In 1960, the FDA approved the contraceptive commonly known as "the pill." Advocates, developers, and manufacturers believed that the convenient new drug would put an end to unwanted pregnancy, ensure happy marriages,

Offering writings from Nobel prize-winning economist Amartya Sen, this book outlines the need to understand India in the light of its argumentative tradition for the success of India's democracy, the defense of its secular p

It struck Bill Bryson one day that we devote a lot more time to the Wars of the Roses or the Normandy Landings than considering what most of history really consists of: centuries upon centuries of people quietly

We live in a world increasingly dominated by the fake, the prepackaged, the artificial: fast food, scripted reality TV shows, Facebook 'friends', and fraudulent memoirs. But people everywhere are demanding the exact opposite, heralding 'auth

Why is Western humanity, richer and safer than ever before, also fatter, sadder and more fearful? Blubberland is a witty and engaging critique of the way we live now. Leading architecture critic and writer Elizabeth Farrelly

02 Are we the last generation to inhabit bodies not routinely reconstructed by surgical enhancements? 03 In the past decades, the pressure to perfect and design our bodies has been unprecedented. Breast enhancement is

The great revelation of anthropology is the realisation that there are other ways of being, Wade Davis writes in the introduction, a colourful, fascinating, and respectful panorama of ethnic diversity. From the Inuit

The naked human body evokes powerful and often contradictory feelings and ideas: it can thrill or revolt us; it can signal innocence or sexual availability; honesty or madness; oneness with nature or separation from society;

In 1960, Cuban photographer Alberto Korda captured fabled revolutionary Ernesto "Che" Guevara in what has become history's most reproduced photo. Now Michael Casey tells the remarkable story of this image, detailing

Traces the controversial record of mercy-killing, a source of heated debate among doctors and laypeople alike. This book examines evolving opinions about what constitutes a good death, taking into account the societal and re

We are being overwhelmed by nonsense about science, medicine and history. False information - 'counterknowledge' - has reached epidemic proportions. This hard-hitting and controversial book leads the fight back.We ar

Once there was no text messaging. No email and no social network sites like Facebook, Bebo and MySpace. The way we live has apparently been transformed by new ways of communicating. But where did these trends start?

This book explores the common characteristics of the communal celebrations displayed by cultures from all parts of the world and throughout history. Ehrenreich uncovers the origins of communal celebration in human biol

Offers a glimpse into the world of newspaper journalism. This book shows how a newspaper moves from being empty at the start of the day to being full twelve hours later, puts readers in the shoes of a journalist on the news-

When Joe Bageant returned to his hometown of Winchester, Virginia, he rediscovered his redneck roots - "the great beery, NASCAR-loving, church-going, gun-owning America that has never set foot in a Starbucks". But he

The next century will see more than half of the world's 6,000 languages become extinct, and most of these will disappear without being adequately recorded. Written by one of the leading figures in language documentation, thi

A Book of All-New Pop Culture Pieces by Chuck Klosterman

Chuck Klosterman has chronicled rock music, film, and sports for almost fifteen years. He's covered extreme metal, extreme nostalgia, disposable art, disposab

Now available in paperback, "Gay Life and Culture" is a comprehensive, global account of gay history. It is spectacularly illustrated throughout and includes an extensive selection of images, many of them only recently recovered. F

Raimond Gaita brings together a thought-provoking collection of essays by public intellectuals on the subject of conflict. The book is a companion to a series of lectures of the same name held in 2009 at the Australian Catholic University. F

Spanning disciplines from evolutionary theory and cultural anthropology to the history of books, libraries, and computer science, this book weaves an intriguing narrative that connects such seemingly far-flung topics as insec

Written in the wake of May 1968 and Deleuze and Guattari's "Anti-Oedipus", this book offers a scathing view of sex manuals for children and society's hypocrisy of over sex that argues for the rights of children to th

Just as Bernhard Schlink's bestselling novels, The Reader and Homecoming, tackle the burden of German guilt about events during the Second World War, so too the six essays that make up this compelling book view the long shadow of p

02 Why do goths wear black? Why do songs about death and despair make us feel good? And why can't you get no satisfaction? According to Craig Schuftan, it all began about two hundred years ago. 03 Hey! Nietzsche! Leave

'Ayse Onal has done an immense service by revealing what it is like to live in an honour-based society and the terrible cost, not just to the women who are beaten and eventually killed, but to the perpetrators and ot

This book looks at some of history's most fascinating recluses and remarkable loners. Some withdrew from society for religious reasons, as in the case of the hermits and ascetics who gave their lives entirely to the service of God by meditating

In 1995, economist Rachel Kranton wrote future Nobel Prize-winner George Akerlof a letter insisting that his most recent paper was wrong. Identity, she argued, was the missing element that would help to explain why people - faci

In Arthur Ransome's charming tale of childhood adventure, "Secret Water", four children are pretending to be savages approaching an outpost of the civilized world. 'What is civilization?' asks Bridget, the youngest.

In the Name of Peace discusses the pacifist leaders, great and small, whose adherence to non-violence, even in the face of ruinous opposition, has changed the course of history. Pacifist leaders and their philosophies have affected societies

In the history of Western culture we find lists of saints, ranks of soldiers, catalogues of grotesque creatures or medicinal plants, and hordes of treasure. This infinity of lists is no coincidence: a culture prefers

Mary Beard's by now famous blog It's A Don's Life has been running on the Times Literary Supplement website for nearly three years. In it she has made her name as a wickedly subversive commentator on the world in whi

Globalization, the war on terror, and Islamic fundamentalism-followed closely by a rise in Islamophobia-have escalated tensions between Western nations and the Muslim world. Yet, internationally renowned Islamic scholar Akbar Ahmed

Are you happy at work? Do you like your job? We spend an average of 25 per cent of our lives week-to-week at work, yet many of us drift through life without really answering these fundamental questions. When we do thin

We live in a world drowning in objects. But what do they tell us about ourselves? In "The Language of Things", Deyan Sudjic charts our relationship - both innocent and knowing - with all things designed. From the opulent excesses of

Provides an introduction to one of the great Marxist thinkers of the 20th century.

In "A Matter of Principle" Australia's most experienced and respected interviewer Jana Wendt engages an assortment of people in the worlds of politics, society, art, sport, music and architecture. Wendt gets under th

Imagine a year without spending or even touching money. Former businessman Mark Boyle did just that and here is his extraordinary story. Going back to basics and following his own strict rules, Mark learned ingenious

'No Logo' was a book that defined a generation when it was first published in 1999. For it's 10th anniversay Naomi Klein has updated this iconic book. By the time you're twenty-one, you'll have seen or heard a millio

01 Falling in love is a complicated, messy, mad endeavour - and staying in love is even worse. But even though we know that it will probably all end in tears (or, at best, tight-lipped tolerance) we continue to pursue

Walter Benjamin's posthumously published collection of writings on hashish is a detailed blueprint for a book that was never written - a 'truly exceptional book about hashish', as Benjamin describes it in a letter to his friend

Originally published 25 years ago 'Orientalism' is an influential book of ideas. Edward Said surveys the history and nature of Western attitudes towards the East. For generations now this book has defined our understa

Where does perversion begin? Who is perverse? Ever since the word first appeared in the Middle Ages, anyone who delights in evil and in the destruction of the self or others has been described as 'perverse'. But while the experience of perve

In this carefully researched, thought-provoking book, Geoffrey Hughes examines the trajectory of political correctness and its impact on public life. Focusing on the historical, semantic, and cultural aspects of political corre

In this enlightening book James Boyle describes what he calls the range wars of the information age - today's heated battles over intellectual property. Boyle argues that just as every informed citizen needs to k

Schlosser explores three prominent and little understood features of globalization - drugs, pornography and migrant labour. He traces the history of the contemporary war on drugs from its origins in Reagan's social conservat

In this insightful and pathbreaking reflection on 'doing nothing', Billy Ehn and Orvar Lofgren take us on a fascinating tour of what is happening when, to all appearances, absolutely nothing is happening. Sifting through a wide range of exam

The sexual landscape has changed for women. A generation ago, it was rare to see an older woman with a younger man. It was rare to see a forty-five year old mother with a new baby. Lesbians were mostly firmly in the closet. Pornography was stri

Sex, Power and Consent: Youth Culture and the Unwritten Rules draws on the real world stories and experiences of young women and young men - as told in their own words - regarding love, sex, relationships and negotiating consent. Judicious r

01 This brilliant new book from the author of Nickel and Dimed and Bait and Switch explores the tyranny of positive thinking, and offers a history of how it came to be the dominant mode in the USA. Ehrenreich conceived

In an era obsessed with celebrity and glamour, sophistication' has come to be perceived as the most desirable of human qualities but it was not always so. In this fascinating book, Faye Hammill explores how a word that once meant falsificati

Are four million women really battered to death by their husbands or boyfriends each year? Does a young person commit suicide every thirteen minutes in the United States? Is methamphetamine our number one drug problem

Why are we more likely to fall in love when we feel in danger? Why would an experienced pilot disregard his training and the rules of the aviation industry, leading to the deadliest airline crash in history? Why do w

01 In 1945, just as the war was ending,'the teenager' arrived. This is the story of how we got to that momentâ??the century and a half of ferment, folly, and angst that created a separate Teen Age in Europe and Ameri

Have you ever wondered how you would react to a disaster? Do you think you would be paralysed with fear, like the diplomat who froze, drink still in hand, as terrorists invaded the Dominican Republic's embassy in Colombia in 1980? O

Wikipedia has been hailed as the most revolutionary aid to the spread of human knowledge since Gutenberg's printing press. In less than a decade it has single-handedly invigorated and torn up the very idea of an ency

In 1959 C. P. Snow delivered his now-famous Rede Lecture, 'The Two Cultures,' a reflection on the academy based on the premise that intellectual life was divided into two cultures: the arts and humanities on one side and science on

"Art is a lie that tells the truth." - Pablo Picasso. Picasso disrupted the world around him, and in doing so he reshaped it. That is the Trickster spirit. Playful, mischievous, subversive, and amoral. Tricksters are

Trust - our belief in the truth or reliability of someone or something - lies at the very heart of our relationships, our society and our everyday lives. Much of the time we take it for granted. And yet trust, or the

Lines across the plain near the Peruvian site of Nazca have been explained as features of a religious calendar. Then, why were these interpreted as the contours of a galactic spaceport? And, what is it about flying saucer cu

This years best selling Massey Lecture The Wayfinders takes readers on a journey through time on a discovery of ancient wisdoms, languages and cultures. Some are already extinct, others are quickly on their way out. It is estimated that 50%

How do we see the world around us? "The Penguin on Design" series includes the works of creative thinkers whose writings on art, design and the media have changed our vision forever. "Seeing comes before words. The child looks and

Essential reading for the 21st century Are we transforming the planet into one massive global city? Urban migration and the rapid growth of cities are creating global change at a revolutionary scale. From Mumbai to Melbourne, we ar

From the best-selling author of "The Rise of the Creative Class" comes a brilliant new book on the surprising importance of place, with advice on how to find the right place for you. It's a mantra of the age of globa

You know what it's like: whether it's the leafblower blaring at 7am or the queue-jumper cutting in at the cinema, there's nothing like an act of rudeness to spoil the day. But why do so many of us get worked up about these examples of

Elizabeth Pisani has spent ten years working as a scientist in the bloated AIDS industry. In "The Wisdom of Whores", she unfolds a universe of brothels and bureaucracies, of bickering junkies and squabbling charities, of men who sell

In 2001 Indonesia appointed its first female President - Megawati Sukarnoputri. This book explores gender relations in Indonesia and presents an overview of the political, social, cultural and economic situ

Something went wrong around the start of the 21st century. Individual creativity began to go out of fashion. Music became an endless rehashing of the past. Scientists were in danger of no longer understanding their own research. Indeed, not