Here are 100 books that Missing Class fans have personally recommended if you like
Missing Class.
Book DNA is a community of 12,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.
Most travel books skate across the surface of the cultures they encounter. But as someone who has lived in a variety of places, studied the languages, and undergone a certain amount of acculturation, I feel like these books often miss the true strangeness and wonder of the world. The books here get at how things look different from inside another culture and language. The travel, in other words, not just to another country, but into another world.
This isn't normally shelved in travel, but I think of it that way, and it is definitely a book about culture and the power of the beliefs of those around us.
Buford was also an American living in England, as he plumbed the depth of soccer hooliganism. At once hilarious and terrifying, this is one of my all-time favorite books, and I will never get tired of rereading it.
The author of this book has spent most of his spare time "among the thugs", the hooligans whose violence scars the face of English football. He has written a work of investigative journalism and a meditation on the violence that lies just beneath the surface of English life.
A moving story of love, betrayal, and the enduring power of hope in the face of darkness.
German pianist Hedda Schlagel's world collapsed when her fiancé, Fritz, vanished after being sent to an enemy alien camp in the United States during the Great War. Fifteen years later, in 1932, Hedda…
James M. Jasper has written a number of books and articles on politics and social movements since the 1980s, trying to get inside them to see what participants feel and think. In recent years he has examined the many emotions, good and bad, involved in political engagement. He summarizes what he has learned in this short book, The Emotions of Protest, taking the reader step by step through the emotions that generate actions, to those that link us to groups, down to the emotional and moral impacts of social movements. The book is hopeful and inspiring but at the same time also clear-eyed about the limitations of protest politics.
Since ancient times people have gathered outdoors to celebrate all sorts of things, generating joy through dancing, marching, singing, and feasting. In the past most had some religious aura, but in the present, many are political gatherings, deeply satisfying ways of expressing moral visions. In this romp through history Ehrenreich shows us the sheer fun of political (and other) gatherings, which modern elites have tried hard to suppress.
From the bestselling social commentator and cultural historian comes Barbara Ehrenreich's fascinating exploration of one of humanity's oldest traditions: the celebration of communal joy
In the acclaimed Blood Rites, Barbara Ehrenreich delved into the origins of our species' attraction to war. Here, she explores the opposite impulse, one that has been so effectively suppressed that we lack even a term for it: the desire for collective joy, historically expressed in ecstatic revels of feasting, costuming, and dancing.
Ehrenreich uncovers the origins of communal celebration in human biology and culture. Although sixteenth-century Europeans viewed mass festivities as foreign and "savage," Ehrenreich…
James M. Jasper has written a number of books and articles on politics and social movements since the 1980s, trying to get inside them to see what participants feel and think. In recent years he has examined the many emotions, good and bad, involved in political engagement. He summarizes what he has learned in this short book, The Emotions of Protest, taking the reader step by step through the emotions that generate actions, to those that link us to groups, down to the emotional and moral impacts of social movements. The book is hopeful and inspiring but at the same time also clear-eyed about the limitations of protest politics.
Internal dynamics, especially decisionmaking, often become more important to protest groups than the impact they are having on the outside world. Through vivid cases in twentieth-century America, Polletta relates the internal and the external, showing that groups decide what to do and who they are -- strategy and identity -- at the same time. She is especially good on the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee of the early 1960s.
Freedom Is an Endless Meeting offers vivid portraits of American experiments in participatory democracy throughout the twentieth century. Drawing on meticulous research and more than one hundred interviews with activists, Francesca Polletta challenges the conventional wisdom that participatory democracy is worthy in purpose but unworkable in practice. Instead, she shows that social movements have often used bottom-up decision making as a powerful tool for political change.
Polletta traces the history of democracy in early labor struggles and pre-World War II pacifism, in the civil rights, new left, and women's liberation movements of the sixties and seventies, and in today's faith-based…
Sine, a professor of creative writing, accompanies Sam, a neuroscientist, on a conference trip to a Hotel Castle. Sam wants to present a new device, the "monitor." Sine hopes to recover from tending to her mother who just passed away.
When they arrive, Sine is in a dream-like state. Real…
James M. Jasper has written a number of books and articles on politics and social movements since the 1980s, trying to get inside them to see what participants feel and think. In recent years he has examined the many emotions, good and bad, involved in political engagement. He summarizes what he has learned in this short book, The Emotions of Protest, taking the reader step by step through the emotions that generate actions, to those that link us to groups, down to the emotional and moral impacts of social movements. The book is hopeful and inspiring but at the same time also clear-eyed about the limitations of protest politics.
Although a little older, this remains in my view the best book on the civil rights movement of the late 1950s and early 1960s, the heroic period of Dr. King and the student sit-ins. Born and raised in rural Mississippi during that time, Morris tells a rich story of the influence of religion: the songs, prayers, and scriptural references, but also the material resources such as churches to meet in, networks of preachers to spread information, and the conduit for funds to flow from more affluent Black communities to those battling on the frontline during the bloody fight for civil rights.
A “valuable, eye-opening work” (The Boston Globe) about the civil rights struggles of the 1950s and 1960s.
On December 1, 1955, in Montgomery, Alabama, Mrs. Rosa Parks, weary after a long day at work, refused to give up her bus seat to a white man…and ignited the explosion that was the civil rights movement in America. In this powerful saga, Morris tells the complete story behind the ten years that transformed America, tracing the essential role of the black community organizations that was the real power behind the civil rights movement. Drawing on interviews with more than fifty key leaders,…
I was born in Toronto, yet spent formative years in Atlanta during the height of the civil rights movement. My family shared values dedicated to social justice and actively working against discrimination. Yet at times, I endured antisemitic jokes and name-calling while observing the parents of my “friends” using racist and hateful language toward Black people. We moved to the Seattle area where I later studied political science at the University of Washington, then earned a master’s degree in organizational leadership from the City University of Seattle. For 20+ years, I led global teams at Microsoft and Amazon.
This book opened a whole new world to me and tapped into my passion and thirst to understand the diversity of our world. I read this classic book early in my career, and it inspired a learning journey that continues to this very day. I still have my original paperback copy, which I dog-eared, tabbed, and highlighted throughout.
I found Hofstede’s book an easily consumable read that explains the differences in people and cultures from countries around the world in a manner everyone can relate.
The revolutionary study of how the place where wegrew up shapes the way we think, feel, and act--with new dimensions and perspectives
Based on research conducted in more than seventy countries over a forty-year span,Cultures and Organizations examines what drives people apart-when cooperationis so clearly in everyone's interest. With major new contributions from MichaelMinkov's analysis of data from the World Values Survey, as well as an account ofthe evolution of cultures by Gert Jan Hofstede, this revised and expanded edition:
Reveals the "moral circles" from which national societiesare built and the unexamined rules by which people think,feel, and act
Explores…
I’ve been a soldier, designer, educator, farmer, and remain a philosopher and writer. I defy the classification of being either practical or theoretic. I have worked on environmental issues for over thirty years, including urban, post-conflict, and climate change projects in Australia, the Americas, Asia, and Europe. I have written over twenty books on design, cities, conflict, and politics. I am driven to understand the complexity of the world in which I live and, thereafter, act based on the knowledge gained–my book list reflects this passion for knowledge, and my life evidences a commitment to act.
Working between cultures, as I do, I have been reading the Sinologist François Jullien for many years. I like how he traces the passage of an idea across cultures as they reveal tensions between the same and the different. The question Jullien poses with this book is, “Are universal values possible,” especially between the East and the West?
Although a common concept may exist, this does not mean a common meaning does. In my experience, we all communicate constantly, oscillating between understanding and misunderstanding, which is more so when cultural differences occur.
The once-read, never forgotten Wittgenstein statement: ‘The limits of my language mean the limits of my world,’ ever resonates–I believe language mediates all sensory experience, but often inadequately.
Francois Jullien, the leading philosopher and specialist in Chinese thought, has always aimed at building on inter-cultural relations between China and the West. In this new book he focuses on the following questions: Do universal values exist? Is dialogue between cultures possible?
To answer these questions, he retraces the history of the concept of the universal from its invention as an aspect of Roman citizenship, through its neutralization in the Christian idea of salvation, to its present day manifestations. This raises the question of whether the search for the universal is a uniquely Western preoccupation: do other cultures, like China,…
In an age of splendor, a heretic king strips Egypt bare—forcing his queen to quell rebellion and plunging his children into a conspiracy against the crown.
Salvation in the Sun follows Nefertiti as she ascends the throne beside Pharaoh Amenhotep—soon to become Akhenaten—just as he declares war on Egypt’s ancient…
My plan to write my book clicked after I bought an apple grown in New Zealand, 10,000 miles away from my home in Ohio. How did it make sense that we could buy apples so cheaply from so far away? What was the carbon footprint of that one transaction? Growing up in Michigan in the 1970s and 1980s, I had seen our industrial cities decay as trade globalized. Later I watched with horror as global financial markets crashed in 2008. With these experiences in mind, I wanted to write about both the benefits and the costs of globalization—and about its ethics—for religious communities like mine. So I did.
Friedman, a longtime New York Times foreign affairs columnist, was one of the first to show me what I should love and hate about globalization, circa 1999, at the peak of Western support for neoliberal globalization.
Although his gee-whiz, gung-ho enthusiasm for the world of the Lexus (high-tech globalization with global supply chains and integrated financial markets) sometimes wears thin, he also covers the problems caused by globalization. He even appeals to the need for the “olive trees” of community, family, and religion to make globalization ethical.
Even when the breezy tone annoys me, this book is still my go-to guide for mapping the effects of globalization on business, economics, politics, culture, and the environment.
A brilliant investigation of globalization, the most significant socioeconomic trend in the world today, and how it is affecting everything we do-economically, politically, and culturally-abroad and at home.
As foreign affairs columnist for The New York Times, Thomas L. Friedman crisscrosses the globe talking with the world's economic and political leaders, and reporting, as only he can, on what he sees. Now he has used his years of experience as a reporter and columnist to produce a pithy, trenchant, riveting look at the worldwide market forces that are driving today's economies and how they are playing out both internationally and…
I was born in Quebec, have lived in eleven countries, and speak four languages. In my 20+ years as an author and journalist, my goal has always been to create bridges between cultures and to tell stories that enable individuals to better understand each other. For me, a trip to a new country, no matter how short or long, is incomplete unless I’ve had the chance to meet locals.
"The
first person you meet when you travel abroad is yourself.”
I was very happy to
discover this self-help book (way back in 2004) on how to deal with ‘the other’
when traveling or living in a foreign culture. It’s a classic in its approach
to understanding the people you meet abroad.
Our impressions of other people
always start with our own expectations and beliefs of what is right and proper.
This book helps us understand our own biases in the process of trying to
understand the locals.
This is the first book to take a unique psychological approach to intercultural interactions. The author helps the sojourner to examine his or her own personality traits, both strengths and weaknesses, and how these characteristics may improve one's ability to communicate effectively in a different culture. Most expatriate placements are made on the basis of technical ability to do the job and the candidates circumstances and willingness to relocate. Apart from overseas development organisations, candidate selection that has any specific focus on intercultural aptitude is the exception rather than the rule. In either case, both the development worker and the…
22 years ago, I called my local LGBTQ+ organization and asked if I could volunteer. I knew nothing about the LGBTQ+ communities but felt strongly about LGBTQ+ rights and inclusion. I ended up working at that agency for 15 years and learning a ton about how to be an effective ally, but in the beginning, I really could have used a good guidebook. I ended up writing a guidebook for LGBTQ+ allies. Now, I’m seeking guidebooks with actionable tips for allies to other communities. The books listed here are the best ones I’ve found so far. Be the change!
Honestly, I’ve been searching for a book like the one I wrote (i.e., a guidebook for allies to the LGBTQ+ communities) only around the issue of race, and I’ve been struggling to find one.
This book by Ijeoma Oluo came the closest for me. Although it’s less of a guidebook and more of a book of essays on race in America, Ijeoma Oluo does a great job of weaving in practical tips for allyship using a tone of kindness, forgiveness, and respect, which I really appreciate.
n So You Want to Talk About Race, editor-at-large of The Establishment Ijeoma Oluo offers a contemporary, accessible take on the racial landscape in America, addressing head-on such issues as privilege, police brutality, intersectionality, micro-aggressions, the Black Lives Matter movement, and the "N" word. Perfectly positioned to bridge the gap between people of color and white Americans struggling with race complexities, Oluo answers the questions readers don't dare ask, and explains the concepts that continue to elude everyday Americans.
Oluo is an exceptional writer with a rare ability to be straightforward, funny, and effective in her coverage of sensitive, hyper-charged…
Born the heir of a master woodcutter in a queendom defined by guilds and matrilineal inheritance, nonbinary Sorin can’t quite seem to find their place. At seventeen, an opportunity to attend an alchemical guild fair and secure an apprenticeship with the…
I’ve been fascinated by different cultures since I was 14 years old growing up in inner-city Chicago. My passion has given me a curious quest to travel the world and learn about different cultures. My friends have a tagline for me which is ‘From the Hood to Hanoi and All the Stops In Between’ because of my international teaching in Vietnam. As an adult who is now an international professor, sought-out global trainer, and cultural subject matter expert, my passion has increased for bringing an awareness to a broader audience about the beauty of diverse friendships.
This book ties in so closely with what I believe about the beauty of diverse friendships if we allow ourselves to come out of our comfort zones to truly connect with people heart-to-heart.
When I read this book it really affirms what I believe, that it is really possible to heal racial divides through humility, listening, and a willingness to connect with a person from a diverse background that we would have never thought possible.
We can heal our communities--one friendship at a time.
Everyone wants to do something to improve race relations, but many of us don't know where to start. In Life-Changing Cross-Cultural Friendships, lifelong friends Gary Chapman and Clarence Shuler will show you how. Through important lessons they have learned, you will learn how to begin and grow authentic friendships across racial and ethnic barriers.
Each chapter will guide you toward deeper understanding of what it takes to foster cross-cultural friendships. These powerful lessons include:
How to overcome the fear of developing cross-cultural friendships
How to differentiate true friends from mere acquaintances…
