Partners in Prayer: Advent

Each year the writers of “Partners in Prayer” lead you on a journey of prayer and reflection through the Advent season. This year author Erin Wathen invites you on a journey to the heart of wilderness, where the Christmas season isn't about shopping or cookie parties. Travel through weekly themes with biblical characters as companions and discover how God called them off the beaten path and into new life. Many criticize the "material, consumer-driven" holiday without mention of a better way. But there must be one. If so many founders of our faith sought God in wilderness and emerged in the light of new life, then we can, too. What will come of moving with intention, seeking a desertpath along the frantic highway?

Less than two years after its 2007 release, the iPhone revolutionized not only how people communicate with each other and the world, but also how they consume and produce culture. Combining traditional and social media with mobile connectivity, the iPhone and other smart phones have redefined as well as expanded the dimensions of everyday life, allowing individuals to personalize media as they move and process constant flows of data. Today, millions of consumers love and live by their iPhones, but what are the implications of its special technology on society, media, and culture? Featuring an eclectic mix of original essays, Moving Data explores the iPhone as technological prototype, lifestyle gadget, and platform for media creativity. Media experts, cultural critics, and scholars consider the device's newness and usability-especially its "lickability"-and its "biographical" story. Contributors provide ethnographic studies illuminating patterns of consumption; the fate of solitude against smartphone ubiquity; the economy of the app store and its perceived "crisis of choice;" and the distance between the accessibility of digital information and the protocols governing its use. Alternating between critical and conceptual analyses, essays link the design of participatory media to the iPhone's technological features and routines of sharing, and they follow the extent to which the pleasures of gesture-based interfaces are redefining traditional notions of media usage and sensory experience. They also consider how user-led innovations, collaborative mapping, and creative empowerment are understood and reconciled with changes in mobile surveillance, personal rights, and prescriptive social software. Presenting a range of perspective and argument, this collection reorients the practice and study of media critique.

Stretching from ancient times to the late medieval period, Traditional Japanese Literature spans both high and popular styles and contains key examples of poetry, drama, prose fiction, and essays. Its depth and breadth have made the anthology an indispensable resource for classroom and individual study. For this abridged edition, Shirane retains substantial excerpts from such masterworks as The Tale of Genji, The Tales of the Heike, The Pillow Book, Man'yoshu, and Kokinshu. He preserves his comprehensive survey of secular and religious anecdotes (setsuwa) as well as classical poems with extensive commentary. He features classic no drama; selections from influential war epics; and notable essays on poetry, fiction, history, and religion. Texts are interwoven, bringing common themes, styles, and allusions into sharp relief while inviting comparison and debate. The conscientious incorporation of well-known classics and lesser-known popular texts enables a rich encounter with classical and medieval Japanese culture and history, and each text and genre benefits from extensive introductions offering sociopolitical and cultural context. The anthology is divided by period, genre, and topic-an instructor friendly structure-and a comprehensive bibliography guides readers toward further study.