Byzantium: Beyond the Cliché PDF Download

Author: Howard Burton
Publisher: Open Agenda Publishing
ISBN: 1771700734
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 54

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Book Description
This book is based on an in-depth filmed conversation between Howard Burton and Maria Mavroudi, Professor of History at UC Berkeley. Maria Mavroudi specializes in the study of the Byzantine Empire and this wide-ranging conversation explores her extensive research on the Byzantine Empire and how it has repeatedly been undervalued by historians despite its having been a military and cultural powerhouse for more than a millennium. This carefully-edited book includes an introduction, Beyond the High-School Narrative, and questions for discussion at the end of each chapter: I. Becoming A Byzantinist - Inspiration and motivation II. Historical Background - Byzantine beginnings III. The High-School Narrative - History as a cultural mirror IV. Recovering Truth - A never-ending goal V. Building Knowledge - Standing on the shoulders of giants VI. Annotated Discoveries - Leo the Mathematician, for example VII. A Translational Discovery - From Arabic to Greek, surprisingly VIII. Arrows of Causality - Consequential greatness IX. Decline - A matter of opinion? X. Extracting Meaning - Interpreting human experiences XI. Ever-Moving Targets - Arab-Greek bilingualism and its implications About Ideas Roadshow Conversations Series: This book is part of an expanding series of 100+ Ideas Roadshow conversations, each one presenting a wealth of candid insights from a leading expert in a relaxed and informal setting to give non-specialists a uniquely accessible window into frontline research and scholarship that wouldn't otherwise be encountered through standard lectures and textbooks. For other books in this series visit our website (https://ideas-on-film.com/ideasroadshow/).

Author: George T. Calofonos
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317148150
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 256

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Book Description
Although the actual dreaming experience of the Byzantines lies beyond our reach, the remarkable number of dream narratives in the surviving sources of the period attests to the cardinal function of dreams as vehicles of meaning, and thus affords modern scholars access to the wider cultural fabric of symbolic representations of the Byzantine world. Whether recounting real or invented dreams, the narratives serve various purposes, such as political and religious agendas, personal aspirations or simply an author’s display of literary skill. It is only in recent years that Byzantine dreaming has attracted scholarly attention, and important publications have suggested the way in which Byzantines reshaped ancient interpretative models and applied new perceptions to the functions of dreams. This book - the first collection of studies on Byzantine dreams to be published - aims to demonstrate further the importance of closely examining dreams in Byzantium in their wider historical and cultural, as well as narrative, context. Linked by this common thread, the essays offer insights into the function of dreams in hagiography, historiography, rhetoric, epistolography, and romance. They explore gender and erotic aspects of dreams; they examine cross-cultural facets of dreaming, provide new readings, and contextualize specific cases; they also look at the Greco-Roman background and Islamic influences of Byzantine dreams and their Christianization. The volume provides a broad variety of perspectives, including those of psychoanalysis and anthropology.

Author: Howard Burton
Publisher: Open Agenda Publishing
ISBN: 1771701552
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 40

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Book Description
This book is based on an in-depth filmed conversation between Howard Burton and Eleanor Nesbitt who is Professor Emeritus of Education Studies at University of Warwick and a poet. Eleanor Nesbitt is an expert on Hindu and Sikh culture and her interdisciplinary approach straddles religious studies, educational theory, ethnography and poetry. After inspiring insights about the time Eleanor Nesbitt spent in India and her academic path, this wide-ranging conversation provides a detailed exploration of the Sikh tradition: the history, religious tenets, other people’s misconceptions about it and more. This carefully-edited book includes an introduction, Isn’ts, and questions for discussion at the end of each chapter: I. Looking To Connect - Eleanor explores the world II. Historical Overview - The first ten gurus and the Guru Granth Sahib III. Identity - Turbans, Five Ks and evolving perspectives IV. Towards Deeper Understanding - On all sides About Ideas Roadshow Conversations: This book is part of an expanding series of 100+ Ideas Roadshow conversations, each one presenting a wealth of candid insights from a leading expert through a focused yet informal setting to give non-specialists a uniquely accessible window into frontline research and scholarship that wouldn't otherwise be encountered through standard lectures and textbooks.

Author: Howard Burton
Publisher: Open Agenda Publishing
ISBN: 1771700564
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 45

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Book Description
This book is based on an in-depth filmed conversation between Howard Burton and Nile Green who holds the Ibn Khaldn Endowed Chair in World History at UCLA. Nile Green is an expert on Islamic history and religion in the world. He has traveled extensively in India, Turkey, Pakistan, China, Myanmar, Iran, Egypt, Yemen, Syria, Morocco and many more countries, to get a deep sense of the reality of situations on the ground. The basis of this wide-ranging conversation is Nile Green’s book Terrains of Exchange which is not only an account of how the Christian missionary movement affected the development of Islam in the 19th and 20th centuries, but also offers a bold new paradigm for understanding the expansion of Islam in the modern world through the model of religious economy. This carefully-edited book includes an introduction, The Economic Enabler, and questions for discussion at the end of each chapter: I. Origins - How teenage travel can change your life II. Sufism - Beyond the stereotype III. The Model of Religious Economy - A use for economics, finally IV. Global History - A new way of looking at historical process V. Terrains of Exchange - Motivations and responses VI. Modern Implications - Lessons from history? VII. Ever Onwards - Much to do About Ideas Roadshow Conversations: This book is part of an expanding series of 100+ Ideas Roadshow conversations, each one presenting a wealth of candid insights from a leading expert through a focused yet informal setting to give non-specialists a uniquely accessible window into frontline research and scholarship that wouldn't otherwise be encountered through standard lectures and textbooks.

Author: Howard Burton
Publisher: Open Agenda Publishing
ISBN: 1771700793
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 49

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Book Description
This book is based on an in-depth filmed conversation between Howard Burton and Josiah Ober, Tsakopoulos-Kounalakis Professor in Honor of Constantine Mitsotakis Professor of Political Science and Classics at Stanford University. This extensive conversation includes topics such as the serendipitous factors that led him to study the classical world, the insights that examining rhetoric provide about ancient Athenian society, and how social media might help us fruitfully recreate aspects of the past. Through an engaging dialogue format Josiah Ober discusses his insights that the ancient Athenians didn’t just happen to stumble upon the idea of democracy—they somehow managed to make it work in practice for the better part of 200 years, all the while facing many of the same divisive societal pressures that we are currently grappling with. This carefully-edited book includes an introduction, Back to the Future, and questions for discussion at the end of each chapter: I. Cutting One’s Wisdom Teeth - How a girlfriend’s dental work leads to Thucydides II. Digging Deeper - Contrasting wars and lurking contradictions III. Battling Iron Laws - Athenian democracy as a counterexample IV. Feet to the Fire? - Using new and old media to keep politicians on point V. Why Athens? - Addressing elite capture and economic and political equality VI. Dissent - Critiquing our system or our values VII. Enter Aristotle - The perils of being a cat in a box VIII. Increasing Eudaimonia - Improving democracy IX. Dignity - An essential ingredient of a flourishing democracy X. Keeping It Real - Engaging the general public with scholarly insights About Ideas Roadshow Conversations Series: This book is part of an expanding series of 100+ Ideas Roadshow conversations, each one presenting a wealth of candid insights from a leading expert, generated through a focused yet informal setting to give non-specialists a uniquely accessible window into frontline research and scholarship that wouldn't otherwise be encountered through standard lectures and textbooks.

Author: Howard Burton
Publisher: Open Agenda Publishing
ISBN: 1771701048
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 211

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Book Description
Conversations About Language & Culture includes the following 5 carefully-edited Ideas Roadshow Conversations featuring leading researchers. This collection includes a detailed preface highlighting the connections between the different books. Each book is broken into chapters with a detailed introduction and questions for discussion at the end of each chapter: 1.Babbling Barbarians: How Translators Keep Us Civilized - A Conversation with David Bellos, translator and professor in French literature at Princeton University. This wide-ranging conversation examines many fascinating features of language and translation, including the value of a translation as opposed to the original work, translating humour, the Bergman Effect and more. 2. China, Culturally Speaking - A conversation with Michael Berry, Professor of Contemporary Chinese Cultural Studies at UCLA and a world-renowned Chinese literary translator and film scholar. After discussing the inspiring influence his English teacher had on him, the conversation covers a wide range of topics such as the appeal of literary translation, modern and contemporary Chinese literature, the history and development of Chinese cinema, popular culture in modern China, censorship, and the importance of staying true to one’s values. 3. The Value of Voice - A Conversation with Nick Couldry, Professor of Media, Communications and Social Theory in the Department of Media and Communications at the London School of Economics. This wide-ranging conversation explores how the media can be used as a filter to examine power structures, political movements, economic interests, democracy and our evolving notion of culture, the importance of voice and the challenge posed by media institutions that order the social, political, cultural, economic, and ethical dimensions of our lives. 4. Perspectives on Mass Communication - A Conversation with Denis McQuail (1935-2017), who was Emeritus Professor at the University of Amsterdam and Visiting Professor at the University of Southampton. He is widely considered to be one of the most influential scholars in the history of mass communication studies.This wide-ranging conversation provides detailed insights into how examining the media, and in particular mass media, necessarily involves a careful, probing look at our societal values; the concepts, metrics and ideas that McQuail developed to measure the sociological influence of the media; the critical role of journalism in society and more. 5. Sign Language Linguistics is based on an in-depth filmed conversation between Howard Burton and renowned researcher of sign languages Carol Padden, the Sanford I. Berman Chair in Language and Human Communication at UC San Diego. This extensive conversation covers many topics related to sign language, such as growing up with ASL, Carol’s early work with Bill Stokoe, the linguistic complexity, structure and properties of ASL and other sign languages, the development of new sign languages throughout the world, the role of gesture and embodiment, and much more. Howard Burton is the founder and host of all Ideas Roadshow Conversations and was the Founding Executive Director of Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics. He holds a PhD in theoretical physics and an MA in philosophy.

Author: Howard Burton
Publisher: Open Agenda Publishing
ISBN: 1771701587
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 187

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Book Description
Conversations About History, Volume 3, includes the following 5 carefully-edited Ideas Roadshow Conversations featuring leading historians. This collection includes a detailed preface highlighting the connections between the different books. Each book is broken into chapters with a detailed introduction and questions for discussion at the end of each chapter: 1.Eating One’s Own: Examining Civil War - A Conversation with intellectual historian David Armitage, the Lloyd C. Blanfein Professor of History at Harvard University. This conversation covers David Armitage’s extensive research on the history of ideas of civil war from Ancient Rome to the present. A salient feature of his work is a strong focus on etymology as it relates to our understanding of how people interpreted (or misinterpreted) and perceived events in history which results in a fascinating exploration of how our understanding of various concepts has been prejudiced by past societies and past beliefs that we might not even be aware of, and how they, in turn, go on to influence other societies; and how this cumulative process frames our understanding of these ideas. 2. China: Up Close and Personal - A Conversation with Karl Gerth, Hwei-Chih and Julia Hsiu Chair in Chinese Studies and Professor of History at UC San Diego. This wide-ranging conversation covers the emerging American-style consumer culture of China which is revolutionizing the lives of hundreds of millions of Chinese, how it has transformed its economy and lifestyle and has the potential to reshape the world. 3. Sheathing the Bodkin: Combating Suicide - A Conversation with poet, author and historian Jennifer Michael Hecht. After intriguing details about how she combines writing poetry, doing scholarly history and public writing, this wide-ranging conversation movingly embellishes upon Jennifer Michael Hecht’s book, Stay: A History of Suicide and the Philosophies Against It, which is an intellectual and cultural history of the most persuasive arguments against suicide from the Stoics and the Bible to Dante, Shakespeare, Wittgenstein, and such twentieth-century writers as Albert Camus. 4. For the Love of History - A Conversation with Margaret MacMillan, Professor of History at the University of Toronto and emeritus Professor of International History and the former warden of St Antony’s College at the University of Oxford. This wide-ranging conversation examines her research on patriotism and nationalism, which are essential themes of her lifelong work on 19th and 20th history. 5. The Epicurean Republic - A Conversation with award-winning author and independent scholar Matthew Stewart. In his later years, Thomas Jefferson referred to “the revolutionary part of the [American] Revolution”, which for him meant the founding ideals that would serve as a model for the world on how to build a modern state, as opposed to an incidental squabble between one country and its former colonists. This wide-ranging conversation explores how many of these ideals that Jefferson referred to are part of an intellectual thread that passes through key Enlightenment thinkers such as Spinoza and can be traced all the way back to Epicurus. Howard Burton is the founder and host of all Ideas Roadshow Conversations and was the Founding Executive Director of Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics. He holds a PhD in theoretical physics and an MA in philosophy.

Author: Howard Burton
Publisher: Open Agenda Publishing
ISBN: 1771701463
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 34

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Book Description
This book is based on an in-depth filmed conversation between Howard Burton and Margaret MacMillan, Professor of History at the University of Toronto and emeritus Professor of International History and the former warden of St Antony’s College at the University of Oxford. This wide-ranging conversation examines her research on patriotism and nationalism, which are essential themes of her lifelong work on 19th and 20th history. This carefully-edited book includes an introduction, Perpetual Revisionism, and questions for discussion at the end of each chapter: I. The Historical Enterprise - Investigating the subtleties II. Historical Value - Reevaluating the present and connecting with the past III. Pride and Prejudice - Patriotism vs. nationalism IV. Professional Insights - An insider’s view V. Living Historically - Following your passion About Ideas Roadshow Conversations: This book is part of an expanding series of 100+ Ideas Roadshow conversations, each one presenting a wealth of candid insights from a leading expert through a focused yet informal setting to give non-specialists a uniquely accessible window into frontline research and scholarship that wouldn't otherwise be encountered through standard lectures and textbooks.

Author: Howard Burton
Publisher: Open Agenda Publishing
ISBN: 1771701560
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 202

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Book Description
Conversations About History, Volume 2, includes the following 5 carefully-edited Ideas Roadshow Conversations featuring leading historians. This collection includes a detailed preface highlighting the connections between the different books. Each book is broken into chapters with a detailed introduction and questions for discussion at the end of each chapter: 1.Constitutional Investigations - A Conversation with Linda Colley, the Shelby M.C. Davis 1958 Professor of History at Princeton University. Linda Colley is a leading expert on British, imperial and global history since 1700. After inspiring insights about Linda Colley’s teachers and professors who had a strong impact on her future career as a historian, this wide-ranging conversation provides a detailed examination of the global history and present state of constitutions and their impact. 2. The Passionate Historian - A Conversation with John Elliott, Professor of Modern History at University of Oxford. This extensive conversation provides behind-the-scenes insights into how an undergraduate encounter with a 17th-century painting of The Count-Duke Olivares led John Elliott on a lifelong odyssey to study the history of Spain, Europe and the Americas in the early modern period to become one of the greatest Spanish historians of our age. 3. The Derveni Papyrus - A Conversation with Richard Janko, Gerald F. Else Distinguished University Professor of Classical Studies at the University of Michigan. This comprehensive conversation covers Richard Janko’s research on the Derveni Papyrus, Europe’s oldest surviving manuscript from the 4th century BCE and the most important text relating to early Greek literature, science, religion and philosophy to have come to light since the Renaissance. 4. Byzantium: Beyond the Cliché - A Conversation between Howard Burton and Maria Mavroudi, Professor of History at UC Berkeley. Maria Mavroudi specializes in the study of the Byzantine Empire and this wide-ranging conversation explores her extensive research on the Byzantine Empire and how it has repeatedly been undervalued by historians despite its having been a military and cultural powerhouse for more than a millennium. 5. Apocalypse Then: The First Crusade - A Conversation with Jay Rubenstein, Professor of History and Director of the Center for the Premodern World at the University of Southern California. This thought-provoking book provides us with fascinating expert insights into medieval society and how the First Crusade happened: What could have suddenly caused tens of thousands of knights, commoners and even nuns at the end of the 11th century to leave their normal lives behind and trek thousands of miles across hostile territory in an unprecedented vicious and bloody quest to wrest Jerusalem from its occupying powers? Howard Burton is the founder and host of all Ideas Roadshow Conversations and was the Founding Executive Director of Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics. He holds a PhD in theoretical physics and an MA in philosophy.

Author: Howard Burton
Publisher: Open Agenda Publishing
ISBN: 1771701242
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 210

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Book Description
Conversations About The History Of Ideas include the following five carefully-edited Ideas Roadshow Conversations featuring leading intellectual historians with a detailed preface highlighting the connections between the different books: I. The Two Cultures, Revisited - A conversation with Stefan Collini, Professor Emeritus of Intellectual History and English Literature at the University of Cambridge. The 'Two Cultures' debate of the 1960s between C.P. Snow and F.R. Leavis is one of the most misunderstood intellectual disputes of the 20th century. Most people think that the debate only revolved around the notion that our society is characterized by a divide between two cultures – the arts or humanities on one hand, and the sciences on the other. This book is based on an extended conversation between Howard Burton and University of Cambridge intellectual historian Stefan Collini— and author of the book, What Are Universities For?— which provides a careful examination and illuminating insights of what the issues really were in this debate. II. Deconstructing Genius - A conversation with Darrin McMahon, the Mary Brinsmead Wheelock Professor of History at Dartmouth College. This book is based on an in-depth conversation with intellectual historian Darrin McMahon, Dartmouth College. The word “genius” evokes great figures like Einstein, Leonardo Da Vinci, and Mozart but what quintessential quality unites these individuals? Can we measure it? Can we create it? This thoughtful conversation explores Darrin’s research on the evolution of genius from Plato to Einstein (which led him to write the book Divine Fury: A History of Genius) in an effort to illuminate what our evolving genius mythology reveals about the rest of us. III. Turning the Mirror: A View From The East - A conversation with Pankaj Mishra. This book is based on an in-depth conversation with award-winning writer Pankaj Mishra.They discuss several of Mishra’s books, including From the Ruins of Empire: The Intellectuals Who Remade Asia and An End To Suffering: The Buddha In The World, and his motivations behind them. IV. Pants On Fire: On Lying In Politics - A conversation with Martin Jay, the Sidney Hellman Ehrman Professor of History Emeritus at UC Berkeley. This book is based on an in-depth conversation with intellectual historian Martin Jay, UC Berkeley. A thought-provoking book in dialogue format examining Martin Jay’s extensive research on lying in politics from Plato and St. Augustine to Hannah Arendt and Leo Strauss which culminated in his book The Virtues of Mendacity. V. Quest For Freedom - A conversation with Quentin Skinner, Barber Beaumont Professor Emeritus of the Humanities at Queen Mary University of London. This book is based on an in-depth conversation with intellectual historian Quentin Skinner, Barber Beaumont Professor Emeritus of the Humanities at Queen Mary University of London. Quentin Skinner is considered to be one of the founders of the Cambridge School of the history of political thought. This thoughtful, detailed conversation examines how Quentin Skinner came to appreciate the importance of the distinction between the modern view of freedom and the so-called neo-Roman view, together with what it implies for our current and future political understanding. Howard Burton is the creator and host of Ideas Roadshow and was the Founding Executive Director of Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics.