Culture Books - Page 5

Fighting for Your Marriage: Positive Steps for Preventing Divorce and Preserving a Lasting Love (Jossey Bass Social and Behavioral Science Series)

Howard Markman, Scott Stanley, Susan L. Blumberg

List Price: $26.00 By: Jossey-Bass Amazon Marketplace: 29 new & used starting at $1.00

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Subjects -> Health, Mind & Body -> Psychology & Counseling -> Counseling -> General AAS
Subjects -> Health, Mind & Body -> Relationships -> Marriage

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 37 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

required reading 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

My husband and I read this book several years ago. We both thought it was the best book we're read on the subject of marriage and communication. I recently sent one to my sister and recommend it to anyone interested in improving their communication. Should be required reading for anyone getting married!

Fighting For Your Marriage 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

Wonderful book! It offers poitive, useful advice for couples either trying to save their marriage or enhance what they have.

Really great book 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

My husband and I attended a marriage workshop on the military base we are stationed at and really enjoyed it. The books were great and if a couple is having marriage problems this book will help a great deal. I recommend this book for any couple!

excellent hands on help 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

This is a great book with a lot of practical application. The key is to honor each other by doing what it says.

Excellent resource for any couple 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

I first read this as a newlywed and found the ideas invaluable. A decade later, it has helped many of the couples I counsel. This book is chock full of practical, easily implemented advice that will enhance any marriage.

Editorial Review:

This book can help you and your partner beat the odds and master the skills that can prevent marital distress and divorce.

The Closing of the American Mind

Allan Bloom

By: Simon&Schuster Amazon Marketplace: 9 new & used starting at $23.63

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 123 Average rating: 3.5 of 5

Makes his points well, but exposes some serious intellectual blind spots 4 out of 5 stars.
2 of 7 people found this review helpful.

Bloom makes a compelling case for embracing, through study, Western Civilization in general, and the Great Books in particular. He also does a good job of showing how today's universities exalt the natural sciences - which address only the material aspect of existence - while neglecting, to man's and society's peril, the social sciences and humanities, which speak to the immaterial aspects of existence.

In the course of making his case Bloom refers to Moses as a myth, or if not the man Moses, then certainly the story of him securing the 10 commandments from Mt. Sinai. At the same time Bloom acknowledges the great contribution of Moses, likening it to those contributions made my Aristotle, Socrates, or Shakespere.

Now, this is interesting logic for such an exalted intellectual as Bloom. He liken Moses to Aristotle, Socrates, and Shakespere but seems untroubled by the fact that one of them - Moses - claimed to receive what he passed down to humanity directly from God, even in face to face interaction. Neither Aristotle, Socrates or Shakespere made any such claim. If they had, wouldn't that change Bloom's opinion of those men - probably for the worse? Truth and deception have nothing in common. How would it be possible for a pathological liar to also provide man with some of the greatest moral truths ever known: "Thou shalt not steal"; "Thou shalt not murder"; "Thou shalt not bear false testimony"? How could a man who could speak this last mentioned commandment, at the same time be so out of touch with reality that he would state that he got the commandments from God? Even if it were possible that such a blend of truth and lies could reside with a man, why would Bloom venerate him?

Furthermore, Bloom convieniently shies away from calling the person, Jesus of Nazareth, a myth (a much harder case to make, even for natural sciences), and Bloom makes no attempt to account for the new paradigm erected by Jesus, especially at the Sermon-on-the-Mount. If Moses' apparently invented moral laws seem noble, if not mythically quaint, to Bloom, if Bloom were alive today would he be prepared to say the same things about Jesus's utterances in the Sermon-on-the-Mount?

Which of the following are quaint mythical statements, as likely fabricated by the mind of man as by God?

"Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God."

"Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy. "

"Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven."

Here again, we have the problem? If Jesus did say those things, so full of truth, how could he also tell the Samaritan women at the well:

"I who speak to you am he." (John 4:26)

after she made mention of the Messiah, if it were not true?

It is sad to see how intransigence toward the God of the Bible can make a muddle out of intellectual acumen.

Rekindling Desire: A Step by Step Program to Help Low-Sex and No-Sex Marriages

Barry W. McCarthy, Emily J. McCarthy

Amazon Price: $12.21 List Price: $17.95 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Routledge Amazon Marketplace: 57 new & used starting at $10.04

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 18 Average rating: 3.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

Is sex more work than play in your marriage? Do you schedule it in like a dentist appointment? Do you make love once a month, twice at the most? If you answered yes to these questions, you are among the forty million Americans trapped in a low-sex or no-sex marriage.

Now there is help from nationally acclaimed sex and marital experts Barry and Emily McCarthy, who for years have helped couples break down the barriers that have developed between them, and rebuild closeness and longing. Their groundbreaking ten-step program is designed to get sex and intimacy back into these marriages and revitalize relationships. Crafted by years of clinical practice, Rekindling Desire first shows couples how to root out the "poisons" that inhibit sexual desire: shame, guilt, anger, passivity, as well as medical side effects and physical dysfunctions. With sensitivity and tact, the McCarthys then lay out concrete techniques and effective strategies that help couples increase sexual awareness, confront inhibitions, revitalize desire, and integrate intimacy and eroticism.

An exciting new way to spark and sustain desire, Rekindling Desire confronts the secrecy and stigma of low-sex and no-sex marriages, teaching couples how to enjoy a fulfilling, life-long sexual partnership.

The Girlfriends' Guide to Surviving the First Year of Motherhood

Vicki Iovine

Amazon Price: $10.17 List Price: $14.95 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Perigee Trade Amazon Marketplace: 580 new & used starting at $0.01

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 206 Average rating: 3.5 of 5

the girlfriends guide to surviving the first year of motherhood 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

This book is a must have for all pregnant women and new moms! I bought one copy for myself after the birth of my second son and it kept me laughing and sane through those rough early months. I have bought two other copies of this book since, as gifts. My copy was pretty dog-eared by the end of the first year!

Just a warning: 3 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

This book is amusing and light to read, but is only useful for BRAND-NEW mothers. I bought it mistakenly thinking there might be some interesting advice on older-baby topics, such as feeding solids, crawling, walking, etc. (I have a 7-month-old daughter). Unfortunately the bulk of the book deals with the newest of new-motherhood issues--losing your baby weight, how to care for your body in the immediate days after delivery, having sex for the first time post-delivery, breast v. bottle, etc. Only buy this if you are still pregnant, seriously.

Editorial Review:

The author of the enormously successful Girlfriends' Guide to Pregnancy brings a mother's wisdom and a girlfriend's candor to the first book in a fresh new series of guides to motherhood. Readers will learn about baby euphoria, postpartum mood swings, salvaging one's sex life, and fitting into that favorite pair of jeans.

Screw the Roses, Send Me the Thorns: The Romance and Sexual Sorcery of Sadomasochism

Philip Miller, Molly Devon

Amazon Price: $16.47 List Price: $24.95 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Mystic Rose Books Amazon Marketplace: 36 new & used starting at $12.96

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 75 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

Philip Miller and Molly Devon think that S/M is fun, and "that reading about it should be fun, too." Screw the Roses, Send Me the Thorns is definitely fun, not to mention approachable, chatty, and insightful. What makes it truly special, however, is the sheer weight of loving details. There's clear explanations and detailed tutorials for beginners, as general as "safe, sane, and consensual" and as specific as "you will be swinging the whip with your arm pivoting at the shoulder." There's also solid advice, safety measures, steamy suggestions, plenty of black-and-white photographs, useful and humorous drawings, an extensive glossary, and over 900 entries of S/M clothing and equipment vendors, publications, computer bulletin boards, and organizations worldwide. As sadomasochism is a practice that's still taboo for many people, the chapter on finding partners and sharing your fantasies with existing partners can be invaluable.

Screw the Roses enthusiastically covers all the basics and even some of the not-so-basics--bondage, negotiation, sex, endorphins, dominance and submission, toys, safety, S/M community, and beyond. It's written primarily from the point of view of male dominant/female submissive interactions, but it's easily translatable into valuable advice for any relationship configuration. Miller and Devon's explanations of not just the how, but also the why, of sadomasochism are honest, sexy, funny--and a must-have for anyone who wants to learn about sadism, masochism, dominance, submission, or bondage. --Cheryl Trooskin

Christ and Culture Revisited

D. A. Carson

Amazon Price: $16.32 List Price: $24.00 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company Amazon Marketplace: 36 new & used starting at $8.17

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 6 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

Called to live in the world, but not to be of it, Christians must maintain a balancing act that becomes more precarious the further our culture departs from its Judeo-Christian roots. How should members of the church interact with such a culture, especially as deeply enmeshed as most of us have become?

D. A. Carson applies his masterful touch to this problem. He begins by exploring the classic typology of H. Richard Niebuhr and his five options for understanding culture. Carson proposes that these disparate options are in reality one still larger vision. Using the Bible's own story line and the categories of biblical theology, he attempts to work out what that unifying vision is. Carson acknowledges the helpfulness of Niebuhr's grid and other similar matrices but warns against giving them canonical force.

More than just theoretical, Christ and Culture Revisited is also designed practically to help Christians untangle current messy debates on living in the world. Carson emphasizes that the relation between Christ and culture is not limited to an either/or cultural paradigm -- Christ against culture or Christ transforming culture. Instead Carson offers his own paradigm in which all the categories of biblical theology must be kept in mind simultaneously to inform the Christian worldview.

Though several other books on culture interact with Niebuhr, none of them takes anything like the biblical-theological approach adopted here. Ground-breaking and challenging, Christ and Culture Revisited is a tour de force.

How to Ruin the United States of America

Ben Stein, Phil DeMuth

Amazon Price: $10.17 List Price: $14.95 Usually ships in 24 hours By: New Beginnings Press Amazon Marketplace: 32 new & used starting at $7.42

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Subjects -> Entertainment -> Humor -> Political
Subjects -> Nonfiction -> Politics -> International -> Relations
Subjects -> Nonfiction -> Politics -> General

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 12 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

On the heels of his very successful books, How to Ruin Your Life, How to Ruin Your Love Life, and How to Ruin Your Financial Life, Ben Stein, in collaboration with his pal Phil DeMuth, has tongue firmly in cheek once again as he comes up with surefire ways to ruin the greatest nation in the history of the human race.

Try a few of these on for size:

·       Trust the United Nations to protect us and our security.

·       Make it unlawful to worship God or even to show images of the Ten Commandments.

·       Convert our universities into fortresses of anti-Americanism, hatred of freedom, and centers of confusion and ignorance.

·       Encourage contempt for the family and for the community.

·       Allow Hollywood to brainwash us into believing that only suckers and criminals fight for their country.

·       Treat the military, the police, firefighters, and teachers as losers and pay them starvation wages.

Hey, does any of this sound familiar? Maybe that’s because it’s already happening! Ben and Phil give you all the information you’ll ever need in order to successfully ruin the USA even further! Sardonic, humorous, but also angrily emphatic, this is a book every old-fashioned patriot really needs to read!

Changing Bodies, Changing Lives: A Book for Teens on Sex & Relationships

Ruth Bell

List Price: $29.95 By: Random House Amazon Marketplace: 5 new & used starting at $3.97

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 20 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Changing Bodies out of date 1 out of 5 stars.
5 of 6 people found this review helpful.

I was very disapointed with the book. Expanded third edition was deceiving because I thought it was new - my oversight. The book is out of date - I oversee a Center that teaches sex education and this was not helpful.

A good primer for younger teenagers. 4 out of 5 stars.
4 of 6 people found this review helpful.

This is a primer for younger teenagers. It is well written, although it needs to be updated in 2006. It is a textbook more than a think piece. It is a good starter book for parents and younger teenagers.

Great resource for teens 3 out of 5 stars.
2 of 2 people found this review helpful.

A great resource for teens, but the pictures are a bit dated. An updated edition is in need. However, the information is still relevant and necessary for all teens.

Great book for parents of teens! 5 out of 5 stars.
2 of 2 people found this review helpful.

I purchased several books for my teen, and this one was one that didn't interest her as much - but I have learned a lot from it! It has a lot of insight into the teen mind, and as much as we think we remember what it was like to be a teen, it's easy to forget about all the fears and insecurities they have. I highly recommend this book as a refresher course for parents of teens. My teen preferred the perspectives offered in the books Cycle Savvy and S.E.X. for information that pertained to her.

Editorial Review:

Addresses the need for open dialogue between teenagers on the topics of sex and relationships. Informs them on how to prevent unwanted pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases. Updated to include material on suicide, AIDS and food and drug abuse.


From the Trade Paperback edition.

Becoming Attached: First Relationships and How They Shape Our Capacity to Love

Robert Karen

Amazon Price: $14.93 List Price: $21.95 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Oxford University Press, USA Amazon Marketplace: 61 new & used starting at $9.42

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 30 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

The struggle to understand the infant-parent bond ranks as one of the great quests of modern psychology, one that touches us deeply because it holds so many clues to how we become who we are. How are our personalities formed? How do our early struggles with our parents reappear in the way we relate to others as adults? Why do we repeat with our own children--seemingly against our will--the very behaviors we most disliked about our parents? In Becoming Attached, psychologist and noted journalist Robert Karen offers fresh insight into some of the most fundamental and fascinating questions of emotional life.
Karen begins by tracing the history of attachment theory through the controversial work of John Bowlby, a British psychoanalyst, and Mary Ainsworth, an American developmental psychologist, who together launched a revolution in child psychology. Karen tells about their personal and professional struggles, their groundbreaking discoveries, and the recent flowering of attachment theory research in universities all over the world, making it one of the century's most enduring ideas in developmental psychology.
In a world of working parents and makeshift day care, the need to assess the impact of parenting styles and the bond between child and caregiver is more urgent than ever. Karen addresses such issues as: What do children need to feel that the world is a positive place and that they have value? Is day care harmful for children under one year? What experiences in infancy will enable a person to develop healthy relationships as an adult?, and he demonstrates how different approaches to mothering are associated with specific infant behaviors, such as clinginess, avoidance, or secure exploration. He shows how these patterns become ingrained and how they reveal themselves at age two, in the preschool years, in middle childhood, and in adulthood. And, with thought-provoking insights, he gives us a new understanding of how negative patterns and insecure attachment can be changed and resolved throughout a person's life.
The infant is in many ways a great mystery to us. Every one of us has been one; many of us have lived with or raised them. Becoming Attached is not just a voyage of discovery in child emotional development and its pertinence to adult life but a voyage of personal discovery as well, for it is impossible to read this book without reflecting on one's own life as a child, a parent, and an intimate partner in love or marriage.

RACE MATTERS

Cornel West

List Price: $15.00 By: Beacon Press Amazon Marketplace: 67 new & used starting at $0.01

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 65 Average rating: 3.5 of 5

Ivy League Charlatan 1 out of 5 stars.
4 of 11 people found this review helpful.

Cornell West is a charlatan and this book, like all the rest of his work, is little more than a collection of biased opinions unsupported by logic or information. While most blacks have achieved middle class status in the past 30 years, West sees only those who are mired in poverty and crime. And those, he thinks, are pure victims of "racism". It does not occur to West that a person with a criminal record, a bad attitude, and a poor education - is unlikely to succeed regardless of his color. If America were really as racist as West imagines, how does he explain his own amazing success - for surely his success is amazing. How many men get paid the money that Cornell West is paid - and that for "mouthing off" about his favorite hobby-horses? Larry Summers chided West for his total lack of scholarship. This book proves that Summers was absolutely right.

Editorial Review:

First published in 1993 on the one-year anniversary of the L.A. riots, Race Matters has since become an American classic. Beacon Press is proud to present this hardcover edition with a new introduction by Cornel West. The issues that it addresses are as controversial and urgent as before, and West's insights remain fresh, exciting, and timely. Now more than ever, Race Matters is a book for all Americans—one that will help us build a genuine multiracial democracy.