Anthropology

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‘A fascinating exploration that challenges our basic assumptions of what work means’ – Yuval Noah Harari

‘There is eminently underlinable stuff on most pages … Fascinating’ – The Times

‘One of those few books that will turn your customary ways of thinking upside down’ – Susan Cain

‘Illuminating’ – New Statesman
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A revolutionary new history of humankind through the prism of work, from the origins of life on Earth to our ever more automated present

The work we do brings us meaning, moulds our values, determines our social status and dictates how we spend most of our time. But this wasn’t always the case: for 95% of our species’ history, work held a radically different importance.

How, then, did work become the central organisational principle of our societies? How did it transform our bodies, our environments, our views on equality and our sense of time? And why, in a time of material abundance, are we working more than ever before?

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Work-Life Balance for Dummies will offer readers advice and simple strategies to achieve more balance whatever their situation.

Discover how to:

• Work out your priorities
• Put off procrastination and improve your time management
• Move your boss towards work-life balance
• Cast your net wider and change jobs and employers
• Plan a relocation

About the author

Jeni Mumford is the author of Life Coaching For Dummies. She is a personal life coach who works with both individuals and organisations on personal development. She runs holistic coaching events in the UK and Italy and is an accredited NLP practitioner.

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In The Throne, Ian Lloyd turns his inimitable, quick-witted style to these key events in British royal history, providing fascinating anecdotes and interesting facts: William the Conqueror’s Christmas Day crowning, during which jubilant shouts were mistaken by his guards as an assassination attempt; the dual coronation of William and Mary in 1689; the pared-back ‘Half Crown-ation’ of William IV; and the televised spectacle of Elizabeth II’s 1953 ceremony.

Detailing everything from the famous Coronation Chair made for Edward I and the Crown Jewels to the infamously uncomfortable Gold State Coach – this is a truly spectacular celebration of British culture and the ultimate pomp of royalty.

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A book about intense physical and personal experience, narrating how Victoria Whitworth began swimming in the cold waters of Orkney as a means of escaping a failing marriage.

This is a memoir of intense physical and personal experience, exploring how swimming with seals, gulls and orcas in the cold waters off Orkney provided Victoria Whitworth with an escape from a series of life crises and helped her to deal with intolerable loss.

It is also a treasure chest of history and myth, local folklore and archaeological clues, giving us tantalising glimpses of Pictish and Viking men and women, those people lost to history, whose long-hidden secrets are sometimes yielded up by the land and sea.

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To reflect and explore this, Gerry Smyth has gathered together myths and folktales from cultures around the world – Native American, Caribbean, Polynesian, Persian, Indian, Scandinavian and European. Just as these stories have been passed down through generations, he brings his own narrative interpretation with additional discussion on their meaning. Stories are divided into seven sections: Origin Stories; Gods and Humans; Voyages; Lost Places, Imagined Spaces; Weather and Nature; Down to the Sea in Ships; Fabulous Beasts; and embellished with illustrations from the wide-ranging collections of the Library.

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The story of Britain’s fish and chips obsession

‘A lyrical, amiable and educational celebration of what may be our greatest achievement: the chippy.’ Stuart Maconie

Step inside and unwrap this deliciously entertaining look at Britain’s national dish.

There is a corner of every town and city in Britain where the air is tangy with vinegar and the scent of frying. Following the irresistible lure, Daniel Gray ponders the magic of chippies and the delights they have sprinkled among us for the last 150 years as he investigates the social – and sociable – history of fish and chips.

Travelling to chippies from Dundee to Devon via South Shields, Oldham, Bradford, Bethnal Green, the Rhondda Valley and more – Daniel Gray explores our fish-and-chip nation to show how chippies have helped emancipate women, promote equality for immigrants and shape local and national identity.

Whether you were raised eating scraps of Wolverhampton’s orange chips, London’s ‘wallies’ or Hull’s chip spice – even if you think you know whether tea, Vimto or dandelion and burdock is the best accompaniment – this mouth-watering book is as much about who we are as what we eat.

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When Saints, Scholars, and Schizophrenics was published twenty years ago, it became an instant classic-a beautifully written study tracing the social disintegration of “Ballybran,” a small village on the Dingle Peninsula in Ireland. In this richly detailed and sympathetic book, Nancy Scheper-Hughes explores the symptoms of the community’s decline: emigration, malaise, unwanted celibacy, damaging patterns of childrearing, fear of intimacy, suicide, and schizophrenia. Following a recent return to “Ballybran,” Scheper-Hughes reflects in a new preface and epilogue on the well-being of the community and on her attempts to reconcile her responsibility to honest ethnography with respect for the people who shared their homes and their secrets with her.

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From the cook, butler and housekeeper to the footman, lady’s maid and nanny, this is a fascinating glimpse behind the scenes of some of Britain’s grandest houses.

The largely untold stories of innumerable, rather humble, lives spent ‘in service’ are lying just below the surface of many great houses; the physical evidence can be seen in surviving servants’ quarters, the material of their everyday life, even their uniforms and possessions.

This account provides a fascinating glimpse at who’s who behind the scenes, from the cook, butler and housekeeper to the footmen, lady’s maids, governesses and tutors, nannies and nursemaids. Giving a fascinating insight into the heirarchy within the servant’s quarters – from the power-wielding cook to the ever-discreet butler – this guide describes how relationships were forged and changed as the gap between upstairs and downstairs was bridged.

Describing their typical working day as well as the holidays, entertainments and pastimes enjoyed on a rare day off, not to mention the whirl of the social season, this previously ‘unwritten history’ recalls vividly the nature of their lives below stairs.

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The Victorian era has dominated the popular imagination like no other period, but these myths and stories also give a very distorted view of the 19th century.

The early Victorians were much stranger that we usually imagine, and their world would have felt very different from our own and it was only during the long reign of the Queen that a modern society emerged in unexpected ways.

Using character portraits, events, and key moments Paterson brings the real life of Victorian Britain alive – from the lifestyles of the aristocrats to the lowest ranks of the London slums. This includes the right way to use a fan, why morning visits were conducted in the afternoon, what the Victorian family ate and how they enjoyed their free time, as well as the Victorian legacy today – convenience food, coffee bars, window shopping, mass media, and celebrity culture.

Praise for Dicken’s London:

Out of the babble of voices, Michael Paterson has been able to extract the essence of London itself. Read this book and re-enter the labyrinth of a now-ancient city.’ Peter Ackroyd

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The bestselling social history of Victorian domestic life, told through the letters, diaries, journals and novels of 19th-century men and women.

The Victorian age is both recent and unimaginably distant. In the most prosperous and technologically advanced nation in the world, people carried slops up and down stairs; buried meat in fresh earth to prevent mould forming; wrung sheets out in boiling water with their bare hands. This drudgery was routinely performed by the parents of people still living, but the knowledge of it has passed as if it had never been. Running water, stoves, flush lavatories – even lavatory paper – arrived slowly throughout the century, and most were luxuries available only to the prosperous.

Judith Flanders, author of the widely acclaimed ‘A Circle of Sisters’, has written an incisive and irresistible portrait of Victorian domestic life. The book itself is laid out like a house, following the story of daily life from room to room: from childbirth in the master bedroom, through the scullery, kitchen and dining room – cleaning, dining, entertaining – on upwards, ending in the sickroom and death.

Through a collage of diaries, letters, advice books, magazines and paintings, Flanders shows how social history is built up out of tiny domestic details. Through these we can understand the desires, motivations and thoughts of the age.

Many people today live in Victorian terraces, and so the houses themselves are familiar, but the lives are not. ‘The Victorian House’ will change all that.

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‘A brilliant, passionate and spellbinding tour de force’ Claudia Roden
‘Fuchsia Dunlop is one of the world’s best writers on Chinese food’ Ken Hom CBE

The epic tale of the world’s most sophisticated gastronomic culture, told through a banquet of thirty Chinese dishes

Chinese was the earliest truly global cuisine. When the first Chinese labourers began to sojourn and settle abroad, restaurants appeared in their wake. Yet Chinese food has the curious distinction of being both one of the world’s best-loved culinary traditions and one of the least understood. For more than a century, the overwhelming dominance of a simplified form of Cantonese cooking ensured that few foreigners experienced anything of its richness and sophistication – but today that is beginning to change.

In this book, the James Beard Award-winning cook and writer Fuchsia Dunlop explores the history, philosophy and techniques of China’s rich and ancient culinary culture. Each chapter examines a classic dish, from mapo tofu to Dongpo pork, knife-scraped noodles to braised pomelo pith, to reveal a singular aspect of Chinese gastronomy, whether it’s the importance of the soybean, the lure of exotic ingredients or the history of Buddhist vegetarian cuisine. Meeting local food producers, chefs, gourmets and home cooks as she tastes her way across the country, Fuchsia invites readers to join her on an unforgettable journey into Chinese food as it is made, cooked, eaten and considered in its homeland.

Weaving together historical scholarship, mouth-watering descriptions of food and on-the-ground research conducted over the course of three decades, Invitation to a Banquet is a lively, landmark tribute to the pleasures and mysteries of Chinese cuisine.

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This is a concise and entertaining guide to the complex tradition of Chinese mythology. While many around the world are familiar with some aspects of Chinese myth – through Chinese New Year festivities or the classic adventures of the Monkey King in Journey to the West – few outside of China understand the richness of Chinese mythology, influenced by Daoism, Buddhism and Confucianism.

Offering much more than any competing overview of Chinese mythology, The Chinese Myths not only retells the ancient stories but also considers their place within the patterns of Chinese religions, culture and history. Tao Tao Liu introduces us to an intriguing cast of gods, goddesses, dragons and monks, including: the ancient hero, Yi the Archer, who shot suns out of the sky to save humanity from a drought; Guanyin, the Goddess of Mercy and Compassion, to whom there are temples dedicated all over East Asia; and Madame White Snake, a water snake spirit in the guise of a mysterious widow, her story adapted into countless films and operas. This book is for anyone interested in China, as knowing its myths allows readers to understand and appreciate its culture in a new light.

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A Brief History of Vietnam explores the fascinating, turbulent history of a land that has risen from the ashes of war to become a leading economic power. This book expertly examines the history of a people and a nation with ancient roots but which only took its current shape in the 19th century under French colonial rule and its current name in 1945.

Before that landmark year, Vietnam was known by many names, under many rulers. Located in the geographical center of Southeast Asia, the country we call “Vietnam” was ruled by China, a series of Vietnamese emperors, and the French. A devastating, decades-long conflict for independence ensued, ending with the conclusion of the Vietnam War in 1975.

Key topics include:

• China’s ancient conquest of Vietnam and the millennia-long struggle of the Vietnamese for independence from its powerful neighbor to the north.
• The reign of the Nguyen dynasty, the last dynasty to rule Vietnam, with its capital at the ancient city of Hue, today a UNESCO world heritage site.
• France’s eventual colonization of Vietnam, which lasted for over 60 years, culminating in the dramatic Battle of Dien Bien Phu.
• The story of Ho Chi Minh, educated in France, who attended the Treaty of Versailles to advocate for independence and became Vietnam’s first President after the Vietnam War.
• The violent political split between North and South, which resulted in a devastating war with the United States and eventual victory by the Communists.
• The country’s miraculous emergence from three decades of war and its path to becoming one of the world’s fastest-growing economies today.
• Perfect for history buffs of all kinds, the book includes 32 pages of vivid color photos that depict the country’s rich history. Journalist Bill Hayton’s accessible prose makes A Brief History of Vietnam an essential study of a beautiful, complex land in the heart of Southeast Asia and its worldwide influence.

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This is the fifth and final volume based on the lectures given by Pierre Bourdieu at the Collège de France in the early 1980s under the title ‘General Sociology’. In these lectures, Bourdieu sets out to define and defend sociology as an intellectual discipline, and in doing so he introduces and clarifies all the key concepts which have come to define his distinctive intellectual approach.

In this volume, Bourdieu develops his view of the social world as the site of a struggle for the legitimate vision of the world. The specific weapon used in these struggles is what Bourdieu calls symbolic capital, which is economic, cultural or social capital when perceived through suitable categories of perception. All forms of power seek to impose their own categories of perception in a way that is both recognised and misrecognised.  This is how forms of power establish themselves as legitimate, because legitimacy is a force of recognition based on misrecognition, that is, recognised in a way that prevents us from recognising its arbitrariness.

By rejecting the opposition between structuralist objectification and subjectivist constructivism, sociology can seek to grasp both the objective structure of social fields and the properly political strategies that agents use in order to establish and impose their viewpoint. And it can do so without forgetting that the whole world of social construction is oriented by the perception agents have of the social world, which depends on their position in the structures of social fields and their dispositions, themselves fashioned by these structures.

An ideal introduction to some of Bourdieu’s most important ideas, the five volumes of this series will be of great value to students and scholars who study and use Bourdieu’s work across the social sciences and humanities, and they will be of interest to general readers who want to know more about the work of one of the most important sociologists and social thinkers of the twentieth century.

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This highly original work presents laboratory science in a deliberately skeptical way: as an anthropological approach to the culture of the scientist. Drawing on recent work in literary criticism, the authors study how the social world of the laboratory produces papers and other “texts,”‘ and how the scientific vision of reality becomes that set of statements considered, for the time being, too expensive to change. The book is based on field work done by Bruno Latour in Roger Guillemin’s laboratory at the Salk Institute and provides an important link between the sociology of modern sciences and laboratory studies in the history of science.

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