A guide to the family Icteridae, known as blackbirds, troupials or New World Blackbirds. A diverse family, the Icterids range throughout the Americas, from Alaska to Cape Horn, and including the Caribbean. Despite the name blackbird, many of the 103 species covered in this book are very brightly coloured, and the group includes some of the most studied species in the world, Red-winged Blackbird and Brown-headed Cowbird for instance. This book depicts every species, showing races where relevant, and covering every aspect of the natural history and identification of the species treated. There...

Featuring concise, identification-focused text positioned opposite the colour plates to allow quick and easy reference, this guide also includes detailed distribution maps for every species of bird found in the spectacular and tourist-friendly country of Chile.

Published in a thoroughly revised second edition, Venice and Amsterdam is a comparative history of the elites of these two major cities in early modern Europe.

V jedné ze svých nejslavnějších prací se anglický historik Peter Burke pokouší představit lidovou kulturu raně novověké Evropy jako celek. Z hlediska zeměpisného zahrnuje celou Evropu, od Irska po Ural, od Norska po Sicílii, z hlediska časového tři století, od prvních tištěných letáků a kramářských tisků po Francouzskou revoluci. Detailním způsobem se v ní věnuje jak světu profesionálních zpěváků, bláznů, žonglérů, šarlatánů, potulných herců a vypravěčů, tak postavám jejich děl, jež se stávaly lidovými hrdiny, vysmívanými hlupáky i...

In this study Peter Burke distances himself from the traditional interpretation of the Renaissance as essentially Italian, self-consciously modern and easily separable from the Middle Ages. He emphasises the survival of medieval traditions and the process of the creative adaptation of classical forms and values to their new cultural and social contexts in Italy and elsewhere in Europe. The story is carried down to the seventeenth century and the diffusion and disintegration of what had once been a coherent movement. Illustrated with black and white plates, this edition has been updated...

This important book examines the role of written and spoken language in shaping our sense of reality, in exchanges of social life, and in fashioning our sense of self. It develops a distinctive, socio-historical approach to these issues, offering a range of illuminating studies in the social history of language.

The first section discusses the history of specially charged languages (Latin, Hebrew, and the speech-forms of the Quakers). The second section examines the politics of language, paying special attention to dialect and the relations between the language of conquerors and...

The way in which history is written has changed quite dramatically - so much so that the phrase the new history is now commonly used by historians. But what is the new history and how new is it? Is it a temporary fashion or a long-term trend? Will it - or should it - replace traditional history, or can the two coexist in peace? This second edition of New Perspectives on Historical Writing sets out to answer these questions, examining the most exciting and important developments in the methodology and practice of history. Concentrating on some of the more recent movements, it sets out to place...

* A new, fully updated edition of a now classic text. * The text has been completely revised to take into account developments of the past 14 years, since History and Social Theory was first published. * Topics which have been added and that are now treated in depth include globalization, postcolonialism and social capital.

The period in which we live is marked by increasingly frequent and intense cultural encounters of all kinds. However we react to it, the global trend towards mixing or hybridization is impossible to miss, from curry and chips - recently voted the favourite dish in Britain - to Thai saunas, Zen Judaism, Nigerian Kung Fu, "Bollywood" films or salsa or reggae music. Some people celebrate these phenomena, whilst others fear or condemn them. No wonder, then, that theorists such as Homi Bhabha, Stuart Hall, Paul Gilroy, and Ien Ang, have engaged with hybridity in their work and sought to untangle...

Peter Burke follows up his magisterial Social History of Knowledge, picking up where the first volume left off around 1750 at the publication of the French Encyclopedie and following the story through to Wikipedia. Like the previous volume, it offers a social history (or a retrospective sociology of knowledge) in the sense that it focuses not on individuals but on groups, institutions, collective practices and general trends.

The book is divided into 3 parts. The first argues that activities which appear to be timeless - gathering knowledge, analysing, disseminating and employing it...