Cultural and media studies Books

Mad at the modern world? Meet Mark Dapin ... your new best friend Modern life: advertorials, obscenely cheerful breakfast tV hosts, celebrity chefs, call centres, smiling charity collectors. Brands, highly effective people, misuses of the word...

the new book from the author of In Bed with Jocasta and the Dag's Dictionary. Meet Richard, the original desperate husband, and his partner, the fabulous but formidable Jocasta. And say hello to their teenage offspring - the teutonic Batboy and his...

The highs and lows of being a reporter in some of the strangest, most dysfunctional places on Earth. Award-winning foreign correspondent Eric Campbell has been stoned by fundamentalists, captured by US Special Forces, arrested in Serbia and threatened...

An icon of Australian life. An inspiring story of success. the uncensored life story of John Singleton: his mates, his women, his larrikin ways. Kerry Packer calls him one of the few men he would trust with a handshake. Four of his ex-wives still think...

We like to think that we live in an age of reason and rationality, that uncertainty and the unknown have largely been eliminated by technology and science. But it seems that we have nagging doubts. Continually, we tell each other odd tales about ankle...

When the family finds it hilarious that you've been talked into buying a pair of women's jeans and you're a bloke; when the bathroom floor you've laboured over starts to rise and the toilet begins to talk; when the mystery of keeping children's...

America is no longer a country but a multimillion-dollar brand, says Kalle Lasn and his fellow "culture jammers". The founder of Adbusters magazine, Lasn aims to stop the branding of America by changing the way information flows; the way institutions...

The nightly news and conventional wisdom tell us that things are bad and getting worse. Yet despite dire predictions, scientists see many good things on the horizon. John Brockman, publisher of Edge (www.edge.org), the influential online salon,...

An incisive, hard-hitting and utterly compelling expose of media, powerful mates and multimillion-dollar deals that reads like a thriller. "Not since The Latham Diaries came out in 2005 has a book delivered so many scoops, insights and revelations into...

A selection of stories from shearers in South Australia, New South Wales and Queensland.In late 1999, Bill 'Swampy' Marsh began to collect shearing stories. When he was interviewed by ABC Radio broadcaster Colin Munro on SUMMER ALL OVER, dozens of people...

Be More Barbie! For generations, Barbie has inspired women around the world. From the first Barbie doll released in 1959 to the pop-culture moment and huge box office success of the Barbie movie in 2023. She has been a doctor, a lawyer, a pilot, an...

Bat, Ball and Field is a wonderful foray into the history and culture of cricket.‘Hotten is not just good, he is one of the best’ Cricketer Chronicling the evolution of the sport since its earliest years, highlighting transcendent moments as well as...

Ticket to the World is a joyous, nostalgic celebration of 80s culture from one man at the centre of it all. New Year’s Eve, 1979. My family and I stand arm in arm around our Formica kitchen table, counting down to the new decade with each televised...

A family cookbook full of beloved Murray favorites, from celebrated chef and owner of the Caddyshack restaurant in Florida, Andy Murray. With lots of stories, snapshots, and a Foreword from celebrated actor and Andy’s older brother, Bill Murray...

Oh Cook! is a foolproof manual packed with practical information and delicious recipes for even the most basic of home cooks. If, like James May, the sight of the kitchen strikes fear into your very heart and you can’t identify a spatula from a fish...

The motorcycle can lay claim as the most influential form of mobility becoming the embodiment of liberation and rebellion; never more so than in the 50s and 60s with the era of rockers, ton-up boys, the 59 Club and cafe racing. My Cool Motorcycle...

My Cool Campervan celebrates a new wave of interest in modern-retro campervans.  Join Jane Field-Lewis and Chris Haddon as they set off on a 3500-mile trip to locate campervans and proud owners, sharing their memories of family holidays...

Offences, outrages and other observations - the best of Bob Jones. Each week Bob Jones reaches from the pages of the NZ Herald to deliver an upper cut to the foibles, foolishness and outright fatuousness of contemporary life. In this unexpurgated...

A fascinating food safari through our rural communities where we meet Australia's premier food producers who share their knowledge and more than 80 recipes with us. This book is drawn from the popular ABC Rural Radio show 'The Cold Esky Challenge'. the...

A one of a kind book which provides a look into the closed world of the Vatican in Rome from the perspective of the first Australian Ambassador to the Holy See, Tim Fischer As the first Australian Ambassador to the Holy See tim Fischer is is the unique...

tHE CULtURE CLUB puts the history of art and philosophy through a shredder, throws the remains in a plastic bag with a torn-up copy of last month's ROLLING StONE and some old tV guides, tips everything out on the floor and glues the pieces where they...

Get the facts, not the spin, in this compelling new book from the ABC's FACT CHECK team. Does halal certification fund terrorism as Pauline Hanson claims? Is there an ice epidemic in Australia? How many election promises has the government...

A fascinating, funny and thought-provoking account of one woman's quest to live her 'best life' according to Oprah's advice for a year. My One-Year Experiment to Walk the Walk of the Queen of talk 'Shhh ... listen carefully. ?If you're very quiet, you...

Truth or dare? Bored with their suburban existence, Mum A, Mum B and Mum C - the Anonymums - prove that sometimes a dash of spice, two good friends and ripping all the hair from your body (dare number three) is all you need to get you back on track. ...

New York Times, Spin, and Vanity Fair contributor Marc Spitz explores the first great cultural movement since Hip Hop: an old-fashioned and yet highly modern aesthetic that’s embraced internationally by teens, twenty and thirty-somethings and even some...

New York Magazine proclaims, "Twitter is the hot web company right now...the Next Big Thing;" the New York Times calls it "one of the fastest-growing phenomena on the Internet;" Time magazine claims "Twitter is on its way to becoming the next killer...

Highly unorthodox questions and answers about life after life from America's most delightful mediumConcetta Bertoldi has been communicating with the "Other Side" since childhood. In her previous book, the bestselling Do Dead People Watch You Shower,...

Discover all there is to know about MrBeast and become his biggest fan! 100% Unofficial MrBeast is packed with his record-breaking challenges, the coolest collaborations, and his greatest giveaways. Whether you’re already a MrBeast subscriber or are...

• Supported by the National Trust • Quirky and fascinating facts about Britain’s favourite subject – the weather. • Includes all sorts of weird and wonderful weather words from around the country. • Supercharge your small talk, never be stuck for...

New York Times bestselling author Michael Arceneaux returns with a hilarious collection of essays about making your voice heard in an increasingly noisy and chaotic world.In his books I Can't Date Jesus and I Don't Want to Die Poor, Michael Arceneaux...

In 1881, a writer in the Saturday Review called tattooing ‘an art without a history’. ‘No-one’, it went on, ‘has made it the business of his life to study the development of tattooing.’ Until now. Painted People is a beguiling and intimate look at an...

New York Times and USA Today BestsellerViral sensation and Emmy Award-winner Leslie Jordan regales fans with entertaining stories about the odd, funny, and unforgettable events in his life in this unmissable essay collection that echoes his droll,...

SHORTLISTED for the Baillie Gifford Prize’s 25th Anniversary Winner of Winners awardWINNER OF THE BAILLIE GIFFORD PRIZE 2020A Spectator Book of the Year • A Times Book of the Year • A Telegraph Book of the Year • A Sunday Times Book of the Year From the...

Fifty savvy skills for outdoor adventurers. This trusty guide teaches you all the essential skills you need to survive in the wild, from building a shelter to making a fire. Forest school practitioner Richard Skrein shares his expertise and enthusiasm...

An enlightening narrative history—an entertaining fusion of Tom Wolfe and Michael Pollan—that traces the colorful origins of once unconventional foods and the diverse fringe movements, charismatic gurus, and counterculture elements that brought them to...

An eye-opening and intimate look into the lonely, sad and nightmarish lives left behind celebrity suicides, Death Becomes Them covers twenty subjects ranging from Sylvia Plath to Ian Curtis, from Vincent van Gogh to Abbie Hoffman, and Diane Arbus to...

From the author of the internationally bestselling Kosher Sex. A wake-up call about the growing trend of misogyny in our culture-as evidenced by the flood of reality TV shows, ads, and lyrics that portray women as brainless bimbos, or worse Shmuley...

From burlesque show to fashion runway, magazine cover to Internet video, fashion icon and “burlesque superheroine” (Vanity Fair) Dita Von Teese has undergone more strokes of red lipstick, bursts of hair spray, boxes of blue-black hair dye and pats of...