(Book). A Perfect Union of Contrary Things is the authorized biography of musician and vintner Maynard James Keenan. Co-author Sarah Jensen's 30-year friendship with Keenan gives her unique insight into his history and career trajectory. The book traces Keenan's journey from his Midwest childhood to his years in the Army to his time in art school, from his stint at a Boston pet shop to his place in the international spotlight and his influence on contemporary music and regional winemaking. A comprehensive portrayal of a versatile and dedicated artist, A Perfect Union of Contrary Things pays homage to the people and places that shaped the man and his art. Until now, Maynard's fans have had access to only an abridged version of his story. A Perfect Union of Contrary Things presents the outtakes, the scenes of disappointment and triumph, and the events that led him to take one step after the next, to change direction, to explore sometimes surprising opportunities. Included are sidebars in his own words, often humorous anecdotes that illuminate the narrative, as well as commentary by his family members, friends, instructors, and industry colleagues. The book also features a foreword by Alex Grey, an American visionary artist and longtime friend of Keenan. Accompanying the text are photos of Keenan from childhood to the present. Maynard's story is a metaphor for the reader's own evolution and an encouragement to follow one's dreams, hold fast to individual integrity, and work ceaselessly to fulfill our creative potential.
This book explores the relationship between space, subjectivity and property in order to invert conventional socio-legal understandings of property. Sarah Keenan demonstrates that new political possibilities for property may be unveiled by thinking about property in terms of space and belonging, rather than exclusion. Drawing on feminist and critical race theory, this book shifts focus away from the propertied subject and on to the broader spaces in and through which the propertied subject is located. Using case studies, such as analyses of compulsory leases under Australia’s Northern Territory Intervention and lesbian asylum cases from a range of jurisdictions, Keenan argues that these spaces consist of networks of relations that revolve around belonging: not just belonging between subject and object, as property is traditionally understood, but also the less explored relation of belonging between the part and the whole. This book therefore offers a conceptually useful way of analysing a wide range of socio-legal issues. It will be of relevance to those working in the area of property and legal geography, but also to those with more general interests in socio-legal studies, social and political theory, postcolonial studies, critical race studies and gender and sexuality studies.
In this collection of excerpts, enjoy a taste of Sarah Pekkanen’s captivating novels, including The Opposite of Me, Skipping a Beat, These Girls, and The Best of Us.
‘When was the last time you heard an all-girl band on the radio? Why don’t all-girl bands get attention they deserve?’ In Women Make Noise musicians, journalists, promoters and fans excavate the hidden story of the all-girl band: from country belles of the 20s–40s and girl groups of the 60s, to prog rock goddesses, women’s liberationists and punks of the 70s–80s; from riot grrrl activists and queercore anarchists of the 90s to radical protesters Pussy Riot and the most inspiring all-girl bands today. These aren’t the manufactured acts of some pop svengali, these groups write their own songs, play their own instruments and make music together on their own terms. All-girl bands have made radical contributions to feminism, culture and politics as well as producing some unique, influential and innovative music. It’s time to celebrate the outspoken voices, creative talents and gutsy performances of the all-girl bands who demand we take notice. Including commentary from members of the original 60s girl groups and classic punk-inspired outfits like The Raincoats and The Slits, as well as contemporary Ladyfest heroines like Beth Ditto, this timely exploration shows the world that sidelining all-girl bands is a major oversight. Contributions by Victoria Yeulet, Elizabeth K.Keenan, Sini Timonen, Jackie Parsons, Deborah Withers, Jane Bradley, Rhian E.Jones, Bryony Beynon, Val Rauzier, Elizabeth K. Keenan and Sarah Dougher This book is a celebration of girl bands in all genres: girl bands who make music on their own terms. With a unique focus on the talented girl bands of the past 50 years rather than casting female musicians in the typical solo ‘singer-songwriter’ mode. New perspectives on each genre – from 1960s Motown groups to 1970s prog rock and punk to 1980s protest music, 1990s queercore, riot grrrl and beyond – written by musicians, performers, journalists, promoters and fans. Contents Introducing the All-girl Band: Finding Comfort in Contradiction | Julia Downes 1. Female Pioneers in Old-time and Country Music | Victoria Yeulet 2. Puppets on a String? Girl Groups of the 50s and 60s | Elizabeth K. Keenan 3. Truth Gotta Stand: 60s Garage, Beat and 70s Rock | Sini Timonen 4. Prog Rock: A Fortress They Call ‘The Industry’ | Jackie Parsons 5. Feminist Musical Resistance in the 70s and 80s | Deborah Withers 6. You Create, We Destroy: Punk Women |Jane Bradley 7. Post-Punk: Raw, Female Sound | Rhian E. Jones 8. Subversive Pleasure: Feminism in DIY Hardcore | Bryony Beynon 9. Queercore: Fearless Women | Val Rauzier 10. Riot Grrrl, Ladyfest and Rock Camps for Girls | Elizabeth K. Keenan and Sarah Dougher Epilogue: Pussy Riot and the Future | Julia Downes Notes Bibliography Reviews “Tales of race riots, intimidation and abuse by male music fans and management, and inspiring moments of in-your-face activism provide fascinating background to some of your favourite bands (and many you’ve never heard of). The greatest strength of Women Make Noise is that many of the contributors were themselves part of the bands they are chronicling. These women offer up inspiring, funny and enraging stories of being radical activists and prolific musicians in a world that worked constantly to push them down.” – Gender Focus “Women Make Noise is a wonderful collection of essays, taking the reader from the days of Sassy country and Western women carving out a place in a horrendously sexist fledgeling music industry, all the way up to the Riot Grrrl movement of the 90s and beyond. Each chapter is written with such boundless enthusiasm for the subject matter that it’ll keep you enthralled until you drift slowly out of your comfort zone without even realising it. Read the book cover to cover, have your eyes opened, discover your next favourite band and perhaps think about the role of Women in music a little differently from now on.” – Intuition, review by Owen Chambers “Fascinating, diverse and, most importantly, inspiring – the title alone is as much a rallying cry as a joyous statement of the truth.” – Zoe Street Howe, author of Typical Girls? The Story of The Slits, and other music titles “It’s exhilarating to learn about different generations of female musicians from such diverse, strong voices.” – Kathleen Hanna, American singer, musician, artist, feminist activist, pioneer of the feminist punk riot grrrl movement “A very important and timely contribution to the debates about “women in rock”. All-girl bands have too often been written off as novelties, and this exciting book sheds new light on an under-researched area.” – Lucy O’Brien, author of She Bop: The Definitive History of Women in Rock, Pop and Soul
Large Language Models (LLMs) have emerged as a cornerstone technology, transforming how we interact with information and redefining the boundaries of artificial intelligence. LLMs offer an unprecedented ability to understand, generate, and interact with human language in an intuitive and insightful manner, leading to transformative applications across domains like content creation, chatbots, search engines, and research tools. While fascinating, the complex workings of LLMs -- their intricate architecture, underlying algorithms, and ethical considerations -- require thorough exploration, creating a need for a comprehensive book on this subject. This book provides an authoritative exploration of the design, training, evolution, and application of LLMs. It begins with an overview of pre-trained language models and Transformer architectures, laying the groundwork for understanding prompt-based learning techniques. Next, it dives into methods for fine-tuning LLMs, integrating reinforcement learning for value alignment, and the convergence of LLMs with computer vision, robotics, and speech processing. The book strongly emphasizes practical applications, detailing real-world use cases such as conversational chatbots, retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), and code generation. These examples are carefully chosen to illustrate the diverse and impactful ways LLMs are being applied in various industries and scenarios. Readers will gain insights into operationalizing and deploying LLMs, from implementing modern tools and libraries to addressing challenges like bias and ethical implications. The book also introduces the cutting-edge realm of multimodal LLMs that can process audio, images, video, and robotic inputs. With hands-on tutorials for applying LLMs to natural language tasks, this thorough guide equips readers with both theoretical knowledge and practical skills for leveraging the full potential of large language models. This comprehensive resource is appropriate for a wide audience: students, researchers and academics in AI or NLP, practicing data scientists, and anyone looking to grasp the essence and intricacies of LLMs.
Keenan & Riches' Business Law is well known and highly regarded as a reliable and practical guide to the law as it applies to the world of business. The text combines a solid academic reputation with clear language and practical features designed to assist the non-specialist, making it a favourite choice of students and professionals. The eleventh edition has been thoroughly updated to incorporate recent legal changes including the European Union Act 2011, the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Act 2011, the Fixed Term Parliaments Act 2011, the Equality Act 2010 and changes in financial regulation as it affects companies. References to treaty articles have been renumbered to reflect changes made by the Consolidated Version of the Treaty on European Union and the Treaty on the Functioning of the Union. The new edition also presents current proposals for reform in areas of business law such as aspects of the Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations, competition law, consumer rights and defamation.
Keenan & Riches' Business Law is well known and highly regarded as a reliable and practical guide to the law as it applies to the world of business. The text combines a solid academic reputation with clear language and practical features designed to assist the non-specialist, making it a favourite choice of students and professionals. The eleventh edition has been thoroughly updated to incorporate recent legal changes including the European Union Act 2011, the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Act 2011, the Fixed Term Parliaments Act 2011, the Equality Act 2010 and changes in financial regulation as it affects companies. References to treaty articles have been renumbered to reflect changes made by the Consolidated Version of the Treaty on European Union and the Treaty on the Functioning of the Union. The new edition also presents current proposals for reform in areas of business law such as aspects of the Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations, competition law, consumer rights and defamation.
Science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) subjects often fail to engage youth of Color, especially girls, by appearing to be unaligned with their everyday experiences and knowledge (Brotman & Moore, 2008). Makerspaces have been hailed as sites of possibility for engaging youth in STEM practices by encouraging an interest-driven approach to making work (Ryoo & Calabrese Barton, 2018); however, there is limited attention paid to how makerspaces can concretely take up issues surrounding equity in STEM. Understanding that fostering connections between STEM-rich making and youths' funds of knowledge (strategically developed skills, practices, knowledge that support youths' everyday well-being) may contribute to a restructuring of power around whose knowledge and experiences are valued in STEM. In this study I worked with three Black girls to examine how, when, and where their funds of knowledge influenced the STEM-rich making work they produced while participating in an after school, community-based makerspace program. Through the stories my youth co-researchers told and the analysis they supported, it became apparent that part of equitably engaging with STEM-rich making involves recognizing and welcoming their Discourses - ways of being, talking, valuing, interacting (Gee, 2008). These Discourses are embedded in the social and cultural histories of youth and helped explain the development and leveraging of youths' funds of knowledge. Discourses influenced how youth navigated the makerspace and opened space for youth to call upon their funds of knowledge in STEM-rich making.To work with youth in conceptualizing how they understood equitable making, we co-planned a making activity they understood as demonstrating design principles that open space for youth makers to bring their out-of-school expertise to bear on their STEM-rich making work. The design implications that arose from this activity demonstrate the importance youth assign to defining how STEM-rich making matters to them, offer suggestions about pushing against the culture of power that permeates education and STEM, and recommend that educators consider humanizing approaches to developing relationships with youth makers. This work shares youth-developed insights into how makerspace educators can cultivate a culture and activities that value youths' Discourse and funds of knowledge.
Ten all-new stories that celebrate our animal friends, by bestselling and award-winning authors. From Seeing Eye dogs to the cat who cuddles in your lap, animals are there for us in more ways than we can count. Helping us get through the day with a wag of the tail and a tilt of the head, they let us know that someone is on our side-no matter what. They also have an amazing ability to break down barriers between people; bringing families and loved ones closer, and giving strangers an excuse to strike up a conversation. In Tails of Love, each writer draws from her own unique perspective on our loyal friends--exploring the many mysterious ways they bring love into our lives. Featuring stories from New York Times bestselling authors Lori Foster and Stella Cameron, and Ann Christopher, Kate Angell, Marcia James, Dianne Castell, Donna MacMeans, Sarah McCarty, Patricia Sargeant, and Sue-Ellen Welfonder. A PORTION OF THE PROCEEDS FROM TAILS OF LOVE GOES TO THE ANIMAL ADOPTION FOUNDATION OF OHIO
Polyvagal Theory provides a breakdown of how the nervous system responds and reacts to unconscious messages of safety and threat. This accessible guide explores Polyvagal Theory and its potential for fully understanding and supporting the behaviours of children and young people in emotional distress at school. By exploring how early childhood experiences - such as abuse, trauma, an insecure attachment, or bereavement - can have a detrimental impact on the development of the child’s nervous system, we can view their behaviours in a new light. Polyvagal Theory in the Classroom: - Contains a wealth of activities to use in the classroom - Delves into new understandings of what is happening to children and young people when they become dysregulated - Introduces practical ways to support pupils' emotional wellbeing, promote better mental health, and help to develop their capacity to self-regulate - Contains exercises which provide opportunities for the reader to reflect on their own practice. Packed full of case studies to bring theory to life, this book builds skills to gain awareness and control of our own nervous systems and to become the safe and calm presence for the overwhelmed child. This empowering book is essential reading for mainstream primary and secondary teachers, SENCOs and teaching support staff.
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