Sociology Books - Page 15

The Necklace: Thirteen Women and the Experiment That Transformed Their Lives

Cheryl Jarvis

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 12 Average rating: 3.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

The true story of thirteen women who took a risk on an expensive diamond necklace and, in the process, changed not only themselves but a community.

Four years ago, in Ventura, California, Jonell McLain saw a diamond necklace in a local jewelry store display window. The necklace aroused desire first, then a provocative question: Why are personal luxuries so plentiful yet accessible to so few? What if we shared what we desired? Several weeks, dozens of phone calls, and a leap of faith later, Jonell bought the necklace with twelve other women, with the goal of sharing it.

Part charm, part metaphor, part mirror, the necklace weaves in and out of each woman’s life, reflecting her past, defining her present, making promises for her future. Lending sparkle in surprising and unexpected ways, the necklace comes to mean something dramatically different to each of the thirteen women.
With vastly dissimilar histories and lives, the women show us how they transcended their individual personalities and politics to join together in an uncommon journey. What started as a quirky social experiment became something far richer and deeper, as the women transformed a symbol of exclusivity into a symbol of inclusiveness. They discovered that sharing the necklace among themselves was only the beginning; The more they shared with others, the more profound this experience–and experiment–became.

Original, resonant, and beautifully told, this book is an inspiring story about a necklace that became greater than the sum of its links, and about thirteen ordinary women who understood the power of possibility, who touched the lives of a community, and who together created one extraordinary experience.

A Conflict of Visions: Idealogical Origins of Political Struggles

Thomas Sowell

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 54 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

A Vision of Visions 4 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

This is a fascinating book that will change the way you see the world. Like all visions, there is much that is left out or oversimplified by Sowell's analysis. Nevertheless, it is an extremely worthwhile read. Sowell is clearly widely read in economics, political philosophy, and social thought, and the book is remarkable for its ability to convey the essence of complex thinkers like Friedrich Hayek in an easily digestible form. Even if you're read your Smith, Mill, and others, you'll still learn a lot from this book.

Editorial Review:

In this classic work, Thomas Sowell analyzes the two competing visions that shape our debates about the nature of reason, justice, equality, and power: the “constrained” vision, which sees human nature as unchanging and selfish, and the “unconstrained” vision, in which human nature is malleable and perfectible. He describes how these two radically opposed views have manifested themselves in the political controversies of the past two centuries, including such contemporary issues as welfare reform, social justice, and crime. Updated to include sweeping political changes since its first publication in 1987, this revised edition of A Conflict of Visions offers a convincing case that ethical and policy disputes circle around the disparity between both outlooks.

Boundaries with Kids

Dr. Henry Cloud, Dr. John Townsend

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 36 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

Since the 1992 release of their Gold Medallion Award-winning book, Boundaries, Drs. Henry Cloud and John Townsend have heard these three questions rephrased thousands of times. As parents begin to realize the tremendous impact poor boundaries have had on their own lives, their concern naturally extends to their children. How can they help their sons and daughters form healthy boundaries that lead to well-rounded characters and successful adult lives? Now there are answers. Boundaries with Kids helps parents apply the Ten Laws of Boundaries (first described in Boundaries) to the challenges of raising children. In their popular, readable style, Cloud and Townsend help moms and dads make choices and develop a parenting approach that sees beyond the moment to the adults their children will become. For parents who want their kids to escape the struggles they themselves have experienced, here’s an in-depth look at how to implement the preventive medicine of character development by establishing sound boundaries starting with the parents. Boundaries with Kids helps moms and dads learn how to
bring control to an out-of-control family life
set limits and still be loving parents define what legitimate boundaries are in the family transfer what they are learning as parents to help their children develop healthy boundaries. Illustrating its points with numerous case studies and anecdotes, Boundaries with Kids gives parents the can-do guidance they need in order to model healthy boundaries for their kids. This book may well be the best investment parents will ever make into the lifelong welfare of their children.

Children of the Self-Absorbed: A Grown-Up's Guide to Getting over Narcissistic Parents

Nina W. Brown

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 69 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

It's not all about you, Mom 5 out of 5 stars.
2 of 2 people found this review helpful.

Children of the Self-Absorbed: A Grown-up's Guide to Getting over Narcissistic Parents

"Children of the Self-Absorbed" by Dr. Nina Brown, practical guide to eliminating bad emotional habits and illusions that interfere with recovery from a childhood with Narcissistic parents. Beginning with an explanation of the term, "Self-Absorbed", Dr.Brown describes some of the lingering emotional and cognitive damage caused, and moves on to techniques of unravelling the emotional tangles and fantasies that prevent the patient from recovering and moving on. Most of the book is devoted to identifying erroneous emotional and thinking patterns and exercises for clearing them away, replacing them with patterns that strengthen and heal. The author is clear, honest and respectful of the reader: she uses everyday language; she remains realistic, avoiding self-help hucksterism, false sympathy, intellectualizing, and flattery; she demonstrates a basic belief that the reader can improve.

On a personal note - a recent death in my family caused such emotional disarray that I searched the Net for answers and explanations of what could be going on. In the process, and through studying this book, many things about the way my family behaves (and how I react), that had been hidden from and confusing to me over my lifetime, were revealed and clarified. I found this book and the exercises in it most liberating. My family drove me to seek psychiatric care many times over the course of my life - I wish those doctors had known what Dr.Brown knows. An enormous weight has finally been lifted from my heart.

This little book packs a lot of healing power.

Editorial Review:

Millions of adults grew up with immature, self-absorbed parents who made their own children responsible for their physical and emotional well-being, expected admiration and constant attention, and reacted with criticism and blame when their slightest need went unmet. In this accessible book, psychologist Nina Brown helps grown children come to terms with the results of such an upbringing, including tendencies to overcomply to others' needs, withdraw when someone needs nurturing, and lack self-esteem. Through self-exploration exercises and protective and coping strategies, Brown helps readers work toward developing a "healthy narcissism" by identifying destructive patterns their parents may have had, evaluating attitudes and behaviors that may be hampering their own adult relationships, dealing with self-doubt and other negative feelings, and piecing together a more integrated sense of self.

Adult Children of Alcoholics

Janet Geringer Woititz

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 57 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Dysfuctional family 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

The book teaches you about lifestyles of alcoholics and what they experience during the time of living at home.

Adult Children of Alcoholics 5 out of 5 stars.
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This is an excellent book. I have used the book in discussing this topic in university-level Social Work classes I have taught over the years.

Excellent 5 out of 5 stars.
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This book has helped me to organize my feelings. I feel like a more centered person.

yes, this is an excellent book 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

This is an excellent book. I first read it nearly 20 years ago and I was blown away by how accurate it was - it described me! It was so helpful and I go back to it now and then for some reminders. It really helped me and was my first step toward real growth.

Editorial Review:

Ten years ago, Janet Woititz broke new ground in our understanding of what it is to be an Adult Child of an Alcoholic. Today she re-examines the movement and its inclusion of Adult Children from various dysfunctional family backgrounds who share the same characteristics. After more than ten years of working with ACoAs she shares the recovery hints that she has found to work. Read Adult Children of Alcoholics to see where the journey began and for ideas on where to go from here.

Not "Just Friends" : Protect Your Relationship from Infidelity and Heal the Trauma of Betrayal

Shirley Glass

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Total reviews: 67 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

Good people in good marriages are having affairs. Well-intentioned people who never intended to be unfaithful are unwittingly forming deep, passionate connections before they realize that they've crossed the line that separates platonic friendship from romantic love. Today's workplace and the Internet have become the new danger zones of attraction and opportunity -- the most fertile breeding grounds for affairs. In the new crisis of infidelity, more and more marriages are being threatened by friendships that have slowly and insidiously turned into love affairs. Yet you can protect your relationship by recognizing the red flags along the slippery slope. You're right to be cautious when you hear these words: "I'm telling you, we're just friends."

Shirley P. Glass, Ph.D., one of the world's leading experts on infidelity, draws on more than two decades of original research and hundreds of clinical cases to chronicle the human story of what occurs before, during, and after the trauma of betrayal. In NOT "Just Friends," Dr. Glass reveals that the disclosure of infidelity is a traumatic event that can reverberate for months -- even years. An important therapeutic breakthrough, her trauma recovery approach helps couples cope with the obsessions, volatile emotions, flashbacks, and other post-traumatic reactions of betrayed partners.

In NOT "Just Friends," infidelity is any secret sexual, romantic, or emotional involvement that violates commitment to an exclusive relationship. An emotional affair, in fact, can be even more destructive to a marriage than extramarital sex. An extramarital affair that involves both sexual intercourse and a deep emotional attachment poses the greatest threat -- and this is the kind of intense infidelity that is becoming more common. In the new crisis of infidelity, more men are getting emotionally involved, and more women are getting sexually involved.

Dr. Glass provides a step-by-step guide through the stages of suspiciousness, revelation, and healing. She gives couples in the midst of turmoil the tools to reestablish safety and foster hope. Healing is not possible until the full story of the affair has been shared. Dr. Glass gives concrete advice about how to tell, what to tell, and when to tell. Eye-opening quizzes help you explore personal vulnerabilities and outside influences to ensure safe friendships and secure marriages. With Dr. Glass's profound, practical guidance, recovery and healing is possible for both partners.

Whether you are an involved partner, a betrayed partner, an affair partner -- or a therapist who would welcome a proven, trauma-based approach to healing infidelity -- you will find wise, nonjudgmental counsel in NOT "Just Friends."

Blessed Unrest: How the Largest Movement in the World Came into Being and Why No One Saw It Coming

Paul Hawken

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Total reviews: 49 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

One of the world’s most influential environmentalists reveals a worldwide grassroots movement of hope and humanity

Blessed Unrest tells the story of a worldwide movement that is largely unseen by politicians or the media. Hawken, an environmentalist and author, has spent more than a decade researching organizations dedicated to restoring the environment and fostering social justice. From billion-dollar nonprofits to single-person causes, these organizations collectively comprise the largest movement on earth. This is a movement that has no name, leader, or location, but is in every city, town, and culture. It is organizing from the bottom up and is emerging as an extraordinary and creative expression of people’s needs worldwide.

Blessed Unrest explores the diversity of this movement, its brilliant ideas, innovative strategies, and centuries-old history. The culmination of Hawken’s many years of leadership in these fields, it will inspire, surprise, and delight anyone who is worried about the direction the modern world is headed. Blessed Unrest is a description of humanity’s collective genius and the unstoppable movement to re-imagine our relationship to the environment and one another. Like Hawken’s previous books, Blessed Unrest will become a classic in its field— a touchstone for anyone concerned about our future.

The Drama of Being a Child

Alice Miller

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 78 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

A Significant Piece of the Puzzle 5 out of 5 stars.
4 of 4 people found this review helpful.

Reading books about psychology, especially books dealing with childhood trauma, is a bit like looking into a shattered mirror. Some parts will accurately reflect aspects of one's own psyche; other parts will be too distorted to have any relevance. As far as mirrors go, I think Alice Miller's "The Drama of the Gifted Child" provides for excellent viewing.

The core of the book is about narcissism, or more precisely, the way that children are negatively affected by the emotional unavailability and/or abuse of their parents. These emotional wounds can create severe dysfunctions and personality disorders later in life - disorders over which the victim has absolutely no control, unless they begin the long and painful road towards breaking out of their "Inner Prison" (as Miller puts it).

Early editions of this book used a lot more psychological jargon, and the revised edition makes things quite clear and concise for the layman, without losing the essential concepts: the role and critical responsibility of the primary object (usually mother); the suppression/repression of feelings in favour of a need to please; the cycles of grandiosity and depression; contempt and its role in perversion and obsession; compulsion to repeat behaviours; the societal role in propagating psychologically diseased values through generations; the severe shortcomings of tradition psychotherapeutic methods (although this was first published in 1979), and the key to healing - consciously experiencing hidden emotional pain.

The case studies and quotes from patients are relevant and add an extra dimension to the theory. I found that some of the examples struck a stronger emotional chord than Miller's own observations, which is important if one is reading a book to gain insight rather than for simple curiosity.

Although a short book at approximately 126 pages, there is very little "fluff" or filling in it. Miller gets straight to the point and has little patience for "parental apologia", which is an approach I think needs to be taken. It seems from other reviews though that some parents bought the book thinking it would affirm their own notions of their child's "giftedness", and were a little "miffed" to find out that wasn't the case. In my opinion, parents like these are the exact reason professionals like Miller need to focus the lens directly on their behaviour.

While it is somewhat of a cliché these days to blame one's parents for one's neuroses, that isn't really the point; responsibility for healing rests with the victim, not the perpetrator. This is something Miller makes clear, although the point is better made in other books, notably Martha Stout's "The Myth of Sanity: Divided Consciousness and the Promise of Awareness".

That the book is now still in print and in its 3rd revision is a testament to its long-term appeal. Despite having read it twice now, I still find revisits to be enlightening and worthwhile. I am very glad to have it on my bookshelf and consider it money well spent.

Readers with a deep interest in the subject may also find "The Narcissistic Family: Diagnosis and Treatment", "Why Is It Always About You? : The Seven Deadly Sins of Narcissism", "Unholy Hungers: Encountering the Psychic Vampire in Ourselves & Others" and the previously mentioned "Myth of Sanity" to be excellent sources of additional information.

Overall, an immensely valuable work and I thank Ms. Miller for her long-term efforts in sharing such important knowledge with the wider public.

Editorial Review:

The first publication of Drama of Being a Child and of this 1997 edition are separated by fifteen years of experience - the author's experience with her own self-therapy and with other recent therapy methods, and finally her knowledge of the life histories of the several thousand readers who have written to her. The research into childhood she has undertaken in this period has led to further fine-tuning of her earlier findings, as is ocumented and illustrated here with an abundance of examples. The author examines the consequences of repression at personal and social levels, the causes of the physical and psychological harm done to children and how this can be prevented, and finally the new methods at our disposal for dealing with the consequences of infant traumas.

Hell's Angels: A Strange and Terrible Saga (Modern Library)

Hunter S. Thompson

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Total reviews: 116 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

"California, Labor Day weekend . . . early, with ocean fog still in the streets, outlaw motorcyclists wearing chains, shades and greasy Levis roll out from damp garages, all-night diners and cast-off one-night pads in Frisco, Hollywood, Berdoo and East Oakland, heading for the Monterey peninsula, north of Big Sur. . . The Menace is loose again."  Thus begins Hunter S. Thompson's vivid account of his experiences with California's most no-torious motorcycle gang, the Hell's Angels.   In the mid-1960s, Thompson spent almost two years living with the controversial An-gels, cycling up and down the coast, reveling in the anarchic spirit of their clan, and, as befits their name, raising hell. His book successfully captures a singular moment in American history, when the biker lifestyle was first defined, and when such countercultural movements were electrifying and horrifying America. Thompson, the creator of Gonzo journalism, writes with his usual bravado, energy, and brutal honesty, and with a nuanced and incisive eye; as The New Yorker pointed out, "For all its uninhibited and sardonic humor, Thompson's book is a thoughtful piece of work." As illuminating now as when originally published in 1967, Hell's Angels is a gripping portrait, and the best account we have of the truth behind an American legend.

On Grief and Grieving: Finding the Meaning of Grief Through the Five Stages of Loss

Elisabeth Kubler-Ross, David Kessler

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 37 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Excellent resource 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

This is a book that I would reccomend everyone read. It is a wonderful guide to the grieving process. It not only helps those going through the process realize what to expect and what is normal, but it also helps those surrounding this person understand better what they are going through. Loss is something we all encounter in our lives and this book helps in preparing us for those times. Also I would reccomend this book as a gift to a grieving person.

Editorial Review:

Elisabeth Kübler-Ross's On Death and Dying changed the way we talk about the end of life. Before her own death in 2004, she and David Kessler completed On Grief and Grieving, which looks at the way we experience the process of grief.

Just as On Death and Dying taught us the five stages of death -- denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance -- On Grief and Grieving applies these stages to the grieving process and weaves together theory, inspiration, and practical advice, including sections on sadness, hauntings, dreams, isolation, and healing.