Social Sciences Books

New book, for a reasonable price. Book was in perfect condition--brand new!! Only complaint was that it took a while to arrive, but I was very satisfied when it finally came.

This book is well horrible for what is claims to be trying to do. It was req. reading for my sociology class and let me just say, i have never hated reading so much before. Bonilla-Silva while presenting a intresting and no doubt helpfull view of racism in modern America, he is one sided and his claims are hypocritical to no end. By the end of the book i felt like i had read 182 pages of "all white people are racist becasue they want the benifits." There is no counter arguements and his sources are rather unconvincing since they are nothing more then like minded authors.

As the author Bonilla-Silva emphasizes repeatedly, this book does not intend to blame whites for being racist. This books attempts to illustrate how whites and blacks are constructed and positioned differently in relation to the past history of slavery and the newer form of racial ideology which supports the white privilege in the age of color blindness. I couldn't agree more with many of the arguments he has made throughout the book. I think this can make a great textbook for college courses.

For white readers, the argument that the racism continues to influence racial minorities' lives may not be convincing because, as Bonilla-Silva notes, they tend to subscribe the notion that racism is a thing of the past. I wish he had provided more "empirical" and "social scientific" evidence of how color-blind racism continues to have a negative impact on the lives of people of color today to make his argument much more convincing. (Just accept the blacks' personal testomony that "racism is still pervasive and affect us" may make this book sound like one-sided).

After reading some of the reviews for this book, I was looking forward to reading it.
The data for this book come primarily from surveys of 627 college students, and 400 adults from the Detroit area and much of the book includes the verbatim responses of the survey participants. Although the author states that rhetorical incoherence is part of all natural speech, to read most of these answers is mind boggling. Not one person seems to be able to express themselves in a clear sentence without `um, I don't know, you know, I guess, it's like, you know'. It got so annoying, I ended up reading only the author's `Conclusion' at the end of each chapter.
The book contains valid points and I don't mean to diminish the author's effort, but summarizing the survey answers in a clear way could have made this book easier to read and more effective.

This book may annoy, irritate, and even infuriate some, but if any of these emotions arise, you might ask yourself "why do I feel so defensive?"...and I promise, you will gather a bit of enlightment. The book portrays the perspective of minority peoples in a way that will open your eyes. It IS one-sided, but not because the author is a "racist", rather, he feels (it's in his Author's Note) that enough books are written ABOUT minorities from a "white perspective" view of the world, so he thought he would write a book that showed a distinct minority perspective on "white" culture. It is not meant to arise aggression, it is written to give realizations and enhance communications between the races.

I received the book much sooner than I expected. It was exactly as the seller described. I am very happy with this purchase, and look forward to doing business with them in the future.

Overall, this textbook was one of the most helpful I've had this year. It has sidenotes, online help and is very easy to read. Great book.

The book corresponds to the telecourse I am taking, wish it had more exercise though.

I bought Second Edition of the Alternate Edition of Destinos for a Spanish 101 class at my local community college because I wanted to learn Spanish in person rather than online or on my own. I never studied any foreign language prior to this. I am also pursuing a Master's degree at Denver, but I wanted to pick up a language before I graduate. I think that this book is very effective in teaching and learning Spanish, but you really do need the cds that go with the book-- they come with it if you buy the book new. Don't try to do this without the cds because I think that you really need them. You also need to watch the episodes of the movies that go with each lesson. (More on that in a moment).

I also highly recommend the "Workbook/Study Guide I" if you are just starting out with Spanish. The book that you want is ISBN-978-0-07-249711-3. The "Workbook/Study Guide I" covers the first 26 lessons in the Destinos book. You have to get a second workbook for lessons 27-52. I don't know what the correct ISBN is for that, because I'm not there yet! At the community college, lessons 27 - 52 are the intermediate levels of Spanish, and they are taught over two semesters. The first 26 lessons are also taught over two semesters. I'm telling you this so you can gauge how deeply you can learn Spanish from Destinos. You can get two years of college level Spanish for beginners and intermediates in this book!

Another reviewer mentioned that you should buy the dvds with the Destinos episodes. You do NOT have to do this! Believe it or not, you can watch them for FREE online with Windows Media Player 11! Just go to http://www.learner.org/resources/series75.html# and register yourself for free, and then you can watch any and every episode of the movies-- and they don't spam you to death, either. Free is far better than paying a few hundred dollars for the complete set of episodes. Make sure your media player is updated so you can actually see the picture. The episodes are really interesting, not cheesy as you might expect.

A real strength of Destinos is that you are exposed through the episodes to rapid conversational Spanish in addition to "academic" Spanish. You don't have to actually study conversational Spanish, but you actually begin to understand a lot of it, and far sooner than you might think. You also get good listening comprehension skills, learn proper Spanish, and get a lot of cultural information about various Spanish speaking areas of the world. You hear Latin American Spanish as well as Spanish from other areas-- which can be different. Each lesson in Destinos builds on the previous lesson, so make sure you "get" the first lesson before you move on!

At first, it feels like you don't understand anything but stick with it and you will be amazed at how quickly you can learn-- and speak-- Spanish! From the very first episode you will understand much of the Spanish conversation. :-) I honestly think that I could have just bought this book and the study guide that goes with it and managed to learn everything myself--but it helps me to have a professor (and native speaker) listen to my words and correct my pronunciation and accent if necessary. Destinos makes learning Spanish easy and fun, and my professor said that you get a more comprehensive understanding of Spanish than if you just focus in on Latin American.

I can't recommend this book highly enough! The cost of Destinos and the study guide may initially seem high, but when you consider that you are getting the cds and that you are also learning two years worth of college level Spanish, it is a great value and well worth the money spent. I think it would also be well spent for anyone who wants to brush up or who wants to move from a beginning to intermediate level. As I said, I have no language experience, but Destinos makes it easy to learn-- you just have to spend the time to read it page by page if you are an absolute beginner, and do the activities on the disks and in the book and workbook, and watch the episodes. You will speak, understand, and be able to write Spanish in no time!

There is just one caveat if you buy "workbook/study guide I." The "Workbook/Study Guide I" also requires a 7 CD set that does NOT come with the workbook. I got mine from the college, which sold copies of the cds at a discounted price. I looked here on amazon to see which set set of cds you would need to buy for the workbook, and it as though there is a lot of confusion on that point. I don't want to make a wrong recommendation, so you will have to figure that out for yourself. In any case, I still highly recommend both Destinos and the "Workbook/Study Guide I."

This book is an excellent text for studying Spanish. It doesn't tell where one can access the online video episodes. If I hadn't previously known, I would have been very upset. Otherwise it is an excellent text and the practise CDs that accompanied the text are very helpful.

I have enjoyed learning Spanish with the Destinos program. The "soap opera" format makes it much more engaging and natural. I was surprised to find, however, that the grammatical instruction is presented more in the workbook than in the textbook, which is the opposite of programs I've used before. Usually the lessons are presented in the text book and the workbook is for practice exercises. Despite that little quirk, I definitely recommend the Destinos series for anyone who wants to learn Spanish.

Watch Video Here: http://www.amazon.com/review/R16CI70X335K6N Watch my video review and find out the pluses and minuses of ordering Destinos. And also watch this video review to find out exactly what you must do in order to buy Destinos here at Amazon and also get lots of BONUS video lessons from your's truly, Jazmin, where I teach Spanish words and phrases.

This book is a must have for anyone doing grounded theory research or dissertations. Kathy Charmaz helps the fans of qualitative methodology into the 21st century with this wonderfully written guide through grounded theory. The book promises to be of value to students or experts in the field, then delivers as promised!

Can't wait for her next book for my collection!!!

This is by far the best and most detailed introduction to Qualitative Analysis I have seen. Charmaz is thorough, clear, to the point, and the book is well-written so that even beginner analysts could follow her points. Excellent find.

As someone who writes about grounded theory and supervises PhD students using grounded theory, I have absolutely no hesitation in recommending this book to them and anyone else using grounded theory. It is infinitely superior to the Strauss and Corbin book which in my opinion is too restrictive and makes it difficult for graduate students to apply grounded theory. Charmaz also very cleverly avoids the schism that rose between Glaser and Strauss on the application of the method by giving the student several alternative steps. A scholarly book which is also very accessible. As someone using grounded theory, I am relieved that Kathy Charmaz wrote this book - she really does do a good job in reformulating it for 21st century researchers.

Charmaz has used her vast experience in qualitative analysis to produce an excellent resource for qualitative researchers. Whether novice or experienced in qualitative research, Charmaz' book "starts at the start" for newer researchers; assists the reflective process of the qualitative methods; and leads the researcher to a firm research outcome thoroughly grounded by informant experience. Charmaz provides substantial examples from her own research to illustrate methods and techniques which encourage the researcher to remain on track, grounded by informant experience and to persevere with reflective and inquisitive thinking. Her book also offers suggestions for creative writing of the project report. I will be prescribing this as a basic text/reference for future qualitative research students.

As the title suggests, Kathy Charmaz's 'Constructing Grounded Theory' is a practical and thoughtful guide to the intricacies of undertaking qualitative research. Each chapter focuses on a specific aspect with numerous 'hints' and examples from her own work. Charmaz is an excellent teacher, unafraid to challenge the work of Glaser & Strauss with humility and commonsense. Highly recommeded to all aspiring qualitative researchers.

this was not a favorite class of mine, but this book got me through the worst of it!

Excellent description of the purpose and procedures of basic statistical techniques. Uses simplified formulas, and does not get lost in the math. Easy to read and understand. Good for social science and public policy courses, including public administration. Only drawback: does not effectively incorporate computer applications.

One of the best statistics books I can think of for social scientists who are not well aquainted with statistical procedures. The book is structured in several chapters, each concentrating on one statistical problem. In the first part of each chapter the theoretical background is given, followed by examples. Then, other examples are given, so that it becomes easily understandable how to correctly use the formulas respectively when they can't be used. Finally, there is a part of exercises where the reader may apply his new knowledge, before proceeding to the next chapter. However, it is just an introduction, not dealing with more complex statistical problems. Very recommendable for anyone who needs a solid basic knowledge in statistic or who wants how to start processing existing data.

In response to Tabsaw's "brilliant" book review, I would offer a more balanced perspective. Yes, the slave narratives provide interesting reading, but what evidence is there that these are historically accurrate? In fact, a quick review of how the WPA collected these narratives should give an clue as to their reliability. Most were done by whites looking to support their perception of slavery in the 1930's. The people interviewed were elderly and their stories written down by their white interviewers. Gee...no chance for embellishment or mistakes in that process!! And Tabsaw just assumes that the white recorders were able to keep their bias out of the narratives as they transcribed them!! Hey..show me a single interviewer who is able to do that!!

Johnson's book, on the other hand, is an excellent work of scholarship. He does cite his sources (that is what those numbers mean at the end of sentenses or paragraphs, genius!!), and had Tabsaw taken the time to look in the section called "Notes", he would have discovered that Johnson is relying upon a wide range of primary and secondary sources to tell his tale. The picture he paints is one of horror and dehumanization. Slaves were treated like animals with little regard given to their well-being. Johnson takes the reader inside the slave market where the smells, sounds and conditions of slavery cannot be ignored. It is a compelling and disturbing read.

In a larger sense, Johnson's work is also a commentary on Southern life as a whole during the 1800's. The enslavement of fellow humans required a new and different social structure. The patriarchial society that ensued brought with it profound implications for relations with women, property rights and behavior. Johnson makes it plain that the slave culture came to dominate Southern life.

I recommend this work highly!! For anyone interested in what the process of slavery was like, this is the place to start. Once finished with the book (which I doubt Tabsaw actually read cover to cover because of the simple-mindness of his review), one will have a clear picture indeed of what life was like for slaves awaiting their purchase and the interactions that occurred with the white owners. The slave narratives are interesting reading, but background knowledge is necessary for an informed arguement. Johnson's book provides the needed background and helps put those narratives in context. READ THIS BOOK and see what life was like in an antibellum slave market.

Johnson has done a splendid job of collating primary resources focused specifically on aspects surrounding the degrading slave auctions. He adds to his woven-together quotes a theme that focuses upon how Whites viewed themselves and each other in light of how well they managed their slaves. Much like a modern banker today might think or say, "I'm a success because I made a great commodity trade," so went the thinking of the slave owner.

The strength of Johnson's research reaches its apex in his focused, first-hand narratives exposes the despicable and hypocritical ways Whites treated blacks.

Johnson details how enslaved African Americans survived in these deplorable conditions. Highlighting how their faith in God, in particular how their identification with Christ's suffering, buoyed them up and gave them hope, not only to survive, but to thrive, would have strengthened an already strong work.

"Soul by Soul" is a very important read about a profound topic. It is not easy reading, if by "easy reading" one means a "happy story." It is hard reading--reading about the hard realities of life, but nonetheless, vital reading.

Reviewer: Bob Kellemen, Ph.D., is the author of Beyond the Suffering: Embracing the Legacy of African American Soul Care and Spiritual Direction , Soul Physicians, and Spiritual Friends.

Slavery in our country's history was grievously wrong, wrong, wrong...but this book was dry, dry, dry. It left out very basic details and was bogged down in the author's repetitive, plodding musings. My mind would drift trying to get through one paragraph (and the paragraphs are quite wordy.) I wanted to soak up this book and its information. Unfortunately, it was just too dull and overwrought, and I came away knowing merely a bit more about the New Orleans slave market than I did going in.

this book was assigned to me as a summer reading book for my advanced placement american history course... after reading the first chapter, i was automatically interested. i wouldn't exactly say i couldn't put the book down, but having to read it was more like an interesting leisure activity instead of a boring read. johnson's use of citing people who reappear throughout the book was very useful because it was more obvious that the horrors of the slave market were true statements from real slaves instead of a general statement without a citation. i strongly recommend this book to people of all ages!!!

This is a well-written book on an interesting subject. The author keeps the subject moving by the way he has the book organized. It follows in the path by which a slave went from one plantation to the slave market in New Orleans to a new plantation in the Lower South. I enjoyed reading the narrative.

This is a book for scholars but it is very readable and will definitely throw you into what anthropology is (should be?) about. You might have to read through each essay a couple of times to make sure you understood the points he was making, but it's not annoying to do because the points he is making are so excellent.

One of the best book purchases I have ever made.

"Man is an animal suspended in webs of significance he himself has spun, I take culture to be those webs..."

These cultural "webs of significance" Clifford Geertz speaks of are constructed of religious beliefs and practices, cultural customs, social interactions, attitudes and behavior -- everything around us that we have constructed as rational beings capable of thought and imagination. According to Geertz, the role of the anthropologist is, in a sense, to 'decode' the symbolic meanings of these certain events, practices, customs and interactions that take place within a specific culture, however insignificant they may seem to the observer. Detail is of utmost importance. An anthropologist must become part of the culture -- looking in from the outside he will understand nothing. Of course, in order to reduce the occurrence of the anthropologist's own cultural bias and to attempt to more accurately understand a culture, one could easily say that it is imperative that anthropologists emerge themselves in the customs and practices of that culture. But, even then, is it ever possible for one to grasp an understanding of a culture in which one was not born into? Are humans socialized from birth to perceive all cultural customs and practices through a shady lens, clouded by perceptions of the world they have acquired during childhood?

Geertz believes that, while to some extent it is possible to reach an understanding of a culture outside of our own, it is important to understand that anthropological writing is merely a "thick description," an interpretation of an interpretation. In other words, the anthropologist is interpreting the culture's interpretation of the event that is taking place. There is nothing precise, categorically logical or rational about anthropological writing: Cultural analysis is strictly the process of creating various hypotheses, examining those hypotheses, and then deriving explanations from the best hypotheses. As Geertz says, the analysis of it is not an "experimental science in search of law" but, rather, "an interpretive one in search of meaning." It is the job of an anthropologist to first attempt to understand how an event is interpreted by the culture in which it takes place, then to make an interpretation of that interpretation, and then it is left up to the reader of anthropological writing to interpret the final interpretations. It is difficult, if not impossible, to derive any absolute factual conclusion from data constructed of so many interpretive layers; thus, interpretation is not definitive.

The role of an anthropologist, according to Geertz, is to construct the finest interpretations possible, and most importantly, to be an active participant in the culture, rather than a passive observer.

This book is THE classical text for a modern cultural anthropologist. It's also an excellent book for anyone skeptical of social science in general, and serves as a great introduction for anyone just curious about anthropology.

Geertz has done much to enrich our understanding of societies, and the role ideas and beliefs play within them. But shouldn't an anthopologist, of all people, also be evaluated for how fairly s/he looks at other cultures? And here I think work like some contained in this book is indefensible.

How can essentializing, stereotyping garbage like this be sold by anyone as great anthropology? From the last essay in the collection, "Deep Play: Notes on the Balinese Cockfight":

"The villagers dealt with us as Balinese seem always to deal with people not part of their life who yet press themselves upon them: as though we were not there."

Easy, pal, didn't occur to you that perhaps they just didn't like you and you?

"To anyone who has been in Bali the identification of Balinese men with their cocks is unmistakable"

C'mon, I mean, don't y'all just see how they identify?

"The Balinese revulsion against any behavior regarded as animal-like can hardly be overstressed. Babies are not allowed to crawl for that reason. Incest, though hardly approved, is a much less horrifying crime than bestiality."

Find me a culture to which most of this doesn't apply.

"The Balinese never do anything in a simple way that they can contrive to do in a complicated one."

Is it the great anthropologist speaking here, or my grandma Grace upon returning from her ten-day vacation to the island?

In sum, while I can certainly see why so many find some of Geertz's work valuable and inspiring, I'm shocked that so few are bugged by his patronizing, essentializing, and plain bellicose mode of looking at other cultures in some other. I think this is an important point, that has to be on this page, no matter how many "unhelpful" votes I get.

In the typical post-modernist sense, Geertz seeks to cast doubt on everything without leaving us with anything in place. Just like other post modernists, his theories are so vague, poorly stated, and in generally strange that they cannot be proved right or wrong. Even if he, like other post-modernists, is right, we do not gain anything but perhaps a somewhat edited understanding of our world.

The field of cultural anthropology in and of itself is a "shady" field. The lack of biological evidence to back up Geertz's claims is immense. To think the Central Nervous System is a result of culture is simply asinine. To think that somehow culture exists out there for us to grab and chose and that it is somehow transferred through our genes and eventually influences evolution is outright ridiculous.

Just because you can make claims and cast doubt on opposing claims does not mean you are correct. There is little evidence to show that the human race is still undergoing evolution in the Darwinian sense. Geertz's failure, or rather deliberate attempt to, distinguish between the mind and the brain shows his general distaste for any sort of reasonable logic.

Please: Someone rescue anthropology from its current blinding veil of post modernist, post-structuralist ideology. Post modernism is like chewing gum that sticks to your shoe sole and impedes you from moving forward. OK, so it has our attention, now let us get it off our feet, move on into the future, and leave this decrepit, inane theory behind us all.

The Interpretation of Culture by Clifford Geertz is concerned with articulating a particular view of what culture is, what role it plays in social life, and proposes a methodology with which it should be studied. Geertz posits that culture should not be seen as a science in search of law but instead as an interpretation in search of meaning. "The concept of culture I espouse, and whose utility the essays below attempt to demonstrate, is essentially a semiotic one. Believing, with Max Weber, that man is an animal suspended in webs of significance he himself spun, I take culture to be those webs, and the analysis of it to be therefore not an experimental science in search of law but an interpretive one in search of meaning. It is explication I am after, construing social expression on their surface enigmatical. But this pronouncement, a doctrine in a clause demands itself some explication" (p5)

In part 1, Geertz begins with "Thick Description: Toward an Interpretative Theory of Culture". This, the first essay in the series explains the complexity of culture and what it is. Geertz explains his semiotics when he writes: "To look at the symbolic dimensions of social action - art, religion, ideology, science, law, morality, common sense - is not to turn away from the existential dilemmas of life for some empyrean realm of deemotionalized forms: it is to plunge into the midst of them. The essential vocations, but to make available to us answers that others, guarding other sheep in other valleys, have given, and thus to include them in the consultable record of what man has said." (p30) In part 2, Geertz explores different dimensions of culture. Culture is a "template" or "program". As individuals, we learn it then modify it. Geertz fails to explain how these templates come to be and be modified but posits that they become "common sense" of Platonic propositions and continue to be so. "In attempting to launch such an integration from the anthropological side and to reach, thereby, a more exact image of man, I want to propose two ideas. The first of these is that culture is best seen not as complexes of concrete behavior patterns - customs, usages, traditions, habit clusters - as has, by and large, been the case up to now, but as a set of control mechanisms - plans, recipes, rules, instructions (what computer engineers call "programs") - for the governing of behavior. The second idea is that man is precisely the animal most desperately dependent upon such extragenetic, outside-the-skin control mechanisms, such as cultural programs, for ordering his behavior." (p44) Part 3 centers on religion. Part 4 is the "thickest" sets of essays including "Ideology As a Cultural System" and "The Politics of Meaning". In chapter 8, Geertz identifies what he sees as the phenomenon of ideology and how ideology is vilified as a space for something that is epistemologically "Other". "That the conception of ideology now regnant in the social sciences is a thoroughly evaluative (that is, pejorative) one is readily enough demonstrated. "[The study of ideology] deals with a mode of thinking which is thrown off its proper course,"" (p196)

The final section part 5 is where is all come together for me. The last portion is his examination of Levi-Strauss and Geertz's "breaking through the veil" in "Deep Play: Notes on the Balinese Cockfight." I will deal with the latter first then tackle what I see as his inability to see merit in the universals. As if transported by some form of deja vu, I "feel" Geertz when he wrote about suddenly being part of the milieu. In "The Cerebral Savage: On the work of Claude Levi-Strauss" Geertz takes apart Levi-Strauss and his humanistic/scientific project. Geertz sees this form of inquiry as bankrupt as anthropologists have "...taken refuge in bloodless universals". (p5). Geertz elaborates on this premise in his critique of Levi-Strauss and his work in "Tristes Tropique". Coming out in a generation that was starting to reflect on "how" they were writing rather than "what" they were writing about, Geertz's critique is a reflection on Levi-Strauss' lack of self reflexivity. In a move that parallels Foucault's in "The Order of Things", Geertz begins his anti-humanist attack on a less reflective mode of writing that, on the inside causes epistemic violence and on the outside is naive and self delusory. "In Levi-Strauss' work the two faces of anthropology - as a way of going at the world and as a method for uncovering lawful relations among empirical facts - are turned in toward one another so as to force a direct confrontation between them rather than (as is more common among ethnologists) out away from one another so as to avoid such a confrontation and the inward stresses which go with it. This accounts both for the power of his work and for its general appeal. It rings with boldness and a kind of reckless candor. But it also accounts for the more intraprofessional suspicion that what is presented as High Science may really be an ingenious and somewhat roundabout attempt to defend a metaphysical position, advance argument, and serve a moral cause." (p346-347). I agree with Geertz and Foucault with regards to the complexity and need to effect a "thick" description. However, much can still be learned from that scientific/humanist Man centered project. The Enlightenment and its project has been credited for the wonderfully contradictory le mission civilastrice which accord to Fanon is such a contradiction in that the ideology that places man at the center, is responsible for so much killing. If Levi-Strauss is doing the same thing theoretically, then he is complicit in this move to reinforce placing Man at the center and to submit us to its results. With Geertz and Foucault we can hopefully find a more "enlightened" middle ground.

Miguel Llora

This textbook is well written. It catches your attention with case studies and then in a way that makes sense, teaches the concepts.

I used this text in a MSW program HBSE class. It was easy to read and a good informative source on basic human development. Each chapter has questions and intensive vocabulary which was helpful.