Books about culture

This work abandons the conventional distinctions between history and science. Diamond focuses on what ancient people were endowed with in the way of land, animals and plants, and on the confrontations between less and more advanced people to see how this led to today's inequalities.

Explores the links between Hollywood and the fast food trade, and the tactics used to target ever younger consumers. This book reveals the full price of our appetite for instant gratification.

The biography of an idea: that many of the problems we face - from teenage delinquency to traffic jams - behave like epidemics and are capable of sudden and dramatic change due to their inherent volatility. The author explores the ramifications of this, offering a way to view the world.

Asking questions about human motivation and living and reaching some conclusions, this book aims to be at the heart of things we see and do and the subjects that bedevil us: from parenting to crime, sport to politics, fat to cheating, fear to traffic jams.

Talks about the mysterious collapse of past civilizations - and what this means for the future. Bringing together evidence from many sources and piecing together the myriad influences, from climate to culture, that make societies self-destruct, this book shows how unlike our ancestors we can benefit from our knowledge of the past.

This study examines the power of the logo, noting its increasing capacity for making the product subservient. It then reaches its core argument - the now uneasy struggle between corporate power and anti-corporate activism - via sweatshop labour, submerged identity and subversive action.

Defines our understanding of colonialism and empire.

The war raged across the galaxy. Billions had died, billions more were doomed. Within the cosmic conflict, there was an individual crusade: deep within a fabled labyrinth lay a fugitive Mind. Both the Culture and the Idirans sought it.

Putting forward an alternative to the endless complaints about reality TV, throwaway movies and violent video games, this book shows that mass culture is actually more sophisticated and challenging than ever before.

A tale that tells the story of a geisha girl, uncovering a hidden world of eroticism and enchantment, exploitation and degradation. From a small fishing village in 1929, the tale moves to the heart of Kyoto in the 1930s, where a peasant girl is sold as servant and apprentice to a geisha house. She tells her story many years later from New York.

Bored with success, Gurgeh - The Player of Games - travels to the Empire of Azad, cruel and incredibly wealthy, to try their fabulous game. This is a game so complex, so like life itself, that the winner becomes emperor.

Intuition is not some magical property that arises unbidden from the depths of our mind. This book shows us how we can hone our instinctive ability to know in an instant, helping us to bring out the best in our thinking and become better decision-makers in our homes, offices and in everyday life.

The inspirational tale of eight women who defied the confines of life in revolutionary Iran through the joy and power of literature.

Cheradenine is an ex- special circumstance agent who had been raised to eminence by a woman named Diziet. Skaffen-Amtskaw, the drone, had saved her life and it believes Cheradenine to be a burnt-out case. But not even its machine intelligence can see the horrors in his past.

Understanding Media: the most important book ever written on communication. Ignore its message at your peril.