Can you please recommend some books on daily life, home life, and general society in the UK and the US in the 1840s - 1880s for me? I already have What Jane Austen Ate, and What Charles Dickens Knew and An Elegant Madness. It doesn't have to be specifically on daily life- creative nonfiction like Larson's The Devil in the White City or Johnson's The Ghost Map are awesome, too.
posted by headspace on Feb 16, 2009 - 13 answers

Looking for a history of Iceland... [more inside]
posted by heylight on Jan 3, 2009 - 4 answers

What are the reasons for and against constitutionally requiring a specific national language? [more inside]
posted by netbros on Aug 28, 2008 - 74 answers

Books about anthropology, psychology, sociology, modern rituals...I think. Can you point me in the right direction? [more inside]
posted by lhall on Dec 20, 2007 - 11 answers

When I was younger, I read a sociology textbook trying to find out why sociology was treated as a separate discipline and how it differs fundamentally from the other social sciences. I learned a lot about Weber and Durkheim, but I still don't get it. Can you help? [more inside]
posted by StrikeTheViol on Sep 11, 2007 - 12 answers

What sites might you visit, books might you read, etc., to research writing a western? [more inside]
posted by kittens for breakfast on Jul 3, 2007 - 21 answers

Gravity/Life/SocietyFilter: So the Earth is all lumpy, with more or less gravity in some places. Has anyone ever corroborated it with life/social/world things? Many questions inside... [more inside]
posted by amberglow on Feb 18, 2006 - 33 answers

In the U.S., we get all caught up in the decisions that adult women make and the consequences of those decisions. (To have children, not to have children, to work, to stay home with the children, not to work, to marry, to have children without marrying, etc.) Are there similar convulsions about these cultural issues in other countries, especially non-English speaking ones? How can I learn about them? I'm curious both about how women's roles in in their societies are changing and about how those societies are reacting to the changes.
posted by croutonsupafreak on Nov 30, 2005 - 6 answers

Do you think you are a smarter person than the average upper-middle class person of 300 years ago? [more inside]
posted by ashbury on Jun 7, 2005 - 37 answers

Has data ever been assembled showing the religous convictions of Americans over time, starting at the countries conception? A sort of compendium of the religious history of the United States... It seems as though such a thing should certainly exist, but I've yet to find it.
posted by phrontist on Feb 23, 2005 - 8 answers

Why were people in olden days so smart about some things, but so dense about others? (more inside) [more inside]
posted by stupidsexyFlanders on Sep 16, 2004 - 35 answers