In 2003, Methodists celebrated the 300th anniversary of the birth of their founder, John Wesley. Today, there are more than 300 Methodist denominations in 140 nations. Covering the activities of this group that plays an important role in the ecumenical movement through its many social and charitable activities in world affairs, this book offers more than 400 entries that describe important events, doctrines, and the church founders, leaders, and other prominent figures who have made notabl...

As an aspiring or seasoned writer, do you feel like you aren't making headway, stumbling on what to write next, or wondering if you're even on the right path? Are you unable to find the motivation to charge up your computer and put your fingers on the keyboard after that last rejection?Between the pages of What I Wish I'd Known: For Writers, 100 highly accomplished authors share their time, energy, and knowledge to pay it forward and inspire other writers, experienced or a...

The study of lived religion is an enterprise which attempts to elucidate how "ordinary" men and women in all times and places draw on religious behavior, media, and meanings to make sense of themselves and their world. Through the influence of liberation theology and postmodernism, pastoral theologians-like other scholars of religion-have begun more closely to examine the particularity of religious practice that is reflected through the rubric of lived religion.Pastoral Bearing...

Have you ever noticed how the word ambulance is written backwards on the front of the emergency vehicle? The reason is so that when you sit in your car and look behind you in your mirror you can read it and know that help and hope is on the way for some one who is hurting or in need of help. In life sometimes as we sit and look behind us we can see many things unfold that have happened. As Barbara Ann sat and thought about the events that have happened in her life she realized how many thi...

The Spring 2024 Issue. Ploughshares is an award-winning journal of new writing. Since 1971, Ploughshares has discovered and cultivated the freshest voices in contemporary American literature, and now provides readers with thoughtful and entertaining literature in a variety of formats. Find out why the New York Times named Ploughshares “the Triton among minnows.”The Spring 2024 Issue, guest-edited by Laila Lalami, features poetry and prose by Mosab Abu Toha, Nathalie Handal, January...

Visual Encounters in the Study of Rural Childhoods brings together visual studies and childhood studies to explore images of childhood in the study of rurality and rural life. The volume highlights how the voices of children themselves remain central to investigations of rural childhoods. Contributions look at representations and experiences of rural childhoods from both the Global North and Global South (including U.S., Canada, Haiti, India, Sweden, Slovenia, South Africa, Russia...

Imagine an America where politicians, governmental institutions, schools, new technologies, and interest groups work together to promote informed, engaged citizens. Civic Education in the Twenty-First Century brings together scholars from various disciplines to show how such a United States is possible today. Inspired by Alexis de Tocqueville’s analysis of American democracy in the early 1800s, this edited volume represents a multidimensional evaluation of civic education in its new and va...

Financial infrastructures are the lifeblood of political economies and are consistently considered critical by governments. They encapsulate socio-technical processes; not merely cables and computer servers, but the relationship of those in finance to these and other physical objects. The Cambridge Global Handbook of Financial Infrastructure consolidates the study of financial infrastructures by bridging political economy, humanities, sociology and science and technology studies. It delves...

Rich in history, color, and imagination, a remarkable novel that pairs the seductive lost world of a creative legend with the coming of age of a young girl guided by an artistry all her ownIn Barbara Quick’s luminous novel, eighteenth-century Venice comes to life in all its splendor and decadence. The Grand Inquisitor’s spies lurk everywhere, and yet the city’s inhabitants abandon themselves to the revelry and masques of Carnival for half the year. This is the worl...

Is anything more terrifying than a dragon? Bat-winged nightmares swooping down from the sky to breathe fire and ice on the wretched humans below, kidnapping princesses, hoarding treasure, swallowing cows.Or not.In DRAGONESQUE, the latest fantastic anthology from Zombies Need Brains, you finally get to experience all that awfulness from the dragon’s point of view. And what if it isn’t necessarily that awful? What if the princess wants to be kidnapped, or the dragon is tired ...

In 1950, China claimed sovereignty over Tibet, leading to decades of unrest and resistance, defining the country today. In Eat the Buddha, Barbara Demick chronicles the Tibetan tragedy from Ngaba, a defiant town on the eastern edge of the Tibetan plateau where dozens of Tibetans have shocked the world since 2009 by immolating themselves. Following the stories of the last princess of the region, of Tibetans who experienced the struggle sessions of Mao's Cultural Revolution, of the recent ge...

Death is not the end but the beginning of something wonderful. Dr. Barbara Baron-Campbell, who has spent almost twenty years working with the dying as a spiritual care coordinator and bereavement coordinator in hospice, knows that quite well. She has been a part of numerous supernatural events that prove that death is not the end. She highlights her experiences with patients she has served as a chaplain in this eye-opening book, illustrating their experiences during the dying process. Her ...