Social & Cultural History

That stately instruments might still be capable of making music in such a hostile landscape is nothing less than a miracle.The Lost Pianos of Siberia is a story about a piano hunt - a quixotic journey through two centuries of Russian history and nine time zones stretching across ...an eleventh of the world's land surface.
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In mid-winter, Matariki rises in the pre-dawn sky, and its observation is celebrated with incantations on hilltops at dawn, balls, exhibitions, dinners and a vast number of events. The Matariki tradition has been re-established, and its regeneration coincides with a growing inter...est in Maori astronomy. Still, there remain some unanswered questions about how Matariki was traditionally observed.
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In 1843, the New Zealand Company settlement of Nelson was rocked by the revolt of its emigrant labourers. By putting violence and class conflict at the centre, this fascinating microhistory upends the familiar image of colonial New Zealand.

In mid-winter, Matariki rises in the pre-dawn sky, and its observation is celebrated with incantations on hilltops at dawn, balls, exhibitions, dinners and a vast number of events. The Matariki tradition has been re-established, and its regeneration coincides with a growing inter...est in Maori astronomy.
Read more

Of all the many things humans rely on plants for, surely the most curious is our use of them to change consciousness- to stimulate, calm, or completely alter, the qualities of our mental experience. In This Is Your Mind On Plants, Michael Pollan explores three very different drug...s - opium, caffeine, and mescaline - and throws the fundamental strangeness of our thinking about them into sharp relief. Exploring and participating in the cultures that have grown up around these drugs, while consuming (or in the case of caffeine, trying not to consume) them, Pollan reckons with the powerful human attraction to psychoactive plants, and the equally powerful taboos. In a unique blend of history, science, memoir and reportage, Pollan shines a fresh light on a subject that is all too often treated reductively. In doing so, he proves that there is much more to say about these plants than simply debating their regulation, for when we take them into our bodies and let them change our minds, we are engaging with nature in one of the most profound ways we can. This ground-breaking and singular book holds up a mirror to our fundamental human needs and aspirations, the operations of our minds, and our entanglement with the natural world.
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