writing in his familiar voice -- a New Yorker's bluntness,
leavened by his passion for ideas -- Rudolph Giuliani demonstrates
in Leadership how the leadership skills he practices can be
employed successfully by anyone who has to run anything. After
all, until the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center
pushed him into an unwanted role in history, Giuliani was
only months away from leaving office with a reputation as
one of the most effective mayors New York had ever seen.
Having inherited a city ravaged by crime and crippled in
its ability to serve its citizens, Giuliani shows how he
found that every aspect of his career up to that point-from
clerking for the formidable judge who demanded excellence
(and rewarded it with a lifetime of loyalty) to busting
organized crime during his years as a federal attorney-shaped
his thinking about leadership and prepared him for the daunting
challenges ahead. Giuliani's successes in turn strengthened
his conviction about the core qualities required to be an
effective leader, no matter what the size of the organization,
be it an international corporation or a baseball team.
In detailing his principles of leadership, Giuliani tells
captivating stories that are personal as well as prescriptive:
how he learned the importance of staying calm in the face
of attack from his father's boxing lessons-as well as the
need to stand up to bullies; how a love of reading was early
instilled in him by his mother and grew into a determination
to master new subjects, and not rely on only the word of
experts; how, in his recent fight with prostate cancer,
learning to make decisions at the right time and with the
right information reflected decision-making on a larger
scale.
Leadership, Giuliani writes, works both ways: it is a privilege,
but it carries responsibilities-from imposing a structure
suitable to an organization's purpose, to forming a team
of people who bring out the best in each other, to taking
the right, unexpected risks. A leader must develop strong
beliefs, and be held accountable for the results-principles
he illustrates with candor and courage throughout the pages
of this important and timely book. He never knew that the
qualities he describes would be put to the awful test of
September 11, he says; but he never doubted that they would
prevail."
Call number: HM1261 .G58 2004
|
| Earth
in the Balance: Ecology and the Human Spirit -
Publisher's Marketing: "A
passionate and lifelong defender of the environment, Vice
President Al Gore describes in this classic best-selling
book how human actions and decisions can endanger or safeguard
the vulnerable ecosystem that sustains us all. The book's
groundbreaking analysis helped place the environment on
the national agenda, summoning politicians, the media, and
the public to attention and action. The message remains
just as urgent today as it did eight years ago: while much
has been accomplished, we must meet a global environmental
challenge that reaches into every aspect of our society.
In brave and unforgettable terms, Earth in the Balance probes
the roots of the environmental crisis and offers a bold
and forceful vision of a new, more sustainable path. Having
provoked international discussion upon its original publication,
it continues to confront us with profound challenges. Human
civilization must change its course if we are to heal our
ailing environment and preserve the earth's ecology for
future generations.
Vice President Gore describes in a new foreword to this
classic what we have achieved and what remains to be done,
and issues a clarion call to begin the millennium with an
"Environment Decade." It is time to reflect deeply
on the fate of our planet and commit ourselves to its future."
Call number: GE170 .G67 2006
|
Paula
Deen: It Ain't All about the Cookin' - Publisher's
Marketing: " Do you know the real Paula Deen?
You may think you know the butter-loving, finger-licking,
joke-cracking queen of melt-in-your-mouth Southern cuisine.
You may have even visited The Lady & Sons to taste for
yourself the down-home delicacies that made her famous and
even heard some version of her Cinderella story (a single
mom with two teenage sons started a brown-bag lunch business
with $200 and wound up with a thriving restaurant, a fairy-tale
second marriage, and wildly popular television shows), but
you have never heard the intimate details of her often bumpy
road to fame and fortune.
Courageously honest, downright inspiring, and just a little
bit saucy, Paula shares the highs and lows of her life in
the inimitable charming and irreverent style that you know
from her television shows and personal appearances. She
talks about long childhood summers spent in a bathing suit
and roller skates and hard years living in the back of her
father's gas station; a buzzing high school social life
of sleepovers, parties, cheerleading, and boys; and a difficult
marriage. The death of her beloved parents precipitated
a debilitating agoraphobia that crippled her for years.
But even when the going got tough, Paula never lost the
good grace and sense of humor that would eventually help
carry her to success and stardom. Of course, you can't get
by on charm alone: as Paula has learned, you need plenty
of willpower, hard work, and, above all, the love and support
of family and friends to finance, sustain, and run a successful
restaurant.
In each chapter, Paula shares new recipes: there's serious
comfort food like her momma's Chocolate-Dippy Doughnuts,
Courage Chili for when you know life's going toget tough,
Sexy Oxtails for seducing that special someone, and the
recipe for her new mother-in-law's Banana Nut Delight Cake
that Paula finally got just right. And you'll love the never-before-seen
photos of her family.
In this memoir, Paula Deen speaks as frankly and intimately
as few women in the public eye have ever dared. Whether
she's telling tales of good times or bad, her story is proof
that the old-fashioned American dream is alive and kicking,
and there still is such a thing as a real-life happy ending."
Call number: TX715.2 .S68 D438 2007
|
| Paula
Deen's Kitchen Classics: The Lady & Sons Savannah Country
Cookbook and the Lady & Sons, Too! - Publisher's
Marketing: "From one of the most frequently
visited restaurants in Savannah, The Lady & Sons, comes
this collection of down-home Southern family favorites.
Paula H. Deen, the owner and proprietor, has created a friendly
cookbook filled with hundreds of quick and easy recipes.
Perfect for home entertaining, family picnics, or Sunday
dinners, "The Lady & Sons Savannah Country Cookbook"
completes any kitchen."
Call number: TX715.2 .S68 D48 2005
|
| The
Baby Book: Everything You Need to Know about Your Baby --
From Birth to Age Two - Publisher's
Marketing: "After more than 10 years and a half-million
copies sold, the classic "bible" for new parents
is now revised and updated. Focusing on the essential needs
of babies, the authors address the questions of greatest
concerns to parents today, from diapering and daycare to
midwifery and "birthing rooms.""
Call number: RJ61 .S44178 2003
|
| Alive
Together: New and Selected Poems - Publisher's
Marketing: "In a collection that represents
over thirty-five years of her writing life, this distinguished
poet explores a wide range of subjects, which include her
cultural and family history and reflect her fascination
with music and the discoveries offered by language. In fact,
her book is a testament to the miraculous power of language
to interpret and transform our world. It is a testament
that invites readers to share her vision of experiences
we all have in common: sorrow, tenderness, desire, the revelations
of art, and mortality - "the hard, dry smack of death
against the glass." To this community Mueller presents
moments after moment where the personal and public realms
intersect, where lives ranging from her own to those of
Mary Shelley and Anton Webern illuminate the ways in which
history shapes our lives. In "Brendel Playing Schubert,
" Mueller's breathtaking linguistic virtuosity reminds
us how music can transport us out of ourselves and into
"the nowhere where the enchanted live"; in "Midwinter
Notes, " the crepuscular world, stripped of its veil,
shines forth as a signal from some realm where the sense
of things may be revealed. In the title piece Mueller brings
a sense of enduring and unclouded wonder to a recognition
of all those whose lives might have been our own."
Call number: PS3563.U35 A79 1996
|
| How
We Die: Reflections on Life's Final Chapter - Publisher's
Marketing: "Attempting to demythologize the
process of dying, Nuland explores how we shall die, each
of us in a way that will be unique. Through particular stories
of dying--of patients, and of his own family--he examines
the seven most common roads to death: old age, cancer, AIDS,
Alzheimer's, accidents, heart disease, and strokes, revealing
the facets of death's multiplicity.
"It's impossible to read How We Die without realizing
how earnestly we have avoided this most unavoidable of subjects,
how we have protected ourselves by building a cultural wall
of myths and lies. I don't know of any writer or scientist
who has shown us the face of death as clearly, honestly
and compassionately as Sherwin Nuland does here."--James
Gleick"
Call number: BD444 .N85 1995
|
| The
Art of Aging: A Doctor's Prescription for Well-Being -
Publisher's Marketing: "In
his landmark book "How We Die," Sherwin B. Nuland
profoundly altered our perception of the end of life. Now
in "The Art of Aging," Dr. Nuland steps back to
explore the impact of aging on our minds and bodies, strivings
and relationships. Melding a scientist’ s passion
for truth with a humanist’ s understanding of the
heart and soul, Nuland has created a wise, frank, and inspiring
book about the ultimate stage of life’ s journey.
The onset of aging can be so gradual that we are often surprised
to find that one day it is fully upon us. The changes to
the senses, appearance, reflexes, physical endurance, and
sexual appetites are undeniable– and rarely welcome–
and yet, as Nuland shows, getting older has its surprising
blessings. Age concentrates not only the mind, but the body’
s energies, leading many to new sources of creativity, perception,
and spiritual intensity. Growing old, Nuland teaches us,
is not a disease but an art– and for those who practice
it well, it can bring extraordinary rewards.
“I’ m taking the journey even while I describe
it, ” writes Nuland, now in his mid-seventies and
a veteran of nearly four decades of medical practice. Drawing
on his own life and work, as well as the lives of friends
both famous and not, Nuland portrays the astonishing variability
of the aging experience. Faith and inner strength, the deepening
of personal relationships, the realization that career does
not define identity, the acceptance that some goals will
remain unaccomplished– these are among the secrets
of those who age well.
Will scientists one day fulfill the dream of eternal youth?
Nuland examines thelatest research into extending life and
the scientists who are pursuing it. But ultimately, what
compels him most is what happens to the mind and spirit
as life reaches its culminating decades. Reflecting the
wisdom of a long lifetime, The Art of Aging is a work of
luminous insight, unflinching candor, and profound compassion."
Call number: HQ1061 .N92 2007
|
The
Best Life Diet - Publisher's
Marketing: "From the bestselling author of "Get
With the Program!" and "Bob Greene's Total Body
Makeover" comes "The Best Life Diet," a lifetime
plan for losing weight and keeping it off. Bob Greene helped
Oprah achieve her dramatic weight loss, and he can help you
too. You'll eat the same delicious food that Oprah enjoys,
and, just like Oprah, you'll have Bob to encourage you at
every step. Unlike a celebrity, however, you don't need to
hire a staff of experts to aid and advise you, because Bob's
plan, easily tailored to an array of tastes, lifestyles, and
activity levels, acts as your personal trainer and private
nutritionist. Just open the book and let Bob help you get
started down the path toward your best possible life.
What sets Bob apart from all the other experts who claim
to have plans that work is that he admits that weight loss
is difficult: seventeen years of watching people struggle
to lose weight on a seemingly endless string of trendy crash
diets, only to backslide and regain the pounds they've shed,
have taught him that dropping pounds is not simply a numbers
game. By acknowledging that it is not simple laziness but
a complicated web of social rituals, cultural expectations,
and habits that drives people to gain weight, Greene is
able to attack the problem of weight loss realistically
and offer not a short-lived, quick-fix formula, but a long-term
program that accounts for the challenges and constraints
of the real world.
Divided into three phases, "The Best Life Diet"
gives you the tools you need to change your life. In each
phase, you'll be asked to reexamine the decisions you make
on a daily basis and gradually alter your habits to achieve
lasting results. The book alsoincludes easy-to-follow meal
plans that make it simple to meet your daily energy and
nutrient requirements, whether you are on the run and breakfast
means a quick smoothie or you have time to shop for fresh
produce and make something special.
You'll watch the weight disappear as you learn to prepare
festive and flavorful dishes like Fire-Roasted Tomato-Shrimp
Veracruz, Chicken Sausage Jambalaya, or Flank Steak with
Chimichurri Topping and indulge in desserts like Roasted
Peaches with Ricotta and Almonds or Apple Rhubarb Walnut
Crisp. And for each delicious recipe, there is a detailed
nutritional analysis, so you know exactly what you are eating
and how it fits into your personal eating plan.
Most important, Bob's plan doesn't end once you've lost
the weight. Instead, it gives you the tools you need to
make living your best life second nature, because for Greene,
a diet is not something you go "on" or "off"
but a set of guidelines that will help you claim the life
you deserve."
Call number: RM222.2 .G7225 2006
|
| The
Human Stain - Publisher's Marketing:
"Set in 1998, when ideological divisions are made manifest
through public denunciations and rituals of purification,
the newest novel by award-winning author Philip Roth concludes
his eloquent trilogy of postwar American lives begun in
"American Pastoral" and continued in "I Married
a Communist"."
Call number: PS3568 .O855 H8 2001 |
Everyman
- Publisher's Marketing:
"Philip Roth's new novel is a candidly intimate yet
universal story of loss, regret, and stoicism. The best-selling
author of The Plot Against America now turns his attention
from "one family's harrowing encounter with history"
(New York Times) to one man's lifelong skirmish with mortality.
The fate of Roth's everyman is traced from his first shocking
confrontation with death on the idyllic beaches of his childhood
summers, through the family trials and professional achievements
of his vigorous adulthood, and into his old age, when he
is rended by observing the deterioration of his contemporaries
and stalked by his own physical woes.
A successful commercial artist with a New York ad agency,
he is the father of two sons from a first marriage who despise
him and a daughter from a second marriage who adores him.
He is the beloved brother of a good man whose physical well-being
comes to arouse his bitter envy, and he is the lonely ex-husband
of three very different women with whom he's made a mess
of marriage. In the end he is a man who has become what
he does not want to be.
The terrain of this powerful novel -- Roth's twenty-seventh
book and the fifth to be published in the twenty-first century
-- is the human body. Its subject is the common experience
that terrifies us all.
Everyman takes its title from an anonymous fifteenth-century
allegorical play, a classic of early English drama, whose
theme is the summoning of the living to death."
Call number: PS3568 .O855 E94 2006
|
| Operation
Shylock: A Confession - Publisher's
Marketing: "Winner of the PEN/Faulkner Award
In Operation Shylock, Philip Roth meets a man who may or
may not be Philip Roth. Because someone with that name has
been touring Israel, promoting a bizarre reverse exodus
of the Jews. Roth is intent on stopping him, even if that
means impersonating his own impersonator. With suspense,
philosophical speculation, and a cast of characters that
includes Israeli intelligence agents, Palestinian exiles,
and an enticing charter member of an organization called
Anti-Semites Anonymous, Operation Shylock barrels across
the frontier between fact and fiction, history and nightmare."
Call number: PS3568 .O855 O6 1994
|
| The
Essential Gwendolyn Brooks -
Publisher's Marketing: "Since
she began publishing her tight lyrics of Chicago's South
Side in the 1940s, Gwendolyn Brooks took her place as one
of the most influential American poets of the 20th century,
distilling modernist style through the sounds and shapes
of a variety of African-American forms and Idioms. Now Elizabeth
Alexander, one of our leading experts on African-American
literature and culture, presents a sweeping new selection
of Brooks's poetry."
Call number: PS3503 .R7244 A6 2005
|
| London
Life in the Eighteenth Century - Publisher's
Marketing: "From the disease-infected rookeries
and teeming vice-ridden streets to the sweatshops, coffee
houses and spacious parks, George's recreation of a capital
city in a dirty, brutal -- but also elegant -- age has never
been surpassed. Both a social history and an impeccably
documented reference work, her book chronicles the change
in social attitudes between 1700 and 1800, which left London
cleaner, healthier and more ordered."
Call number: HN398.L7 G4 1985
|
Freud:
Inventor of the Modern Mind (Eminent Lives)
- Publisher's Marketing:
"Often referred to as "the father of psychoanalysis,"
Sigmund Freud championed the "talking cure" and
charted the human unconscious. But though Freud compared himself
to Copernicus and Darwin, his history as a physician is problematic.
Historians have determined that Freud often misrepresented
the course and outcome of his treatments— so that the
facts would match his theories. Today Freud's legacy is in
dispute, his commentators polarized into two camps: one of
defenders; the other, fierce detractors.
Peter D. Kramer, himself a practicing psychiatrist and
a leading national authority on mental health, offers a
new take on this controversial figure, one both critical
and sympathetic. He recognizes that although much of Freud's
thought is now archaic, the discipline he invented has become
an inescapable part of our culture, transforming the way
we see ourselves. Freud was a myth-maker, a storyteller,
a writer whose books will survive among the classics of
our literature. The result of Kramer's inquiry is nothing
less than a new standard history of Freud by a modern master
of his thought."
Call number: BF109.F74 K73 2006
|
| Neon
Vernacular: New and Selected Poems -
Publisher's Marketing: "An
award-winning poet's testimony of the war in Vietnam."
Call number: PS3561 .O455 N46 1993
|
Practical
Gods - Publisher's Marketing:
"Practical Gods is the eighth collection by Carl Dennis,
a critically acclaimed poet and winner of one of the prestigious
Pulitzer and Ruth Lilly Poetry prizes. Carl Dennis has won
acclaim for "wise, original, and often deeply moving"
poems that "ease the reader out of accustomed modes
of seeing and perceiving" (The New York Times). Many
of the poems in this new book involve an attempt to enter
into dialogue with pagan and biblical perspectives, to throw
light on ordinary experience through metaphor borrowed from
religious myth and to translate religious myth into secular
terms. While making no claims to put us in touch with some
ultimate reality, these clear, precise, sensitive poems
help us to pay homage to the everyday household gods that
are easy to ignore, the gods that sustain life and make
it rewarding."
Call number: PS3554 .E535 P73 2001
|
| Our
Final Hour: A Scientist's Warning - Publisher's
Marketing: "From world-renowned astrophysicist
Sir Martin Rees, a timely, brisk, and alarming look at the
way today's technology could spell the end of tomorrow.
Bolstered by unassailable science and delivered in eloquent
style, Our Final Hour's provocative argument that humanity
has a mere 50-50 chance of surviving the next century has
struck a chord with readers, reviewers, and opinion-makers
everywhere. Rees's vision of our immediate future is both
a work of stunning scientific originality and a humanistic
clarion call on behalf of the future of life."
Call number: CB161 .R38 2004
|
| Selected
Poems - Publisher's Marketing:
"The Selected Poems James Tate's Pulitzer Prize-winning
collection and his first British publication, gathers work
from nine previous books, from the Lost Pilot which was
a Yale Younger Poets selection in 1967, through his 1986
collection Reckoner. He is a most agile poet in a precarious
world. Life is alarming and absurd, but properly considered
that absurdity reveals, often with laughter, the something
else by which we live. The poems are about our world, our
wrecked, vexed love for it. Tate has been described as a
surrealist. If that is what he is, his surrealism issues
in a vision of a world delivered back to itself by his unillusioned
subversion and candor."
Call number: PS3570.A8 A6 1991
|
| Repair:
Poems - Publisher's Marketing:
""Repair "is body work in C. K. Williams's
sensual poems, but it is also an imaginative treatment of
the consternations that interrupt life's easy narrative.
National Book Critics Circle Award-winner Williams keeps
the self in repair despite love, death, social disorder,
and the secrets that separate and join intimates. These
forty poems experiment with form but maintain what Alan
Williamson has heralded Williams for having so steadily
developed from French influences: "the poetry of the
sentence.""
Call number: PS3573 .I4483 R46 2000
|
The
Notebooks of Robert Frost - Publisher's
Marketing: "Robert Frost is one of the most widely
read, well loved, and misunderstood of modern writers. In
his day, he was also an inveterate note-taker, penning thousands
of intense aphoristic thoughts, observations, and meditations
in small pocket pads and school theme books throughout his
life. These notebooks, transcribed and presented here in their
entirety for the first time, offer unprecedented insight into
Frost's complex and often highly contradictory thinking about
poetics, politics, education, psychology, science, and religion--his
attitude toward Marxism, the New Deal, World War--as well
as Yeats, Pound, Santayana, and William James. Covering a
period from the late 1890s to early 1960s, the notebooks reveal
the full range of the mind of one of America's greatest poets.
Their depth and complexity convey the restless and probing
quality of his thought, and show how the unruliness of chaotic
modernity was always just beneath his appearance of supreme
poetic control.
Edited by preeminent Frost scholar Robert Faggen and annotated
to help readers with the poet's more elusive references,
the notebooks are also thoroughly cross-referenced, marking
thematic connections within these and Frost's other writings,
including his poetry, letters, and other prose. This is
a major new addition to the canon of Robert Frost's writings."
Call number: PS3511 .R94 A6 2006
|
The
Secret - Publisher's Marketing:
"Fragments of a Great Secret have been found in the oral
traditions, in literature, in religions and philosophies throughout
the centuries. For the first time, all the pieces of The Secret
come together in an incredible revelation that will be life-transforming
for all who experience it.
In this book, you'll learn how to use The Secret in every
aspect of your life -- money, health, relationships, happiness,
and in every interaction you have in the world. You'll begin
to understand the hidden, untapped power that's within you,
and this revelation can bring joy to every aspect of your
life.
The Secret contains wisdom from modern-day teachers --
men and women who have used it to achieve health, wealth,
and happiness. By applying the knowledge of The Secret,
they bring to light compelling stories of eradicating disease,
acquiring massive wealth, overcoming obstacles, and achieving
what many would regard as impossible."
Call number: BF637.S8 B9 2006
|
| The
Middle East: A History
Call number: DS62 .F5 2004
|
| Cry
Havoc!: The Crooked Road to Civil War, 1861 - Publisher's
Marketing: "A compelling re-creation of the
eight crucial weeks preceding the Civil War
In early March 1861, civil war loomed. By late April, Americans
had begun to kill their fellow citizens. "Cry Havoc!"
recounts in riveting detail the events that divided the
states and reveals how quirks of timing, character, and
place all conspired to transform the nation into a battlefield.
Nelson Lankford, author of "Richmond Burning,"
chronicles the eight critical weeks that began with Lincoln's
inauguration through the explosion at Fort Sumter and the
president's fateful response to it. Before Fort Sumter,
the balance could have tipped in favor of a peaceful resolution.
This book addresses the many mighthave-beens, both familiar
and lesser known. What if Lincoln had delayed the proclamation
calling for troops? Could wavering Unionists in the upper
South have held the line? A must read for all who wish to
understand the birth of the modern United States of America,
"Cry Havoc!" probes the fateful series of events
and analyzes each of the failed possibilities that hindsight
affords."
Call number: E458.1 .L36 2007
|
| Skulls
to the Living, Bread to the Dead: The Day of the Dead in
Mexico and Beyond - Publisher's
Marketing: "Come the end of October, decorated
breads, fanciful paper cutouts, plastic toys playing humorously
on the theme of death, and sugar candy skulls and skeletons
are evident everywhere throughout Mexico. Then, from October
31 through November 2, Mexicans clean, decorate, and maintain
vigil over relatives' graves. Most of the activities and
artistic displays connected with this holiday are folk elaborations
entirely separate from liturgical requirements. The origin
of these folk practices is a source of scholarly and popular
debate. What is clear is that the holiday has come to symbolize
Mexico and Mexican identity. Within Mexico, it is a key
symbol of national identity; in the United States, it symbolizes
ethnic identity. Less informed discussions of the Day of
the Dead have simply reproduced the popular image of Mexicans
as unafraid of death: jocular in confronting mortality or
with an intimate relationship to death. This forms an integral
part of most portrayals of Mexican national character. In
Skulls to the Living, Bread to the Dead, we learn that the
ultimate paradox is that the very holiday responsible for
producing a stereotype of the stoic Mexican, longing for
death, is actually a powerful affirmation of life and creativity.
Brandes examines these themes and others bearing on the
ethnographic content and symbolic meanings of this holiday.
Beautifully illustrated with both black-and-white and color
photographs, this book will be required reading for anyone
interested in Mexican culture, art, and folklore as well
as contemporary globalization and identity politics."
Call number: GT4995.A4 B73 2006
|
Distant
Worlds: Milestones in Planetary Exploration
- Publisher's Marketing:
"This book recounts the epic saga of how we as human
beings have come to understand the Solar System. The story
of our exploration of the heavens, Peter Bond reminds us,
began thousands of years ago, with the naked-eye observations
of the earliest scientists and philosophers. Over the centuries,
as our knowledge and understanding inexorably broadened and
deepened, we faltered many times, frequently labored under
misconceptions, and faced seemingly insurmountable obstacles
to understanding. Yet, despite overwhelming obstacles, a combination
of determined observers, brilliant thinkers, courageous explorers,
scientists and engineers has brought us, particularly over
the last five decades, into a second great age of human discovery.
At our present level of understanding, some fifty years
into the Space Age, the sheer volume of images and other
data being returned to us from space has only increased
our appetite for more and more detailed information about
the planets, moons, asteroids, and comets of the Solar System.
Taking a much-needed overview of how we now understand these
"distant worlds" in our cosmic neighborhood, Bond
not only celebrates the extraordinary successes of planetary
exploration, but reaffirms an important truth: For seekers
of knowledge, there will always be more to explore.
An astonishing saga of exploration.
In this much-needed overview of "where we stand today,"
Peter Bond describes the achievements of the astronomers,
space scientists, and engineers who have made the exploration
of our Solar System possible. A clearly written and compelling
account of the Space Age, the book includes:
Dramatic accounts of the daring, resourcefulness, andferocious
competitive zeal of renowned as well as almost-forgotten
space pioneers.
Clear explanations of the precursors to modern astronomy,
including how ancient natural philosophers and observers
first took the measure of the heavens.
More than a hundred informative photographs, maps, simulated
scenarios, and technical illustrations--many of them in
full color.
Information-dense appendices on the physical properties
of our Solar System, as well as a comprehensive list of
50 years of Solar System missions.
Organized into twelve chapters focused on the objects of
our exploration (the individual planets, our Moon, the asteroids
and comets), Bond??'s text shows how the great human enterprise
of space exploration may on occasion have faltered or wandered
off the path, but taken as a whole amounts to one of the
great triumphs of human civilization."
Call number: QB500.262 .B6 2007
|
| Poetry
Speaks: Hear Great Poets Read Their Work from Tennyson to
Plath with CD - Publisher's
Marketing: " Combining the talents of great
poets past and living, their words written and spoken, this
collection features the authors themselves reading their
poetry on audio CD. Contributors range from Alfred, Lord
Tennyson to Sylvia Plath and Langston Hughes. Additional
poems in print form allow the reader to further explore
the poets' works."
Call number: PS323.5 .P58 2001
Call number: PS323.5 .P58 2001 CD
|
| Black
Zodiac: Poems - Publisher's
Marketing: "Winner of the Pulitzer Prize and
the National Book Critics Circle Award
"Black Zodiac" offers poems suffused with spiritual
longing— lyrical meditations on faith, religion, heritage,
and morality. The poems also explore aging and mortality
with restless grace. Approaching his vast subjects by way
of small moments, Wright magnifies details to reveal truths
much larger than the quotidian happenings that engendered
them. His is an astonishing, flexible, domestic-yet-universal
verse. As the critic Helen Vendler has observed, Wright
is a poet who "sounds like nobody else.""
Call number: PS3573 .R52 B47 1997
|
| Different
Hours: Poems - Publisher's
Marketing: "In his 11th volume of poetry, Dunn
explores the "different hours" not only of a life
but also of the historical and philosophical landscape beyond
the personal."
Call number: PS 3554 .U49 D54 2002
|
| Moy
Sand and Gravel - Publisher's
Marketing: "Paul Muldoon's ninth collection
of poems, his first since "Hay" (1998), finds
him working a rich vein that extends from the rivery, apple-heavy
County Armagh of the 1950s, in which he was brought up,
to suburban New Jersey, on the banks of a canal dug by Irish
navvies, where he now lives. Grounded, glistening, as gritty
as they are graceful, these poems seem capable of taking
in almost anything, and anybody, be it a Tuareg glimpsed
on the Irish border, Bessie Smith, Marilyn Monroe, Queen
Elizabeth I, a hunted hare, William Tell, William Butler
Yeats, Sitting Bull, Ted Hughes, an otter, a fox, Mr. and
Mrs. Stanley Joscelyne, un unearthed pit pony, a loaf of
bread, an outhouse, a killdeer, Oscar Wilde, or a flock
of redknots. At the heart of the book is an elegy for a
miscarried child, and that elegiac tone predominates, particularly
in the elegant remaking of Yeats's "A Prayer for My
Daughter" with which the book concludes, where a welter
of traffic signs and slogans, along with the spirits of
admen, hardware storekeepers, flimflammers, fixers, and
other forebears, are borne along by a hurricane-swollen
canal, and private grief coincides with some of the gravest
matter of our age."
Call number: PR6063 .U367 M69 2002
|
Sonoma
Diet - Publisher's Marketing:
"Stop Starving and Start Enjoying Food Again!
Inspired by the sun-drenched foods and vibrant lifestyle
of California's breathtakingly beautiful wine country, The
Sonoma Diet is a surefire weight loss plan based on wholesome,
satisfying, flavorful meals.
Here's the perfect answer for diet dropouts frustrated
by low-carb and low-fat diets. Instead of depriving you
of the balanced nourishment you need, The Sonoma Diet emphasizes
readily available Power Foods (like whole grain breads and
sweet berries) that deliver heart-protective nutrients with
a minimum of calories. And you'll eat these foods in smart
combinations that boost their health benefits, their flavor,
and your weight loss success.
Best of all, The Sonoma Diet is designed for real people
who live in the real world. No time-consuming calorie-counting
at each meal. No need to keep track of any points. No measuring.
No weighing. Just a great selection of flavorful, everyday
foods, easy-to-follow diet instructions, and plenty of mouthwatering
recipes.
Your days of struggling with those extra pounds are about
to end. Welcome to The Sonoma Diet, where eating for weight
loss and pleasure is a satisfying lifestyle."
Call number: RM222.2 .S66 2005
|
The
Sonoma Diet Cookbook: Enjoy the Most Flavorful Recipes Under
the Sun - Publisher's Marketing:
" The flavor-filled lifestyle that's sweeping the country
just got easier to follow!
With its balanced, sane approach to eating, The Sonoma
Diet is more than an eating plan-it's a healthy lifestyle
you can live with. You can lose weight while enjoying a
delicious balance of whole grains, protein, healthy fats
and fresh produce, and The Sonoma Diet Cookbook shows you
how. More than 150 flavorful recipes, from breakfast to
dinner, are designed for Wave 1, 2, or 3, so it's easy to
tell when each recipe is appropriate. There's even a pull-out
guide, so it's easy to follow the diet even when you're
on the go.'
Call number: RM222.2 .S661 2006
|
| Philosophy
Made Simple - Publisher's Marketing:
"Revised and updated, this bestselling reference is
a step-by-step guide through this sometimes abstract discipline.
The philosophers/authors make their subject matter lively
and comprehensible as they delve into such areas as Ethics,
Political Philosophy, Metaphysics, and Logic."
Call number: BD21 .P6 1993
|
Back
to the Family: Food Tastes Better Shared with the Ones You
Love - Publisher's Marketing:
""Back to the Family" is a companion to Art
Smith's "New York Times" bestseller and James Beard
award-winning cookbook, "Back to the Table," Smith
is the personal chef to Oprah Winfrey and a contributing editor
to "O Magazine," This book encourages readers
to better understand the importance of valuing the ones
you love through cooking and communing with food. Most importantly
"Back to the Family" stresses the importance of
recognizing old food traditions (family recipes, meals,
memories, etc.) and the equal importance of creating new
and healthier food traditions. More than 150 recipes and
more than 140 photographs provide a wonderful evocative
eating and reading experience."
Call number: TX715 .S651317 2007
|
George
Balanchine: The Ballet Maker (Eminent Lives)
- Publisher's Marketing:
"Part of the Eminent Lives Series, this biography, written
by the gifted author Robert Gottlieb, will describe the life
of the dynamic George Balanchine, the foremost contemporary
choreographer in ballet. Timed to coincide with the 2004 centenary
of the artist’ s birth.
The life and achievement of the great choreographer who
both summed up everything that proceeded him in ballet,
and extended the art form into radical yet inevitable new
paths. Leaving Revolutionary Russia in 1924 (he was 20),
he joined Serge Diaghilev’ s famous Ballets Russes,
where he created his first enduring masterpiece, Apollo,
cementing his lifelong collaboration with Stravinsky.
In 1933 he arrived in America to found a school and a company,
but the company as we know it - The New York City Ballet
- didn’ t emerge until 1948. Meanwhile, he made ballets
wherever opportunity allowed, while choreographing Broadway
shows (four for Rodgers and Hart), movies (The Goldwyn Follies),
even the circus - a ballet for elephants with a score by
Stravinsky. By the time of his death, in 1983, he had been
recognized as a member of the triad of the greatest modern
masters, alongside Picasso and Stravinsky.
Balanchine was married many times, always to outstanding
ballerinas, but his truest muse always remained Terpsichore,
the Muse of Dance."
Call number: GV1785 .B32 G68 2004
|
| Athenian
Red Figure Vases: The Archaic Period: A Handbook -
Publisher's Marketing: "The
red figure technique of vase painting was invented in Athens
by about 530 BC at a time when the black figure technique
was barely past its prime and when several other important
studios of vase painting were flourishing in the Greek world,
from the western colonies to Ionia."
Call number: NK4649 .B62 1985
|
| Athenian
Red Figure Vases: The Classical Period
- Publisher's Marketing:
"This volume is the successor to Athenian Red Figure
vases: The Archaic period and it carries the survey of Athenian
decorated pottery down to the time when painters finally
abandoned the red figure technique, during the second half
of the fourth century BC."
Call number: NK4649 .B625
|
Beethoven:
The Universal Composer (Eminent Lives) -
Publisher's Marketing: "Ludwig
van Beethoven (1770-1827) was a genius so universal that his
popularity, extraordinary even during his lifetime, has never
ceased to grow. It now encircles the globe: Beethoven's most
famous works are as beloved in Beijing as they are in Boston.
Edmund Morris, the author of three bestselling presidential
biographies and a lifelong devotee of Beethoven, brings
the great composer to life as a man of astonishing complexity
and overpowering intelligence. A gigantic, compulsively
creative personality unable to tolerate constraints, he
was not so much a social rebel as an astute manipulator
of the most powerful and privileged aristocrats in Germany
and Austria, at a time when their world was threatened by
the rise of Napoleon Bonaparte.
But Beethoven's achievement rests in his immortal music.
Struggling against progressive, incurable deafness (which
he desperately tried to keep secret), he nonetheless produced
towering masterpieces, such as his iconic Fifth and Ninth
symphonies. With sensitivity and insight, Edmund Morris
illuminates Beethoven's life, including his interactions
with the women he privately lusted for but held at bay,
and his work, whose grandeur and beauty were conceived "on
the other side of silence.""
Call number: ML410.B4 M67 2005
|
Caravaggio:
Painter of Miracles (Eminent Lives) -
Publisher's Marketing: "Francine
Prose's life of Caravaggio evokes the genius of this great
artist through a brilliant reading of his paintings. Caravaggio
defied the aesthetic conventions of his time; his use of ordinary
people, realistically portrayed— street boys, prostitutes,
the poor, the aged— was a profound and revolutionary
innovation that left its mark on generations of artists. His
insistence on painting from nature, on rendering the emotional
truth of experience, whether religious or secular, makes him
an artist who speaks across the centuries to our own time.
Born in 1571 near Milan, Michelangelo Merisi (da Caravaggio)
moved to Rome when he was twenty-one years old. He became
a brilliant and successful artist, protected by the influential
Cardinal del Monte and other patrons. But he was also a
man of the streets who couldn't seem to free himself from
its brawls and vendettas. In 1606 he fled Rome, apparently
after killing another man in a dispute. He spent his last
years in exile, in Naples, Malta, and Sicily, at once celebrated
for his art and tormented by his enemies. Through it all,
he produced masterpieces of astonishing complexity and power.
Eventually he received a pardon from the Pope, only to die,
in mysterious circumstances, on the way back to Rome in
1610.
Francine Prose presents the brief but tumultuous life of
one of the greatest of all painters with passion and acute
sensitivity."
Call number: ND623 .C26 P76 2005
|
American
Dietetic Association Complete Food and Nutrition Guide -
Publisher's Marketing: "A
lifetime of sound and easy advice on healthy eating from the
world's foremost authority on food and nutrition
The choices you make every day about food, nutrition, and
health can have a major impact on your life. To find the
most reliable nutrition information and positive advice
for achieving optimal health, look no further— this
comprehensive book from the American Dietetic Association
explains everything you need to know about eating for health.
It's packed with simple, practical tips and flexible guidelines
to help you choose nutritious, flavorful, and convenient
foods that suit your needs and lifestyle no matter what
your age or stage of life.
This brand-new edition of the bestselling "American
Dietetic Association Complete Food and Nutrition Guide"
features: The new Dietary Guidelines for Americans from
USDA and USHHS, providing the latest science-based advice
on food choices and physical activity for your health, USDA's
MyPyramid food guide, and the latest American Heart Association
guidelines More ways to include fruits, vegetables, whole
grains, and other nutrient-rich foods in your everyday meals
and snacks Updated information on women's health and nutrition
covering pregnancy to menopause The effective use of dietary
supplements including herbals and other botanicals Food
and lifestyle advice on preventing and managing health conditions
(including metabolic syndrome, diabetes, cancer, and heart
disease), on food-drug interactions, and on food allergies
and intolerances (including gluten intolerance) The latest
on food and water safety Help in making smart food choices
in restaurants: fast-food, sit-down, and ethnic restaurants
The latest on eating andhydration for peak performance More
on managing body weight and a science-based look at popular
weight-loss plans Quick, easy ways to blend nutrition with
great taste for your family table
"American Dietetic Association Complete Food and Nutrition
Guide" has received the National Health Information
Award and the National Federation of Press Women Award,
among others."
Call number: RA784 .D89 2006
|
Choice
and Coercion: Birth Control, Sterilization, and Abortion in
Public Health and Welfare - Publisher's
Marketing: "In August 2003, North Carolina became
the first U.S. state to offer restitution to victims of state-ordered
sterilizations carried out by its eugenics program between
1929 and 1975. The decision was prompted by newspaper stories
based on the research of Johanna Schoen, who was granted unique
access to summaries of 7,500 case histories and the papers
of the North Carolina Eugenics Board.
In this book, Schoen situates the state's reproductive
politics in a national and global context. Widening her
focus to include birth control, sterilization, and abortion
policies across the nation, she demonstrates how each method
for limiting unwanted pregnancies had the potential both
to expand and to limit women's reproductive choices. Such
programs overwhelmingly targeted poor and nonwhite populations,
yet they also extended a measure of reproductive control
to poor women that was previously out of reach.
On an international level, the United States has influenced
reproductive health policies by, for example, tying foreign
aid to the recipients' compliance with U.S. notions about
family planning. The availability of U.S.-funded family
planning aid has proved to be a double-edged sword, offering
unprecedented opportunities to poor women while subjecting
foreign patients to medical experimentation that would be
considered unacceptable at home.
Drawing on the voices of health and science professionals,
civic benefactors, and the women themselves, Schoen's study
allows deeper understandings of the modern welfare state
and the lives of American women."
Call number: HQ766.5 .U5 S36 2005
|
Cash
for Your Trash: Scrap Recycling in America - Publisher's
Marketing: "Over the past two decades, concern
about the environment has brought with it a tremendous increase
in recycling in the United States and around the world. For
many, it has become not only a civic, but also a moral obligation.
Long before our growing levels of waste became an environmental
concern, however, recycling was a part of everyday life for
many Americans, and for a variety of reasons. From rural peddlers
who traded kitchen goods for scrap metal to urban children
who gathered rags in exchange for coal, individuals have been
finding ways to reuse discarded materials for hundreds of
years.
In Cash for Your Trash, Carl A. Zimring provides a fascinating
history of scrap recycling, from colonial times to the present.
Moving beyond the environmental developments that have shaped
modern recycling enterprises, Zimring offers a unique cultural
and economic portrait of the private businesses that made
large-scale recycling possible. Because it was particularly
common for immigrants to own or operate a scrap business
in the nineteenth century, the history of the industry reveals
much about ethnic relationships and inequalities in American
cities. Readers are introduced to the scrapworkers, brokers,
and entrepreneurs who, like the materials they handled,
were often marginalized.
Integrating findings from archival, industrial, and demographic
records, Cash for Your Trash demonstrates that over the
years recycling has served purposes far beyond environmental
protection. Its history and evolution reveals notions of
Americanism, the immigrant experience, and the development
of small business in this country."
Call number: HD9975 .U52 Z56 2005
|
| The
Crafts and Culture of ... - Publisher's
Marketing: "These Wonderful Hands-On Craft Projects
Make This Series an Exciting Addition to Curriculum-Based
Study of the Ancient World! Watch history leap off the page
and into your students' imagination with Crafts of the Ancient
World, a series that features exciting hands-on craft activities
related to six fascinating cultures. These projects appear
alongside comprehensive discussions of each ancient civilization's
history and important cultural achievements. With the help
of easy-to-follow, step-by-step instructions and illustrations,
readers will learn how to create replicas of intriguing
objects--all from ordinary household materials."
The Crafts and Culture of the Ancient Egyptians
Call number: TT61 .J68 2002
The Crafts and Culture of the Ancient Greeks
Call number: TT78 .J68 2002
The Crafts and Culture of the Romans
Call number: TT16 .J68 2002
The Crafts and Culture of the Aztecs
Call number: TT28 .J68 2002 |
Arts
and Crafts of Ancient Greece
Call number: TT75 .M67 2007
|
Arts
and Crafts of Ancient Egypt
Call number: TT117 .M67 2007
|
Arts
and Crafts of Ancient Rome
Call number: TT16 .M67 2006 |
Arts
and Crafts of the Aztecs and Maya
Call number: TT28.M6 M67 2007
|
Arts
and Crafts of the Native Americans
Call number: TT22 .M69 2007
|
| Glass
Throughout Time: History and Technology of Glassmaking from
the Ancient World to the Present - Publisher's
Marketing: "The history of glass and glassmaking
is shown here through 400 works from ancient times to those
created using the latest technology. Glass is the guiding
motif of a journey through time, space, and the various
cultures that have interpreted and used this material over
the centuries. The volume gathers together both rarities
and masterpieces of glass art from important public and
private collections of antique, modern and contemporary
glass, including works by Dale Chihuly and Sandy Skoglund.
It studies in greater depth some themes which have emerged
over the centuries: symbol and myth, nature and ten thematic
rooms: from the Room of Water to the Room of Nature, the
Room of Play to the Room of Geometry, the Room of Fragments
to the Room of the Orient, the Room of the Body to the Room
of the Sacred and Profane, and from the Room of Everyday
Life to the Room of the Fantastic. The volume is completed
by the Techniques and Materials Section, which follows the
various steps in the glassmaking process, from the raw materials
to the latest generation of technological glass products
and ends by examining the relationship between glass and
ecology."
Call number: NK5106 .G5413 2003
|
Stranger
Than Fiction - Vendor's Marketing:
"After ten years of painstaking work, novelist
Karen Eiffel (Thompson) is nearing completion on her latest,
and potentially finest, book. Her only remaining challenge
is to figure out how to kill off her main character, Harold
Crick. Little does she know that Harold Crick (Ferrell)
is inexplicably alive-and-well in the real world, and suddenly
aware of her words. The bewildered and hilariously resistant
Harold hears what she has in mind and realizes he must find
the author and persuade her to change her (and his) ending.
An all-star cast headlines this wonderfully inventive new
comedy."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 StrangerTh DVD
|
The
Prestige - Vendor's Marketing:
"British director Christopher Nolan's (BATMAN
BEGINS) eclectic resume gains another interesting entry
with THE PRESTIGE. The basic plot, which concerns the rivalry
between two magicians in early 20th-century London, closely
resembles a fellow 2006 movie--Edward Norton's THE ILLUSIONIST--and
the two films are sure to be closely compared. In Nolan's
film, Hugh Jackman and Christian Bale bring the characters
of Robert Angier and Alfred Bordon to life. Robert and Alfred
were young magician apprentices together, but became bitter
rivals as their careers began to shape their adult lives
and a terrible accident claimed the life of Robert's wife.
In the subsequent years Robert has become wildly jealous
of Alfred's superior talents, so in a last ditch attempt
to steal some artistic ground he sends his assistant, Olivia
(Scarlett Johansson), to infiltrate his rival's lair and
steal the secret to a spectacular trick called "The
Transported Man." Nolan's film twists and turns down
a number of unexpected avenues as it flits back and forth
between numerous time periods, creating a movie that needs
to be watched as closely as the tricks his leading characters
perform. Bale and Jackman perfectly execute their roles,
winding up the tension to an unbearable degree as they willfully
enter into some dangerously competitive patterns of behavior.
Michael Caine makes his second appearance in a Nolan film,
almost reprising his role of Alfred in BATMAN BEGINS by
playing Cutter, Jackman's mentor; and Johansson pouts and
flounces across the elaborate sets like a classic Hollywood
screen siren. Stylistically, THE PRESTIGE is full of dark,
gloomy colors and a palpable feeling of menace, which is
an impeccable visual match for the viewer's growing unease
as the protagonists push each other to increasingly ridiculous
lengths. It's not an easy film to digest, but Nolan's movie
offers intelligent and challenging fare that will likely
reveal further cinematic magic on repeated viewings."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 Prestige DVD
|
The
Illusionist - Vendor's Marketing:
"In 1900 Vienna, a magician named Eisenheim
the Illusionist is mystifying audiences with a remarkable
magic act that is seemingly too good to believe. Chief Inspector
Uhl, who is in the pocket of Crown Prince Leopold--and considers
himself somewhat of an amateur conjurer--becomes obsessed
with Eisenheim; Uhl is not only desperate to find out the
secrets behind Eisenheim's tricks but also worried that
the master magician might pose a threat to the crown prince's
nefarious plans. In addition, Eisenheim is quickly growing
close to Duchess Sophie von Teschen, his childhood love,
who is engaged to Leopold. As Eisenheim's act becomes even
more amazing--including apparently raising the spirits of
the dead--he enrages the crown prince even further, leading
to deception and murder. Edward Norton (FIGHT CLUB), who
studied magic with Ricky Jay (THE SPANISH PRISONER) in preparing
for the role, is terrific as Eisenheim, an enigmatic showman
hiding a dark side. The excellent supporting cast features
fine performances by Rufus Sewell (A KNIGHT'S TALE) as the
evil, conniving Leopold; Jessica Biel (7TH HEAVEN) as the
beautiful Sophie; and Paul Giamatti (SIDEWAYS) as the perceptive
but bumbling Uhl. Written and directed by Neil Burger (INTERVIEW
WITH THE ASSASSIN), THE ILLUSIONIST, which is based on a
short story by Pulitzer Prizewinner Steven Millhauser, is
a complex tale filled with mystery and awe. The compelling
score was composed by minimalist musician Philip Glass and
conducted by Michael Reisman."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 Illusioni DVD
|
The
Departed - Vendor's Marketing:
"Director Martin Scorsese returns to his trademark
style with the violent, bruised, and bloody feature THE
DEPARTED. Scorsese filched the basic storyline from Wai
Keung Lau and Siu Fai Mak's masterful 2002 Hong Kong action
film, INFERNAL AFFAIRS, which saw a policeman going undercover
as a mob member and a mob member infiltrating the police
force. Scorsese transfers the action to Boston, positioning
Leonardo Di Caprio as undercover cop William Costigan and
Matt Damon as undercover mobster Colin Sullivan. While Costigan
and Sullivan get into plenty of nail-biting situations that
almost reveal their true identities, Scorsese gradually
unravels his strong supporting cast, including Jack Nicholson
as Sullivan's mob boss, Frank Costello; Ray Winstone as
Costello's meat-headed muscle; Mark Wahlberg as a hot-headed
police sergeant; and Vera Farmiga as a love interest for
both Damon and DiCaprio's characters. THE DEPARTED finds
Scorsese generously dipping his toes back into waters that
will be warmly familiar to his biggest fans. Rolling Stones
songs pepper the soundtrack, recalling the remarkable "Jumpin'
Jack Flash" sequence in MEAN STREETS; bullets and blood
punctuate every key scene, bringing TAXI DRIVER's explosive
finale to mind; and the mobster-themed storyline is a thrilling
return to GOODFELLAS territory. Nicholson and Winstone provide
acting master-classes every time they appear, neatly complementing
the blossoming talents of DiCaprio, Damon, and Wahlberg,
while further veteran support comes in small roles for Martin
Sheen and Alec Baldwin. Scorsese is often criticized for
affording precious little screen time to female characters,
and THE DEPARTED won't quell those dissenting voices, although
Farmiga's character proves to be more than a match for DiCaprio
and Damon's posturings. But Scorsese followers who balked
at his diversions into documentary filmmaking (NO DIRECTION
HOME) and period epics (THE AVIATOR) will be delighted to
find raw male machismo puncturing the screen once again
in this frenetic entry into his celebrated oeuvre."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 Departed DVD
|
Children
of Men - Vendor's Marketing:
"CHILDREN OF MEN is not a popcorn movie. With
its almost relentlessly bleak perspective on the future,
Alfonso Cuarón's film doesn't make for pleasant viewing.
But it's an exhilarating experience because the picture
is an amazing dystopian drama that lacks all the typical
trappings of the genre. Set uncomfortably close to the present,
it paints a frighteningly realistic picture of the future.
In 2027, every woman on earth is infertile. With the loss
of the ability to have children, the world has also lost
hope. Clive Owen (CLOSER) plays Theo, an Englishman attempting
to make a life in a hellish world. His estranged wife (Julianne
Moore) convinces him to help transport a young woman to
safety. When Theo learns that the woman is pregnant, their
journey takes on a significance--and a danger--he never
imagined. This is Cuarón's best film to date, a strong
statement considering his wonderful HARRY POTTER AND THE
PRISONER OF AZKABAN and Y TU MAMA TAMBIÉN. Filmed
using a handheld camera, the action draws the audience close,
making the horror that much more real. In addition to its
remarkable car-chase scenes, the film features impressive
acting. With his expressive face and voice, Owen gives a
nuanced performance that ranks with the best of his career.
As a reclusive hippie, Michael Caine shares a charming counterculture
view of the crumbling world. Chiwetel Ejiofor (DIRTY PRETTY
THINGS) brings gravitas to the role of a terrorist. Just
when the film threatens to overwhelm with its sense of dread,
small moments of comedy show through in Owen's wry sense
of humor and Caine's perfect delivery. When the credits
roll, CHILDREN OF MEN leaves the audience feeling shell-shocked,
not only because of its brutal prophecy, but also because
of its brilliance."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 ChildrenM DVD
|
Grey
Gardens - Vendor's Marketing:
"Out in East Hampton, behind a cloud of overgrown
foliage and weeds, there is a large decaying mansion which
is home to Edith Bouvier Beale and her grown-up daughter
Little Edie. Big and Little Edie are the aunt and first
cousin of Jacquelyn Kennedy Onassis, and this documentary
is a portrait of their unusual life together. When Little
Edie left New York, she left behind her dreams of stardom
to take care of her aging mother, and together they developed
a unique relationship, cloistered away in their fading glory.
A stirring portrait by the pioneers of documentary filmmaking,
the Maysles Brothers."
Call number: CT275 .B435 G7 1976 DVD
|
High
School Boot Camp - Vendor's
Marketing: "Director Chuck Braverman certainly
got his hands dirty with this attempt to document the activities
at a HIGH SCHOOL BOOT CAMP. Choosing the Eagle Academy in
Belle Grade, Florida as his muse, Braverman follows a group
of youths as they attempt to rescue their troubled lives
from toppling further into a crime-strewn abyss. But to
survive the rigors of the Boot Camp these kids will discover
they have to leave their ego's at the door--a task some
of them find hard to accomplish. As the tough regime kicks
into action, it becomes clear exactly how harsh the training
is, with Marine-style maneuvers introduced in an attempt
to instill some discipline in the youthful miscreants. An
emotionally-charged documentary, Braverman's film is a bold
attempt to chronicle a facet of youth development that has
rarely been seen on screen before."
Awards
Call number: U408.3 .H54 2004 DVD
|
BaadAsssss
Cinema: A Bold Look at '70s Blaxploitation Films -
Vendor's Marketing: "In
this groundbreaking documentary from the Independent Film
Channel, filmmaker Isaac Julien takes us back to the early
70s and the explosion of blaxploitation films, today one
of America's most beloved cult genres, thoroughly exploring
the films from their breakout casting and unforgettable
soundtracks to the outrageous fashions and hilariously over-the
top story lines that together helped the genre achieve it's
revered cult status."
Call number: PN1995.9 .N4 B323 2002 DVD
|
Scared
Straight! - Vendor's Marketing:
"In 1972, documentary filmmaker Arnold Shapiro
brought 17 juvenile delinquents to a maximum security prison
in New Jersey to spend a day with some of the most dangerous
and hardened criminals behind bars. These life-sentence
inmates gave the wayward teens a shockingly realistic, no-holds-barred
account of the brutality of daily prison life, powerfully
documented by Shapiro in his Oscar and Emmy-award winning
film SCARED STRAIGHT. This DVD revisits the important and
influential documentary that altered the course of the participants'
lives as well as those of millions of other troubled teens
in high schools across the country. Also included is the
updated feature SCARED STRAIGHT! 20 YEARS LATER, which examines
the lasting effects of the program by following up on the
teens and inmates two decades after the experience."
Awards
Call number: HV7431 .S27 2003 DVD
|
Gray's
Anatomy - Vendor's Marketing:
"Acclaimed director Steven Soderbergh films
Spalding Gray’s monologue--originally written for
the stage--with an energy that makes for an intriguing cinematic
viewing experience. Opening with a succession of black-and-white
interviews that details horrific incidents dealing with
human eyeballs, Gray’s topic of discussion becomes
readily apparent. Eventually, Gray admits that he himself
experienced a near-traumatic episode when one of his eyes
became blurry and unfocused. Terrified at the thought of
surgery--which would have involved scraping his eyeball--Gray
decided to search for another way to rid himself of his
unfortunate condition. In a series of hysterical tales,
Gray describes his attempts to find a nonsurgical cure for
his affliction. These include calling a Christian Science
hot line, flying to the Philippines to meet with a psychic
surgeon, and traveling to Minnesota to partake in a Native
American ceremony that aims to sweat the problem out of
him. When Gray realizes that these approaches aren’t
working, he must finally decide whether to place himself
under the knife and risk losing his eye. As usual, Soderbergh’s
keen vision adds a spark to the proceedings. His roaming
camera emphasizes the dialogue in a way that the stage could
never do, allowing Gray to do his thing and keep the laughs
rolling."
Call number: PN1995.9 .C55 G72 1999 DVD
|
Dancing
to New Orleans - Vendor's Marketing:
"More than any other place, Louisiana--and in
particular New Orleans--has been responsible for the development
of one of the most rich and diverse musical legacies in
America. From country to R&B, Zydeco to blues, Cajun
to jazz, DANCING TO NEW ORLEANS examines how the region's
people, land, and culture impacted Louisiana's unique musical
heritage and nurtured completely new sounds like Dixieland
jazz and Hank Williams' lonesome country blues. Includes
interviews with and live performances from the contemporary
artists and musicians who continue to preserve this musical
legacy: Buckwheat Zydeco, BeauSoleil, the Dirty Dozen Brass
Band, Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown, Big Jack Johnson,
the Neville Brothers, and many more."
Call number: ML3477.7 .L8 D36 2003 DVD
|
| The
Thames Shakespeare Collection - Vendor's
Marketing: "This collection of televised adaptations
includes some of Shakespeare's finest works, all produced
for British television. Among them are interpretations of
MACBETH (with Ian McKellen and Judi Dench), KING LEAR, ROMEO
& JULIET, and TWELFTH NIGHT (directed by Kenneth Branagh)."
King Lear -
Call number: PR2819.A23 C33 1974 DVD
Romeo & Juliet -
Call number: PR3093 .R65 1976 DVD
Twelfth Night -
Call number: PR3093 .T84 1988 DVD
Macbeth -
Call number: PR2823.A2 C283 1978 DVD |
Jason
and the Argonauts - Vendor's
Marketing: "Greek mythology comes to life in
this exciting film adaptation of the story of Jason's quest
for the Golden Fleece. Ray Harryhausen's special effects
in this picture are legendary, especially a sword fight
between three live actors and seven skeletons. Loosely based
on the Argonautica of Apollonius of Rhodes (c. 250 B.C.)."
Call number: PN1997 JasonAnd DVD
|
Spartacus
- Vendor's Marketing:
"SPARTACUS, based on Howard Fast's popular novel,
is Stanley Kubrick's glorious masterpiece about a slave
uprising in Rome in 70 B.C. Kirk Douglas, who also served
as executive producer, stars as the title character, a man
born of a slave woman and a slave master who has known nothing
but chains his entire life. After being forced to put on
a gladiator show--that almost leads to his death--for wealthy
Romans (including a marvelously conniving Laurence Olivier
as the power-hungry Crassus), Spartacus leads a slave revolt
across Italy that soon has thousands marching on Rome. Meanwhile,
he has fallen in love with the beautiful Varinia (an effervescent
Jean Simmons), pledging his life to her. Douglas assembled
a fabulous all-star cast for the film; in addition to himself,
Simmons, and Olivier, terrific performances are turned in
by Charles Laughton as the curmudgeonly senator Gracchus,
John Gavin as the young Julius Caesar, Tony Curtis as Antoninus
(a "singer of songs," with all lines delivered
in a beautifully thick New York accent), and especially
Peter Ustinov, an Oscar winner for his portrayal of the
businessman Batiatus, who always wants to know what's in
it for him. Blacklisted writer Dalton Trumbo's melodramatic
script and Alex North's thrilling, soaring score add a majesty
that helps make SPARTACUS one of the finest costume epics
to ever come out of Hollywood."
Awards,
American Film Institute honoree.
Call number: PN1997 Spartacus DVD
|
The
Shining - Vendor's Marketing:
"Opening with spectacular aerial shots of a
beautiful, mountainous landscape, Stanley Kubrick's horror
classic THE SHINING sucks the viewer into his frightening
tale with quiet, relaxing visuals--but the ominous soundtrack
warns that all is not right at the gorgeous Overlook Hotel.
Based on Stephen King's best-selling novel, the film stars
Jack Nicholson at his eyebrow-raising best in his portrayal
of Jack Torrance, a Vermont schoolteacher working at the
Overlook as a winter caretaker. The glorious early-20th
century resort only operates in warm weather because the
snowy roads deny access in the colder months, so Jack brings
his wife, Wendy (Shelley Duvall), with him, as well as his
young son, Danny (Danny Lloyd), who possesses some unique
psychic powers. As the Torrances settle in for the long,
lonely months ahead, strange, unexplainable things start
occurring in the hotel--and in every scene Jack seems to
be growing a little more evil and dangerous.... Cinematographer
John Alcott (who also worked on BARRY LYNDON and A CLOCKWORK
ORANGE) allows his Steadicam to float eerily through the
deserted halls and corridors of the hotel, creating a creepy
air of tension as Jack plummets into madness. Kubrick's
obsessive eye for detail is prevalent throughout; the famous
scene where Danny rides his toy buggy through the hotel
is remarkable for Alcott's gliding camerawork and the desolate
sound of the wheels alternately scraping across the hardwood
and carpeted floors. Nicholson and Duvall are outstanding
throughout, with both actors running the full gamut of human
emotions as the film races towards a thrilling conclusion.
Supplemented by an oddball cast of dead twin girls, suicidal
ax-murdering ghosts, Scatman Crothers as the hotel cook,
and many other weird and wonderful figures, Kubrick's film
is a pulse-racing treat that is among the best in his inimitable
body of work."
Awards,
American Film Institute honoree.
Call number: PN1997 Shining DVD
|
The
Great Gatsby - Vendor's Marketing:
"Jack Clayton's version of THE GREAT GATSBY
was adapted for the screen by Francis Ford Coppola from
F. Scott Fitzgerald's 1925 masterpiece about a handsome
and enigmatic tycoon betrayed by the American Dream. Though
self-made millionaire Jay Gatsby (Robert Redford) has been
in love with the spoiled Daisy Buchanan (Mia Farrow) since
his days as a poor boy in the Midwest, she's now married
to a boorish philanderer (Bruce Dern) and seems more out
of reach than ever. Gatsby's attempts to win Daisy back
result in his tragic downfall, as witnessed and narrated
by his neighbor and friend Nick Carraway (Sam Waterston).
The result is a richly successful evocation of the Jazz
Age and a tragic portrait of shallow lives ruined by wealth,
brilliantly acted by Redford, Waterston, Dern, and the rest
of the supporting cast."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 GreatGa DVD
|
American
Splendor - Vendor's Marketing:
"Harvey Pekar, the hilariously downtrodden Cleveland
comic book artist, is the subject of AMERICAN SPLENDOR,
titled after Pekar's autobiographical series. Played by
actor Paul Giamatti, Pekar also appears as himself, giving
the film a documentary feeling with many behind-the-scenes
on-set shots. Directors Shari Springer Berman and Robert
Pulcini maintain this balance between the actors and the
real-life characters--Pekar's wife Joyce and coworker Toby
also appear on set as themselves--while crafting a funny,
difficult, heartwarming tale that encapsulates Pekar's life,
work, and uniquely bizarre perspectives. Pekar is a pessimistic
file clerk with no hope of ever rising above his boring
job, slobbish apartment, and bad attitude. Wonderfully set
in his ways, Pekar's constant self-deprication is clearly
a front for his prolific interests in music and art. When
his friend Robert Crumb (James Urbaniak) gets his big break
as a comic book artist, Pekar decides to try his hand at
the craft. Though he can't illustrate, his stories are good,
and Crumb agrees to help draw the pictures. Soon several
artists are illustrating Pekar's American Splendor series,
and the comic book's readership grows. The film continues
through the events of Pekar's life--meeting wife Joyce Brabner,
appearing on David Letterman, struggling with cancer, and
adopting a daughter--always showing Pekar's no-frills approach
to life. A creative and punchy film, AMERICAN SPLENDOR invites
viewers into the odd world of Pekar and his comic-book antihero
persona."
Awards,
American Film Institute honoree.
Call number: PN1997 AmericanS DVD
|
Ali
Rap - Vendor's Marketing: "ALI
RAP is an ESPN production that pays warm tribute to former
boxer Muhammad Ali, and is hosted by Public Enemy star Chuck
D. During Ali's heyday he was known for his thoughtful speeches,
so this production highlights some of the ways he used language
to get his message across."
Call number: GV1132 .A44 A45 2006 DVD
|
American
Movie - Vendor's Marketing:
"Smith's film is a poignant commentary on what
it takes to make an independent film. It also happens to
be a genuinely hysterical, crowd-pleasing romp. Trying to
get his masterpiece, NORTHWESTERN, off the ground, but failing
miserably due to lack of funding and support, struggling
Midwestern filmmaker Mark Borchardt instead turns his attention
to COVEN, an abandoned 37-minute horror film that he began
filming in 1990. His hopes are to sell enough copies of
the video to enable him to clear his current debts and begin
moving forward with his real baby, NORTHWESTERN. The painstaking
effort to get COVEN in the can and onto the screen for the
film's world premiere provides the greatest laughs in this
undeniably entertaining documentary."
Awards
Call number: PN1995.9 .P7 A43 2000
|
Bird
- Vendor's Marketing:
"Charlie "Bird" Parker had been a
hero of Clint Eastwood’s since childhood, and Eastwood,
having been disappointed in such jazz biopics as YOUNG MAN
WITH A HORN, really wanted to make a true jazz fan’s
movie about the music. He cast Forest Whitaker as Parker,
the legendary alto sax player, and Diane Venora as Chan,
Parker’s wife. The film shows how Parker, a genius
who changed the face of modern music, was hampered and eventually
destroyed by his appetite for women, food, and drugs. The
two leads do a great job giving a recognizable human face
to the characters’ complex relationship. With wit
and warmth, BIRD tells the story in direct and honest terms,
avoiding all sentimentality. Eastwood’s love of Parker’s
music comes across in the tremendous care that he and composer
Lennie Niehaus took with reconstructing it, using Parker’s
original solos. Eastwood and cinematographer Jack N. Green
also patterned the dark, moody look of the film after old
photos of musicians who used to appear in jazz magazines.
Music lovers will be thrilled with the result, and movie
lovers will find plenty to engage them in this moving tale
of a great man battling his demons."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 Bird DVD
|
Being
John Malkovich - Vendor's Marketing:
"Original is far too understated a term to describe
this picture, brought to you by the surreal, twisted minds
of screenwriter Kaufman and actor-director Jonze. The story
concerns a puppeteer, Craig Schwartz (Cusack), who discovers
his office has a secret portal that leads directly into
the brain of one of America's most popular actors, John
Malkovich (Malkovich himself, in a hilariously self-mocking
appearance). When the journey ends fifteen minutes later,
the participant is spewed onto the side of the New Jersey
Turnpike. Schwartz uses his discovery as a way to get closer
to fellow co-worker Maxine (the always sexy Keener). Together,
the pair form JM, INC., which allows ordinary citizens to
join in on the fun for $200 a pop. But when Craig's wife
Lotte (a homely Diaz), as Malkovich, is seduced by Maxine,
things begin to unfurl at an even more outrageous pace.
Sound confusing? Thanks to Jonze's grounded direction, it
isn't. The result is one of the decade's most original films."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 BeingJo DVD
|
Casino
Royale - Vendor's Marketing:
"After a great deal of discussion--on the part
of fans and producers alike--over Daniel Craig’s (THE
MOTHER, MUNICH) suitability for the role of James Bond,
he more than proves himself in this explosive revamping
of the franchise. Under the direction of Martin Campbell
(THE MASK OF ZORRO) and with Paul Haggis (CRASH) helping
with the re-writes, this addition to the Bond canon manages
to hold true to the essence of the stories--the villainous
villains, the fabulous sets, the beautiful women, the fast-paced
action--while updating the formula with subtlety and humanity.
Trading in the Cold War era for a new, post-9-11 landscape,
the tale unfolds in locations that span the globe, including
the Bahamas, Venice, and the Czech Republic. It opens in
Madagascar, where Bond pursues a guerilla bomb-maker in
one of the most breathtaking chase scenes ever--and it all
takes place on foot. Botching that assignment, Bond goes
to Montenegro to square off against terrorist baddie Le
Chiffre (Mads Mikkelson), an international loan shark who
gambles with the money of his equally dangerous clients.
Beautiful British Treasury representative Vesper Lynd (Eva
Green, THE DREAMERS) supplies Bond’s own funds, appearing
on his arm in Montenegro, while M (Dame Judi Dench, PRIDE
AND PREJUDICE) keeps a close watch on the action from headquarters.
The extravagant poker game forms the center of the action,
with Jeffrey Wright (SYRIANA, THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE)
putting in an intense appearance at the table; interrupting
the game are assassination attempts, poisoning, and other
dramatic events that keep the adrenaline pumping. The flirtation
that unfolds between Bond and Vesper Lynd is only in keeping
with the spy’s M.O. as a ladies’ man. What differs
here, however, is what sets this Bond apart from the rest:
the romance is taken seriously, and it exposes a vulnerability
in Bond that he’s never shown before. This, however,
only makes him the tougher, as Craig's Bond is darker, less
campy, more brooding and mysterious, than his past incarnations
ever were."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 CasinoRo DVD
|
A.I.
Artificial Intelligence - Vendor's
Marketing: "A.I. ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE is
the story of David (Haley Joel Osment), the first mecha
(a futuristic term for a mechanized human being) designed
with the ability to love. A couple whose son is in a coma
"adopts" David to help them recover from their
loss. Naturally, things do not go as planned, and David
is forced to leave the mother (Frances O’Connor) he's
been "imprinted" to love, and make his way in
the world. Traveling with Teddy, a hi-tech stuffed bear,
David escapes the Flesh Fair, where angry humans destroy
mechas to "purge artificiality," and unexpectedly
befriends Gigolo Joe (Jude Law in a wry performance), a
robot designed to pleasure women. Joe agrees to help David
in his quest to become human. Director Stanley Kubrick originally
developed A.I., at one point asking Spielberg to direct
it. When Kubrick passed away, Spielberg took the reins.
Using a treatment and thousands of drawings commissioned
by Kubrick, Spielberg wrote his own screenplay (his first
since 1979's CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND). Osment,
perhaps the only pre-teen actor who can effectively convey
existential angst, gives a marvelous performance, helping
Spielberg create a gorgeous futuristic fairy tale that questions
the very nature of what we call life."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 AI DVD
|
The
Iceman Cometh - Vendor's Marketing:
"The acclaimed film actor Jason Robards (PARENTHOOD,
MAGNOLIA) made the transition from up and coming theatre
actor to bonified star after his critically acclaimed performance
in the now legendary 1956 New York production of Eugene
O'Neill's THE ICEMAN COMETH. Along with a star-studded cast
which includes James Broderick, Myron McCormick, and Robert
Redford, Robards brings new depth to O'Neill's masterpiece
of battered lives and failed dreams in 1912 New York."
Call number: PS3529 .N5 I34 1960 DVD
|
Flushed
Away - Vendor's Marketing:
"This computer-animated feature, directed by
David Bowers and Sam Fell, explores a whole new world under
London. A pet mouse named Roddy St. James (voiced by Hugh
Jackman) is pretty much spoiled rotten. His owners live
in a chic Kensington apartment, and Roddy has everything
he could possibly want--except friends and a family. Everything
changes for Roddy when his owners go away for a few days
and their flat is invaded by a common rat, Sid (Shane Richie).
Determined to reclaim his apartment and boot out the intruder,
Roddy tries to talk Sid into enjoying the apartment "Jacuzzi,"
which is actually the toilet. But Sid is smarter than he
looks, and soon Roddy is traveling down the pipes out of
his sheltered life into a world that he never knew existed.
Emerged in Ratropolis and completely out of his element,
Roddy is immediately caught up in an adventure. He meets
Rita (Kate Winslet), a street-smart scavenger who travels
the sewers by boat looking for riches that will help her
care for her parents and multitude of siblings, and hires
her to help him get above ground. But the villainous Toad
(Ian McKellen) and his rodent henchmen, Spike (Andy Serkis)
and Whitey (Bill Nighy), are constant problems. To make
matters worse, the Toad is preparing to hatch an evil plot
that promises to wipe out all the rats and mice dwelling
underground, and he brings in his mercenary Parisian cousin
Le Frog (Jean Reno) and his team to help get the job done.
This comedy/adventure features first-class animation from
the team that created WALLACE & GROMIT: THE CURSE OF
THE WERE-RABBIT and is voiced by an all-star cast."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 FlushedA DVD
|
Terms
of Endearment - Vendor's
Marketing: "TERMS OF ENDEARMENT is a deeply
observed drama about the intimate relationship between a
mother and daughter, based on the novel by Larry McMurtry.
Shirley MacLaine and Debra Winger are at their absolute
best, with terrific support from Jack Nicholson, Jeff Daniels,
and John Lithgow."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 TermsOf DVD
|
Fight
Club - Vendor's Marketing:
"FIGHT CLUB is narrated by a lonely, unfulfilled
young man (Edward Norton) who finds his only comfort in
feigning terminal illness and attending disease support
groups. Hopping from group to group, he encounters another
pretender, or "tourist," the morose Marla Singer
(Helena Bonham Carter), who immediately gets under his skin.
However, while returning from a business trip, he meets
a more intriguing character--the subversive Tyler Durden
(Brad Pitt). They become fast friends, bonding over a mutual
disgust for corporate consumer-culture hypocrisy. Eventually,
the two start Fight Club, which convenes in a bar basement
where angry men get to vent their frustrations in brutal,
bare-knuckle bouts. Fight Club soon becomes the men's only
real priority; when the club starts a cross-country expansion,
things start getting really crazy. Like Tyler Durden himself,
director David Fincher’s FIGHT CLUB, based on the
novel by Chuck Palahniuk, is startlingly aggressive and
gleefully mischievous as it skewers the superficiality of
American pop culture. Outstanding performances by Norton
and Pitt are supported by a razor-sharp script and an arsenal
of stunning visual effects that include computer animation
and sleight-of-hand editing. One of the most unique films
of the late 20th century, FIGHT CLUB is a pitch-black comedy
of striking intensity."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 FightCl DVD
|
Bottle
Rocket - Vendor's Marketing:
"Three criminally aspiring friends bungle their
way through a series of misadventures in this oddball comedy
from Austin auteur Wes Anderson. Brothers Luke and Owen
Wilson play best friends Anthony and Dignan, two good-hearted
though confused misfits who, along with their friend Bob
(Robert Musgrave), attempt to find purpose in their lives
by starting criminal careers. Though they make rather unimpressive
criminals, the three guys shine in their unwavering sense
of honor, friendship, and loyalty. BOTTLE ROCKET is an endearing,
funny, and unique comic gem, featuring James Caan's adept
turn as the local crime boss."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 BottleRo DVD
|
Rushmore
- Vendor's Marketing:
"Director Wes Anderson's follow-up to the acclaimed
BOTTLE ROCKET is a funny, warmhearted, and extremely sharp
American response to the English "Angry Young Man"
films of the 1960s, right down to its British Invasion soundtrack.
Newcomer Jason Schwartzman creates a classic protagonist
in Max Fischer, a sophomore at Rushmore Academy. He excels
at every extracurricular activity in school, from theater
to beekeeping. Gradewise, however, he's failing. He has
few friends outside school save for wealthy but depressed
industrialist Herman Blume (Bill Murray), father of obnoxious
twin boys who also attend Rushmore. Enter Rosemary Cross
(Olivia Williams), a beautiful young widowed teacher at
Rushmore Elementary. While Max is immediately smitten with
Miss Cross, she finds comfort in the company of the emotionally
frazzled Blume. But Max won't let Blume have Miss Cross
without a fight. Anderson and cowriter Owen Wilson have
created a script brimming with oddball humor at the surface,
but at its core lies just enough realistic pain and disappointment
to create an all-too-rare bittersweet edge, striking a subtle
balance that few films ever achieve, and finally giving
national treasure Bill Murray the chance to shine like never
before. As director, Anderson displays his exceptional talents
with careful choices in color palette, effective use of
slow motion to comedic effect, and, most important, a brilliant
selection of offbeat songs that are integral to the story.
Easily one of the finest comedies since THE GRADUATE, RUSHMORE
is a monument to brilliant filmmaking."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 Rushmore DVD
|
Royal
Tenenbaums - Vendor's Marketing:
"In their youth, the Tenenbaums--an eccentric
New York family--were extraordinary. They were all geniuses.
Royal Tenenbaum (Gene Hackman) was a successful litigator.
His wife Etheline (Angelica Huston) raised their children
to be ambitious, entrepreneurial, and creative--then published
an acclaimed book about her child-rearing techniques. Adopted
daughter Margot (Gwyneth Paltrow) was a gifted playwright.
Son Chas (Ben Stiller) was a masterful businessman with
a taste for real estate. And the other son, Richie (Luke
Wilson), was a natural tennis champ. However, when Royal
packed up his life and left his wife and his family in a
cloud of betrayal, everything fell apart. Twenty years later,
the Tenenbaums are a dejected and alienated bunch, each
having found that their early successes did not carry over
into adulthood. When washed-up Royal learns that his distant
wife Etheline, who has become an archaeologist, may remarry,
he feigns illness as an excuse to reunite with his estranged
family. From Wes Anderson, director of RUSHMORE, this film
is full of quirky comedy that will have audiences reeling
and reflecting simultaneously. The brilliant script is impeccable
with choppy, intentionally awkward language delivered with
dry wit by the well-appointed (almost too good to be true)
cast. Dramatic sets are emphasized by the film's masterful
orchestration of scene changes and chapter separations.
The photography beautifully captures a faded, vintage 1980s
New York. And the eclectic soundtrack features much-loved
tunes by Nico, The Velvet Underground, The Clash, and the
Vince Guaraldi Trio."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 RoyalTe DVD
|
The
Enigma of Kaspar Hauser - Vendor's
Marketing: "(Also Known As: Every Man for Himself
and God Against All, Also Known As: Mystery of Kaspar Hauser,
Also Known As: Jeder Fur Sich Und Gott Gegen Alle)
Director Werner Herzog (AGUIRRE, THE WRATH OF GOD; FITZCARRALDO)
approaches the true story of famous wild child Kaspar Hauser
as a metaphor, continuing his cinematic investigations into
human consciousness and civilization. In 1828, Kaspar was
found in the town square of Nuremberg, Germany, hardly able
to speak or walk, having been kept in solitary confinement
by unknown forces for his entire life. As Kaspar is taken
in by the locals, his integration into society and the curiosity
posed by his mysterious and possibly dangerous origins start
to pull at the carefully kept seams of civilization. In
Kaspar, Herzog creates an idealized and unspoiled perspective
through which to see both the ridiculous and the sublime
aspects of humanity and nature as well as the interaction
between the two that results in civilization. Breathtaking
and eerie images of natural landscapes are juxtaposed with
the intricate artifice of Kaspar’s indoctrination
into the language, thought, religion, and culture of 19th-century
Germany. Bruno S. (Stroszek in Herzog’s film of the
same name) gives an astonishing performance as the haunting
man-child Kaspar, stumbling, literally and figuratively,
through his newfound environment, giving human and emotional
life to the enigma of Kaspar Hauser."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 Enigma DVD
|
Dead
Man - Vendor's Marketing: "In
bringing his distinct vision to the Western genre, writer-director
Jim Jarmusch has created a quasi-mystical avant-garde drama
that remains a deeply spiritual viewing experience. After
losing his parents and fiancée, a Cleveland accountant
named William Blake (a remarkable Johnny Depp) spends all
his money and takes a train to the frontier town of Machine
in order to work at a factory. Upon arriving in Machine,
he is denied his expected job and finds himself a fugitive
after murdering a man in self-defense. Wounded and helpless,
Blake is befriended by Nobody (Gary Farmer), a wandering
Native American who considers him to be a ghostly manifestation
of the famous poet. Nobody aids Blake in his flight from
three bumbling bounty hunters, preparing him for his final
journey--a return to the world of the spirits. Jarmusch
once again employs the beautifully contrasted black-and-white
photography of Robby Müller, which sets a poetic, dreamy
mood. He also fades in and out of scenes in order to better
reflect Blake’s dazed, weak mental state. Adding an
even greater depth to the film is Neil Young’s haunting
score, which completes the overall effect. DEAD MAN stands
firmly as a timeless work of art whose impact only increases
upon subsequent viewings."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 DeadMan DVD
|
Ghost
Dog: The Way of the Samurai - Vendor's
Marketing: "Eastern and Western cultures and
philosophies intersect in this comic drama from acclaimed
director Jim Jarmusch. Ghost Dog (Forest Whitaker) is a
silent modern-day warrior who lives on a rooftop shack.
He spends his days breeding pigeons and playing chess in
the park with his best friend, Raymond (Isaach de Bankolé),
a French-speaking ice-cream man. At night he goes to work
as a hit man, performing his tasks stealthily and invisibly,
abiding by the codes established by HAGAKURE: THE BOOK OF
THE SAMURAI, an 18th-century text. One night, while on his
latest hit, Ghost Dog encounters a mob boss's beautiful
daughter, Louise (Tricia Vessey). Although Ghost Dog leaves
her unharmed, her father nonetheless orders Ghost Dog’s
execution, to the dismay of Louie (John Tormey), his loyal
retainer. As the mobsters struggle to locate the mysteriously
untraceable Ghost Dog, he must find a way to protect himself
while remaining loyal to Louie and the ancient codes that
define him as an individual. Jarmusch successfully tackles
a variety of genres with GHOST DOG, including mob movies
and spiritual samurai films. Fusing all of this with the
RZA’s thumping, atmospheric score, GHOST DOG remains
another lighthearted, entertaining addition to Jarmusch’s
impressive filmography."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 GhostD DVD
|
Sleeper
- Vendor's Marketing:
"The sci-fi satire SLEEPER is often hailed as
the best of Woody Allen's early comedies, which relied mostly
on slapstick and quick verbal asides, but still had more
than their share of comic intelligence. SLEEPER tells the
tale of Miles Monroe (Allen), who is accidentally cryogenically
frozen following a minor operation. Released 200 years later,
in 2173, Miles blunders his way through a bizarre future,
featuring plenty of props and situations for Allen to mine
for laughs. Eventually he meets vapid, hedonistic "poet"
Luna Schlosser (Diane Keaton), with whom he eventually joins
a rebel group opposed to the oppressive government. As in
his earlier BANANAS and LOVE AND DEATH, Allen's character
stumbles into a revolutionary plot, revealing the anti-authoritarianism
that will appear again and again in his films. Loosely based
on H.G. Wells' novel WHEN THE SLEEPER WAKES, the film features
a strong parodic bent, particularly of the type of science
fiction that was being written and filmed when it was made
in 1973. Oppressive, faceless governments and the technological
dominance over human life (altering even the most fundamental
natural actions, such as sex) are the main tropes Allen
skewers, as well as playing off the futuristic production
design of films like A CLOCKWORK ORANGE and THX-1138. However,
SLEEPER was still considered a strong work of science fiction,
winning both the prestigious Hugo and Nebula Awards, which
are given to the finest works in the genre."
Awards,
American Film Institute honoree.
Call number: PN1997 Sleeper DVD
|
Crimes
and Misdemeanors - Vendor's
Marketing: "CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS is Woody
Allen's most mature, most profound film. Martin Landau plays
Judah Rosenthal, a successful ophthalmologist having an
affair with Dolores (Anjelica Huston), who is threatening
to reveal their relationship unless Judah commits to her
and leaves his wife. He admits his sin to Ben (Sam Waterston),
a friend, a patient, and a learned rabbi who is losing his
eyesight but not his faith. Judah turns to his brother Jack,
who is connected to the mob and can make Dolores disappear.
Allen plays Cliff Stern, a documentary filmmaker who accepts
an assignment to film his pompous, successful brother-in-law,
Lester (Alan Alda), a comedy star; both Cliff and Lester
fall for Hallie Reed (Mia Farrow), a producer involved in
the documentary. Allen the director brings all the characters
together in a fabulous mix of comedy and drama, deceit and
delight. CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS is a marvel of complexity,
with fascinating, well-written characters; deep, complicated
relationships; and thought-provoking examinations of religion,
infidelity, morality, murder, comedy, and tragedy."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 CrimesA DVD
|
Edward
Scissorhands - Vendor's Marketing:
"In Tim Burton's EDWARD SCISSORHANDS, a suburban
fairy tale with incredibly imaginative sets, an Avon lady,
Peg Boggs (Dianne Wiest), discovers the half-finished experiment--a
man/monster named Edward (Johnny Depp)--of a mad scientist
(played magically by Vincent Price) living in the neighborhood's
old abandoned castle. The scientist died before replacing
the shy man's large shears with real hands. When Peg attempts
to bring Edward into her suburban world, to live among her
skeptical family (husband Alan Arkin and daughter Winona
Ryder) and gossipy neighbors, his hands--dangerous yet capable
of creating things of great beauty--make for some awkward,
funny, and poignant situations: Edward as a topiary gardener,
Edward as a cutting-edge hair stylist. EDWARD SCISSORHANDS
is a story about tolerance, difference, and creativity as
much as it is a story of a young man's coming of age (the
young man in question is, of course, a monster). In the
ironically surreal world of Edward's suburban community,
he must try to find his place in it, and in the world at
large."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 EdwardSc DVD
|
Brian's
Song - Vendor's Marketing:
"Brian's Song is the Emmy Award-winning true
story that chronicles the special relationship between two
Chicago Bears football players--Brian Piccolo and Gale Sayers--and
Piccolo's heroic fight against cancer."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 BriansSo DVD
|
Carrie
- Vendor's Marketing:
"Brian De Palma's commercial breakout, based
on a novel by Stephen King, helped launch a whole slew of
teen-based horror films, and Carrie the blood-spattered
prom queen has taken her throne in the pantheon of modern
American myth. High school girls played by Amy Irving (in
her film debut), P.J. Soles, and Nancy Allen plot to avenge
themselves on ostracized fellow student and budding telekinetic
Carrie White (Sissy Spacek) after they get in trouble for
pelting her with tampons. When they get popular boy Tommy
Ross (William Katz) to be her date for the prom, the stage
is set for some heart-rending cruelty and fiery retribution.
De Palma expertly uses split screens, slow motion, color
filters, and tracking shots to imbue the proceedings with
a haunting, allegorical elegance. Piper Laurie plays Carrie’s
mentally ill, devoutly Christian mom; she’s brilliant,
as is Spacek."
Awards,
American Film Institute honoree.
Call number: PN1997 Carrie DVD
|
King
Kong - Vendor's Marketing:
"Despite his origins as a low-budget filmmaker
with a taste for the unsavory side of life, Peter Jackson
has turned into an "event" filmmaker--someone
who can conjure up a movie on a scale unlike anything we've
seen before. KING KONG is his sprawling, epic remake of
Merian C. Cooper and Ernest B. Schoedsack's 1933 movie of
the same name, and it is as big as the gorilla that runs
riot through Jackson's rendering of Depression-era New York.
Keeping the simple yet effective plot intact--a film crew
travels to the mysterious Skull Island, picks up Kong, and
brings him back to New York City--Jackson expands on this
basic premise by drawing on the jaw-dropping talents of
his special effects team to satisfy his thirst for the grand
spectacle. The movie posits Naomi Watts as Ann Darrow, the
starry-eyed blonde beauty whom Kong falls for; Jack Black
as Carl Denham, a low-rent Orson Welles look-alike who drags
the crew to the island to make his movie; and Adrian Brody
as Jack Driscoll, a hack playwright who battles Kong both
physically and for Darrow's heart. As the men struggle against
Kong and the lumbering dinosaurs of Skull Island, Andy Serkis,
who made the character of Gollum so believable in the Lord
of the Rings trilogy, steps in to form the facial features
of the mighty gorilla, lending a real emotional sucker-punch
to the scenes between Darrow and Kong. But it's the final
third of the movie where Jackson really delivers; his 1930s
New York is stunning, and when Kong breaks free from his
shackles and stampedes on a lovelorn trek through the city,
then iconically climbs the Empire State Building with his
sweetheart, it's impossible to not be swept away by the
sheer beauty and sadness of the moment. While its three-hour
length may prove daunting to some, the payoff in Jackson’s
KING KONG is ultimately worth it, proving once again that
he is a director of breathtaking vision."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 KingKo 2006 DVD
|
Life
Is Beautiful - Vendor's Marketing:
"Conjuring keys and hats out of thin air, Guido
(Roberto Benigni), a clever Jewish-Italian waiter, successfully
courts Dora (Nicoletta Braschi), a beautiful local woman,
in Fascist pre-WWII Italy. His life, however, is turned
upside down a few years later when he, Dora, and their young
son, Giosué (Giorgio Cantarini), are sent to a Nazi
concentration camp. Refusing to give up hope, Guido tries
to protect his son's innocence by pretending that their
imprisonment is just an elaborate game, with the grand prize
being a tank. For years the box-office champ in Italy and
the country's most beloved slapstick comic, the Chaplinesque
Benigni took a huge risk with LIFE IS BEAUTIFUL. Many people
worried that the film would be as offensive as plopping
a cartoon character in Auschwitz. (A similar work--THE DAY
THE CLOWN CRIED, a Jerry Lewis film about a comedian in
a concentration camp--turned out to be a disaster two decades
earlier.) Although LIFE IS BEAUTIFUL did provoke some controversy,
many people found the film to be a poignant, tragicomic
story that profoundly reaffirmed the humanity of concentration
camp victims. The film became the highest grossing foreign
language film in the U.S. and established Benigni as an
international star."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 LifeIsBe DVD
|
Nixon
- Vendor's Marketing:
"Using a nonchronological narrative style à
la CITIZEN KANE (from which he quotes), director Oliver
Stone explores former president Richard Nixon's strict Quaker
upbringing, his nascent political strivings in law school,
and his strangely self-effacing courtship of his wife, Pat
(played by Joan Allen). The contradictions in his character
are revealed early, in the vicious campaign against Helen
Gahagan Douglas and the oddly masochistic Checkers speech.
His defeat at the hands of the hated and envied John F.
Kennedy in the 1960 presidential election, followed by the
loss of the 1962 California gubernatorial race, seem to
signal the end of his career. Yet, although wholly lacking
in charisma, Nixon remains a brilliant political operator,
seizing the opportunity provided by the backlash against
the antiwar movement to take the presidency in 1968. It
is only when safely in office, running far ahead in the
polls for the 1972 presidential election, that his growing
paranoia comes to full flower, triggering the Watergate
scandal. Surprisingly, Stone evinces considerable compassion
as he gives us a Nixon of tragic stature and nearly Shakespearean
dimension in this powerfully moving film. The star-studded
cast, including Ed Harris and James Woods, complements Hopkins's
extraordinary performance."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 Nixon DVD
|
Natural
Born Killers - Vendor's Marketing:
"Oliver Stone's over-the-top satire on America's
worshipful fascination with tabloid criminals stars Woody
Harrelson as Mickey Knox and Juliette Lewis as girlfriend-wife
Mallory Wilson. Commencing with the dual murder of Mallory's
sexually abusive father (Rodney Dangerfield) and grossly
negligent mother (Edie McClurg), the anomic couple take
off on a three-week killing spree across the country, telling
everyone who they are so that they get the credit for their
crimes. The media are immediately enthralled with the couple,
especially Wayne Gale (Robert Downey Jr.), the bloodthirsty
host of a tabloid TV show who follows their every move.
By the time they're finally arrested, they've become such
huge media stars that the cops treat them more like celebrities
than criminals. Even the maniacal limelight-hogging warden
of the Batongaville State Prison, Dwight McClusky (Tommy
Lee Jones), is in awe. Stone pulls out all the stops in
the prison riot, as the unwitting Gale becomes an unwilling
participant in his own broadcast of the event. Again the
director switches from film to video, from color to black
and white, from sitcom parody to newsreel parody, and from
one film stock to another, hoping to jar the audience out
of its complacency with visual hyperbole."
"This radical video detonates with the world premier
of the uncut film version of Natural Born Killers, and then
ignites with over 60 minutes of never-before-seen footage,
a new exclusive Oliver Stone interview, the lost scenes
with Ashley Judd and Denis Leary, and Stone's explosive
alternate ending. Also includes a bonus documentary, taking
you behind-the-scenes on the making of Natural Born Killers."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 NaturalBo DVD
|
JFK
- Vendor's Marketing:
"Covers the period from 1963 to 1968; Produced
and released in 1991. Oliver Stone's self-proclaimed "countermyth,"
JFK mocks the doubtful veracity of the Warren Commission's
findings on the Kennedy assassination and summarizes some
of the myriad theories that have been proposed in its contest.
Focusing on the investigation by New Orleans district attorney
Jim Garrison (Kevin Costner) into the activities of the
FBI and other government agencies as well as their attempted
cover-ups, Stone weaves fact and speculation into a compelling
argument for the reopening of the case files. Garrison begins
to investigate local links to the assassination, including
Clay Shaw (Tommy Lee Jones), David Ferrie (Joe Pesci), Guy
Bannister (Ed Asner), Perry Russo (Kevin Bacon), and Lee
Harvey Oswald (Gary Oldman). When the accounts of Ferrie,
Russo, and others almost invariably diverge from the FBI
versions of events, Garrison begins to suspect a cover-up.
Widening his net, he interviews many of the original assassination
witnesses and again finds little that coincides with the
government's record. Combining interviews with an analysis
of the physical evidence, Garrison's team posits the existence
of a conspiracy to kill the president. A mysterious Col.
X (Donald Sutherland) implies the orchestration of the conspiracy
at the highest levels of government, and Garrison is ready
to go to trial. Stone deploys video, different film stocks
shot at varying speeds, and a dizzying style of montage
while harnessing the talents of a large and extraordinary
cast to create a film of undeniable power and excitement."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 JFK DVD
|
Born
on the Fourth of July - Vendor's
Marketing: "Set in the years between 1956 and
1976; Produced and released in 1989. One of the best films
made about the devastating impact of the Vietnam War on
the body politic, BORN ON THE FOURTH OF JULY is superbly
executed by director Oliver Stone, who evokes what may be
Tom Cruise's best performance as Vietnam vet Ron Kovic.
Before the war starts, Kovic is a normal American kid, going
to school, hanging out with his friends, and bagging groceries
for pocket money. But as the Vietnam conflict begins to
impact the lives of everyone around him, the patriotic teenager
decides to enlist. Although his father (Raymond J. Berry)
is not happy with his decision, his mother (Caroline Kava)
could hardly be more enthusiastic. Once in combat, Kovic
becomes disillusioned with his commanding officer (John
Getz) who dismisses the fact that Kovic accidentally shot
one of their own men in combat. Shortly thereafter, Kovic
is paralyzed from the chest down by a bullet in the spine.
He must begin a lengthy and excruciatingly painful rehabilitation,
which includes a period in the shockingly negligent Bronx
Veteran's Hospital. He finally returns to his hometown,
now a confused, embittered, and alienated man. His family
is also unsettled, unsure about how to deal with this very
changed person. After a dissipated spree with other disabled
vets like Charlie (Willem Dafoe), Kovic begins talking to
antiwar activists like Donna (Kyra Sedgwick) and starts
to reevaluate his thinking. In sum, BORN ON THE FOURTH OF
JULY is a deeply moving true account of the effects of war
on its survivors."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 BornOn DVD
|
U-Turn
- Vendor's Marketing: "Oliver
Stone shelved his social conscience while making this vicious
nest-of-vipers noir. Sean Penn stars as Bobby Cooper, a
gambler on the run who is forced to lay up in a desolate
Arizona whistlestop with car trouble. Desperate and broke,
he receives an offer from the middle-aged Jake McKenna (Nick
Nolte) to kill his beautiful young wife, Grace (Jennifer
Lopez). Initially reluctant, he's finally forced to contemplate
the deal. But the fun doesn't really begin until Grace hires
Bobby to kill Jake. The film is based on the modern noir
novel STRAY DOGS by John Ridley."
Call number: PN1997 Uturn DVD
|
Stealing
Beauty - Vendor's Marketing:
"When 19-year-old Lucy Harmon (Liv Tyler) arrives
in Tuscany, wondering about her mother (a recent suicide)
and still nursing a crush on Niccolo, the local playboy
she met on a visit four years earlier, everyone sits up
and takes notice--especially director Bernardo Bertolucci,
who trains his camera on the ingenue with understandable
enthusiasm. The Graysons, who own the artists' colony and
villa where Lucy's mother once wrote poetry, take the young
girl in, and their guests enjoy the infusion of youth. Perhaps
most deeply affected is Alex Parrish (Jeremy Irons), a terminally
ill writer who finds Lucy charming and vital. Before such
attentions, Lucy's interest in Niccolo (who turns out to
be a jerk) quickly fades, replaced by an unexpected mystery
regarding the identity of her father and a possible new
love. And in a further attempt to understand her mother,
Lucy writes light little poems as well. (Bertolucci has
her words appear on the screen as she scribbles.) In fact,
everything seems light in lush and lovely in Tuscany, which
provides a gorgeous setting for the gifted ensemble to play
out their intrigues."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 StealingBe DVD
|
The
Sheltering Sky - Vendor's Marketing:
"Port and Kit Moresby (John Malkovich and Debra
Winger) are American artists and self-styled "travelers"
(as opposed to tourists) exploring Saharan Africa. Their
10-year marriage is strained enough to be threatened by
the presence of their boorish companion, Tunner (Campbell
Scott), who has designs on Kit. The couple's restlessness,
along with a kind of fascination with their own estrangement,
keeps them moving further away from civilization and from
infidelity. Port grows ill, however, and Kit finds herself
alone in the desert, cut off from everything she knows.
Director Bernardo Bertolucci and director of photography
Vittorio Storaro fabulously capture the forbidding beauty
of the Saharan locations, as well as Malkovich's brooding
self-assurance and Winger's artless sexuality. The color
schemes of red and blue serve the story of lovers who live
on different emotional planes. Paul Bowles, the expatriate
author whose semiautobiographical novel is the basis for
the film, comments on the action as a narrator and one-man
chorus. He warns Kit, and the viewer, that life is far more
finite than one habitually imagines, and that the chance
to put things right will not wait forever."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 Shelteri DVD
|
|
The
Crying Game - Vendor's Marketing:
"This highly original film put screenwriter-director
Neil Jordan on the international map. The story begins at
a carnival in Ireland with British soldier Jody (Forest
Whitaker) kidnapped by IRA terrorists Jude (Miranda Richardson)
and Fergus (Stephen Rea). Fergus is assigned to guard Jody,
and they become friends. After the kidnapping goes horribly
wrong, Fergus escapes to London to track down Jody's girlfriend,
Dil (Jaye Davidson), to fulfill a promise to Jody and ends
up falling in love with her. The only problem--well, it's
not the only problem--is Jude has also come to London with
news that the IRA is after Fergus and has a dangerous new
mission in mind. A sensation during its original release
for its controversial plot development, THE CRYING GAME
went on to win several awards and remains a tender and thrilling
viewing experience. Jordan's script bristles with wit and
intelligence, and the plentiful symbolic imagery shows the
hand of a true artist. Ian Wilson's photography beautifully
captures the various locales of London and rural Ireland.
Boy George sings the title song, and the rest of the memorable
score is by Anne Dudley."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 CryingG DVD
|
Saturday
Night Fever - Vendor's Marketing:
"Director John Badham's hit film propelled John
Travolta to stardom, made white polyester suits an instant
fashion craze, and garnered praise for its portrayal of
blue-collar life. Nineteen-year-old Brooklyn native Tony
Manero (Travolta) lives for Saturday nights at the local
disco, where he's king of the club, thanks to his stylish
moves on the dance floor. But outside of the club, things
don't look so rosy. At home, Tony fights constantly with
his father and has to compete with his family's starry-eyed
view of his older brother, a priest. Nor can he find satisfaction
at his dead-end job at a paint store. However, things begin
to change when he spies Stephanie (Karen Lynn Gorney) in
the disco and starts training with her for the club's dance
competition. Stephanie dreams of the world beyond Brooklyn,
and her plans to move to the big city just over the bridge
soon change Tony's life forever. This portrait of young
Brooklyn natives struggling to escape their sheltered lives
for freedom and adventure in the big city of Manhattan defined
a generation of disco dancers and 1970s youths rebelling
against the more traditional expectations of their parents.
Set to the popular dance music of the Bee Gees, this instant
cinematic sensation revealed the fashions and aspirations
of an underground culture to the world."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 SaturdayN DVD
|
Borat:
Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious
Nation of Kazakhstan - Vendor's
Marketing: "Sacha Baron Cohen brings his Borat
character to the big screen with this feature length adaptation
of his American exploits. Fans of DA ALI G SHOW will already
be familiar with the devilishly simple Borat formula, in
which the heavily mustachioed TV host from Kazakhstan dupes
a number of unwitting citizens into revealing their deepest
prejudices, and this movie takes that premise, stirs in
a little narrative structure, and serves a side-splitting
84-minute mirth-fest. The action begins with Borat traveling
to America alongside his producer Azamat Bagatov (Ken Davitian).
After a hotel room viewing of BAYWATCH Borat decides he
must travel to California to woo Pamela Anderson, so he
and the long-suffering Azamat take a cross-country road
trip in an ice cream van, encountering some funny, disturbing,
and deeply strange individuals along the way. SEINFELD producer
Larry Charles lends his directing talents to BORAT, and
he gets the balance between the loosely threaded plot and
Borat’s encounters with real Americans exactly right.
At times the movie threatens to topple over into glorious
anarchy, with each situation escalating to ridiculous (and
ridiculously funny) extremes, but Charles knows exactly
when to put the brakes on and progress to Borat’s
next encounter--although the police are called at the tail-end
of one memorable sequence. Keen-eyed viewers will notice
some repetition from the TV show, with Borat once again
going to a rodeo and again taking etiquette lessons, but
it’s almost as if Cohen treats each of these set-pieces
as a comedic "bit" he is working on, gradually
adding further delirium every time he goes back for another
shot. Sometimes it’s difficult to tell who, if any,
of BORAT’s participants are actors, but it matters
little when the material is this gut-wrenchingly funny,
and it’s testament to Cohen’s talents that he’s
managed to take a marginal supporting character from his
TV show and turned him into a genuine cultural phenomenon."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 Borat DVD
|
Yoga
for Inflexible People - Vendor's
Marketing: "While yoga's benefits have long
been known, many people who are inflexible are unable to
stretch certain muscles properly. Instructor Judi Rice directs
this video toward these very people with 35 perfect beginner
and intermediate programs. Flexibility will improve with
this interactive video."
Call number: RA781.7 .Y6323 2002 DVD
|
Fast
Times at Ridgemont High - Vendor's
Marketing: "Nascent filmmaker and then-Rolling
Stone journalist Cameron Crowe went undercover in a southern
California high school to document the hilarious hijinx
of teens in the 1980s. Director Amy Heckerling turned his
book into a classic teen comedy--equal parts sex, stoners,
sensitivity, and satire. Many of the young cast--most notably,
Sean Penn and Jennifer Jason Leigh--went on to Hollywood
fame. A milestone in '80s teen flicks."
Awards,
American Film institute honoree
Call number: PN1997 FastTime DVD
|
A
Love Song for Bobby Long - Vendor's
Marketing: "When her mother dies unexpectantly,
a young woman returns home to New Orleans ready to claim
her childhood home. Upon arriving at the house, she discovers
that two of her mother's friends are still living in it.
Unable to force them out, the daughter begins to form a
bond with the men as they talk about her mother." Based
on the novel by "Off Magazine Street" by Ronald
Everett Capps.
Call number: PN1997 LoveSong DVD
|
The
Interpreter - Vendor's Marketing:
"Director Sidney Pollack's diverse career sees
him returning to familiar ground with THE INTERPRETER. Crafted
from the same mould that saw Pollack produce the superlative
political thriller THREE DAYS OF THE CONDOR (1975), Nicole
Kidman and Sean Penn star in a film riddled with subterfuge,
recriminations, and deadly secrets. Kidman plays Silvia
Broome, an interpreter who works at the UN in New York City.
One night, while collecting a bag she has left behind in
the building, Silvia overhears a whispered conversation
in which an assassination attempt on a redoubtable African
leader, named Zuwanie (Earl Cameron), is planned during
his future visit to the UN. Secret service agent Tobin Keller
(Penn) is assigned to provide security for Zuwanie on the
forthcoming trip, and conducts an investigation when Silvia
explains what she has heard. He quickly discovers that Silvia
has a lengthy, troubled past as a citizen from the same
country as Zuwanie, and immediately doubts her story. A
series of frantic, fast-paced set pieces ensue, with Pollack
beautifully capturing the architectural wonder of the UN,
and staging some breathtaking scenes all over the city.
Much has been made of THE INTERPRETER'S status as the first
film to be shot inside the UN, and it's to Pollack's credit
that he wasn't overawed by such a prospect. Making full
use of the building, the director highlights the hustle
and bustle of a typical day at the UN, while also shooting
eerily silent late night scenes among the famous halls and
corridors. As Pollack piles on the tension, Penn and Kidman
deliver exemplary performances alongside a prodigious supporting
cast, who do justice to an intelligently written plot designed
to keep viewers guessing right up until the final moments
of the film."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 Interprete DVD
|
West
Side Story - Vendor's Marketing:
"Considered one of the most popular musicals
of all time, WEST SIDE STORY earned director Robert Wise
an Oscar for Best Director as well as nine other Academy
Awards, including Best Picture. Realistically portrayed
characters and their surroundings and expert editing complementing
innovative dance sequences mark this highly stylized modern-day
Romeo and Juliet tale. The stage is set in New York’s
Upper West Side in the 1950s, where the area’s slums
are plagued by racial tensions acted on by two rival gangs:
the Puerto Rican Sharks and the Caucasian Jets. In the middle
of this mess is young, innocent Maria (Natalie Wood), a
Puerto Rican seamstress whose brother, Bernardo (George
Chakiris), is the leader of the Sharks. Despite the warnings
of Anita (Rita Moreno), Bernardo's fiery girlfriend, Maria
falls in love with a young, hopeful Polish boy, Tony (Richard
Beymer), who used to belong to the Jets, now headed by Riff
(Russ Tamblyn). When Tony, on Maria’s urging, tries
to stop a rumble between the gangs, tragedy ensues, marking
their dedicated love affair with violence and desperation.
The infectious, lyrical landmark score by Leonard Bernstein
and Stephen Sondheim help round out one of the greatest
musical experiences ever captured on film."
Awards
Call number: PN1997 WestSide DVD
Call number: PN1997 .W45 2003 (screenplay)
|
Life
the Movie: How Entertainment Conquered Reality -
Publisher's Marketing: ""A
thoughtful, in places chilling, account of the way entertainment
values have hollowed out American life." --"The
New York Times Book Review"
From one of America's most original cultural critics and
the author of Winchell, the story of how our bottomless
appetite for novelty, gossip, glamour, and melodrama has
turned everything of importance-from news and politics to
religion and high culture-into one vast public entertainment.
Neal Gabler calls them "lifies," those blockbusters
written in the medium of life that dominate the media and
the national conversation for weeks, months, even years:
the death of Princess Diana, the trial of O.J. Simpson,
Kenneth Starr vs. William Jefferson Clinton. Real Life as
Entertainment is hardly a new phenomenon, but the movies,
and now the new information technologies, have so accelerated
it that it is now the reigning popular art form. How this
came to pass, and just what it means for our culture and
our personal lives, is the subject of this witty, concerned,
and sometimes eye-opening book."
Call number: PN1995.9 .S6 G23
|
| Where
the Germs Are: A Scientific Safari - Publisher's
Marketing: "A guided tour through the strange
and sometimes dangerous microscopic world
Germs are everywhere--in our intestines and on our skin
as well as on kitchen counters, public toilets, doorknobs,
and just about everything else. Why are there so many microorganisms?
Which ones are dangerous? And how can we avoid the ones
that will make us sick? This entertaining and informative
book provides the answers. Profiling a rogue's gallery of
harmful germs--from the influenza virus, salmonella, and
herpes to hepatitis, tuberculosis, and HIV--as well as helpful
microbes (we actually need E. Coli and other bacteria for
proper digestion), the book reveals how different germs
interact with the human body and what happens when they
do."
Call number: QR46 .B27 2003
|
| Wellsprings:
A Natural History of Bottled Spring Waters - Publisher's
Marketing: "Bottled water is a part of everyday
life for millions of Americans. Per capita consumption in
the United States now tops fifteen gallons per year with
sales over $5 billion in 2002. Even as fuel prices climb,
many people are still willing to pay more for a gallon of
bottled water than they are for the equivalent in gasoline.
At the same time, bottled water has become a symbol of refined
taste and a healthy lifestyle. But despite its growing popularity,
many people cannot quite put their finger on just why they
prefer bottled water to the much less expensive tap variety.
Some have a vague notion that bottled water is "healthier,"
some prefer the convenience and more consistent taste and
others are simply content to follow the trend. The fact
is, most people know very little about the natural beverage
that they drink and enjoy. It is reasonable to wonder, therefore,
just what differentiates bottled water from other water?
Is it really better or healthier than tap water? Why is
it that different brands seem to have subtle variations
in taste? As Francis H. Chapelle reveals in this delightful
and informative volume, a complex story of geology, hydrology,
and history lies behind every, bottle of spring water. The
book chronicles the history of the bottled water industry
in America from its beginnings in Europe hundreds of years
ago to the present day. Subsequent chapters describe the
chemical characteristics that make some, waters desirable
and provide an overview of the geologic circumstances that
produce them. Wellsprings explains, how these geologic conditions
vary throughout the country and how this affects the kinds
and quality of bottled water industry uses this natural
history, together with the perceived health benefits of
spring waters, to market their products. Accessibly written
and well illustrated, Wellsprings is both a revealing account
and a user's guide to natural springs waters. Regardless
of your drinking preference, this timely exploration will
make your next drink of water refreshingly informed."
Call number: TD223 .C434 2005
|
Entangled
Minds: Extrasensory Experiences in a Quantum Reality -
Publisher's Marketing: "IS
EVERYTHING CONNECTED?
Can we sense what's happening to loved ones thousands of
miles away? Why are we sometimes certain of a caller's identity
the instant the phone rings? Do intuitive hunches contain
information about future events? Is it possible to perceive
without the use of the ordinary senses?
Many people believe that such "psychic phenomena"
are rare talents or divine gifts. Others don't believe they
exist at all. But the latest scientific research shows that
these phenomena are both real and widespread, and are an
unavoidable consequence of the interconnected, entangled
physical reality we live in.
Albert Einstein called entanglement "spooky action
at a distance" -- the way two objects remain connected
through time and space, without communicating in any conventional
way, long after their initial interaction has taken place.
Could a similar entanglement of minds explain our apparent
psychic abilities? Dean Radin, senior scientist at the Institute
of Noetic Sciences, believes it might.
In this illuminating book, Radin shows how we know that
psychic phenomena such as telepathy, clairvoyance, and psychokinesis
are real, based on scientific evidence from thousands of
controlled lab tests. Radin surveys the origins of this
research and explores, among many topics, the collective
premonitions of 9/11. He reveals the physical reality behind
our uncanny telepathic experiences and intuitive hunches,
and he debunks the skeptical myths surrounding them. "Entangled
Minds" sets the stage for a rational, scientific understanding
of psychic experience."
Call number: BF1040 .R33 2006
|
| The
Myth of Mental Illness: Foundations of a Theory of Personal
Conduct (Revised) (2ND ed.) -
Publisher's Marketing: "
A classic work that has revolutionized thinking throughout
the Western world about the nature of the psychiatric profession
and the moral implications of its practices. "Bold
and often brilliant."-- "Science" "Bold
and often brilliant." "--Science"
"It is no exaggeration to state that Szasz's work
raises major social issues which deserve the attention of
policy makers and indeed of all informed and socially conscious
Americans...Quite probably he has done more than any other
man to alert the American public to the potential dangers
of an excessively psychiatrized society."--Edwin M.
Schur, "Atlantic""
Call number: RC437.5 .S9 1974
|
Isaac's
Storm: A Man, a Time, and the Deadliest Hurricane in History
- Publisher's Marketing:
"September 8, 1900, began innocently in the seaside town
of Galveston, Texas. Even Isaac Cline, resident meteorologist
for the U.S. Weather Bureau, failed to grasp the true meaning
of the strange deep-sea swells and peculiar winds that greeted
the city that morning. Mere hours later, Galveston found itself
submerged by a monster hurricane that completely destroyed
the town and killed over 6,000 people in what remains the
greatest natural disaster in American history -- and Isaac
Cline found himself the victim of a devastating personal tragedy.
Using Cline's own telegrams, letters, and reports, the
testimony of scores of survivors, and our latest understanding
of the science of hurricanes, Erik Larson builds a chronicle
of one man's heroic struggle and fatal miscalculation in
the face of a storm of unimaginable magnitude. Thrilling,
powerful, and unrelentingly suspenseful, Isaac's Storm is
the story of what can happen when human arrogance meets
the uncontrollable force of nature."
Call number: F394.G2 L37 2000b
|
| How
the Pro-Choice Movement Saved America: Sex, Virtue, and
the Way We Live Now - Publisher's
Marketing: " The passion of the pro-life movement
extends beyond abortion opposition to an overarching desire
to end contraceptive use and to restrict sex to procreation
only, argues Page, director of a national pro-choice organization.
In contrast, by supporting women's ability to control their
reproductive lives, the pro-choice movement has helped to
improve life for American women across a broad range of
social and economic issues. She details the corrosive influence
of pro-life politics on science, including lobbying to prevent
FDA approval of an emergency contraceptive pill to be sold
over the counter. The pro-life movement has political “muscle
that extends across the globe,” harming efforts to
reduce family size in developing nations and to encourage
advancement of women. Page outlines the threats to the Roe
decision and the privacy rights that also protect all aspects
of sexuality, from contraception to homosexuality. This
is a well-researched and thoughtful look at the politics
behind reproductive issues and the implications for all
Americans, whatever their position on abortion."
Call number: HQ767.5 .U5 P334 2006
|
| Admiral
of the Ocean Sea: A Life of Christopher Columbus -
Publisher's Marketing: "Telling
the story of the greatest sailor of them all, "Admiral
of the Ocean Sea" is a vivid and definitive biography
of Columbus that details all of his voyages that, for better
or worse, changed the world. 50 drawings, maps & charts;
4 fold-outs."
Call number: E111 .M86 1991b
|
| Life
in the Ancient Near East, 3100-332 B.C.E. - Publisher's
Marketing: "In this sweeping overview of life
in the ancient Near East, Daniel Snell surveys the history
of the region from the invention of writing five thousand
years ago to Alexander the Great's conquest in 332 B.C.E.
The book is the first comprehensive history of the social
and economic conditions affecting ordinary people and of
the relations between governments and peoples in ancient
Egypt, Jordan, Israel, Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, and Turkey.
To set Near East developments in a broader context, the
author also provides brief contrasting views of India, China,
Greece, and Etruscan Italy. Snell organizes his book chronologically
in time spans of about five hundred years and considers
broad continuities. Drawing on the latest scholarship in
many fields and in many languages, he sets forth a detailed
picture of what is known about the demography, social groups,
family, women, labor, land and animal management, crafts,
trade, money, and government of the ancient Near East. For
general readers with an interest in historical events that
have influenced the development of Europe and the Middle
East, for specialists seeking a broader understanding of
early periods of Middle Eastern history, and for anyone
with an interest in the Bible, this book offers a fascinating
tour of life in ancient Western Asia."
Call number: DS62.23 .S65 1997
|
| The
End of the Bronze Age: Changes in Warfare and the Catastrophe
CA. 1200 B.C. - Publisher's
Marketing: "The Bronze Age came to a close early
in the twelfth century B.C. with one of the worst calamities
in history: over a period of several decades, destruction
descended upon key cities throughout the Eastern Mediterranean,
bringing to an end the Levantine, Hittite, Trojan, and Mycenaean
kingdoms and plunging some lands into a dark age that would
last more than four hundred years. In his attempt to account
for this destruction, Robert Drews rejects the traditional
explanations - earthquakes, migrations, drought, systems
collapse - and proposes a military one instead. Combining
fascinating archaeological facts with vivid descriptions
of military tactics, Drews presents the transition from
chariot to infantry warfare as the primary cause of the
Great Kingdoms' downfall. Late in the thirteenth century
B.C. the barbarians who until then had been little cause
for concern to the Great Kingdoms, and who had served the
kings as mercenary "runners" in support of the
chariots, awoke to the fact that en masse they could destroy
a chariot army. There followed an orgy of slaughter, looting,
and destruction. From the ashes arose the city-states of
Greece and the tribal confederacy of Israel, communities
that depended on massed formations of infantrymen. In making
these arguments, the author uses textual and archaeological
evidence to reconstruct what actually happened in the Bronze
Age chariot battles, as well as the combat that characterized
the Catastrophe."
Call number: GN778.3 .A1 D7
|
| Corporate
Culture: Illuminating the Black Hole - Publisher's
Marketing: "No subject is more important to
the success of today's business organization than Corporate
Culture. After so many years of failed fads and fix-its,
such as business-process reengineering, outsourcing, downsizing,
flawed go-for-growth strategies, and outrageous cases of
corporate lawlessness, Dr. Jerry Want brings clarity and
direction to the one subject that is most critical to the
success and very survival of today's corporation- corporate
culture. "Corporate Culture: Illuminating the Black
Hole "is the definitive source of knowledge for understanding
and building the new type of business culture that is required
in this age of radical business change. Through dozens of
real-life examples drawn from his many years of consulting
and corporate experience, and unique tools such as the proprietary
Hierarchy of Corporate cultures ranging from Predatory through
Bureaucratic to high-performing New Age cultures, Dr. Want
shows concretely and clearly how a company's culture permeates
everything it does, and how to revitalize the culture in
order to grow and perform to maximum capability. Case studies
show how corporate culture has contributed to the success
of such companies as Nucor, Harley-Davidson, Green Mountain
Coffee Roasters, and Cisco Systems, among others. The book
also examines how flawed corporate cultures have contributed
to the failure or near failure of former industry leaders
such as SmithKline, Motorola, Arthur Andersen, Xerox, and
Polaroid, among others."
Call number: HD58.7 .W327 2007
|
| Organization
Theory: Tension and Change - Publisher's
Marketing: ""Organization Theory: Tension
and Change" provides the most current and concise analysis
of the development and evolution of organizational theories,
forms, and practices, from the rise of the factory system
to the emergence of the virtual global organization. Using
a wide variety of examples and applications from private-
and public-sector organizations, the text emphasizes the
tensions, contradictions, and paradoxes inherent in all
organizational arrangements. In addition to the classic
themes such as scientific management, human relations, rational
bureaucratic models, and environmental models, the book
explores emerging organizational forms based on lean and
flexible production, post-bureaucracy, alliancess, and networks,
virtual organization and information technologies, corporate
cultures, learning organizations, transnational commodity
chains, and post-modernism."
Call number: HD31 .J243 2001
|
| Emotional
Bridges to Puerto Rico: Migration, Return Migration, and
the Struggles of Incorporation - Publisher's
Marketing: "Emotional Bridges to Puerto Rico
is about Puerto Ricans' struggles of incorporation into
U.S. society, and the conditions under which members of
the Puerto Rican middle-class move back and forth between
the mainland and island. The book illustrates how structures
of inequalities based on race, class, and gender affect
Puerto Ricans' subjective assessments of incorporation.
Issues regarding the racialization of Puerto Ricans in the
U.S. reveal that in spite of structural incorporation, Puerto
Ricans do not feel like they fully belong in mainland society.
These experiences carry implications for future migration
and settlement decisions."
Call number: E184.P85 A73 2007
|
| America's
Colony: The Political and Cultural Conflict Between the
United States and Puerto Rico - Publisher's
Marketing: "Provides a new and needed approach
to understanding the development and current status of Puerto
Rico."-CHOICE
The precise legal nature of the relationship between the
United States and the people of Puerto Rico was not explicitly
determined in 1898 when the Treaty of Paris transferred
sovereignty over Puerto Rico from Spain to the United States.
Since then, many court cases, beginning in 1901, have been
instrumental in defining this delicate relationship.While
the legislation has clearly established the non-existence
of Puerto Rican nationhood and lack of independent Puerto
Rican citizenship, the debate over Puerto Rico's status
continues to this day.Malavet offers a critique of Puerto
Rico's current status as well as of its treatment by the
U.S. legal and political systems. Puerto Rico is a colony
of the United States, and Puerto Ricans living on this geographically
separate island are subject to the United States's legal
and political authority. They are the largest group of U.S.
citizens currently living under territorial status. Malavet
argues that the Puerto Rican cultural nation experiences
U.S. imperialism, which compromises both the island's sovereignty
and Puerto Ricans' citizenship rights. He analyzes the three
alternatives to Puerto Rico's continued territorial status,
examining the challenges manifest in each possibility, as
well as illuminating what he believes to be the best course
of action."
Call number: F1975 .M23 2004
|
| Restoring
Growth in Puerto Rico: Overview and Policy Options -
Publisher's Marketing: "As
a territory of the United States, Puerto Rico enjoys the
benefits of key U.S. legal, monetary, security, and tariff
systems, and its residents are U.S. citizens. In the decades
following World War II, Puerto Rico emerged as one of the
worlds fastest-growing economies. From 1950 to 1970 per
capita income nearly doubled as a percentage of the U.S.
average, making the island the richest economy in Latin
America. Since the mid-1970s, however, labor force attachment
has declined, economic growth has slowed, and the islands
living standards have fallen further behind those on the
mainland. Today more than half of all Puerto Rican children
live below the U.S. poverty level. Why did Puerto Ricos
economic progress stall? And more important, what can be
done to restore growth? A number of overlapping concerns—
labor supply and demand, entrepreneurship, the fiscal situation,
financial markets, and trade— are at the heart of
its economic difficulties. This is a companion volume to
"Restoring Growth: The Economy of Puerto Rico"
(Brookings, 2006), in which economists from Puerto Rico
and the United States examine the islands economy and propose
strategies for sustainable growth. This monograph summarizes
the analyses published in that volume and presents a set
of policy recommendations to increase employment, improve
education, upgrade infrastructure, and fix government finances.
Contributors include James Alm (Georgia State University),
Barry P. Bosworth and Gary Burtless (Brookings Institution),
Susan M. Collins (Brookings Institution and Georgetown University),
Steven J. Davis (University of Chicago), Mara E. Enchautegui,
Juan Lara, Luis A. Rivera- Batiz, and Orlando Sotomayor(University
of Puerto Rico), Richard B. Freeman and Robert Z. Lawrence
(Harvard University), Helen F. Ladd (Duke University), Rita
Maldonado-Bear and Ingo Walter (New York University), Francisco
L. Rivera-Batiz (Columbia University), and Miguel A. Soto-Class
(Center for the New Economy)."
Call number: HC154.5 .R43 2006
|
| The
Economy of Puerto Rico - Publisher's
Marketing: "A non-incorporated territory of
the United States, Puerto Rico operates under U.S. legal,
monetary, security and tariff systems. Despite sharing in
these and other key U.S. institutions, Puerto Rico has experienced
economic stagnation and large scale unemployment since the
1970s. The islands living standards are low by U.S. standards,
with a per capita income only half that of Mississippi,
the poorest state. While many studies have analyzed the
fiscal implications of Puerto Ricos political relationship
with the United States, little research has focused broadly
on the islands economic experience or assessed its growth
prospects. In this innovative new book, economists from
U.S. and Puerto Rican institutions address a range of major
policy issues affecting the islands economic development.
To frame the current situation, the contributors begin by
assessing Puerto Ricos past experience with various growth
policies. They then analyze several reforms and new initiatives
in labor, education, entrepreneurship, fiscal policy, migration,
trade, and financing development, which they incorporate
into a proposed strategy for jumpstarting Puerto Rican economic
growth.
Contributors include Gary Burtless (Brookings Institution);
Orlando Sotomayor, Luis Rivera-Batiz, Ramn Cao, Maria Enchautegui,
Jos Joaqun Villamil, Eileen Segarra, Marins Aponte, and
Juan Lara (University of Puerto Rico); Richard Freeman and
Robert Lawrence (Harvard University); Helen Ladd (Duke University);
Francisco Rivera-Batiz (Columbia University); Steven Davis
and Bruce Meyer (University of Chicago); James Alm (Georgia
State University); Ingo Walter, Rita Maldonado-Bear, and
William Baumol (New York University); Belinda Reyes(University
of California, Merced); Alan Krueger (Princeton University);
Carlos Santiago (University of Wisconsin); David Audretsch
(Indiana University); Ronald Fisher (Michigan State University);
Fuat Andic (UN Advisor); Arturo Estrella (NY Federal Reserve);
James Hanson and Daniel Lederman (World Bank); James Dietz
(University of California, Fullerton); and Katherine Terrell
(University of Michigan)."
Call number: HC154.5 .E275 2006
|
| Puerto
Rico Under Colonial Rule: Political Persecution and the
Quest for Human Rights - Publisher's
Marketing: "Puerto Rico, one of the last and
most populated colonial territories in the world, occupies
a relatively unique position. Its lengthly interaction with
the United States has resulted in the long-term acquisition
of expanded legal rights and relative political stability.
At the same time, that interaction has simultaneously seen
political intolerance and the denial of basic rights, particularly
toward those who have challenged colonialism. In "Puerto
Rico under Colonial Rule, academics and intellectuals from
the fields of political science, history, sociology, and
law examine three themes: evidence of state-sponsored political
persecution in the twentieth century, contemporary issues,
and the case of Vieques."
Call number: JC599.P9 P84 2006
|
| Living
in Mexico - Publisher's
Marketing: "Living in Mexico gives advice on
how to feel at home, make friends, and enjoy everyday life
in the country of Mexico and provides a brief introduction
to the culture for all travelers whether venturing abroad
for study, pleasure, or business."
Call number: F1216 .F369 2005
|
| The
Plain Truth about Living in Mexico: The Expatriate's Guide
to Moving, Retiring, or Just Hanging Out - Publisher's
Marketing: "Expatriates Doug and Cindi Bower
have successfully expatriated to Mexico, learning through
trial and error how to do it from the conception of the
initial idea to driving up to their new home in another
country. Now the potential expatriate can benefit from their
more than three years of pre-expat research to their more
than two years of actually living in Mexico. They explain:
How to begin the process of deciding whether Mexico is for
you. How to evaluate locations and costs for expatriation.
How to avoid being stereotyped as an Ugly American. How
to find and set up your new home. Ways to cure culture shock
before arriving in Mexico. How to master Spanish before
moving. How safe Mexico really is. The benefits of cheap
living, travel, and medical care. The modern technology
available in Mexico. and much more! The Plain Truth about
Living in Mexico answers the potential expatriate's questions
by leading them through the process from the beginning to
the end. In this comprehensive guide, you will learn not
only how-to expatriate but will learn what to expect, in
daily life, before coming to Mexico."
Call number: F1216 .B68 2005
|
| Florida
Almanac (2007-2008) - Publisher's
Marketing: "A first-rate activities guide, reference
manual, atlas, directory, and history book, the Florida
Almanac contains useful information on everything from government
in 1875 to the state's biggest squash to hurricane survival
tips."
Call number: Reference - F 311 .F65
|
| I
Like You: Hospitality Under the Influence
- Publisher's Marketing:
"America's most delightfully unconventional hostess
provides jackpot recipes and solid advice laced with her
blisteringly funny take on entertaining--plus four-color
photos and enlightening sidebars on everything it takes
to pull off a party with extraordinary flair."
Call number: GV1471 .S39 2006
|
| In
Spite of the Gods: The Strange Rise of Modern India -
Publisher's Marketing: "India
remains a mystery to many Americans, even as it is poised
to become the world’ s third largest economy within
a generation, outstripping Japan. It will surpass China
in population by 2032 and will have more English speakers
than the United States by 2050. In "In Spite of the
Gods," Edward Luce, a journalist who covered India
for many years, makes brilliant sense of India and its rise
to global power. Already a number-one bestseller in India,
his book is" "sure to be acknowledged for years
as the definitive introduction to modern India.
"In Spite of the Gods" illuminates a land of many
contradictions. The booming tech sector we read so much
about in the West, Luce points out, employs no more than
one million of India’ s 1.1 billion people. Only 35
million people, in fact, have formal enough jobs to pay
taxes, while three-quarters of the country lives in extreme
deprivation in India’ s 600,000 villages. Yet amid
all these extremes exists the world’ s largest experiment
in representative democracy— and a largely successful
one, despite bureaucracies riddled with horrifying corruption.
Luce shows that India is an economic rival to the U.S. in
an entirely different sense than China is. There is nothing
in India like the manufacturing capacity of China, despite
the huge potential labor force. An inept system of public
education leaves most Indians illiterate and unskilled.
Yet at the other extreme, the middle class produces ten
times as many engineering students a year as the United
States. Notwithstanding its future as a major competitor
in a globalized economy, American. leaders have been"
"encouraging India’ s rise, even welcoming itinto
the nuclear energy club, hoping to balance China’
s influence in Asia.
Above all, "In Spite of the Gods "is an enlightening
study of the forces shaping India as it tries to balance
the stubborn traditions of the past with an unevenly modernizing
present. Deeply informed by scholarship and history, leavened
by humor and rich in anecdote, it shows that India has huge
opportunities as well as tremendous challenges that make
the future “hers to lose.”"
Call number: HC435.3 .L83 2007
|
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