I can't say that I picked this book out myself... I'm reading for my anthropology class on pop fiction adn politics, nonetheless it has served as a wonderful resource. The articles span several subjects, countries, and view points. Particularly excelent is Karen Barber's introduction which serves as an excelent starting point for the study of pop-culture in the setting of any region.

As someone that prides themself on customer satisfaction, I have to say this was not a bad little book. A lot is common sense, but some would learn from this. People like to be taken care of from start to finish in any industry and this is a good reminder in service.

This book provides those who are more likely to have believed the Harlem Renaissance to be entirely literary and entirely Harlem-centered with evidence of the all-encompassing scope and international import of this crucial, modern, blackened artistic surge. The exploration of black identity and construction of black nationality called the Harlem Renaissance is insightfully revisited through the social and artistic problems enacted in the works, within the voices, and upon the bodies of protagonists: Josephine Baker, Paul Robeson, and surprisingly, Orson Welles. This book is a fine complement to books which focus on literary-hitsorical aspects (such as David L. Lewis' _When Harlem was in Vogue_) and those which focus on music such as Angela Davis' _Blues Legacies and Black Feminism_ and Albert Murray's _Stomping the Blues_). It is a a fabulous expansion of the artistic territory encompassed in black art. Maya Angleou has said: "I am human, and therefore nothing h! uman can escape my grasp." I believe that black art has languished too long in the storage bin where fads and fanices go to die. _Black Rhapsodies_ rescues the Renaissance from this fate by positing black art as a philosphical stance, therefore attainable in varied ways throughout the post WWI world--not as the exotic and undisciplined, irregular expressions of primitive black jungle souls on the drum-pulsing streets of 20s Harlem. I couldn't agree more, and I hope that the idea that black art is both a real category and a complex one full of contadictions is adopted in the teaching of the Renaissance.

My one complaint is minor and may stem from my own unfamiliarity with the indexing system of books on art. I found it difficult to locate quickly the visual art being described in certain passages. If there were a more convenient way on idexing the art or of expaining the system to the novice reader, it would be appreciated.

Gole has set out to study the war plans gamed by the Army War College in the 1930s, with very interesting results. The students (who appear to have been company- and field-grade officers) had a remarkable grasp of how World War II would work out, foreseeing for example a sneak attack by the Japanese, the early loss of the Philippines, a "Germany first" strategy on the part of the western allies, and a cautious island-hopping retaking of the Pacific by the U.S. Understandably, they did not take such leaps as the possibility that Germany might over-run France in a few weeks, or that the development of carrier warfare might make the climatic naval battle (expected by both the U.S. and Japanese navies) an impossibility. Gole's point, as I understand it, is that by playing these annual games, a third-rate army (the U.S. Army had fewer than 200,000 men in the late 1930s) was able to leverage its officer corps into a cadre that could command an army ten times as large, and that was therefore ready to wage and win a global war. The book will repay a second reading. - Dan Ford

Rohdie's analysis of Visonti's masterpiece "Rocco and His Brothers" is another of the BFI's useful, concise, and fairly affordable book companions to classic films. Rohdie covers pretty much everything, touching on the roles of female characters in Visconti's films, industrial-era economic displacement in Italy, homosexual themes in "Rocco," the conflict of peasant vs. urban values in Visonti's Italy, Visconti's political loyalties, "Rocco" and Italian censorship, the balance of ideology and melodrama in "Rocco," Visconti and neo-realism, Visconti's many literary and theatrical influences etc., etc., etc. The main focus, or at least the one the book comes back to time and time again, is the theatrical elements of "Rocco," which makes sense, but Rohdie is pretty thorough, and his discussion covers a variety of topics.

Some interesting (and unrelated) facts from this book: Each of the film's five "chapters" were written by a different screenwriter, Visconti himself penning the final chapter. The migration of the film's Parondi family was not an exceptional one; over nine million Italians moved from the South to the North between 1955 and 1971. Commercial success eluded "Rocco" until the film began showing in smaller periphery cities, at which point the three-hour "Rocco" became Italy's second highest grossing movie of the year (behind the three-hour "La Dolce Vita"). An unfilmed prologue was written for the film, depicting the funeral of the Parondi father. And finally, here's an eyebrow-raising quote from Visconti on family values: "When the family doesn't exist, nothing any longer exists. Women can have careers, can be artists, but they need to place their duties of lover, wife, mother above everything else and thus recreate in all its integrity what had been until a century ago the solid structure of the family."

I absolutely adore "Rocco and His Brothers," so to me this book was an easy sell. I mostly enjoy the BFI series because each volume provides a very useful context for the film it discusses. Knowing what cultural, political, and personal events fill in the backdrop of a film's production is fascinating to me. For that purpose, this book is great. Of course there is also (as I listed above) a good deal of critical analysis of the film as well. The critical aspect suffers by trying to cover so many bases, but its a handy guide. And the extensive bibliography info is very nice.

It's a good book which is easy to study. It give me a lot of examples and explanation. So reader who have a little SAS backgroud can learn it without problem. This book make SAS/IntrNet easy to use and useful especially grnerating Graphics and tables in web. The tables can be drill down. The only point which is not good enough is that we can not click in the specail word in the graph and make it drill down.

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This book doesn't look all too great, as it appears to be typewritten text with handwritten marks for the letters. But looks aside, it is a very good book that will provide you a strong foundation in arabic study. The book gives arabic phrases and english meaning, and it explains exactly how those phrases work in grammar, then gives you exercises to test yourself. You also learn how to write and read Arabic script, as each arabic phrase is written in arabic as well. one must admire the writer who had to handwrite in every arabic phrase and mark every letter in.

the only problems i had where the typewriter text sometimes being blotchy and hard to read, and the fact that there aren't any answers for the exercises you are given(although they are very easy). But overall it is a very good book, starting slowly with very basic things, making you constantly use the vocabulary you learned earlier, and working up to more advanced levels.

These books are nice guide-- been buying them for years-- Husband who is a serious skeptic-- even reads his daily in his book!!

This book describes how cancer patients, family members, and the general public seek health information. The focus is on the Cancer Information Service, an award-winning, nation-wide service that provides the latest, most accurate cancer information through the 1-800-4-CANCER telephone number. Although the book is a bit dated, it provides a useful analysis of what people look for when they call for cancer information, and their satisfaction with it. A 1998 Journal of Health Communications monograph has more recent analyses of how callers use information obtained through the Cancer Information Service.