The Social Sciences category has 3,302 audiobooks on Listento.it, with an average listener rating of 4.5★ across 32,502 ratings. The most-rated is Homo Deus.

A major audiobook about the future of the world, blending intellectual and natural history and field reporting into a powerful account of the mass extinction unfolding before our eyes. Over the last half a billion years, there have been five mass extinctions, when the diversity of life on Earth suddenly and dramatically contracted. Scientists around the world are currently monitoring the sixth extinction, predicted to be the most devastating extinction event since the asteroid impact that wiped out the dinosaurs. This time around, the cataclysm is us. In The Sixth Extinction, two-time winner of the National Magazine Award and New Yorker writer Elizabeth Kolbert draws on the work of scores of researchers in half a dozen disciplines, accompanying many of them into the field: geologists who study deep ocean cores, botanists who follow the tree line as it climbs up the Andes, marine biologists who dive off the Great Barrier Reef. She introduces us to a dozen species, some already gone, others facing extinction, including the Panamian golden frog, staghorn coral, the great auk, and the Sumatran rhino. Through these stories, Kolbert provides a moving account of the disappearances occurring all around us and traces the evolution of extinction as concept, from its first articulation by Georges Cuvier in revolutionary Paris up through the present day. The sixth extinction is likely to be mankind's most lasting legacy; as Kolbert observes, it compels us to rethink the fundamental question of what it means to be human.
©2013 Elizabeth Kolbert (P)2013 Simon & Schuster

Global Cooling, Patriotic Prostitutes, and Why Suicide Bombers Should Buy Life Insurance The New York Times best-selling Freakonomics was a worldwide sensation, selling more than four million copies in 35 languages and changing the way we look at the world. Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner return with Superfreakonomics, and fans and newcomers alike will find that the freakquel is even bolder, funnier, and more surprising than the first. SuperFreakonomics challenges the way we think all over again, exploring the hidden side of everything with such questions as: How is a street prostitute like a department-store Santa? What do hurricanes, heart attacks, and highway deaths have in common? Can eating kangaroo save the planet? Levitt and Dubner mix smart thinking and great storytelling like no one else. By examining how people respond to incentives, they show the world for what it really is: good, bad, ugly, and, in the final analysis, super freaky. Freakonomics has been imitated many times over - but only now, with SuperFreakonomics, has it met its match.
©2009 Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner (P)2009 HarperCollins Publishers

A candid guide for ambitious women who want to succeed without losing themselves in the process In The Myth of the Nice Girl, Fran Hauser deconstructs the negative perception of "niceness" that many women struggle with in the business world. If women are nice, they are seen as weak and ineffective, but if they are tough, they are labeled a bitch. Hauser proves that women don't have to sacrifice their values or hide their authentic personalities to be successful. Sharing a wealth of personal anecdotes and time-tested strategies, she shows women how to reclaim "nice" and sidestep regressive stereotypes about what a strong leader looks like. Her accessible advice and hard-won wisdom detail how to balance being empathetic with being decisive, how to rise above the double standards that can box you in, how to cultivate authentic confidence that projects throughout a room, and much more. The Myth of the Nice Girl is a refreshing dose of forward-looking feminism that will resonate with smart, professional women who know what they want and are looking for real advice to take their careers to the next level without losing themselves in the process.
©2018 Fran Hauser (P)2018 Audible, Inc.

National treasure and renowned wit Stephen Fry explores the highways and byways of the English language in these celebrated programmes. In each episode, Fry explores the oddities and celebrates the curiosities of the language we use. His love of words is indulged with infectious enthusiasm and intellectual curiosity at all times. From puns and metaphors to clichés and gibberish, this famously witty, incisive and engaging series explores the joys of the English language.
©2008 Testbed Audio Ltd (P)2013 Audible, Inc.

Rose and Rosie are known for their candid and hilarious YouTube videos...but now they are taking oversharing to a whole new level. Discussing sexuality, revealing secrets and empowering others, Overshare is a book packed with Rose and Rosie's unique take on friendships, fame, mental health and LGBT issues. As visibly out members of the LGBT community, they open up about their own experiences, both together and as individuals, and have written this book in the hope that it gives strength to those who have faced similar difficulties. They are spreading a message of positivity and inclusivity, and want everyone to feel comfortable in their own skin, no matter what their sexuality. Delve deep into the unfiltered highs and lows of Rose and Rosie's life: family relationships, secrets of a happy marriage, struggles with OCD and anxiety, finding love and navigating the world as a gay couple. Get ready to laugh, cry, cringe and overshare. PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying reference material will be available in your Library section along with the audio on our desktop site.
©2018 Rose Ellen Dix and Rosie Spaughton (P)2018 Orion Publishing Group Limited

“How many women cry when angry because we've held it in for so long? How many discover that anger turned inward is depression? Soraya Chemaly’s Rage Becomes Her will be good for women, and for the future of this country. After all, women have a lot to be angry about.” (Gloria Steinem) A transformative audiobook urging 21st-century women to embrace their anger and harness it as a tool for lasting personal and societal change. Women are angry, and it isn’t hard to figure out why. We are underpaid and overworked. Too sensitive or not sensitive enough. Too dowdy or too made-up. Too big or too thin. Sluts or prudes. We are harassed, told we are asking for it, and asked if it would kill us to smile. Yes, yes it would. Contrary to the rhetoric of popular “self-help” and an entire lifetime of being told otherwise, our rage is one of the most important resources we have, our sharpest tool against both personal and political oppression. We’ve been told for so long to bottle up our anger, letting it corrode our bodies and minds in ways we don’t even realize. Yet our anger is a vital instrument, our radar for injustice and a catalyst for change. On the flip side, the societal and cultural belittlement of our anger is a cunning way of limiting and controlling our power. We are so often told to resist our rage or punished for justifiably expressing it, yet how many remarkable achievements in this world would never have gotten off the ground without the kernel of anger that fueled them? Rage Becomes Her makes the case that anger is not what gets in our way, it is our way, sparking a new understanding of one of our core emotions that will give women a liberating sense of why their anger matters and connect them to an entire universe of women no longer interested in making nice at all costs. Following in the footsteps of classic feminist manifestos like The Feminine Mystique and Our Bodies, Ourselves, Rage Becomes Her is an eye-opening audiobook for the 21st-century woman: an engaging, accessible credo offering us the tools to re-understand our anger and harness its power to create lasting positive change.
©2018 Soraya Chemaly (P)2018 Simon & Schuster

Named a Best Book by: The Globe and Mail, Indigo, Out Magazine, Audible, CBC, Apple, Quill & Quire, Kirkus Reviews, Brooklyn Public Library, Writers’ Trust of Canada, Autostraddle, Bitch, and BookRiot. Finalist for the 2019 Lambda Literary Award, transgender nonfiction Nominated for the 2019 Forest of Reading Evergreen Award Winner of the 2018 Alcuin Society Awards for Excellence in Book Design - prose nonfiction "Cultural rocket fuel." (Vanity Fair) "Emotional and painful but also layered with humour, I'm Afraid of Men will widen your lens on gender and challenge you to do better. This challenge is a necessary one - one we must all take up. It is a gift to dive into Vivek's heart and mind." (Rupi Kaur, best-selling author of The Sun and Her Flowers and Milk and Honey) A trans artist explores how masculinity was imposed on her as a boy and continues to haunt her as a girl - and how we might reimagine gender for the 21st century. Vivek Shraya has reason to be afraid. Throughout her life she's endured acts of cruelty and aggression for being too feminine as a boy and not feminine enough as a girl. In order to survive childhood, she had to learn to convincingly perform masculinity. As an adult, she makes daily compromises to steel herself against everything from verbal attacks to heartbreak. Now, with raw honesty, Shraya delivers an important record of the cumulative damage caused by misogyny, homophobia, and transphobia, releasing trauma from a body that has always refused to assimilate. I'm Afraid of Men is a journey from camouflage to a riot of colour and a blueprint for how we might cherish all that makes us different and conquer all that makes us afraid.
©2018 Vivek Shraya (P)2018 Penguin Random House Canada

This program is read by the author. The mental wellbeing of our children is shockingly poor. Marc Brackett, author of Permission to Feel, knows why. And he knows what we can do. "We have a crisis on our hands, and its victims are our children." Marc Brackett is a professor in Yale University’s Child Study Center and founding director of the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence. In his 25 years as an “emotion scientist”, he has developed a remarkably effective plan to improve the lives of children and adults - a blueprint for understanding our emotions and using them wisely so that they help, rather than hinder, our success and well-being. The core of his approach is a legacy from his childhood, from an astute uncle who gave him permission to feel. He was the first adult who managed to see Marc, listen to him, and recognize the suffering, bullying, and abuse he’d endured. And that was the beginning of Marc’s awareness that what he was going through was temporary. He wasn’t alone, he wasn’t stuck on a timeline, and he wasn’t “wrong” to feel scared, isolated, and angry. Now, best of all, he could do something about it. In the decades since, Marc has led large research teams and raised tens of millions of dollars to investigate the roots of emotional well-being. His prescription for healthy children (and their parents, teachers, and schools) is a system called RULER, a high-impact and fast-effect approach to understanding and mastering emotions that has already transformed the thousands of schools that have adopted it. RULER has been proven to reduce stress, depression, and burnout and enhance to encourage higher academic achievement. This book is the culmination of Marc’s development of RULER and his way to share the strategies and skills with listeners around the world. It is tested, and it works. This audiobook combines rigor, science, passion, and inspiration in equal parts. Too many children and adults are suffering; they are ashamed of their feelings and emotionally unskilled, but they don’t have to be. Marc Brackett’s life mission is to reverse this course, and this audiobook can show you how. PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.
©2019 Marc Brackett (P)2019 Macmillan Audio

A New York Times best seller An inspiring personal story of redemption, second chances, and the transformative power within us all, from the founder and CEO of the nonprofit charity: water. At 28 years old, Scott Harrison had it all. A top nightclub promoter in New York City, his life was an endless cycle of drugs, booze, models - repeat. But 10 years in, desperately unhappy and morally bankrupt, he asked himself, "What would the exact opposite of my life look like?" Walking away from everything, Harrison spent the next 16 months on a hospital ship in West Africa and discovered his true calling. In 2006, with no money and less than no experience, Harrison founded charity: water. Today, his organization has raised more than $400 million to bring clean drinking water to more than 10 million people around the globe. In Thirst, Harrison recounts the twists and turns that built charity: water into one of the most trusted and admired nonprofits in the world. Renowned for its 100 percent donation model, bold storytelling, imaginative branding, and radical commitment to transparency, charity: water has disrupted how social entrepreneurs work while inspiring millions of people to join its mission of bringing clean water to everyone on the planet within our lifetime. In the tradition of such best-selling books as Shoe Dog and Mountains Beyond Mountains, Thirst is a riveting account of how to build a better charity, a better business, a better life - and a gritty tale that proves it’s never too late to make a change. The author will donate 100 percent of his net proceeds from Thirst to fund charity: water projects around the world.
©2018 Scott Harrison (P)2018 Random House Audio

We will soon be able to meet and exceed the basic needs of every man, woman, and child on the planet. Abundance for all is within our grasp. This bold, contrarian view, backed up by exhaustive research, introduces our near-term future, where exponentially growing technologies and three other powerful forces are conspiring to better the lives of billions of people. This book is an antidote to pessimism by tech-entrepreneur-turned-philanthropist Peter H. Diamandis and award-winning science writer Steven Kotler. Since the dawn of humanity, a privileged few have lived in stark contrast to the hardscrabble majority. Conventional wisdom says this gap cannot be closed. But it is closing - fast. The authors document how four forces - exponential technologies, the DIY innovator, the technophilanthropist, and the rising billion - are conspiring to solve our biggest problems. Abundance establishes hard targets for change and lays out a strategic road map for governments, industry, and entrepreneurs, giving us plenty of reason for optimism. Examining human need by category - water, food, energy, health care, education, and freedom - Diamandis and Kotler introduce dozens of innovators making great strides in each area: Larry Page, Stephen Hawking, Dean Kamen, Daniel Kahneman, Elon Musk, Bill Joy, Stewart Brand, Jeff Skoll, Ray Kurzweil, Ratan Tata, Craig Venter, and many, many others.
©2012 Peter H, Diamandis and Steven Kotler (P)2012 Tantor

Drawing on advances in social science, evolutionary biology, genetics, neuroscience, and network science, Blueprint shows how and why evolution has placed us on a humane path - and how we are united by our common humanity. For too long, scientists have focused on the dark side of our biological heritage: our capacity for aggression, cruelty, prejudice, and self-interest. But natural selection has given us a suite of beneficial social features, including our capacity for love, friendship, cooperation, and learning. Beneath all our inventions - our tools, farms, machines, cities, nations - we carry with us innate proclivities to make a good society. In Blueprint, Nicholas A. Christakis introduces the compelling idea that our genes affect not only our bodies and behaviors, but also the ways in which we make societies, ones that are surprisingly similar worldwide. With many vivid examples - including diverse historical and contemporary cultures, communities formed in the wake of shipwrecks, commune dwellers seeking utopia, online groups thrown together by design or involving artificially intelligent bots, and even the tender and complex social arrangements of elephants and dolphins that so resemble our own - Christakis shows that, despite a human history replete with violence, we cannot escape our social blueprint for goodness. In a world of increasing political and economic polarization, it's tempting to ignore the positive role of our evolutionary past. But by exploring the ancient roots of goodness in civilization, Blueprint shows that our genes have shaped societies for our welfare and that, in a feedback loop stretching back many thousands of years, societies have shaped, and are still shaping, our genes today. PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.
©2019 Nicholas A. Christakis (P)2019 Audible, Inc.

Language, in its seemingly infinite varieties, tells us who we are and where we come from. Many linguists believe that all of the world’s languages - over 7,000 currently - emerged from a single prehistoric source. While experts have not yet been able to reproduce this proto-language, most of the world’s current languages can be traced to various language families that have branched and divided, spreading across the globe with migrating humans and evolving over time. The ability to communicate with the spoken word is so prevelant that we have yet to discover a civilization that does not speak. The fitful preservation of human remains throughout history has made tracing the ultimate origin of sophisticated human cultures difficult, but it is assumed that language is at least 300,000 years old. With so much time comes immense change - including the development of the written word. There’s no doubt that over centuries, numerous languages have been born, thrived, and died. So how did we get here, and how do we trace the many language branches back to the root? In Language Families of the World, Professor John McWhorter of Columbia University takes you back through time and around the world, following the linguistic trails left by generations of humans that lead back to the beginnings of language. Utilizing historical theories and cutting-edge research, these 34 astonishing lectures will introduce you to the major language families of the world and their many offspring, including a variety of languages that are no longer spoken but provide vital links between past and present. PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.
©2019 The Great Courses (P)2019 The Teaching Company, LLC

From one of the world's most highly regarded social scientists, a transformative book on the habits of mind that lead to the best predictions. Everyone would benefit from seeing further into the future, whether buying stocks, crafting policy, launching a new product, or simply planning the week's meals. Unfortunately people tend to be terrible forecasters. As Wharton professor Philip Tetlock showed in a landmark 2005 study, even experts' predictions are only slightly better than chance. However, an important and underreported conclusion of that study was that some experts do have real foresight, and Tetlock has spent the past decade trying to figure out why. What makes some people so good? And can this talent be taught? In Superforecasting, Tetlock and coauthor Dan Gardner offer a masterwork on prediction, drawing on decades of research and the results of a massive, government-funded forecasting tournament. The Good Judgment Project involves tens of thousands of ordinary people - including a Brooklyn filmmaker, a retired pipe installer, and a former ballroom dancer - who set out to forecast global events. Some of the volunteers have turned out to be astonishingly good. They've beaten other benchmarks, competitors, and prediction markets. They've even beaten the collective judgment of intelligence analysts with access to classified information. They are "superforecasters". In this groundbreaking and accessible book, Tetlock and Gardner show us how we can learn from this elite group. Superforecasting offers the first demonstrably effective way to improve our ability to predict the future - whether in business, finance, politics, international affairs, or daily life - and is destined to become a modern classic. PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying reference material will be available in your My Library section along with the audio.
©2015 Philip Tetlock Consulting, Inc., and Connaught Street, Inc. (P)2015 Audible, Inc.

In the best-selling tradition of Sloan Crosley's I Was Told There'd Be Cake and Mindy Kaling's Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me?, here is a collection of humorous essays on what it's like to be unabashedly awkward in a world that regards introverts as hapless misfits and Black as cool. "My name is 'J' and I'm awkward--and Black. Someone once told me those were the two worst things anyone could be. That someone was right. Where do I start?" Being an introvert in a world that glorifies cool isn't easy. But when Issa Rae, the creator of the Shorty Award-winning hit series The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl, is that introvert--whether she's navigating love, work, friendships, or rapping-- it sure is entertaining. Now, in this debut collection of essays written in her witty and self-deprecating voice, Rae covers everything from cybersexing in the early days of the Internet to deflecting unsolicited comments on weight gain, from navigating the perils of eating out alone and public displays of affection to learning to accept yourself --natural hair and all. A reflection on her own unique experiences as a cyber pioneer yet universally appealing, The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl is a book no one--awkward or cool, Black, White, or other--will want to miss.
©2015 Issa Rae (P)2015 Simon & Schuster

What is autism: a lifelong disability or a naturally occurring form of cognitive difference akin to certain forms of genius? In truth it is both of these things and more - and the future of our society depends on our understanding it. Wired reporter Steve Silberman unearths the secret history of autism, long suppressed by the same clinicians who became famous for discovering it, and finds surprising answers to the crucial question of why the number of diagnoses has soared in recent years. Going back to the earliest days of autism research and chronicling the brave and lonely journey of autistic people and their families through the decades, Silberman provides long-sought solutions to the autism puzzle while mapping out a path for our society toward a more humane world in which people with learning differences and those who love them have access to the resources they need to live happier, healthier, more secure, and more meaningful lives. Along the way he reveals the untold story of Hans Asperger, the father of Asperger's syndrome, whose "little professors" were targeted by the darkest social-engineering experiment in human history; exposes the covert campaign by child psychiatrist Leo Kanner to suppress knowledge of the autism spectrum for 50 years; and casts light on the growing movement of "neurodiversity" activists seeking respect, support, technological innovation, accommodations in the workplace and in education, and the right to self-determination for those with cognitive differences.
©2015 Steve Silberman (P)2015 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

The good news is that the vast majority of soldiers are loath to kill in battle. Unfortunately, modern armies, using Pavlovian and operant conditioning, have developed sophisticated ways of overcoming this instinctive aversion. The psychological cost for soldiers, as witnessed by the increase in post-traumatic stress, is devastating. The psychological cost for the rest of us is even more so: contemporary civilian society, particularly the media, replicates the army's conditioning techniques and, according to Lt. Col. Dave Grossman's thesis, is responsible for our rising rate of murder among the young. Upon its first publication, On Killing was hailed as a landmark study of the techniques the military uses to overcome the powerful reluctance to kill, of how killing affects the soldier, and of the societal implications of escalating violence. Now, Grossman has updated this classic work to include information on 21st-century military conflicts, recent crime rates, suicide bombings, school shootings, and much more. The result is a work that is sure to be relevant and important for decades to come.
©2009 David Grossman (P)2009 David Grossman

An original and scientifically rigorous exploration of the darkest recesses of the human mind. What is it about evil that we find so compelling? From our obsession with serial killers to violence in pop culture, we seem inescapably drawn to the stories of monstrous acts and the aberrant people who commit them. But evil, Dr. Julia Shaw argues, is all relative, rooted in our unique cultures. What one may consider normal, like sex before marriage, eating meat, or being a banker, others may find abhorrent. And if evil is only in the eye of the beholder, can it be said to exist at all? In Evil, Dr. Shaw uses case studies from academia, examples from popular culture, and anecdotes from everyday life to break down complex information and concepts, such as the neuroscience of evil, the psychology of bloodlust, and workplace misbehavior. In grappling with thorny dilemmas - from "Would I kill baby Hitler?" to "Why do I want to murder my spouse?" - Dr. Shaw offers listeners a better understanding of the world, ourselves, and our Google search histories.
©2019 Doubleday Canada (P)2019 Julia Shaw

Every man is born with just one thing: his sovereignty - his power to respond to his environment and his circumstances. Unfortunately, most men have spent much of their lives giving away that sovereignty. Every time a man passes blame or shirks his responsibility, every time he makes excuses for his performance, and every time he trades his unlimited potential for a little perceived safety and security, he willingly submits himself to the mercy of others. Is it any wonder that men, in general, seem to have lost their way? You don't have to look very far to recognize that men don't seem to possess the same amount of vigor and purpose they once did. Take one sobering statistic - the rate of suicide in men - and you begin to see how damaging the effects of the voluntary subjugation of men to their families, their businesses, and their governments can be. It's not hard to understand why we give up control to others - it's easy and we're expected to. Sovereignty: The Battle for the Hearts and Minds of Men is a call for men to once again rise up and establish themselves as they once were - a revolution if you will. Inside this book, we'll uncover the battle each man will inevitably engage in, the external forces fighting against the call to masculinity, and the internal struggle all men must overcome. But make no mistake, this revolution is not a call for men to go their own way and rally against society. It's a call for men to become fully the men they are meant to be so they may more adequately take care of themselves and those they are responsible for. Men have always been expected to protect, provide, and preside over themselves, their families, their businesses, and their communities.
©2018 Ryan Michler (P)2018 Ryan Michler

Stonewall Book Award Honor Book winner Ivan Coyote is a celebrated storyteller and the author of 10 previous books, including Gender Failure (with Rae Spoon) and One in Every Crowd, a collection for LGBT youth. Tomboy Survival Guide is a funny and moving memoir told in stories, in which Ivan recounts the pleasures and difficulties of growing up a tomboy in Canada's Yukon, and how they learned to embrace their tomboy past while carving out a space for those of us who don't fit neatly into boxes or identities or labels. Ivan writes movingly about many firsts: the first time they were mistaken for a boy; the first time they purposely discarded their bikini top so they could join the boys at the local swimming pool; and the first time they were chastised for using the women's washroom. Ivan also explores their years as a young butch, dealing with new infatuations and old baggage, and life as a gender-box-defying adult, in which they offer advice to young people while seeking guidance from others. (And for tomboys in training, there are even directions on building your very own unicorn trap.) Tomboy Survival Guide warmly recounts Ivan's adventures and mishaps as a diffident yet free-spirited tomboy, and maps their journey through treacherous gender landscapes and a maze of labels that don't quite stick, to a place of self-acceptance and an authentic and personal strength. These heartfelt, funny, and moving stories are about the culture of difference - a "guide" to being true to one's self.
©2016 Ivan Coyote (P)2017 Audible, Inc.

From the wickedly funny and feminist creator and host of the Throwing Shade podcast, a collection of hilarious personal essays and political commentary perfect for fans of Lindy West and Roxane Gay. Since women earned the right to vote a little less than 100 years ago, our progress hasn't been the Olympic sprint toward gender equality first-wave feminists hoped for, but more of a slow, elderly mall walk (with frequent stops to Cinnabon) over the 400 million hurdles we still face. Some of these obstacles are obvious - unequal pay, underrepresentation in government, reproductive restrictions, lack of floor-length mirrors in hotel rooms. But a lot of them are harder to identify. They're the white noise of oppression that we've accepted as lady business as usual, and the patriarchy wants to keep it that way. Erin Gibson has a singular goal - to create a utopian future where women are recognized as humans. In Feminasty - titled after her nickname on the hit podcast Throwing Shade - she has written a collection of make-you-laugh-until-you-cry essays that expose the hidden rules that make life as a woman unnecessarily hard and deconstructs them in a way that's bold, provocative, and hilarious. Whether it's shaming women for having their periods, allowing them into STEM fields but never treating them like they truly belong, or dictating strict rules for how they should dress in every situation, Erin breaks down the organized chaos of old-fashioned sexism, intentional and otherwise, that systemically keeps women down.
©2018 Erin Gibson (P)2018 Erin Gibson