"From SoulCycle to Scientology, we're all obsessed with cults. Linguist Amanda Montell examines the language cults use to draw us in"-- What causes people to join-- and more importantly, stay in-- extreme groups? The answer, Montell believes, has nothing to do with freaky mind-control wizardry or Kool-Aid. She argues that the key to manufacturing intense ideology, community, and us/them attitudes all comes down to language. In both positive ways...

"Lost" 1984 documentary, rediscovered and restored, about Japanese men and women who, at the turn of the century, immigrated to the West Coast of the United States. These pioneers tell their own stories of struggles and triumphs in a new land. "'Issei' brings to vivid life the world of early Japanese immigrants in rural California. Infused with spirit and humor, this captivating film is a treasure." - Valerie Matsumoto, Professor, History, UCLA. "Toshi...

Twelve Native Americans came to the Big Oakland Powwow for different reasons. Jacquie Red Feather is newly sober and trying to make it back to the family she left behind in shame. Dene Oxedrene is pulling his life together after his uncle's death and has come to work the powwow and to honor his uncle's memory. Edwin Frank has come to find his true father. Bobby Big Medicine has come to drum the Grand Entry. Opal Viola Victoria Bear Shield has come...

"Robert Cardinal Sarah calls The Day Is Now Far Spent his most important book. He analyzes the spiritual, moral and political collapse of the Western world and concludes that "the decadence of our time has all the faces of mortal peril." A cultural identity crisis, he writes, is at the root of the problems facing Western society. "The West no longer knows who it is, because it no longer knows and does not want to know who made it, who established...

The story of a Chinese mother and her daughter, who has been adopted by an American couple, tracing the very different cultural factors that compel them to consume a rare native tea that has shaped their family's destiny for generations. Li-yan and her family align their lives around the seasons and the farming of tea in their remote Yunnan village. Then a stranger arrives, finding the rare tea he has been seeking and a reticent Akha people. Li-yan...

"From the indie rockstar of Japanese Breakfast fame, and author of the viral 2018 New Yorker essay that shares the title of this book, an unflinching, powerful memoir about growing up Korean-American, losing her mother, and forging her own identity. In this exquisite story of family, food, grief, and endurance, Michelle Zauner proves herself far more than a dazzling singer, songwriter, and guitarist. With humor and heart, she tells of growing up the...

"The product of over 2,000 interviews recorded in 60 countries, this unique and thrilling collection of stories and images leads inexorably to the core of what it means to be human. Stories full of love and happiness, hatred and violence, from everyday experiences to accounts of the most unbelievable lives, share a rare sincerity and underline what is universal. Intercut with never-before-seen aerial images accompanied by soaring music..."--Container. "......

"Sixteen-year-old Sarah (it's pronounced SAH-rah, thank you) has a successful blog creating fusion recipes. When Sarah is invited to compete on Cyber Chef, a virtual cooking competition that soars in popularity at the height of the pandemic, her twists on her Baba's recipes are not enough to pique the palate of the show's producers. She is pushed to present dishes that represent her Filipinx culture, but these flavours are foreign to her since her...

"As Alex and Elana try to make their home among the academics and young leftists in El Paso and Juárez, they are pulled from each other by an affair with a lucha libre fighter, their struggles to define themselves, and the loud cry of home"-- When Alex and Elana move from smalltown Virginia to El Paso, they are just a young married couple, intent on a new beginning. Mexican by birth but adopted by white American Pentecostal parents, Alex is hungry...