Download or read book Every Word Is a Bird We Teach to Sing written by Daniel Tammet and published by Little, Brown Spark. This book was released on 2017-09-12 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A mind-expanding, deeply humane tour of language by the bestselling author of Born on a Blue Day and Thinking in Numbers. Is vocabulary destiny? Why do clocks "talk" to the Nahua people of Mexico? Will A.I. researchers ever produce true human-machine dialogue? In this mesmerizing collection of essays, Daniel Tammet answers these and many other questions about the intricacy and profound power of language. In Every Word Is a Bird We Teach to Sing, Tammet goes back in time to London to explore the numeric language of his autistic childhood; in Iceland, he learns why the name Blær became a court case; in Canada, he meets one of the world's most accomplished lip readers. He chats with chatbots; contrives an "e"-less essay on lipograms; studies the grammar of the telephone; contemplates the significance of disappearing dialects; and corresponds with native Esperanto speakers - in their mother tongue. A joyous romp through the world of words, letters, stories, and meanings, Every Word Is a Bird We Teach to Sing explores the way communication shapes reality. From the art of translation to the lyricism of sign language, these essays display the stunning range of Tammet's literary and polyglot talents.
Download or read book How to Be Normal written by Daniel Tammet and published by Quercus. This book was released on 2020-09-10 with total page 32 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An eye-opening short book by the international bestselling writer of Born on a Blue Day and Thinking in Numbers. Have you ever wondered how neurotypicals - so called 'normal' people - come across to those who are on the autistic spectrum? What would an instruction manual about being an average human being look like to them? And actually, would it be that different, fundamentally, to a field guide about autistic people (were such a thing to exist)? Daniel Tammet is an essayist, poet, novelist and translator. In 2004, he was diagnosed with high-functioning autistic savant syndrome. In this eye-opening and fascinating book, he takes readers on a tour around nightclubs, ponders the significance of tattoos, delves into anti-age creams and puzzles over playing the lottery, all from the perspective of someone who approaches everything in life from a unique angle. After all, this is a man for whom Wednesdays are always blue, who sees numbers as shapes and who learned conversational Icelandic from scratch in seven days. These short essays come together in a beautifully written, sometimes humorous but always refreshing narrative that focuses on the eccentricities of modern life as seen through the eyes of someone always on the outside. Rather wonderfully, it illustrates the eccentricity inherent in every kind of mind, reminding us of the little-noticed strangeness of our common humanity, while subtly questioning what it means to be thought 'normal'.
Download or read book Embracing the Wide Sky written by Daniel Tammet and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2009-01-06 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Owner of "the most remarkable mind on the planet," (according to Entertainment Weekly) Daniel Tammet captivated readers and won worldwide critical acclaim with the 2007 New York Times bestselling memoir, Born On A Blue Day, and its vivid depiction of a life with autistic savant syndrome. In his fascinating new book, he writes with characteristic clarity and personal awareness as he sheds light on the mysteries of savants' incredible mental abilities, and our own. Tammet explains that the differences between savant and non-savant minds have been exaggerated; his astonishing capacities in memory, math and language are neither due to a cerebral supercomputer nor any genetic quirk, but are rather the results of a highly rich and complex associative form of thinking and imagination. Autistic thought, he argues, is an extreme variation of a kind that we all do, from daydreaming to the use of puns and metaphors. Embracing the Wide Sky combines meticulous scientific research with Tammet's detailed descriptions of how his mind works to demonstrate the immense potential within us all. He explains how our natural intuitions can help us to learn a foreign language, why his memories are like symphonies, and what numbers and giraffes have in common. We also discover why there is more to intelligence than IQ, how optical illusions fool our brains, and why too much information can make you dumb. Many readers will be particularly intrigued by Tammet's original ideas concerning the genesis of genius and exceptional creativity. He illustrates his arguments with examples as diverse as the private languages of twins, the compositions of poets with autism, and the breakthroughs, and breakdowns, of some of history's greatest minds. Embracing the Wide Sky is a unique and brilliantly imaginative portrait of how we think, learn, remember and create, brimming with personal insights and anecdotes, and explanations of the most up-to-date, mind-bending discoveries from fields ranging from neuroscience to psychology and linguistics. This is a profound and provocative book that will transform our understanding and respect for every kind of mind.
Download or read book Thinking in Numbers written by Daniel Tammet and published by . This book was released on 2014-07-01 with total page 139 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The book that Daniel Tammet, bestselling author and mathematical savant, was born to write. In Tammet's world, numbers are beautiful and mathematics illuminates our lives and minds. Using anecdotes, everyday examples, and ruminations on history, literature, and more, Tammet allows us to share his unique insights and delight in the way numbers, fractions, and equations underpin all our lives. His idiosyncratic worldview gives us new perspecttives on the universal questions of what it is to be human and how we make meaning. This book will change the way you think about math and fire your imagination to see the world with fresh eyes.--From publisher description.
Download or read book I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings written by Maya Angelou and published by Random House. This book was released on 2010-07-21 with total page 289 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Here is a book as joyous and painful, as mysterious and memorable, as childhood itself. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings captures the longing of lonely children, the brute insult of bigotry, and the wonder of words that can make the world right. Maya Angelou’s debut memoir is a modern American classic beloved worldwide. Sent by their mother to live with their devout, self-sufficient grandmother in a small Southern town, Maya and her brother, Bailey, endure the ache of abandonment and the prejudice of the local “powhitetrash.” At eight years old and back at her mother’s side in St. Louis, Maya is attacked by a man many times her age—and has to live with the consequences for a lifetime. Years later, in San Francisco, Maya learns that love for herself, the kindness of others, her own strong spirit, and the ideas of great authors (“I met and fell in love with William Shakespeare”) will allow her to be free instead of imprisoned. Poetic and powerful, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings will touch hearts and change minds for as long as people read. “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings liberates the reader into life simply because Maya Angelou confronts her own life with such a moving wonder, such a luminous dignity.”—James Baldwin From the Paperback edition.
Download or read book Born On A Blue Day written by Daniel Tammet and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2007-01-09 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A journey into one of the most fascinating minds alive today—guided by the owner himself. Bestselling author Daniel Tammet (Thinking in Numbers) is virtually unique among people who have severe autistic disorders in that he is capable of living a fully independent life and able to explain what is happening inside his head. He sees numbers as shapes, colors, and textures, and he can perform extraordinary calculations in his head. He can learn to speak new languages fluently, from scratch, in a week. In 2004, he memorized and recited more than 22,000 digits of pi, setting a record. He has savant syndrome, an extremely rare condition that gives him the most unimaginable mental powers, much like those portrayed by Dustin Hoffman in the film Rain Man. Fascinating and inspiring, Born on a Blue Day explores what it’s like to be special and gives us an insight into what makes us all human—our minds.
Download or read book Aaaaw to Zzzzzd The Words of Birds written by John Bevis and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2010-08-20 with total page 159 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The distinctive and amazing songs and calls of birds: a meditation and a lexicon. “A miraculous little book: a compressed encyclopedia of our fascination with avifauna.” —The Nation “A charming, funny, and eccentric book.” —Times Literary Supplement “An elegant tribute to the beauty of its subject.” —Los Angeles Times Birds sing and call, sometimes in complex and beautiful arrangements of notes, sometimes in one-line repetitions that resemble a ringtone more than a symphony. Listening, we are stirred, transported, and even envious of birds' ability to produce what Shelley called “profuse strains of unpremeditated art.” And for hundreds of years, we have tried to write down what we hear when birds sing. Poets have put birdsong in verse (Thomas Nashe: “Cuckoo, jug-jug, pu-we, to-witta-woo”) and ornithologists have transcribed bird sounds more methodically. Drawing on this history of bird writing, in Aaaaw to Zzzzzd John Bevis offers a lexicon of the words of birds. For tourists in Birdland, there could be no more charming phrasebook. Consulting it, we find seven distinct variations of “hoo” attributed to seven different species of owls, from a simple hoo to the more ambitious hoo hoo hoo-hoo, ho hoo hoo-hoo; the understated cheet of the tree swallow; the resonant kreeaaaaaaaaaaar of the Swainson's hawk; the modest peep peep peep of the meadow pipit. We learn that some people hear the Baltimore oriole saying “here, here, come right here, dear” and the yellowhammer saying “a little bit of bread and no cheese.” Bevis, a poet, frames his lexicons—one for North America and one for Britain and northern Europe—with an evocative appreciation of birds, birdsong, and human attempts to capture the words of birds in music and poetry. He also offers an engaging account of other methods of documenting birdsong—field recording, graphic notation, and mechanical devices including duck calls and the serinette, an instrument used to teach song tunes to songbirds. The singing of birds is nature at its most sublime, and words are our medium for expressing this sublimity. Aaaaw to Zzzzzd belongs in the bird lover's backpack and on the word lover's bedside table, an unexpected and sui generis pleasure.
Download or read book The Song of the Bird written by Anthony De Mello and published by Image. This book was released on 2016-07-05 with total page 192 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Every one of these stories is about YOU." --Anthony de Mello Everyone loves stories; and in this book the bestselling author of Sadhana: A Way to God shares 124 stories and parables from a variety of traditions both ancient and modern. Each story resonates with life lessons that can teach us inescapable truths about ourselves and our world. De Mello's international acclaim rests on his unique approach to contemplation and ability to heighten self-awareness and self-discovery. His is a holistic approach, and in the words of one reviewer: "his mysticism cuts across all times and peoples and is truly a universal invitation." The Song of the Bird uses the familiar yet enduring medium of the story to illustrate profound realities that bring us in touch with the problems and concerns of daily life, as well as with our common spiritual quest. The aim is to develop the art of tasting and feeling the message of each story to the point that we are transformed. "Let the story speak to your heart, not to your brain," the author directs. "This may make something of a mystic out of you." Enhanced by lovely ink drawings, this is indeed a volume to treasure, to share, and to read many times over, for it is everyone's best companion on the road to spiritual growth.
Download or read book The Book of Human Emotions written by Tiffany Watt Smith and published by Little, Brown. This book was released on 2016-06-07 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A thoughtful, gleeful encyclopedia of emotions, both broad and outrageously specific, from throughout history and around the world. How do you feel today? Is your heart fluttering in anticipation? Your stomach tight with nerves? Are you falling in love? Feeling a bit miffed? Do you have the heebie-jeebies? Are you antsy with iktsuarpok or filled with nakhes? Recent research suggests there are only six basic emotions. But if that makes you feel uneasy, suspicious, and maybe even a little bereft, THE BOOK OF HUMAN EMOTIONS is for you. In this unique book, you'll get to travel across the world and through time, learning how different cultures have articulated the human experience and picking up some fascinating new knowledge about yourself along the way. From the familiar (anger) to the foreign (zal), each entertaining and informative alphabetical entry reveals the surprising connections and fascinating facts behind our emotional lives. Whether you're in search of the perfect word to sum up that cozy feeling you get from being inside on a cold winter's night, surrounded by friends and good food (what the Dutch call gezelligheid), or wondering how nostalgia evolved from a fatal illness to enjoyable self-indulgence, Tiffany Watt Smith draws on history, anthropology, science, art, literature, music, and popular culture to find the answers. In reading THE BOOK OF HUMAN EMOTIONS, you'll discover feelings you never knew you had (like basorexia, the sudden urge to kiss someone) and gain unexpected insights into why you feel the way you do. Besides, aren't you curious what nginyiwarrarringu means?
Download or read book Every Little Thing written by Bob Marley and published by Chronicle Books. This book was released on 2012-08-31 with total page 31 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Bob Marley's songs are known the world over for their powerful message of love, peace, and harmony. Now a whole new generation can discover one of his most joyous songs in this reassuring picture book adaptation written by his daughter Cedella and exuberantly illustrated by Vanessa Brantley-Newton. This upbeat story reminds children that the sun will always come out after the rain and mistakes are easily forgiven with a hug. Every family will relate to this universal story of one boy who won't let anything get him down, as long as he has the help of three very special little birds. Including all the lyrics of the original song plus new verses, this cheerful book will bring a smile to faces of all ages—because every little thing's gonna be all right!
Download or read book Struck by Genius written by Jason Padgett and published by HMH. This book was released on 2014-04-22 with total page 268 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From head trauma to scientific wonder—a “deeply absorbing . . . fascinating” true story of acquired savant syndrome (Entertainment Weekly). Twelve years ago, Jason Padgett had never made it past pre-algebra. But a violent mugging forever altered the way his brain worked. It turned an ordinary math-averse student into an extraordinary young man with a unique gift to see the world as no one else does: water pours from the faucet in crystalline patterns, numbers call to mind distinct geometric shapes, and intricate fractal patterns emerge from the movement of tree branches, revealing the intrinsic mathematical designs hidden in the objects around us. As his ability to understand physics skyrocketed, the “accidental genius” developed the astonishing ability to draw the complex geometric shapes he saw everywhere. Overcoming huge setbacks and embracing his new mind, Padgett “gained a vision of the world that is as beautiful as it is challenging.” Along the way he fell in love, found joy in numbers, and spent plenty of time having his head examined (The New York Times Book Review). Illustrated with Jason’s stunning, mathematically precise artwork, his singular story reveals the wondrous potential of the human brain, and “an incredible phenomenon which points toward dormant potential—a little Rain Man perhaps—within us all” (Darold A. Treffert, MD, author of Islands of Genius: The Bountiful Mind of the Autistic, Acquired, and Sudden Savant). “A tale worthy of Ripley’s Believe It or Not! . . . This memoir sends a hopeful message to families touched by brain injury, autism, or neurological damage from strokes.” —Booklist “How extraordinary it is to contemplate the bizarre gifts that might lie within all of us.” —People
Download or read book When I Was a Child I Read Books written by Marilynne Robinson and published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. This book was released on 2012-03-13 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Marilynne Robinson has built a sterling reputation as a writer of sharp, subtly moving prose, not only as a major American novelist, but also as a rigorous thinker and incisive essayist. In When I Was a Child I Read Books she returns to and expands upon the themes which have preoccupied her work with renewed vigor. In "Austerity as Ideology," she tackles the global debt crisis, and the charged political and social political climate in this country that makes finding a solution to our financial troubles so challenging. In "Open Thy Hand Wide" she searches out the deeply embedded role of generosity in Christian faith. And in "When I Was a Child," one of her most personal essays to date, an account of her childhood in Idaho becomes an exploration of individualism and the myth of the American West. Clear-eyed and forceful as ever, Robinson demonstrates once again why she is regarded as one of our essential writers.
Download or read book Who Sang the First Song written by Ellie Holcomb and published by B&H Kids. This book was released on 2018-10-04 with total page 24 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Have you ever wondered who hummed the first tune? Was it the flowers? The waves or the moon? Dove Award-winning recording artist Ellie Holcomb answers with a lovely lyrical tale, one that reveals that God our Maker sang the first song, and He created us all with a song to sing. Go to bhkids.com to find this book's Parent Connection, an easy tool to help moms and dads (or anyone else who loves kids) discuss the book's message with their child. We're all about connecting parents and kids to each other and to God's Word.
Download or read book True Believers written by Kurt Andersen and published by Random House Incorporated. This book was released on 2012 with total page 449 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Withdrawing herself from consideration for Supreme Court Judgeship, distinguished judge Karen Hollander reflects on the reasons for her decision while remembering her coming of age in 1960s America, during which she experienced a formative event that reverberates in the cultural landscape of her present-day life. By the best-selling author of Heyday. 40,000 first printing.
Download or read book The Naked Voice written by W. Stephen Smith and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2007-03-15 with total page 223 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In The Naked Voice, W. Stephen Smith invites all singers to improve their vocal technique through his renowned and time-tested wholistic method. Focusing not only on the most important technical, but also on the often overlooked psychological and spiritual elements of learning to sing, his book allows readers to develop their own full and individual identities as singers. With philosophies and techniques drawn from a lifetime of teaching voice, Smith demonstrates how one can reveal the true unique sound of one's own voice by singing with the whole self. The master's method, presented in concrete and comprehensible terms with helpful illustrations, is enhanced by a CD containing exercises performed by singers from Smith's own studio-singers whose talent and training bring them across the country and around the world. The clear and easy style of The Naked Voice welcomes the reader into Smith's teaching studio, and into conversation with Smith himself as he presents the six simple and elegant exercises that form the core of his method. These exercises provide a foundation for free singing, and lead singers through the step-by-step process of mastering the technique. Throughout, Smith speaks sympathetically and encouragingly to the singer in search of an unencumbered and effective approach to the art. The Naked Voice is a must-read for all singers, giving teachers and students, amateurs and professionals, access to the methods and concepts that have earned Smith his reputation as one of the most highly-sought-after vocal instructors in the international arena today.
Download or read book The Story of Colour written by Gavin Evans and published by Michael O'Mara Books. This book was released on 2017-08-17 with total page 300 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Why is green the colour of envy? Why is black 'evil'? Why is white pure? Why do we 'feel blue' or 'see red'? Why do colours have different meanings for different cultures? When we look at or talk about a colour in a particular setting, we are as likely to see its cultural or symbolic meaning as the shade itself. Why? Sometimes our grasp of a colour relates to the random way we define it. Light blue is called 'blue' but, over the last century or two, light red has become pink, whereas in Russia light blue and dark blue are separate colours. Does language play a part in our perception of colours? In most cases, the origins of why we view a colour in a certain way goes back hundreds, if not thousands, of years. Blue was not always a boy's colour; pink was not always a girl's. Indeed, less than one hundred years ago, in the West, it was the other way round. This book offers a lively, anecdotal treatment of the cultural mysteries of colour, and focuses on the way we respond to colours, the significance we give them - and how these things change over time and from place to place. It tells the story of how we have come to view the world through lenses passed down to us by art, science, politics, fashion, sport and, not least, prejudice.
Download or read book Make Meatballs Sing written by Matthew Burgess and published by Enchanted Lion Books. This book was released on 2021-05-04 with total page 80 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Deeply influenced by the example of Christ--to stand in love with the least of us--and fired up by the social justice issues of her day, artist, designer, and educator Sister Corita Kent was a nun like no other!
