Books - Fall 2007

Africa: Who Got It Right? Who Got It Wrong?

Language: What a Difference a Word Makes

Africa: Who Got It Right? Who Got It Wrong?

The fourth appearance of Precious Ramotswe, protagonist of The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency and two sequels, is once again a charming account of the everyday challenges facing a female private detective in Botswana.

Geoff Hill takes the reader inside Robert Mugabe’s party, ZANU-PF, and the opposition Movement for Democratic Change. The author has met with members of both parties who have been prepared to talk candidly with him, giving him behind-the-scenes information. The book considers the role of critics and observers - the role and treatment of the press within Zimbabwe, and the often contradictory responses to Mugabe from the international community. It also looks at the lives of ordinary Zimbabweans living in a collapsing economy. Finally, it considers Zimbabwe’s future - the challenge that lies ahead to rebuild the country.

Biomedical Ethics: Challenges for Patients & Doctors

Clinical Ethics introduces the four-topics method of approaching ethical problems (i.e., medical indications, patient preferences, quality of life, and contextual features). Each of the four chapters represents one of the topics. In each chapter, the authors discuss cases and provide comments and recommendations. The four-topics method is an organizational process by which clinicians can begin to understand the complexities involved in ethical cases and can proceed to find a solution for each case.

Darwin's Voyage of Discovery: A Novelist's View

A compelling novel about two adventurers brought together for one goal but pushed apart by their conflicting ideals.In 1831, Fitzroy and Darwin—the captain and the naturalist—board the Beagle and set sail for Tierra del Fuego and points beyond. As they travel around the world, exploring the coasts of Patagonia and surveying the Galápagos Islands, the two men forge a life-long bond while simultaneously debating morality, nationality, biology, fate, and religion. And as Darwin formulates his theory of evolution, in the process he destroys everything Captain Fitzroy, the Christian Tory aristocrat, stands for. With vigorous command of character and masterful storytelling, Thompson paints a complicated portrait of two inquiring men with irreconcilable worldviews.

In anticipation of the bicentennial observance of Charles Darwin's birth in 1809, paleontologist and author Eldredge has organized an exhibition that coincides with the publication of this abundantly illustrated primer on Darwin's life, thought, and legacy.

Evolution & Intelligent Design, Part 1--The Science

Written for a general college audience, this book offers an introduction to the principles and significance of Darwinian evolution. It differs from most other textbooks on evolution in three fundamental ways: First, it is intended for students taking evolution early in their studies. Second, it examines the intellectual significance of Darwinian evolution. Third, the text departs from the standard treatment of evolution in other textbooks, wherein the arguments are reductionist, molecular, and overwhelmingly genetic in emphasis.

Read or download free: Teaching About Evolution and the Nature of Science from www.nationalacademies.org/evolution/

Read or download free: Evolution in Hawaii: A Supplement to Teaching About Evolution and the Nature of Science from www.nationalacademies.org/evolution/

Read or download free: Genesis: The Scientific Quest for Life's Origins from www.nationalacademies.org/evolution/

History of the Modern Middle East

Comprehensive survey to understand how the Middle East got to where it is today.

The Ottoman Empire was one of the most important non-Western states to survive from medieval to modern times, and played a vital role in European and global history. It continues to affect the peoples of the Middle East, the Balkans and central and western Europe to the present day. This new survey examines the major trends during the latter years of the empire, paying attention to gender issues and to hotly-debated topics such as the treatment of minorities.

Placing the evolution of the modern Iraqi state firmly into historical context, the author analyzes the roots of Islamic law, the negative effects of British imperialism, the controversial Haahemite monarchy, the fledgling republic, and, finally, the emergence of the militant Ba'th Party and the subsequent dictatorship of Saddam Hussein.

One Palestine, Complete is a detailed account of Palestine under British rule from 1917 to 1948, the critical period in the modern history of the region that led up to the creation of the state of Israel.

"Extraordinarily ambitious, provocative and vividly written...Fromkin unfolds a gripping tale of diplomatic double-dealing, military incompetence and political upheaval."

Making sense of any particular episode in the long and convoluted conflict between Arabs and Israelis can seem a Sisyphean task--engineering peace in the Middle East has become nearly clichéd in its complexity, with each individual dispute traceable back to years of anger, mistrust, and mutual misunderstanding fueled by cycles of violence and revenge.

Gilles Kepel's Jihad is an intense, detailed examination of the militant Islamist movement over the last quarter-century. Kepel divides his book into two parts--"Expansion" and "Decline"--and posits that the September 11, 2001, attacks, rather than demonstrating "strength and irrepressible might," highlighted the "isolation" and "fragmentation" of a "faltering" and probably doomed extremist ideology.

How Culture Shapes Nations

The book provides a summary of critical cultural factors including religion and shows how they have impacted nations. Liberal use is made of recent case studies. Finally the author points the way toward cultural models that produce success.

This collection of essays addresses a difficult question: Are some cultures better than others at creating freedom, prosperity, and justice?

Developing Cultures: Essays on Cultural Change is a collection of 21 expert essays on the institutions that transmit cultural values from generation to generation.

Human Behavior & Neurobiology: Are We Hardwired?

Wonderfully nourishing food for thought, tackling some of the toughest ethical issues of our time with vigor, intelligence and insight.

Behind the bad moral choices that sent Martha Stewart to prison, Tancredi discerns abnormal functioning of the brain. Indeed, much of what traditional morality has condemned as greed, lust, or sin looks like impaired neurobiology to this psychiatrist-lawyer, who locates the foundations of an ethical conscience in healthy genetic coding and properly balanced mental chemistry.

A three-year-old toddler is "a grammatical genius"--master of most constructions, obeying adult rules of language. To Pinker, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology psycholinguist, the explanation for this miracle is that language is an instinct, an evolutionary adaptation that is partly "hard-wired" into the brain and partly learned. In this exciting synthesis--an entertaining, totally accessible study that will regale language lovers and challenge professionals in many disciplines--Pinker builds a bridge between "innatists" like MIT linguist Noam Chomsky, who hold that infants are biologically programmed for language, and "social interactionists" who contend that they acquire it largely from the environment.

In the words of Jonathan Weiner, "Time, love, and memory are ... three cornerstones of the pyramid of behavior." While some find it difficult to view humans as mere machines, molecular biologists maintain that most behavior is genetically based. Even skeptics and opponents agree that molecular biology may well change the way we all live in the 21st century. Little-known outside this exploding field, Seymour Benzer, his mentors, and his generations of students have studied the common fruit fly, Drosophila, and discovered genes that seem to have some influence upon our internal clock, our sexuality, and our ability to learn from our experiences.

Language: What a Difference a Word Makes

The book gives a broad picture of the many languages spoken in America — all English, but all just a bit different.

In a series of penetrating essays, Chomsky cuts through the confusion and prejudice that has infected the study of language and mind, bringing new solutions to traditional philosophical puzzles and fresh perspectives on issues of general interest, ranging from the mind-body problem to the unification of science.

Machiavelli In Hell

This intellectual biography of the 16th century Italian quotes exclusively from Machiavelli's own words rather than quoting others who commented upon him. In this way de Grazia, a professor at Rutgers, paints a colorful portrait of the man entirely in the context of his time. In The Prince Machiavelli had famously examined the dilemma of the ruler who must find a resolution between political necessity and ethical behavior. By thus inventing 'realpolitik' Machiavelli entered the language of political discourse, and got himself rather a bad name. De Grazia's book, which won a Pulitzer Prize, goes some way to rehabilitating him, suggesting that his immoral means were put to good political ends.

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Mahler: His Life and Music, Part 3

Whether describing the composer's youth in Central Europe, triumphs as a conductor in Vienna and New York, or stormy marriage to Alma Schindler, Carr elucidates Mahler's complex nature without presuming to "explain" it.

An account of Mahler's childhood and youth, and of his years as an opera conductor in Cassel, Prague, Leipzig, Budapest, Hamburg, and Vienna. All Mahler's works are discussed.

The latest research on the Eighth Symphony and Das Lied von der Erde has been incorporated. Focusing on the nine completed symphonies and The Song of the Earth, David Hurwitz addresses his readers directly in an informal, conversational tone (includes a CD of highlights mentioned in the text).

This is a recent biography that shows the influence on Mahler exercised by his tempestuous wife. The story of Alma's marriages and liaisons is set against the social and cultural background of the Vienna of her day.

Masterpieces of European Art, Part 2

Retaining the intelligence and freshness of H.W. Janson's classic original work, this highly esteemed, unsurpassed introductory survey on the history of Western art from the ancient through modern worlds is specifically written and designed to make art history accessible and enjoyable for readers.

Microlending: Can a $50 Loan Change the World?

The book is a New York Times bestseller and is available in paperback. As the course lasts only four weeks, please finish this book before the start of class.

Norse Mythology: Siegfried to Blitzkrieg, Part 1

Davidson provides an accessible, scholarly overview of Norse deities and mythology. Three of her eight chapters give us an overview of the nordic cosmos and themes, the rest tell us stories of the deities.

Colum is a masterful storyteller and fully tells the Ring saga, as well as other tales. His style is utterly enchanting.

Lee describes Wagner's version of the Ring cycle.

Overcoming Hurdles to Artistic Genius: Creativity & Disability

In this boldly ambitious study, Gardner ( Frames of Mind ) profiles seven creative giants. Creativity, he argues, is not an all-purpose trait but instead involves distinct intelligences, as exemplified by Picasso's visual-spatial skills or by Gandhi's nonviolent approach to human conflict or Martha Graham's search for a distinctly American form of bodily expression.

"...[Eysenck] expertly weaves together a vast array of research, and proposes a theory which, although as yet not fully tested, suggests a creative and viable synthesis of the research on creativity to date." Shari Tishman, Applied Cognitive Psychology.

As Csikzentmihalyi (Flow) argues, creativity requires not only unusual individuals, but a culture and field of experts that can foster and validate such work. Most creative people, the author suggests, have dialectic personalities: smart yet naive, both extroverted and introverted, etc.

Public Art in Your Backyard

From the Washington Monument to the 1913 Armory show to 9/11 memorials, controversies over art exhibitions, memorials and public art have abounded in the U.S. In this expansively researched history of major and lesser-known disputes from the 1830s to the 21st century, Pulitzer Prize winner Kammen (A Time to Every Purpose) argues that the "disturbations" roused by artworks and monuments are often both "destabilizing" and "enlightening and educational," indicative of healthy social change and increasing democratization.

Sherman's March to the Sea

Companion volume to a PBS series, this is an extraordinary collection of photos, engravings and paintings, many published for the first time, conveying military and political events of the Civil War, accompanied by a pungent text that avoids sentimentality in depicting "the most horrible, necessary, intimate, acrimonious, mean-spirited, and heroic" war in our history. Typical illustrations include a photo of a pile of amputated feet, four pages of clinical portraits of maimed soldiers, photos of nurses at work in hospitals and rare studio portraits of slaves among some 500 illustrations which, in combination with the text, present a memorable record of the War Between the States.