The Educator And The Oligarch: A Teacher Challenges The Gates Foundation. Anthony Cody

Can a teacher challenge the wealthiest man in the world? Anthony Cody, who spent 24 years working in the high poverty schools of Oak­land, California, has done so here. Education reform is the top do­mestic priority for the Gates Foundation, and this philanthropic organ­ization has poured billions of dollars into reshaping American schools. This money has paid for research, advocacy, and a whole non-profit industry aligned with the Gates agenda. According to Cody, their chosen path of data-driven reform, centered on high stakes tests, educational technology and market-based competition between schools, threatens great harm to public education.

Orwell Award

In Search of Sir Thomas Browne: The Life and Afterlife of the Seventeenth Century's Most Inquiring Mind. Hugh Aldersey-Williams

In Search of Sir Thomas Browne is more than just a biography―it is a cabinet of wonders and an argument that Browne, standing at the very gates of modern science, remains an inquiring mind for our own time. As Stephen Greenblatt has written, Browne is "unnervingly one of our most adventurous contemporaries."

“[F]ascinating…. [A] cleverly constructed and amusing book, on a subject deserving of fresh attention.” (Wall Street Journal)

“A triumph. With humour, humility and intelligent generosity, Aldersey-Williams brings Sir Thomas Browne splendidly to life, urns and all.” (Financial Times (UK))

PEN Literary Awards Longlists

Altruism: The Power of Compassion to Change Yourself and the World. Matthieu Ricard

In Happiness, Matthieu Ricard demonstrated that true happiness is not tied to fleeting moments or sensations, but is an enduring state of soul rooted in mindfulness and compassion for others. Now he turns his lens from the personal to the global, with a rousing argument that altruism--genuine concern for the well-being of others--could be the saving grace of the 21st century. It is, he believes, the vital thread that can answer the main challenges of our time: the economy in the short term, life satisfaction in the mid-term, and environment in the long term. Ricard's message has been taken up by major economists and thinkers, including Dennis Snower, Amartya Sen, Joseph Stiglitz, and George Soros.

"Ricard's book, full of good behavior on the part of humans-and other animals-is of a piece with Steven Pinker's The Better Angels of Our Nature in suggesting that we don't have to be rotten. Inspirational in all the right ways..."―Kirkus

Культуры городов. Шарон Зукин

Политический социолог Шарон Зукин, начавшая, не без влияния работ Вальтера Беньямина, писать о городах, большую часть жиз­ни провела в Нью-Йорке, и именно этот город является основным объектом ее исследований. Ее последняя книга «Голый город: смерть и жизнь аутентичных городских мест» рассказывает о проблеме джентрификации в шести нью-йоркских районах. В «Культурах городов», впервые вышедших почти 20 лет назад, Зу­кин выбирается за границы любимого города, и посвящает несколько глав феноменам Диснейленда и Беркширских музеев современного искусства, вопросам шоппинга и роли блошиных рынков, а также публичных пространств.

The Teenage Brain. A Neuroscientist's Survival Guide to Raising Adolescents and Young Adults. Frances E. Jensen, Amy Ellis Nutt

For many years, scientists believed that the adolescent brain was es­sentially an adult one. Over the last decade, however, neurology and neuroscience have revealed that the teen years encompass vitally im­portant stages of brain development.

Interweaving clear summary and analysis of research data with anec­dotes drawn from her years as a clinician, researcher, and public speaker, renowned neurologist Frances E. Jensen, MD, explores ad­olescent brain functioning and development in the context of learning and multitasking, stress and memory, sleep, addiction, and decision making.

The Teenage Brain explains how these eye-opening findings not only dispel commonly held myths about teens but also yield practical sug­gestions for adults and teenagers negotiating the mysterious and ma­gical world of adolescent biology.

“It’s charming to see good science translate directly into good parent­ing.”—New York Times Book Review

“This well-written, accessible work...offers support and a way for par­ents to understand and relate to their own soon-to-be-adult offspring.”—Publishers Weekly

Landskipping. Painters, Ploughmen and Places. Anna Pavord

Landskipping is a ravishing celebration of landscape, its iridescent beauty and its potential to comfort, awe and mesmerise. In spirit as Romantic as rational, Anna Pavord explores the different ways in which we have, throughout the ages, responded to the land. In the eighteenth century, artists first started to paint English scenery, and the Lakes, as well as Snowdon, began to attract a new kind of visitor, the landscape tourist. Early travel guides sought to capture the beauty and inspiration of waterfall, lake and fell. Sublime! Picturesque! they said, as they laid down rules for correctly appreciating a view.
Anna Pavord’s Landskipping (Bloomsbury), which tells the story of the emergence of landscape as an artistic, cultural and tourist phenomen­on. Guardian

Эфиопия: христианство, ислам, иудаизм. проф. Хагай Эрлих, д-р Агар Соломон, проф. Стивен Каплан

Курс открытого Университета "Эфиопия: христианство, ислам, иудаизм" представляет собой целостное описание одной из ин­тереснейших цивилизаций - эфиопской и роли в ее становлении и развитии трех мировых монотеистических религий - христи­анства, ислама и иудаизма.

Диалог о двух главнейших системах мира — птолемеевой и коперниковой. Галилео Галилей

Самая известная и значительная из астрономических работ Га­лилея, вышедшая в августе 1632 во Флоренции, и являющаяся результатом более чем тридцатилетних трудов и размышлений великого ученого. Именно эта книга послужила формальным по­водом гонений на автора со стороны инквизиции. Содержание работы, в основном, представляет собой изложение различных аргументов как в пользу геоцентрической, так и в пользу гелио­центрической систем, а также критику положений аристотелевой физики - именно поэтому автор выбрал для нее форму дискуссии между приверженцами обеих теорий. Книга снабжена современ­ными примечаниями и комментариями.

Текст данной версии рукописи, которая хранится в Национальной центральной библиотеке Флоренции, близок к окончательному тексту рукописи, подготовленной к печати (полная версия текста рукописи с правками автора хранится в библиотеке Семинарии Падуи). На написание этого труда, опубликованного в 1632 году, Галилео потребовалось шесть лет; это одна из его самых значи­тельных работ. Трактат написан в форме дискуссии между сто­ронником взглядов Коперника, сторонником взглядов Птолемея и Аристотеля и образованным мирянином, которого оба оппонента пытаются убедить в своей правоте.

Magic in Western Culture. From Antiquity to the Enlightenment. Brian P. Copenhaver

The story of the beliefs and practices called 'magic' starts in ancient Iran, Greece, and Rome, before entering its crucial Christian phase in the Middle Ages. Centering on the Renaissance and Marsilio Ficino – whose work on magic was the most influential account written in pre­modern times – this groundbreaking book treats magic as a classical tradition with foundations that were distinctly philosophical. Besides Ficino, the premodern story of magic also features Plotinus, Iamblichus, Proclus, Aquinas, Agrippa, Pomponazzi, Porta, Bruno, Campanella, Descartes, Boyle, Leibniz, and Newton, to name only a few of the prom­inent thinkers discussed in this book. Because pictures play a key role in the story of magic, this book is richly illustrated.

Лаборатория империи: мятеж и колониальное знание в Великобритании в век Просвещения. Станислав Малкин

Это исследование — первая в российской и зарубежной историо­графии интеллектуальная история решения «Хайлендской проблемы» Великобритании в конце XVII — первой половине XVIII вв. В центре внимания автора — роль колониального зна­ния в умиротворении и «цивилизации» Горной Шотландии. Гео­графы, этнографы, политэкономы в Хайленде были еще и чинов­никами, на практике подтверждая тесную связь между властью и знанием в рамках колониальной и окраинной политики европей­ских держав в духе века Разума и Просвещения. Они сочетали экспансию имперского порядка, новое научное знание и секуляр­ные представления о человечестве. Раскрытие этих сюжетов по­могает более глубоко понять, как формировались британская на­ция и Британская империя, а также значение интеллектуальной колонизации Хайленда для имперского строительства за океана­ми и шире — роль гуманитарного знания в век Разума, Просве­щения и первых глобальных империй. С.Г. Малкин — доктор ис­торических наук, профессор кафедры всеобщей истории и мето­дики обучения Поволжской государственной социально-гумани­тарной академии (г. Самара), автор более 70 научных работ по истории.

Месть географии. Что могут рассказать географические карты о грядущих кон­фликтах и битве против неизбежного. Роберт Д. Каплан

Книга журналиста-международника Роберта Каплана о том, как, несмотря на стирание границ и расстояний в современном мире, географическое положение страны все еще имеет важное значе­ние для ее исторической судьбы. Именно в нем автор видит при­чины «арабской весны» в Тунисе, войны на Балканах, медленно­го развития Африки и Индии и других процессов.

Trashed. Candida Brady

Jeremy Irons sets out to discover the extent and effects of the global waste problem, as he travels around the world to beautiful destinations tainted by pollution. This is a meticulous, brave investigative journey that takes Irons (and us) from skepticism to sorrow and from horror to hope.

Cannes Film Festival Nomination
Tokyo International Film Festival Award

Four Horsemen

The modern day Four Horsemen continue to ride roughshod over the people who can least afford it. Crises are converging when governments, religion and mainstream economists have stalled. 23 international thinkers come together and break their silence about how the world really works and why there is still hope in re-establishing a moral and just society. Four Horsemen is free from mainstream media propaganda, doesn't bash bankers, criticize politicians or get involved in conspiracy theories. The film ignites the debate about how we usher a new economic paradigm into the world which, globally, would dramatically improve the quality of life for billions.

When Europe forgot its homework: Education in crisis

Despite the wide consensus on the fact that quality education is a key element to exit the economic and social crisis, to reduce social inequalities, to increase social well-being and democratic participation in society, education systems in many European countries are deteriorating. ETUCE looked in-depth into the reality of five countries: Greece, Italy, Portugal, Spain and Ireland, which have experienced very big cut backs in education. The ETUCE documentary 'When Europe forgot its homework: education in crisis' shows that cuts and downturns in the education systems have affected everyday people  – teachers, students, parents, and societies – and made the prospects and opportunities for young people more unclear, jeopardizing the future of the younger generations. It also shows how teacher trade unions have reacted to the economic crisis, delivering alternative answers to face the effects of austerity.

Tabriz: Images from the Forgotten World. Mohammad Ehsani

An Armenian photographer's archives, whose ancestors introduced photography to the ancient city of Tabriz in 1900, could be in jeopardy. There are over thousand photographs of historic significance in his archives, which reflect the lives of the Moslem and Christian communities of Tabriz. Therefore, no child to pass it on to, the photographer needs to protect his national treasure

Bangkok International Film Festival Nomination
Moondance International Film Festival  Award
Rhode Island International Film Festival Nomination

Bottled Life: Nestle's Business with Water. Urs Schnell

Do you know how to turn ordinary water into a billion-dollar business? In Switzerland there's a company which has developed the art to perfection - Nestlé. This company dominates the global business in bottled water. Swiss journalist Res Gehringer has investigated this money-making phenomena. Nestlé refused to cooperate, on the pretext that it was "the wrong film at the wrong time". So Gehringer went on a journey of exploration, researching the story in the USA, Nigeria and Pakistan. His journey into the world of bottled water reveals the schemes and strategies of the most powerful food and beverage company on our planet.

War & Peace 1614-1714

La Capella Reial de Catalunya & Le Concert des Nations, Jordi Savall
 
Lully, Handel, Charpentier, Scheidt, Biber, Schein, Cabanilles, Dumanoir, Rosenmüller, Jenkins, Cererols, Blow: this double SACD-book gathers the who’s-who of European music, to mention but a few, of the 17th and the beginning of the 18th centuries. Deeply affected by the Thirty Years War as well as the War of Spanish Succession, the finest music inspired by this turmoil is vividly performed by Jordi Savall and his ensembles. The set ends with a fantastic and complete performance of Handel’s 'Jubilate Deo'; and, as you have come to expect from Alia Vox, the booklet is lavishly documented.

International Classical Music Awards – Best collection

Piotr Tchaikovsky: Iolanta

Olesya Golovneva, Alexander Vinogradov, Andrei Bondarenko, Dmytro Popov, Vladislav Sulimsky, John Heuzenroeder, Marc-Olivier Oetterli, Dalia Schaechter, Justyna Samborska,
Choir of the Cologne Opera – Gürzenich Orchestra of Cologne
Dmitrij Kitajenko

Die Uraufführungen von Jolanthe und Der Nussknacker fanden am 18. Dezember 1892 im St. Petersburger Mariinski-Theater statt. „Die Ausführung beider“, schrieb der Komponist tags darauf an seinen Bruder Anatoly, „war großartig, und die des Balletts wohl zu großartig – der Glanz ermüdete die Augen.“ Gustav Mahler dirigierte bereits am 3. Januar 1893 in Hamburg die erste Aufführung des Operneinakters außerhalb Russlands und brachte Jolanthe am 22. März 1900 auch als Wiener Erstaufführung zu Gehör.

International Classical Music Awards – Opera winner

Лукас Генюшас. Эмансипация Консонанса.

Фирма «Мелодия» представляет диск фортепианной музыки современных российских композиторов в исполнении лауреата XV Международного конкурса им. П.И. Чайковского Лукаса Генюшаса. Этот молодой пианист принадлежит к наиболее ярким музыкальным дарованиям современности. Ученик В. Горностаевой, он достойно продолжает великие традиции отечественного фортепианного исполнительства, идущие от Г. Нейгауза. В свои 25 лет он является обладателем множества престижных международных премий, в том числе серебряных медалей крупнейших фортепианных состязаний Европы – имени Ф. Шопена в Варшаве (2011) и имени П.И. Чайковского в Москве (2015). Критики отмечают зрелость и глубину искусства пианиста, убедительность его исполнительских трактовок музыки самых разных эпох – от Генделя до Хиндемита. Записи Генюшаса выходили на лейблах NIFC, Art Classic, DUX, Piano Classics; двойной диск с произведениями Шопена выпустил Институт Ф. Шопена в Польше, в 2013 г. Московской консерваторией была выпущена трансляционная запись концерта пианиста, посвященного юбилею Рахманинова. На этот раз Л. Генюшас представляет фортепианные циклы современных русских авторов – Леонида Десятникова, Валерия Арзуманова и Владимира Рябова. Исполняемые сочинения написаны во второй половине 1980-х гг. и выдержаны в эстетике «новой простоты». В то же время эта музыка по-своему отражает сложное время тотальной «переоценки ценностей», происходившей в эти годы в жизни и искусстве нашей страны.

CPO Panufnik Symphonic Works series (8 CDs)

The Andrzej Panufnik Edition is one of the major recording projects involving modern music in recent years. Panufnik’s extensive output of symphonic music is richly communicative and of potentially widespread appeal. Highly committed, first rate soloists, the excellent Konzerthausorchester Berlin and the Polish Radio Symphony Orchestra under the charismatic and expressive conductor Lukas Borowicz – the real ‘master’ of this edition, having this music definitely in his bones – are inspired protagonists.
Andrzej Panufnik stands out in the compositional landscape of the Western World. “For me music is always the expression of the deepest human feeling and genuine emotion. The spiritual and poetic content is therefore very essential and has a decided influence on the construction. In all my works I attempt to form a real balance between emotion and intellect – an equilibrium of heart and mind, of motivation and construction.” This month CPO are concluding their complete edition of Panufnik’s symphonic works with his three great concertos for violin, cello, and piano.

American School Reform: What Works, What Fails, and Why. Joseph P. McDonald

Dissecting twenty years of educational politics in our nation’s largest cities, American School Reform offers one of the clearest assessments of school reform as it has played out in our recent history. Joseph P. McDonald and his colleagues evaluate the half-billion-dollar Annenberg Challenge—launched in 1994—alongside other large-scale reform efforts that have taken place in New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, and the San Francisco Bay Area. They look deeply at what school reform really is, how it works, how it fails, and what differences it can make nonetheless.

the PROSE Awards.  Winner, Education Practice

The Public School Advantage: Why Public Schools Outperform Private Schools. Christopher A. Lubienski and Sarah Theule Lubienski

Nearly the whole of America’s partisan politics centers on a single question: Can markets solve our social problems? And for years this question has played out ferociously in the debates about how we should educate our children. From the growth of vouchers and charter schools to the implementation of No Child Left Behind, policy makers have increasingly turned to market-based models to help improve our schools, believing that private institutions—because they are competitively driven—are better than public ones. With The Public School Advantage, Christopher A. and Sarah Theule Lubienski offer powerful evidence to undercut this belief, showing that public schools in fact outperform private ones

the PROSE Awards.  Winner, Education Theory

How Should We Live? A Practical Approach to Everyday Morality. John Kekes

Nearly the whole of America’s partisan politics centers on a single question: Can markets solve our social problems? And for years this question has played out ferociously in the debates about how we should educate our children. From the growth of vouchers and charter schools to the implementation of No Child Left Behind, policy makers have increasingly turned to market-based models to help improve our schools, believing that private institutions—because they are competitively driven—are better than public ones. With The Public School Advantage, Christopher A. and Sarah Theule Lubienski offer powerful evidence to undercut this belief, showing that public schools in fact outperform private ones

the PROSE Awards. Honorable Mention, Philosophy

В стране чудес Алисы: из истории создания

В этом году исполнилось 150 лет с первой публикации «Алисы в Стране чудес». С тех пор кто только не иллюстрировал знаменитую сказку! В книге студии «4+4» собрано более 400 иллюстраций, созданных 43 художниками из разных стран, с 1860-х по 2000-е годы: здесь и Сальвадор Дали, и Мервин Пик, Артур Рэкхем, Геннадий Калиновский, Юлия Гукова и многие другие. Иллюстрации сопровождает (в данном случае никак не наоборот) классический перевод Нины Демуровой, который тут явно играет вспомогательную роль, почему и помещен на левую страницу книжного разворота, как бы для того, чтобы только напомнить рассматривающему картинки читателю тот фрагмент текста, иллюстрации к которому (и комментарии к ним) занимают на развороте большую часть площади.

The Meaning of the Library: A Cultural History. Edited by Alice Crawford

From Greek and Roman times to the digital era, the library has remained central to knowledge, scholarship, and the imagination. Generously illustrated, The Meaning of the Library examines this key institution of Western culture. Tracing what the library has meant since its beginning, examining how its significance has shifted, and pondering its importance in the twenty-first century, significant contributors—including the librarian of the Congress and the former executive director of the HathiTrust—present a cultural history of the library.

Whether relishing an account of the Alexandrian Library or a look at the stylish railway libraries of nineteenth-century England, readers will find a sparkling survey of the library through time. Here, too, are the imagined libraries of fiction, poetry, and film, from Scheherazade’s stories to The Name of the Rose and beyond.

The Innovator’s Hypothesis: How Cheap Experiments Are Worth More Than Good Ideas. Michael Schrage

What is the best way for a company to innovate? Advice recommending “innovation vacations” and the luxury of failure may be wonderful for organizations with time to spend and money to waste. The Innovator’s Hypothesis addresses the innovation priorities of companies that live in the real world of limits. Michael Schrage advocates a cultural and strategic shift: small teams, collaboratively—and competitively—crafting business experiments that make top management sit up and take notice. He introduces the 5x5 framework: giving diverse teams of five people up to five days to come up with portfolios of five business experiments costing no more than $5,000 each and taking no longer than five weeks to run. Successful 5x5s, Schrage shows, make people more effective innovators, and more effective innovators mean more effective innovations.

Про это. Факсимильное издание. Статьи. Комментарии. В.Маяковский, илл. А.Родченко

Поэма Про это писалась в экстремальных условиях разлада Маяковского с возлюбленной, героиней поэмы: по взаимной договоренности с Лилей Брик они не виделись ровно два месяца. В это время Маяковский работал по 16–20 часов в сутки и сделал столько, сколько, по его собственному признанию, «никогда не делал за полгода».

В 1925 году на Международной выставке в Париже Родченко показал иллюстрации к поэме, за что получил серебряную медаль в номинации «Искусство книги». Настоящее издание впервые воспроизводит факсимильное издание поэмы и включает в себя фотомонтажи в цвете.

The University of Chicago. A History. John W. Boyer

With The University of Chicago: A History, John W. Boyer, Dean of the College since 1992, presents a deeply researched and comprehensive history of the university. Boyer has mined the archives, exploring the school’s complex and sometimes controversial past to set myth and hearsay apart from fact. The result is a fascinating narrative of a legendary academic community, one that brings to light the nature of its academic culture and curricula, the experience of its students, its engagement with Chicago’s civic community, and the conditions that have enabled the university to survive and sustain itself through decades of change.

The Secret Lives of Teachers. Anonymous

Welcome to “East Hudson,” an elite private school in New York where the students are attentive, the colleagues are supportive, and the tuition would make the average person choke on its string of zeroes. You might think a teacher here would have little in common with most other teachers in America, but as this veteran educator—writing anonymously—shows in this refreshingly honest account, all teachers are bound by a common thread. Stripped of most economic obstacles and freed up by anonymity, he is able to tell a deeper story about the universal conditions, anxieties, foibles, generosities, hopes, and complaints that comprise every teacher’s life. The results are sometimes funny, sometimes scandalous, but always recognizable to anyone who has ever walked into a classroom, closed the door, and started their day.

Improbable Libraries. Alex Johnson

Public libraries are a cornerstone of modern civilization, yet like the books in them, libraries face an uncertain future in an increasingly digital world. Undaunted, librarians around the globe are thinking up astonishing ways of reaching those in reading need, whether by bike in Chicago, boat in Laos, or donkey in Colombia. Improbable Libraries showcases a wide range of unforgettable, never-before-seen images and interviews with librarians who are overcoming geographic, economic, and political difficulties to bring the written word to an eager audience. Alex Johnson charts the changing face of library architecture, as temporary pop-ups rub shoulders with monumental brick-and-mortar structures, and many libraries expand their mission to function as true community centers.