Vastralaya

Evan Shively (Perseus271)

Edgar Colt

Vitor Miguel

Prisma Soulstorm

Serena

Jordan

Bruna Guedes

Husain Kothari

FRNK

Uendi Prifti

Abdul Hasib

Black Skins White Masks is a scary book. In it Fanon discusses the black man’s experience in a white world; he ironically, and justly, creates an image of the world through a black lens, so to speak. \
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    “The N**** enslaved by his inferiority, the white man enslaved by his superiority alike behaves in accordance with a neurotic orientation.”\
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The crux of the work resides on the black man’s experience and how he is perceived, and how he is forced to perceive himself. Fanon argues that language is the key and it had a profound effect to the human psyche. To speak the white man’s language is to crush a part of the African heritage. Fanon argues that “to speak is to exist absolutely for the other.’’ Fanon points out that for the black man to be considered equal in the white man’s culture, he must become whiter. This is achieved through a similar education and an acceptance of white culture. And here’s the rub: such a relationship creates a profound inferiority complex for the original culture of the black man; it is, in essence, repressed and destroyed.  Later in the book, Fanon suggests that these blacks who are trying to be whiter should stop in their endeavours. They should remember their heritage and recognise that differences will always exist between two cultures. He recognised that the black man, although embracing white culture, is still treated as inferior; therefore, there is little point in doing so because a patronising relationship will only be achieved. This is a stark observation, true, but also very idealistic. I don’t think it fully considers what the ramifications would be for one who living in white culture would be subjected to if they deviated from the norm. The racism would be even worse. Needless to say it’s a little bit of a loose loose situation, which will only be alleviated when people open their eyes.As Fanon concludes:“The N***** is not. Any more than the white man.Both must turn their back on the inhuman voices which were those of their respective ancestors in order that authentic communication be possible. Before he can adopt a positive voice, freedom require an effort at disalienation. At the beginning of his life a man is always clotted, he is drowned in contingency. The tragedy of man is that he was once a child.”Fanon’s answer to the alienation is an obvious one: stop being so stupid world! We’re all men: we’re all the same species. The sad thing is that a book like this actually had to be written. It bears a strong message, and the style is persuasive and emotionally engaging: the anger and injustice come bursting through the narration. Stylistically speaking, this book is remarkable. However, Fanon was a product of his time. He is misogynistic and incredibly homophobic. The females barely have a voice and the homosexuals are linked with women as an indirect insult. To be gay is to be no less a man. Womanhood has nothing to do with it. It also deals with complex psychological matters, which I’m not going to go into, but it suggests how these relationships have been created within the human psyche. It’s a penetrating work, one that demands to be read once you’ve read those first few sentences: \
  The explosion will not happen today. It is too soon…or too late.\
 

Alternate Cover Edition can be found here. First published to critical acclaim in 1929, Passing firmly established Nella Larsen's prominence among women writers of the Harlem Renaissance. The Modern Library is proud to present Passing—an electrifying story of two women who cross the color line in 1920s New York—together with a new Introduction by the Obie Award- winning playwright and novelist Ntozake Shange.Irene Redfield, the novel's protagonist, is a woman with an enviable life. She and her husband, Brian, a prominent physician, share a comfortable Harlem town house with their sons. Her work arranging charity balls that gather Harlem's elite creates a sense of purpose and respectability for Irene. But her hold on this world begins to slip the day she encounters Clare Kendry, a childhood friend with whom she had lost touch. Clare—light-skinned, beautiful, and charming—tells Irene how, after her father's death, she left behind the black neighborhood of her adolescence and began passing for white, hiding her true identity from everyone, including her racist husband. As Clare begins inserting herself into Irene's life, Irene is thrown into a panic, terrified of the consequences of Clare's dangerous behavior. And when Clare witnesses the vibrancy and energy of the community she left behind, her burning desire to come back threatens to shatter her careful deception.Brilliantly plotted and elegantly written, Passing offers a gripping psychological portrait of emotional extremity.

Edward Said makes one of the strongest cases ever for the aphorism, "the pen is mightier than the sword." This is a brilliant work of literary criticism that essentially becomes political science. Culture and Imperialism demonstrates that Western imperialism's most effective tools for dominating other cultures have been literary in nature as much as political and economic. He traces the themes of 19th- and 20th-century Western fiction and contemporary mass media as weapons of conquest and also brilliantly analyzes the rise of oppositional indigenous voices in the literatures of the "colonies." Said would argue that it's no mere coincidence that it was a Victorian Englishman, Edward G. Bulwer-Lytton, who coined the phrase "the pen is mightier . . ." Very highly recommended for anyone who wants to understand how cultures are dominated by words, as well as how cultures can be liberated by resuscitating old voices or creating new voices for new times.

From Terry Eagleton’s Literary Theory for Toddlers: An Introduction. Phenomenology: Tigger tells Pooh that he must distinguish between the phenomena and noumena of a pot of honey. That his intentionality towards the honey is narrowing his awareness of his surroundings, pushing him into a false structure of consciousness where the honey is both a perpetual fantasy and an instrument of real-life fixation. He tells Pooh he must separate his intentionalities to avoid becoming corrupted and driven by his desire for honey. Hermeneutics: Tigger tells Winnie that he must forget about honey and concentrate on the Heideggerian being-with of bear relatedness. He must suppress the empirical evidence around the existence and necessity of honey as a thing-in-itself and take an antipositivist approach to his own need for honey in a godless and indifferent universe. Reception Theory: Tigger tells Winnie that the only reason he is so popular as a character is that readers can “relate” to his being orange and craving frequent honey. Their life experiences have shown them that things with orange bears and honey are an essential part of the human condition, and require enshrinement in the literary pantheon for almost entirely no other reason. Structuralism: Tigger tells Pooh that his preoccupation with honey is part of larger woodland structure dating back to the stone age, and that “honey” has always been a signifier triggering hunger and savagery in the heart of orange bears, long before Milne gave them the consciousness to understand the signified of “honey” as a delicious bee-made product popularly served in pots. Semiotics: Tigger tells Pooh that honey is merely a symbol for part of a larger racial and class struggle among woodland beings. Across the woodland culture, the word “honey” can symbolise the tyrannous oppression of the orange bears over beavers or squirrels, or the totalitarian confiscation of honey among the lower orders. To bees, “honey” is understood as a priceless trading commodity frequently being plundered by cuddly pirates, whose struggle remains unacknowledged among the wider woodland populace. Post-structuralism: Tigger tells Pooh that the destabilised meaning of his quest for honey is more significant for the reader, whose quest for honey will loom even larger once Pooh’s quest is complete. But more importantly, “honey” is a binary opposition which also means “Jacuzzi,” so Pooh’s system of language is under severe scrutiny. Psychoanalysis: Tigger tells Pooh that his craving for honey is merely a way of screwing his mother and killing his father and venerating his very curly and unseen penis. (From p12, p54, p87, p99, p123, and p149).

A distinguished psychiatrist from Martinique who took part in the Algerian Nationalist Movement, Frantz Fanon was one of the most important theorists of revolutionary struggle, colonialism, and racial difference in history. Fanon's masterwork is a classic alongside Edward Said's Orientalism or The Autobiography of Malcolm X, and it is now available in a new translation that updates its language for a new generation of readers.The Wretched of the Earth is a brilliant analysis of the psychology of the colonized and their path to liberation. Bearing singular insight into the rage and frustration of colonized peoples, and the role of violence in effecting historical change, the book incisively attacks the twin perils of post-independence colonial politics: the disenfranchisement of the masses by the elites on the one hand, and intertribal and interfaith animosities on the other.Fanon's analysis, a veritable handbook of social reorganization for leaders of emerging nations, has been reflected all too clearly in the corruption and violence that has plagued present-day Africa. The Wretched of the Earth has had a major impact on civil rights, anticolonialism, and black consciousness movements around the world, and this bold new translation by Richard Philcox reaffirms it as a landmark.

Captain Phillips is a multi-layered examination of the 2009 hijacking of the U.S. container ship Maersk Alabama by a crew of Somali pirates. It is - through director Paul Greengrass's distinctive lens - simultaneously a pulse-pounding thriller, and a complex portrait of the myriad effects of globalization. The film focuses on the relationship between the Alabama's commanding officer, Captain Richard Phillips (two time Academy Award®-winner Tom Hanks), and the Somali pirate captain, Muse (Barkhad Abdi), who takes him hostage. Phillips and Muse are set on an unstoppable collision course when Muse and his crew target Phillips' unarmed ship; in the ensuing standoff, 145 miles off the Somali coast, both men will find themselves at the mercy of forces beyond their control.

After receiving the healing powers from a magical flower, the baby Princess Rapunzel is kidnapped from the palace in the middle of the night by Mother Gothel. Mother Gothel knows that the flower's magical powers are now growing within the golden hair of Rapunzel, and to stay young, she must lock Rapunzel in her hidden tower. Rapunzel is now a teenager and her hair has grown to a length of 70-feet. The beautiful Rapunzel has been in the tower her entire life, and she is curious of the outside world. One day, the bandit Flynn Ryder scales the tower and is taken captive by Rapunzel. Rapunzel strikes a deal with the charming thief to act as her guide to travel to the place where the floating lights come from that she has seen every year on her birthday. Rapunzel is about to have the most exciting and magnificent journey of her life.

Cameron Poe, a highly decorated Army Ranger, comes home to Alabama to his wife Tricia, only to run into a few drunken regulars at the bar where she works. Cameron accidentally kills one of the drunks, and is sent to a federal penitentiary for involuntary manslaughter for seven years. He becomes eligible for parole and can now go home to his wife and daughter. Unfortunately, Cameron has to share a prison airplane with some of the country's most dangerous criminals, who take control of the plane and are now planning to escape the country. Cameron has to find a way to stop them while playing along. Meanwhile, United States Marshal Vince Larkin is trying to help Cameron get free and stop the criminals, led by Cyrus "The Virus" Grissom.

A social worker fights to save a girl from her abusive parents, only to discover that the situation is more dangerous than she ever expected.

Preacher Graham Hess loses his faith in God after his wife dies in a brutal car accident. He lives with his children and brother in a farmhouse. Crop circles start to appear in their cornfields; Graham dismisses them as mischief by miscreants. After hearing strange noises and watching news coverage on crop circles appearing all over the world, the family grows suspicious of alien activities. Now they must stick together as a family and believe, to survive and escape the ordeal.

During World War II when all the men are fighting the war, most of the jobs that were left vacant because of their absence were filled in by women. The owners of the baseball teams, not wanting baseball to be dormant indefinitely, decide to form teams with women. So scouts are sent all over the country to find women players. One of the scouts, passes through Oregon and finds a woman named Dottie Hinson, who is incredible. He approaches her and asks her to try out but she's not interested. However, her sister, Kit who wants to get out of Oregon, offers to go. But he agrees only if she can get her sister to go. When they try out, they're chosen and are on the same team. Jimmy Dugan, a former player, who's now a drunk, is the team manager. But he doesn't feel as if it's a real job so he drinks and is not exactly doing his job. So Dottie steps up. After a few months when it appears the girls are not garnering any attention, the league is facing closure till Dottie does something that grabs attention. And it isn't long Dottie is the star of the team and Kit feels like she's living in her shadow.

Roger, who has lost his mother, is living separated from his father. As he and his friend J.P. are fans of the California Angels baseball team, he has got only two dreams: living together with a real family and seeing the Angels winning the Pennant.

In Spokane, Washington, Juniper Pearl - Joon to those that know her - is an artist. She is also a mentally challenged young woman who requires around the clock care, as she could cause harm to herself or others. Her brother Benny Pearl, who owns and operates a garage and who is her only living relative since their parents died twelve years ago in a car accident, has made the decision that she would live at home with him, in the process sacrificing being able to have a personal life of his own. He has hired full-time housekeepers to provide that care when he isn't around. However, he has exhausted the list of housekeepers, who keep quitting because Joon is too much to handle. As such, Benny makes the decision that perhaps it would be best for all concerned if Joon were to live in a group home, something he is hesitating telling her for fear of her reaction. Into their lives comes Sam, the eccentric cousin of Benny's friend Mike, who they obtained from Mike in a losing hand of poker. Among his eccentricities, Sam has a penchant for bursting into

1993 film directed by Jeremiah S. Chechik

In 2005, the only thing hurting Los Angeles Times columnist Steve Lopez more than his face from a recent bike accident was his pressing need for story ideas. That is when he discovers Nathaniel Ayers, a mentally ill, homeless street musician who possesses extraordinary talent, even through his half-broken instruments. Inspired by his story, Lopez writes an acclaimed series of articles about Ayers and attempts to do more to help both him and the rest of the underclass of LA have a better life. However, Lopez's good intentions run headlong in the hard realities of the strength of Ayers' personal demons and the larger social injustices facing the homeless. Regardless, Lopez and Ayers must find a way to conquer their deepest anxieties and frustrations to hope for a brighter future for both of them.

In a distant, but not so unrealistic, future where mankind has abandoned earth because it has become covered with trash from products sold by the powerful multi-national Buy N Large corporation, WALL-E, a garbage collecting robot has been left to clean up the mess. Mesmerized with trinkets of Earth's history and show tunes, WALL-E is alone on Earth except for a sprightly pet cockroach. One day, EVE, a sleek (and dangerous) reconnaissance robot, is sent to Earth to find proof that life is once again sustainable. WALL-E falls in love with EVE. WALL-E rescues EVE from a dust storm and shows her a living plant he found amongst the rubble. Consistent with her "directive", EVE takes the plant and automatically enters a deactivated state except for a blinking green beacon. WALL-E, doesn't understand what has happened to his new friend, but, true to his love, he protects her from wind, rain, and lightning, even as she is unresponsive. One day a massive ship comes to reclaim EVE, but WALL-E, out of love or loneliness, hitches a ride on the outside of the ship to rescue EVE. The ship arrives back at a large space cruise ship, which is carrying all of the humans who evacuated Earth 700 years earlier. The people of Earth ride around this space resort on hovering chairs which give them a constant feed of TV and video chatting. They drink all of their meals through a straw out of laziness and/or bone loss, and are all so fat that they can barely move. When the auto-pilot computer, acting on hastily-given instructions sent many centuries before, tries to prevent the people of Earth from returning by stealing the plant, WALL-E, EVE, the portly captain, and a band of broken robots stage a mutiny.

2008 American computer-animated romantic science fiction film directed by Andrew Stanton

In the wake of an unknown global terror, a mother must find the strength to flee with her children down a treacherous river in search of safety. Due to unseen deadly forces, the perilous journey must be made blindly. Directed by Emmy winner Susanne Bier, Bird Box is a thriller starring Academy Award winner Sandra Bullock, John Malkovich, Sarah Paulson, and Trevante Rhodes.

The polar ice caps have melted, and the earth is covered by water. The remaining people travel the seas, in search of survival. Several different societies exist. The Mariner falls from his customary and solitary existence into having to care for a woman and a young girl while being pursued by the evil forces of the Deacon.

Groups of people - colonies - are forced underground due to another ice age. Colony 7 goes to check on Colony 5, which they lost contact with. When they get there they find that the colony has fallen and there is a whole new enemy that they have to face on their way back.

Set in 2031, the entire world is frozen except for those aboard the Snowpiercer. For seventeen years, the world's survivors are on a train hurtling around the globe creating their own economy and class system. Led by Curtis (Chris Evans), a group of lower-class citizens living in squalor at the back of the train are determined to get to the front of the train and spread the wealth around. Each section of the train holds new surprises for the group who have to battle their way through. A revolution is underway.

Four Black women, all of whom have suffered for lack of money and at the hands of the majority, undertake to rob banks. While initially successful, a policeman who was involved in shooting one of the women's brothers is on their trail. As the women add to the loot, their tastes and interests begin to change and their suspicions of each other increase on the way to a climactic robbery.

Five teenagers head off for a weekend at a secluded cabin in the woods. They arrive to find they are quite isolated with no means of communicating with the outside world. When the cellar door flings itself open, they of course go down to investigate. They find an odd assortment of relics and curios, but when one of the women, Dana, reads from a book, she awakens a family of deadly zombie killers. However, there's far more going on than meets the eye.

An action-thriller about a writer who takes an experimental drug that allows him to use 100% of his mind. As one man evolves into the perfect version of himself, forces more corrupt than he can imagine mark him for assassination. Out-of-work writer Eddie Morra's (Cooper) rejection by girlfriend Lindy (Abbie Cornish) confirms his belief that he has zero future. That all vanishes the day an old friend introduces Eddie to NZT, a designer pharmaceutical that makes him laser-focused and more confident than any man alive. Now on an NZT-fueled odyssey, everything Eddie's read, heard or seen is instantly organized and available to him. As the former nobody rises to the top of the financial world, he draws the attention of business mogul Carl Van Loon (De Niro), who sees this enhanced version of Eddie as the tool to make billions, but brutal side effects jeopardize his meteoric ascent. With a dwindling stash and hit men who will eliminate him to get the NZT, Eddie must stay wired long enough to elude capture and fulfill his destiny. If he can't, he will become just another victim who thought he'd found invincibility in a bottle.

A true story about Frank Abagnale Jr. who, before his 19th birthday, successfully conned millions of dollars worth of checks as a Pan Am pilot, doctor, and legal prosecutor. An FBI agent makes it his mission to put him behind bars. But Frank not only eludes capture, he revels in the pursuit.

In an airport waiting room, a man in a wheelchair tells a stranger a story about a fixed horse race in 1979 that resulted in a family's deaths. In Manhattan, two bookies and the son of a Mob boss die. A young man just out of the shower answers the door to a neighbor woman and explains that he's visiting, has had a bad week, including being mugged, and doesn't know where his pal, who lives there, is. The neighbor is chatty; she's a coroner. Two thugs arrive and, believing the visitor to be the guy who lives there, take him to see the boss with the dead son, who tells him to kill the son of his Mob rival. Mistaken identity? What connects the threads? Cops are watching.

The three Halliwell sisters discover that they are descendents of a line of female witches. Each has a special ability (stopping time, moving objects, seeing the future), and they can also combine their abilities into the "Power of Three" to fight demons, warlocks, and other evils.

American supernatural drama / fantasy television series (1998–2006)

The FBI teams up with a formerly-institutionalized scientist - who was performing experiments on the fringe of real science - and his son to investigate weird crimes that are seemingly part of a larger pattern, and may be connected with a global company called Massive Dynamic.

American science fiction television series

The series follows the life of anti-social, pain killer addict, witty and arrogant medical doctor Gregory House (Hugh Laurie) with only half a muscle in his right leg. He and his team of medical doctors try to cure complex and rare diseases from very ill ordinary people in the United States of America.

"In every generation there is a chosen one... she alone will stand against the vampires, the demons and the forces of darkness. She is the slayer." Buffy Summers knows this tale by heart, and no matter how hard she tries to be just a "normal girl", she can not escape from her destiny... Thankfully, she is not alone in her quest to save the world, as she has the help of her friends, the hilarious (and surprisingly quite effective) evil-fighting team called "The Scooby Gang". Together, Buffy & co. will slay their demons, survive one apocalypse after another, attend high school and college... and above all, understand that growing up can truly be Hell sometimes... literally.

1997 American supernatural drama TV series

Explores a group of siblings who, as children, grew up in what would go on to become the most famous haunted house in the country. Now adults, and forced back together in the face of tragedy, the family must finally confront the ghosts of their past, some of which still lurk in their minds while others may actually be stalking the shadows of Hill House.

Ben becomes a surprise dad to a baby girl when she's left on his doorstep by an ex-girlfriend. Ben decides to raise the baby with the help of his mother, his brother Danny, his friend Tucker and Riley the girl who is harboring a secret crush on him.

This show was based on Superman (Dean Cain) being a Generation X man. In his twenties, somewhere Clark Kent (Dean Cain) must experience life as a pre-thirties pupil. Lois Lane (Teri Hatcher), as always, is by his side at the Daily Planet, adding that oh-so-ever romantic side to his life. The relationship between Lois and Clark, is as always, a platonic but on the edge of mad love, type of experience.

After being kicked out of their houses by their wives, two friends try to share an apartment, but their ideas of housekeeping and lifestyles are as different as night and day.

Thelma Harper and her spinster sister Fran open their home to Thelma's recently-divorced son Vinton and his teenage daughter and son, Sonja and Buzz. It's quite an adjustment for everyone, especially the cranky, argumentative Thelma, especially when Vinton becomes interested in pretty, sexy neighbor Naomi and marries her and moves her into Thelma's house.

Judge Harold T. Stone presides over "Night Court", a court which deals with petty crimes which can be dealt with in a dime-a-dozen manner. Invariably, the cases appearing before the court are bizarre, but that's ok because Judge Stone is not your regular judge. He's assisted by a motley crew of clerks and District Attorneys who often create as much chaos as the criminals they bring in for trial.

Follows stand-up comedian Jerrod Carmichael as he navigates through life with his therapist in-training girlfriend and his heavily opinionated family.

Three friends at a retirement center have their comfortable existence rattled by a newcomer to the community.

A once-famous football player must rent part of his house to support himself. A single mother and her two kids are the latest tenants. He also owns a sports clinic that he barely manages to run with help from his friends.

Follows the lives of several single male and female roommates and friends in 1990s Brooklyn, New York.

Dre Johnson (Anthony Anderson) has it all: a great job, beautiful wife Rainbow (Tracee Ellis Ross), four kids, and a big house in a classy neighborhood; but as a Black man, he questions whether all his success has brought too much cultural assimilation for his family. With the help of his father (special guest-star Laurence Fishburne), Dre tries to create a sense of ethnic identity for his family members that will allow them to honor their background while preparing them to embrace the future.

American television sitcom for ABC (2014-present)

Mike, a Chicago police officer, meets fourth-grade teacher Molly one day when he speaks at an Overeaters Anonymous meeting and they fall in love, thanks in part to their mutual love of pie and the desire to resist it. Both face challenges in their quest to lose weight -- Molly from her slender sister and mother and Mike at the diner where he frequently eats. But having found each other, they will support each other as they try to achieve their goals, be it weight loss or Molly's decision to quit teaching and pursue her dream as a writer.

The Sinner follows a young mother who, when overcome by an inexplicable fit of rage, commits a startling act of violence and to her horror has no idea why. The event launches an inverted and utterly surprising crime thriller whose driving force is not the "who" or the "what" -- but the "why" -- as an investigator finds himself obsessed with uncovering the woman's buried motive. Together they travel a harrowing journey into the depths of her psyche and the violent secrets hidden in her past.

2017 American crime drama television series

A royal woman living in rural Russia during the 18th century is forced to choose between her own personal happiness and the future of Russia, when she marries an Emperor.

2020 British-American comedy series on Hulu

A look at life for a group of high school students as they grapple with issues of drugs, sex and violence. The series focuses on the relationship between two young girls trying to find their place in the world: recovering addict Rue and new-in-town Jules.

2019 American teen drama television series

Nikki  Morgan

Güero 

TasteDive Official

Bread Man

Ruka Asghar

Tami Thomas

Krista Ward

Bare Noise

Fass

It's the late 1980s. Twenty-seven year old Wall Streeter Patrick Bateman travels among a closed network of the proverbial beautiful people, that close

Sara Goldfarb (Ellen Burstyn) is a retired widow, living in a small apartment. She spends most of her time watching TV, especially a particular self-h

Memento chronicles two separate stories of Leonard, an ex-insurance investigator who can no longer build new memories, as he attempts to find the murd

College student Jeffrey Beaumont returns to his idyllic hometown of Lumberton to manage his father's hardware store while his father is hospitalized. 

Psychological Thrillers

movie

tv show

In a futuristic world, a strict regime has eliminated war by suppressing emotions: books, art and music are strictly forbidden and feeling is a crime 

It is the year 2029: Astronaut Leo Davidson boards a pod cruiser on a Space Station on a rescue and recovery mission. But an abrupt detour through a s

In present-day London, 12-year-old Quinn Abercromby witnesses the awakening of a hibernating dragon from a centuries-long slumber, the result of a con

In this second adventure, Neo and the rebel leaders estimate that they have 72 hours until Zion falls under siege to the Machine Army. Only a matter o

Post-apocalyptic, Dystopian, Alternate History  

Before there was money, there was debt Every economics textbook says the same thing: Money was invented to replace onerous and complicated barter systems—to relieve ancient people from having to haul their goods to market. The problem with this version of history? There’s not a shred of evidence to support it.Here anthropologist David Graeber presents a stunning reversal of conventional wisdom. He shows that for more than 5,000 years, since the beginnings of the first agrarian empires, humans have used elaborate credit systems to buy and sell goods—that is, long before the invention of coins or cash. It is in this era, Graeber argues, that we also first encounter a society divided into debtors and creditors.  Graeber shows that arguments about debt and debt forgiveness have been at the center of political debates from Italy to China, as well as sparking innumerable insurrections. He also brilliantly demonstrates that the language of the ancient works of law and religion (words like “guilt,” “sin,” and “redemption”) derive in large part from ancient debates about debt, and shape even our most basic ideas of right and wrong. We are still fighting these battles today without knowing it.Debt: The First 5,000 Years is a fascinating chronicle of this little known history—as well as how it has defined human history, and what it means for the credit crisis of the present day and the future of our economy.

First published in Portuguese in 1968, Pedagogy of the Oppressed was translated and published in English in 1970. The methodology of the late Paulo Freire has helped to empower countless impoverished and illiterate people throughout the world. Freire's work has taken on especial urgency in the United States and Western Europe, where the creation of a permanent underclass among the underprivileged and minorities in cities and urban centers is increasingly accepted as the norm. With a substantive new introduction on Freire's life and the remarkable impact of this book by writer and Freire confidant and authority Donaldo Macedo, this anniversary edition of Pedagogy of the Oppressed will inspire a new generation of educators, students, and general readers for years to come.

This is a perfect example of the kind of writing characterised by Clive James as prose that ‘scorns the earth for fear of a puncture’. Foucault may be able to think – it's not easy to tell – but he certainly can't write.Everywhere there is an apparent desire to render a simple thought impenetrable. When he wants to suggest that the modern world has imposed on us a great variety in the ways we talk about sex, he must refer to ‘a regulated and polymorphous incitement to discourse’. When he advances the theory that the nineteenth century focused less on marriage than on other sexual practices, he talks about ‘a centrifugal movement with respect to heterosexual monogamy’. When there is only one of something he calls it ‘markedly unitary’.It almost becomes funny, except that it tells us something about how loosely his ideas are rooted in reality. Some people seem to think that complex prose must conceal a profundity of thought, but good readers and writers know that the reverse is usually the case. A thought which is impenetrable is not easily rebutted, and so it may only seem correct by default.For example, Foucault has the following idea: that talking more about sex is really an attempt to get rid of any sexual activity that isn't focused on having children. It wouldn't be hard to pick holes in that argument, partly because it uses terms we all immediately understand and which we can very quickly relate to reality. But Foucault puts the theory like this:For was this transformation of sex into discourse not governed by the endeavour to expel from reality the forms of sexuality that were not amenable to the strict economy of reproduction [...]?And you'll see from the square brackets that I've left half the sentence out! Here the argument is harder to refute, not because it's any stronger, but because it takes some effort to work out what the fucking hell the man is talking about.Where he cannot think of a roundabout way of saying something, Foucault instead opts for words which might at least slow his readers down a bit, like erethism. And if no suitably obscure word is at hand, he simply makes one up, so we get a lot of these ugly formations which the postmodernists seem to love, such as discursivity, genitality, or pedagogization.Here I should point out that from what I can tell, all of this complexity exists in the original French, and is not simply a fault in the translator (Robert Hurley, in my edition). In fact sometimes Rob helps us out a bit, such as when he translates the typical Foucaultism étatisation as the more helpful phrase ‘unrestricted state control’. But there's only so much he can do. If he'd put all of Foucault's prose into natural English the book would be a quarter of the size.On the few occasions when Foucault does deign to explain himself, he only makes matters worse. After several pages in which he makes much confusing use of the word ‘power’, he finally defines this vague term as the multiplicity of force relations immanent in the sphere in which they operate and which constitute their own organization; as the process which, through ceaseless struggles and confrontations, transforms, strengthens, or reverses them; as the support which these force relations find in one another, thus forming a chain or a system, or on the contrary, the disjunctions and contradictions which isolate them from one another; and lastly, as the strategies in which they take effect, whose general design or institutional crystallization is embodied in the state apparatus, in the formulation of the law, in the various social hegemonies.My point is not that Foucault makes the reader do unnecessary work, although that's certainly an inexcusable flaw in anyone who wants their view to be taken seriously: a reader should be working to engage with an argument, not having to rewrite the whole damn thing in his head as he goes along. No, my point is that Foucault not only confuses the reader, he confuses himself. Having decided, as a mathematician decides that x equals four, that ‘power’ equals a whole range of ‘force relations’, he then combines it with other comparably dense terms and juggles them around and puts them together until you have to at least suspect that the underlying reality has been lost to Foucault as well as to us.Evidence of his own confusion therefore seems built into the texture of his sentences. He calls the family unit, for instance, ‘a complicated network, saturated with multiple, fragmentary, and mobile sexualities’. The idea of multiple sexualities is fairly clear: an assertion that, for example, homosexuality and paedophilia play their part in family life along with heterosexuality. He offers no evidence for it, but at least it is a proposition we can examine. But what about fragmentary sexualities? What on earth is a fragmentary sexuality? Perhaps one which is in some way both hetero and homo? How does a fragmentary sexuality manifest itself in terms of behaviour or desire? There are no answers. And then we also have the ‘mobile sexualities’, which sounds like some kind of wonderful bus service but which presumably we are meant to understand as sexual feelings that keep changing. To deal with any one of these ideas is problematic. To deal simultaneously with all three, and then to imagine such concepts ‘saturating’ a ‘network’, is just not a serious argument – it's a huge act of intellectual masturbation.Anyone can play this game. The opposing view to Foucault's is the traditional idea that the Victorians were frightened and offended by their sexual feelings, and that consequently their society worked to repress sex. But if we wanted to protect the argument from attack we could easily rephrase it and say that the dominant narrative of Victorian social constructs was characterised by a repressive power projection whose motus was the twin stimuli of (psycho)logical terror and physiological disgust. This is harder to argue against, because it has less meaning. Similarly many of Foucault's arguments are, to paraphrase Wolfgang Pauli, so badly expressed that not only are they not right, they're not even wrong.

The One-Dimensional Man: Studies in the Ideology of Advanced Industrial Society, Herbert MarcuseThe One-Dimensional Man: Studies in the Ideology of Advanced Industrial Society is a 1964 book, by the a German-American philosopher Herbert Marcuse, in which the author offers a wide-ranging critique of both contemporary capitalism and the Communist society of the Soviet Union, documenting the parallel rise of new forms of social repression in both these societies, as well as the decline of revolutionary potential in the West. He argues that "advanced industrial society" created false needs, which integrated individuals into the existing system of production and consumption via mass media, advertising, industrial management, and contemporary modes of thought.تاریخ نخستین خوانش: روز نهم ماه جولای سال 1972 میلادیعنوان: انسان تک ساحتی؛ نویسنده: هربرت مارکوزه؛ مترجم: محسن مویدی؛ تهران، امیرکبیر، 1350؛ در 259 ص؛ چاپ سوم 1362؛ چاپ چهارم 1378؛ پنجم و ششم 1388؛ چاپ هفتم 1392؛ موضوع: تمدن جدید - علوم اجتماعی از نویسندگان آلمانی تبار امریکایی - سده 20 منویسنده ی کتاب؛ برخی گرایشهای نظام سرمایه داری امریکا را، که به سوی جوامع بسته رهسپار هستند، بررسی کرده است. انسان تک ساحتی موجودی ست که در فضای آزاد پرورش نیافته، و جامعه ای بازدارنده، و سرکوبگر، به بهانه های: تأمین نیازها، و تدارک بهزیستی برای او، بی رحمانه گرفتارش ساخته است. ا. شربیانی

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As a toxin begins to turn the residents of Ogden Marsh, Iowa into violent psychopaths, sheriff David Dutton tries to make sense of the situation while he, his wife, and two other unaffected townspeople band together in a fight for survival.

Donnie Darko doesn't get along too well with his family, his teachers, and his classmates; but he does manage to find a sympathetic friend in Gretchen, who agrees to date him. He has a compassionate psychiatrist, who discovers hypnosis is the means to unlock hidden secrets. His other companion may not be a true ally. Donnie has a friend named Frank, a large bunny which only Donnie can see. When an engine falls off a plane and destroys his bedroom, Donnie is not there. Both the event, and Donnie's escape, seem to have been caused by supernatural events.

John Murdoch awakens alone in a strange hotel to find that he has lost his memory and is wanted for a series of brutal and bizarre murders. While trying to piece together his past, he stumbles upon a fiendish underworld controlled by a group of beings known as The Strangers who possess the ability to put people to sleep and alter the city and its inhabitants. Now Murdoch must find a way to stop them before they take control of his mind and destroy him.

In New York, the simple and naive just-graduated in journalism Andrea Sachs is hired to work as the second assistant of the powerful and sophisticated Miranda Priestly, the ruthless and merciless executive of the Runway fashion magazine. Andrea dreams to become a journalist and faces the opportunity as a temporary professional challenge. The first assistant Emily advises Andrea about the behavior and preferences of their cruel boss, and the stylist Nigel helps Andrea to dress more adequately for the environment. Andrea changes her attitude and behavior, affecting her private life and the relationship with her boyfriend Nate, her family and friends. In the end, Andrea learns that life is made of choices.

Maybe To Watch

All the serious shows and movies that were were it in genres I normally don’t watch

Presidential advisers get their personal lives hopelessly tangled up with professional duties as they try to conduct the business of running a country. Fictional Democratic President Josiah "Jed" Bartlet suffers no fools, and that policy alienates many. He and his dedicated staffers struggle to balance the needs of the country with the political realities of Washington, D.C., working through two presidential terms that include countless scandals, threats and political scuffles, as well as the race to succeed Bartlet as the leader of the free world.

American political drama series created by Aaron Sorkin for NBC (1999-2006)

The streets of Baltimore as a microcosm of the US's war on drugs, and of US urban decay in general. Seen not only through the eyes of a few policemen and drug gang members but also the people who influence and inhabit their world - politicians, the media, drug addicts and everyday citizens.

A talented but emotionally troubled dancer runs away to New York City and quickly finds herself immersed in the cutthroat world of professional ballet.

Good Drama

A Chicago-based wizard works as a private investigator.

Canadian/American television series (2007)

Edith Cushing's mother died when she was young but watches over her. Brought up in the Victorian Era she strives to be more than just a woman of marriageable age. She becomes enamored with Thomas Sharpe, a mysterious stranger. After a series of meetings and incidents she marries Thomas and comes to live with him and his sister, Lady Lucille Sharpe, far away from everything she has known. The naive girl soon comes to realize not everything is as it appears as ghosts of the past quite literally come out of the woodwork. This movie is more about mystery and suspense than gore.

Maria, a lonely 18-year-old high school student, opens up to her reflection because of the lack of support she has from family and her peers. She switches place with her supportive, but evil, twin that she discovers in the mirror's reflection, but the newfound freedom unleashes suppressed feelings.

Supernatural Cravings

Kat and Bianca Stratford may be sisters, but all comparisons end there. Kat is an outspoken, independent feminist, while Bianca is a social butterfly who wants nothing more to be popular, even if it means bowing to the whims of people like the demanding, Chastity Church. The series highlights the Stratford sisters as they experience the highs and lows of high schools, deal with their overprotective father and find love. In Bianca's case this is her friend Cameron who has a huge crush on her, while Kat finds herself in an interesting relationship with school bad boy Patrick Verona.

At 17 Mike O'Donnell is on top of the world: he's the star of his high school basketball team, is a shoo-in for a college scholarship, and is dating his soul-mate, Scarlet. But at what's supposed to be his big game where a college scout is checking him out, Scarlet reveals that she's pregnant. Mike decides to leave the game and asks Scarlet to marry him, which she does. During their marriage, Mike can only whine about the life he lost because he married her, so she throws him out. When he also loses his job, he returns to the only place he's happy at, his old high school. While looking at his high school photo, a janitor asks him if he wishes he could be 17 again and he says yes. One night while driving he sees the janitor on a bridge ready to jump, and goes after him. When he returns to his friend Ned's house, where he has been staying, he sees that he is 17 again. He decides to take this opportunity to get the life he lost.

Kathryn Merteuil and Sebastian Valmont are seductive, manipulative step-siblings who get what they want when they want it. Kathryn makes a bet with Sebastian: Sebastian must bed Annette, daughter of the headmaster at their school, before the end of summer break. Annette has stated that she would wait until love and marriage to sleep with a man. If Kathryn wins, she gets Sebastian's vintage 1959 Jaguar Roadster. If Sebastian wins, he gets Kathryn, the only girl he knows he'll never have. Also in play is Cecile, a naïve girl whose mother had enlisted Kathryn to help her fit in at her new school. However, Kathryn (with Sebastian's help) plans to ruin Cecile's reputation as revenge on Kat's ex-boyfriend, who left her for Cecile.

Thirty-two year old single mom, Lorelai, lives with her teenage daughter Rory in the small town of Stars Hollow, Connecticut, with crazy neighbors and many ups and downs.

American comedy-drama series for The WB and The CW (2000–2007)

Dumb Teen Movie/TV -Great Watch

In the Dark Ages, there was a race of heroic warrior monsters known as Gargoyles. These creatures existed as stone during the day, but become flesh and blood at night. One Scottish clan made an alliance with humans to help protect a castle by night if the humans would protect their stone forms by day. The uneasy alliance was shattered when human prejudice provoked a betrayal that allowed the castle to be sacked and most of the resident clan destroyed, leaving only six adult survivors and a rookery of unhatched eggs. A further misunderstanding during the clan's retaliation on the invaders and rescue of their hostages left the clan frozen in stone by a magic spell that would only be broken when the "castle rises above the clouds." For a thousand years, the castle laid abandoned and the clan condemned by this curse. In 1994, a wealthy multibillionare named David Xanatos (Jonathan Frakes) bought the castle and transported the whole structure to Manhattan, where he placed it on top of the Eyrie building which he owned. It is high enough to be above the clouds, thus the conditions of the spell were met and the Gargoyles were revived. Now, this clan must adjust to this new age and gain friends, like Detective Elisa Maza (Salli Richardson-Whitfield), who reveals that Xanatos revived them to exploit them for his unscrupulous ends. This is coupled by the fact that another Gargoyle comrade, Demona (Marina Sirtis), is alive from their age, and is now an insane renegade bent on the extermination of humanity. Rebelling against them, the clan abandon the castle and pledge to protect New York City like they protected the castle in the past.

1994–1997 American animated television series

The star of the series was Garfield, a lazy feline whose only desires in life were lasagna, catnaps and kicking his hapless canine companion, Odie, off the table. The show also starred Garfield's hopelessly-single owner, Jon Arbuckle. Each Garfield adventure featured Garfield's adventures and run-ins with the cast of semi-regulars (including Neurmal, an irksome kitty; Binky the Clown and the mice which inhabited Jon's house); most were satires on American life and pop culture. Each show also featured "U.S. Acres," another of Davis' strips; this strip was set in a barnyard and featured the adventures of such characters as Orson Pig, Wade Duck, Roy Rooster, Bo and Lanolin the sheep, Booker the chick and Sheldon, an unhatched egg.

American animated television series with characters from the Garfield and U.S. Acres comic strips

In this series, a new generation of Looney Toon characters study at Acme Acres Looniversity under the instruction of the original characters. The leading characters are Buster and Babs Bunny (no relation) who, with their classmates, have a variety of adventures that are a mix of original stories, movie and television parodies, and modern remakes of classic Warner Brothers shorts.

A beautiful, pure-hearted young woman, Maleficent has an idyllic life growing up in a peaceable forest kingdom, until one day when an invading army threatens the harmony of the land. Maleficent rises to be the land's fiercest protector, but she ultimately suffers a ruthless betrayal - an act that begins to turn her pure heart to stone. Bent on revenge, Maleficent faces a battle with the invading king's successor and, as a result, places a curse upon his newborn infant Aurora. As the child grows, Maleficent realizes that Aurora holds the key to peace in the kingdom - and perhaps to Maleficent's true happiness as well.

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