BASIC_BOOK

David Weiner ACC social science

Selected Book List: seminal works, classics, and gems

Short List

Rudolfo Acuna. Occupied America: A History of Chicanos -- how some U.S. citizens are denied the "democracy" enjoyed by other citizens.

Hannah Arendt. The Origins of Totalitarianism -- how nationalism, imperialism, totalitarianism and anti-semitism are historically related; how Hitler and Stalin could arise and prevail..

W.E.B. Dubois. The Negroe -- the richness of African history and culture missing from high school and many college texts.

Jared Diamond. Guns, Germs and Steel -- asks why Europeans were able to conquer the world.

William Domhoff. The Higher Circles -- a constantly updated report on who runs things and how in the U.S.

Viktor Frankl. Man's Search for Meaning -- what being human really means.

Erich Fromm. Escape From Freedom -- man's fear of genuine independence in a society that encourages passivity, constitutes a sobering challenge to cultural survival

John Kenneth Galbraith. The Essential Galbraith -- how the system really works versus how we are told it works.

Malcolm Gladwell. The Tipping Point – how a combination of key individuals and the right social context can create major social change.

William Greider. Who Will Tell the People -- the recent history of the rise of corporations as individuals.

Erick Hobsbawm. The Age of Extremes:1914-1991 -- the soaring success of Western capitalism and its sudden decline

Walter LaFeber. Inevitable Revolutions: The United States in Central America -- the U.S. has not been a good neighbor in its own hemisphere.

James Loewen. Lies My Teacher Told Me -- how high school history courses distort and disguise rather than reveal and examine America's past.

Charles C. Mann. 1491 – New evidence revealing the size and remarkable sophistication of Western Hemisphere societies before European diseases wiped them out.

Gunnar Myrdal. An American Dilemma – this comprehensive study found post-slavery African American culture surprisingly adaptive, its members fully capable of joining the US melting pot; if allowed to..

Anthony Nutting. The Arabs -- Islamic culture and politics from 3500 BC to the mid-20th century.

Elaine Pagels. The Gnostic Gospels -- how ideology and politics interacted in defining Christianity.

Stephen Pinker. The Blank Slate – though probably over-stating the influence of genes on personality, he shows how culture enables us to adapt and survive and how the ultimate selfishness is altruism.

David Roediger. Working Toward Whiteness: how America’s immigrants became white – documents the crucial role that racial and ethnic differentiation have played in defining U.S. culture and politics.

Joseph Stiglitz. Globalization and its Discontents – a detailed description of how the IMF undermines rather than facilitates Third World economic modernization.

James Surowiecki. The Wisdom of Crowds – When we operate independently and our knowledge can be aggregated, self-actualized groups of humans seem to possess great wisdom

C. Wright Mills. The Power Elite -- a slightly dated but still seminal analysis of who runs things and how.

Merlin Stone. When God Was a Woman – presents evidence that that male dominated religion, and its ideologies, was not always the norm.

Max Weber. The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism -- how U.S. capitalism was molded by Calvinism.

Stephen Weinberg. Dreams of a Final Theory -- a nobelist tells us how physics really works

James Weinstein. The Corporate Ideal in the Liberal State: 1900-1918 – how Teddy Roosevelt and the corporate Progressives coopted labor and took U.S. capitalism away from small business

William Julius Wilson. When Work Disappears: the world of the new urban poor – how family stability and the social fabric in general are damaged when men lack work, across all cultures and ethnicities

Howard Zinn. A People's History of the United States -- America viewed as an oligarchical work in progress.

Science and Social Science.

Rudolfo Acuna. Sometimes There Is No Other Side -- how powerful interests shape social science.

J.D. Bernal. The History of Science -- detailed, objective, and sometimes irreverent.

J.D. Bernal. The History of Science -- look up sociology in the index: sociology was "invented" to reinforce power, not generate real knowledge.

Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann. The Social Construction of Reality -- the proper study of society includes what people subjectively perceive it to be.

Catherine Besteman and Hugh Gusterson, eds., Why America's Top Pundits Are Wrong – Anthropologists expose how reactionary ideology poses as social science

Stuart Chase. The Proper Study of Mankind -- how sociology is used by the military and others.

Kimberly Crenshaw et. al. (eds.). Critical Race Theory -- analyses heretofore rejected by social science concerning how race operates in the U.S.

Emile Durkheim. Suicide -- one of the three early works which defined sociological methodology.

Emile Durkheim. The Division of Labor in Society -- one of the three early works which defined sociolgical methodology.

Joe Feagan and Hernan Vera -- Liberation Sociology -- what crucial issues mainstream sociology ignores but which require systematic analysis.

John Kenneth Galbraith. The Essential Galbraith -- how orthodox economic theory (and social science) distorts U.S. culture, and other issues.

Daniel Goleman. Social Intelligence – how our brain’s design allows us to evolve emotionally and intellectually both individually and culturally

Daniel Greenberg. The Politics of Pure Science -- how politics can infect science (and by implication, sociology.

Robert Heilbroner. The Worldly Philsophers -- short biographies of the classical economists.

Arthur Koestler. The Sleepwalkers -- asks whether mankind progress by plan or by accident.

Leszek Kolakowski. The Alienation of Reason: a history of positivist thought -- how logical positivism degrades democratic, enlightened society.

Thomas Kuhn. The Structure of Scientific Revolutions -- how scholarly knowledge can be affected by politics.

Leon Lederman. The God Particle -- a nobelist describes the birth and development of modern science.

Karl Mannheim. Ideology and Utopia -- the need for social science to ensure that knowledge free of political or cultural constraint is possible.

Floyd Matson. The Broken Image -- social science versus scientism; knowledge production versus service to power.

Robert Merton. Social Theory and Social Structure -- why sociology must strive to be scientific, and how this can be accomplished.

C. Wright Mills. Power, Politics and People -- studies both rigorous and meaningful.

C. Wright Mills. The Sociological Imagination -- the need for a social science neither "scientist" nor eager to serve powerful interests.

Ernest Nagel. The Structure of Science -- social science cannot be systematic in quite the way that natural science is, but can approach this goal.

Heinz Pagels. The Cosmic Code -- quantum theory made understandable.

Bernard Philips. Sociology’s Tower of Babel – an effort to define sociology as a web of fundamental concepts needing integration, emphasizing intuitive as well as quantitative methods.

Karl Popper. The Open Society and its Enemies -- how logical positivism enhances democractic, enlightened society.

Irving Stone. The Origin. -- how Charles Darwin radicalized science.

James Watson. The Double Helix. -- the fascinating story of how the structure of DNA was finally unravelled.

Max Weber. The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism -- one of the three early works which defined sociological methodology.

Stephen Weinberg. Dreams of a Final Theory -- a nobelist tells us how physics really works.

Anthropology and Ethology

Milton Allimadi The Hearts of Darkness: how white writers created the racist image of Africa -- including the NY Times and other journals up to the present day

Ruth Benedict. Patterns of Culture -- the misapplication of the concept "primitive" to early cultures.

Catherine Besteman and Hugh Gusterson, eds., Why America's Top Pundits Are Wrong – Anthropologists expose how reactionary ideology poses as social science

J.M. Blaut. The Colonizer's Model of the World -- exposure of studies verifying the diffusion of superior European culture as phony research.

Anita Diamant. The Red Tent – Women played a much stronger role in early Semitic cultures than many Western history texts indicate.

Jared Diamond. Guns, Germs and Steel -- asks why Europeans were able to conquer the world.

Riane Eisler. The Chalice and the Blade – presents evidence suggesting that domination based cultures are no more characteristic of homo sapiens than partnership cultures

Weston La Barre. The Human Animal -- an in depth analysis of human nature.

Malcolm Gladwell. Blink – how our remarkable analytical powers compete with prejudice and conditioning to determine what we “know”

Conrad Lorenz. On Aggression -- when animals aggress, and when they do not; possible lessons for humans.

Charles C. Mann. 1491 – New evidence revealing the size and remarkable sophistication of Western Hemisphere societies before European diseases wiped them out.

Ashley, Montague. Man and Aggression --a critique of aggression theory applied to humans.

Elaine Morgan. The Descent of Woman -- an answer to aggression theory's assumptions concerning human nature.

Peter J. Richerson and Robert Boyd. Not by Genes Alone: how culture transformed human evolution – the primary mechanism of human adaptation is not genes, but culture

Merlin Stone. When God Was a Woman – presents evidence that that male dominated religion, and its ideologies, was not always the norm.

James Surowiecki. The Wisdom of Crowds – When we operate independently and our knowledge can be aggregated, self-actualized groups of humans seem to possess great wisdom

Nicholas Wade. Before the Dawn -- a 2006 overview of the biological and anthropological evidence concerning the history and human-nature of our species

Norbert Wiener. The Human Use of Human Beings: cybernetics and society -- man as an amazing machine.

Edward O. Wilson. Sociobiology -- a comprehensive survey of research on the social behavior of animals.

Culture

Milton Allimadi The Hearts of Darkness: how white writers created the racist image of Africa -- including the NY Times and other journals up to the present day.

Bob Altemeyer. The Authoritarian Specter – how right wing authoritarians view things and influence U.S. culture and politics today

Rudolfo Anaya. Bless me Ultima -- (fiction) describes the richness of humble Mexican American family life.

Stanley Aronowitz. The Dealth and Rebirth of American Radicalism -- reviews and critiques U.S. politics since the '50s, and advocates for a new approach to participative democracy.

Sholem Asch. The Apostle --(fiction) Paul, and the birth of Christianity.

Sholem Asch. The Nazarene --(fiction) Jesus as social activist.

Joe Bageant. Deer Hunting With Jesus: dispatches from America’s class war – how 21^st century white people find themselves becoming poorer and more powerless

Derrick Bell. Faces at the Bottom of the Well -- the depressing permanence of racism in U.S. society

Derrick Bell. Silent Covenants: Brown v. Board of Education and the unfulfilled hopes for racial reform -- the stability of white supremacy in the United States

Mary F. Belenky et. al, Women's Ways of Knowing -- culture need not be molded by the unhealthy practice of reducing issues to one dimensional debate.

Ruth Benedict. Patterns of Culture -- the richness of Native American tribal culture.

Catherine Besteman and Hugh Gusterson, eds., Why America's Top Pundits Are Wrong – how reactionaries posing as social scientists denigrate non-Western cultures.

J.M. Blaut. The Colonizer's Model of the World -- exposure of studies verifying the diffusion of superior European culture as phony research.

Peter Blau. Exchange and Power in Social Life -- how politics operates in everyday life.

Lewis Browne. This Believing World. -- overview of the worlds major religions.

Norman Cohen. The Pursuit of the Millennium -- religion as grand delusion.

Anita Diamant. The Red Tent – Women played a much stronger role in early Semitic cultures than many Western history texts indicate.

Jared Diamond. Guns, Germs and Steel -- asks why Europeans were able to conquer the world.

W.E.B. Dubois. The Negroe -- the richness of African history and culture missing from high school and many college texts.

W.E.B. Dubois. The Philadelphia Negroe -- one of the great in depth analyses of an American sub-culture.

W.E.B. Dubois. The Soul of Black Folks – calls upon African Americans to acknowledge their cultural strengths and on both whites and blacks to acknowledge the full measure of black oppression.

Emile Durkheim. The Division of Labor in Society -- classic, detailed analysis of how technology changed culture at the dawn of the modern era.

Emile Durkheim. The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life -- classic study of the origins of religion in primitive tribal cultures.

Troy Duster, et. Al. White Washing Race – The most comprehensive description to date of how U.S. racism operates in the 21st century, with huge economic effects.

Riane Eislerr. The Chalice and the Blade – presents evidence suggesting that domination based cultures are no more characteristic of homo sapiens than partnership cultures

Ralph Ellison. Invisible Man -- (fiction) what it means to be black in America.

Susan Faludi. Stiffed: The Betrayal of the American Man -- explores how definitions of masculinity contribute to the unhealth of society, and men in particular.

Thomas Frank. What's the Matter With Kansas? -- how twenty first century grassroots conservatism is poised to create a United States resembling Saudi Arabia.

Betty Friedan. The Feminine Mystique --critiques and attacks cultural mores defining women's appropriate role in society

Mark Gerzon. A Choice of Heroes: the changing face of American Manhood -- from aggression to compassion, and why its so hard.

Malcolm Gladwell. The Tipping Point – describes how ideas floating in the culture can suddenly congeal into a social movement, and tries to identify the conditions necessary for this to occurs.

Barry Glassner. The Culture of Fear -- how media stimulate us to fear minor threats, and ignore important ones

Daniel Goldhagen. Hitler's Willing Executioners -- anti-semitism was imbedded in pre-war German culture.

Daniel Goleman. Social Intelligence – how our brain’s design allows us to evolve emotionally and intellectually both individually and culturally

Erick Hobsbawm, The Age of Revolutions -- how the modern West emerged, and with what consequences

Barbara Kingsolver. The Poisonwood Bible -- (fiction) Congolese village culture and deep south U.S. fundamentalist culture dramatically juxtaposed.

Naomi Klein, No Logo -- how corporations have hijacked culture and manipulated the public

Bernard Lefkowitz, – Our Guys – describes the pathology of normal society through an incident demonstrating how middle class Christian boys were essentially raised to rape.

Lawrence Lipton. The Unholy Barbarians --who the beatniks were.

Robert Love (ed.) -- The Best of Rolling Stone -- pop culture in the US from the mid-sixties through the eighties.

Charles C. Mann. 1491 – New evidence revealing the size and remarkable sophistication of Western Hemisphere societies before European diseases wiped them out.

Robert S. and Helen Lynd. Middletown -- classic 1929 in-depth study of small town U.S. culture.

Greil Marcus. Lipstick Traces -- European based counter-culture: Sex Pistols, Situationist International, etc.

Kate Millett. Sexual Politics – in depth analysis of the patriarchal nature of our society, and its implications.

Michael M. Mooney. The Ministry of Culture: connections among art, money and politics – how Government is used to coopt popular culture and render it harmless.

Carlos Munoz. Youth, Identify, Power: the Chicano movement --how students re-defined Mexican-Americans' struggle for identity and power during the 1960s.

Hal Niedzviecki, Hello I'm Special: how individuality became the new conformity -- describes the rise of corporatized pop culture, and the new forms that alienation is taking in 2000+..

Anthony Nutting. The Arabs -- Islamic culture and politics from 3500 BC to the mid-20th century.

Elaine Pagels. The Gnostic Gospels -- how ideology and politics interacted in defining Christianity.

Kevin Phillips. The Cousins' Wars -- U.S. culture and politics as expressions of religious identifications.

James Ridgeway. Blood in the Face -- cultures of hatred: the KKK and other right wing groups.

David Riesman. The Lonely Crowd -- how U.S. culture creates personal disconnectedness.

Matthew Rothschild. You Have No Rights: stories of America in an age of repression – a polemic on how U.S. democracy has been undermined since 9/11/2001.

Theodore Rozak. The Making of a Counter Culture -- radical movements of the '60s.

Salman Rushdie. The Moors Last Sigh -- (fiction) the amazing complexity of Indian cultural history.

Edward Said., Orientalism – how Western culture mystifies and denigrates those it dominates.

Earl Shorris. Latinos: A Biography of the People --contrasts Anglo stereotypes of Latino culture(s) with the realities, providing a rich, insightful tapestry

Leslie Silko. Gardens in the Dunes -- (fiction) the richness of Native American tribal culture.

Randy Shils. And The Band Played On -- (fiction) AIDS research reflects homophobia not compassion as gays and lesbians continue to be stigmatized in the modern USA.

Ahdaf Soueif. The Map of Love -- contrasts Egyptians 19th century eagerness to modernize with Britain's eagerness to suppress this drive; a very different view of Islam than media present.

Merlin Stone. When God Was a Woman – presents evidence that that male dominated religion, and its ideologies, was not always the norm.

James Surowiecki. The Wisdom of Crowds – When we operate independently and our knowledge can be aggregated, self-actualized groups of humans seem to possess great wisdom

Deborah Tannen, The Argument Culture -- how the reification of one dimensional debate diminishes rationality in our culture.

Angela Valenzuela. Subtractive Schooling: U.S.- Mexican Youth and the Politics of Caring -- how Hispanic Culture is denigrated in U.S. schools.

Victor Villasenor. Rain of Gold -- the author discovers his cultural roots, and traces them into the present.

Nicholas Wade. Before the Dawn -- a 2006 overview of the biological and anthropological evidence concerning the history and human-nature of our species

Benjamin Whorff. Language, Thought and Reality -- how language affects personality.

William F. Whyte. Street Corner Society -- a participant-observer reveals the sub-culture of lower class Italian-Americans.

William Julius Wilson. When Work Disappears: the world of the new urban poor – how family strability and the social fabric in general are damaged when men lack work, across all cultures and ethnicities

Social Psychology

Theodore Adorno. The Authoritarian Personality -- why many people prefer to be followers.

Gordon Allport. The Nature of Prejudice -- the psychological roots of prejudice.

Bob Altemeyer. The Authoritarian Specter – how right wing authoritarians view things and influence U.S. culture and politics today

Hannah Arendt. Eichmann in Jerusalem -- explores the psychology of Holocaust victimizers and victims.

Virginia Axline. Dibs in Search of Self -- deprivation of love can make a child sick.

Simon Bar Cohen. The Essential Difference – how hormones and genes interact to affect male and female brains somewhat differently.

Mary F. Belenky et. Al. Women's Ways of Knowing -- rigid objectivity and dialectical debate would seem to be socially unhealthy "knowing" devices.

John Bowlby. Attachment and Loss – human infants are motivated and equipped to learn, through a complex interactive process called attachment, how to become social beings

Emile Durkheim. Suicide -- classic study relating social change to psychological malaise.

Riane Eisler. The Chalice and the Blade – presents evidence suggesting that domination based cultures are no more characteristic of homo sapiens than partnership cultures

Susan Faludi. Stiffed: The Betrayal of the American Man -- explores how definitions of masculinity contribute to the unhealth of society, and men in particular.

Franz Fanon. The Wretched of the Earth -- the psychology of colonialist oppression.

Peter Fonagy. Affect Regulation, Mentalization and the Development of Self – extends John Bowlby’s analysis arguing that attachment theory predicts our life-long ability to improve at self regulation

Viktor Frankl. Man's Search for Meaning -- what being human really means.

Paulo Freire. pedagogy of the oppressed -- a methodology for overcoming self-negation..

Sigmund Freud. Jokes and the Unconscious -- why do humans laugh?

Erich Fromm. Escape From Freedom -- man's fear of genuine independence in a society that encourages passivity, constitutes a sobering challenge to cultural survival

Erich Fromm. To Have or to Be? -- the means to self-actualization in an ill society.

Erich Fromm. Man Against Himself -- the psychology of cultures of hatred.

Erich Fromm. The Art of Loving -- the full implications of what to love implies.

Mark Gerzon. A Choice of Heroes: the changing face of American Manhood -- from aggression to compassion, and why its so hard.

Malcolm Gladwell. Blink – how our remarkable analytical powers compete with prejudice and conditioning to determine what we “know”

Malcolm Gladwell. The Tipping Point – how a combination of key individuals and the right social context can create major social change

Barry Glassner. The Culture of Fear -- how media stimulate us to fear minor threats, and ignore important ones

Erving Goffman. The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life -- how we convey who we feel we are.

Erving Goffman. Stigma -- detailed look at how stigmitization affects people.

Daniel Goleman. Social Intelligence – how our brain’s design allows us to evolve emotionally and intellectually both individually and culturally

William Grier and Price Cobbs. Black Rage -- the psychological consequences of racial abuse.

Naomi Klein, No Logo -- how corporations have hijacked culture and manipulated the public

Melvin Kohn. Work and Personality – A structuralist (essentially Marxian) framed analysis of how the work people do molds their personalities, which then effect their work.

Melvin Kohn. Class and Conformity – the analysis above applied to understanding why social classes differ in value and attitudes.

Bernard Lefkowitz, – Our Guys – describes the pathology of normal society through an incident demonstrating how middle class Christian boys were essentially raised to rape.

Herbert Marcuse. Eros and Civilization -- human nature is not what is destructive.

Kate Millett. Sexual Politics – in depth analysis of the patriarchal nature of our society, and its implications.

Vance Packard. The Hidden Persuaders -- how corporations manipulate us psychologically.

Jean Piaget. --The origins of intelligence in children -- what children can and cannot perceive.

Alan Schore. Affect Regulation and the Origin of the Self: the neurobiology of emotional development – empirical evidence supports attachment theory’s premise that we are all hard-wired for socialization.

James Surowiecki. The Wisdom of Crowds – When we operate independently and our knowledge can be aggregated, self-actualized groups of humans seem to possess great wisdom

Nicholas Wade. Before the Dawn -- a 2006 overview of the biological and anthropological evidence concerning the history and human-nature of our species

Benjamin Whorff. Language, Thought and Reality -- how language affects personality.

J.J. Winnicott. The Child, the Family, and the Outside World -- how children become human.

Global History and Politics

Milton Allimadi The Hearts of Darkness: how white writers created the racist image of Africa -- including the NY Times and other journals up to the present day.

Stanley Aronowitz and Heather Gautney (eds). Implicating Empire: Globalization and Resistance in the 21st century world order-- describes and critiques anarchism etc. new movements.

Hannah Arendt. The Origins of Totalitarianism -- how nationalism, imperialism, totalitarianism and anti-semitism are historically related; how Hitler and Stalin could arise and prevail..

Catherine Besteman and Hugh Gusterson, eds., Why America's Top Pundits Are Wrong – how reactionaries posing as social scientists distort the histories of non-Western cultures.

Geoffrey Bibby. Four Thousand Years Ago -- the very beginnings of the modern age.

William Cleveland. A History of the Modern Middle East -- a rich and illuminating description of two centuries of profound change.

Jared Diamond, Guns, Germs and Steel -- the European conquest of the world had nothing to do with racial or cultural superiority.

Anita Diamant. The Red Tent – Women played a much stronger role in early Semitic cultures than many Western history texts indicate.

W.E.B. Dubois. The Negroe -- the richness of African history and culture missing from high school and many college texts.

Noam Chomsky. Hegemony or Survival: America's quest for global dominance -- and how this now places the US at great risk.

Riane Eisler. The Chalice and the Blade – presents evidence suggesting that domination based cultures are no more characteristic of homo sapiens than partnership cultures

Amos Elon. Founders and Sons -- the creation of Israel.

Thomas Friedman. From Beirut to Jersusalem -- how politics operates in the Middle East; the remarkable survival of the Palestinians.

Al Gore. Earth in the Balance -- why environmental policy must change dramatically.

Erick Hobsbawm, The Age of Revolutions: 1789-1848 -- how the modern West emerged, and with what consequences.

Erick Hobsbawm. The Age of Capital: 1848-1875 -- how capitalism transformed the world.

Erick Hobsbawm. The Age of Empire, 1875-1914 -- the transition from nation states to empires.

Erick Hobsbawm. The Age of Extremes:1914-1991 -- the soaring success of Western capitalism and its sudden decline

Herbert Hunter and S. Abraham (eds) Race,Class, and The World System -- the Sociology of Oliver Cox -- how capitalism emerged out of feudalism.

Pierre Jalee. The Pillage of the Third World -- the economics of imperialism: how the West drains the Third World and gives little in return.

Barbara Kingsolver. The Poisonwood Bible -- (fiction) how the West responded to the Congo's quest for Independence.

Arthur Koestler. Darkness at Noon -- (fiction) communism versus capitalism as ideologies.

Richard Labeviere. Dollars for Terror: The United States and Islam -- How the CIA's "great game" in the Arabic world may have gotten out of control.

Owen Lattimore. The Situation in Asia -- Asia entered the modern era in their own way, not ours.

David McLellan. Marxism after Marx -- including Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin, Lucaks, Gramsci, Mao, Che, Castro, the Frankfurt School and more.

Charles C. Mann. 1491 – New evidence revealing the size and remarkable sophistication of Western Hemisphere societies before European diseases wiped them out.

Martin Meredith. The Fate of Africa – A detailed and tragic description of Africa in the 20th and 21st centuries. In spite of conservative bias, provides valuable details.

E.J. Mishan. The Costs of Economic Growth -- the possibly catastrophic downside of unplanned development.

Anthony Nutting. The Arabs -- Islamic culture and politics from 3500 BC to the mid-20th century.

Elaine Pagels. The Gnostic Gospels -- how ideology and politics interacted in defining Christianity.

John Perkins. Confessions of an Economic Hit Man – how third world countries are manipulated into massive indebtedness by the IMF and other agencies.

John Ross. The War Against Oblivion: The Zapatista Chronicles -- journal of a people's battle for existence.

Jules Roy. The Battle of Dien Bien Phu -- how the Veit Cong overcame the French occupation.

Edward Said, Orientalism – how Western culture mystifies and denigrates those it dominates.

Leslie Silko. The Almanac of the Dead -- a new kind of revolution being born in Mexico.

Leslie Sklair. Sociology of the Global System – an overview and critique of efforts to understand how Trans-National-Capitalism operates in the world today.

Edgar Snow. Red Star Over China -- the story of a revolution.

Ahdaf Soueif. The Map of Love -- contrasts Egyptians 19th century eagerness to modernize with Britain's eagerness to suppress this drive; a very different view of Islam than media present.

Joseph Stiglitz. Globalization and its Discontents – a detailed description of how the IMF undermines rather than facilitates Third World economic modernization

Barbara Tuchman. A Distant Mirror -- the end of feudalism and the rise of the bourgeoisie in Europe.

Laurens Van der Post. Cry the Beloved Country -- the struggle in South Africa.

U.S. History and Politics

Rudolfo Acuna. Occupied America: A History of Chicanos -- how some U.S. citizens are denied the "democracy" enjoyed by other citizens.

Rudolfo Acuna. Sometimes There Is No Other Side -- how powerful interests shape social science.

Jerome Armstrong and Markos Moulitsas Zuniga. Crashing the Gates: netroots, grassroots, and the rise of people-powered politics. How a new breed of young activists may transform U.S. politics.

Stanley Aronowitz. The Dealth and Rebirth of American Radicalism -- reviews and critiques U.S. politics since the '50s, and advocates for a new approach to participative democracy.

Stanley Aronowitz and Heather Gautney (eds). Implicating Empire: Globalization and Resistance in the 21st century world order-- describes and critiques anarchism etc. new movements.

Donald Bartlett and James Steele. America: What Went Wrong? -- how corporations have changed things.

Vincent Bugliosi. The Betrayal of America -- how the supreme court chose the U.S. president in 2000.

Rachel Carson. Silent Spring -- a sobering example of corporate damage to the environment and the dominance of corporate power.

Robert Caro. The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York -- a Pulitzer Prize winning study of real politics in the U.S.

Noam Chomsky. American Power and the New Mandarins -- the role of intellectuals in maintaining a democratic facade for those in power.

Noam Chomsky. Hegemony or Survival: America's quest for global dominance -- and how this now places the US at great risk

Noam Chomsky. Manufacturing Consent -- (video) in the U.S. freedom of dissent exists, but only certain ideas are distributed.

Derrick Bell. Silent Covenants: Brown v. Board of Education and the unfulfilled hopes for racial reform -- the stability of white supremacy in the United States

William Domhoff. The Higher Circles -- a constantly updated report on who runs things and how in the U.S.

Troy Duster, et. Al. White Washing Race – The most comprehensive description to date of how U.S. racism operates in the 21st century, with huge economic effects.

Thomas Frank. What's the Matter With Kansas? -- how twenty first century grassroots conservatism is poised to create a United States resembling Saudi Arabia.

John Kenneth Galbraith. The Essential Galbraith -- the political role of economists in support of conservative policy.

John Kenneth Galbraith. The New Industrial State -- how US democracy limits individual power.

Lawrence Goodwyn. The Populist Moment -- how Populism briefly challenged the U.S. capitalist elite, and why the movement declined.

William Greider. Secrets of the Temple -- how powerful the Federal Reserve system is, and how invisible.

William Greider. Who Will Tell the People -- virtually every U.S. institution has changed as corporations have become the US's most powerful citizens.

Richard Hofstadter. Anti Intellectualism in American Life -- religion as politics; the relationship between religion and social class.

Richard Hofstadter. The Age of Reform -- populism and reform in America.

Richard Hofstadter. The American Political Tradition -- how capitalists learned to temper greed and "manage" democracy in the U.S.A

Herbert Hunter and S. Abraham (eds) Race,Class, and The World System -- the Sociology of Oliver Cox -- how racism and capitalism are related in the U.S.

Michael H. Hunt. Ideology and U.S. Foreign Policy -- how the assumptions of anglo supremacy and imperial right have shaped foreign policy.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson. The Disappearance of Black Leadership -- minority affluence versus political activism.

Richard Immerman. The CIA in Guatemala -- a former agent reveals how U.S. policy helped to destroy a modernizing indigenous movement for independence.

Chalmers Johnson. Blowback: The Costs and Consequences of American Empire -- How the U.S. has attempted, and failed, to control Asian politics.

Vickie Karp and Abbe Waldman Delozier. Hacked: High Tech Election Theft in America – a collection of essays describing how vote-theft works and documenting its pervasiveness in the 21^st century.

Gabriel Kolko. Wealth and Power in America -- who the power brokers are and how they operate.

Richard Labeviere. Dollars for Terror: The United States and Islam -- How the CIA manages foreign policy in the new millenium with little accountability.

Walter LaFeber. Inevitable Revolutions: The United States in Central America -- the U.S. has not been a good neighbor in its own hemisphere.

Owen Lattimore. Ordeal By Slander -- how a State Department scholar was brutalized by Sen. Joseph McCarthy; how McCarthy defined democracy.

Owen Lattimore. The Situation in Asia -- the inconsistency between U.S. foreign policy philosophy and global realities following WWII.

David Lindsey, Body of Truth -- (fiction) describes the U.S. supported regime's ruthless suppression of Indians in Guatemala.

James Loewen. Lies My Teacher Told Me -- how "the West" was really won, and other revelations; how history book lies discourage healthy dissent.

Ferdinand Lundberg. The Rich and the Super Rich -- asks who owns the wealth and has the influence.

James Madison and Alexander Hamilton. The Federalist Papers -- what democracy meant to the founders.

Norman Mailer. Armies of the Night -- description and analysis of the 1967 anti-Vietnam War march on Washington.

Floyd Matson. The Broken Image -- Sociology's role in blocking the analysis of issues threatening to "the establishment."

Robert McChesney. Rich Media, Poor Democracy: Communication Politics in Dubious times -- how powerful interests increasingly control media.

C. Wright Mills. Listen Yankee -- asks what kind of place Cuba really is.

C. Wright Mills. Power, Politics and People -- how we are manipulated by the powers that be.

C. Wright Mills. The Power Elite -- a slightly dated but still seminal analysis of who runs things and how.

Michael M. Mooney. The Ministry of Culture: connections among art, money and politics – how Government is used to coopt popular culture and render it harmless.

Carlos Munoz. Youth, Identify, Power: the Chicano movement --how students re-defined Mexican-Americans' struggle for identity and power during the 1960s.

Gunnar Myrdal. A Challenge to Affluence -- how the great welfare programs operated and who got the money.

Marion Nestle. Food Politics: how the food industry influences nutrition and health – a classic study in how corporations manipulate government to profitable if not healthy ends

David F. Noble. America By Design. -- how corporate culture evolves, adapts and controls.

Kevin Phillips. The Cousins' Wars -- how Protestant religio-political ideology framed U.S. democracy so as to exclude non-whites, and others.

Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber. Weapons of Mass Deception: the uses of propaganda in Bush's war on Iraq -- the policies and players of dis-information management.

Jacob Riis. How the Other Half Live --how the early immigrants struggled and coped in New York City.

Matthew Rothschild. You Have No Rights: stories of America in an age of repression – a polemic on how U.S. democracy has been undermined since 9/11/2001.

Assata Shakur. Assata: an autobiography -- a Black Panther's intimate view of radical activism versus authority in the USA.

Joseph Stiglitz. Globalization and its Discontents – a detailed description of how the IMF undermines rather than facilitates Third World economic modernization

I.F. Stone. The Haunted Fifties -- anti-communism as a mask for anti-intellectualism.

Hunter Thompson. Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail -- a presidential election, down and dirty.

Alexis de Tocqueville. Democracy in America -- a 19th century enlightened French aristocrat wonders how democratic the U.S. will be.

Victor Villasenor. Rain of Gold -- the author discovers his cultural roots, and traces them into the present.

Max Weber. The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism -- how U.S. capitalism was molded by Calvinism.

James Weinstein. The Corporate Ideal in the Liberal State: 1900-1918 – how Teddy Roosevelt and the corporate Progressives coopted labor and took U.S. capitalism away from small business

James Weinstein. The Long Detour: the History and Future of the American Left – describes how the U.S. Left began, faltered and still struggles to find solid footing.

William Appleman Williams. The Contours of American History -- how corporate capitalism emerged in the U.S.

Douglas Wixson. Worker Writers in America -- how the Midwestern intellectuals of the early 1900s attempted to raise the consciousness of the working class.

Howard Zinn. A People's History of the United States -- America viewed as an oligarchical work in progress.

Class in the U.S.

Joe Bageant. Deer Hunting With Jesus: dispatches from America’s class war – how 21^st century white people find themselves becoming poorer and more powerless

Derrick Bell. Silent Covenants: Brown v. Board of Education and the unfulfilled hopes for racial reform -- the stability of white supremacy in the United States

Jack Conroy. The Disinherited -- (fiction) the struggles and aspirations of working people during the early 20th century.

Barbara Ehrenreich, Nickeled and Dimed – what it’s like to be a poor white working woman in the late twentieth Century U.S.A.

Thomas Frank. What's the Matter With Kansas? -- how twenty first century grassroots conservatism is poised to create a United States resembling Saudi Arabia.

Herbert Gans. The War Against the Poor -- the exploitation of poor people in America.

Lawrence Goodwyn. The Populist Moment -- how Populism briefly challenged the U.S. capitalist elite, and why the movement declined.

Michael Harrington. The Other America -- what it means to be poor in America.

Richard Hofstadter. Anti Intellectualism in American Life -- religion as politics; the relationship between religion and social class.

Richard Hofstadter. The Age of Reform -- populism and reform in America.

Michael H. Hunt. Ideology and U.S. Foreign Policy -- how strongly influenced this has been by assumptions of anglo supremacy, and imperial right.

Carlos Munoz. Youth, Identify, Power: the Chicano movement --how students re-defined Mexican-Americans' struggle for identity and power during the 1960s.

James Ridgeway. Blood in the Face -- profiles of US right wing mainly poor white extremists.

Jacob Riis. How the Other Half Live -- how early, poor immigrants struggled and coped in NY city.

Lillian Rubin. Families on the fault line : America's working class speaks about the family, the economy, race, and ethnicity – describes on how White people struggle against barriers to social mobility they neither perceive nor understand.

David K. Shipler. The Working Poor – how low income working people in the 21^st Century USA are systematically victimized rather than aided by private interests

David T. Wellman. Portraits of White Racism -- some of the ways in which white people justify discrimination.

William J. Wilson. The Truly Disadvantaged : the inner city, the underclass, and public policy -- how deeply the impoverished of the United States suffer as they become less and less visible.7

Douglas Wixson. Worker Writers in America -- how working class intellectuals sought autonomy during the early 20th century.

Howard Zinn. A People's History of the United States -- America viewed as an oligarchical work in progress.

Race in the U.S.

Rudolfo Acuna. Occupied America: A History of Chicanos -- how some U.S. citizens are denied the "democracy" enjoyed by other citizens.

Rudolfo Acuna. Sometimes There Is No Other Side -- how the intellectual and academic contexts for racism have grown in subtlety and power in the U.S.

Milton Allimadi The Hearts of Darkness: how white writers created the racist image of Africa -- including the NY Times and other journals up to the present day

Gordon Allport. Prejudice -- the psychology of prejudice and discrimination.

James Baldwin. The Fire Next Time -- (fiction) understanding what racism is about and how to respond.

Derrick Bell. Faces at the Bottom of the Well -- the depressing permanence of racism in U.S. society

Derrick Bell. Silent Covenants: Brown v. Board of Education and the unfulfilled hopes for racial reform -- the stability of white supremacy in the United States

Kimberly Crenshaw et. al. (eds.). Critical Race Theory -- analyses heretofore rejected by social science concerning how race operates in the U.S.

Angela Davis. Angela Davis: An Autobiography -- seeing US class and race relations clearly.

John Dollard. Caste and Class in a Southern Town -- racial discrimination is part of the fabric of some communities.

W.E.B. Dubois. The Negroe -- the richness of African history and culture missing from high school and many college texts.

W.E.B. Dubois. The Soul of Black Folks – calls upon African Americans to acknowledge their cultural strengths and on both whites and blacks to acknowledge the full measure of black oppression.

Troy Duster, et. Al. White Washing Race – The most comprehensive description to date of how U.S. racism operates in the 21st century, with huge economic effects.

Ralph Ellison. The Invisible Man -- a young black man's search for identity.

Joe Fagin. White Racism -- how institutional discrimination works.

William Grier and Price Cobbs. Black Rage -- the psychological consequences of racial abuse.

Tara Hervel and Paul Wright (eds.). Prison Nation -- a 2003 study of the overrepresentation of African Americans in US prisons, the role and source of prison violence, etc..

Herbert Hunter and S. Abraham (eds) Race,Class, and The World System -- the Sociology of Oliver Cox -- how racism began and why it remains.

Michael H. Hunt. Ideology and U.S. Foreign Policy -- how the assumptions of anglo supremacy and imperial right have shaped foreign policy.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson. The Assassination of the Black Male Image -- racial warfare as pre-60s U.S. policy.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson. The Disappearance of Black Leadership -- the need to stay focused on inequality.

Jonathan Kozol. Death at an Early Age -- how US schools destroy minority students.

Jonathan Kozol. Savage Inequalities -- not all US schools are even remotely equal.

James Loewen. Lies My Teacher Told Me -- history as propaganda versus history as fact, particularly as regards U.S. race relations.

Carlos Munoz. Youth, Identify, Power: the Chicano movement --how students re-defined Mexican-Americans' struggle for identity and power during the 1960s.

Christian Parenti. Lockdown America: Police and Prisons in the Age of Crisis -- how prisons are designed as violent cages for citizens defined as expendable.

Kevin Phillips. The Cousins' Wars -- how Protestant religio-political ideology framed U.S. democracy so as to exclude non-whites, and others.

James Ridgeway. Blood in the Face -- profiles of white ethnocentric extremist organization in the U.S.

Randall Robinson. The Debt -- What it will take successfully to combat racism in the U.S.

Harriett Romo and Toni Falbo. Latino High School Graduation: Defying the Odds -- how school administration systematically denies education to some.

Assata Shakur. Assata: an autobiography -- a Black Panther's intimate view of radical activism versus authority in the USA.

Earl Shorris. Latinos: A Biography of the People --contrasts Anglo stereotypes of Latino culture(s) with the realities, providing a rich, insightful tapestry

Ronald Takaki. A Different Mirror -- how America was a melting pot for whites only.

Angela Valenzuela. Subtractive Schooling: U.S.- Mexican Youth and the Politics of Caring -- how Hispanic Culture is denigrated in U.S. schools.

Victor Villasenor. Rain of Gold -- the author discovers his cultural roots, and traces them into the present.

David T. Wellman. Portraits of White Racism -- some of the ways in which white people justify discrimination.

William J. Wilson. The Truly Disadvantaged : the inner city, the underclass, and public policy -- how deeply the impoverished of the United States suffer as they become less and less visible.

Cornel West. Race Matters -- A critique and criticism of the African American response to racism.

Cornel West. The Cornell West Reader -- how white supremacy operates as a fundamental ideological premise of Western culture.

C. Van Woodward. The Strange Career of Jim Crow – how newly freed slaves in the South were used by reconstructionists and repressed by Southerners.

Malcom X. The Autobiography of Malcolm X -- building an organized response to institutionalized inequality.

Sex and Gender

Margaret Atwood, The Handmade’s Tale – What a Christian Fundamentalist world might be like for women.

Simon Bar Cohen. The Essential Difference – how hormones and genes interact to affect male and female brains somewhat differently

Mary F. Belenky et. Al. Women's Ways of Knowing -- rigid objectivity and dialectical debate would seem to be socially unhealthy "knowing" devices.

Anita Diamant. The Red Tent – Women played a much stronger role in early Semitic cultures than many Western history texts indicate.

Angela Davis. Women, Race and Politics – argues that issues of gender and issues of social class conflict are not separate in our society.