Singing With Blackbirds

A study of the survival of primal Celtic shamanism in later folk-traditions of Gaelic speaking peoples. This is an insightful and intelligent academic study that brings together areas of study not normally combined in an accessible style.

Music and images together will engage students and help them have fun as they learn a traditional song that teaches opposites in this interactive eBook.

From one of Granta’s Best Young British Novelists, a stunningly insightful, emotionally powerful new novel about an outsider haunted by an inescapable past: a story of loneliness and survival, guilt and loss, and the power of forgiveness. Jake Whyte is living on her own in an old farmhouse on a craggy British island, a place of ceaseless rain and battering wind. Her disobedient collie, Dog, and a flock of sheep are her sole companions, which is how she wants it to be. But every few nights something—or someone—picks off one of the sheep and sounds a new deep pulse of terror. There are foxes in the woods, a strange boy and a strange man, and rumors of an obscure, formidable beast. And there is also Jake’s past, hidden thousands of miles away and years ago, held in the silences about her family and the scars that stripe her back—a past that threatens to break into the present. With exceptional artistry and empathy, All the Birds, Singing reveals an isolated life in all its struggles and stubborn hopes, unexpected beauty, and hard-won redemption. This eBook edition includes a Reading Group Guide.

From Caldecott Honor winner Christian Robinson and acclaimed author Renee Watson, comes the inspiring true story of Florence Mills. Born to parents who were both former slaves, Florence Mills knew at an early age that she loved to sing, and that her sweet, bird-like voice, resonated with those who heard her. Performing catapulted her all the way to the stages of 1920s Broadway where she inspired everyone from songwriters to playwrights. Yet with all her success, she knew firsthand how prejudice shaped her world and the world of those around her. As a result, Florence chose to support and promote works by her fellow black performers while heralding a call for their civil rights. Featuring a moving text and colorful illustrations, Harlem's Little Blackbird is a timeless story about justice, equality, and the importance of following one's heart and dreams. A CARTER G. WOODSON ELEMENTARY HONOR BOOK (awarded by the National Council for the Social Studies, 2013)

After the events that occurred at the queen's ball, Mavis has become the symbol of a potential uprising being waged in her name. Raiona has become a kingdom of dark government secrets and political games that she has found herself in the middle of. In an attempt to keep the queen from obtaining the dangerous secrets that the lost president hid within the kingdom before the democracy was destroyed, Mavis races across Raiona, unlocking the president's relics and stitching the jagged pieces of history back together. In a story of thrilling adventure, Mavis must decide if the weapon inside of her is strong enough to break through the corruption to get to the truth, or if she will succumb to the wills of the wicked.

A collection of traditional and composed songs, chants, singing games, finger plays and more for children ages two to five.

Pulled apart by his parent's stormy relationship, which comes to a climax when their crops are threatened by huge numbers of migrating blackbirds, 10-year-old Marcus struggles to come to terms with himself, his parents, and a complex ecological dilemma.

To many readers some of this book will be instantly recognisable as the songs that have formed the backdrop to every generation since the 1960s. Their lyrics have been learned, almost subliminally, by heart: 'Eleanor Rigby', 'Band on the Run', 'She's Leaving Home', 'Penny Lane' . . . But among the familiar are poems that have never before been seen. Sharing the preoccupations of the songs and including moving elegies to Paul's wife, Linda, they give us unique access to the inner life of one of the most influential figures in popular culture of the last fifty years.

Where the Red-Winged Blackbirds Sing examines the ways in which the Akimel O’odham (“River People”) and their ancestors, the Huhugam, adapted to economic, political, and environmental constraints imposed by federal Indian policy, the Indian Bureau, and an encroaching settler population in Arizona’s Gila River Valley. Fundamental to O’odham resilience was their connection to their sense of peoplehood and their himdag (“lifeway”), which culminated in the restoration of their water rights and a revitalization of their Indigenous culture. Author Jennifer Bess examines the Akimel O’odham’s worldview, which links their origins with a responsibility to farm the Gila River Valley and to honor their history of adaptation and obligations as “world-builders”—co-creators of an evermore life-sustaining environment and participants in flexible networks of economic exchange. Bess considers this worldview in context of the Huhugam–Akimel O’odham agricultural economy over more than a thousand years. Drawing directly on Akimel O’odham traditional ecological knowledge, innovations, and interpretive strategies in archives and interviews, Bess shows how the Akimel O’odham engaged in agricultural economy for the sake of their lifeways, collective identity, enduring future, and actualization of the values modeled in their sacred stories. Where the Red-Winged Blackbirds Sing highlights the values of adaptation, innovation, and co-creation fundamental to Akimel O’odham lifeways and chronicles the contributions the Akimel O’odham have made to American history and to the history of agriculture. The book will be of interest to scholars of Indigenous, American Southwestern, and agricultural history.

Secrets lurk in the shadows of a kingdom where the Queen has never shown her face. Raiona once had a democracy, but after an uprising forced the president out of power, a monarchy was formed. The kingdom is home to legends and corruption, and 17-year-old Mavis Caverly finds herself in the midst of a conspiracy. An odd purple question mark tattooed on her wrist has served as proof that she is different. She has spent her whole life looking for answers about the origin and meaning of the mark, and when a mysterious stranger arrives in her city, the truth seems to be on the horizon. Mavis embarks on a journey across the kingdom uncovering the dark history of Raiona, and the crimes that the unseen Queen has committed. Along the way she realizes just how different she is, how important she truly is to the future of her kingdom, and that the Queen will do whatever it takes to find her.