The Past as Present
Forging Contemporary Identities Through History
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Buy for $17.70
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Manisha Sethi
-
By:
-
Romila Thapar
About this listen
Understanding our past is of critical importance to our present. Many popularly held views about the past need to be critically inquired into before they can be taken as historical. For instance, what was the aftermath of the raid on the Somanatha temple? Which of us is Aryan or Dravidian? Why is it important for Indian society to be secular? When did communalism as an ideology gain a foothold in the country? How and when did our patriarchal mindset begin to support a culture of violence against women? Why are the fundamentalists so keen to rewrite history textbooks?
The answers to these and similar questions have been disputed and argued about ever since they were first posed. Distinguished historian Romila Thapar has investigated, analyzed and interpreted the history that underlies such questions throughout her career; now, in this book, through a series of incisive essays she argues that it is of critical importance for the past to be carefully and rigorously explained, if the legitimacy of our present, wherever it derives from the past, is to be portrayed as accurately as possible. This is especially pertinent given the attempts by unscrupulous politicians, religious fundamentalists and their ilk to try and misrepresent and willfully manipulate the past in order to serve their present-day agendas.
An essential and necessary book at a time when sectarianism, bogus 'nationalism' and the muddying of historical facts are increasingly becoming a feature of our public, private and intellectual lives.
Romila Thapar is one of the most important indian academics writing today. Well-researched and thoroughly accessible, this volume is sure to become essential listening for those interested in Indian history and religion. It includes her experience of writing history textbooks for school, analysis of ancient history and interpretations of the epics, and the role history plays in contemporary politics.
©2014 Romila Thapar (P)2016 Audible, Inc.Listeners also enjoyed...
-
An Autobiography
- The Story of My Experiments with Truth
- By: Mohandas - Mahatma K. Gandhi
- Narrated by: Bill Wallace
- Length: 18 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A holy man to Hindus, a hero to Muslims, and a criminal to the British, Mohandas K. Gandhi was an inspiring figure of the 20th century, a man whose quest to live in accord with God’s highest truth led him to initiate massive campaigns against racism, violence, and colonialism.
-
-
Narration disappointment
- By Antonia on 06-23-11
-
Identity and Violence
- The Illusion of Destiny
- By: Amartya Sen
- Narrated by: Steven Crossley
- Length: 7 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this sweeping philosophical work, Amartya Sen proposes that the murderous violence that has riven our society is driven as much by confusion as by inescapable hatred. Challenging the reductionist division of people by race, religion, and class, Sen presents an inspiring vision of a world that can be made to move toward peace as firmly as it has spiraled in recent years toward brutality and war.
By: Amartya Sen
-
Rebels Against the Raj
- Western Fighters for India's Freedom
- By: Ramachandra Guha
- Narrated by: Vidish Athavale
- Length: 18 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Rebels Against the Raj tells the story of seven people who chose to struggle for a country other than their own: foreigners to India who across the late 19th to late 20th century arrived to join the freedom movement fighting for independence from British colonial rule.
-
-
Excellent, but would have benefited from more context
- By Jack Ruskin on 03-11-23
By: Ramachandra Guha
-
The Autobiography of Malcolm X
- As Told to Alex Haley
- By: Malcolm X, Alex Haley
- Narrated by: Laurence Fishburne
- Length: 16 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Experience a bold take on this classic autobiography as it’s performed by Oscar-nominated Laurence Fishburne. In this searing classic autobiography, originally published in 1965, Malcolm X, the Muslim leader, firebrand, and Black empowerment activist, tells the extraordinary story of his life and the growth of the Human Rights movement. His fascinating perspective on the lies and limitations of the American dream and the inherent racism in a society that denies its non-White citizens the opportunity to dream, gives extraordinary insight into the most urgent issues of our own time.
-
-
it's Nearly perfect
- By Kerry on 09-16-20
By: Malcolm X, and others
-
The Bhagavad Gita
- By: Eknath Easwaran
- Narrated by: Paul Bazely
- Length: 8 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Bhagavad Gita, "The Song of the Lord", is the best known of all the Indian scriptures, and Easwaran's reliable and accessible version has consistently been the best-selling translation. Easwaran's introduction places the Gita in its historical setting and brings out the universality and timelessness of its teachings. Chapter introductions give clear explanations of key concepts in that chapter.
-
-
Content and narration reduced me to tears
- By Lauriesland on 01-11-16
By: Eknath Easwaran
-
Development as Freedom
- By: Amartya Sen
- Narrated by: Byron Wagner
- Length: 11 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
By the winner of the 1988 Nobel Prize in Economics, an essential and paradigm-altering framework for understanding economic development - for both rich and poor - in the 21st century. Freedom, Sen argues, is both the end and most efficient means of sustaining economic life and the key to securing the general welfare of the world's entire population. Releasing the idea of individual freedom from association with any particular historical, intellectual, political, or religious tradition, Sen clearly demonstrates its current applicability and possibilities.
-
-
The book that launched a field
- By Bryan on 06-07-12
By: Amartya Sen
-
An Autobiography
- The Story of My Experiments with Truth
- By: Mohandas - Mahatma K. Gandhi
- Narrated by: Bill Wallace
- Length: 18 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A holy man to Hindus, a hero to Muslims, and a criminal to the British, Mohandas K. Gandhi was an inspiring figure of the 20th century, a man whose quest to live in accord with God’s highest truth led him to initiate massive campaigns against racism, violence, and colonialism.
-
-
Narration disappointment
- By Antonia on 06-23-11
-
Identity and Violence
- The Illusion of Destiny
- By: Amartya Sen
- Narrated by: Steven Crossley
- Length: 7 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this sweeping philosophical work, Amartya Sen proposes that the murderous violence that has riven our society is driven as much by confusion as by inescapable hatred. Challenging the reductionist division of people by race, religion, and class, Sen presents an inspiring vision of a world that can be made to move toward peace as firmly as it has spiraled in recent years toward brutality and war.
By: Amartya Sen
-
Rebels Against the Raj
- Western Fighters for India's Freedom
- By: Ramachandra Guha
- Narrated by: Vidish Athavale
- Length: 18 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Rebels Against the Raj tells the story of seven people who chose to struggle for a country other than their own: foreigners to India who across the late 19th to late 20th century arrived to join the freedom movement fighting for independence from British colonial rule.
-
-
Excellent, but would have benefited from more context
- By Jack Ruskin on 03-11-23
By: Ramachandra Guha
-
The Autobiography of Malcolm X
- As Told to Alex Haley
- By: Malcolm X, Alex Haley
- Narrated by: Laurence Fishburne
- Length: 16 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Experience a bold take on this classic autobiography as it’s performed by Oscar-nominated Laurence Fishburne. In this searing classic autobiography, originally published in 1965, Malcolm X, the Muslim leader, firebrand, and Black empowerment activist, tells the extraordinary story of his life and the growth of the Human Rights movement. His fascinating perspective on the lies and limitations of the American dream and the inherent racism in a society that denies its non-White citizens the opportunity to dream, gives extraordinary insight into the most urgent issues of our own time.
-
-
it's Nearly perfect
- By Kerry on 09-16-20
By: Malcolm X, and others
-
The Bhagavad Gita
- By: Eknath Easwaran
- Narrated by: Paul Bazely
- Length: 8 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Bhagavad Gita, "The Song of the Lord", is the best known of all the Indian scriptures, and Easwaran's reliable and accessible version has consistently been the best-selling translation. Easwaran's introduction places the Gita in its historical setting and brings out the universality and timelessness of its teachings. Chapter introductions give clear explanations of key concepts in that chapter.
-
-
Content and narration reduced me to tears
- By Lauriesland on 01-11-16
By: Eknath Easwaran
-
Development as Freedom
- By: Amartya Sen
- Narrated by: Byron Wagner
- Length: 11 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
By the winner of the 1988 Nobel Prize in Economics, an essential and paradigm-altering framework for understanding economic development - for both rich and poor - in the 21st century. Freedom, Sen argues, is both the end and most efficient means of sustaining economic life and the key to securing the general welfare of the world's entire population. Releasing the idea of individual freedom from association with any particular historical, intellectual, political, or religious tradition, Sen clearly demonstrates its current applicability and possibilities.
-
-
The book that launched a field
- By Bryan on 06-07-12
By: Amartya Sen
-
The Anarchy
- The Relentless Rise of the East India Company
- By: William Dalrymple
- Narrated by: Sid Sagar
- Length: 15 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Anarchy tells the remarkable story of how one of the world’s most magnificent empires disintegrated and came to be replaced by a dangerously unregulated private company, based thousands of miles overseas in one small office, five windows wide, and answerable only to its distant shareholders. In his most ambitious and riveting audiobook to date, William Dalrymple tells the story of the East India Company as it has never been told before, unfolding a timely cautionary tale of the first global corporate power.
-
-
excellent book but awkward narration
- By TexasVC on 02-25-20
-
Power and Progress
- Our Thousand-Year Struggle over Technology and Prosperity
- By: Daron Acemoglu, Simon Johnson
- Narrated by: Malcolm Hillgartner
- Length: 15 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Throughout history, technological change — whether it takes the form of agricultural improvements in the Middle Ages, the Industrial Revolution, or today’s artificial intelligence — has been viewed as a main driver of prosperity, working in the public interest. The reality, though, is that technology is shaped by what powerful people want and believe, generating riches, social respect, cultural prominence, and further political voice for those already powerful. For most of the rest of us, there is the illusion of progress.
-
-
A different take on Technology’s impact
- By Ricardo Ernst on 07-23-23
By: Daron Acemoglu, and others
-
Peter the Great
- His Life and World
- By: Robert K. Massie
- Narrated by: Frederick Davidson
- Length: 43 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This superbly told story brings to life one of the most remarkable rulers––and men––in all of history and conveys the drama of his life and world. The Russia of Peter's birth was very different from the Russia his energy, genius, and ruthlessness shaped. Crowned co-Tsar as a child of ten, after witnessing bloody uprisings in the streets of Moscow, he would grow up propelled by an unquenchable curiosity, everywhere looking, asking, tinkering, and learning, fired by Western ideas.
-
-
Narrater ruins everything
- By BrendaLouQuilts on 12-30-11
By: Robert K. Massie
-
Gandhi Before India
- By: Ramachandra Guha
- Narrated by: Derek Perkins
- Length: 23 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Ramachandra Guha takes us from Gandhi's birth in 1869 through his upbringing in Gujarat, his two years as a student in London, and his two decades as a lawyer and community organizer in South Africa. Guha has uncovered myriad previously untapped documents, including private papers of Gandhi's contemporaries. Using this wealth of material in an exuberant, brilliantly nuanced and detailed narrative, Guha describes the social, political, and personal worlds inside of which Gandhi began the journey that would earn him the honorific Mahatma: "Great Soul".
-
-
Somewhat repetitive and lacking
- By freehope on 03-10-21
By: Ramachandra Guha
-
Rome and Persia
- The Seven Hundred Year Rivalry
- By: Adrian Goldsworthy
- Narrated by: Mark Elstob
- Length: 20 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Roman empire was like no other. Stretching from the north of Britain to the Sahara, and from the Atlantic coast to the Euphrates, it imposed peace and prosperity on an unprecedented scale. Its only true rival lay in the east, where the Parthian and then Persian empires ruled over great cities and the trade routes to mysterious lands beyond. Tracing seven centuries of conflict between Rome and Persia, historian Adrian Goldsworthy shows how these two great powers evolved together
-
-
MAPS NEEDED
- By David on 12-29-23
-
Children of Ash and Elm
- A History of the Vikings
- By: Neil Price
- Narrated by: Samuel Roukin
- Length: 17 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Viking Age - from 750 to 1050 saw an unprecedented expansion of the Scandinavian peoples into the wider world. As traders and raiders, explorers and colonists, they ranged from eastern North America to the Asian steppe. But for centuries, the Vikings have been seen through the eyes of others, distorted to suit the tastes of medieval clerics and Elizabethan playwrights, Victorian imperialists, Nazis, and more. None of these appropriations capture the real Vikings, or the richness and sophistication of their culture.
-
-
Outstanding
- By Than on 10-06-20
By: Neil Price
-
Gandhi
- The Years That Changed the World, 1914-1948
- By: Ramachandra Guha
- Narrated by: Derek Perkins
- Length: 36 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This volume opens with Mohandas Gandhi's arrival in Bombay in January 1915 and takes us through his epic struggles over the next three decades. In reconstructing Gandhi's life and work, author Ramachandra Guha has drawn on 60 different archival collections. Using this wealth of material, Guha creates a portrait of Gandhi and of those closest to him that illuminates the complexity inside his thinking, his motives, his actions, and their outcomes as he engaged with every important aspect of social and public life in the India of his time.
-
-
Well researched and heart touching
- By M Umar Khan on 02-01-21
By: Ramachandra Guha
-
How to Hide an Empire
- A History of the Greater United States
- By: Daniel Immerwahr
- Narrated by: Luis Moreno
- Length: 17 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
We are familiar with maps that outline all 50 states. And we are also familiar with the idea that the United States is an "empire", exercising power around the world. But what about the actual territories - the islands, atolls, and archipelagos - this country has governed and inhabited? In How to Hide an Empire, author Daniel Immerwahr tells the fascinating story of the United States outside the United States. In crackling, fast-paced prose, he reveals forgotten episodes that cast American history in a new light.
-
-
How to beat a straw man to death
- By Susan on 01-25-20
By: Daniel Immerwahr
-
Inglorious Empire
- What the British Did to India
- By: Shashi Tharoor
- Narrated by: Shashi Tharoor
- Length: 10 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the 18th century, India's share of the world economy was as large as Europe's. By 1947, after two centuries of British rule, it had decreased six-fold. Beyond conquest and deception, the Empire blew rebels from cannons, massacred unarmed protesters, entrenched institutionalized racism, and caused millions to die from starvation. British imperialism justified itself as enlightened despotism for the benefit of the governed, but Shashi Tharoor takes on and demolishes this position, demonstrating how every supposed imperial "gift" was designed in Britain's interests alone.
-
-
An entertaining and provocative history
- By James Moseley on 01-07-20
By: Shashi Tharoor
-
The WEIRDest People in the World
- How the West Became Psychologically Peculiar and Particularly Prosperous
- By: Joseph Henrich
- Narrated by: Korey Jackson
- Length: 19 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In The WEIRDest People in the World, Joseph Henrich draws on cutting-edge research in anthropology, psychology, economics, and evolutionary biology to explore these questions and more. He illuminates the origins and evolution of family structures, marriage, and religion, and the profound impact these cultural transformations had on human psychology. Mapping these shifts through ancient history and late antiquity, Henrich reveals that the most fundamental institutions of kinship and marriage changed dramatically under pressure from the Roman Catholic Church.
-
-
Lots of mispronounced words
- By Phillip Falk on 10-24-20
By: Joseph Henrich
-
India: A Wounded Civilization
- By: V. S. Naipaul
- Narrated by: Sam Dastor
- Length: 6 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1975, at the height of Indira Gandhi’s “Emergency”, V. S. Naipaul returned to India, the country his ancestors had left 100 years earlier. Out of that journey he produced this concise masterpiece: a vibrant, defiantly unsentimental portrait of a society traumatized by centuries of foreign conquest and immured in a mythic vision of its past.
-
-
Insightful & informative!
- By Kindle Customer on 05-03-24
By: V. S. Naipaul
-
Orientalism
- By: Edward Said
- Narrated by: Peter Ganim
- Length: 19 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This landmark book, first published in 1978, remains one of the most influential books in the Social Sciences, particularly Ethnic Studies and Postcolonialism. Said is best known for describing and critiquing "Orientalism", which he perceived as a constellation of false assumptions underlying Western attitudes toward the East. In Orientalism Said claimed a "subtle and persistent Eurocentric prejudice against Arabo-Islamic peoples and their culture."
-
-
We're lucky to have this on audio
- By Delano on 02-27-13
By: Edward Said
Related to this topic
-
The Chalice and the Blade
- Our History, Our Future
- By: Riane Eisler
- Narrated by: Riane Eisler
- Length: 2 hrs and 52 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Riane Eisler believes that war and the "war of the sexes" are concepts neither divinely nor biologically ordained. Join the author as she reconstructs a prehistoric culture based on partnership rather than domination and traces the roots of the global shift to patriarchy. Eisler, an acclaimed scholar, futurist, and activist, also presents new scripts for living based on a more socially, economically, ecologically, personally, and spiritually balanced society. This script is in direct opposition to the tension and violence typical of what she calls the dominator model. Her vision is the partnership model, which today is struggling to reemerge. This program is an important contribution to that struggle.
-
-
the chalice and the blade
- By Anne on 07-25-08
By: Riane Eisler
-
Culture and Imperialism
- By: Edward Said
- Narrated by: Peter Ganim
- Length: 19 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A landmark work from the intellectually auspicious author of Orientalism, this book explores the long-overlooked connections between the Western imperial endeavor and the culture that both reflected and reinforced it. This classic study, the direct successor to Said's main work, is read by Peter Ganim ( Orientalism).
-
-
BRAVO, AUDIBLE!! WE NEED MORE SAID!! REAL BOOKS!!
- By AnthonyStevens on 02-27-11
By: Edward Said
-
The Faith Instinct
- How Religion Evolved and Why It Endures
- By: Nicholas Wade
- Narrated by: Alan Sklar
- Length: 12 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For at least the last fifty thousand years, and probably much longer, people have practiced religion. Yet little attention has been given, either by believers or atheists, to the question of whether this universal human behavior might have an evolutionary basis. Did religion evolve, in other words, because it helped people in early societies survive?
-
-
If you're religious or into religion read this
- By Adam on 08-16-10
By: Nicholas Wade
-
Battling the Gods
- Atheism in the Ancient World
- By: Tim Whitmarsh
- Narrated by: James Langton
- Length: 10 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Long before the European Enlightenment and the Darwinian revolution, which we often take to mark the birth of the modern revolt against religious explanations of the world, brave people doubted the power of the gods. Religion provoked skepticism in ancient Greece, and heretics argued that history must be understood as a result of human action rather than divine intervention. They devised theories of the cosmos based on matter and notions of matter based on atoms.
-
-
We have a history as long and as rich as any relig
- By Glencannnon on 08-13-19
By: Tim Whitmarsh
-
From Babel to Dragomans
- Interpreting the Middle East
- By: Bernard Lewis
- Narrated by: William Neenan
- Length: 23 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Bernard Lewis is recognized around the globe as one of the leading authorities on Islam. Hailed as "the world's foremost Islamic scholar" (Wall Street Journal), as "a towering figure among experts on the culture and religion of the Muslim world" (Baltimore Sun), and as "the doyen of Middle Eastern studies" (New York Times), Lewis is nothing less than a national treasure, a trusted voice that politicians, journalists, historians, and the general public have all turned to for insight into the Middle East.
-
-
Fifty Years Of Good Stuff
- By David on 04-10-15
By: Bernard Lewis
-
Why You Think the Way You Do
- The Story of Western Worldviews from Rome to Home
- By: Glenn S. Sunshine
- Narrated by: Patrick Lawlor
- Length: 8 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Why You Think the Way You Do traces the development of the worldviews that underpin the Western world. Professor and historian Glenn S. Sunshine demonstrates the decisive impact that the growth of Christianity had in transforming the outlook of pagan Roman culture into one that—based on biblical concepts of humanity and its relationship with God—established virtually all the positive aspects of Western civilization.
-
-
"Christian's view of the western world"
- By Bradley on 03-21-10
-
The Chalice and the Blade
- Our History, Our Future
- By: Riane Eisler
- Narrated by: Riane Eisler
- Length: 2 hrs and 52 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Riane Eisler believes that war and the "war of the sexes" are concepts neither divinely nor biologically ordained. Join the author as she reconstructs a prehistoric culture based on partnership rather than domination and traces the roots of the global shift to patriarchy. Eisler, an acclaimed scholar, futurist, and activist, also presents new scripts for living based on a more socially, economically, ecologically, personally, and spiritually balanced society. This script is in direct opposition to the tension and violence typical of what she calls the dominator model. Her vision is the partnership model, which today is struggling to reemerge. This program is an important contribution to that struggle.
-
-
the chalice and the blade
- By Anne on 07-25-08
By: Riane Eisler
-
Culture and Imperialism
- By: Edward Said
- Narrated by: Peter Ganim
- Length: 19 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A landmark work from the intellectually auspicious author of Orientalism, this book explores the long-overlooked connections between the Western imperial endeavor and the culture that both reflected and reinforced it. This classic study, the direct successor to Said's main work, is read by Peter Ganim ( Orientalism).
-
-
BRAVO, AUDIBLE!! WE NEED MORE SAID!! REAL BOOKS!!
- By AnthonyStevens on 02-27-11
By: Edward Said
-
The Faith Instinct
- How Religion Evolved and Why It Endures
- By: Nicholas Wade
- Narrated by: Alan Sklar
- Length: 12 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For at least the last fifty thousand years, and probably much longer, people have practiced religion. Yet little attention has been given, either by believers or atheists, to the question of whether this universal human behavior might have an evolutionary basis. Did religion evolve, in other words, because it helped people in early societies survive?
-
-
If you're religious or into religion read this
- By Adam on 08-16-10
By: Nicholas Wade
-
Battling the Gods
- Atheism in the Ancient World
- By: Tim Whitmarsh
- Narrated by: James Langton
- Length: 10 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Long before the European Enlightenment and the Darwinian revolution, which we often take to mark the birth of the modern revolt against religious explanations of the world, brave people doubted the power of the gods. Religion provoked skepticism in ancient Greece, and heretics argued that history must be understood as a result of human action rather than divine intervention. They devised theories of the cosmos based on matter and notions of matter based on atoms.
-
-
We have a history as long and as rich as any relig
- By Glencannnon on 08-13-19
By: Tim Whitmarsh
-
From Babel to Dragomans
- Interpreting the Middle East
- By: Bernard Lewis
- Narrated by: William Neenan
- Length: 23 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Bernard Lewis is recognized around the globe as one of the leading authorities on Islam. Hailed as "the world's foremost Islamic scholar" (Wall Street Journal), as "a towering figure among experts on the culture and religion of the Muslim world" (Baltimore Sun), and as "the doyen of Middle Eastern studies" (New York Times), Lewis is nothing less than a national treasure, a trusted voice that politicians, journalists, historians, and the general public have all turned to for insight into the Middle East.
-
-
Fifty Years Of Good Stuff
- By David on 04-10-15
By: Bernard Lewis
-
Why You Think the Way You Do
- The Story of Western Worldviews from Rome to Home
- By: Glenn S. Sunshine
- Narrated by: Patrick Lawlor
- Length: 8 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Why You Think the Way You Do traces the development of the worldviews that underpin the Western world. Professor and historian Glenn S. Sunshine demonstrates the decisive impact that the growth of Christianity had in transforming the outlook of pagan Roman culture into one that—based on biblical concepts of humanity and its relationship with God—established virtually all the positive aspects of Western civilization.
-
-
"Christian's view of the western world"
- By Bradley on 03-21-10
-
Orientalism
- By: Edward Said
- Narrated by: Peter Ganim
- Length: 19 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This landmark book, first published in 1978, remains one of the most influential books in the Social Sciences, particularly Ethnic Studies and Postcolonialism. Said is best known for describing and critiquing "Orientalism", which he perceived as a constellation of false assumptions underlying Western attitudes toward the East. In Orientalism Said claimed a "subtle and persistent Eurocentric prejudice against Arabo-Islamic peoples and their culture."
-
-
We're lucky to have this on audio
- By Delano on 02-27-13
By: Edward Said
-
A Concise History of Buddhism
- From 500 BCE-1900 CE
- By: Andrew Skilton
- Narrated by: Jinananda
- Length: 8 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Andrew Skilton - Senior Research Fellow in Buddhist Studies, Kings College, London - explains the development of the basic concepts of Buddhism and its spread across the continents during its 2,500 years of history. He begins with a close look at Buddhism in India, where it flourished until the 12th/13th century CE, charting the growth of different schools and practices. By the time it disappeared from its homeland midway through the millennium, it had become established in Central Asia and the Far East in a variety of forms.
-
-
Difficult for the indoctrinated
- By Heavypen on 04-18-18
By: Andrew Skilton
-
The Lies That Bind
- Rethinking Identity
- By: Kwame Anthony Appiah
- Narrated by: Kwame Anthony Appiah
- Length: 7 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
We all know how identities - notably, those of nationality, class, culture, race, and religion - are at the root of global conflict, but the more elusive truth is that these identities are created by conflict in the first place. In provocative, entertaining chapters, Kwame Anthony Appiah interweaves keen-edged argument with engrossing historical tales and reveals the tangled contradictions within the stories that define us.
-
-
Not full of SJW nonsense
- By Frank on 10-22-18
-
In Defense of History
- By: Richard J. Evans
- Narrated by: Julian Elfer
- Length: 7 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Richard J. Evans shows us how historians manage to extract meaning from the recalcitrant past. To materials that are frustratingly meager, or overwhelmingly profuse, they bring an array of tools that range from agreed-upon rules of documentation to the critical application of social and economic theory, all employed with the aim of reconstructing a verifiable, usable past. Evans defends this commitment to historical knowledge from the attacks of postmodernist critics who deny the possibility of achieving any kind of certain knowledge about the past.
-
-
Enlightening
- By David A on 07-03-18
By: Richard J. Evans
-
The Twilight of the American Enlightenment
- The 1950s and the Crisis of Liberal Belief
- By: George M. Marsden
- Narrated by: William Hughes
- Length: 6 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the aftermath of World War II, the United States stood at a precipice. The forces of modernity unleashed by the war had led to astonishing advances in daily life, but technology and mass culture also threatened to erode the country's traditional moral character. As award-winning historian George M. Marsden explains in The Twilight of the American Enlightenment, postwar Americans looked to the country's secular liberalelites for guidance in this precarious time, but these intellectuals proved unable to articulate a coherent common cause by which America could chart its course.
-
-
Such a relevant book to our current world
- By Adam Shields on 09-14-16
-
The Next Christendom
- The Coming of Global Christianity
- By: Philip Jenkins
- Narrated by: Robert Feifar
- Length: 12 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this new and substantially expanded Third Edition, Philip Jenkins continues to illuminate the remarkable expansion of Christianity in the global South - in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Drawing upon the extensive new scholarship that has appeared on this topic in recent years, he asks how the new Christianity is likely to affect the poor, among whom it finds its most devoted adherents. How should we interpret the enormous success of prosperity churches across the Global South? Politically, what will be the impact of new Christian movements?
-
-
Be aware that the audio book is an old edition
- By GANC Line on 04-20-18
By: Philip Jenkins
-
A History of Judaism
- By: Martin Goodman
- Narrated by: Derek Perkins
- Length: 23 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Judaism is one of the oldest religions in the world, and it has preserved its distinctive identity despite the extraordinarily diverse forms and beliefs it has embodied over the course of more than three millennia. A History of Judaism provides the first truly comprehensive look in one volume at how this great religion came to be, how it has evolved from one age to the next, and how its various strains, sects, and traditions have related to each other.
-
-
Not easy to follow.
- By Max on 03-12-19
By: Martin Goodman
-
Ibn Khaldun
- An Intellectual Biography
- By: Robert Irwin
- Narrated by: John Telfer
- Length: 9 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Ibn Khaldun (1332-1406) is generally regarded as the greatest intellectual ever to have appeared in the Arab world - a genius who ranks as one of the world's great minds. Yet the author of the Muqaddima, the most important study of history ever produced in the Islamic world, is not as well known as he should be, and his ideas are widely misunderstood. In this groundbreaking intellectual biography, Robert Irwin provides an engaging and authoritative account of Ibn Khaldun's extraordinary life, times, writings, and ideas.
-
-
Issues with accuracy, pronounciation
- By Moh 3aly on 01-02-19
By: Robert Irwin
-
Democracy
- A Life
- By: Paul Cartledge
- Narrated by: Paul Hodgson
- Length: 13 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Ancient Greece first coined the concept of democracy, yet almost every major ancient Greek thinker - from Plato and Aristotle onward - was ambivalent toward or even hostile to democracy in any form. The explanation for this is quite simple: The elite perceived majority power as tantamount to a dictatorship of the proletariat. In ancient Greece, there can be traced not only the rudiments of modern democratic society but the entire Western tradition of antidemocratic thought.
-
-
Great Listen!
- By Timothy on 06-01-21
By: Paul Cartledge
-
Slavery and Islam
- By: Jonathan A.C. Brown
- Narrated by: Christopher Lane
- Length: 14 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
What happens when authorities you venerate condone something you know is wrong? What does this mean about what you’ve been venerating? No issue brings this question into starker contrast than slavery. Every major religion and philosophy condoned or approved of it, but in modern times there is nothing seen as more evil. Americans confront this crisis of authority when they erect statues of Founding Fathers who slept with their slaves. And Muslims faced it when ISIS revived sex slavery, justifying it with verses from the Quran and the practice of Muhammad.
-
-
A Bold and Broad Study of a Difficult Topic
- By Rob Squires on 02-21-20
-
World-Systems Analysis: An Introduction
- A John Hope Franklin Center Book
- By: Immanuel Wallerstein
- Narrated by: Fred Filbrich
- Length: 4 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In World-Systems Analysis, Immanuel Wallerstein provides a concise and accessible introduction to the comprehensive approach that he pioneered 30 years ago to understanding the history and development of the modern world. Since Wallerstein first developed world-systems analysis, it has become a widely utilized methodology within the historical social sciences and a common point of reference in discussions of globalization.
-
-
Uneven, but Ambitious
- By Logical Paradox on 08-27-14
-
The Lost History of Christianity
- The Thousand-Year Golden Age of the Church --- and How It Died
- By: Philip Jenkins
- Narrated by: Dick Hill
- Length: 10 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Lost History of Christianity will change how we understand Christian and world history. Leading religion scholar Philip Jenkins reveals a vast Christian world to the east of the Roman Empire and how the earliest, most influential churches of the East---those that had the closest link to Jesus and the early church---died. In this paradigm-shifting book, Jenkins recovers a lost history, showing how the center of Christianity for centuries used to be the Middle East, Asia, and Africa, extending as far as China.
-
-
Worthwhile with caveats
- By Telorast on 03-05-13
By: Philip Jenkins
What listeners say about The Past as Present
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Jean Burke-Spraker
- 01-08-22
Excellent introduction to Indian historiography
Romila Thapar writes cogently and succinctly about the major historiographical issues driving popular ideas about Indian history. From the Aryan invasion myth to the dating of the Indian epics to the position of women in Indian society, the range and depth of her scholarship is staggering. The narrative by Manisha Sethi is a perfect pace for this well argued treatise.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!