Tag Archives: Non Fiction

In My Hands Today…

Posted on by
Reply

Four Points of the Compass: The Unexpected History of Direction – Jerry Brotton

North, south, east, and west: almost all societies use these four cardinal directions to orientate themselves and to understand who they are by projecting where they are. For millennia, these four directions have been foundational to our travel, navigation, and exploration, and are central to the imaginative, moral, and political geography of virtually every culture in the world. Yet they are far more subjective—and sometimes contradictory—than we might realize.

Four Points of the Compass takes us on a journey of directional discovery. Societies have understood and defined directions in very different ways based on their locations in time and space. Historian Jerry Brotton reveals why Hebrew culture privileges east; why Renaissance Europeans began drawing north at the top of their maps; why early Islam revered the south; why the Aztecs used five color-coded cardinal directions; and why no societies, primitive or modern, have ever orientated themselves westwards. In doing so, politically-loaded but widely used terms such as the “Middle East,” the “Global South,” the “West Indies,” the “Orient,” and even the “western world” take on new meanings. Who decided on these terms and what do they mean for geopolitics? How have directions like “east” and “west” taken on the status of cultural identities—or more accurately stereotypes?

Yet today, because of GPS capability, cardinal points are less relevant. Online, we place ourselves at the center of the map as little blue dots moving across geospatial apps; we have become the most important compass point, though in the process we’ve disconnected ourselves from the natural world. Imagining what future changes technology may impose, Jerry Brotton skillfully reminds us how crucial the four cardinal directions have been to everyone who has ever walked our planet.

In My Hands Today…

Posted on by
Reply

Girl on Girl: How Pop Culture Turned a Generation of Women Against Themselves – Sophie Gilbert

When did feminism lose its way? This question feels increasingly urgent in a moment of reactionary cultural and legislative backlash, when widespread uncertainty about the movement’s power, focus, and currency threatens decades of progress.

Sophie Gilbert, a staff writer at The Atlantic and finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in criticism, provides one answer, identifying an inflection point in the late 1990s and early 2000s when the energy of third-wave and “riot girl” feminism collapsed into a regressive period of hyper-objectification, sexualization, and infantilization. Gilbert mines the darker side of nostalgia, training her keen analytic eye on the most revealing cultural objects of the era, across music, film, television, fashion, tabloid journalism, and more. And what she recounts is harrowing, from the unattainable aesthetic of Victoria’s Secret ads and explicit music videos to a burgeoning internet culture vicious towards women in the spotlight and damaging for those who weren’t. Gilbert tracks many of the period’s dominant themes back to the explosion of internet porn, tracing its widespread influence as it began to pervade our collective consciousness.

Gilbert paints a devastating picture of an era when a distinctly American confluence of excess, materialism, and power-worship collided with the culture’s reactionary, puritanical, and chauvinistic currents. Amid a collective reconsideration of the way women are treated in public, Girl on Girl is a blistering indictment of the matrix of misogyny that undergirded the cultural production of the early twenty-first century, and how it continues to shape our world today.

In My Hands Today…

Posted on by
Reply

Misbehaving: The Making of Behavioral Economics – Richard H. Thaler

Traditional economics assumes rational actors. Early in his research, Thaler realized these Spock-like automatons were nothing like real people. Whether buying a clock radio, selling basketball tickets, or applying for a mortgage, we all succumb to biases and make decisions that deviate from the standards of rationality assumed by economists. In other words, we misbehave. More importantly, our misbehavior has serious consequences. Dismissed at first by economists as an amusing sideshow, the study of human miscalculations and their effects on markets now drives efforts to make better decisions in our lives, our businesses, and our governments.

Coupling recent discoveries in human psychology with a practical understanding of incentives and market behavior, Thaler enlightens readers about how to make smarter decisions in an increasingly mystifying world. He reveals how behavioral economic analysis opens up new ways to look at everything from household finance to assigning faculty offices in a new building, to TV game shows, the NFL draft, and businesses like Uber.

Laced with antic stories of Thaler’s spirited battles with the bastions of traditional economic thinking, Misbehaving is a singular look into profound human foibles. When economics meets psychology, the implications for individuals, managers, and policy makers are both profound and entertaining.

In My Hands Today…

Posted on by
Reply

Handwritten: The Founding Story of Yuppiechef – Andrew Smith

In 2006, from a lounge in Cape Town, two friends launched an online kitchen-tool store with 32 products, no credit-card facilities, and zero marketing budget. They packaged orders themselves, dropping in a handwritten card with every purchase to prove to skeptical consumers that there were real humans “on the other side of the internet”.

Over the next 16 years, Yuppiechef evolved into a retail pioneer. Handwritten takes you on the rollercoaster journey of scaling an e-commerce empire. From sharing a rusted 1989 Toyota Corolla and battling early credit card fraudsters, to securing multi-million-dollar backing from global venture capital giant Tiger Global. It chronicles the chaotic highs of holiday-season and warehouse floods, the bold move into physical retail, and the ultimate acquisition by the Mr Price Group in 2021.

But beyond the timeline of a successful startup, this is a deeply human memoir drawn from decades of the author’s private journals. It strips away the glossy veneer of the “optimistic, confident” entrepreneur to reveal the profound emotional toll of leadership.

Inside Handwritten, you will discover:

  • The Bootstrapper’s Reality: How Yuppiechef survived its fragile early years without funding, driven by the philosophy of “growing as fast as we can and as slowly as we need to”.
  • Culture as a Strategy: Why true customer loyalty and teamwork is built on genuine human connection, empathy, and “relational hygiene”.
  • The Cost of Success: An honest look at the burnout, anxiety, and imposter syndrome that accompany the relentless pursuit of startup growth.

Whether you are founding a company, leading an organization, or simply someone who often feels like you’re not good enough, Handwritten proves that you can build something extraordinary without having to be perfect.

In My Hands Today…

Posted on by
Reply

China and Japan: Facing History – Ezra F. Vogel

One of the world’s most eminent scholars of East Asia reveals the important touchstones in the long history between China and Japan and argues that for the sake of world stability they must forge a new relationship for the twenty-first century.

China and Japan have cultural and political connections that stretch back fifteen hundred years. But today their relationship is strained. China’s military buildup deeply worries Japan, while Japan’s brutal occupation of China in World War II remains an open wound. In recent years less than ten percent of each population had positive feelings toward the other, and both countries insist that the other side must deal openly with its history before relations can improve.

From the sixth century, when the Japanese adopted core elements of Chinese civilization, to the late twentieth century, when China looked to Japan for a path to capitalism, Ezra Vogel’s China and Japan examines key turning points in Sino-Japanese history. Throughout much of their past, the two countries maintained deep cultural ties, but China, with its great civilization and resources, had the upper hand. Japan’s success in modernizing in the nineteenth century and its victory in the 1895 Sino-Japanese War changed the dynamic, putting Japan in the dominant position. The bitter legacy of World War II has made cooperation difficult, despite efforts to promote trade and, more recently, tourism.

Vogel underscores the need for Japan to offer a thorough apology for the war, but he also urges China to recognize Japan as a potential vital partner in the region. He argues that for the sake of a stable world order, these two Asian giants must reset their relationship, starting with their common interests in environmental protection, disaster relief, global economic development, and scientific research.