Gentrification is reshaping cities worldwide, resulting in seductive spaces and exclusive communities that aspire to innovation, creativity, sustainability, and technological sophistication. Gentrification is also contributing to growing social-spatial division and urban inequality and precarity. In a time of escalating housing crisis, unaffordable cities, and racial tension, scholars speak of eco-gentrification, techno-gentrification, super-gentrification, and planetary-gentrification to describe the different forms and scales of involuntary displacement occurring in vulnerable communities in response to current patterns of development and the hype-driven discourses of the creative city, smart city, millennial city, and sustainable city. In this context, how do contemporary creative practices in art, architecture, and related fields help to produce or resist gentrification? What does gentrification look and feel like in specific sites and communities around the globe, and how is that appearance or feeling implicated in promoting stylized renewal to a privileged public? In what ways do the aesthetics of gentrification express contested conditions of migration and mobility? Addressing these questions, this book examines the relationship between aesthetics and gentrification in contemporary cities from multiple, comparative, global, and transnational perspectives.

In a world ever more congested and polluted with both toxins and noise, award-winning photographer Pete McBride takes readers on a once-in-a-lifetime escape to find places of peace and quiet—a pole-to-pole, continent-by-continent quest for the soul. We tend to think of silence as the absence of sound, but it is actually the void where we can hear the sublime notes of nature. In this National Outdoor Book Award winning work, photographer Pete McBride reveals the wonders of these hushed places in spectacular imagery—from the thin-air flanks of Mount Everest to the depths of the Grand Canyon, from the high-altitude vistas of the Atacama to the African savannah, and from the Antarctic Peninsula to the flowing waters of the Ganges and Nile. These places remind us of the magic of being “truly away” and how such places are vanishing. Often showing beauty from vantages where no other photographer has ever stood, this is a seven-continent visual tour of global quietude—and the power in nature’s own sounds—that will both inspire and calm.

The Place of Silence explores the poetics and politics of silence in architecture. Bringing together contributions by internationally recognized scholars in architecture and the humanities, it explores the diverse practices, affects, politics and cultural meanings of silence, silent places and silent buildings in historical and contemporary contexts. What counts as silence in specific situations is highly relative, and the term itself carries complex and varied significations which make it a revealing field of study. Chapters explore a range of themes, from the apparent 'loss of silence' in the contemporary urban world; through designed silent spaces; to the forced silences of oppression, catastrophe, or technological breakdown. The book unfolds a rich and complementary array of perspectives which address – through the lens of architecture and place – questions of sound, atmosphere, and attunement, together building a volume which will form the key scholarly resource on architecture and silence.

John Cage is the outstanding composer of avant-garde music today. The Saturday Review said of him: "Cage possesses one of the rarest qualities of the true creator- that of an original mind- and whether that originality pleases, irritates, amuses or outrages is irrelevant." "He refuses to sermonize or pontificate. What John Cage offers is more refreshing, more spirited, much more fun-a kind of carefree skinny-dipping in the infinite. It's what's happening now." –The American Record Guide "There is no such thing as an empty space or an empty time. There is always something to see, something to hear. In fact, try as we may to make a silence, we cannot. Sounds occur whether intended or not; the psychological turning in direction of those not intended seems at first to be a giving up of everything that belongs to humanity. But one must see that humanity and nature, not separate, are in this world together, that nothing was lost when everything was given away."

Sacred spaces in the home are becoming increasingly popular as people everywhere feel a growing need for prayer, meditation, solace, or inspiration. These spiritual havens represent one of the most contemporary of architectural and design trends. This visual anthology explores this trend, through evocative photographs and authoritative text, and provides insights into creating sacred space in the home and surrounding environment. --dustjacket.

What is silence? Where can it be found? Why is it now more important than ever? In 1993, Norwegian explorer Erling Kagge spent fifty days walking solo across Antarctica, becoming the first person to reach the South Pole alone, accompanied only by a radio whose batteries he had removed before setting out. In this book. an astonishing and transformative meditation, Kagge explores the silence around us, the silence within us, and the silence we must create. By recounting his own experiences and discussing the observations of poets, artists, and explorers, Kagge shows us why silence is essential to sanity and happiness—and how it can open doors to wonder and gratitude. (With full-color photographs throughout.)

“Arguably the greatest living travel writer” (Outside magazine), Pico Iyer has called Japan home for more than three decades. But, as he is the first to admit, the country remains an enigma even to its long-term residents. In A Beginner’s Guide to Japan, Iyer draws on his years of experience—his travels, conversations, readings, and reflections—to craft a playful and profound book of surprising, brief, incisive glimpses into Japanese culture. He recounts his adventures and observations as he travels from a meditation hall to a love hotel, from West Point to Kyoto Station, and from dinner with Meryl Streep to an ill-fated call to the Apple service center in a series of provocations guaranteed to pique the interest and curiosity of those who don’t know Japan—and to remind those who do of its myriad fascinations.

A personal and cultural exploration of silence and its value in our lives—“[an] artful book, mixing autobiography, travel writing, meditation, and essay” (Independent, UK). In her late forties, after a noisy upbringing as one of six children and adulthood as a vocal feminist and mother, Sara Maitland found herself living alone in the country and, to her surprise, falling in love with silence. In this fascinating, intelligent, and beautifully written book, Maitland describes how she began to explore this new love, spending periods of silence in the Sinai desert, the Scottish hills, and a remote cottage on the Isle of Skye. Maitland also delves deep into the rich cultural history of silence, exploring its significance in fairy tale and myth, its importance to the Western and Eastern religious traditions, and its use in psychoanalysis and artistic expression. Her story culminates in her building a hermitage on an isolated moor in Galloway. “Her book is probably unique in its subject, and timely, because good, healing silence is becoming hard to find, and we may not know we need it” (Guardian, UK).

A Best Book of 2022 by the New York Public Library • One of the Best SFF Books of 2022 (Gizmodo) • One of the Best SF Mysteries of 2022 (CrimeReads) • A GoodReads Choice Award finalist for Best Science Fiction! Titanic meets Event Horizon in this SF horror novel in which a woman and her crew board a decades-lost luxury cruiser and find the wreckage of a nightmare that hasn't yet ended. Claire Kovalik is days away from being unemployed—made obsolete—when her beacon repair crew picks up a strange distress signal. With nothing to lose and no desire to return to Earth, Claire and her team decide to investigate. What they find is shocking: the Aurora, a famous luxury spaceliner that vanished on its maiden tour of the solar system more than twenty years ago. A salvage claim like this could set Claire and her crew up for life. But a quick search of the ship reveals something isn’t right. Whispers in the dark. Flickers of movement. Messages scrawled in blood. Claire must fight to hold on to her sanity and find out what really happened on the Aurora before she and her crew meet the same ghastly fate. "Truly un-put-downable in its purest sense.” Chloe Gong, #1 New York Times bestselling author of These Violent Delights At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

Discover the restorative power of silent reflection with this practical guide by the meditation teacher and author of Slaying the Three Dragons. Silence—deep inner silence—opens the pathways to spiritual self-discovery. But where can we find that silence in our noise-polluted world? This book provides a practical toolkit for escaping the clashing sounds of everyday life. Through gentle insights and guided meditations, it provides a quiet space for making mindful choices and learning to enjoy the profound benefits of tranquility—even as the noise around us continues.