Social Sciences Books

First off, I'd like to agree with the first reviewer. This is an excellent compilation that stands by itself (although, for an intro class, it definitely requires a "discipline-oriented" text book like Kottak as a guiding force). I would recommend this book highly to my fellow anthros and to general readers alike. What follows is a brief summary of some of my favorite articles in the collection. The selections are all short and well-written, they make interesting and useful points and convey the complexity and utility of anthropology very, very well.

I've been waiting a long time to see Peggy McIntosh's wonderful essay on "White Privilege" in print somewhere. I had the distinct pleasure of hearing her give an oral version of the same talk a number of years ago and am very very pleased to see it published here for the benefit of students. The book is worth the price for that article alone.

However, this is not the only gem in this collection. Phillipe Bourgois' work on crack dealers is introduced here as is Gerald Murray's work on wood farming as a means to encourage re-forestation programs in Haiti. There are also classics such as Richard Lee's story of the !Kung San insulting of his gift of a Christmas ox ("Eating Christmas in the Kalahari") and Laura Bohannon's failure to get Tiv elders to see Hamlet as a story about incest, revenge and justice. Jared Diamond's revisionist view of the advent of agriculture is also here (perhaps an antidote for his more recent "Guns, Germs and Steel" though undoutedly similar in style).

Other personal favorites of mine include Eugene Cooper's discussion of Chinese table manners (also a must for people who want to teach a course on the anthropology of food), Richard Reed's examination of the tension between environmentalists and indigenous communities in Paraguay, Joan Cassels' excellent analysis of surgery as a male-gendered medical speciality and Paul Farmer's and Arthur Kleinman's thoughtful peice on suffering and AIDS in Haiti.

Incidentally, I would thoroughly recommend anything by Paul Farmer to readers interested in social medicine. His scholarship and humanity are both quite phenomenal and totally justify the attention he has recieved due to the MacArthur fellowship.

I only have a couple of quibbles with this book and even these are not so much criticisms as comments for the unwary: Jennifer Laab's peice on corporate anthropologists seems to have been written for a corporate audience as a selling point for anthropology. As such it plays up the notion of anthropologists as service providers for corporate interests in a way which is a little frown-inducing for an academician such as myself. Not because I don't approve of anthropology in the private sector, but because the peice itself seems to argue that anthropology is merely a set of techniques that can be workshopped (like team-building exercises)to busy executives for the greater good of the company. Again, this is a VERY worthwhile point to debate, but not one that easily stands without comment. Secondly, the article by Wade Davis (he of "Serpent and the Rainbow" fame), while again discussion-worthy, seems a little superficial, dated in language and probably replaceable (Robert Voeks'recently-published "Sacred Leaves of Candomble" is one alternative that springs to mind). Lastly, I would like to plead for the inclusion of a selection on tatooing or bodily adornment of some sort in any future editions. This is a topic of enduring interest among students and would definitely be an asset to such a nicely-balanced and valuable collection.

When I took a sophomore level anthropology class at my University, Applying Anthropology was required as a secondary reading text, in addition to Kottak's Anthropology (7th edition). Applying Anthropology contains 52 articles in the categories of Biological Anthropology, Archaeology, Cultural Anthropology, Culture and Communication, Culture and Food, Culture and Race, Economy and Business, Gender and Socialization, Politics & Law & Warfare, and Social & Cultural Change. Instead of being a textbook that was something I just read for the class that required it, it turned out to be a book that I would have bought for my own personal purposes. Also, in addition to enjoying reading it, I learned a lot about anthropology. One of my favorite articles discusses what may have happened on Easter Island that resulted in the demise of an entire culture. All in all, Applying Anthropology provides an interesting approach to learning a lot about culture worldwide.

How often can you say you actually read an entire textbook for a course? I read this whole book; it was that well-written.

The material is well presented, with plenty of examples from all over the world. The Cross-Cultural Miscues are frequently amusing and always informative. One of my favorites involved differences in humor across cultures.

This textbook made a freshman level basics course more enjoyable than one expects of that type of course.

This item was in good shape but it took over 3 weeks to get to me when it said that it would take 3-5 days.

Book was delivered exactly as described in new condition. Very fast shipping. Would recommend seller!

This book was new and in excellent condition. Also, it was shipped to me at a good time. Great Job!

Good book, very helpful. It was a need it for my class.

It's a shame that this book continues to find it's way into the required reading lists in graduate social work classes.

This book illustrates the tasks of interviewing and intervention in a very simplified and concrete fashion. In an introductory text, this is acceptable. However, in describing the "skills of helping" there is little if any attention given to an overarching theory of how people think, feel and behave. Intervention and theory inform one another in a continuous feedback loop. To presume to teach intervention without teaching a model of human behavior simply misses the point.

Professional training is, at it's best, about integrating theory and technique. This book fosters a disconnect between the tasks of intervention and a larger theoretical sense of what intervention is based on. In that sense it does an enormous disservice to trainees, who are the principal audience of this text.

I bought this book, as many people do, because it was required reading in my graduate program. I used it only for the occasional paper that demanded it be cited. When I wanted to referr to something useful, I read Shawn Shea's "Psychiatric Interviewing" or Leston Haven's "Making Contact." These are both excellent, accessible, well written and USEFULL books that any mental health trainee would benefit from reading.

If you have to buy the book to do course work in your classes you can't be faulted for purchasing it. If you really want to understand the dynamics of helping people, if you really want to learn how to interview, if you actually want to learn something that will be of enduring value to your practice, don't waste your time with this book.

I read this book way back in graduate school. Let's just say if you have two or more days worth of clinical practice you will know that clients/customers/consumers don't always respond the Shulman's cookbook style examples would lead you to believe they would. I gave two stars because there were in fact some VERY general informational type items in the books, descriptions of issues that might be useful to the complete novice to social work. I am aware that this is a standard in social work schools everywhere and I can't think of a reason why! Do professors not read the texts they assign or have they been teaching so long that they have no idea what clinical practice is all about? Shulman makes it seem so easy... if we could just get our clients to rehearse Shulman's lines, all would be well and any six year old who could read the excerpts from clinical intervention examples could solve the world's problems. I felt disappointed to learn that my most recent student intern had been assigned to read Shulman. I told her to run out and get some books that would help her be a therapist to the real people we serve. My reading list did not include this book.

While often overloaded with details, anecdotes, and apocrypha, Crabgrass Frontier is a passionate, informative investigation into the history of the suburb, both in America and elsewhere. The author clearly researched his stuff thoroughly, though one might wish for a bit LESS detail sometimes (his "evidentiary anecdotes" often get in the way of the narrative flow).

The sheer volume of detail and data make this a great book for the historian or history student (in college).
The passion of the author, and the light writing style, makes this a great book for the historical dabbler as well.

A good read, if at times a bit weighty.

Needed book for a college course, and the campus bookstore did not have it. It came within 10 days of order, standard shipping. could not ask for more.

Even though the book was written a while ago, it's still really good. I think the chapter on credit and housing was fascinating.

It's an acknowledged classic in the field of Urban History, but it's twenty years old and the last quarter of Crabgrass reads like it. Delores Hayden has covered the same ground in her more recent "Building Suburbia". The approach is hisorical, Jackson takes each period of suburbanization in chronological order. In terms of explanation for why America is so surburban, he focuses on government policy and the unique characteristics of the american middle class mind. Also, the fact that land is cheap is important. Readers may want to check out Building Suburbia for a more recent treatment of the same subject.

Jackson writes one of the seminal studies in urban history relating to the suburbs. The end conclusion is that suburbs have not been beneficial to the United States. This tracks things from the start of suburbanization to the downfall of downtowns. Race relations are a big part of the book as is the heralding of the automobile. Jackson writes very well and the book is wonderfully organized. If you are starting out in urban history this is an essential book to start off with. For those interested in post world war 2 American life this is also a must read.

I borrowed this book from a public library. Otherwise, I would be regret ever buying this book. The author must be a powerful person as I can't see how the publisher would publish such a book with lot of words, with little meat. The flow of thoughts are poorly organized. The only take I have from this book is Davos is a cool place to be when all the big names are in town.

well, not this book actually, but a related book by Parag Khanna titled The Second World.

Some of the various, and numerous, factual errors that riddle the book are relatively trivial, but suggest serious sloppiness and disregard for getting facts right. For example, Yugoslavia was not part of Warsaw pact, as Khanna states. Moscow mayor Yuri Luzhkov was appointed to office in 1992 by Boris Yeltsin, and not by Vladimir Putin. Serbia, Bosnia, Croatia, Macedonia and Albania are not all smaller by population than Manhattan, and the death toll from the civil wars in former Yugoslavia was not greater than half a million. Other obviously wrong assertions seem to be made up simply to provide lurid background color to Khanna's travelogue: the former KGB headquarters in Moscow has not been turned into "a high-class disco," expensive Moscow malls do not charge entrance fees, and police road checkpoints in Uzbekistan do not stop and check all vehicles. And other gross misstatements of fact display a simple complete lack of understanding the history and culture of the countries of which he writes: the (Orthodox) Uspenky cave monastery in Crimea is not representative of Ukraine's "proud Catholic heritage," Zoran Djindjic was not the first democratically elected leader since World War II in former Yugoslavia , and in the 1980s Yugoslav republics like Bosnia and Macedonia were not richer than Spain. Many of Khanna's wildly wrong claims sound like local myths that he has taken at face value. I can easily imagine some misguided elderly Belgrade resident waxing nostalgically for the days "when every one of our republics was richer than Spain!"

Yet more of Khanna's assertions are not merely factually wrong, but far exceed the ludicrous. In the fast paced and dangerous Russian business world, "one is safe only in the sauna, where everyone is naked and no weapons are allowed." It was news to me to learn from Khanna that every winter "waves" of Russians and "thousands of Ukrainians" freeze to death in "crumbling heatless apartment blocks." And he employs gross mischaracterizations of fact to buttress his claims. For example, according to Khanna, in 2006 Greek GDP increased 25% when the government started to account for prostitution and cigarette smuggling in its figures. In fact, the government said it would include all unreported economic activity, mostly in construction and trade, but including a "small" amount for illegal activities such as smuggling. And this is merely a sampling of patently ridiculous claims.

And for a "foreign policy whiz-kid," Khanna makes numerous and serious analytical mistakes, showing a clear misunderstanding of economics, international institutions, and international relations. The unhedged statement, "Russia's diplomatic position is purely residual," will surely surprise diplomats from Brussels to Tokyo. Noting that Gazprom's market capitalization is $300 billion leads Khanna to the conclusion that Gazprom is one third of the Russian economy, confusing market capitalization with GDP. And his bald assertion that "[n]one of Central Asian legal systems have evolved beyond Kakfaaesque" is belied by the numerous successful legislative accomplishments of Kazakhstan and its quite sophisticated legal code, for example.


But the worst moments of Khanna's book are when he quotes conversations that seem of such dubious authenticity as to make me believe they may be fabricated, or at best the result of very selective reporting, only relating those comments that fit within his pre-existing views. "'Our pride has suffered'" explains a "Moscow intellectual over a narrow glass of [of course] ice-chilled vodka, `but this only drives our nationalism further.'" In Kiev, the locals "give lifts to strangers for a token fare." Why? "We suffered enough together, so we still trust each other." There are just too many such (anonymous) quotations that fail to ring true to trust in the author's integrity. And he also reports statements by national leaders as if they were heard in personal conversation, yet in a curiously indirect fashion that suggests otherwise.

This book is an attempt to present a picture of people at the top of their fields with high-profile international roles (the global elite), and to assess their collective impact on the course of world events and the behavior and policy choices of governments.

The book has many strengths. One is the close personal experience the author has from having worked in the circles he writes about. While this sometimes sounds too much like a vicarious trip around the planet to elite dinner parties, it does give the author practical understanding of who these people are, what they do and how they interact with government, all of which is of benefit to the reader.

Another strength is the author's use of some elite theorists of the past, particularly C Wright Mills, though he does not really develop an analytical framework along these lines, which is unfortunate. The book might have benefitted from the thought of other elite theorists, such as Mosca and Pareto, though he mentions Pareto in another context. While the use of elite theory provides a nice intellectual framework, it is underdeveloped and, as a result, seems directionless.

For example, the author notes variously how elites circulate in and out off various positions at the top (business, government, the arts, etc.), suggesting Mills' idea of interlocking directorates. But what is his ultimate evaluation of this? In Mills, the idea implied a door closed to outsiders, which meant these elites were unresponsive to democratic mechanisms. If true, then democracy is but window dressing. Does the author believe this or not? Sometimes it seems he does and sometimes it seems he doesn't.

Related to this is the circulation of elites from the lower orders up to the elite and the opposite movement of older elites downward. How does this work with the global elite? Is it a process of meritocratic and competitive advancement or is it a process of caste, privilege, etc., all supported by various networks? The author seems to imply both in different places without synthesizing his analysis into a cogent whole. He does speak at length about the rise and fall of elites, but sometimes we think that a person's attendance at an elite university offers social networking opportunities that promote advancement, while, at other times, we think the elite in question are driven, skilled and smart and that's how they got there. It's likely a combination of the two, but why? What are the recruitment mechanisms (aside from elite universities)? What are the relevant correlates of elite circulation or lack thereof? This is the type of circulation of elites that Mosca and Parerto discussed, but the author makes no use of them here. It would also be a great opportunity for the author to use the data he seems to have on the 6,000 persons identified as being in the global elite. There is a treasure trove of testable hypotheses in elite literature.

The author does attempt to synthesize the characteristics of this superclass (e.g., he tells us where most went to school and where most originate from), but I'd liked to have seen a more systematic analysis of this group. It's possible, however, that the group of 6,000 is so diverse that they are really not a single group. It's easy to see top business and government elites as being in the same overall group, but how does Sting come into play here? He wants a voice on African development, but will Sting ever circulate out of music into the World Bank? Would Sting's skills translate into worthwhile economic and financial analysis? Maybe Sting and similar characters are in a different tier of the global elite.

Last, the book attempts to address the problems that governments face in dealing with this class of people. It seems that government policies that might be adverse to the interests of the global elite, even if beneficial to the public at large, will cause the elite to make financial decisions that will harm a society (such as moving billions of dollars around the globe in a short order of time). This forces governments to dance to the tune of the elite to keep them happy, but prevents them from pursuing policies that may be necessary for their publics. This is one of the conundrums of globalization and the author's discussion of this issue is well worth reading.

The world is ruled by an elite class , the superclass consisting in roughly six- thousand people, overwhelmingly male. This Superclass includes not only the Big Business elite, but heads of State, and even religious leaders like the Pope, and crime - bosses. These people, the one in a million who influence many millions are part of a global structure in which they trade and deal with each other.
They are the few who influence the many.
Rothkopf takes a tour around the world with them, speaks privately and interviews many. He goes to their famous meeting grounds, perhaps most famously, Davos and learns how they operate with global and not national concerns in mine.
In the course of the exploration Rothkopf provides a great deal of information, and insight. He provides portraits of figures most of us have never heard anything about, no matter how powerful they be.
All this is fine, but my sense is the central thesis is somewhat exaggerated and mistaken. Another world- affairs analyst Fred Kagan has recently written about how old national rivalries are as alive as ever, how competition between states still rules the world. The picture of these Davos people does not exactly expunge that of the Chinese now staging their grand show in Beijing. Old- style nationalism and national pride is helping drive them to leadership in the world. There are forces at work in history beyond those which Rothkopf attributes as being in the hands of elite.
One can learn much from this book, but it only tells a small part of the whole story of how the world moves and decides.

I read this book hoping for some insight into the dynamics of the global power divide, and what those at the top of the power pile are doing to exacerbate the have/have not split or (possibly) ameliorate certain aspects of it. That's not what I got. Instead, I plodded through 300+ vapid pages that told me exactly two things: the modern aristocracy enjoy hanging around with people like themselves, and so does the author of the book.

Mr. Rothkopf makes a couple of mild points that are accurate enough, as when he points to 'conspicuous conscience' (think the Gates Foundation) as a modern manifestation of the more familiar term 'conspicuous consumption,' and when he notes--almost nervously, I thought--that maybe the rich/poor divide wouldn't be getting worse in so many places today if this super-powerful bunch of people *really* wanted to try doing something effective about the structural reasons for global poverty. But such criticisms are rare and hold no sting. Mr. Rothkopf is a cheerleader for markets, markets, markets, at one point even ballyhooing the vigorous international arms trade; in his strange and scary world, "the benefits cascade outward" from rising arms sales in southeast Asia. Really?

And, thank you anyway, Mr. Rothkopf, but it is possible to oppose globalization in its current form without being some sort of xenophobic freak or knuckle-dragging troglodyte. That straw man won't stand.

Reading this book is a huge waste of time. If you haven't picked it up already, substitute Naomi Klein's _Shock Doctrine_ for this self-indulgent silliness; you'll be glad you did.

Mr. DuBois gave a harsh reality on the struggles of the African American people. He left no stone unturned and no points missed.

I love this book. It is part of the best of the works of the great W.E.B. DUBOIS. My active reading of this book expanded my knowledge more on what it takes to be a blackman in America. It is a piece of identification that everyblack person in America is looking to verify about their race in the U.S.
It's a great book.

In 1903, two years after Booker T. Washington's autobiography, "Up from Slavery", W.E.B. Du Bois published "The Souls of Black Folk", a series of essays which today most consider a seminal work in African-American Sociology literature. Du Bois view of race relations in American at the dawn of the 20th century was clear, critical and deeply profound.

Throughout the fourteen chapters Du Bois uses a metaphor, the veil, with considerable deftness:
"...the Negro...born with a veil...gifted with second sight...double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one's self through the eyes of others."

Du Bois shares his thoughts on Emancipation & the Post-Emancipation era, "...there was scarcely a white man in the South who did not honestly regard Emancipation as a crime and its practical nullification as a duty." In other chapters he covers: the education of the Negro, Negro suffrage, tenant farming, and Negro spirituals a.k.a Sorrow Songs. In the chapter, "Of the Black Belt", we take a journey with him as he travels through the Black Belt of Georgia - which is not a reference to the large number of people of color in the area but to the color of the soil. In "The Coming of John", the lone fictional chapter, Du Bois relates a short story of two Johns, one white and one Negro, both coming home to the South after attaining an education in the North.

I could go on and on but this one relevant text that you must read for yourself.

was worthless...was not the correct match for my class book requirement. Never used it...if someone wants it you can have it for free

"The Soul Of Black Folk" Is a book I think everyone should read regardless of race, ethnicity, religion, color, or creed simply because there's something in it for all. W.E.B. Dubois' engaging book falls more inline with the panorama of all American experiences, not just the Black experiences alone: if that makes any sense?
This fine book was originally published in 1903 and is still a significant piece of literature today. The anecdotes that are shared in this book belong in the lexicon of American history, but what's most striking are Dubois' references to Negro music called the sorrow songs, which of course spanned through hundreds of years of sanguineous slavery. And it was these same songs that set the foundation of Gospel, the Blues, Rock n Roll, and the American dream.
The reason I'm using this terminology is because in-spite of the torture blacks suffered they still managed to sing amazing songs such as "Steal Away," and "Poor Rosy." (Some songs were in reference to allegorical content).
Furthermore, the British rock-band Led Zeppelin is a fine example of individual intellectualism insofar as embracing American Negro culture considering they were influenced by this book because in 1968, Led Zeppelin's first album debuted and not only did they cover blues favorites written by Willie Dixon, but they also covered Negro spirituals, which Du Bois referred to as the "Sorrow Songs."
Led Zeppelin's song "How Many More Times" is an opus of Negro "Sorrow Songs." It's amazing that it took the bluesy cadence of an English rock band to pay homage to the very people whose hardship and strife inspired them to borrow the lyrics and the music from this book. It's a wonderful sight to see when people like Jimmy Page and Robert Plant take the time to learn about Black Americanism and about themselves. It just goes to show that all Americans should embrace their African heritage because without acknowledging the Black experience it's impossible to be a true American.
It's upsetting to note that in today's America racism is so rampant that the subject of Rock n Roll history can't even be encroached upon like it was in the 1960's civil rights movement, due to the fact that the political language has significantly changed.
(In layman's terms we can't be honest with ourselves and discuss the sheer fact that racism still dictates our everyday lives simply because the corporate world creates the phony left/right paradigm and ad-hominems through the media, which leaves America with an erroneous history).
Anyway, music played a major role during the 1960's. It helped people prosper through the horrific struggle for independence. The poetry that the slaves introduced over two-hundred years ago would yet again set the recalcitrant atmosphere that was needed when Blacks won the right to vote in 1965. And it was that moment in history that systemic change began. It was almost like an ancestral eidolon cascading over America with the strength and perseverance of a god in love with his people.

Moreover, Dubois elaborates on many subject matter with a linguistic style coming across as the perfect salubrious prolepsis for today's readers.

Sorry to digress, but another high point in the book was Dubois' rebuttal to Booker T. Washington's bourgeois attitude. Even today many Black scholars quote Booker T, but the inquiry was...is that wise? Well, according to Dubois, promulgating Booker T's message was rather pernicious and would only lead to more draconian virulence. Booker T's stance on waiting for White America to become simpatico to the needs of the Negro, while hoping for acceptance to proliferate from them in due time was not realistic at all.
Dubois strongly felt that Booker T's ideas were a depravity, a mummery, and an insult. Waiting for the bully to stop picking on you never works; for some reason Booker T couldn't contemplate that this scenario he was promulgating was ambiguous. If the powers that be are unwilling to negotiate with you then you have no other recourse but recalcitrancy. Booker T was in favor of slow progression, but just imagine what America would be like if Blacks took on Booker T's mindset? Life would be very different that's for sure.
Dubois hits on many touching moments in his memoirs and the personal lives of his students, which everyone reading this will enjoy. "The Soul Of Black Folk" is required reading for all. Give this book a chance! Dubois' writings are an inspirational experience!