検索キーワード： 大衆文化

At more than 100 million user accounts created and over $10 billion made, it is not only the most-subscribed MMORPG in the world, but the highest-grossing video game of all time. Ten years after its launch, Blizzard Entertainment's World of Warcraft is less a game and more a world unto itself, and it's a world Daniel Lisi knows well. More time in his high school years was spent in Azeroth than in his hometown of Irvine, California—a home he happened to share with Blizzard itself.

Nestled in the Caucasus Mountains at the crossroads of Europe and Asia, Georgia plays a geopolitical role far greater than its size would suggest. Its strategic location has been both a blessing and a curse, however. Once a battlefield of the Christian and Muslim worlds, today it is caught between its EU aspirations and its location in Russia’s backyard.

Professor of Classics Peter Meineck traces Marvel’s lineage back to its earliest roots at the dawn of human culture. Using Marvel’s most beloved heroes (and antiheroes), such as Spider-Man and Deadpool, Meineck demonstrates how ancient themes continue to appear in our stories today and reintroduces characters like Achilles and Odysseus from Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey.

In The Evolving Brain, evolutionary neuroscientist Paul Goldsmith reveals the reason why we feel this way - our brains are fundamentally no different to those of the very first humans. They evolved to help us survive our environment of millions of years ago, and since then the world around us has changed faster than our brains could ever hope to. Many of the issues we face in our daily lives stem from this mismatch - we are using an ancient tool to navigate our complex modern lives.

One of Maya Rupert’s earliest memories was learning how to be inauthentic. That performance—the ability to make white people feel comfortable about race—has brought her everything from safety to success. As the third Black woman in history to run a presidential campaign, she soon realized that there was no room among society’s expectations for our real selves. In The Real Ones, Rupert reveals that for some, inauthenticity is necessary for survival.

A lifelong gamer and a renowned video games journalist, Keza MacDonald digs down to Nintendo’s experimental roots, tracking the company’s rise with each new revolutionary product and exploring the driving force of these creative triumphs (and occasional failures!): Nintendo’s willingness to take risks, to place long-term goals over short-term profits.

Since the dawn of time, punctuality has been a scam. You rush to get ready for an event, only to discover that your pants have a hole in them, there’s a chance of rain, and the train is skipping your stop, so now the fastest method is a $100 rideshare to go 2 miles. And for what? To arrive “on time” rather than “whenever I want”? Enough is enough. In Colored People Time, Manny Fidel bravely confronts this injustice head-on, arguing that until America reaches genuine racial equity, people of color are allowed—nay, encouraged—to be late to anything they want.

Currently chaired by Andy Zaltzman, The News Quiz is the topical panel quiz show that takes its questions from the week's news stories. This bundle collection includes all three series from 2025, presenting hilarious and topical panels of some of Britain’s best known faces.

The best, the fastest, the hippest and the most unorthodox account ever published of the US presidential electoral process in all its madness and corruption. In 1972 Hunter S. Thompson, the creator and king of Gonzo journalism, covered the US presidential campaign for Rolling Stone magazine alongside the establishment newsmen of Washington. The result is a classic piece of subversive reportage and a fantastic ride on the rollercoaster of Hunter’s uniquely savage imagination.

In June of 1952, German publishing tycoon Axel Springer was sending a new paper to print: a four-page broadsheet that almost ready, save for a narrow blank on the second page. With minutes to spare, Springer commissioned a one-block cartoon of a petite blonde with a predilection for rich men. That blonde was named “Lilli.” But in a span of seven short years, she would be reborn in plastic, across an ocean, and under a different name: Barbara Millicent Roberts.

Bigger Than Fashion is about the relentless rise of streetwear; it’s a captivating story of how a fiercely guarded counterculture, full of iconoclasts and hustlers, was disregarded until it skyrocketed into a massively influential lifestyle and fashion movement worth billions of dollars. Streetwear was built on the fusion of subcultures, unflinching DIY ethos, and a fiery sense of community that attracted everyone from skaters and hip-hop heads to punks and graffiti artists.

Over the past twenty-five years, pop culture has suffered from a perplexing lack of reinvention. We’ve entered a cultural “blank space”—an era when reboots, rehashes, and fads flourish, while bold artistic experimentation struggles to gain recognition. Why is risk no longer rewarded, and how did playing it safe become the formula for success? Acclaimed cultural historian W. David Marx sets out to uncover the answers.

With the 2024 reelection of Donald Trump, it has become impossible to deny that male supremacy is America’s chief value system. To deny this is to ignore the root cause of democratic crises here and all over the Western world. And denial undermines our ability to resist and overcome. With her trademark “skill, wit, and sharp insight” (Laura Bates, author of Girl Up), Soraya Chemaly walks us through how we got to this moment of terrible backlash while also offering hope to a better, more equitable future for men and women.

The explosion of glee and sympathy for Luigi surprised everyone, but it was everywhere. Hours after the shooting of the United Healthcare executive, his company put out a message out on Facebook saying their “hearts go out to Brian’s family and all who were close to him.” People replied with laughing emojis and comments like this one: “No one here is the judge of who deserves to live or die. That’s the job of the AI algorithm the insurance company designed to maximize profits on your health.”

Scrutinized in life, mythologized in death, Tupac Shakur remains a subject of immense cultural significance and speculation nearly thirty years after his murder. Despite a multitude of books, documentaries, and even a feature film, much about Tupac’s story remains shrouded and misunderstood. Like many icons who died tragically young, Tupac the man has long been obscured—his edges sanded down, his complexity numbed—by the competing agendas that surround his legacy.

In Meet Me at Luke’s, you can expect to find a treasure trove of insights, anecdotes, and life lessons drawn from the show's rich tapestry of relationships, small-town charm, and the enduring bond between a mother and daughter. With a warm stroll through the characters' lives and loves, the book explores how their world can enrich our own.

Culture Smart! Peru introduces you to the changing realities of modern Peru. It describes contemporary values and attitudes, key customs and traditions, and reveals what people are like at home, in business, and in their social lives. Peruvians are outgoing, sociable, and laid-back; get to know them, and they will respond with warmth and generosity.

Jane Birkin was synonymous with chic. Her effortless style and artistic legacy have been immortalized through her music and film career. And, of course, she was the inspiration behind one of the world’s most coveted bags, the Hermès Birkin. But who was the real woman behind the it girl? Now, New York Times bestselling author Marisa Meltzer sheds new light on Birkin’s enigmatic life and explores her profound influence on generations in a rigorously reported biography unlike any other.

In early 1960’s Palo Alto, Jerry Garcia randomly opened a dictionary to a fable in which an appreciative soul repays the generosity of a traveler by delivering him a fortune, a “gift of the grateful dead.” After a traumatic car accident that injured him and killed a close friend, Garcia had recently resolved to build the life he wanted, which meant making music. He had practiced relentlessly and caromed across the northern California folk and bluegrass scene, gathered up some fellow musicians and formed a band. Now they had their name.

In The Wicked Witch of the West: The Enduring Legacy of a Feminist Icon, Lona Bailey explores the radical feministic undertones of one of the most enduring characters in popular culture. This book traces her transformation over the past century, highlighting how she has evolved through countless adaptations from The Wizard of Oz to the film adaptation of Wicked while maintaining her core identity as a powerful, defiant figure.