Can sociology help us to tackle environmental problems? What can sociology tell us about the nature of the environment and about the origins and consequences of environmental risks, hazards and change? In this important new book Alan Irwin maps out this emerging field of knowledge, teaching and research. He reviews the key sociological debates in the field and sets out a new framework for analysis and practice.

Among the themes examined are constructivism and realism, sustainable development and theories of the risk society. Readers are also introduced to communities at risk, institutional regulation and the environmental consequences of technology. Particular topics for discussion include genetically modified organisms, nuclear power, pesticide safety and the local hazards of the chemical industry. Rather than maintaining a fixed boundary between nature and society, Irwin highlights the hybrid character of environmental issues and emphasizes the role of social and cultural factors within environmental policy.

Combining theoretical discussion and case-studies with a sensitivity to the concerns of environmental policy and practice, "Sociology and the Environment "provides an excellent introduction to an expanding and immensely important field. It will be a valuable text for students and scholars in sociology, geography, environmental studies and related disciplines.

A classic book about the phenomenon of suicide and its social causes written by one of the world's most influential sociologists.
Emile Durkheim's "Suicide "addresses the phenomenon of suicide and its social causes. Written by one of the world's most influential sociologists, this classic argues that suicide primarily results from a lack of integration of the individual into society. "Suicide "provides readers with an understanding of the impetus for suicide and its psychological impact on the victim, family, and society.

This book examines the complexities of the colonization of the territory that is now Brazil and its shaping of psychological knowledge and practice. It reveals the rich network of cultural practices that were formed through the appropriation of elements of Jesuit Catholicism and the blending with elements of the cultures of native, African and Lusitanian populations present in the territory, and how psychological concepts and practices emerged and circulated between the sixteenth and the late eighteenth centuries, long before the establishment of psychology as a modern science. The volume summarizes the research program developed by the author over 38 years of academic activity through which she contributed to expand the field of historical studies in psychology by investigating how psychological concepts and practices were produced in cultural and historical contexts different from the European and North American societies where scientific psychology developed in the 19th and 20th centuries. Psychological Knowledge and Practices in Brazilian Colonial Culture will be of interest not only to historians of psychology, but also to professional psychologists working with culturally diverse populations who seek to understand how psychological concepts and phenomena are shaped by culture. By doing so, the book intends to contribute to the development of a psychology better prepared to deal with cultural diversity in an increasingly multicultural world. "Massimi's book will now form an important foundation of English-language scholarship about the psychological and cultural impact of colonization on subjugated peoples. She has, of course, made many such contributions in Portuguese. It is to be hoped that much of her work will be translated into English so that more scholars may benefit from the richness of her insights." - Excerpt from the Foreword by Dr. Wade E. Pickren.

Crises and Hegemonic Transitions reworks the concept of hegemony at the international level and analyses its relation to world market crises. Returning to the critical edition of Gramsci's Quaderni and maintaining that the author's work is permeated by Marx's Capital and the law of value, Fusaro argues that imperialist states strive to constructing hegemonic relations in order to secure capital accumulation using domination and leadership, coercion and consensus, and that economic crises have only the potential to provoke crises of hegemony. Tracing the vicissitudes of US hegemony from the interwar period to the present and assessing the Great Depression's and the Great Recession's impact, Fusaro provides a novel way to interpret past and present developments within the world economy.

After the end of the apartheid regime in the 1990s, South Africa experienced a boom in new heritage and commemorative projects. These ranged from huge new museums and monuments to small community museums and grassroots memory work. At the same time, South African cities have continued to grapple with the difficulties of overcoming entrenched inequalities and divisions. Urban spaces are deep repositories of memory, and also sites in need of radical transformation. Remaking the Urban examines the intersections between post-apartheid urban transformation and the politics of heritage-making in divided cities, using the Nelson Mandela Bay Metro in South Africa's Eastern Cape as a case study. Roux unpacks the processes by which some narratives and histories become officially inscribed in public space, while others are visible only through alternative, ephemeral or subversive means. Including discussions of the history of the Red Location Museum of Struggle; memorialisation of urban forced removals; the heritage politics and transformative potential of public art; and strategies for making visible memories and histories of former anti-apartheid youth activist groups in the city's townships, Roux examines how these twin processes of memory-making and change have played out in Nelson Mandela Bay. -- .

This volume draws on disciplines as different as Psychology, Anthropology, History and Biology to explain when and why individuals act to promote their own self-interest and when they sacrifice their own outcomes so that others can benefit.

Your organs are failing and require replacement. If you had the choice, would you prefer organs from other humans or non-human animals, or would you choose a 'cybernetic' medical implant? Using a range of social science methods and drawing on the sociology of the body and embodiment, biomedicine and technology, this book asks what happens to who we are (our identity) when we change what we are (our bodies)? From surveying young adults about whether they would choose options such as 3-D bioprinting, living or deceased human donation, or non-human animal or implantable biomechanical devices, to interviewing those who live with an implantable cardiac defibrillator, Haddow invites us to think about what kind of relationship we have with our bodies. She concludes that the reliance on 'cybernetic' medical devices create 'everyday cyborgs' who can experience alienation and new forms of vulnerability at implantation and activation. Embodiment and everyday cyborgs invites readers to consider the relationship between personal identity and the body, between humans and non-human animals, and our increasing dependency on 'smart' implantable technology. The creation of new techno-organic hybrid bodies makes us acutely aware of our own bodies and how ambiguous the experience of embodiment actually is. It is only through understanding how modifications such as transplantation, amputation and implantation make our bodies a 'presence' to us, Haddow argues, that we realise our everyday experience of our bodies as an absence. -- .

Taking the recent coronavirus pandemic as a starting point, this book presents and analyzes new research around medical clowning in hospitals, from social media use to the impact on the hospitalized child in later life. This innovative book begins with an overview of the work of medical clowns. It discusses the idea of humor as a mechanism related to the revolution in language and human consciousness, and makes a connection between humor and anxiety, exploring how this can be mobilized to support hospitalized patients. There is extensive examination of medical clowning to strengthen coping skills and promote wellbeing in the time of Covid-19, where loneliness and isolation loomed large and anxieties were high. Subsequent chapters explore the role of medical clowning in wartime and at time of natural disasters, the experiences of children some time after their experience of hospitalization and clowning, and the role of social media and medical clowns in community building. This book is a fascinating contribution to the literature on medical clowning. It is of interest to researchers, practitioners and lecturers in medical clowning, play in healthcare, nursing, medicine, and performance studies.

Narasimha is one of the least studied major deities of Hinduism. Furthermore, there are limited studies of the history, thought, and literature of middle India. Lavanya Vemsani redresses this by exploring a range of primary sources, including classical Sanskrit texts (puranas and epics), and regional accounts (sthalapuranas), which include texts, artistic compositions, and oral folk stories in the regional languages of Telugu, Oriya, and Kannada. She also examines the historical context as well as contemporary practice. Moving beyond the stereotypical classifications applied to sources of Hinduism, this unique study dedicates chapters to each region of middle India bringing together literary, religious, and cultural practices to comprehensively understand the religion of Middle India (Madhya Desha). Incorporating lived religion and textual data, this book offers a rich contribution to Hindu studies and Indian studies in general, and Vaishnava Studies and regional Hinduism in particular.

Social life is in a constant process of change, and sociology can never stand still. As a result, contemporary sociology is a theoretically diverse enterprise, covering a huge range of subjects and drawing on a broad array of research methods. Central to this endeavour is the use of core concepts and ideas which allow sociologists to make sense of societies, though our understanding of these concepts necessarily evolves and changes. This clear and jargon-free book introduces a careful selection of essential concepts that have helped to shape sociology and continue to do so. Going beyond brief, dictionary-style definitions, Anthony Giddens and Philip W. Sutton provide an extended discussion of each concept which sets it in historical and theoretical context, explores its main meanings in use, introduces relevant criticisms, and points readers to its ongoing development in contemporary research and theorizing. Organized in ten thematic sections, the book offers a portrait of sociology through its essential concepts, ranging from capitalism, identity and deviance to the digital revolution, environment, postcolonialism and intersectionality. It will be essential reading for all those new to sociology as well as anyone seeking a reliable route map for a rapidly changing world.

How might the social sciences best be employed in the study of law, especially in light of today's legal climate of anti-foundationalism? Realistic Socio-Legal Theory addresses this question thoroughly and precisely. Drawing upon philosophical pragmatism to construct an epistemological and methodological foundation, this book formulates a framework for a realistic approach to socio-legal theory.
Brian Z. Tamanaha contrasts the strengths of his realistic approach with those of the major schools of socio-legal theory through application to many key issues in the field. He explores the problematic state of socio-legal studies, the relationship between behavior and meaning, the notion of legal ideology, the nature of the concept of law, the problem of indeterminacy in rule following and application, and the structure of judicial decision making.
Tamanaha's discussion is always clear and concise as he articulates a social theory of law that draws equally from legal theory and socio-legal studies. His book has much to offer those interested in the gathering and organization of knowledge about law and legal phenomena.

Society is under siege - under attack on two fronts: from the global frontier-land where old structures and rules do not hold and new ones are slow to take shape, and from the fluid, undefined domain of life politics. The space between these two fronts, until recently ruled by the sovereign nation-state and identified by social scientists as 'society' is ever more difficult to conceive of as a self-enclosed entity. And this confronts the established wisdom of the social sciences with a new challenge: sovereignty and power are becoming separated from the politics of the territorial nation-state but are not becoming institutionalized in a new space. What are the consequences of this profound transformation of social life? What kind of world will it create for the twenty-first century?

This remarkable book - by one of the most original social thinkers writing today - attempts to trace this transformation and to assess its consequences for the life conditions of ordinary individuals. The first part of the book is devoted to the new global arena in which, thanks to the powerful forces of globalization, there is no 'outside', no secluded place to which one can retreat and hide away, and where the territorial wars of the past have given way to a new breed of 'reconnaissance wars'. The second part deals with settings in which life politics has taken hold and flourished. Bauman argues that the great challenge facing us today is whether we can find new ways to reforge the human diversity that is our fate into the vocation of human solidarity.

For the past three decades, Manuel Castells has been at the forefront of debates about contemporary social transformations. From his seminal book on urban change in the early 1970s to his more recent work on globalization, Castells has been widely read by all those striving to understand our increasingly interconnected world. Above all, it is his highly acclaimed trilogy, The Information Age, which constitutes the single most comprehensive attempt to integrate a vast range of subjects into a coherent theory of the present-day. It has earned him favourable comparisons to Marx and Weber. This book provides the first in-depth study of Castellsrsquo; entire body of work. Focusing on Castellsrsquo; theory of the network society, the book explores his core thesis - that a shift has occurred from hierarchies to networks as the dominant organizing principle of society - through his analysis of informational capitalism, social movements, and the crisis of democracy. Special emphasis is given to the theory of the lsquo; space of flowsrsquo; which Castells argues forms the material foundation of the new society. In this way, the book serves as both an introduction to Castellsrsquo; wide-ranging theories, and an original critique which contributes to ongoing debates in the field.

What happens to people, places and objects that do not fit the ordering regimes and progressive narratives of modernity? Conventional understandings imply that progress leaves such things behind, and excludes them as though they were valueless waste. This volume uses the concept of indeterminacy to explore how conditions of exclusion and abandonment may give rise to new values, as well as to states of despair and alienation. Drawing upon ethnographic research about a wide variety of contexts, the chapters here explore how indeterminacy is created and experienced in relationship to projects of classification and progress.

Heritage science, a cross-disciplinary field of study that emphasizes research on cultural interpretation and management, has seen significant development in recent years. Modern technology has opened new innovations and possibilities for scientific cooperation that produces several benefits that affect multiple aspects of this scientific field. Applying Innovative Technologies in Heritage Science is a collection of progressive studies on the methods and applications of the technological implications and scientific advancements within heritage and cultural research to bridge the once unbridgeable gap between science and humanities. While highlighting topics including digital archives, cultural data, and chemical documentation, this book is ideally designed for archaeologists, museologists, conservationists, preservationists, librarians, researchers, educators, cultural heritage professionals, academicians, and students.

These lectures focus on twelve pioneers of economic, demographic and social statistics ranging from the seventeenth century to the end of the nineteenth century. The first lecture discusses the work of the political arithmeticians including William Petty, Founding Fellow of the Royal Society. The second lecture considers three steps in the development of quantitative economics in the form of Bishop Fleetwood, Arthur Young and Patrick Colquhoun. In the third lecture Stone turns to demography, and to John Graunt, Edmond Halley and William Farr. The fourth lecture deals with social statistics in the persons of Frederick Morton Eden, Florence Nightingale and Charles Booth.

Every month, groups of people from all over the United Kingdom decide what kind of research should be carried out on patients within the NHS. These groups - Research Ethics Committees (RECs) - made up of doctors, nurses, researchers, and members of the general public - help shape the future of medicine, and play a crucial role in the regulation of a wide range of research from social science to epidemiology, vaccine and drugs trials to surgery. Based on extensive observations, interviews, and archival research, this book provides an in-depth insight into RECs, one of the most crucial forms of regulation around medical research. In providing one of the first empirical examinations of this kind of regulation, this book challenges the impersonal, de-socialised, and mechanical models of REC decision-making. -- .

This book presents important fields of research in public healthcare in India from an interdisciplinary and health systems perspectives. Discussing how the exchange of power between the health justice triad, viz., the State (judiciary as the arm of the State), legal and medical professions, and civil society, cumulatively shapes the outcomes of health justice for citizens, it provides insights into India's juridico-legal processes and of seeking justice in healthcare. It critically assesses civil society's counter-hegemonic role in bolstering justice in health care and examines the potential of transforming health care jurisprudence into health justice. Repositioning the social right to healthcare as integral to social citizenship and social justice, and opening avenues for inter-professional and interdisciplinary power discourse in public health policy research, the book is of interest to academics, practitioners, students, researchers, and the wide academic community working in public health care issues broadly.

Since its sovereign debt crisis in 2009, Greece has been living under austerity, with no apparent end in sight. This volume explores the effects of policies pursued by the Greek state since then (under the direction of the Troika), and how Greek society has responded. In addition to charting the actual effects of the Greek crisis on politics, health care, education, media, and other areas, the book both examines and challenges the "crisis" era as the context for changing attitudes and developments within Greek society.

The field of the medical humanities is developing rapidly, however, there has also been parallel concern from sceptics that the value of medical humanities educational interventions should be open to scrutiny and evidence. Just what is the impact of medical humanities provision upon the education of medical students? In an era of limited resources, is such provision worth the investment? This innovative text addresses these pressing questions, describes the contemporary territory comprising the medical humanities in medical education, and explains how this field may be developed as a key medical education component for the future. Bleakley, a driving force of the international movement to establish the medical humanities as a core and integrated provision in the medical curriculum, proposes a model that requires collaboration between patients, artists, humanities scholars, doctors and other health professionals, in developing medical students' sensibility (clinical acumen based on close noticing) and sensitivity (ethical, professional and humane practice). In particular, this text focuses upon how medical humanities input into the curriculum can help to shape the identities of medical students as future doctors who are humane, caring, expressive and creative - whose work will be technically sound but considerably enhanced by their abilities to communicate well with patients and colleagues, to empathise, to be adaptive and innovative, and to act as 'medical citizens' in shaping a future medical culture as a model democracy where social justice is a key aspect of medicine. Making sense of the new wave of medical humanities in medical education scholarship that calls for a 'critical medical humanities', Medical Humanities and Medical Education incorporates a range of case studies and illustrative and practical examples to aid integrating medical humanities into the medical curriculum. It will be important reading for medical educators and others working with the medical education community, and all those interested in the medical humanities.

Cafes and coffee shops have become core venues in the urban landscape, places to be social, chat with friends or colleagues, take a break or relax, or work in companionable solitude. In this edited volume, researchers from a range of social sciences and countries examine the practices, histories, and meanings of cafes, thus contributing to a more comprehensive understanding of the contemporary cafe. The essays that make up this text are as heterogeneous as they are complementary; they are at once a synthesis of what we know and an invitation to investigate further the concept of a 'cafe society'.

A new collection in the IAU Issues in Higher Education Series that deals with the major tensions between education and science. Drawing on experiences from a range of countries and regions, the book demonstrates the need to find new avenues for the management of knowledge production to ensure that it can meet increasingly global goals and demands.

These essays by leading theorists and researchers in sociocultural, cognitive, developmental and educational psychology honour the memory of Sylvia Scribner, whose work is recognized by each of the authors as seminal to their own thinking. The themes include the relationship between history and culture, the importance of context to thinking, the place of literacy in human activity and thought, and cognition in school and in the workplace. The volume presents applications of activity theory to fundamental issues in human behaviour at work, in school, and in problem solving situations, and it analyses historical-societal processes in science and culture. Scribner's conviction that science holds a responsibility to human welfare and understanding is carried on in these chapters. Sociocultural Psychology is crucial reading for researchers and graduate students in sociocultural, cognitive, developmental and educational psychology.

reviews a wide-range of genetically modified (GM) crops, to understand how they are produced, the impacts on the agricultural industry, and the potential for improving food security. examines how food security can be achieved through GM crops. provides an important synthesis of GM crops from their commercial value to the agricultural industry, as well as their potential for improving food security. will be of great interest to students and scholars of agricultural engineering, crop science, food biotechology, food security and those interested in food and agriculture and sustainable development more broadly.