Instilling Ethics casts a fresh light on both the historical sources and the contemporary issues of a major preoccupation of our time: ethics. Norma Thompson has compiled essays from prominent scholars in a wide-range of disciplines to address the problems, pretensions, and positive potentialities of ethical practices today. Instilling Ethics offers a new way of connecting today's ethics to the great ethical sources of the past-- classical, medieval, and early modern--and presents a wise and witty critique of the current practice of 'professional ethics.'

Groups for parents, babies and toddlers, spanning the 1001 critical days from late pregnancy up to age two, are an effective way of supporting expectant and new parents by helping them to become more attuned, sensitive and empathic towards their child. Contributors bring together a range of theoretical perspectives to show different ways to facilitate groups that combine mindfulness and psychological insight to promote bonding, attunement and mind-mindedness, and to prevent abuse and neglect. Case examples show a range of techniques that can be used, including baby massage, movement therapy, Video Interaction Guidance, Watch Wait Wonder and psychotherapeutic interventions. Examples include an in-patient mother-baby unit, community and health centres in the UK, to international examples in Greece, Kenya and New Zealand. Chapters illustrate practical and clinical aspects of running groups, the associated challenges, and highlights the importance of professional collaboration in a benign environment. Weaving the Cradle is full of ideas and insights for those already running groups, as well as for those considering it, across health, social care and education settings.

This volume brings together leading thinkers who offer reflections on the place of Western civilization in the academy, at a time when there is indifference or even antipathy toward the study of the West at most institutions of higher learning. Alternative narratives-including multiculturalism, diversity, and sustainability-have come to the fore in the stead of Western civilization. The present volume is designed to explore the roots, extent, and long-term consequences of this educational climate: How and why did undergraduate education turn its back on what was once an important component of its mission? To what extent has such change affected the experience of undergraduates and the ability of colleges to educate citizens of a constitutional republic? What are the likely individual and social outcomes of such a shift in educational priorities? The volume's theme is, and will continue to be, the subject of national scholarly and media attention.

Norma Thompson opens a new angle of political vision in this imaginative and engaging interpretation of Herodotus' History. She claims for the "father of history" a position in the canon of political thought, finding modern validity in his fundamental perceptions about the importance of stories to the coherence of political communities. Thompson arrives at a unique explanation for Herodotus' side-by-side placement of factual and fanciful historical stories. She contends that he recognized the central importance of compelling stories, even imaginary ones like the tale of Arion, the poet and singer who leaped into the sea to escape Corinthian pirates and was carried to safety on the back of a dolphin. Such stories can become the "facts" of a people's past and thereby the core of the political community. Herodotus understood that stories define and bind together one polity as distinct from others. Further, a polity evolves in reference to its own defining story. Thompson relates Herodotus' work to historical and cultural debate among such scholars as Martin Bernal, Francois Hartog, and Edward Said, and she invites philosophers, philologists, anthropologists, historiographers, and political theorists into the discussion.

It was to all appearances an ordinary murder - many might have said that it was an open-and-shut case. But some jurors were not convinced, and the taint of reasonable doubt led one of them to question the very future of our legal system. For many Americans, the civic responsibility of jury duty might seem an inconvenience; for Norma Thompson, it was a unique opportunity to bring her expertise to bear on the state of trial procedures in America today. With a background in political science, literature, and the classics, Thompson served as jury foreman in a trial of an ""ordinary"" murder in New Haven, Connecticut. Deliberations were buffeted by crosswinds of common sense and strong emotion. The trial ended in a hung jury because of what Thompson calls the ""unreasonable doubts"" of two fellow jurors concerning circumstantial evidence in an age when DNA testing holds out the promise of irrefutable proof. In a compelling tale of contrasting rhetoric, Thompson takes readers into the courtroom to hear a streetwise convict verbally sparring with the D.A., then brings us into the confines of the jury room to have us witness nervous chatter over the meaning of evidence. She also contrasts this ordinary murder with the concurrent brutal stabbing of a Yale student, a case that attracted considerably more police and media attention. Thompson argues that the indeterminate results of the trial are symptomatic of larger problems in the justice system and society and that the reluctance of most people today to be judgmental is damaging the criminal justice system. As an antidote, she suggests that great literary and historical texts can help us develop the capacity for prudential judgment. Gleaning insights from an imaginary jury of Tocqueville and Plato, Jane Austen and William Faulkner, among other writers and thinkers, Thompson shows how confrontation with the works of such authors can help model more proper habits of deliberation. Blending personal memoir, social analysis, and literary criticism, ""Unreasonable Doubt"" is a challenging book that deals squarely with the evasion of judgment in contemporary political, social, and legal affairs. Brimming with brilliant insights, it suggests that the foundations for thought and action in our time have been neglected as a result of the wall erected between the social sciences and the humanities and invites readers to consider jury duty in a new light. Through real-world drama and literary reflection, it shows us that there is more to politics than power - and more of value to be found in the humanities than we may have supposed.