Widely regarded as one of the rare eminent scientists who is also a graceful writer, Ian Tattersall here takes up some of the most controversial questions in evolutionary history in this superb collection of essays. Tattersall stresses that living creatures, including humans, are not finely engineered organisms with every component perfectly adapted to their function. We are - on the contrary - jury-rigged, improvised beings, owing as much to chance as to adaptation. And this is true of all living creatures. Leading the reader around the world and into the far reaches of the past, Tattersall shows us what the science of human evolution is about and what it is up against - from the sparsity of evidence to the pressures of religious fundamentalism. The fundamental questions of our origins - and our evolutionary future - find new life in this extraordinary book, full of delightful stories, scientific wisdom, and fresh insight

Situated at the intersection of natural science and philosophy, Our Genes explores historical practices, investigates current trends, and imagines future work in genetic research to answer persistent, political questions about human diversity. Readers are guided through fascinating thought experiments, complex measures and metrics, fundamental evolutionary patterns, and in-depth treatment of exciting case studies. The work culminates in a philosophical rationale, based on scientific evidence, for a moderate position about the explanatory power of genes that is often left unarticulated. Simply put, human evolutionary genomics - our genes - can tell us much about who we are as individuals and as collectives. However, while they convey scientific certainty in the popular imagination, genes cannot answer some of our most important questions. Alternating between an up-close and a zoomed-out focus on genes and genomes, individuals and collectives, species and populations, Our Genes argues that the answers we seek point to rich, necessary work ahead.

This volume draws together ten important essays which use a variety of approaches and materials to explore the significance of sexuality in Shakespeare's work. Some consider the erotic effect of Shakespeare's language; others are concerned with expressions of desire (male, female, inter-racial, homosexual and heterosexual) in performance as well as text. Many are reprinted from Shakespeare Survey. They are introduced by Ann Thompson's survey of the topic in recent criticism, and conclude with a new essay by Celia Daileader on nudity in Shakespeare films.

Consideration of the body as a subject for study has increased in recent years with new technologies, forms of modification, debates about obesity and issues of age being brought into focus by the media. Drawing on contemporary culture, Body Studies: The Basics introduces readers to the key concerns and debates surrounding the study of the sociological body, cutting across disciplines to cover topics which include:

• Nature vs. Culture: how we build and transform our bodies
• Conformity and resistance in bodily practice
• Issues of body image beauty, diet, exercise and age
• Sporting bodies and the pursuit of ideals
• Enfreakment, disability and monstrosity
• Cyborgs and virtual online bodies

With further reading signposted throughout, this accessible book is essential reading for anyone studying the body through the lens of sociology, cultural studies, sports studies, media studies and gender studies; and all those with an interest in how the physical body can be a social construct."

Homo Sapiens, A Problematic Species examines how Western culture has understood and continues to understand what it is to be human. This book features reflections on mythical thought and its logic and contrasts it to the Western conception of man as expressed in philosophy from antiquity to the twentieth century, its main sources being Christianity and the idealistic tenet in antique Greek philosophy. The author stresses the necessity to break away from a religious and metaphysical perception of man that is inevitably anthropocentric in order to construct a more scientifically based anthropology appropriate to tackle the threats our species poses to the vast ecological system on Earth.

Both timely and topical, with 2005 marking the 60th anniversary of the end of the Second World War, this unique book examines the little-known and under-researched area of German migration to Britain in the immediate post-war era. Authors Weber-Newth and Steinert analyze the political framework of post-war immigration and immigrant policy, and the complex decision-making processes that led to large-scale labour migration from the continent. They consider:

* identity, perception of self and others, stereotypes and prejudice
* how migrants dealt with language and intercultural issues
* migrants' attitudes towards national socialist and contemporary Germany
* migrants' motivation for leaving Germany
* migrants' initial experiences and their reception in Britain after the war, as recalled after 50 years in the host country, compared to their original expectations.

Based on rich British and German governmental and non-governmental archive sources, contemporary newspaper articles and nearly eighty biographically oriented interviews with German migrants, this outstanding volume, a must-read for students and scholars in the fields of social history, sociology and migration studies, expertly encompasses political as well as social-historical questions and engages with the social, economic and cultural situation of German immigrants to Britain from a life-historical perspective."

Internationally recognized psychologist Paul L. Wachtel sheds new light on the psychological foundations of our nation's racial impasse and applies his pathbreaking "vicious circle" approach to help resolve it. This timely and fascinating analysis shows how the ways we attempt to cope with racial tensions and inequalities often lead to the perpetuation of our difficulties rather than their resolution. Understanding the ironies that characterize contemporary race relations is the first step toward extricating our nation from the vicious circle. Both controversial and healing, Race inthe Mind of America challenges the orthodoxies that shape black and white opinion and liberal and conservative policies while sensitively exploring the way the world looks to both sides and why it looks that way. Wachtel probes the daily experiences of blacks and whites, shedding new light on how individual experiences and larger social, historical and economic forces continually re-create each other. In illustrating how blacks and whites get caught in vicious circles that sustain the very behaviors and attitudes they wish would change, Wachtel also points toward the concrete solutions to our seemingly enduring dilemmas and shows how to move beyond the adversarial rhetoric that divides us.

Johnny Saldana outlines the basic elements of longitudinal qualitative data, focusing on micro-levels of change observed within individual cases and groups of participants. He draws upon his primary experience in theater education to examine time and change in longitudinal qualitative studies; contending that "playwrights and qualitative researchers write for the same purpose: to create a unique, insightful, and engaging text about the human condition." Offering sixteen specific questions through which researchers may approach the analysis of longitudinal qualitative data, Professor Saldana presents a text intended as a primer for fellow newcomers to long term inquiry, based on traditional social science methods from traditional qualitative and quantitative paradigms, but enriched by an artist-educator's unconventional perspective.

As with a number of specific areas in the medical professions, the field of personality disorders has experienced a period of rapid growth and development over the past decade. This volume is designed to offer the student, practitioner and researcher with a single source for the most up-to-date research and treatment writing on a variety of specific areas within the field.

Living Beings examines the vital characteristics of social interactions between living beings, including humans, other animals and trees. Many discussions of such relationships highlight the exceptional qualities of the human members of the category, insisting for instance on their religious beliefs or creativity. In contrast, the international case studies in this volume dissect views based on hierarchical oppositions between human and other living beings. Although human practices may sometimes appear to exist in a realm beyond nature, they are nevertheless subject to the pull of natural forces. These forces may be brought into prominence through a consideration of the interactions between human beings and other inhabitants of the natural world. The interplay in this book between social anthropologists, philosophers and artists cuts across species divisions to examine the experiential dimensions of interspecies engagements. In ethnographically and/or historically contextualized chapters, contributors examine the juxtaposition of human and other living beings in the light of themes such as wildlife safaris, violence, difference, mimicry, simulation, spiritual renewal, dress and language.

Harbingers of Global Change enriches a revealing case study of a little-understood group of immigrants with the contemplation of broader social dynamics, including assimilation, acculturation, and the persistence of racial and ethnic prejudice. Author Roli Varma reveals how familiar obstacles to social equity_such as the silicon ceiling_are complicated by the unique constellation of social pressures confronting a group of scientists and engineers whose talent it highly valued, and yet whose presence as culturally unfamiliar human beings is received with unease and ambivalence. The analysis combines United States political and social history as it bears on immigration policy with a sensitive and balanced treatment of how India's techno immigrants negotiate career, family, and loyalty to social-cultural traditions.Harbingers of Global Change is not merely a much needed addition to the emergent literature on the plight of international immigration-professionals; it is a visionary look at where global society is headed in the twenty-first century, an epoch in which all human beings may become foreigners in the virtual techno-marketplace.

Ethnic Realignments offers a fresh look at the phenomenon of rapidly changing ethnic identity claims. By focusing on the countries of Australia, China, Malaysia, and India, Matthew Hoddie provides a comparative study arguing that government policies designed to favor one ethnic group over another can influence individuals among the disfavored group to change their 'identities' and recast themselves as members of the favored group. Hoddie employs a statistical methodology to lay out the conditions and factors that lead to these ethnic identity changes, thereby contributing to the ongoing debate concerning the malleability of ethnic identity. Ethnic Realignments is a significant work for scholars interested in the politics of ethnicity and the effectiveness of affirmative action policies.

Exploring sensitive issues often hidden to outsiders, this engaging study traces the transformation and economic development of a south China village during the first tumultuous decade of reform. Drawing on a wealth of intimate detail, Ku explores the new sense of risk and mood of insecurity experienced in the post-reform era in Ku Village, a typical hamlet beyond the margins of richer suburban areas or fertile farmland. Villagers' dissatisfaction revolves around three key issues: the rising cost of living, mounting agricultural expenses, and the forcible implementation of birth-control quotas. Faced with these daunting problems, villagers have developed an array of strategies. Their weapons include resisting policies they consider unreasonable by disregarding fees, evading taxes, and ignoring strict family planning regulations; challenging the rationale of official policies and the legitimacy of the local government and its officials; and reestablishing clan associations to supercede local Party authority. Using lively everyday narratives and compelling personal stories, Ku argues that rural people are not in fact powerless and passive; instead they have their own moral system that informs their everyday family lives, work, and political activities. Their code embodies concepts of fairness and justice, a concrete definition of the relationship between the state and its citizens, an understanding of the boundaries and responsibilities of each party, and a clear notion of what constitutes good and bad government and officials. On the basis of these principles, they may challenge existing policies and deny the authority of officials and the government, thereby legitimizing their acts of self-defense. Through his richly realized ethnography, Ku shows the reader a world of memorable, fully realized individuals striving to control their fate in an often arbitrary world.

"The thesis is radical," writes Marshall Sahlins of this landmark text in anthropology and political science. "We conventionally define the state as the regulation of violence; it may be the origin of it. Clastres's thesis is that economic expropriation and political coercion are inconsistent with the character of tribal society - which is to say, with the greater part of human history."Can there be a society that is not divided into oppressors and oppressed, or that refuses coercive state apparatuses? In this beautifully written book, Pierre Clastres offers examples of South American Indian groups that, although without hierarchical leadership, were both affluent and complex. In so doing he refutes the usual negative definition of tribal society and poses its order as a radical critique of our own Western state of power.Born in 1934, Pierre Clastres was educated at the Sorbonne; throughout the 1960s he lived with Indian groups in Paraguay and Venezuela. From 1971 until his death in 1979 he was Director of Studies at the fifth section of the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes in Paris and held the Chair of Religion and Societies of the South American Indians there.Robert Hurley is the translator of the History of Sexuality by Michel Foucault and cotranslator of Anti-Oedipus by Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari.

A field ethnographer to visit West Africa before the second half of the 19th century, the author of this work presents an informative description of the surrounding tribes together with a collection of Temne, Bulom and Susu vocabularies. The second volume represents a systematic account of African medicine, diseases, remedies and therapeutic plants. The volumes were first published in 1803.

Ethnic Realignments offers a fresh look at the phenomenon of rapidly changing ethnic identity claims. By focusing on the countries of Australia, China, Malaysia, and India, Matthew Hoddie provides a comparative study arguing that government policies designed to favor one ethnic group over another can influence individuals among the disfavored group to change their "identities" and recast themselves as members of the favored group. Hoddie employs a statistical methodology to lay out the conditions and factors that lead to these ethnic identity changes, thereby contributing to the ongoing debate concerning the malleability of ethnic identity. Ethnic Realignments is a significant work for scholars interested in the politics of ethnicity and the effectiveness of affirmative action policies.

** WINNER OF THE PEN HESSELL-TILTMAN PRIZE 2021 ** 'Beautiful, evocative, authoritative.' Professor Brian Cox 'Important reading not just for anyone interested in these ancient cousins of ours, but also for anyone interested in humanity.' Yuval Noah Harari Kindred is the definitive guide to the Neanderthals. Since their discovery more than 160 years ago, Neanderthals have metamorphosed from the losers of the human family tree to A-list hominins. Rebecca Wragg Sykes uses her experience at the cutting-edge of Palaeolithic research to share our new understanding of Neanderthals, shoving aside cliches of rag-clad brutes in an icy wasteland. She reveals them to be curious, clever connoisseurs of their world, technologically inventive and ecologically adaptable. Above all, they were successful survivors for more than 300,000 years, during times of massive climatic upheaval. Much of what defines us was also in Neanderthals, and their DNA is still inside us. Planning, co-operation, altruism, craftsmanship, aesthetic sense, imagination, perhaps even a desire for transcendence beyond mortality. Kindred does for Neanderthals what Sapiens did for us, revealing a deeper, more nuanced story where humanity itself is our ancient, shared inheritance.

The ability to use DNA evidence is revolutionizing our understanding of the past. This book introduces archaeologists to the basics of DNA research so they can understand the powers and pitfalls of using DNA data in archaeological analysis and interpretation. By concentrating on the principles and applications of DNA specific to archaeology, the authors allow archaeologists to collect DNA samples properly and interpret the laboratory results with greater confidence. Written by archaeologists who conduct fieldwork as well as laboratory analysis, the volume is replete with case examples of DNA work in a variety of archaeological contexts and is an ideal teaching tool for archaeologists and their students.

The ability to use DNA evidence is revolutionizing our understanding of the past. This book introduces archaeologists to the basics of DNA research so they can understand the powers and pitfalls of using DNA data in archaeological analysis and interpretation. By concentrating on the principles and applications of DNA specific to archaeology, the authors allow archaeologists to collect DNA samples properly and interpret the laboratory results with greater confidence. Written by archaeologists who conduct fieldwork as well as laboratory analysis, the volume is replete with case examples of DNA work in a variety of archaeological contexts and is an ideal teaching tool for archaeologists and their students.

This text includes short sketches of each of the principal tribes of South-West Africa, showing their state of development, their mode of living and how they differ from each other.

Key Themes in Qualitative Research is an attempt by three well-respected ethnographic researchers to present a balanced view of qualitative methodology and research. The book is structured around classic texts, written by methodological pioneers, which comprise the basic foundation of modern qualitative research. The authors examine key premises in these texts, such as intimacy, advocacy, and validity, and how they may be supported, redesigned, or made problematic in today's field. This allows for a critical analysis of Old Guard vs. Avant-Garde ideas and provides for the reader a guide to wade through the proliferation of texts and theories available since the postmodern turn. While not designed as a primer in qualitative research methods, anyone with modest experience in the field should find this book extremely useful.

The culture of early Anglo-Saxon England explored from an inter-disciplinary perspective. A stimulating contribution to the field of Anglo-Saxon studies. MEDIEVAL ARCHAEOLOGY A mind-stretching read. NOTES AND QUERIES The papers contained in this volume, by leading researchers in the field, cover a wide range of social, economic and ideological aspects of the culture of early Anglo-Saxon England, from an inter-disciplinary perspective. The status of `Anglo-Saxondom' and `Englishness' as cultural and ethnic categories are a recurrent focus of debate, while other topics include the reconstruction of settlement patterns; social and political structures; farming in medieval England; and the spiritual world of the Anglo-Saxons. As a whole, the contributionsoffer fascinating insights into key contemporary research questions and projects, and into the character and problems of interdisciplinary approaches. Dr JOHN HINES is Reader in the School of History and Archaeology atthe University of Wales, Cardiff. Contributors: WALTER POHL, IAN WOOD, DELLA HOOKE, DOMINIC POWLESLAND, HEINRICH HAERKE, THOMAS CHARLES-EDWARDS, PATRIZIA LENDINARA, PETER FOWLER, CHRISTOPHER SCULL, JANE HAWKES, D.N. DUMVILLE, JOHN HINES, GIORGIO AUSENDA

The Mexican-American Mind is a book intended to give the reader a glimpse into the mental machinations of members of the Mexican-American cultural group, which has grown into one of the largest minority groups in the nation. In this collection of essays, the reader becomes privy to understanding how Mexican-Americans feel about, as well as interpret, almost all areas of culture: including men's roles, women's roles, relationships, marriage, religion, travel, and education. Caravantes gives expression to many cultural tendencies, which many have noticed, but few are willing to admit to in such a candid manner. Ultimately, this book, with its sociological inclinations, has an ultimate goal of acute cultural awareness among members of this population, as well as greater cultural awareness among those who service them.

This book is an ethnographic and historical study of the main Albania-Greece highway. But more than an ethnography on the road, it is an anthropology of the road. Highways are part of an explicit cultural-material nexus that includes houses, urban architecture and vehicles. Complex socio-political phenomena such as EU border security, nationalist politics, post-Cold War capitalism and financial crises all leave their mark in the concrete. This book explores anew classical anthropological and sociological categories of analysis in direct reference to infrastructure, providing unique insights into the political and cultural processes that took place across Europe after the Cold War. More specifically, it sheds light on political and economic relationships in the Balkans during the socialist post-Cold War period, focusing especially on Albania, one of the most under-researched countries in the region. -- .

Originally published in 1969, the aim of this book is to tell the story of the major discoveries which have been made and the attitude of the world at large to these discoveries during the ten decades since Darwin published On the Origin of Species in 1859. For anyone interested in man's past and in understanding the significance of each new discovery relating to human evolution, this reissue will be of great value.