Tom Clark

Paranormal Britain is the most systematic study available of the nature and scope of paranormal beliefs, experiences, and subcultures in contemporary Britain. Using original survey data from British citizens regarding their beliefs and experiences with UFOs, ghosts, psychics and other paranormal phenomena, this open access book details the prevalence and patterns of paranormalism in the U.K. In addition to presenting original findings based on novel data, the authors also engaged in extensive ethnographic fieldwork with different paranormal subcultures. Among other adventures, readers get to ride along as they spend the night with the ‘most violent poltergeist in history,’ participate in the high ritual of a UFO cult, search for Nessie and werewolves, visit crop circles, learn to read Tarot, talk with alien abductees, and go on shamanic vision quests. Authoritative and systematic, yet readable and entertaining, Paranormal Britain will be of interest to scholars researching the sociology of religion, science, and belief in late modernity. The ebook editions of this book are available open access under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence on bloomsburycollections.com. Open access was funded by Chapman University.

Paranormal Britain is the most systematic study available of the nature and scope of paranormal beliefs, experiences, and subcultures in contemporary Britain. Using original survey data from British citizens regarding their beliefs and experiences with UFOs, ghosts, psychics and other paranormal phenomena, this open access book details the prevalence and patterns of paranormalism in the U.K. In addition to presenting original findings based on novel data, the authors also engaged in extensive ethnographic fieldwork with different paranormal subcultures. Among other adventures, readers get to ride along as they spend the night with the ‘most violent poltergeist in history,’ participate in the high ritual of a UFO cult, search for Nessie and werewolves, visit crop circles, learn to read Tarot, talk with alien abductees, and go on shamanic vision quests. Authoritative and systematic, yet readable and entertaining, Paranormal Britain will be of interest to scholars researching the sociology of religion, science, and belief in late modernity. The ebook editions of this book are available open access under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence on bloomsburycollections.com. Open access was funded by Chapman University.

How can you turn technology from a support function into a strategic enabler of business success? Technology Strategy by Tom Clark is a practical guide for CIOs, CTOs, IT directors and senior technology leaders who want to align digital investment with business goals, deliver measurable impact and position technology as a driver of organizational growth. Written for professionals navigating complex, fast-changing technology landscapes, this book provides a step-by-step approach to building and executing a business-driven technology strategy. It equips leaders with the skills to diagnose organizational needs, evaluate market trends and link technology priorities directly to strategic objectives. You'll discover how to: - Identify quick wins that deliver immediate business value - Optimize resources and ensure effective service delivery - Strengthen vendor management and governance processes - Build communication strategies that secure stakeholder buy-in - Track performance and drive digital transformation with confidence Whether you are shaping a new strategy or accelerating progress in an established organization, Technology Strategy helps you transform IT from operational necessity to strategic advantage. Themes include: technology strategy, digital transformation, IT governance, resource optimization, vendor management, business alignment

How can you turn technology from a support function into a strategic enabler of business success? Technology Strategy by Tom Clark is a practical guide for CIOs, CTOs, IT directors and senior technology leaders who want to align digital investment with business goals, deliver measurable impact and position technology as a driver of organizational growth. Written for professionals navigating complex, fast-changing technology landscapes, this book provides a step-by-step approach to building and executing a business-driven technology strategy. It equips leaders with the skills to diagnose organizational needs, evaluate market trends and link technology priorities directly to strategic objectives. You'll discover how to: - Identify quick wins that deliver immediate business value - Optimize resources and ensure effective service delivery - Strengthen vendor management and governance processes - Build communication strategies that secure stakeholder buy-in - Track performance and drive digital transformation with confidence Whether you are shaping a new strategy or accelerating progress in an established organization, Technology Strategy helps you transform IT from operational necessity to strategic advantage. Themes include: technology strategy, digital transformation, IT governance, resource optimization, vendor management, business alignment

It's bath time for Thomas when he summons his Pirate friends using his imagination to board the Old Wooden Walrus, searching for the "Golden Duck. He and his crew must be alert and not fall prey to "Bathtub Bay Falls", a treacherous cove where ships have gone to see Davy Jones Locker and a whole host of crazy creatures along the way. It's Thomas' last adventure as he's now getting old enough to take a shower but he leaves nothing at port, for this one promises to be his most imaginative and also the most fun yet. So climb aboard the Old Wooden Walrus with Thomas, keep peeking overboard helping him look for trouble and help him bring home the treasure.

It's bath time for Thomas when he summons his Pirate friends using his imagination to board the Old Wooden Walrus, searching for the "Golden Duck. He and his crew must be alert and not fall prey to "Bathtub Bay Falls", a treacherous cove where ships have gone to see Davy Jones Locker and a whole host of crazy creatures along the way. It's Thomas' last adventure as he's now getting old enough to take a shower but he leaves nothing at port, for this one promises to be his most imaginative and also the most fun yet. So climb aboard the Old Wooden Walrus with Thomas, keep peeking overboard helping him look for trouble and help him bring home the treasure.

Over a dozen years into austerity, statistical warning lights are flashing to suggest a return to types of deprivation we once imagined we had consigned to history. In the decade up to the pandemic, the official count of rough sleepers and recorded malnutrition in hospital patients both doubled, while recourse to food banks rocketed by an order of magnitude. And yet it has never been statistics but rather individual human stories – from the fictionalised accounts of Dickens to the faithful reporting of Orwell and Priestley – that have seared the reality of hard times into the public imagination. In Broke, Tom Clark assembles today’s masters of social reportage to go deep into the communities so often ignored by politicians, introducing us to those at the hardest end of the poverty crisis. Contributions from Jem Bartholomew, Cal Flyn, Dani Garavelli, Frances Ryan, Samira Shackle, Daniel Trilling and Jennifer Williams and a foreword by Kerry Hudson unflinchingly reveal the contemporary experience of cold, hunger, homelessness, disease, debt, disability, punishing work and an immigration system that makes people destitute by design. With Joel Goodman’s photography bringing the characters to life, and some of the writers having had first-hand experience of the issues raised, Broke blends powerful human stories with analysis of the policies that have led us to this point – and the reforms we urgently need. All royalties will be donated to Leeds Asylum Seekers’ Support Network

A dozen years into austerity, statistical warning lights are flashing to suggest a return to types of deprivation we once imagined we had consigned to history. Here, today's masters of social reportage to go deep into the communities so often ignored by politicians, introducing us to those at the hardest end of the poverty crisis.

How to do your Social Research Project or Dissertation provides a straight-talking, easy-to-navigate, and reassuring guide to support final-year social science undergraduates. Uniquely shaped by real social science undergraduates from a range of institutions, the book includes their advice to help you through with what can be a daunting, but rewarding stage of your degree. From the look and feel of the book, to the development of the chapter content and the advice it provides, students have been involved at every stage of the book's development to ensure it is focused on what's important to you. Expert advice from real supervisors across the subject disciplines in the 'Working with your supervisor' feature also helps you to make the most of research supervision, and learn from the experience of real researchers in your chosen field. By providing anecdotes, words of wisdom, scenarios, or simply reminders, hints, and tips on how best to prepare for meetings, and communicate effectively, How to do your Social Research Project or Dissertation is the most complete guide to facilitate the student-supervisor working relationship. Dedicated chapters cover all the typical stages of a research project or dissertation in the social sciences, while their carefully constructed structure allows you to quickly and efficiently navigate the content. Throughout the book, you'll focus on three key questions: 'What do I need to know?', 'What do I need to think about?' and 'What do I need to do?'. In so doing, each chapter gives you a clear and direct checklist of actions as you progress through your dissertation or research project, keeping you organized, motivated, and confident. The book's online resources include a wealth of free-to-access materials, including: Author videos - Additional advice around key challenges for each chapter, including developing a research idea, managing your time, and writing up your dissertation. Supervision guidance Advice and tips on how to approach your supervision meetings, including tasks to help you plan for meetings and to build a productive relationship with your supervisor. Doing academic presentations Support with planning and delivering presentations, including tips on what a dissertation presentation might include, as well as author videos showing examples of a good and bad presentations. _ Dissertation templates Templates for dissertations, showing how dissertations might look different depending on which theoretical and methodological approaches you use. This includes notes on chapter content and tips on dissertation structure. Research plan templates Templates for you to use for planning your project, including helping you to get started and complete the dissertation, and to manage your time using key milestones and recommended timescales and targets. Guidance on developing and designing your research question - A set of questions divided into categories and designed to help you formulate ideas, develop your thinking, set your research questions, help you later on in the process to consolidate your argument and consider the contribution of your work. Delve Even Deeper Even more Delve Deeper recommendations and research suggestions, including a list of freely available data sets, links and resources to help you understand SPSS and NVivo processes and tools, analysis tools and help for specific research methods, and guidance on using vlogs, blogs, and other public resources, as well as using social media for your research. Bad, better, and best examples of literature reviews, questionnaires, interview questions, and observation plans Examples of each of these key elements of your project deliberately designed to demonstrate how you can improve your work, and highlighted with annotations to help you gain a deeper understanding of how best to approach these stages of your project. Examples of research proposals Examples of research proposals for different social sciences to give you that extra support and an idea of what to expect. Here you will find tips on how to build a proposal and consider how this is useful for planning the dissertation. What do I need to think about? and What do I need to do? checklists digital versions of the end-of-chapter checklists for you to download and use.

An analysis of the enduring social costs of the post-2008 economic crisis 2008 was a watershed year for global finance. The banking system was eventually pulled back from the brink, but the world was saddled with the worst slump since the 1930s Depression, and millions were left unemployed. While numerous books have addressed the financial crisis, very little has been written about its social consequences. Journalist Tom Clark draws on the research of a transatlantic team led by Professors Anthony Heath and Robert D. Putnam to determine the great recession’s toll on individuals, families, and community bonds in the United States and the United Kingdom. The ubiquitous metaphor of the crisis has been an all-encompassing “financial storm,” but Clark argues that the data tracks the narrow path of a tornado—destroying some neighborhoods while leaving others largely untouched. In our vastly unequal societies, disproportionate suffering is being meted out to the poor—and the book’s new analysis suggests that the scars left by unemployment and poverty will linger long after the economy recovers. Politicians on both sides of the Atlantic have shown more interest in exploiting the divisions of opinion ushered in by the slump than in grappling with these problems. But this hard-hitting analysis provides a wake-up call that all should heed.

Tom Clark’s collection of short fiction, The Last Gas Station, is in two contrasting parts. It opens with 23 very short prose pieces––amusingly surreal California vignettes, some no longer than a page, peopled by denim-clad cowgirls, itinerant lover boys, Martin Heidegger, Boris Pasternak, Muslim college students, Vietnam vets, Ty Cobb, Ted Berrigan, and a great dinosaur poet of the Jurassic period. These are followed by the novella “Incident at Basecamp,” an odd matter-of-fact account of a close encounter between a young married couple and a spindly, three-toed, mind-reading extraterrestrial somewhere deep in the Rocky Mountain wilderness.

A poet of original vision and gentle, careful word-shaping, Clark allows his images to merge and converge toward a resolution in which flow is not arrested but pauses to take thought; the images take over the controls and 'do the talking', almost as if they had a mind of their own. What a relief when that happens, the poet confesses; he just follows along and tries to stay out of the way of whatever it is they seem to want to be saying. And when the elements of image and sound and sense do then mysteriously come together in the moment, as Clark here proposes, 'A point is fixed'.

Drawing on collaborative research from a distinguished team at Harvard and Manchester universities, The age of Obama asks how two very different societies are responding to the tide of diversity that is being felt around the rich world. Guardian journalist Tom Clark, Robert D. Putnam – best-selling author of Bowling alone – and Manchester’s Edward Fieldhouse offer a wonderfully readable account. Like Bowling alone, The age of Obama mixes social scientific rigor with accessible charts and lively arguments. It will be enjoyed by politics, sociology and geography students, as well as by anyone else with an interest in ethnic relations.Injustice, it turns out, still blight lives of many UK and US minorities – particularly African Americans. And there are signs the new diversity strains community life. Yet in both countries, public opinion is running irreversibly in favour of tolerance. That augurs well for the future – and suggests a British Obama cannot be ruled out.

Drawing on collaborative research from a distinguished team at Harvard and Manchester universities, The age of Obama asks how two very different societies are responding to the tide of diversity that is being felt around the rich world. Guardian journalist Tom Clark, Robert D. Putnam – best-selling author of Bowling alone – and Manchester’s Edward Fieldhouse offer a wonderfully readable account. Like Bowling alone, The age of Obama mixes social scientific rigor with accessible charts and lively arguments. It will be enjoyed by politics, sociology and geography students, as well as by anyone else with an interest in ethnic relations.Injustice, it turns out, still blight lives of many UK and US minorities – particularly African Americans. And there are signs the new diversity strains community life. Yet in both countries, public opinion is running irreversibly in favour of tolerance. That augurs well for the future – and suggests a British Obama cannot be ruled out.

Essential for all readers of progressive American poetry, this collection encompasses the exhilaration and joy, the madness and sorrow of the last forty years with a lyric intensity that, in the words of the poet Robert Creeley, offers a “wry and securing truth.” A generous selection from the poet’s career, Light and Shade is a major release from one of the country’s most influential poets and critics.

All the components of the Jack Kerouac legend are here: the excesses of alcohol and drugs; the soul searching; the charactersNeal Cassady and Allen Ginsberg, Gregory Corso and Lucien Carr, John Clellon Holmes and William Burroughs, Jack's mother, Gabrielle, and the other women in Kerouac's life. There is also a record of the travels that became the basis for On the Road and Visions of Cody, the death-shrouded childhood that became Mexico City Blues and Tristessa, and the stupor of fame that weighed on him as he tried to articulate his torments in Big Sur. This edition is newly revised with a new introduction by the author.