This volume presents a series of studies by Jacqueline Caille, acknowledged as the leading expert on medieval Narbonne, which chart the development and history of the city from its Roman origins to its decline in the late Middle Ages. They focus on the period of Narbonne's heyday, from the mid-11th to the mid-14th centuries, and a central place is held by Ermengarde, viscountess for half the 12th century, and celebrated figure in the 'world of the troubadours'. The book opens with an impor...

In his classic essay The Gift, Marcel Mauss argued that gifts can never be truly free; rather, they bring about an expectation of reciprocal exchange. For over one hundred years, his ideas on economy, social relations, and exchange have inspired new modes of thought, none more so than what crystallized in the 1980s around an innovative group of French academics. In The**Gift Paradigm, Alain Caillé provides the first in-depth, English-language introduction to La Revue ...

A small-town embalmer's daughter lifts the shroud on the fascinating minutiae of dealing with the dead.Imagine rubbing shoulders with the dead for most of your life. As she picks the brain of her father for the most gruesome and thought-provoking secrets of his embalming career - from the drowned boy whose organs were eaten by eels to how to inject just the right amount of colour into a corpse's skin for that blushing look - the narrator must look her parents' deat...

A portion of the proceeds from the book will go to the Oral Lee Brown Foundation. To learn more about the Oral Lee Brown Foundation please visit www.oralleebrownfoundation.com.In the bestselling tradition of The Pact and The Freedom Writers Diary*—the inspiring story of one woman’s extraordinary promise and steely determination to make a difference in the world.*One morning in 1987 Oral Lee Brown walked into a corner store in East Oakland, California, to b...

The true story of a remarkable young woman's struggle to find a home in the worldCaille Millner is a rising star on the literary scene. A graduate of Harvard University, she was first published at age sixteen and was recently named one of *Columbia Journalism Review'*s Ten Young Writers on the Rise. The Golden Road is Millner's clear-eyed and transfixing memoir. From her childhood in a Latino neighborhood in San Jose, California, and coming of age in a mor...

This book examines the future of the social sciences and the reconstruction of society in contemporary times. Drawing on the lead piece For a New Classic Sociology, it calls for a new theoretical synthesis that overcomes the fragmentation, specialization and professionalization within the social sciences. The position paper and the responses by a team of world-class social theorists provide an alternative to utilitarianism and the colonization of the social sciences by rational ch...

A Family for RonnieSuddenly orphaned, little Ronnie faced two startled guardians. His aunt, Alicia Brant, wanted to mother the boy. And his rugged bachelor uncle, Luke Garrick, was proving a natural-born dad. Unfortunately, Alicia and Luke had something else in common. A past….One long-ago summer, lone-wolf Luke had nearly made shy, virginal Alicia his mate. But she'd been afraid to trust his unspoken love, his secretive intensity. Ten years apart hadn't ease...

Trapped alone in a tower in a land filled with magic, a young girl struggles to survive and to defy her captors. For as long as anyone can remember, the traditions of her kingdom require that one peasant girl be chosen every generation to become the future bride of the king's heir. This time, Little Leeta is chosen and, as is custom, is bricked into a tower for years to await rescue by the king's son when they are both old enough to marry. She is left enough food to keep her alive, a myste...