Housing inequality is a growing concern in our society. In recent decades, this inequality has been exacerbated by the phenomenon of housing being financialized and commodified as a means for wealth accumulation. Management of financial institutions and housing markets has become the centre of attention in policy discussion. The questions of how to promote the moral values tied to housing, such as human rights, dignity and freedom, and how to better enable people to access suitable housing h...

The Myth of Child Protection captures the harsh ironic reality of the harm that arises when well-intentioned systems are broken. This book serves as a guide for persons who want to create change for the better in the system.

It is an apology to all those children and youth whom the system has failed. At the same time, it is a pledge to do better by those still present and others yet to come. In those instances where intervention did more good than harm, it is a recognition of this good.

This ...

The growing use of prescription drugs is a global health concern. A “pill-popping culture”, where many life issues are seen as problems that can be treated with medication, is becoming more common worldwide. Simultaneously, there are increasing concerns about the nonmedical use of prescription drugs (NMUPD) such as sedatives, opi-oid-based pain relief medication and prescription stimu-lants. Nevertheless, this trend has received limited attention in scientific research in Belgium, and in ...

In the rolling hills of Limburg, near Margraten, they slowly loom up, row after row: the thousands of white marble crosses and Stars of David. They mark the final resting place of nearly 8,300 American soldiers who died during World War II. While the headstones provide us with the names of the mostly young men involved in the liberation of the Netherlands, they do not tell us who the soldiers were and who they left behind. Moreover, the peace and quiet at the only American war cemetery in the...

Welcome to the Anthropocene, the epoch in which humankind emerged as a geological superpower that shapes the future of life on Earth. This Age of Humans gives a new urgency to age-old questions. Who are we? What is a human being? What is our place in the cosmos? What is our responsibility for the Earth’s ecosystem? What stories do we have to tell about ourselves now that we have arrived in the Anthropocene? This book takes you on an exciting quest to find out what it means to be human in a ...

Tami Amit’s self-titled monograph compiles reproductions of her recent work on paper and canvas. Amit’s practice is a particular mode of action painting which processes childhood memories and issues of self identity and expression. This is her first monograph as a painter.

Accountable Temporary Expedients is a practice that challenges the ability of dancers to attend to multiple stimuli at once and instigate situations which embrace confusion, doubt and uncertainty. This work stands in response to the notion that dance urges to emancipate. Baldini’s current critique sees dance as being "stuck, gooey, a victim of its own habit and, so in love with itself, it does not recognise its limitations. It is self-seduced, self-sufficient, and self-indulgent. Dance is n...

Curious Myths of the Middle Ages, first published in 1866, is a collection of 24 of the most commonly held superstitions of the Medieval era. For each story, Baring-Gould presents his research into the history and possible inspiration for the myth. Included among these familiar tales are: The Wandering Jew, the story of the Jewish shoemaker who is doomed to wander the earth until the Second Coming. William Tell, the Swiss hero who shot an apple off his son’s head. Saint George, a Christian...

The things we surround ourselves with in our daily lives are a shadow of who we are. The house we live in, the carpet under our feet, the color of the wallpaper, souvenirs and knick knacks in the closet contain residues of memories and sentiments.

'What speaks to us' is a publication about the oeuvre of visual artist Arjan van Helmond, which offers a broad overview of his work from the past 12 years. The book is a moment of looking back, reflection, collecting and connecting.

De dingen waarm...

Difficult problems do not always require far-fetched solutions, but in order to arrive at the solution a change of perspective may be in order. The City as a System advocates such a change of perspective in the study of the urban environment. It posits that designers who wish to truly improve the functioning of the city and solve tricky urban problems cannot afford to only focus on the spatial manifestation of the city, but should also conduct thorough research into the underlying system, int...