Jiang provides a vivid depiction of life as young girl growing up in China during Mao Ze-dong’s Cultural Revolution. I was struck by how pervasive the “Revolution” was, even recruiting children to become foot soldiers of sorts to report classmates for wrongthink. Citizens who were lumped into the “wrong” category of having professions or opinions deemed to be “counter-revolutionary” were publicly shamed to confess their supposed sin in struggle sessions that often turned violent.
I have mentally revisited this book many times for its tragic warning of how political and social revolutions often demonize segments of their population as enemies and how this process of dehumanization is used to justify violence against perceived enemies. Such demonization can turn neighbors against neighbors and even family members against each other.
Publishers Weekly Best Book * ALA Best Book for Young Adults * ALA Notable Children's Book * ALA Booklist Editors' Choice
In the tradition of The Diary of Anne Frank and I Am Malala, this is the incredible true story of one girl’s courage and determination during one of the most terrifying eras of the twentieth century. This edition includes a detailed glossary, pronunciation guide, discussion questions, and a Q&A with the author.
It's 1966, and twelve-year-old Ji-li Jiang has everything a girl could want: brains, popularity, and a bright future in Communist China. But it's also the year that…
With striking clarity, this short book delivers an understanding of how the economy works and grows well beyond what one might expect from its page count.
This book serves, as the title indicates, as an excellent primer for the layman wishing to better understand the economy. I enjoy this book, however, as a great “back to basics” refresher, keeping at bay the risk of getting lost in the forest of technical jargon and complex statistical equations that reflect economic theories on a chalkboard but not real life.
I especially enjoy this book because it is a vital tool to penetrate society’s economic illiteracy, and explains sound economic reasoning in such easily relatable terms that it will enhance my ability to teach economics to others.
This little book was written to accomplish something big: economic literacy. It is intentionally kept very short to be inviting rather than intimidating. You will gain life-changing understanding of how the economy works in practically no time.
Per Bylund will make you excited about what economics has to offer. Because economic literacy is mind-opening. Sound economic reasoning is an enormously powerful tool for understanding both the economy and society. Economic literacy uncovers what is going on under the surface and why things work out as they do. There is no magic to it. In fact, economic literacy is necessary to…
I am a huge fan of Thomas Sowell’s work, and re-reading this book reminded me of why. Few can match Sowell’s writing style, which uses an economy of words to explain his primary concepts, which are backed by mountains of research to buttress his point.
The word “justice” seems to be overused these days, and while everyone agrees on the need for justice, Sowell writes, there is a vast difference in what different people mean by that word. I appreciate Sowell’s ability to calmly and reflectively identify what political progressives mean by this term, which, today, often refers to as “social justice,” what Sowell labels “cosmic justice.”
This book helped to provide me a clear look into the motives of progressive activists advancing “social justice,” while also providing arguments as to why pursuit of such a goal ignores the costs imposed on innocent people.
This is not a comforting book -- it is a book about disturbing issues that are urgently important today and enduringly critical for the future. It rejects both "merit" and historical redress as principles for guiding public policy. It shows how "peace" movements have led to war and to needless casualties in those wars. It argues that "equality" is neither right nor wrong, but meaningless. The Quest for Cosmic Justice shows how confused conceptions of justice end up promoting injustice, how confused conceptions of equality end up promoting inequality, and how the tyranny of social visions prevents many people from…
The purpose of Economics in Action is to equip students with a sound mental framework through which to view and understand the countless patterns of behavior and complex phenomena that surround us every day.
Based on the insights of the Austrian School of Economics and drawing from the work of Ludwig von Mises, Carl Menger, and Murray Rothbard, Economics in Action will present economics not as a series of complex statistical equations but as real choices made by real human beings in the real world.
Armed with this framework, Economics in Action provides analysis of key economic concepts and analysis of important current issues and exposing popularly-held, but damaging, economic fallacies.
