Calvin Riley was born in poverty to parents who were allegedly blood brother and sister, on the island of Jamaica, where the privileged had a constant smile on their faces, but the underprivileged shed endless tears. From childhood, he experienced limitless emotional and physical pain, and at length he began to retaliate. As he got older, he realised that he was moulding into a new person of a new world, but he seemed forever condemned and hemmed in by walls. Eventually he had to lie and cheat to survive, and perhaps only the fact that he had love in his heart why he hadnt committed murder; it was also the same love that kept him from being killed.

Drawing on two and a half years of field work, Victor Turner offers two thorough ethnographic studies of Ndembu revelatory ritual and divinatory techniques, with running commentaries on symbolism by a variety of Ndembu informants. Although previously published, these essays have not been readily available since their appearance more than a dozen years ago. Striking a personal note in a new introductory chapter, Professor Turner acknowledges his indebtedness to Ndembu ritualists for alerting him to the theoretical relevance of symbolic action in understanding human societies. He believes that ritual symbols, like botanists' stains, enable us to detect and trace the movement of social processes and relationships that often lie below the level of direct observation.

Liberal arts colleges represent a tiny portion of the higher education market—no more than 2 percent of enrollees. Yet they produce a stunningly large percentage of America’s leaders in virtually every field of endeavor. The educational experience they offer—small classes led by professors devoted to teaching and mentoring, in a community dedicated to learning—has been a uniquely American higher education ideal. Liberal Arts at the Brink is a wake-up call for everyone who values liberal arts education. A former college president trained in law and economics, Ferrall shows how a spiraling demand for career-related education has pressured liberal arts colleges to become vocational, distorting their mission and core values. The relentless competition among them to attract the “best” students has driven down tuition revenues while driving up operating expenses to levels the colleges cannot cover. The weakest are being forced to sell out to vocational for-profit universities or close their doors. The handful of wealthy elite colleges risk becoming mere dispensers of employment and professional school credentials. The rest face the prospect of moving away from liberal arts and toward vocational education in order to survive. Writing in a personable, witty style, Ferrall tackles the host of threats and challenges liberal arts colleges now confront. Despite these daunting realities, he makes a spirited case for the unique benefits of the education they offer—to students and the nation. He urges liberal arts colleges to stop going it alone and instead band together to promote their mission and ensure their future.

Robert Ellis, a former Army nurse, makes a legitimate claim that he spent more time with the former strong man of Iraq, Saddam Hussein, than any other American. For 8 months in his deployment at Camp Cropper near Baghdad, Robert was responsible for the health and well-being of the Army s high-value detainees depicted on the infamous deck of cards showing Iraq s Most Wanted. In particular, he was charged with keeping the deposed Iraqi dictator, known by his code name Victor, not only alive but well. Caring for Victor presents the story of the author's experience and complicated relationship with Saddam and how that experience developed and was shaped by events in Robert s own life including two sad journeys he made back to St. Louis to deal with family deaths, first his mother and then his brother. Robert also covers his dealings with some of the other high-value detainees, including Chemical Ali, and presents an exclusive look at the everyday life of a soldier during the U.S. occupation of Iraq.

In this book, Victor Turner is concerned with various kinds of social actions and how they relate to, and come to acquire meaning through, metaphors and paradigms in their actors' minds; how in certain circumstances new forms, new metaphors, new paradigms are generated. To describe and clarify these processes, he ranges widely in history and geography: from ancient society through the medieval period to modern revolutions, and over India, Africa, Europe, China, and Meso-America. Two chapters, which illustrate religious paradigms and political action, explore in detail the confrontation between Henry II and Thomas Becket and between Hidalgo, the Mexican liberator, and his former friends. Other essays deal with long-term religious processes, such as the Christian pilgrimage in Europe and the emergence of anti-caste movements in India. Finally, he directs his attention to other social phenomena such as transitional and marginal groups, hippies, and dissident religious sects, showing that in the very process of dying they give rise to new forms of social structure or revitalized versions of the old order.

In "Subsurface History of Humanity: Direction of History", Victor Torvich gives a sweeping overview of global humankind's history for the last 44 thousand years. The book will help you to make sense of human history. Victor Torvich found the objective direction of the history of humankind. How fast humankind is moving in the found direction? Is that move controllable by humans? Why humans rule the Earth? Which force is driving humanity's development? These are other questions Torvich answers in his wide-ranging book. Torvich looks at history from a viewpoint of a precise science. Insights from his scientific papers on the complex system of humanity helped him to find out where mankind is headed. The book concludes with a discussion of which circumstances could shortly lead us off the uncovered course.

If you have been wounded, experienced terrible trials, bear unbearable burdens or become a victim of life's circumstances, this book, in the author's opinion, is for you.

This American's memoirs tell of the 45 years he lived in the Soviet Union, experiencing acclaim as a parachutist, imprisonment, marriage, and banishment to Siberia.