The essays gathered in this volume contain analyses based on the general action perspective of Chicago sociology and, in particular, on the contributions of Anselm L. Strauss, whose lengthy achievement this volume honors.

Completely revised, updated and with four new chapters on sustainability, new technologies, precision agriculture and the future of animal welfare, the third edition of this highly successful textbook: · Is edited by an outstanding world expert on animal welfare. · Emphasizes throughout the importance of measuring conditions that compromise welfare, such as lameness, heat stress, body condition, and bruises during transport. · Combines scientific information with practical recommendations for use on commercial operations. · Reviews practical information on livestock handling, euthanasia, slaughter, pain relief, and assessments of abnormal behavior. Improving Animal Welfare: A Practical Approach remains essential reading for students and practitioners of ethology, animal and veterinary science, veterinary medicine, as well as those working directly with farm animals and committed to improving their welfare.

In this compendium of related and cross-referential essays, David R. Maines draws from pragmatist/symbolic interactionist assumptions to formulate a consistent new view of the entire field of sociology. Suitable for courses in social theory, qualitative methods, social psychology, and narrative inquiry, this volume will change the way the general public looks at interpretive sociology.

This book is organized as an expression of the centrality of interactionism to general sociology. Each chapter is designed to articulate this view of the field. Symbolic interactionism, the way Maines has come to understand and use it, is essentially the concerted application of pragmatist principles of philosophy to social inquiry.

There are four basic elements to this characterization. First, people transform themselves: people are self-aware beings who reflexively form their conduct and thus are capable of adjusting their lines of action and creating new ones. Second, people transform their social worlds: human action takes place in contexts of situations and social worlds. People can modify the social matrices in which they act, and thus people are agents of change. Third, people engage in social dialogue: communication is generic and is at the heart of both stability and change. A fourth element is that people respond to and deal with their transformations. Humans construct situations and societies; they establish social structures and cultures. These are the consequences of human action and, once formed, they reflexively function to direct and channel conduct.

Maines argues that when people do things together they can create enduring group formations, such as divisions of labor, rules for inheritance, wage-labor relations, or ideologies. These are instances of group characteristics that influence human conduct and indeed are not reducible to the traits of individuals making up the group or society.

Completely revised, updated and with four new chapters on sustainability, new technologies, precision agriculture and the future of animal welfare, the third edition of this highly successful textbook: · Is edited by an outstanding world expert on animal welfare. · Emphasizes throughout the importance of measuring conditions that compromise welfare, such as lameness, heat stress, body condition, and bruises during transport. · Combines scientific information with practical recommendations for use on commercial operations. · Reviews practical information on livestock handling, euthanasia, slaughter, pain relief, and assessments of abnormal behavior. Improving Animal Welfare: A Practical Approach remains essential reading for students and practitioners of ethology, animal and veterinary science, veterinary medicine, as well as those working directly with farm animals and committed to improving their welfare.

In this brilliant debut novel, Noe's family - his wife, sons and daughters-in-law - tell what it's like to live with a man touched by God, while struggling against events that cannot be controlled or explained. For when Noe orders his sons to build an ark, he can't tell them where the wood will come from, just that God will provide. When he sends his daughter-in-law out to gather the animals, he can offer no directions, money, or protection. Just faith. But once the rain starts, they all come to realise that the harshest test of their faith is just beginning. The novel is a wickedly funny, wildly imaginative retelling of one of the most dramatic stories known to mankind. At its core it's about a family caught in the midst of an extraordinary event. David Maine infuses this timeless tale with humanity, tension and wit.

The US Government has been testing the long-term effects of high-level radiation on a few select islands in the South Pacific. Their efforts have produced killer plants, mole people, and a 40 foot creature named K. Covered in fur and feathers, gifted with unusable butterfly wings and the mental capacity of a goldfish, K. is an evolutionary experiment gone very awry. Although he has no real understanding of his world, he knows when he's hungry, and he knows to follow the drum beats that lead him, every time, to the tree where a woman will be offered to him as sacrifice by the natives. When a group of American hunters stumble across the island, it's bound to get interesting. Especially when the natives offer up the beautiful wife of the guide to K. Not to be outdone, the Americans manage to capture him. Back in the States, they start a traveling show. The main attraction: K.

"Monster, 1959" is not just a portrait of what may have gone wrong inside the head of a monster like Godzilla, it isn't just a novel that follows the typical plot of a '50s monster movie. It's also a nuanced, detailed and exquisitely written view of a time that had a profound effect on creating the world we live in today. It captures David Maine's storytelling brilliance as it's never been seen before.

From the internationally acclaimed author of "The Preservationist "comes a provocative retelling of the story of Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel: a novel that gives new meaning to the words "temptation," "rivalry," and "murder."
Their expulsion from the Garden is only the beginning: Eve and Adam have to find their way past recriminations and bitterness, to construct a new life together in a harsh land. But the challenges are many for the world's first family. Among their children are Cain and Abel, and soon they must discover how to be parents to one son who is everything they could hope for, and another who is sullen, difficult, and rife with insecurities and jealousies. In the background, always, is the incomprehensibility of God's motives as He watches over their faltering attempts to build a life. In "Fallen," David Maine has drawn a convincing, wryly observant, and enthralling portrait of a family--one driven (and riven) by passions, irrationality, and love. The result is an intimate, in-depth story of brothers, a husband, and a wife--people whose struggles are both completely familiar and yet utterly original.

From the author of the acclaimed and provocative novels "Fallen" and "The Preservationist" comes a tale about a man who believes he is touched by the hand of God---and instructed by that God to slaughter his enemies. Told with crackling wit and black humor, this is the story of "this worldly existence of men & brutes desire & unkindness" and of the woman, the deadly and alluring Dalila, who figures at the center of it all. It's a story you think you know, but soon you will leave your preconceived notions at the door. In "The Book of Samson, "David Maine has created an unforgettable portrait, a unique and astonishing masterpiece that shows the human side of a previously faceless icon.

Praise for Dave Maine and "The Preservationist":
""The Preservationist" is funny, tender, intelligent, energetic, irreverent, and worshipful. It is an enormous juggling act of families, animals and faith, and it kept me engaged through every page. I imagine Noah would be enormously pleased with David Maine's novel, I know I was." - "Ann Patchett," author of "Bel Canto"
"I loved "The Preservationist," It's a funny, convincing amplification of the Biblical story."
- Tracy Chevalier, author of "The Virgin Blue"
"Once they were strangers to us. Distant as specks. No more! Thanks to David Maine it is in the daily, the ordinary "Noah family" the "what's for breakfast?" the aching feet, the little insults or winks, the slap on the back, the gathering of insects in cupped hands that we know them now as we know ourselves, the family next door preparing to face the unknown, the "I am certain," the magnificent, the awful, the wonderful, the weird, the big. "The Preservationist" was great. Very moving and enjoyable and clever."
- Carolyn Chute, author of "The Beans of Egypt, Maine"
"Maine simply, wisely, asks himself what it was like to be there, "when the rain began to fall." For me, the strength of this book lies not so much in its entertaining characters as in the wonderful details of this old brand-new world.In just these details, small and large, Maine convinces us that the world Noah worked so hard to save is indeed worth preserving."
- Jincy Willett, author of "Winner of the National Book Award"
"If, like me, you've always wondered how Noah actually built his ark, and managed to fit all those animals on it, and survived forty days and forty nights of rain andflood, "The Preservationist" is the book for you. A funny, cheeky, irreverent, wonderfully original first novel, informed both by Biblical history and Dave Maine's joyous imagination."
- Jim Fergus, author of "One Thousand White Women"
""The Preservationist "is delightfully wry and witty, throwing light on man's-and woman's-eternal folly in the name of God and of love. More, this retelling of an ancient tale is a great deal of fun to read, its characters etched with an acid affection that makes them unforgettable."
- India Edghill, author of "Queenmaker"