Resisting Images: Essays on Cinema and History (Critical Perspectives on the Past Series)

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"It's easy to imagine a TV sitcom making fun of a character who visits psychics and astrologers and channels Sarah Bernhardt," opines Wendy Kaminer, "but virtually impossible to imagine it laughing at anyone who takes the Bible literally and believes that someone named Jonah once lived in a whale." She goes on to demonstrate that, despite the complaints from many religious people that the "secular media" mocks their beliefs, American culture still shows a high degree of respect for the faithful and pious, while popular hostility towards atheists continues to rise. But "why should it be socially acceptable to make fun of psychics and not priests?" That's one of many provocative questions Kaminer raises in Sleeping with Extra-Terrestrials, a critical assessment of the extent to which U.S. society has succumbed to the irrational.

Kaminer goes on to sift her way through pop spirituality "classics" like The Celestine Prophecy and Conversations with God and visits seminars by New Age gurus (leaving her "amused and dismayed by the painful stupidities that people embrace to ease their fears of death"), but Sleeping with Extra-Terrestrials is not merely an assault on religion--Kaminer also attacks purveyors of junk science, the influence of the recovered-memory movement on both feminism and the American court system, and the "cyberspacy" claims made by boosters of technological progress. Whether she's considering the extensive belief in UFOs and alien abductions or wondering why so many people worshipped Princess Diana in the hour of her death, Kaminer shows how an unrestrained culture of faith "encourages passivity, gullibility, and a childlike craving for authority." Rationalists will find her skepticism a refreshing tonic. --Ron Hogan

Book Description

In Sleeping with Extra-Terrestrials, social critic Wendy Kaminer illuminates the various ways in which society has come to value emotion over reason, faith over fact, and argues that declarations of intense belief have largely taken the place of rational discourse. In a world in which "How do you feel," seems to be a more frequently asked question than "What do you know," Kaminer's examination of the rise of spiritualism, the mushrooming junk science, and the habitual merging of political and evangelical speech, blazes with relevance and incisive wit.

Probing the amusing and ominous implications of rampant credulity in our age, Kaminer raises important questions, and provides a thoughtful and eloquent perspective on the perils of present-day irrationalism.

Customer Reviews:

not serious work.......2007-07-18

This book is a personal rant; an irritated author who has a burr under her saddle that she itches and scratches at way beyond the 1000 word op ed this should have been. If you want to read thinkers, read Hannah Arendt; read Aquinas, read Fuller, read Solzhenitsyn, read Romero, read thinkers who faced real suffering instead of the trite annoyances this author talks about in her privledged life, her personal kvetching that amounts to no more than being irritated by her colleagues and by others who are not her. Read people who have walked the walk. Make up your own mind.

Where were the rational thinkers.....?.......2007-06-29

Hi, I'm just wondering where all the rational thinkers were when I was trying to deal with severe mental illness exacerbated by childhood sexual abuse and my partner needed treatment for gambling addiction exacerbated by childhood sexual abuse? I notice nobody from Radcliffe gave me a call or a hug to help either of us deal with these problems. Or are addictions and mental illness just another figment of our society's imaagination, like sleeping with aliens?...I'd like to see Ms. Kaminer's solutions for dealing with these kinds of problems and wonder if she has ever expreienced anything like them? Hey, it was through a 12-step program I was able to STOP thinking like a victim. As far as I'm concerned, generalizing about concepts like these just sells your book, lady, doesn't offer any solutions to these types of issues. But, hey, I don't have the credentials...I'm not a highbrow journalist or didn't attend Radcliffe----I'm just a 12-step program "grunt."

kind though firm.......2007-04-24

yeah, yeah, yeah... all the same stuff the others said (the friendlies). And-- wendy is kind to people still brain-washed. she doesn't drive away the very audience that needs to hear what she has to say,. too often we sound arrogant and sarcastic. wendy keeps a sense of humor and humility that is very disarming and allows the word to get there.

A needed dose of reality.......2007-03-08

I have read, and reread this book, and a previous book by this author, "I'm Dysfunctional, You're Dysfunctional", and I keep hoping that she will write another book in the popular culture, American spirituality, self-help vein because her combination of sharp intellect, satire, and dry sense of humor are so hard to come by.

America the Irrational.......2006-06-15

Sleeping With Extra-Terrestrials is a wonderful introduction into the world of critical thinking. The post millenium America is a nation deeply mired in superstition and magical thinking. Ms. Kaminer deftly and with humor deflates some of best-loved sacred cows: religion; pop spirituality and pop psychology; junk science. She clearly defines the irrational thinking behind these belief systems and the warns of the pratfalls caused by embracing shaky reasoning.

Her message is clear - Americans would rather not think. They would rather have faith in some magic deity who can make the world all right or find solutions to problems with some magic formula. Thinking is hard; and so is reasoning. It's much better to dismiss reasoning as elitist intellectualism, distrust science and logic than to apply ourselves. Taking responsibility and ultimately solving our own problems takes a back seat to faith and wishful thinking. By turning to religion, pop spirituality and pop psychology, however, we put our selves into intellectual and physical danger. Increased sectarian government is the result of clinging to piety, which in turn leads to loss of liberty. Lack of logical debate gives way to basing arguments on impulse emotionalism. Sound bites and pseudoscience replace true analysis. Ultimately, our insistence in clinging to the irrational harms us intellectually. We become indolent and unable to apply reason at the same level as our peers.

Ms. Kaminer presents these lessons in reasoning in a very readable and easy to understand manner. Indeed, even the casual reader immersed in pop culture would understand her witty prose. Each chapter is constructed and supporting arguments documented. To further hold the readers' interest she avoids lengthy discussion of classical philosophy that so makes so many books on critical thinking choppy and a chore to read. That said, I am a bit puzzled by some of the criticism of this book. I certainly saw no rants. It was very readable and I finished the entire book (without skimming) in one evening. I'm even forgiving of her rather lengthy introduction defining her belief system. I see her point. The knee jerk reaction to skepticism is that all skeptics believe in nothing and are somehow spiritually bereft. By disclosing her belief in homeopathy, she makes herself more human and less threatening.

As I write this in the middle of the year 2006, I am surrounded by the irrational. Our president justifies his public policy by spouting evangelical religion. Shrill, sensationalistic pundits in mini-skirts write tomes of unsubstantiated emotionalism that fly off bookshelves, while concise, well-researched books of science gather dust. The TV is our psychologist, people still believe in ghosts and reactionaries on the left and right use junk science to support their positions. Superstition controls the behavior of the populace. The Internet spews dubious information taken as fact. Science, skeptics and critical thinking are viewed with distrust. And UFO still zip around in the skies. To say we need a good dose of reality is an understatement. A good start on the way to critical thinking is by reading this book. After finishing, give it to someone you know who is sinking in the mire of ridiculousness espoused by our pop culture. As Wendy Kaminer states in her conclusion, " Without faith in the supernatural, people tend to celebrate reason...". Pass this book on and start a trend.

Sleeping with Extra-Terrestrials: The Rise of Irrationalism and Perils of Piety.(Review) (book review): An article from: Issues in Science and Technology

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Sleeping with Extra-Terrestrials: The Rise of Irrationalism and Perils of Piety.(Review) (book review): An article from: Issues in Science and Technology
Robert L. Park
Manufacturer: National Academy of Sciences
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital

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This digital document is an article from Issues in Science and Technology, published by National Academy of Sciences on March 22, 2000. The length of the article is 1309 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Sleeping with Extra-Terrestrials: The Rise of Irrationalism and Perils of Piety.(Review) (book review)
Author: Robert L. Park
Publication: Issues in Science and Technology (Refereed)
Date: March 22, 2000
Publisher: National Academy of Sciences
Volume: 16 Issue: 3 Page: 91

Article Type: Book Review

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Sleeping With Extra-Terrestrials: The Rise of Irrationalism and Perils of Piety

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Sleeping With Extra-Terrestrials: The Rise of Irrationalism and Perils of Piety
Wendy Kaminer
Manufacturer: Pantheon Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000HJYRPS

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Sleeping With Extra-terrestrials: the Rise of Irrationalism and Perils of Piety
Wendy Kaminer
Manufacturer: Vintage Books USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000N75DDE

Book Description

Strategy is the key to success at the blackjack table; that’s a mathematical fact, and you can count on these expert, easy-to-learn tactics to make you a victor. Here’s the deal: everything begins with the basic rules, and they’re laid out on these pages with smart little “factoid” tips. Go through blackjack economics, which explain why cards fall the way they do, and what makes a good (and a sucker) bet. Easy-to-follow tables suggest strategies for splitting pairs and soft hands and provide dozens of other statistics and card probabilities. Keep digging deeper into the game and much more.

Customer Reviews:

Blackjack 101.......2005-02-24

The Smarter Bet Guide to Blackjack is a great introductory text. I does a good job of covering the rules and play. It's not so lengthy that you couldn't read it on a two hour flight to Vegas. It includes a Basic Strategy for both single deck and multiple deck Blackjack which are standard. Nestor includes a chapter on the variations such as Spanish 21, which a lot of books avoid. He includes a chapter on card counting which introduces the reader to counting. Lastly, he introduces progressive betting of which I am a proponent. This is a good introduction to Blackjack, and the price is right. Newly written Blackjack books generally sell for $15 or more, and this one is about $5. It's not thorough, but you can't expect a small and relatively short book to be comprehensive.

Amazon.com

If you just stumbled into design, maybe via a hobby that grew into a career, and you want to improve your work without having to enroll in a degree program, this book can bridge some of the gaps in your acumen. Not really a primer on basic facts, Design Workshop is more like a guide to style.

The first chapter quizzes readers on mostly technical, basic details of design (like dpi), all of which can be found in Williams's previous publications (for example, The Non-Designer's Design Book). Readers will be dismayed, possibly annoyed, that the quiz answers are not provided. Even if not knowing the answers means that you need remedial help, it feels like a bit of a tease.

The next chapters show how to use stock images, or your own images, to increase the visual impact of your piece (basically through an increase in contrast). The best part of this section, and the book as a whole, is the "before-and-after" approach in the examples; they're like a series of makeovers. The captions effectively describe what was changed in the image, and how it improved the design.

The book applies a similar set of makeovers to various types of design projects: logos, forms, newsletters, tables of contents, etc. In the final section, seven designers, including coauthor Tollett, break down the process that they went through on a job of their own.

Self-taught graphic designers probably would make the best audience for this book, but designers who are of their own "school of thought" might find fault with some of the tenets that are put forth. Graphic design by nature is a subjective enterprise--at the mercy of "styles." What you get in this book is more of a "desktop-publisher style" (many of the drawings are clip art, for example). There's a lack of sophistication in the design of the book, as well as in the illustrations of posters, letterheads, advertisements, and other applications that are used as examples. On the other hand, this same open, naive look gives the book an inviting appeal, and makes it perhaps a bit less daunting than style guides, such as Robert Bringhurst's The Elements of Typographic Style, that are intended for die-hard professionals. --Angelynn Grant

Topics covered:

Style advice for design projects, including:

Logos
Business cards and letterhead
Invoices and forms
Advertising
Billboards
Web sites
Tables of contents and indices
Newsletters and brochures
Flyers

Book Description

Learn design theory and practical know-how from the award-winning author/design team, Robin Williams and John Tollett! Robin Williams introduced design and typographic principles to legions of readers with her best-selling Non-Designer's book series. Now she and designer/co-author John Tollett take you to the next level of creative design with practical advice and lessons in composition, visual impact, and design challenges.

Presented in Robin and John's signature style—writing that is so crystal clear, it's accessible to absolutely anyone—and illustrated with hundreds of full-color design examples, the ideas in this book tackle design theory, visual puns, and layout and graphics strategies for real-world projects. Developing designers will appreciate the authors' imaginative approach and well-chosen examples.

Discover practical and effective design principles and concepts—and how to apply them to virtually any project.
Learn why some designs are attention-getting and others are not.
Learn how to choose just the right look—corporate or casual, classic or trendy—for specific types of projects, such as business cards, letterhead and envelopes, newsletters and brochures, logos, advertising, and more.
Test your design acumen by comparing before-and-after examples.
Find a wealth of inspiration for your own design projects.
Gain insight into the design process by studying the work of guest designers, who offer their personal commentary and insights.

Customer Reviews:

Robin Williams Design Workshop (2nd Edition).......2007-09-26

Book has excellant information, good examples, and plenty of suggestions and recommendations. Easy to understand with many design images.

Design workshop book review.......2007-09-19

The book is an excellent tool to assist in text layout for various documents, ads, marketing pieces etc. Helps the reader to understand the reasons and components of what makes a layout eye apealing

A Worthwhile Workshop.......2007-05-06

Not as compelling as her Non-Designers Design Book, but useful and inspiring nonetheless. I find this book useful when trying to solve design problems in my own business.

Joe Okonkwo
www.ZootCreative.com

Very useful.......2006-11-10

I've always admired Robin Williams' design books. They're straight forward, practical, and well layed out, of course. What's important about Robin's books is that she consistently ties together several design principals and builds and connects to those principles in each of her books. She provides numerous examples and resources for you to build upon and she makes you feel that you can achieve the goals of good design. Her books are not written from an elitist or esoteric point of view. They're written for both design students and laymen who are interested in the principles of good and effective design.

Very helpful.......2006-11-10

I found this book to be very helpful and easy to understand. Examples of what to do and what not to do are very clear and provide many "aha" moments when you realize how much better a piece can look by following the tips/suggestions in the book. Essential reference book for any graphic designer from beginner to advance.

Average customer rating:

An outstanding, uniquely useful book
Web Design guide
Worn this one out
Some great information but not worth purchasing
awesome design ideas

Robin Williams Web Design Workshop
Robin Williams , John Tollett , and Dave Rohr
Manufacturer: Peachpit Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0201748673

Amazon.co.uk

Because "there's more to Web design than Photoshop and HTML," Robin Williams Web Design Workshop covers everything for the working Web designer including "how to survive dealing with clients."

Although Dreamweaver, GoLive, Photoshop, and other applications are mentioned (Flash even gets its own chapter), the book covers the gamut of Web design and technology issues rather than focusing on an individual application.

Each chapter is divided into sections, often no more than a couple of pages long. The chapter on backgrounds, the area of a Web page that seems to attract the worst design crimes, shows you how to avoid "the heartbreak of bad background design" in no less than eight sections.

In many books this subject would be lucky to get eight paragraphs; Robin Williams Web Design Workshop uses a clear two-column layout and plenty of real-life example screen shots to get the message across. Some pages consist only of captioned screen shots providing a great source of visual ideas.

There's a good balance between purely design-related issues and the technical stuff. Subjects like search engines, embedded fonts, DHTML, and forms are given a thorough overview, highlighting the main issues, and links to sources of more in-depth information are often to be found at the end of the chapter.

If you like to learn by example and see yourself more as a designer than a programmer, but want a working knowledge of current Web technologies from a book that you can read away from your computer, this is it. --Ken McMahon, amazon.co.uk

Customer Reviews:

An outstanding, uniquely useful book.......2006-05-27

Because web sites are made with computers, somehow it seems that the vast majority of authors of "how to make a web site" books focus almost entirely on the technical aspects, as somehow devoid of relation to the practical art of making sites that work.

This book is remarkable, because it is written from the point of view of working, experienced web/graphic designers.

As the authors make clear, making a web site is a lot more than just using a computer and making pretty pictures. They clarify what you really need to know about the entire process. It covers everything about the development cycle, from clarifying the site requirements with the client, to making thumbnail sketches, to practical, nitty-gritty details of how to make an interesting, "non-boxy" site.

If you want to really understand the entire process of developing effective, beautiful web sites for people as a business, this is the best book I have ever seen on the subject.

Web Design guide.......2006-02-25

Robin Williams does an excellent job of providing clear suggestions, good rationales, and lots of examples to make her point.

Worn this one out.......2005-01-05

Several years ago I met with the main designer at company that created the web pages for several pharmaceutical distributors in Canada. At the time, I was well versed in creating web pages using several of the professional programs including Dreamweaver, as well as writing code. The designer, however, said that they did all of their designing in Photoshop and then used a slicing technique in ImageReady before editing the site in Dreamweaver. I hate to admit it, but I had never heard of creating web pages that way, so I went home and began looking through all of my web designing books to see if I could find a description of the technique. Yes, I found it in this book.

I don't want to give the impression that this book is all about Photoshop, it clearly isn't. But, at least for me, the Photoshop information has been extremely useful! Though I do not design the majority of my sites using Photoshop, there are some that I could not have created as easily with out it. I have not used other applications that supposedly are similar to Photoshop/ImageReady, so I can't say if they can or can not do the things that Photoshop/ImageReady can.

Nevertheless, since the time I opened this book and took a real look, I have used this book more than any other web books on my shelf. Sometimes it is to simply look at the pictures to spark a new idea, sometimes it is to review a specific designing technique.

Honestly I do not think Robin can write a bad book.

Some great information but not worth purchasing.......2004-11-05

I borrowed this book from the library to see if it was worth purchasing. It has some great design tips and ideas but nothing that can't be found in other books in greater detail. The glossy color pages make it fun to browse through, but there isn't enough detailed information on the various design topics.

I skimmed through the book within two or three days and don't see it as an item I will bother to purchase for my personal Web design library.

awesome design ideas.......2004-07-31

This book is very focused on the design aspect, which makes sense, since it is titled "Web Design Workshop". Just don't expect to see any html or javascript in it. Still an awesome book though - very very good design advice for the web.

Robin Williams Design Workshop. (Book Reviews).: An article from: Technical Communication

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Robin Williams Design Workshop. (Book Reviews).: An article from: Technical Communication

Manufacturer: Society for Technical Communication
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital

Book Description

This digital document is an article from Technical Communication, published by Society for Technical Communication on February 1, 2002. The length of the article is 1149 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Robin Williams Design Workshop. (Book Reviews).
Publication: Technical Communication (Refereed)
Date: February 1, 2002
Publisher: Society for Technical Communication
Volume: 49 Issue: 1 Page: 100(3)

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Robin Williams Web Design Workshop. (Book Reviews).: An article from: Technical Communication

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Robin Williams Web Design Workshop. (Book Reviews).: An article from: Technical Communication
Karla Saari Kitalong
Manufacturer: Society for Technical Communication
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital

Book Description

This digital document is an article from Technical Communication, published by Society for Technical Communication on August 1, 2002. The length of the article is 1376 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Robin Williams Web Design Workshop. (Book Reviews).
Author: Karla Saari Kitalong
Publication: Technical Communication (Refereed)
Date: August 1, 2002
Publisher: Society for Technical Communication
Volume: 49 Issue: 3 Page: 359(2)

Distributed by Thomson Gale

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Robin Williams DVD Design Workshop
Robin Williams , John Tollett , and David Rohr
Manufacturer: Peachpit Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0321136284

Book Description

Robin Williams DVD Design Workshop provides a clear, accessible introduction to the world of DVD menu design and authoring. If you're an amateur video artist, home-movie buff, or professional designer, you can use this book as a great introduction to learning how to create DVDs for your personal use or professional projects. John Tollett, David Rohr, and Robin Williams make it easy by presenting necessarytechnical information and design inspiration in the classic informaland friendly style that has made Robin's books continual best-sellers.

Robin Williams DVD Design Workshop provides all of theinformation you need to understand the DVD authoring process and to get started with your own DVD projects. You'll learn about the advantages of the DVD format, applications of DVD technology, hardware requirements, and the pros and cons of various consumer vs. prosumer DVD authoring tools. The book also includes overviews of leading Mac and PC DVD authoring software tools, such as iDVD, MyDVD, DVD Studio Pro, DVD Producer and more. To get you inspired, the authors includeexamples of successful (and sometimes unusual) DVD interface designs from professional designers and major Hollywood studios. Valuable outsource resources for packaging and distributing your own DVD are also included.

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Robin Williams Design Workshop
Robin;Tollett, John, Williams
Manufacturer: Peachpit Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OOHTHE

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Robin Williams DVD Design Workshop - A Designer's Introduction To DVD Menu Design & DVD Authoring
John; Rohr, David & Williams, Robin Tollett
Manufacturer: Peachpit Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: B000OUIGI4

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Robin Williams Web Design Workshop
Robin Williams
Manufacturer: PEACHPIT (LONG)
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000K2J1SK

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