A BARACK OBAMA, NEW SCIENTIST AND NPR PICKData shaped empires. Now it's shaping our future. A groundbreaking 11,000 year global history from clay tablets to the algorithmic state, perfect for readers of Nexus and The Age of Surveillance Capitalism.'The new history of mankind demanded by our times' Jaron Lanier, author of Ten Arguments for Deleting Your Social Media Right Now

The next chapter of human history should not be written by algorithms, it should be written by us. It is only by fully understanding how data has shaped our past that we can decide what role it plays in our future.We live in an era when trading our information for access can feel harmless or inevitable – yet from targeted advertising to mass surveillance, data shapes the course of our lives. How did it gain the power it now holds over us?Long before writing existed, at the ...

BARACK OBAMA’S 2026 SUMMER READING PICKAn NPR, New Scientist, Nautilus, and Next Big Idea Club Best Book of the Month“Here is the new history of mankind demanded by our times.” —Jaron Lanier, author of Who Owns the Future?“A must-read.”—NPR, “15 Books Our Critics Can’t Wait to Read This Summer”“Essential reading for understanding the opportunities and dangers of the technolo...

AN NPR SUMMER READING PICK | WINNER OF KIRKUS' EARPHONES AWARD“A powerful and thought-provoking deep history of data and power, essential reading for understanding the opportunities and dangers of the technological revolution now transforming our world.” —Jonathan Kennedy, author of PathogenesisFrom clay tablets to the algorithmic state, a groundbreaking new lens on human history arguing that information has always been the...

Many writers started their professional lives in very diverse fields before embracing writing, or on the contrary have turned away from writing. The present volume seeks to explore the complex relationship between that ‘other life’ and writing. The aim is to determine whether a writer’s ‘other life’ appears in, influences or even shapes his/her work, and to what extent. What is the part of gestation and that of rupture? A diversity of writers is examined: Patrick Chamoiseau, J. M. Coet...

Exploring the intersections of digital humanities and African diaspora studiesHow can scholars use digital tools to better understand the African diaspora across time, space, and disciplines? And how can African diaspora studies inform the practices of digital humanities? These questions are at the heart of this timely collection of essays about the relationship between digital humanities and Black Atlantic studies, offering critical insights into race, migration, ...

The digital cultural record has a powerful role to play in both new and future strategies of creating new homes within the digital milieu. For example, the development and establishment of new digital archives around South Asian studies not only allows us to create new archives of the past but also to remember and commemorate the past differently. New maps transform how we understand space and place. And new digital comfort zones facilitate connections for those whose family and loved ones...

Anti-racist Community Engagement: Principles and Practices centers anti-racist community-engaged traditions that BIPOC academics and community members have created through more than a century of collaboration across university and community. It demonstrates both the progress and the work that still needs to be done.The book is organized around a set of Anti-racist Community Engagement Principles developed by the editors as part of their shared work and dialogue with collea...

Au fil des vingt et quelques chapitres que compte cet ouvrage, les auteurs explorent le passé, le présent et l’avenir de la recherche, de l’enseignement et de l’expérimentation en sciences humaines numériques au Canada. Ce recueil, qui rassemble les travaux de chercheuses et de chercheurs établis et émergents, présente des initiatives contemporaines dans le domaine des sciences humaines numériques. Celles-ci sont conjuguées à un réexamen de l’héritage légué par ce domaine jusqu’à ce jour e...

From one of cinema’s wisest and most penetrating observers, an arresting new perspective on the sweep of film history.David Thomson has been called “the greatest living writer on the movies.” Here is a career capstone of sorts—a one-volume history of film and screens as illuminating and provocative as his classic Biographical Dictionary of Film. In tracing the progress, from the Lumiere Brothers to the Coens, Thomson glories in the great movies, but admits...

**“A thought-provoking analysis on what exactly we’re doing with all our many hours of screen time.” —Harper’s BazaarAn eye-opening look at how social media shapes the stories we tell and the lives we lead**Over the past two decades, platforms like Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok have revolutionized how we document and share our lives. We once archived our experiences in photo albums, and now we capture our most significant moments in reels and photo dumps. Whether...

"An absolute must-read for anyone interested not just in big tech, but in what it takes to not lose your soul in modern-day America." —Naomi Fry, staff writer at The New YorkerA whip-smart, darkly funny, and timely memoir of one woman’s twelve years inside Google and her transformation from insider to dissenter as the company’s ideals begin to unravel from within.When Claire Stapleton joined Google in 2007, it felt...