Taught by Professor Lawrence Weinstein of Old Dominion University, this course explains the science, history, hazards, applications, and latest advances in nuclear physics. You learn the principles of radioactivity, how nuclear bombs and reactors work, the uses of radiation for cancer treatment and medical imaging, what makes some forms of radiation dangerous, plus you tour a linear accelerator.

Reviews

Excellent worthwhile course!
I really enjoyed this course. I took nuclear physics in college many decades ago, so it was fun to catch up on what has happened since then. The course is a great survey of this wide scientific field with an excellent and accessible level of detail. Topics include basic research, nuclear energy, star & sun nuclear processes, weapons, and nuclear medicine. Several things make this a standout course, including, a very knowledgeable, engaging professor who obviously knows this scientific field at great depth and yet is able to make the material accessible to a wide audience; his guided tour of the Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility (Jefferson Lab); his lab demonstrations of key concepts; excellent graphics such as the repeated references and animations of the table of nuclides; and a presentation pace and style that holds your attention. The course guide book is also a standout with its color illustrations, extensive bibliography, and historical timeline.

Product Details

• Full Audio MP3 Program
• Full PDF E-Book Included
• Starring: Lawrence Weinstein
• Genres: Special Interest, Documentary
• Subtitles: English [CC]
• Audio: languages English

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Conventional wisdom suggests English is going to the dogs, that bad grammar, slang, and illogical constructions signal a decline in standards of usage – to say nothing of the corruption wrought by email and text messages.

But English is a complicated, marvelous language. Far from being a language in decline, English is the product of surprisingly varied linguistic forces, some of which have only recently come to light. And these forces continue to push English in exciting new directions.

These 24 eye-opening lectures dispel the cloud of confusion that clings to English, giving you a crystal-clear view of why we use it the way we do and where it fits into the diverse languages of the world. Like an archaeologist sifting through clues to a vanished civilization, you’ll uncover the many features of English that sound normal to a native speaker but that linguists find puzzling and also revealing.

For example, the only languages that use “do” the way English does (as in “do not walk”) are the Celtic languages such as Welsh, which were spoken by people who lived among the early English and influenced their language in many subtle ways.

You’ll also delight in considering modern controversies about how English is used. For example, “Billy and me went to the store” is considered incorrect, because the subject form, “I,” should be used instead of “me.” But then why does “Me and Billy went to the store” sound so much more fluent than “I and Billy went to the store”?

These examples and many more represent a few of the flash points in English’s long history of defying rules, a process that occurs in all languages. You’ll come away from this course with every reason to be a proud, informed, and more self-aware speaker of English.

About the Author

Dr. John McWhorter is Associate Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University. He previously was Associate Professor of Linguistics at the University of California, Berkeley. He earned his B.A. from Rutgers University, his M.A. from New York University, and his Ph.D. in Linguistics from Stanford University. Professor McWhorter specializes in language change and language contact. He is the author of The Power of Babel: A Natural History of Language; The Word on the Street, a book on dialects and Black English; and Doing Our Own Thing: The Degradation of Language and Music in America and Why We Should, Like, Care. A Contributing Editor at The New Republic, he has also been published in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, The Chronicle of Higher Education, Time, and The New Yorker. Frequently sought after by the media, Professor McWhorter has appeared on Dateline NBC, Politically Incorrect, Talk of the Nation, Today, Good Morning America, The Jim Lehrer NewsHour, Up with Chris Hayes, and Fresh Air.

Product details

• Full Audiobook MP3 Program
• Full PDF Guidebook Included
• Listening Length : 12 hours and 14 minutes
• Author : John McWhorter, The Great Courses
• Narrator : John McWhorter
• Release Date : July 08, 2013
• Publisher : The Great Courses
• Version : Original recording
• Language : English
• ASIN B00DTO42BC

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Great mystery and suspense writers have created some of the most unforgettable stories in all of literature. Even those who don’t consider themselves fans of this intriguing genre are familiar with names such as Hercule Poirot, Sam Spade, Hannibal Lecter, and Robert Langdon, and understand the deep and lasting impact this writing has had on literature as a whole. An utterly captivating and compelling genre, mystery and suspense has leapt off the pages of the old dime store paperbacks, magazines, and comic books onto big screens, small screens, radio serials, podcasts, websites, and more. You’ll find elements, characters, and references permeating popular culture and news reports worldwide, and bleeding into other literary genres such as romance, political thrillers, sports stories, and even biographies. Nearly 200 years old, the genre of mystery and suspense literature is only growing more popular.

How did it become so prevalent? Why is mystery and suspense a go-to genre for so many around the world? What makes the dark and sometimes grisly themes appealing? In 24 lectures of The Secrets of Great Mystery and Suspense Fiction, Professor David Schmid of the University at Buffalo examines these questions, as he guides you through an examination of the many different varieties of the genre, including classic whodunits, hard-boiled crime fiction, historical mysteries, courtroom dramas, true crime narratives, espionage fiction, and many more.

Fans of the genre will be delighted by the breadth and depth of information presented, guaranteed to uncover gems they had not yet discovered. But anyone, whether they are admirers of mystery on radio and film, or simply fans of literature, history, or pop culture, will find something to enlighten and entertain in this study of a genre with such tremendous impact.

About the Author

David Schmid is an Associate Professor in the Department of English at the University at Buffalo, The State University of New York (SUNY). The recipient of the Milton Plesur Excellence in Teaching Award and the SUNY Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Teaching, he teaches courses in British and American fiction, cultural studies, and popular culture.

Born and raised in England, Dr. Schmid received his B.A. from Oxford University, his M.A. from the University of Sussex, and his Ph.D. in Modern Thought and Literature from Stanford University.

Dr. Schmid has published on a variety of subjects, including the nonfiction novel, celebrity, film adaptation, Dracula, and crime fiction. He is the author of Natural Born Celebrities: Serial Killers in American Culture; coauthor of Zombie Talk: Culture, History, Politics; editor of Violence in American Popular Culture; and coeditor of Globalization and the State in Contemporary Crime Fiction: A World of Crime.

Product details

• Full Audiobook MP3 Program
• Full PDF E-Book Included
• Listening Length : 18 hours and 56 minutes
• Author : David Schmid, The Great Courses
• Narrator : David Schmid
• Release Date : November 11, 2016
• Publisher : The Great Courses
• Version : Original recording
• Language : English
• ASIN B01N04W64A

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According to the latest scientific research, anyone can be creative. You just have to know how to think creatively, which involves taking a more imaginative approach to the challenges we all face. Learn how to wield the same research-based tools that today’s creative people use and tap into your inner creative thinker with Professor Puccio’s engaging 24-lecture series that takes you step-by-step through the creative-thinking process.

You’ll get a solid introduction to the four major stages of creative problem solving, one of the most effective methods used in creativity training around the world. Just like today’s creative geniuses, you’ll learn how to approach professional and personal challenges by clarifying your obstacles, ideating potential solutions, developing the ones that are workable, and implementing them in the real world.

You’ll also learn how to wield the tools of the creative trade with the aid of simple exercises, in-studio demonstrations, hypothetical scenarios, and more. These powerful tools include everything from tapping into the power of brainwriting (an alternative take on brainstorming) to the effective use of How-How diagrams (which help you develop concrete action steps).

Whether you want to overcome writer’s block, solve a complex business problem, or figure out the best way to resolve a tense argument, this series will give you everything you need so that when other people are dodging challenges, you’re uncovering the hidden opportunities they’ll have missed.

By training yourself to become a more creative thinker, you can

• develop and bring to fruition new answers to problems that once seemed daunting or unsolvable;
• become more persuasive in how you present and sell your ideas;
• avoid tired solutions in favor of novel ones with the potential for even greater success;
• strengthen your ability to lead teams and organizations; and
• reach new levels of satisfaction and fulfillment in your daily life.

Because creativity is a set of skills that anyone can improve, you can learn how to wield the same research-based tools and techniques that today’s creative people use in their own work. All you need is an open mind, a determination to succeed, and The Creative Thinker’s Toolkit. Award-winning Professor Gerard Puccio of Buffalo State–The State University of New York—an expert in creative thinking and a consultant to individual clients and large companies—has crafted 24 lectures that take you step-by-step through the creative-thinking process and that use real-world scenarios to show you this vital skill in action.

Whether you want to overcome writer’s block, look at your career with a fresh perspective, solve a complex business problem, introduce a new idea to the marketplace, or figure out the best way to resolve a tense argument, Professor Puccio’s course will give you everything you need so that when other people are dodging life’s challenges, you’re uncovering the potentially successful opportunities they’ll have missed.

Explore the Creative Problem-Solving Process

It doesn’t matter if you’re a Nobel Prize-winning writer, a Fortune 500 CEO, or a high school student; the stages of thought you move through to close the gap between what you have and what you want are the same. And the most reliable way to do so is with creative problem solving, the model that Professor Puccio uses as the backbone of The Creative Thinker’s Toolkit.

Creative problem solving is delightfully intuitive, building on the natural creative process in all of us instead of replacing it. It’s also the most widely researched deliberate creative process model in existence—and one of the most effective methods used in creativity training in organizations and universities around the world.

With this series, you’ll get a solid introduction to the four major stages of this process. Each stage, as you’ll learn, involves a different way of thinking and a different set of tools to facilitate greater creativity. And all of them can be adapted to fit the demands of your own particular challenge.

• Clarify: Once you’ve determined your problem and your goal, you need to identify the challenges (both obvious and hidden) you’ll have to address and overcome to achieve the results you want.
• Ideate: This stage is about generating ideas: good ones, bad ones, ugly ones. It’s also where tools like brainstorming, brainwriting, forced connections, and even borrowing from others can lead you to out-of-the-box solutions.
• Develop: Now you need to focus on development, which involves taking your ideas, evaluating them, determining which ones are workable, and transforming them into solutions.
• Implement: Last comes the most tactical part of the process, in which you move the solutions from your own head into reality, using a plan that includes specific, measurable steps.

Learn the Tools of the Creative Trade

According to Professor Puccio, creative problem solving is a toolbox. As such, his fascinating lectures are packed with tools you can pick up and carry with you any time you find yourself in a situation that demands a more creative approach. You’ll learn how each stage of the creative-thinking process comes with its own set of equipment designed to maximize your creativity and increase your ability to solve problems and achieve your desired goals.

• Brainwriting: Traditional brainstorming sessions not fruitful enough? Try this silent method, in which participants write their ideas and swap papers with one another, using cross-fertilization to build on already written ideas or add entirely new ones.
• Solution enactment: A kind of dress rehearsal often used by tech developers, this tool involves acting out a proposed solution to see how it could be improved. It can also help you more effectively communicate abstract ideas and processes.
• Stakeholder analysis: To determine who can support (or hinder) the success of your plan of action, analyze the positions of those individuals who have a stake in your plan. Then, devise a set of specific actions aimed at gaining their support.
• How-How diagram: Designed to help move your solution forward, this webbing tool forces you to be more concrete by repeatedly asking yourself, “How do I achieve this solution?” in order to shift your perspective into concrete action steps.

Using simple exercises, in-studio demonstrations, hypothetical scenarios, and the real-world experiences and successes of creative giants in business, science, and the arts, Professor Puccio teaches you how to wield these and other fascinating tools. He also shows you how to select the tools that work best for your unique situation, and invites you to take a step back and see how the lessons of creative thinking can help you become a better leader and live a more creative life.

About the Author

Dr. Gerard Puccio is a professor at The State University of New York at Buffalo for Studies in Creativity, a unique academic department that offers the world’s first and leading Master of Science in Creativity. Professor Puccio holds a Ph.D. in Organizational Psychology from The University of Manchester in England. Professor Puccio’s research interests include the identification of creative thinking preferences and the efficacy of creativity training. In recognition of his outstanding work as a scholar, Professor Puccio received The State University of New York’s Research and Scholarship Award in 2004 and the Buffalo State President’s Award for Excellence in Research, Scholarship, and Creativity in 2007. An accomplished speaker and consultant, Professor Puccio has worked with major corporations, universities, and school districts to deliver training programs and keynote speeches.

Product details

• Full Audiobook MP3 Program
• Full PDF Guidebook Included
• Listening Length : 12 hours and 20 minutes
• Author : Gerard Puccio, The Great Courses
• Narrator : Gerard Puccio
• Release Date : December 13, 2013
• Publisher : The Great Courses
• Program Type : Audiobook
• Version : Original recording
• Language : English
• ASIN B00GT1MXHM

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Become a more thoughtful consumer, save money, and reduce your ecological footprint with this course that teaches you how integrate sustainable practices into your everyday life. By learning specific knowledge and techniques on how to work more efficiently with the energy, water, and food you consume, you can live a more balanced and sustainable lifestyle that also positively impacts the world around you.

Sustainable living practices can help you to:

• reduce your home’s energy consumption by 75 percent or more and enjoy the same or better service;
• heat your home without fossil fuels and produce enough clean energy to contribute back to the grid (or leave it altogether);
• reduce, and potentially eliminate, your water bill;
• grow your own pesticide-free fruits, vegetables, and herbs year round; and
• make effective cleaning products at home that are safer and cheaper than anything you can buy at the store.

And you can do these wherever you live, whether it’s on acres of land or in a small city apartment.

Fundamentals of Sustainable Living reveals how you can become an active participant in the worldwide sustainability revolution, in as simple or as ambitious a way as you wish. Across 12 practical and inspiring half-hour lectures, you’ll learn concrete strategies for making the shift toward providing for yourself and reducing your cost of living, without compromising the resources of future generations. Guiding you is Lawrence A. Gamble, an award-winning Assistant Professor of Sustainable Living and the Co-Director of the Sustainable Living Program at Maharishi University of Management. A pioneer of the discipline and living proof of sustainability’s real-world applications, Professor Gamble hasn’t had to pay an electric bill in more than two decades.

The significant financial rewards are only one benefit of cultivating a sustainable lifestyle, but it’s a perk that can be realized relatively quickly. As Professor Gamble says, “For about the price of a daily latte, you can put enough solar electric power on your roof to offset your electricity bill. And you don’t even have to give up the latte – the system will pay for itself in utility bill savings.”

What Is Sustainability?

Whatever the motivation – personal finances or personal ethics – energy and resource conservation are a priority for virtually everyone. The reality of living a sustainable worldview, though, is still new to many of us. First and foremost, sustainability is not about doing without.

It’s about doing more with less and working with natural systems to become co-producers of the resources we need to meet our needs, without diminishing the ability of future generations to meet theirs. Every aspect of life can be reconsidered in terms of sustainability, from your choice of home and mode of transportation, to city design and the provenance of your produce.

Fundamentals of Sustainable Living brings this notion to life with demonstrations of how you can implement sustainable practices where you live. You’ll leave the studio for eye-opening field trips: see a thriving community orchard; watch the installation of a backyard drip irrigation system; walk through the professor’s own greenhouse; tour solar-friendly Fairfield, Iowa; and witness many other aspects of sustainability in action.

• Food: By cultivating fruit, vegetables, and herbs in your yard, a container, or a community garden, you can be confident that you’re eating the safest produce possible. Tips to get you started include step-by-step instructions for building a simple greenhouse that allows you to enjoy fresh produce through winter.
• Energy: Designing your home to collect and store solar energy pays dividends for your bottom line. Get strategies for using solar – even if you rent, have a shady yard, or can’t put panels on your home.
• Water: Investigate how you can minimize your dependence on the water company by collecting, storing, purifying, and using rainwater to meet your daily needs.
• Shelter: Travel to the Sustainable Living Center to learn how local rammed earth blocks timber, and earth plasters can be used to create sustainable materials for regenerative buildings.
• Heat: Visit the Living Soil Compost Lab to learn the recipe for good compost and how heat generated as a byproduct of the process can be used to heat water, buildings, and greenhouses, and even to create a “hot spring” in the snow.

Intellectual Exploration Meets Practical Application

Why do organics cost more? What style of washing machine uses half the energy and one-third less water? Which wild-growing plants are safe to eat? You’ll get answers to these and other practical questions throughout, yet this is so much more than a how-to course.

Fundamentals of Sustainable Living zooms out to view the big picture of sustainability and the institutions that flow from it as you explore the interconnectedness between human and natural systems. The underlying science of the course, much like the field of sustainability itself, cuts across a diverse swath of disciplines, including engineering, physics, biology, chemistry, agriculture, and economics.

You’ll learn how the disparate parts of sustainability come together in a holistic design process grounded in systems thinking; how energy and the law of entropy play a fundamental role; and how this movement fits in the context of other great societal shifts.

A sought-after consultant, Professor Gamble is truly inspiring. A teacher who successfully practices what he preaches can be relied upon to be knowledgeable, and he is the epitome – not only is his home solar-powered, but also it was built from straw bales with his own hands. He harvests rainwater and grows much of his own food.

And yet he understands that not everyone has the same options he has. These highly visual, informative lectures lay out the potential for a truly sustainable future if a range of possible choices are made on both the individual and institutional levels. With Fundamentals of Sustainable Living, you can understand and help build this future, preserving valuable resources for yourself, your community, and future generations.

About the Author

Professor Lonnie A. Gamble is a founding faculty member and Co-Director of the Sustainable Living program at Maharishi University of Management, where he has taught since 2003. He holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Electrical Engineering from North Carolina State University and has completed additional studies in renewable energy, cognitive science, and computer science at the University of Maine; Maharishi University of Management; and the University of California, San Diego.

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What sort of men were the Roman emperors (and were they all men)? What background and training, if any, prepared them for their awesome responsibilities? What depravities did they display? And what achievements can they claim: laws passed, monuments built, lands and peoples conquered?

Dive into these questions and more with this introduction to the complex personalities of emperors such as Augustus, Caligula, Claudius, and Nero. These thirty-six gripping lectures bring to life the many emperors of Rome from the turn of the 1st century to the transition to the Middle Ages. For more than five centuries, these emperors-a checkered mix of the wise, the brutal, and the unhinged-presided over a multi-ethnic empire that was nearly always at war.

Professor Fagan takes you deep into ancient Rome, asking: How did this system of rule come about? What did it replace? And who were the colorful, cruel, and crafty men who filled the almost omnipotent post of emperor? One of the most intriguing questions about the emperorship is why it endured for so long.

As you witness the reigns of the successive rulers unfold, you will see how the office evolved with the political forces that sustained it, becoming more and more tightly bound to the military. Each step toward despotism was taken with a view toward expedience. But when that step became the new normal, it paved the way for the next step, and so on. As you explore these questions, you’ll also study the amalgam of eyewitness reports, later compilations, archaeological remains, and inscriptions on monuments and coins. Contemporary accounts, when available, are not necessarily to be trusted, which means you play the role of detective, sifting for the truth of this spellbinding era.

About the Author

Garrett G. Fagan (1963–2017) was a Professor of Ancient History at Pennsylvania State University. He was born in Dublin, Ireland, and was educated at Trinity College. He earned his PhD from McMaster University and held teaching positions at McMaster University, York University, and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He also gave many public lectures to audiences of all ages. Professor Fagan had an extensive research record in Roman history and held a prestigious Killam Postdoctoral Fellowship at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver and an Alexander von Humboldt Research Fellowship at the University of Cologne. He published numerous articles in international journals, and he wrote Bathing in Public in the Roman World. He also edited a volume on the phenomenon of pseudoarcheology.

Product details

• Full Audiobook MP3 Program
• Full PDF E-Book Included
• Listening Length 17 hours and 38 minutes
• Author Garrett G. Fagan, The Great Courses
• Narrator Garrett G. Fagan
• Release Date July 08, 2013
• Publisher The Great Courses
• Version Original recording
• Language English
• ASIN B00DTNXPD4

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Why is Benjamin Franklin so compelling? What made him so successful in his day? And why has he continued to influence generations of Americans? Tackle these questions and more in The Age of Benjamin Franklin, a thorough—and sometimes surprising—course that presents a full portrait of a personality that defies easy definition. Taught by Professor Robert J. Allison of Suffolk University, these 24 insightful lectures explore the many aspects of Franklin’s life and times.

From his humble beginnings as the son of a Boston soap maker to a world-renowned diplomat, Franklin’s story is the embodiment of the American Dream, characterized by a pull-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps resolve. It’s the story he tells in his world famous autobiography—a blueprint for becoming a “self-made” man, by combining hard work and following a series of thirteen virtues. What you’ll learn early in this course is the difference between the character of Franklin that he created in his Autobiography, and the far more nuanced—and interesting—reality. For instance:

• He was an Enlightenment thinker with Puritan roots, a friend of the leading thinkers of his time such as Voltaire and the evangelist George Whitfield.
• He was Boston-born and Philadelphia proud, yet he was equally at home in London or Paris.
• He championed intellectual values and wore the leather apron of a working man.
• He possessed a scientific and creative mind, and his inventions include the lightning rod, bifocal glasses, and a flexible urinary catheter.
• He was extraordinarily sociable; had a wife, children, a large, extended family, and close friendships with so many women that at least one scholar was inspired to call him “the founding flirt.”
• He was a brilliant writer and humorist. His publication of Poor Richard’s Almanack inspired other American writers like Noah Webster.
• He was highly respected, but not universally beloved in his time (or afterward). Many, like John Adams, questioned Franklin’s moral compass, in politics as well as in his personal life.

In this course, you’ll explore these many sides and more to discover who Benjamin Franklin was, what he believed, and how he conducted himself in business and politics. To better understand Franklin’s unique genius, Professor Allison takes you into his world of the 18th century—an era of political revolution, science and reason, communication and literacy. As Franklin rises to international greatness, you’ll see his countrymen take their own places on the world stage as they shake off the British Empire to form a new nation. Informative, entertaining, and insightful, The Age of Benjamin Franklin takes you into the fascinating life and times of a bona fide American genius.

We all have certain images of Ben Franklin: the witty Founding Father who promoted independence; the Philadelphia printer who created Poor Richard’s Almanack; the scientist who conducted experiments with kites in electrical storms; the author of what is arguably America’s best-known autobiography. These images reveal an intellectually curious and successful man of the 18th century, but they don’t fully capture the full spirit of one of the most extraordinary Americans – perhaps the quintessential American.

Why is Benjamin Franklin so compelling? What made him so successful in his day? And why has he continued to influence generations of Americans? Tackle these questions and more in The Age of Benjamin Franklin, a thorough – and sometimes surprising – course that presents a full portrait of a personality that defies easy definition. Taught by Professor Robert J. Allison of Suffolk University, these 24 insightful lectures explore the many facets of Franklin’s life and times. From his humble beginnings as the son of a Boston soap maker to a world-renowned diplomat, you’ll explore the many sides of this complex man, who somehow found time to:

• Build a national printing business
• Open America’s first library
• Pioneer the development of the post office
• Publish a number of satires
• Invent the Franklin stove
• Help create and codify the science of electricity
• Write a string quartet
• Write one of the first texts about chess published in the US
• Take up swimming
• Write his memoirs

Amid all that, Franklin traveled the world, helped draft the Declaration of Independence, negotiated for support during the war and peace after, served in Congress, and helped establish American government. He was a busy, busy man: ambitious, worldly, imaginative, and forward thinking, representing the best output from the Age of Enlightenment.

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Most of us have a limited understanding of the powerful role economics has played in shaping human civilization. This makes economic history – the study of how civilizations structured their environments to provide food, shelter, and material goods – a vital lens through which to think about how we arrived at our present, globalized moment.

Designed to fill a long-empty gap in how we think about modern history, these 48 lectures are a comprehensive journey through more than 600 years of economic history, from the medieval world to the 21st century. Aimed at the layperson with only a cursory understanding of the field, An Economic History of the World since 1400 reveals how economics has influenced (and been influenced by) historical events and trends, including the Black Death, the Age of Exploration, the Industrial Revolution, the European colonization of Africa, the collapse of the Soviet Union, and the birth of personal computing. Professor Harreld has crafted a riveting, centuries-long story of power, glory, and ideology that reveals how, in step with history, economic ideas emerged, evolved, and thrived or died.

Along the way, you’ll strengthen your understanding of a range of economic concepts, philosophies, trends, treaties, and organizations, including the mercantile system, Adam Smith’s The Wealth of Nations, Marxist economics, African independence movements, and the formation of economic organizations including the European Union. You’ll also consider provocative questions about the intersection of history and economics. What did the economies of Roosevelt’s America and Hitler’s Germany have in common? What does history tell us about how nations should dictate economic policy? Can we say that free trade is truly free?

Marvel at just how much we still have to learn about the economic forces that have dictated our past – and that will dictate our future.

Discover the Economics behind History’s Great Events

What’s so special about the year 1400? Professor Harreld starts the course here because this was the historical moment in which we first begin to see the baby steps that would send the world toward the modern economic systems we use today. And while the lectures extend outward to examine the economic histories of places like India, China, and Africa, the focus is primarily on the West, because the world economy has been framed by Western ideas and ideals for the past several centuries.

“Economic history is not the examination of the history of economics,” notes Professor Harreld. “We’ll only lightly touch on the history of economic thought. Instead, we’ll focus on what happened in the past—rather than what people thought about what happened in the past.”

An Economic History of the World since 1400 is your opportunity to view major historical moments through the perspective of economics, shedding new light on familiar people and events. It’s also your chance to see how, in step with history, economic ideas emerged, evolved, and thrived or died.

• The Black Death and the end of serfdom: From 1346 to 1353, the plague devastated the population of Europe—an event that would have profound ramifications for the largely feudal economy of the time. Along with a drop in the amount of cultivated farmland and a rise in wages, the Black Death forced indebted manorial lords to turn the management of their estates over to peasants, which began the trend of eliminating serfdom that would be finished by the 19th century.
• Colonialism and joint stock companies: By the end of the 16th century, the Dutch and English broke the Portuguese monopoly on voyages to Asia, opening a new chapter in the story of European domination over long-distance maritime trade. This, in turn, gave rise to joint stock companies—new forms of business organizations like the Dutch East India Company. So powerful were these merchant blocks that their charters acknowledged the use of violence to advance international trade.
• Class consciousness and consumer culture: In the late 19th century, thanks to technological advancements and better living standards, Europeans and Americans had more money in their pockets than ever before. What resulted was a working-class interest in fashions and tastes that had formerly concerned only the upper class. To satisfy this, people turned to more modern forms of consuming goods like mail-order catalogs and department stores. However, an increased emphasis on class lines also led to major labor strikes and riots, as well as the birth of communism.
• World War I and postwar debts: The First World War not only destroyed nations, it also ravaged the international economy. In the years after the war, huge debts that countries had accumulated to finance the war had to be paid off. Inflation hit much of Europe after the United States insisted on being repaid in full. There was also the matter of Germany’s war reparations bill, which was more than $30 billion. Unknown to most parties, these and other economic events created conditions that helped bring about World War II.
• The Middle East and the oil economy: How did the Middle East become such a powerful player on the world stage? The answer lies in the last quarter of the 20th century, when Western attempts to exert economic power in the region, a softening of the post-World War II economy, and a global shift in fuel consumption provided these oil-rich nations with a major role in world affairs.

Examine the Intersection of History and Economics

As Professor Harreld takes you through the tumultuous centuries of modern history, you’ll strengthen your understanding of a range of economic concepts, philosophies, trends, treaties, and organizations.

• Learn how early guilds and monopolies were established in an effort to protect merchants from competition in distant cities.
• See how the mercantile system defined by Adam Smith in The Wealth of Nations helped further the process of state building that would remake Western Europe.
• Discover how the United States, which often borrowed European technologies, pioneered the American system of manufacturing using interchangeable parts in the 19th century.
• Consider how Marxist economic ideas played a major role in the African independence movement (and the Cold War) during the 1950s and 1960s.
• Witness how various nations came together to form international economic organizations, partnerships, and trade blocs including the European Union, the Arab League, and NAFTA.

By grounding these and other topics in the history of world events, An Economic History of the World since 1400 makes them much more understandable. It also cements the important role the economy played in why wars were won (and lost), why international agreements were made (and broken), and why national economies rose (and fell).

Professor Harreld also invites you to consider provocative questions about the intersection of history and economics—and their illuminating answers.

• What technological invention, more than any other, revolutionized the modern economy?
• How do economic historians define terms like “globalization” and “class consciousness”?
• Why didn’t China’s advanced civilization industrialize hundreds of years before it actually did?
• What did the economies of Roosevelt’s America and Hitler’s Germany have in common?
• What does history tell us about how nations should—and shouldn’t—dictate economic policy?
• Can we say that free trade is truly free?

Marvel at History’s Economic Forces

An award-winning teacher and chairman of Brigham Young University’s Department of History, Professor Harreld has spent his career carefully analyzing the interplay between economics and the social and political behavior of countries throughout the world. His chronological approach to the subject, combined with illuminating visual aids (including detailed maps, historical documentation, and illustrations of key trade routes) make this an excellent visual learning experience. And his resonant, authoritative voice makes these lectures equally compelling to hear.

While it may seem daunting to chart the economic evolution of the modern world, in the hands of this master educator, you’re never overwhelmed or vexed by complex economic details. Instead, you’re guided through a top-level explanation of economic concepts, with the focus always being on their historical ramifications.

“History doesn’t repeat itself exactly,” says Professor Harreld. “The world changes. But the past helps us see the world today more clearly.” With An Economic History of the World since 1400, marvel at just how much we still have to learn about the economic forces that have dictated our past—and that will undoubtedly dictate our future.

About the Author

Dr. Donald J. Harreld is Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of History at Brigham Young University, where he has taught since 2001. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota in 2000. A specialist in the social and economic history of early modern Europe, Professor Harreld has twice been named an Alcuin fellow by Brigham Young University for excellence in teaching general education courses.

Product details

• Full Audiobook MP3 Program
• Full PDF Guidebook Included
• Listening Length: 24 hours and 25 minutes
• Author: Donald J. Harreld, The Great Courses
• Narrator: Donald J. Harreld
• Release Date: August 19, 2016
• Publisher: The Great Courses
• Version: Original recording
• Language: English
• ASIN B01K4ZMZJY

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Mathematics is filled with beautiful theorems that are as breathtaking as the most celebrated works of art, literature, or music. They are the Mona Lisas, Hamlets, and Fifth Symphonys of the field—landmark achievements that repay endless study and that are the work of geniuses as fascinating as Leonardo, Shakespeare, and Beethoven. Here is a sample:

• Pythagorean theorem: Although he didn’t discover the Pythagorean theorem about a remarkable property of right triangles, the Greek mathematician Euclid devised an ingenious proof that is a mathematical masterpiece. Plus, it’s beautiful to look at!
• Area of a circle: The formula for the area of a circle, A = π r², was deduced in a marvelous chain of reasoning by the Greek thinker Archimedes. His argument relied on the clever tactic of proof by contradiction not once, but twice.
• Basel problem: The Swiss mathematician Leonhard Euler won his reputation in the early 1700s by evaluating an infinite series that had stumped the best mathematical minds for a generation. The solution was delightfully simple; the path to it, bewilderingly complex.
• Larger infinities: In the late 1800s, the German mathematician Georg Cantor blazed the trail into the “transfinite” by proving that some infinite sets are bigger than others, thereby opening a strange new realm of mathematics.

You can savor these results and many more in Great Thinkers, Great Theorems, 24 half-hour lectures that conduct you through more than 3,000 years of beautiful mathematics, telling the story of the growth of the field through a carefully chosen selection of its most awe-inspiring theorems.

Approaching great theorems the way an art course approaches great works of art, the course opens your mind to new levels of math appreciation. And it requires no more than a grasp of high school mathematics, although it will delight mathematicians of all abilities.

Your guide on this lavishly illustrated tour, which features detailed graphics walking you through every step of every proof, is Professor William Dunham of Muhlenberg College, an award-winning teacher who has developed an artist’s eye for conveying the essence of a mathematical idea. Through his enthusiasm for brilliant strategies, novel tactics, and other hallmarks of great theorems, you learn how mathematicians think and what they mean by “beauty” in their work. As added enrichment, the course guidebook has supplementary questions and problems that allow you to go deeper into the ideas behind the theorems.

An Innovative Approach to Mathematics

Professor Dunham has been taking this innovative approach to mathematics for over a quarter-century—in the classroom and in his popular books. With Great Thinkers, Great Theorems you get to watch him bring this subject to life in stimulating lectures that combine history, biography, and, above all, theorems, presented as a series of intellectual adventures that have built mathematics into the powerful tool of analysis and understanding that it is today.

In the arts, a great masterpiece can transform a genre; think of Claude Monet’s 1872 canvas Impression, Sunrise, which gave the name to the Impressionist movement and revolutionized painting. The same is true in mathematics, with the difference that the revolution is permanent. Once a theorem has been established, it is true forever; it never goes out of style. Therefore the great theorems of the past are as fresh and impressive today as on the day they were first proved.

What Makes a Theorem Great?

A theorem is a mathematical proposition backed by a rigorous chain of reasoning, called a proof, that shows it is indisputably true. As for greatness, Professor Dunham believes the defining qualities of a great theorem are elegance and surprise, exemplified by these cases:

• Elegance: Euclid has a beautifully simple way of showing that any finite collection of prime numbers can’t be complete—that there is always at least one prime number left out, proving that the prime numbers are infinite. Dr. Dunham calls this one of the greatest proofs in all of mathematics.
• Surprise: Another Greek, Heron, devised a formula for triangular area that is so odd that it looks like it must be wrong. “It’s my favorite result from geometry just because it’s so implausible,” says Dr. Dunham, who shows how, 16 centuries later, Isaac Newton used algebra in an equally surprising route to the same result.

Great Thinkers, Great Theorems includes many lectures that are devoted to a single theorem. In these, Professor Dunham breaks the proof into manageable pieces so that you can follow it in detail. When you get to the Q.E.D.—the initials traditionally ending a proof, signaling quod erat demonstrandum (Latin for “that which was to be demonstrated”)—you can step back and take in the masterpiece as a whole, just as you would with a painting in a museum.

In other lectures, you focus on the biographies of the mathematicians behind these masterpieces—geniuses who led eventful, eccentric, and sometimes tragic lives. For example:

• Cardano: Perhaps the most bizarre mathematician who ever lived, the 16th-century Italian Gerolamo Cardano was a gambler, astrologer, papal physician, convicted heretic, and the first to publish the solution of cubic and quartic algebraic equations, which he did after a no-holds-barred competition with rival mathematicians.
• Newton and Leibniz: The battle over who invented calculus, the most important mathematical discovery since ancient times, pitted Isaac Newton—mathematician, astronomer, alchemist—against Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz— mathematician, philosopher, diplomat. Each believed the other was trying to steal the credit.
• Euler: The most inspirational story in the history of mathematics belongs to Leonhard Euler, whose astonishing output barely slowed down after he went blind in 1771. Like Beethoven, who composed some of his greatest music after going deaf, Euler was able to practice his art entirely in his head.
• Cantor: While Vincent van Gogh was painting pioneering works of modern art in France in the late 1800s, Georg Cantor was laying the foundations for modern mathematics next door in Germany. Unappreciated at first, the two rebels even looked alike, and both suffered debilitating bouts of depression.

Describing a common reaction to the theorems produced by these great thinkers, Professor Dunham says his students often want to know where the breakthrough ideas came from: How did the mathematicians do it? The question defies analysis, he says. “It’s like asking: ‘Why did Shakespeare put the balcony scene in Romeo and Juliet? What made him think of it?’ Well, he was Shakespeare. This is what genius looks like!” And by watching the lectures in Great Thinkers, Great Theorems, you will see what equivalent genius looks like in mathematics.

About the Author

Dr. William Dunham is the Truman Koehler Professor of Mathematics at Muhlenberg College in Allentown, Pennsylvania. He earned his undergraduate degree from the University of Pittsburgh and his M.S. and Ph.D. in Mathematics from The Ohio State University. Before his current appointment at Muhlenberg, Dr. Dunham taught at Hanover College in Indiana, receiving teaching awards from both institutions as well as the Award for Distinguished College or University Teaching from the Eastern Pennsylvania and Delaware Section of the Mathematical Association of America. He was a Visiting Professor at Ohio State and at Harvard University, where he was invited to teach an undergraduate course on the work of Leonhard Euler and to deliver the Clay Public Lecture in 2008. Dr. Dunham’s great theorems approach to teaching mathematics was fostered by a 1983 summer grant from the Lilly Endowment, which also led to his first book, Journey Through Genius: The Great Theorems of Mathematics-a Book-of-the-Month Club selection that has been translated into five languages. Other books followed in addition to articles on mathematics and its history, earning him numerous awards from the Mathematical Association of America and other organizations. He has presented popular talks on mathematics throughout the United States and has appeared on the BBC and NPR’s Talk of the Nation: Science Friday.

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Think about this: How would you address a group of two or more people? Would you say “you”, “you all”, “yous”, “you lot”, “y’all”, “you guys”, “you’uns”, “yinz”, or something else? Would that change depending on whom you were talking to or where you were? Your answers can provide revealing insights into who you are, where you grew up or live now, and your social, economic, and educational background.

Welcome to the enthralling world of linguistics. If you’ve ever been curious about how words like awesomesauce ever came to be, let alone made it into the Oxford English Dictionary, or if you’ve wondered why you say “firefly” and someone else calls the same insect a “lightning bug”, English in America is for you.

There’s an incredibly rich and colorful history behind American English. A profoundly diverse assortment of cultures has influenced our vocabulary, pronunciation, and grammar, and the language continues to grow and shift. Dialect variations are widespread and actually increasing, and the new words, accents, and sentence structures both reflect and shape changes in our culture and society. Investigating these dialects is the domain of sociolinguistics, the study of the intricate interrelation between language variation and cultural, interpersonal, and personal identity.

Over 24 lectures, you’ll encounter a wide range of ethnic and social groups that have shaped the course of the development of American English over the centuries: English speakers from all over the British Isles; speakers of West African languages; immigrants from Western and Eastern Europe; speakers of languages from Asia; and Spanish speakers from all over the world. In considering the contributions of these groups, you’ll also gain deep insights into the perceptions – and misperceptions – about language and dialect variation. As you’ll discover, American English is an umbrella term for many different EnglishES, reflecting who we have always been as a nation.

The ABCs of American Vocabulary: Absorbing, Borrowing, and Creating

Start by exploring the dialects of English in our first colonies, and learn how settlers adopted many Native American words for locations, foods, and more. As you travel through the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries, you’ll see how accents shifted, grammar changed, and new words were coined. These changes were often connected to the cultural, technological, and political phenomena of the time. You’ll delve into the early formative period of American English, when it was influenced by Spanish, French, and Dutch colonists as well as many Native American languages and the West African languages of slaves. You’ll also examine the effects of later immigration, as English speakers absorbed foreign words and sayings to add nuance, color, and expressiveness.

In addition to borrowing and adapting words from other cultures, the founding Americans were notorious for making words up simply to suit their needs—a creative exercise we still practice today. Benjamin Franklin created a plethora of words and phrases in order to describe his inventions, words that are now staples of our language, such as: battery, condenser, conductor, charge, plus, minus, electric shock, and electrician. Thomas Jefferson was credited with generating more than one hundred new words, including: electioneering, indecipherable, odometer, and belittle.

Some of these new words were Americanisms—a term coined by John Witherspoon and referring to words and word usages that became associated with America or the American experience—and often gained international recognition. Some Americanisms we now take for granted include:

• “raccoon” and “chipmunk,” based on adaptations of Native American words
• “backwoods” and “bifocal,” new words made up of existing English word stock, including what were originally bits of Latin
• “filibuster,” which appears to come from Dutch via French and Spanish influences

Americanisms were not always widely accepted, especially during the colonial era and the first decades of nationhood, as this period in history was rife with conflict over independence and identity. Even Witherspoon himself, who enjoyed collecting and documenting Americanisms, called some of the terms “improprieties and vulgarisms.” Acceptance grew as the American dialect became more stable and its speakers more confident.

English in America Becomes American English

Linguist Edgar Schneider has studied the historical development of a variety of English dialects around the world. He found that these dialects typically pass through similar stages of development, despite the very different end results. These five stages are:

• Foundation: The founders bring their dialects to the new location. There is dialect mixing among the founders and contact with indigenous languages in the new land.
• Exonormative Stabilization: Dialects continue to mix and speakers begin to creatively innovate, but they still look to the home country for norms.
• Nativization: Dialect mixing and borrowing from other languages continues, and there is an explosion of linguistic creativity that widens the gulf between the new dialect and the old world variety.
• Endonormative Stabilization: The dialect begins to set its own language standards, looking inward to create norms of usage, codified in dictionaries, grammars, and spelling books, rather than relying on those set by the ancestral country.
• Differentiation: As speakers of the dialect become secure in their linguistic identity, they can turn then their focus from presenting a united political and linguistic front, to considering their own intra-national cultural and linguistic diversity.

You’ll trace the arc of the development of American English through each of these stages, up to its current state—and projected future development. The Endonormative Stabilization stage is of particular interest to many people, as that period featured many pivotal advocates of American English whose works have become immortalized today: Noah Webster, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Walt Whitman, and Mark Twain, among others.

Noah Webster was a political activist and educational reformer as well as a lexicographer. He firmly believed that the separation of the United States from England required a “system of our own, in language as well as government,” which motivated him to publish dictionaries and spelling books of the English language that focused on American vocabulary, spellings, and usages. He advocated for spelling reforms such as dropping the “u” from the British spelling of words such as “color” and “labor,” as well as more straightforward spellings for words such as “tire.” Although he cataloged hundreds of new words and Americanisms, he himself claimed to contribute only one new entry: “demoralizing.”

The Influence of Ethnicity and Technology

Throughout the course, you’ll encounter a wide range of ethnic and social groups that have shaped the course of the development of American English over the centuries: English speakers from all over the British Isles; speakers of West African languages, who were enslaved; immigrants from western Europe, particularly Germans; people hailing from Eastern Europe; speakers of languages from Asia; and Spanish speakers from all over the world.

In considering the contributions of these groups, you’ll also gain deep insights into the perceptions—and misperceptions—about language and dialect variation. For example, when Americans hear a British accent, we might still think of the speaker as “better” than us: more educated, more cultured, or at least more linguistically adept. You’ll discover how often-changing beliefs about “proper” usages have been used to elevate some groups and discriminate against others. And you’ll take an in-depth look at how writers such as Mark Twain have used depictions of dialects to both perpetuate and dispel linguistic stereotypes, as well as to define and distinguish American literature. Twain in particular had an amazing ear for linguistic details and could capture the dialects of people of various regions, races, and classes without relying on exaggerated stereotypes.

Two ethnic dialects, African American English and Latino English, have been particularly stigmatized by speakers of other dialects. Contrary to common misconceptions, both of these dialects are governed by consistent and intricate rules and capably convey a rich variety and depth of expression. With time and cultural contact, stigma associated with ethnic dialects often diminishes; for example, Jewish American English has left a deep impact on General American English, especially its lexicon, and African American English is emulated by young people all over the world.

Throughout the 20th century in particular, advances in technology have left their mark on American English. Our methods of communication changed drastically with the advent and increasingly widespread use of radio, television, telephones, the Internet, and more. In many ways, this led to greater connections between diverse Americans, which would seemingly reduce the number of regional dialects. However, instead, new dialects and dialect features arose out of these advancements. Sometimes, as different people intercommunicate more frequently, the fear of loss of cultural distinctiveness serves to promote increasing dialect differentiation.

In leading you through these centuries of change, Professor Schilling is an engaging and authoritative guide. She specializes in the study of language variation and change in American English dialects, including regional, ethnic, and gender-based language varieties, and is the author and coauthor of three books that are standards in sociolinguistics. Bringing to bear her main expertise in stylistic variation (how and why individuals use different language styles as they shape and reshape personal, interpersonal, and group identities and relations), the concluding lectures take a penetrating look at modern dialects and where American English is heading.

As you’ll discover, American English is simply an umbrella term for many different EnglishES. This glorious linguistic variety reflects who we are, and have always been, as a nation: e puribus unum—out of many, one.

About the Author

Dr. Natalie Schilling is an Associate Professor of Linguistics and head of a research project at Georgetown University called Language and Communication in Washington, DC. She earned a doctorate in Linguistics from The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where she also received a bachelor’s degree in English, and she holds a master’s degree in English from North Carolina State University.

Dr. Schilling has appeared on a number of NPR programs, and has authored and contributed to articles in national publications. She is the author of Sociolinguistic Fieldwork, coauthor of American English: Dialects and Variation (third edition), and coeditor of The Handbook of Language Variation and Change (second edition). She has conducted forensic linguistic investigation of speaker profiling and authorship attribution, applying expertise in American English dialect variation to casework.

Dr. Schilling is keenly interested in American literature as well as American linguistics, especially in the works of Nathaniel Hawthorne, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Walt Whitman, and Mark Twain. She specializes in the study of language variation and change in American English dialects, including regional, ethnic, and gender-based language varieties. Dr. Schilling’s main expertise is stylistic variation: how and why individuals use different language styles as they shape and reshape personal, interpersonal, and group identities and relations.

Product details

• Full Audiobook MP3 Format
• Full PDF Guidebook Included
• Listening Length: 5 hours and 55 minutes
• Author: Natalie Schilling, The Great Courses
• Narrator: Natalie Schilling
• Release Date: February 05, 2016
• Publisher: The Great Courses
• Version: Original recording
• Language: English
• ASIN B01AYGHNCM

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