EBookClubs

Read Books & Download eBooks Full Online

EBookClubs

Read Books & Download eBooks Full Online

Book Myths of Empire

    Book Details:
  • Author : Jack Snyder
  • Publisher : Cornell University Press
  • Release : 2013-05-21
  • ISBN : 0801468590
  • Pages : 342 pages

Download or read book Myths of Empire written by Jack Snyder and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2013-05-21 with total page 342 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Overextension is the common pitfall of empires. Why does it occur? What are the forces that cause the great powers of the industrial era to pursue aggressive foreign policies? Jack Snyder identifies recurrent myths of empire, describes the varieties of overextension to which they lead, and criticizes the traditional explanations offered by historians and political scientists.He tests three competing theories—realism, misperception, and domestic coalition politics—against five detailed case studies: early twentieth-century Germany, Japan in the interwar period, Great Britain in the Victorian era, the Soviet Union after World War II, and the United States during the Cold War. The resulting insights run counter to much that has been written about these apparently familiar instances of empire building.

Book Myths of Empire

    Book Details:
  • Author : Jack Snyder
  • Publisher : Cornell University Press
  • Release : 2013-05-15
  • ISBN : 0801468604
  • Pages : 342 pages

Download or read book Myths of Empire written by Jack Snyder and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2013-05-15 with total page 342 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Overextension is the common pitfall of empires. Why does it occur? What are the forces that cause the great powers of the industrial era to pursue aggressive foreign policies? Jack Snyder identifies recurrent myths of empire, describes the varieties of overextension to which they lead, and criticizes the traditional explanations offered by historians and political scientists. He tests three competing theories—realism, misperception, and domestic coalition politics—against five detailed case studies: early twentieth-century Germany, Japan in the interwar period, Great Britain in the Victorian era, the Soviet Union after World War II, and the United States during the Cold War. The resulting insights run counter to much that has been written about these apparently familiar instances of empire building.

Book Myths of Empire

    Book Details:
  • Author : Jack Snyder
  • Publisher : Cornell University Press
  • Release : 1991
  • ISBN : 9780801497643
  • Pages : 348 pages

Download or read book Myths of Empire written by Jack Snyder and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 1991 with total page 348 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Overextension is the common pitfall of empires. Jack Snyder identifies recurrent myths of empire, describes the varieties of overextension to which they lead, and criticizes the traditional explanations offered by historians and political scientists.

Book Exploding the Western

    Book Details:
  • Author : Sara L. Spurgeon
  • Publisher : Texas A&M University Press
  • Release : 2005
  • ISBN : 1603445927
  • Pages : 180 pages

Download or read book Exploding the Western written by Sara L. Spurgeon and published by Texas A&M University Press. This book was released on 2005 with total page 180 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The frontier and Western expansionism are so quintessentially a part of American history that the literature of the West and Southwest is in some senses the least regional and the most national literature of all. The frontier--the place where cultures meet and rewrite themselves upon each other's texts--continues to energize writers whose fiction evokes, destroys, and rebuilds the myth in ways that attract popular audiences and critics alike. Sara L. Spurgeon focuses on three writers whose works not only exemplify the kind of engagement with the theme of the frontier that modern authors make, but also show the range of cultural voices that are present in Southwestern literature: Cormac McCarthy, Leslie Marmon Silko, and Ana Castillo. Her central purposes are to consider how the differing versions of the Western "mythic" tales are being recast in a globalized world and to examine the ways in which they challenge and accommodate increasingly fluid and even dangerous racial, cultural, and international borders. In Spurgeon's analysis, the spaces in which the works of these three writers collide offer some sharply differentiated visions but also create new and unsuspected forms, providing the most startling insights. Sometimes beautiful, sometimes tragic, the new myths are the expressions of the larger culture from which they spring, both a projection onto a troubled and troubling past and an insistent, prophetic vision of a shared future

Book The Language of Empire

    Book Details:
  • Author : Robert H. MacDonald
  • Publisher : Manchester University Press
  • Release : 1994
  • ISBN : 9780719037498
  • Pages : 298 pages

Download or read book The Language of Empire written by Robert H. MacDonald and published by Manchester University Press. This book was released on 1994 with total page 298 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The debate about the Empire dealt in idealism and morality, and both sides employed the language of feeling, and frequently argued their case in dramatic terms. This book opposes two sides of the Empire, first, as it was presented to the public in Britain, and second, as it was experienced or imagined by its subjects abroad. British imperialism was nurtured by such upper middle-class institutions as the public schools, the wardrooms and officers' messes, and the conservative press. The attitudes of 1916 can best be recovered through a reconstruction of a poetics of popular imperialism. The case-study of Rhodesia demonstrates the almost instant application of myth and sign to a contemporary imperial crisis. Rudyard Kipling was acknowledged throughout the English-speaking world not only as a wonderful teller of stories but as the 'singer of Greater Britain', or, as 'the Laureate of Empire'. In the last two decades of the nineteenth century, the Empire gained a beachhead in the classroom, particularly in the coupling of geography and history. The Island Story underlined that stories of heroic soldiers and 'fights for the flag' were easier for teachers to present to children than lessons in morality, or abstractions about liberty and responsible government. The Education Act of 1870 had created a need for standard readers in schools; readers designed to teach boys and girls to be useful citizens. The Indian Mutiny was the supreme test of the imperial conscience, a measure of the morality of the 'master-nation'.

Book The Empire s New Clothes

    Book Details:
  • Author : Philip Murphy
  • Publisher : Oxford University Press
  • Release : 2018-08-01
  • ISBN : 0190935006
  • Pages : pages

Download or read book The Empire s New Clothes written by Philip Murphy and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2018-08-01 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the wake of Brexit, the Commonwealth has been identified as an important body for future British trade and diplomacy, but few know what it actually does. How is it organized and what has held it together for so long? How important is the Queen's role as Head of the Commonwealth? Most importantly, why has it had such a troubled recent past, and is it realistic to imagine that its fortunes might be reversed?In The Empire's New Clothes,? Murphy strips away the gilded self-image of the Commonwealth to reveal an irrelevant institution afflicted by imperial amnesia. He offers a personal perspective on this complex and poorly understood institution, and asks if it can ever escape from the shadow of the British Empire to become an organization based on shared values, rather than a shared history.

Book The Brazilian Empire

Download or read book The Brazilian Empire written by Emília Viotti da Costa and published by . This book was released on 2000 with total page 364 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This classic work of on the history of 19th-century Brazil now includes a new chapter on women.

Book Quetzalcoatl and the Irony of Empire

Download or read book Quetzalcoatl and the Irony of Empire written by David Carrasco and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 1992-06-15 with total page 246 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Davíd Carrasco draws from the perspectives of the history of religions, anthropology, and urban ecology to explore the nature of the complex symbolic form of Quetzalcoatl in the organization, legitimation, and subversion of a large segment of the Mexican urban tradition. His new Preface addresses this tradition in the light of the Columbian quincentennial. "This book, rich in ideas, constituting a novel approach . . . represents a stimulating and provocative contribution to Mesoamerican studies. . . . Recommended to all serious students of the New World's most advanced indigenous civilization."—H. B. Nicholson, Man

Book Seven Myths of the Spanish Conquest

Download or read book Seven Myths of the Spanish Conquest written by Matthew Restall and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2021-04-13 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An update of a popular work that takes on the myths of the Spanish Conquest of the Americas, featuring a new afterword. Seven Myths of the Spanish Conquest reveals how the Spanish invasions in the Americas have been conceived and presented, misrepresented and misunderstood, in the five centuries since Columbus first crossed the Atlantic. This book is a unique and provocative synthesis of ideas and themes that were for generations debated or perpetuated without question in academic and popular circles. The 2003 edition became the foundation stone of a scholarly turn since called The New Conquest History. Each of the book's seven chapters describes one "myth," or one aspect of the Conquest that has been distorted or misrepresented, examines its roots, and explodes its fallacies and misconceptions. Using a wide array of primary and secondary sources, written in a scholarly but readable style, Seven Myths of the Spanish Conquest explains why Columbus did not set out to prove the world was round, the conquistadors were not soldiers, the native Americans did not take them for gods, Cortés did not have a unique vision of conquest procedure, and handfuls of vastly outnumbered Spaniards did not bring down great empires with stunning rapidity. Conquest realities were more complex--and far more fascinating--than conventional histories have related, and they featured a more diverse cast of protagonists-Spanish, Native American, and African. This updated edition of a key event in the history of the Americas critically examines the book's arguments, how they have held up, and why they prompted the rise of a New Conquest History.

Book Empires in World History

    Book Details:
  • Author : Jane Burbank
  • Publisher : Princeton University Press
  • Release : 2021-05-11
  • ISBN : 1400834708
  • Pages : 528 pages

Download or read book Empires in World History written by Jane Burbank and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2021-05-11 with total page 528 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How empires have used diversity to shape the world order for more than two millennia Empires—vast states of territories and peoples united by force and ambition—have dominated the political landscape for more than two millennia. Empires in World History departs from conventional European and nation-centered perspectives to take a remarkable look at how empires relied on diversity to shape the global order. Beginning with ancient Rome and China and continuing across Asia, Europe, the Americas, and Africa, Jane Burbank and Frederick Cooper examine empires' conquests, rivalries, and strategies of domination—with an emphasis on how empires accommodated, created, and manipulated differences among populations. Burbank and Cooper examine Rome and China from the third century BCE, empires that sustained state power for centuries. They delve into the militant monotheism of Byzantium, the Islamic Caliphates, and the short-lived Carolingians, as well as the pragmatically tolerant rule of the Mongols and Ottomans, who combined religious protection with the politics of loyalty. Burbank and Cooper discuss the influence of empire on capitalism and popular sovereignty, the limitations and instability of Europe's colonial projects, Russia's repertoire of exploitation and differentiation, as well as the "empire of liberty"—devised by American revolutionaries and later extended across a continent and beyond. With its investigation into the relationship between diversity and imperial states, Empires in World History offers a fresh approach to understanding the impact of empires on the past and present.

Book How to Hide an Empire

    Book Details:
  • Author : Daniel Immerwahr
  • Publisher : Farrar, Straus and Giroux
  • Release : 2019-02-19
  • ISBN : 0374715122
  • Pages : 372 pages

Download or read book How to Hide an Empire written by Daniel Immerwahr and published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. This book was released on 2019-02-19 with total page 372 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Named one of the ten best books of the year by the Chicago Tribune A Publishers Weekly best book of 2019 | A 2019 NPR Staff Pick A pathbreaking history of the United States’ overseas possessions and the true meaning of its empire We are familiar with maps that outline all fifty states. And we are also familiar with the idea that the United States is an “empire,” exercising power around the world. But what about the actual territories—the islands, atolls, and archipelagos—this country has governed and inhabited? In How to Hide an Empire, Daniel Immerwahr tells the fascinating story of the United States outside the United States. In crackling, fast-paced prose, he reveals forgotten episodes that cast American history in a new light. We travel to the Guano Islands, where prospectors collected one of the nineteenth century’s most valuable commodities, and the Philippines, site of the most destructive event on U.S. soil. In Puerto Rico, Immerwahr shows how U.S. doctors conducted grisly experiments they would never have conducted on the mainland and charts the emergence of independence fighters who would shoot up the U.S. Congress. In the years after World War II, Immerwahr notes, the United States moved away from colonialism. Instead, it put innovations in electronics, transportation, and culture to use, devising a new sort of influence that did not require the control of colonies. Rich with absorbing vignettes, full of surprises, and driven by an original conception of what empire and globalization mean today, How to Hide an Empire is a major and compulsively readable work of history.

Book Age of Swords

    Book Details:
  • Author : Michael J. Sullivan
  • Publisher : Del Rey
  • Release : 2017-07-25
  • ISBN : 1101965371
  • Pages : 496 pages

Download or read book Age of Swords written by Michael J. Sullivan and published by Del Rey. This book was released on 2017-07-25 with total page 496 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The gods have been proven mortal and new heroes will arise as the battle continues in the sequel to Age of Myth—from the author of the Riyria Revelations and Riyria Chronicles series. In Age of Myth, fantasy master Michael J. Sullivan launched readers on an epic journey of magic and adventure, heroism and betrayal, love and loss. Now the thrilling saga continues as the human uprising is threatened by powerful enemies from without—and bitter rivalries from within. Raithe, the God Killer, may have started the rebellion by killing a Fhrey, but long-standing enmities dividing the Rhunes make it all but impossible to unite against the common foe. And even if the clans can join forces, how will they defeat an enemy whose magical prowess renders them indistinguishable from gods? The answer lies across the sea in a faraway land populated by a reclusive and dour race who feel nothing but disdain for both Fhrey and mankind. With time running out, Persephone leads the gifted young seer Suri, the Fhrey sorceress Arion, and a small band of misfits in a desperate search for aid—a quest that will take them into the darkest depths of Elan. There, an ancient adversary waits, as fearsome as it is deadly. Magic, fantasy, and mythology collide in Michael J. Sullivan’s Legends of the First Empire series: AGE OF MYTH • AGE OF SWORDS • AGE OF WAR

Book Twisted Myths

    Book Details:
  • Author : Maura McHugh
  • Publisher : B.E.S. Publishing
  • Release : 2013
  • ISBN : 9780764166204
  • Pages : 0 pages

Download or read book Twisted Myths written by Maura McHugh and published by B.E.S. Publishing. This book was released on 2013 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Fantasy author Maura McHugh revisits the popular myths of Loki, Odin, Cupid and Psyche, and other myths from Africa, Asia, and the Americas and gives them a macabre makeover.

Book Seven Myths of Africa in World History

Download or read book Seven Myths of Africa in World History written by David Northrup and published by Hackett Publishing. This book was released on 2017-09-01 with total page 190 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Northrup's highly accessible book breaks through the most common barriers that readers encounter in studying African history. Each chapter takes on a common myth about Africa and explains both the sources of the myth and the research that debunks it. These provocative chapters will promote lively discussions among readers while deepening their understanding of African and world history. The book is strengthened by its incorporation of actors and issues representing the African diaspora and African Americans in particular." —Rebecca Shumway, College of Charleston

Book The Mongol Empire between Myth and Reality

Download or read book The Mongol Empire between Myth and Reality written by Denise Aigle and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2014-10-23 with total page 407 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In The Mongol Empire between Myth and Reality, Denise Aigle presents the Mongol empire as a moment of contact between political ideologies, religions, cultures and languages, and, in terms of reciprocal representations, between the Far East, the Muslim East, and the Latin West. The first part is devoted to “The memoria of the Mongols in historical and literary sources” in which she examines how the Mongol rulers were perceived by the peoples with whom they were in contact. In “Shamanism and Islam” she studies the perception of shamanism by Muslim authors and their attempts to integrate Genghis Khan and his successors into an Islamic framework. The last sections deal with geopolitical questions involving the Ilkhans, the Mamluks, and the Latin West. Genghis Khan’s successors claimed the protection of “Eternal Heaven” to justify their conquests even after their Islamization.

Book Star Wars  Myths   Fables

Download or read book Star Wars Myths Fables written by Lucasfilm Press and published by Disney Electronic Content. This book was released on 2019-08-06 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Star Wars: Batu In-World Fairytales Book

Book Empire of Sentiment

    Book Details:
  • Author : Joanna Lewis
  • Publisher : Cambridge University Press
  • Release : 2018-01-18
  • ISBN : 1107198518
  • Pages : 305 pages

Download or read book Empire of Sentiment written by Joanna Lewis and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2018-01-18 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An innovative study proposing a new history of the British Empire in Africa by exploring the emotion culture of imperialism.