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The Invention of Yesterday
A 50,000-Year History of Human Culture, Conflict, and Connection
Contributors
By Tamim Ansary
Formats and Prices
- On Sale
- Oct 1, 2019
- Page Count
- 448 pages
- Publisher
- PublicAffairs
- ISBN-13
- 9781610397964
Price
$35.00Price
$46.00 CADFormat
Format:
- Hardcover $35.00 $46.00 CAD
- ebook $17.99 $22.99 CAD
- Audiobook Download (Unabridged)
- Trade Paperback $21.99 $28.99 CAD
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“Terrific… Tamim Ansary explores the underappreciated ways that empires, nations, and smaller sets of people have responded to their surroundings, influenced one another, and developed stories that give their lives meaning.” ―San Francisco Chronicle
Fifty thousand years ago, we roamed the world as countless autonomous bands of hunter-gatherers, each one telling itself a story of the world with itself at the center. We used narratives to organize for survival and explain the unfathomable, and these stories evolved into the bases for cultures, empires, and civilizations. When disparate narratives collided, the encounters produced everything from confusion, chaos, and war to cultural efflorescence, religious awakenings, and intellectual breakthroughs.
Traveling across millennia and cultures, The Invention of Yesterday illuminates our propensity to invent a shared symbolic universe, and argues that world history is a narrative we’re constantly inventing.
Genre:
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“Ansary offers a remarkable big-picture synthesis that draws upon geography but resists determinism and celebrates diversity while embracing humanity's commonalities.”Booklist
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“Terrific… Tamim Ansary explores the underappreciated ways that empires, nations and smaller sets of people have responded to their surroundings, influenced one another and developed stories that give their lives meaning.”San Francisco Chronicle
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“A well-written and valuable take on the diverse narratives that have shaped human history.”Kirkus
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“Chatty, breezy, and capacious.”Publishers Weekly
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“A beautifully written world history focused on the stories different civilizations have told about who we are. It ends with a fundamental question: In today’s extraordinary world, can we build new narratives that are inclusive and global enough to encourage worldwide cooperation in the task of building a better future for humanity?”David Christian, author of Origin Story
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“Brimming with essential insights and yet always approachable, this is the global history we need now.”Lynn Hunt, author of Inventing Human Rights
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“Tamim Ansary has done it again, writing an expansive, wonderfully readable account of our present world. With deft examples drawn from across history, he skewers the idea that there’s anything pure about culture or race. Ideas have blended and meshed across space and time to make the modern world what it is. Ansary is a charming guide to this Blesh of Civilizations, and to the world’s permanent—and hopeful—capacity for change.”Raj Patel, author of Stuffed and Starved
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“Weaving together multiple complex strands of the human experience into a single compelling storyline, Ansary delivers—in his usual down-to-earth yet erudite style—an engaging global ‘narrative of narratives’ informed by decades of critical study, reflection, and personal transcultural experience. A deeply enriching, highly relevant read from an important, unique voice of our day.”R. Charles Weller, Washington State University and Kazakh National University
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“The Invention of Yesterday is an insightful guide into human civilization packed with information that shows how we have been connected globally since the beginning of history. Tamim Ansary unpacks complicated theories to make sense of how we became who we are today.”Fariba Nawa, author of Opium Nation
