Manichaeanism. Brownian Motion. Comstockery. Even those with the most impressive (or rather, Brobdingnagian) grasps on the ideologies and beliefs that have shaped society will find more than a few examples such as these to expand their vocabularies in this new reference volume of curiously engrossing and amusing trivia.

All the Movements, Ideologies and Doctrines That Have Shaped Our World
Vintage Books; 388 pages; $14.95

The movements and ideas that we as a society use to define the natural world as well as our communities and psychological quirks can be, in a word, cumbersome. Even the most well-read participant in any discussion of politics, philosophy, religion, or anthropology can become humbled when encountering terms he or she is unfamiliar with. ‘Isms and ‘Ologies: All the Movements, Ideologies, and Doctrines that Have Shaped Our World is an intellectually stimulating aid to those who are unsure of their understanding of Monopolism (which isn't even in my spell-check), Phlogiston Theory, or Irredentism (which both surprisingly are), as well as over 450 other terms.

Beyond its use as a learning tool, the book also serves as a well-designed means to explain an idea for those who understand them but aren't sure how to put them into words. Each entry includes a concise and yet conclusive explication of its term or phrase. When asked for a brief but accurate definition of Pragmatism, I once remarked that it is when your best friend dies and you check to see if his shoes will fit you. Goldwag's three-paragraph definition is only a bit lengthier yet much more succinct in that even the uninitiated to social philosophy would find it distinctly comprehensible.

The entries are sectioned into easily referenced categories which include anything from politics and history, to the arts, to science, economics, religion, and even just for fun an entire section on sexual perversions. Michael Lewis' brief forward points out that this unusual collection of annotations does not only answer questions, but answers "questions I had never thought to ask." A totally new layer is added to the book when the reader, in searching for a specific answer, becomes engrossed in the myriad of new questions that arise among a body of work that captivates the curiosity. 

Altogether, the work stands as a fascinating compendium of easily digested rubrics that exemplify Occam's Razor, defined in its pages as a standard that says "if you're trying to explain something, don't make your explanations more complicated than they have to be." In a society where language seems to be taking a back seat to the constant flood of "lol" and "brb" text messages, "cutely" misspelled business names, an ever growing number of people who cannot differentiate "your" from "you're" properly or even connect a subject to a predicate with a verb, we could all use the occasional refresher in our vocabularies. Goldwag has simply managed to make the lesson an enjoyable one. | Jason Neubauer