Sarah Foot – författare

Inventing Adulthoods offers a ground-breaking new perspective on young peoples' experiences of growing up at the turn of the 21st century, arguing that a biographical approach is vital to understanding the holistic and dynamic character of their lives. Based on a study of a diverse group of young people over a 10 year period, the book explores high profile policy issues: education, employment, drugs, cultures of violence and well-being. It also considers the significance of those things that mean most to young people themselves: mobility, home, belonging, intimacy and social life.

The book is written in a lively and engaging style and, through case studies and interviews, examines:

"the impact that social factors such as gender, class, sexuality, religion, disability and family have on life opportunities; and

"connections between young people's lives, social policy frameworks and practice applications.

Inventing Adulthoods is an invaluable resource to anyone interested in the lives of young people. Thought-provoking yet accessible, this book is ideal for students in youth studies and education, as it is for youth workers, social workers and other practitioners.

Inventing Adulthoods is the set book for the Open University course Youth: Perspectives and Practice (KE308).

Sheila Henderson is a Visiting Fellow at London South Bank University. Janet Holland is Professor of Social Research and Co-director of the Families and Social Capital ESRC Research Group at London South Bank University. Sheena McGrellis is a Senior Research Fellow in the Families Group, but is based at University of Ulster. Sue Sharpe is a Visiting Fellow at London South Bank University. Rachel Thomson is Professor of Social Research in the Faculty of Health and Social Care at The Open University.

The book is divided into three key parts, covering:

- Part I. Foundations: The Theoretical Grounds for Knowledge of the Past

- Part II. Applications: Theory-Intensive Areas in History

- Part III. Coda. Post-Postmodernism: Directions and Interrogations.

This important handbook brings together, in one volume, discussions of modernity, empiricism, deconstruction, narrative and postmodernity in the continuing evolution of the historical discipline into our post-postmodern era. Chapters are written by leading academics from around the world and cover a wide array of specialized areas of the discipline, including social history, intellectual history, gender, memory, psychoanalysis and cultural history. The influence of major thinkers such as Jacques Derrida, Michel Foucault and Hayden White is fully examined.

This handbook is an essential resource for practising historians, and students of history, and will appeal to scholars in related disciplines in the social sciences and humanities who seek a closer understanding of the theoretical foundations of history.

How do you know right from wrong when your certainties about life are slipping through your fingers? Phillip Snowe is a genius of the advertising world but what he can no longer do is sell himself to himself. Struggling to find meaning, he quits his career ''to give something back.'' Julia, his wife, a brilliant and beautiful lawyer, fights her own demons, but with her intelligence and hard work, she believes she can keep them at bay. And so far she has. Into their lives comes Laura Cusack, a single mother torn between the demands of her young daughters and her own unfulfilled passions. Whose needs should you put first? Your family''s? Your neighbour''s? A complete stranger''s? Or your own? And once you have made that choice, how do you live with yourself? Spanning three generations, this compassionate and surprising story - touching profoundly upon love, art, religion and the search for fulfilment - grips from first to last as it explores the moral and emotional complexities of modern life.