This  List is updated every time I finish a book be it Audiobooks which are in Italics and normally from Librivox or conventional paper copy.
1.Book 1 Study is Hard Work Armstrong
2.Book 2 Gang Leader for a Day
3.Book 3 Jeffrey Deaver The Broken Window
4.Book 4 Snyder and Mitchell Cultural Locations of Disability
5.Book 5 Some said it thundered David Pytches
6.Book 6 Bertrand Russell The Problems of Philosophy
7.Book 7 Milan Kundera An Unbearable Lightness of Being
8.Book 8 Clare Boylan The Agony and the Ego
9.Book 9 Charles Taylor Sources of the Self the making of modern identity
10.Book 10 Naomi Klein The Shock Doctrine
11.Book 11 Doris Lessing The Golden Notebook
12.Book 12  Friedrich Nietzsche Beyond Good and Evil
13.Book 13 Sue Monk Kidd The Secret Life of Bees
14.Book 14  Machiavelli The Prince
15.Book 15 Jade Goody Forever in my heart Official Cancer Diaries
16.Book 16 Alexander mc call smith The No 1 Ladies Detective Agency
17.Book 17 Homer The Illiad
18.Book 18 David Hume An Enquiry into human understanding
19. J S Mill Utilitarianism

20.  Alexander Mc Call Smith ‘Tears of a Girraffe’

21. George Stock ‘Stoicism’

22. Martin Lewis Three things about Money

23. Homer The Odyssey

24.Euthyphro Plato

25. Milton The Aeropagita

26 Martha Nussbaum Upheavals of Thought: the Intelligence of the Emotions 766 pages

27  Jonathan Glover ‘Causing Deaths and Saving Lives’

28  Steven Lukes ‘Moral Relativism’

29  Tom Shakespeare ‘Disability Rights and Wrongs’

30 Sophie Kinsella ‘ The Undomesticated Goddess’

31. Naomi Klein ‘No Logo’

32. Louis Althusser ‘On Ideology’

33. George Bernard Shaw ‘Pygmalion’

34. John Carey ‘Pure Pleasure’

35. John Jacques Rousseau ‘The Discourse on Ineqaulity’

36 Nietzsche The Joyful Science

37 Plato The Ion

38 Harriet Beacher Stowe ‘Uncle Toms Cabin’

This is my first ever test of listening to a Philosopher’s Work in Audiobook (MP3) Format.
Over a week or two I have taken a Section at a time working my way through about 10 hours of’ Reading’.
During this time I was not able to take in my Latest attempt at Tome Reading; the full 766 pages of Martha Nussbaum’s ‘Upheaval of Emotions the Intelligence of the Emotions’ which title wise would suggest a very female text.
So to contrast the rather calm but authentic tones of Nussbaum I have subjected myself to the angry embittered stunningly insightful in parts (the bits I did get that is) of one Friedrich Nietzsche .
This is just a brief review just to post up the fact that now I am on Book No 12 hallelujah! now that is one book a month. Lets get through next layer to make it 24 books a year so far-aided and abetted shamelessly due to their difficult content-Philosophers tomes in audiobook format.

This is Book 11 this Year making Martha Nussbaum ‘Upheaval of Emotions The Intelligence of the Emotions’ is Book 12 a work in progress.

I noticed this book in Tesco and decided to buy it as the Storyline looked interesting and pertinent and she also won the Nobel Prize for Literature making this the first Nobel Winner I have ever read.

This book  like the Taylor weighed in at a spectacular 576 pages. Taylor 601 pages and the Cultural Locations of Disability another tome a more modest 245 pages.

Now to the story line. Meet Anna Wulf a single divorced mum who has an number of unending bad sexaul relationships and to add to her woes suffers from Writers Block. That along with Film offers from Directors who wish to change the plot means her Notebooks Red for Political life (how appropriate!) a Black Notebook for Writing Life (given the parlous state of her writing life this colour does not surprise me and is, I think a reflection of her moods); Yellow Notebook her emotional life where she wishes to see the sunshine but doesn’t having lost Paul the beloved Psychiatrist who ends up in foreign climes away from his wife in a notional separation. Blue Notebook for everyday events this would stand for the sky Blue Sky = Day so we have some logic coming on here.

Finally and unexpectedly we get the Lover who mistreats her but who unlocks the Book resulting from the scribblings in the Golden Notebook. This book ends up selling solving the problem but we are still ended up with the bleakness that is characteristic over every aspect of her notebooked life.

Criticisms are unending bleakness.Philosophical bleakness? in the name of what I heard is ‘realism’ no bright lights only constant sadness. There are no light moments.

Surely in the most miserable fo lives there are light moments.

To conclude all in all a well written book from a Writer who definitely shows that portraying life is a skill to be learned in both philosophy and writing (but with it’s lighter moments)

342 words

This is a shocking account of Shock Therapy which tells how Milton Friedman. Chicago School Economists one size fits all Policies . Resulted in gross inequalities and poverty for many Nations round the World.

She shows us how . Shock Therapy Regimes are imposed to circumvent grassroots resistance which is an eye opener into pervasive corporatism which is deliberately seeking to avoid Governance and the Government ; and in effect run their own Mini-States within a weakened dis-empowered State.

(US Military Provision using Private Companies which famous Politicans such as Donald Rumsfeld benefited from financially). This has implications for Democracy and the Democratic Process. Dahl a famous Democracy Theorist at the University of Chicago says quite plainly that the Capitalist System is best served by Democracy. Naomi Kleins courageous honest well researched and thorough analysis is yet another example of what good research is. Her intellectual honesty is refreshing too.

The books begins with the disturbing accounts of Psychic Driving as done by Dr Ewen Cameron whose methods were later utilised as Torture methods. You see the poor woman whose life has been ruined by psychic driving, without any legal recompense or compensation. Others of course have suffered a similar fate. Then she develops her account of how the Chicago School of Free Market Economists have used Shock Therapy to force Free Market Ideologies WHICH THEY KNOW WILL BE DEMOCRATICALLY OPPOSED to an unwilling populace with devastating consequences. As a result the word ‘controversial’ is the only word that can be applied to this book hence every human being in the world should attempt to grab a copy.

Klein rightly defends the Market but within a socially just framework which the Shock Doctors of Chicago have not done.

All in all this is a balanced and truly controversial account which ought to be sky high in Bestseller lists all over the world.

335 words

.

.

Posted in 2000 Book Reading Programme, 2009 Reading List Novels and Academic, 50 Book Reading List 2009 Tagged: 2000 Book Programme, academic fluency, academic inspiration ]]> http://katesjc6189.wordpress.com/2009/07/04/book-10-naomi-klein-the-shock-doctrine-or-watch-a-new-phenomenon-at-work/feed/ 0 katesjc6189 http://katesjc6189.wordpress.com/2009/07/04/book-9-charles-taylor-sources-of-the-self-the-making-of-modern-identity-a-six-month-read-into-my-first-adventures-into-selves/ http://katesjc6189.wordpress.com/2009/07/04/book-9-charles-taylor-sources-of-the-self-the-making-of-modern-identity-a-six-month-read-into-my-first-adventures-into-selves/#comments Fri, 03 Jul 2009 19:33:59 +0000 katesjc6189 http://katesjc6189.wordpress.com/?p=957 ]]>

This book is the start of me formally attempting to reply to the Research Draft Proposal Draft with something pertaining to a sensible answer without of course having the elementary qualifications those in Academia are blessed to have Charles Taylor is part of two Philosophers I am reading that attempt to go beyond the ISMS and Ideologies as fundamental explanations. (As I stand I think both sides need listening too ). This is to discover the subtleties and nauced explanations and theories and range of explanations that give a deeper picture than just the ISM’s and Continental Philosophy which have influenced Literature and the Arts so much. These voices deserve to be heard and one must remain open. Just like Chritchley defends the right of Continental Philosophers to be heard alongside Analytic Philosophers. So I am defending my right to read both sides and see value in opposing sides. This book took me SIX MONTHS to read but by persevering even when I may have lost hold of the Books Plot. Taylor I discover does NOT like Marxism. But he employs a wide ranges of Philosophers to account for the Philosopher-leading accounts of PHILOSOPHERS and their respective theories and ideologies as accounting for the types of person in Society. This is I think very Philosopher Kings of Plato. Taylor does not think philosophical insights should come from the populace but rather the experts which must make him a Platonist. However in additon to this I have seen Taylor quoted as an Hegelian Nietzschean which means I have had to plough thorough ‘Beyond Good and Evil’ on Librivox (not finished yet) and look into Hegel. I have downloaded his History of Philosophy just to get a taste of a man I believe to espouse transcendental modes of philosophy. The extra work means audiobooks are coming into their own and more scans if you like are in order just to get a flavour or try too, of where he is coming from. So this is my take: I think he is an Orthodox Platonist (?) ( I am ignorant of Philosophy per se but read Philosphy books which means I am learning loads), who favours the Experts Philosopher Kings of the Academy as central connoters of identities on the ground. This is shown in the analysis of various Philosopher viewpoints: the Humean Self, The Punctual Self of Locke, the Homeric Self, The Self of Rational Reason (Plato highly influential). IN THEORY his rationale could be extended to any and every Philosopher under the sun-including Marx to generate a database of ’selves’. This could be a useful instrument to both Philosphers and preferably people at the bottom who end up niavely taking on these ’selves’.. An interesting well written clear book with a couple of niggle points which I believe has greater challenges in terms of inspiring agenda setting ideas in terms of the philosophy of the various selves around the world. 537 words

William H Armstrongs book which I found via Librarything is a Study Skills Guide in the most traditonal educational sense, the kind of education you see in Public Schools rather than State run Classrooms, and it is definitely School Masterish but don’t let that put you off

William H Armstrong is a a devil for the detail. He advises Students to tackle things in depth and in a  a detailed Subject attending way. Attention to detail he maintains will speed you up in the long run. This means this is a book for the Keenies the educational hardocore the devoted School Pupil or Undergradaute. He  dismisses no Subject, all Subjects are important to him and he is unashamedly traditionalist. He speaks eloquently of his Subjects . One must do Subjects because one has to, not because one is interested, if interest were the only criteria then he surmises we would get nothing done if interest were our only guidepoint.

The Author is a a Disciplinarian who loves his Studies who teaches us to love our studies. In each Chapter before you read it there are five questions gauging interest (or not) in a Subject, followed by at end a Five Question review of the Chapter to see how well you have been paying attention.

Reading Reading Reading is the baseline of all study and naturally he advocates a love of the book as essential to the task. He would be horrified at some of the things happening in the Education system at the moment. Such as Students who find it difficult to read set books, or the decline in the public Library. The decline of Maths and Science in Schools would give him kittens.

I must confess I thought this is a book to take one chapter at a time but ended up rushing it a bit because references to Assignments are plainly irrelevant to me. I struggled with his no nonsense old fashioned tone but gradually came to terms with it.

A  first class book from someone who knows how to study.

342 words

Yippee! I have done 3,086 very rambling throughout the day words editing posts on Blog which go back to it’s inception in the original Amateur Social Science Bookworm blog which was transferred to WordPress.

Intellectual input today: at least 3 Book Salons Stanford:Alice Rayner Phenomonology of theatre (interesting), Adam Johnson, and Tales of Ovid by Hughes (two academics supporting one another on podcast nice to see as lauding is habit de rigeur).

Current listen is David E Ebrey on Ancient Philosophy who is showing me just what this whole Philosphy deal is all about.

I notice he gives few readings but expects Students to learn to learn how to philosophize and learn how to engage with the texts which he adds wisely is not an easy exercise. He tries to open their eyes up to the fact that a 2 page paper done overnight is not quite the way forward but that one needs to engage thoroughly with the texts which has to be ‘very close and detailed’ look at texts (paraphrase).

A week on pages given but bit more is wiser.

Multiple choice sounds like Thou shalt know thy authors in fact just as academics do sic.

Chap hasn’t settled on rest of Readings (this would get me worried as I would be frantically ordering from Amazon). Go back from class and read what you have been reading after class. First read is practically worthless, read, and re-read and re-re read.

Reading on the other hand Kate style might be good because at least I can give broadbrush book reviews.

So to conclude: ought I to slow down Philosophy and other topic reads but throw in plenty of ego boosting booster texts e.g Novels etc that don’t require close and careful attention and SLOW down on Philosophy Now Forums and Magazine once I re-subsubscribe keeping a weather eye on the Amateurs published within the magazine and topics thereof.

316 words + 3,086 = 3,402 words grand total

I KNOW ALL ABOUT ACADEMIC WOUNDING……..

Greyfriars lady killing look. Maths teacher male who touched me up depriving me of much needed extra encouragement in maths. Family background in education and our family is renowned for our love of education especially the University the found of all love and affection. Evidence by massive libraries, adverse environments, took years of academic life. Relevant for all folks in ALL academic situations and circumstances.

129 words

From resourced School (Teachers TV) to ill resourced and marginalised and mainly distanced Adult Education.

From mainstream to the margins

From discourses to (remainder hidden for would be PhD reasons, I have to think PhD Subject etc even without proper things and knowledge aqquisition going on because ideas have been nicked, stolen, robbed by xxxx)

126 word Excerpt

Just think I book at a time. I am reading Ehenriech Nickeled and Dimed at the moment (Exploring Self in Society) and have 150pp to finish of ‘Fields of Reading’ As its the Summer hols I might ease up a bit and just feed brain every now and then

2000 Book Library what does 2000 books look like in practice? How does one actually work through numbers? What Strategy does one use in order to realise this?. What should one’s strategy be re different Subject areas how deeply does one read, assuming one can access 1) books 2) resources that come from books look at so and so and joe bloggs on x y z and joe bloggette on the x of the abc and and so on.. What in short should be one’s pedagogy?

If one is on a limited income should decisions be based FIRST on available resources ie what is Library at one particular time and one’s working through it? Is Wish Listing on Amazon and inspirations from Library Thing a good thing because you get some mighty clues as to where to go, or is it bad (too many inspirations, too little money).

Should one seek to answer specific questions? or float about more generally?

Maybe I need to make a slideshow of 2000 Book Libraries of academic books for inspiration?

316 words

LATER EDIT Friday Jan 2nd 2009 3:30pm

MIT OCW Theme: Exploring Self and Society which I saw as the most advantageous start off point to launch myself into some informal work based on provisions on MIT OCW site www.ocw.edu for more information.

Self and Society is the most relevant for my purposes since Society impacts Self and Self impacts Society whether positive or negative. (Bowie now on Youtube Playlist, was Beatles, previously Police and Sting Playlist).My questions are ‘How does Society impact you now with Credit Crunch?, various ISMS, statistical odds and probabilities, employment rates for disabled/mental illness. What kinds of things REALLY need to happen however improbable in order to survive’

This guy explains it like no other. A must for all writers not just those of Short Stories. Aim Atlantic Monthly or in UK Terms Professional Writer (and Academic by the way) the British Qaulity Press and Journals. This book is read alongside ‘Fields of Reading Motives for Writing Conley et al’ important point. It is also an American import of critical importance for us Brits usingthe stellar MIT OCW website by mining its’ riches.

How Tom Bailey helps the would be Writer in us all [academic, novelist too using MIT OCW Student).

First he shows us the various components of Story making from Character Construction to point of view to Voice. Then he illustrates it by some very good short stories, then I believe he takes us through Exercises designed to help us get the point.

As a Writer he is 10/10. Book Teaching Score 10/10.

Short Review

Word Count 201 word count

He takes us through the various means of Character construction, point of view etc (terms I have to get to learn having carved my writing foolishly on Nanowrimo).  The book as American has American authors. There must be an UK equivalent but as yet I have not found it.

LATER EDIT Friday 2nd Jan 2008 3:42pm

A