April 2008, Issue #108

Creating Medieval Cairo: Empire, Religion, and Architectural Preservation in Nineteenth-Century Egypt by Paula Sanders (The American University in Cairo Press)

Creating Medieval Cairo argues that the historic city we know as Medieval Cairo was created in the nineteenth century by both Egyptians and Europeans against a background of four overlapping political and cultural contexts: namely, the local Egyptian, Anglo-Egyptian, Anglo-Indian, and Ottoman imperial milieu. Addressing the interrelated topics of empire, local history, religion, and transnational heritage, historian Paula Sanders shows how Cairo’s architectural heritage became canonized in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

Sanders, dean of graduate and postdoctoral studies and associate professor of history at Rice University, also explains why and how the city assumed its characteristically Mamluk appearance and situates the activities of the European-dominated architectural preservation committee, known as the Comité, within the history of religious life in nineteenth-century Cairo. Sanders explores such varied topics as the British experience in India, the Egyptian debate over religious reform, and the influence of The Thousand and One Nights on European notions of the medieval Arab city.
The story of conservation in Cairo has been told in different ways. In the conventional version, conservation began in the middle of the nineteenth century, when European engineers, architects, and travelers began to clamor for the rescue of Egypt's dilapidated Arab architecture. The scholars who tell this story focus on the history of the Comité de Conservation des Monuments de 1’Art Arabe, the commission founded in 1881 by Khedive Tawfiq and charged with the task of preserving Islamic monuments in Egypt.

Creating Medieval Cairo tells a different story about conservation in Cairo. In Sanders’ story, what we call Medieval Cairo was created in the nineteenth century. Throughout the book, Sanders uses the term ‘Medieval Cairo’ to refer to this nineteenth-century construct and not to Cairo as it was in the Middle Ages. The first half of Creating Medieval Cairo tells the story of Medieval Cairo in two frames: empire and religion. Chapter 1, "Constructing Medieval Cairo in the Nineteenth Century," follows Donald M. Reid's attention to politics and culture, but adds two new elements to the story: the Anglo-Indian and Ottoman imperial contexts. While there is considerable discussion in the historical literature of the British quasi-colonial presence in Egypt, the Anglo-Indian context and its implications for the history of Egypt have received little or no attention. Egypt has been excluded from the writing of Ottoman history, just as the Ottoman period has often been neglected or minimized in accounts of Egyptian history.

Chapter 1 considers how all these elements interacted to shape the way the Comité, the British government in Cairo, European travelers, and Egyptians perceived Arab architecture in Cairo. Sanders explores how different pasts were configured in imperial and local settings, where they overlapped and diverged, and how architecture played a role in them. One goal of Chapter 1, then, is to account for the identification of the medieval in Cairo with the Mamluk period. To address this problem, Sanders discusses the long history of local conservation under the aegis of waqf (pious endowment), as well as Ottoman and Anglo-Indian architectural practice. The Comité's program to survey, record, and preserve old monuments, and the creation of usable historic pasts expressed through architecture, had preludes in both the Ottoman and British empires.

The discussion of these imperial contexts of conservation and their interaction with the history of local conservation in Creating Medieval Cairo shows that there is no single or simple cause for the Comité's blindness to Ottoman practices or its disdain for Ottoman architecture. Sanders finishes this chapter by arguing that British interest in preserving Arab art is best considered within the broader imperial context of British interests in India. The story of architectural preservation has also been isolated from the history of the city's religious life in the nineteenth century. Despite the predominance of religious buildings in the Comité's work, the historiography of preservation has asked few, if any, questions about the character of religious life in Cairo in the later nineteenth century, the role of old religious buildings in local religious life, or the role of architecture in debates and discussions about religion. Many Egyptian officials and dignitaries were silent on the issue of preservation. Others made policy decisions that frustrated the efforts of the Comité. How should we understand their actions? Sanders in Creating Medieval Cairo addresses these questions by discussing conservation within the framework of nineteenth-century religious practice.

Chapter 2, "Islam for the Modern World: Medieval Cairo between Egyptian Reformers and British Critics," discusses the ways in which different ideas about Islam and its characteristics as a religion influenced attitudes toward conservation in Cairo. In the late nineteenth century, many Azhar-educated Egyptians, particularly the followers of Muhammad ‘Abduh and Rashid Rida, were attempting to create a modern Islam through a wide-ranging program of reform (islah). ‘Ali Mubarak's ideas about Islam as a living tradition made the trade-off between antique mosques and wide, modern streets a reasonable one because in his view nothing of importance in contemporary religious life was being sacrificed. While these Egyptians were articulating a vision of a modern Islam, the British – who viewed Islam as stagnant and incapable of reform – were pursuing an aggressive program to conserve Arab architecture that in visual terms represented Islam as medieval.

Chapters 1 and 2 show how reframing the story of conservation allows for a new understanding of Medieval Cairo as a creation of the nineteenth century. Chapters 3 and 4 lay out the questions that arise from this understanding of Medieval Cairo's historically contingent character. Sanders addresses the questions by showing how Medieval Cairo was constructed and maintained through a series of amalgamations that blurred the distinction between old and new. These amalgamations have sustained an unacknowledged colonial legacy that persists in contemporary World Heritage ideology and practice.

Chapter 3, "Cairo of the Arabian Nights," weaves together two stories that are ordinarily considered as separate, but which, when told together, highlight the historical contingency central to Sanders’ account. Looking at the Arabian Nights and Medieval Cairo in direct relation to one another sheds light on how they were produced and regarded by readers, viewers, and restorers. Creating Medieval Cairo argues that Medieval Cairo and the Arabian Nights are themselves amalgamations of old and new. Through a close reading of a number of texts and images, Sanders shows how these amalgamations were constructed and how they provided fertile interpretive terrain for nineteenth- and twentieth-century European and Egyptian audiences.

Chapter 4, "Keeping Cairo Medieval: World Heritage and the Debate over Fatimid Monuments," reveals the nineteenth century's continuing legacy by analyzing one of the most heated controversies over interventions in Medieval Cairo today, namely, the dispute over the Bohra restorations of monuments established in the Fatimid period (969-1171). The Bohras are Ismaili Shiites who trace their spiritual lineage to the Fatimids but whose communal roots lie in the Indian subcontinent. Their restorations of Fatimid monuments have been categorically condemned by the World Heritage preservation community, who charge the Bohras with violating international conservation standards. This is not merely a contemporary dispute between competing conservation philosophies and practices; it is also a debate over competing notions of historical and cultural authenticity. Sanders argues that these debates can only be understood in the context of the colonially produced relationship between Egypt and India in the nineteenth century. The competing positions that the Bohras and the World Heritage community espouse both belong to the legacy of British colonialism in the East, although they have ended up advocating remarkably different things.

In many areas it breaks new ground, asks new questions, and gives a far more sophisticated, nuanced presentation of preservation and conservation issues for Egypt than I have seen elsewhere . . .. [C]overs familiar territory in a totally new manner. – Jere Bacharach, University of Washington

Offering fresh perspectives and keen historical analysis, Creating Medieval Cairo examines the unacknowledged colonial legacy that continues to inform the practice of and debates over preservation in Cairo.

Business & Investing / Economics / Poverty

Out of Poverty: What Works When Traditional Approaches Fail by Paul Polak (BK Currents Series: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc.)

For the past twenty-five years, two questions have kept my curiosity aroused: What makes poor people poor? And what can they do about their poverty? – Paul Polak, from the Preface

There are 800 million people in the world who live in rural areas in developing countries and make their living from small farms. The scattered quarter-acre plots where they scratch out a living usually have poor soil and no access to irrigation, and they usually can't produce enough to keep from going hungry. While the typical response to these farmers' plight has been to try to donate them out of poverty, massive global aid initiatives have produced little, if any, results. In fact, in some areas where this approach has been tried, such as sub-Saharan Africa, poverty rates have actually gone up.

Why are so many millions of people around the world still mired in poverty, despite decades of relief efforts? International Development Enterprises (IDE, an organization that has helped lift 17 million people out of poverty) founder Paul Polak explains that it is because most poverty eradication programs are fatally flawed.

In Out of Poverty, designer, entrepreneur and self-described ‘troublemaker’ Polak exposes what he calls the ‘Three Great Poverty Eradication Myths’: donations alone will end poverty, national economic growth will end poverty, and Big Business, operating as it does now, will end poverty. Instead of relying on the resources of governments, relief agencies, corporations, and private citizens, Polak points a way forward to a more promising, proven alternative that actually draws on the entrepreneurial spirit of the poor themselves.

Throughout the course of the book, Polak tells success stories about the people he and the IDE have helped. Out of Poverty tells the story of Krishna Bahadur Thapa and his family, and of how they moved from barely surviving on less than a dollar a day to earning forty-eight hundred dollars a year from their two-acre farm in the hills of Nepal. The book tells many stories like Bahadur's, and each of them satisfies another bit of readers’ curiosity about how people who are extremely poor live their lives and dream their dreams. Polak says that what he learned from these people has been put to work in straightforward strategies that millions of other poor people have used to end their poverty.

Each of the practical solutions to poverty described in Out of Poverty is obvious and direct. If it is true that common sense is not really common, and that seeing and doing the obvious are even less so, then some of the conclusions he draws from his conversations with poor people will surprise readers: they certainly fly in the face of conventional theory and practice in the development field. The IDE model is simple: identify market opportunities in high-value, labor-intensive cash crops for the world's poorest rural farmers and provide them access to affordable agricultural tools tailored specifically to their needs. To accomplish this, poor farmers need access to affordable irrigation, a new generation of farming methods and inputs customized to fit tiny farms, the creation of new markets that bring them the seeds and fertilizers they need, and open access to markets where small-acreage farmers can sell their products at a profit. This range of new products and services for poor customers can only be created by a revolution in current design practice, based on the ruthless pursuit of affordability.

The first section of Out of Poverty explains how Polak became curious about poverty, describes the process he learned for finding creative solutions to major social problems, and challenges the poverty eradication myths that have inhibited doing the obvious to end poverty.

The next section, Chapters 3 to 8, describes what many small-acreage farmers have taught Polak, a practical approach capable of ending the poverty of millions of the world's dollar-a-day people. For poor people themselves, there is little doubt that the single most important step they can take to move out of poverty is to learn how to make more money. The way to do it is through grassroots enterprises – just about all of the poor are already tough, stubborn, survival entrepreneurs. Chapter 9 describes how the principles discussed in the earlier chapters can be applied to helping poor people living in urban slums and on the sidewalks of cities in developing countries.

In the wrap-up section, Chapter 10 describes the central role poverty plays in most of the problems facing planet Earth; Chapter 11 describes what donors, governments, universities, research institutions, and readers can do to end poverty; and Chapter 12 tells how Bahadur and his family finally moved out of poverty.

Out of Poverty teaches us to think simple. Paul Polak brings forward ideas and solutions that bypass government agencies and other leaden institutions. Ideas that work! – Paul Newman

Paul Polak offers a personal, radical, and profoundly sensible prescription for alleviating global poverty. His engaging style of storytelling is not only persuasive, but entertaining. Read Out of Poverty – it will change the way you look at the world. – Sandra Postel, Director of the Global Water Policy Project and author of Pillar of Sand: Can the Irrigation Miracle Last?

Out of Poverty is very exciting. It matches a lot of my own thoughts about solving things. When you alleviate something but don't fix the cause, it comes back. Paul Polak's approach confronts the root causes. – Steve Wozniak, Inventor of the Apple computer and Cofounder of Apple Computers

Paul Polak listens to people few of us ever hear from – the world's poor ‘one-acre farmers’ – and comes up with simple, practical solutions for helping them better their lives. His work is profoundly inspiring. Even if you don't normally read books about development and poverty, read this one! – Lori Pottinger, Director of Africa Programs, International Rivers

Viewing the poor as passive recipients of assistance has wasted billions of dollars. Top-down, bailout subsidy programs don't work. As Paul explains, we need to partner with the developing world and provide tools and technologies to give them an opportunity to help themselves. – Shrikrishna Upadhyay, Founder, SAPPROS, Nepal

Paul Polak delivers a refreshing dose of common sense to the question of how best to help the world's poorest citizens, the common sense borne of a lifetime of hands-on experience. It serves as a how-to manual for Stanford's course on Design for Extreme Affordability. – James M. Patell, Herbert Hoover Professor of Public and Private Management. Graduate School of Business, Stanford University

Paul Polak's method works because it harnesses the power of design thinking, low cost technology and human enterprise to create sustainable communities of trade. Paul's remarkable work has eliminated poverty and restored dignity to millions of families. – Ann Willoughby, President and Creative Director, Willoughby Design

Throughout the course of this impassioned book, Polak tells fascinating and moving success stories about the people he and the IDE have helped. Bold, spirited, and, at times, even humorous, Out of Poverty is a call for a revolution in the way we view the poor. As a result, it will be received as one of the most important contributions on the subject in recent times. Many readers will come away from reading Out of Poverty energized and inspired to do the work that needs to be done.

Business & Investing / Economics / Social Sciences / Gerontology / Public Policy

Ageing Labour Forces edited by Philip Taylor (Edward Elgar Publishing)

Ageing Labour Forces considers the changing status of older workers, the evolution of public policy on age and work, and the behavior of employers. It attempts to answer the critical question: in an ageing society, can older workers look forward to the prospect of longer working lives with choice and security and make successful transitions to retirement?

Ageing Labour Forces challenges the current stance of many governments and observers concerning policies to extend working lives. It utilizes perspectives and case studies from public policy, employment policy and the attitudes and behavior of older people. Editor Philip Taylor, Faculty of Business and Enterprise at Swinburne University of Technology, Australia, together with contributions from leading researchers in a number of countries, argues that older workers have been at the forefront of industrialized society's efforts to respond to the crisis facing social welfare systems and the economic threats associated with population ageing. Their involvement has forced the restructuring of economies, adjustments to social welfare systems as well as redefinitions to the actual concept of old age.

Listening to policy makers and some commentators might make one optimistic that older workers are on the threshold of a new era of opportunity, a ‘golden age’ of job openings and flexible retirement. This volume tests the validity of this claim, focusing on developments in a small number of industrialized nations: Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Japan, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and the U.S. Nowadays, the necessity for economies, and the value for both industry and older people of extending working lives seems to be taken for granted and dissenting voices are seldom heard. This volume takes a close look at the relatively recent shift away from rhetoric and action of early retirement towards that of ‘active ageing’, seeking to understand the motives and behavior of key actors, examining recent trends in older workers' labour force participation and offering an assessment of their likely position into the future.

Beginning with an introduction by editor Taylor, Ageing Labour Forces contains an overview of the recent history of older workers before moving on to discuss the changing policy landscape. According to Taylor, the final quarter of the twentieth century saw the growth of early retirement as a phenomenon. Most industrialized nations, and some European ones in particular, have seen a decline, sometimes marked, in labour force participation rates among older workers. This downward trend continued until recently, but noticeable is a recent slowing and in some countries, a modest reversal.

The result has been the breakdown of the three phase model of the life course: education, work and rest. ‘Socially assigned’ economic inactivity has, for some, made the last stage ‘unforeseeable and uncertain’. While early retirement has often been portrayed as an opportunity to enter a life of leisure, free from the stresses of working life and while in good health, in fact, the reality, as some older people have found out too late, is often very different. Research studies have shown that while, for some, it is welcomed and can come as a relief, many others would have preferred to stay on or at least have chosen their time of retirement. Most thought they might easily move into new, often part-time, jobs but the reality is that a lifetime's experience has often counted for little. What should be a period of winding down and relaxation can turn into an anxious wait and an inevitable scaling back of ambitions.

Taylor in Ageing Labour Forces asks, What accounts for the problems faced by many older workers? First is society's preference for youth. Second, and importantly, until recently, many European governments gave tacit, and some overt support to employers wishing to dispense with older labour. Third, evidence shows that older workers sometimes help perpetuate ageist myths.

In the drive for competitiveness and greater efficiency businesses have often being unwittingly drained of vast reservoirs of skills and experience which are then lost forever, but recently, a few employers have begun to recognize that older workers have things to offer and that a blend of youth and experience has business benefits. Against the background of a scarcity of labour and relatively buoyant economies, it is hardly a surprise that some organizations have demonstrated an interest in older workers. What is not generally acknowledged is the continuing pressure that older workers are under as they confront the ‘specter of uselessness’ as the forces of globalization undermine their position in labour markets, with jobs they could do moving elsewhere and employers being unwilling to invest in the level of skills training that might give them a solid foothold in the labour market.

A cautious approach underpins the construction of Ageing Labour Forces. Although proponents of active ageing seem to have a strong case, this needs to be tested. While early retirement now has few defenders, it may still have an important role to play in protecting older workers from the vagaries of labour markets. Chapters are provided by leading experts in the field of age and work in Europe, North America, Japan and Australia. These consist of country reviews where the authors seek to compare the promise of active ageing with the reality of older workers' experiences in the labour market. They examine the ageing of workforces and the changing status of older workers, consider the reform of retirement income systems, the emergence of active labour market policies and the rationale for current actions. They ask whether real progress is being made towards active ageing and set out the critical barriers to extending working lives.

It is clear that, so far, ‘age free’ employment is more aspiration than reality. Indeed, as noted by Guillemard and Jolivet in Ageing Labour Forces, trends such as towards greater work intensification potentially undermine older workers' prospects. While some observers point to a coming era of age-free employment, what might emerge instead is even greater age segmentation of labour markets as global industry demands a highly flexible, mobile and skilled workforce. While industrialized nations are ageing and some commentators draw an obvious link with ageing workforces, new labour reserves are increasingly being mined elsewhere. It cannot, therefore, yet be said with any certainty that a new era of employment opportunity is unfolding for older people. A plausible scenario is one of increasing labour market insecurity and personal hardship as workers can no longer fall back on early retirement when they begin to lose the struggle to maintain labour market competitiveness.

Public policymakers must, then, be wary of pushing older people into labour markets where their abilities are not valued. Based on this review, it might even be concluded that in some countries there is a ‘lost generation’ for whom the notion of working later has come too late. This assessment might be criticized by advocacy groups as being defeatist, but appears to have been recognized by some public policy makers, tacitly at least, in the form of relatively weak activation measures. Initiatives so positioned to assist workers at critical points in their careers so they do not reach their 50s having accumulated a range of characteristics that put them at a disadvantage are likely to be more effective than remedial actions, though of course, this would require a significant ramping up of resources.

It is also Taylor’s contention that targeted exit pathways will continue to play a crucial role in the volatile globalizing labour market of the early twenty-first century. Much of industry may simply feel unable to countenance ageing workforces, with the consequence that those who might hitherto have left the labour market for retirement would instead now be forced to remain economically active, but jobless or underemployed. The likelihood of significant social and individual costs resulting from ‘activation’ has been pointed to in Ageing Labour Forces. As a singular focus on early exit benefited some, but had unintended negative consequences, ‘activation’ has its own pros and cons. Rather than abandoning early exit entirely, new forms of social protection for older workers may be required, probably not on the same mass scale as the past, and not simply misusing other instruments such as disability benefits.

Finally, there is a need to act at a basic level to change the way age and ageing is viewed. In the meantime, according to Taylor, policy makers and commentators need to be brave enough to accept the current limits of active ageing and devise policy responses accordingly. A pragmatic balance is required between, on the one hand, maximizing job chances, and on the other, an escape from diminishing prospects.

Ageing Labour Forces is a provocative work, which will appeal to academics and researchers interested in work, ageing and public policy, as well as labour economics.

Business & Investing / Economics / Social Sciences / Research

The Cult of Statistical Significance: How the Standard Error Costs Us Jobs, Justice, and Lives by Steven T. Ziliak & Deirdre N, McCloskey (Economics, Cognition, and Society Series: The University of Michigan Press)

Can so many scientists have been wrong over the eighty years since 1925? Unhappily, yes. – from the book

The Cult of Statistical Significance shows, field by field, how ‘statistical significance,’ a technique that dominates many sciences, has been a mistake. The authors, Stephen T. Ziliak, Professor of Economics at Roosevelt University and Deirdre N. McCloskey, Distinguished Professor of Economics, History, English, and Communication at the University of Illinois at Chicago, find that researchers in a broad spectrum of fields, from agronomy to zoology, employ ‘testing’ that doesn’t test and ‘estimating’ that doesn’t estimate. The facts will startle outside readers: how could a group of brilliant scientists wander so far from scientific magnitudes?

‘Statistical significance,’ a technique that dominates medicine, economics, psychology, and many other scientific fields, has, according to Ziliak and McCloskey, been a huge mistake. The outcome is a case study in bad science – how it originates and how it grows. ‘Null hypothesis significance testing’ is a scientific train-wreck, about which a small group of statisticians have been warning for a century. Ziliak and McCloskey measure the disaster in their home field of economics, and in psychology, epidemiology, and medical science. They also touch on law, biology, psychiatry, pharmacology, sociology, political science, education, forensics, and other fields in the grip of ‘significance.’ Ziliak and McCloskey show field by field how the wreck happened, report on the fatalities, and offer a quantitative way forward. The facts will inspirit the scientists who seek conscious interpretations of ‘oomph’ rather than arbitrary columns of t-tests: how can the statistical sciences get back on track, and fulfill their quantitative promise?

Implied readers of The Cult of Statistical Significance are significance testers, the keepers of numerical things. The authors want to persuade readers of one claim: that William Sealy Gosset (1876-1937) – aka ‘Student’ of Student's t-test – was right and that his difficult friend, Ronald A. Fisher, though a genius, was wrong. No working scientist today knows much about Gosset, a brewer of Guinness stout and the inventor of a good deal of modern statistics. He took an economic approach to the logic of uncertainty. For over two decades he quietly tried to educate Fisher. But Fisher, our flawed villain, erased from Gosset's inventions the consciously economic element.

Ziliak and McCloskey lament what could have been in the statistical sciences if only Fisher had cared to understand the full import of Gosset's insights. They say that only slowly did they realize how widespread the standard error had become in sciences other than their home field of economics. Some time passed before they systematically looked into them. Finally they undertook the broader intervention in The Cult of Statistical Significance. They say they couldn't examine every science or subfield. And additional work remains of course to be done, on significance and other problems of testing and estimation. But they think the methodological overlaps in education and psychology, economics and sociology, agriculture and biology, pharmacology and epidemiology are sufficiently large, and the inheritance in them of Fisherian methods sufficiently deep, that The Cult of Statistical Significance can shed some light on all the t-testing sciences. They were dismayed to discover, for example, that supreme courts in the United States, state and federal, have begun to decide cases on the basis of Fisher's arbitrary test. The law itself is distorted by Fisher.

In the book they invite general and non-technical readers to the discussion, too. If they start at the beginning and read through chapter 3 they will get the main point – that oomph, the difference a treatment makes, dominates precision. The extended but simple ‘diet pill example’ in chapter 3 will equip them with the essential logic and with the replies they will need to stay in the conversation. Chapter 17 through to the end of the book provides a brief history of the problem and a sketch of a solution.

Readers may find it strange that two historical economists have intruded on the theory, history, philosophy, sociology, and practice of hypothesis testing in the sciences. Ziliak and McCloskey are not professional statisticians and are only amateur historians and philosophers of science. Yet economically concerned people have played a role in the logic, philosophy, and dissemination of testing, estimation, and error analysis in all of the sciences. Gosset himself, they note, was a businessman and the inventor of an economic approach to uncertainty. Keynes wrote A Treatise on Probability (1921), an important if somewhat neglected book on the history and foundations of probability theory.

Advanced empirical economics, which they have endured, taught, and written about for years, has become an exercise in hypothesis testing, and is broken. They are saying in The Cult of Statistical Significance that the brokenness extends to many other quantitative sciences – though notably – they could say significantly – not much to physics and chemistry and geology. They don't claim to understand fully the sciences they survey. But they do understand their unhappy statistical rhetoric.

McCloskey and Ziliak have been pushing this very elementary, very correct, very important argument through several articles over several years and for reasons I cannot fathom it is still resisted. If it takes a book to get it across, I hope this book will do it. It ought to. – Thomas Schelling, Distinguished University Professor, School of Public Policy, University of Maryland, and 2005 Nobel Prize Laureate in Economics
With humor, insight, piercing logic and a nod to history, Ziliak and McCloskey show how economists – and other scientists – suffer from a mass delusion about statistical analysis. The quest for statistical significance that pervades science today is a deeply flawed substitute for thoughtful analysis. . . . Yet few participants in the scientific bureaucracy have been willing to admit what Ziliak and McCloskey make clear: the emperor has no clothes. – Kenneth Rothman, Professor of Epidemiology, Boston University School of Health

The Cult of Statistical Significance shows how the most important statistical method used in many of the sciences does not pass the test for basic common sense. Significance testers will read the book optimistically – with a sense of how ‘real’ significance can transform their science. The book will encourage scientists who want to know how to get the statistical sciences back on track and fulfill their quantitative promise.

Business & Investing / Marketing & Sales

Making Meaning: How Successful Businesses Deliver Meaningful Customer Experiences by Steve Diller, Nathan Shedroff, & Darrel Rhea (Voices That Matter Series: New Riders Press)
In a market economy characterized by commoditized products and global competition, how do companies gain deep and lasting loyalty from their customers? The key, Making Meaning argues, is in providing meaningful customer experiences. The book was written by Steve Diller, who with more than 20 years of strategy and marketing consulting experience, leads Cheskin’s Experience Design Studio and also drives Cheskin’s innovation practice; Nathan Shedroff, one of the pioneers of experience design, program chair of California College of the Art's groundbreaking MBA in Design Strategy; and Darrel Rhea, CEO of Cheskin, one of the world’s most influential strategic design consultants.

Writing in the tradition of Louis Cheskin, one of the founding fathers of market research, Diller, Shedroff and Rhea in Making Meaning observe, define, and describe the meaningful customer experience. By consciously evoking certain deeply valued meanings through their products, services, and multidimensional customer experiences, they argue, companies can create more value and achieve lasting strategic advantages over their competitors. Making Meaning not only encourages businesses to adopt an innovation process that’s centered on meaning, it also tells them how. With real-world examples drawn from the Cheskin company's experience and from the authors' observations of the contemporary global market, this book outlines a plan of action and describes the attributes of a meaning-centric innovation team.
Making Meaning is not a book about finding one’s soul in the workplace. It is a straightforward business book with a straightforward capitalistic goal: To encourage businesses to create more value by adopting a process that deliberately places meaning at the center of innovation. This is a recipe for a healthy business in any economic climate, but in today's volatile environment, where shareholder value can evaporate more quickly than it can be built, the authors believe it is both a timely and a reasonable pursuit. If readers innovate with an eye to what is meaningful in their customers' lives, their products and services are more likely to be adopted and retained, not tossed aside when the next new sensation arrives. If they identify the core meanings that their product, service, or brand convey, they are more capable of translating the experience into multiple cultures – again, a timely and reasonable pursuit, given our increasingly globalized economy. And if they approach innovation with meaning at the center of their process, they are better able to foster open and transparent collaboration among departments and functions. This saves costs, saves time, and produces real value for the customer, the shareholders, and the people with whom they work.

Louis Cheskin in 1945 used the emerging discipline of psychology, to help some of this country's most prominent businessmen (and they were all men at that time) to rethink and redesign their products. He helped Marlboro find its masculinity, margarine find its true color (yellow). Some 50-odd years later, Diller, Shedroff and Rhea say that their own work in the field has led them to the conviction that for companies to achieve enduring competitive advantage through experience design, their innovations cannot be based simply on novelty. Increasingly, companies must address their customers' essential human need for meaning.

In Making Meaning, they observe, define, and describe the phenomenon of the meaningful customer experience. Where Louis Cheskin drew almost exclusively from psychology, they add insights from cultural anthropology and contextual design. In this book they briefly wrestle with defining both ‘experience’ and ‘meaning’ in the context of business innovation. They offer readers a list of types of meaning their work has led them to find are most valuable to people. And they offer practical strategies for turning their business into a ‘meaning business,’ focusing on the roles, tools, and process of identifying, designing, delivering, and maintaining meaningful experiences. They show readers how meaning can be the engine behind innovation and an organization's strategic plan, as well as a way of unifying vision and communicating it to everyone in an organization – whether they are selling software or soft drinks, or something that doesn't even exist yet.

We're now hip-deep, if not drowning, in the 'experience economy.' Here's the smartest book I've read so far that can actually help get your brand to higher ground, fast. And it's written by people who not only drew the map, but blazed these trails in the first place. – Brian Collins, Executive Creative Director, Ogilvy and Mather Worldwide Brand Integration Group
This delightfully clear book is intended to help companies connect real people by placing meaning at the center of a company's ‘culture of innovation.’ With wit, intelligence, and humor, Making Meaning is about as far as one can get from the rapaciousness of soulless consumerism. Louis Cheskin must be smiling! – Brenda Laurel, Ph.D., Distinguished Engineer, Sun Microsystems
A visionary, eye-opening book that tackles the critical emerging question: When everything is possible, what is necessary? Authored by top leaders in the field, it is a must-read for anyone looking towards the future, for it brilliantly illustrates one of the promising keys to business success. – Marco Steinberg, Associate Professor, Harvard University, Graduate School of Design
Making Meaning is a 'whole brain' innovation process that makes a whole lot of sense. – Brad Casper, President and Chief Executive Officer of The Dial Corporation

Making Meaning is an engaging and practical book for business leaders, explaining how their companies can create more meaningful products and services to better achieve their goals. Some businesses have already discovered this approach, but Diller, Shedroff and Rhea articulate it in a persuasive and practical way. Their vision of a world of meaningful consumption is idealistic, but this is a straightforward business book with an eye on the ROI. It shows how to bring R&D, design, and marketing together to create deeper and richer experiences for customers. Readers will find it an enjoyable, thought-provoking read. At the very least, it will give readers an opportunity and a vantage point from which to think about what their job means, and why that's an important consideration.

Business & Investing / Management & Leadership

So What?: The Definitive Guide to the Only Business Questions that Matter by Kevin Duncan (Capstone)

We all know how irritating it can be when a child repeatedly asks why? And yet we are often unable to answer the simplest of questions in a clear, direct way, and frequently have no idea why we are doing something. This problem has a huge bearing on inefficiency in business, and goes some way to explaining why so many people spend so much time doing things that have no bearing on the true purpose.
Kevin Duncan in So What? says that by behaving like a child, in a genuinely inquisitive way, readers can get right to the heart of the matter and save themselves hours, days, and months of anguish. Duncan, who worked in advertising and direct marketing for twenty years, teaches at Canterbury University, and advises various businesses as a non-executive director, business strategist and trainer.

So What? helps readers navigate through the potential conflict that may arise from asking a boss "Do we really need to do this?" or "What's the point of that?"
For example the book covers:

The value of questions. The only way to break the unholy chain of vagueness is to start by asking questions.
Write a list of what one is not going to do, because what they are not going to do is just as important as what they are going to do.
The issue of ‘when’. Put the frenetic activity in early on, so that there is plenty of time to make mistakes, and rectify them.
Simple is good. Why would anyone want the route to getting something done to be complicated? If the way forward is clear, take it.
Jargon and cliché red alert. Business does not work if people talk nonsense. Jargon limits clear expression and prevents people from articulating what they really mean. Only plain English will do.
The Why chromosome. Take the inquisitive nature of childhood and continue it into later life.

As Duncan says, it is not a complicated approach, and it is perfect for self-employed people, who can ask the questions of themselves, but it does require some subtlety when used with colleagues.

According to Duncan in So What?, once all the right questions have been posed, there is a final, sure-fire method for testing whether something is relevant and helpful to the matter in hand. By completing the sentence "Something must be wrong if..." with a true statement of the current reality, it is simple to work out if one is wasting one’s time. For example, "Something must be wrong if I am spending three days a week in meetings."

So, Duncan advises: be more inquisitive. Let the questions roll. Pay attention to what the answers are. By so doing, readers will immediately improve the quality of their lives, and the success of their businesses.

Being successful in business is not a matter of being clever-clever but plain-and-simple-smart. Unfortunately being clever-clever is much easier than plain-and-simple-smart, and that is what most business books focus on. So What? is different. It gets you to ask yourself (and your colleagues) those questions that get to smart answers and helps you turn them into smart habits and smart actions. Oh, and it's a pleasure to read too. – Mark Earls, author, Herd and Welcome to the Creative Age

I sit in meetings discussing businesses almost every day. Sadly, much of the talking just doesn't move anything forward. Kevin makes observations that are so sharp that it could save you months of wasted time. If you really want to get straight to the point and sort your business out right now, read this book as soon as possible. – Don Williams, partner, BDO Stoy Hayward

A refreshingly different kind of business book, full of the straight-talking, no-nonsense and practical advice we have come to expect from Kevin Duncan. Also, lots of useful quotes throughout, and a very handy at-a-glance collection of summaries from the works of other business gurus. – Rita Clifton, Chairman, Interbrand

Far too much business analysis ends up in serving to over-complicate the issues. The bigger the company, the more opinions on the table. Kevin's clinical style cuts through all this static so you know exactly where you are. With so much on at any given moment, that's a really valuable quality these days. For people who value their time and need to move forwards quickly, then I strongly recommend you read this book. – Mark Giffin, Head of Brand Strategy and Creative Development, Visa Europe

So What? gives it to readers straight like no other business book they will have read – Duncan's no-nonsense style takes readers to the heart of the issue with dozens of different scenarios.

Childrens / Families / Animals / Ages 4-8

Say Daddy! by Michael Shoulders, illustrated by Teri Weidner (Picture Books Series: Sleeping Bear Press)

When does a child's life-long love of reading begin?
Could it be on the day they are born?

Daddy read a book about promises and making dreams come true.
He closed the last page and smiled at me for hours and said, ‘Say Daddy! Say Daddy!’
He hoped Daddy would be my first word!
I just made a funny sound.

Finally Grandma reads about the most important thing of all ... families ... and how they are always there for us.

‘Say Nana! Say Nana!’
She hoped Nana would be my first word!

Say Daddy! is the story of a family's love of reading and the newest addition to their family. When a newborn bear arrives, Mother shares a book about love and brother reads a tale about friendship. Aunt Grace and Uncle Roy read about adventures and laughter. Daddy reads a book about promises and making dreams come true. Grandma reads a book about families.

Each member of the family is hopeful, that after the reading and snuggling and hugging, their name would be baby bear's very first word. The delighted family dances and cheers when they hear baby's first word is ... BOOK. Daddy, however, just won't give up: "Now, say Daddy!"

Sharing books is important to the bear family of readers in Say Daddy!.

The National Institute for Literacy encourages reading with very young children, "When does a child learn to read? Many would answer kindergarten or first grade. But researchers have found strong evidence that children can begin to learn reading and writing in their earliest years, long before they go to school."

Educator and author Michael Shoulders, who has devoted his career and life to spreading the word that ‘reading is magic,’ offers a gentle telling of the power of reading together and the lifelong love of books. Endearing watercolor illustrations from Teri Weidner bring the family to life as they share touching moments through the pages of books. A wonderful baby shower gift, sweet reading for a parent and child and perfect for early readers, Say Daddy! is a story that reinforces the importance of lifelong reading beginning at the earliest age.

Computers & Internet

Running Windows on Your Mac by Dwight Silverman (Peachpit Press)

Now readers no longer have to choose between Mac OS X and Windows. The latest Macs from Apple can run both Mac OS X and Windows, so readers are not limited to just one operating system. Running Windows on Your Mac explains how this technology works and walks readers through the process of setting up Windows on their Mac.

Aimed at three types of users, the book asks readers, are they Windows users who are buying their first Mac? Macintosh users who need to run Windows software? Or just computer users who want the best of both worlds? Readers will find detailed instructions for installing Windows on their Mac, a guide to the Mac for Windows users and a reference to Windows for Mac users.
In Running Windows on Your Mac, readers learn how to

Load and configure the two most popular Mac OS X virtualization programs, Parallels Desktop for Mac and VM ware Fusion.
Install Windows easily, either in Parallels or Fusion, or with Boot Camp.
Keep their Windows installation in top shape, free of viruses and spyware.
Run Windows applications alongside Macintosh programs.
Add their new Mac to an existing Windows network.
Explore the intricacies of a new operating system, either Mac OS X or Windows.

Written by Dwight Silverman, veteran journalist, computing columnist, technology blogger, and interactive journalism editor at the Houston Chronicle, Running Windows on Your Mac, the first part of the book provides information for anyone who wants to run Windows on the Mac, while the last three parts focus on specific user types.

Part I, Installing Windows on the Mac, lays out the many choices readers have for running Windows on the Macintosh. It then walks them through the processes of installing the software they need to run Windows, and then installing Windows itself. Readers learn how they can run Windows in a window on the Mac desktop, run Windows programs as though they are part of the Mac OS, and run Windows as the primary operating system.

Part II, Macintosh for Windows Users, is designed to help Mac newbies cope in their new environs. It walks them through the basic differences between the Mac and Windows operating systems, and how they can make the Mac operating system seem more Windows-like. It also shows them how to get their Mac talking with Windows PCs on their home network. They learn how to get started with the software that comes with the Mac, how to download and install new programs, and how to take advantage of the new features in Leopard, the latest version of Mac OS X.

Part III, Windows for Macintosh Users, introduces the vagaries of the Windows operating system to those who are new to it. This part of Running Windows on Your Mac emphasizes how to prevent spyware and viruses – a major issue on the Windows platform, which the Mac has largely eluded to date.

Running Windows on Your Mac is a handy reference showing how the technology works and walking readers through every phase of the process of setting up Windows on their Mac. There’s something in it for everyone. Once readers have finished reading the book, they should have mastered everything they need to know to switch between the Windows and Mac platforms with ease.

Education / Early Childhood

Creative Activities for Young Children, 9th Edition by Mary Mayesky (Delmar Cengage Learning)

It seems in today's fast-paced world that people are eager to buy into the notion of speeding up a child's development, using any means at hand to make ‘smarter’ babies. Early childhood educators know that with or without technology, young children will develop at their own unique pace and that despite the rapid changes in the world, the developmental needs of young children remain constant. Our commitment to the development of their creativity must remain at least, or grow at best, as young children face the pressures of today's world.

Creative Activities for Young Children, 9th edition is filled with creative and easy-to implement activities for young children. Hundreds of activities and research to match make this book a good resource for those planning to work creatively with children across the curriculum. The author, Mary Mayesky, Professor Emerita, Program in Education, Duke University; former director of the Early Childhood Certification Program, explains that since the last edition of Creative Activities for Young Children, national standards for preschool/early childhood education have been adopted in many states. Standards are meant to ensure that all students master basic skills, but as early childhood educators, the teacher’s job is to ensure that young children develop those qualities and skills that will empower them to contribute meaningfully to the needs of future societies – even in ways that we cannot yet see. In this standard-driven educational milieu, Mayesky’s advice to early childhood teachers is to remain steadfast to what they know is developmentally sound for children.

Teachers will find reflected in the pages of Creative Activities for Young Children the same joy and sense of purpose that led them to working with young children. Maintaining the same purpose as in the first eight editions, this edition is designed for those who are dedicated to helping children reach their full potential. It is written for people who want to know more about creativity, creative children, creative teaching, and creative curriculum and activities. While it is sound in developmental theory, it is practical in applying these theories in actual classroom settings.

Part 1 of Creative Activities for Young Children presents a general discussion of various child development theories. Included in Part 1 are chapters on creativity, aesthetic experiences, and social-emotional and physical-mental growth, as reflected in art development theories. Part 1 sets an appropriate theoretical stage for application of these theories in specific curriculum areas presented in Part 2.

Part 2 covers the early childhood curriculum in Section 5 and Section 6. Section 5 covers creativity in curriculum areas. Section 6 addresses creativity in the multicultural, anti-bias curriculum, including the place of celebrations in the curriculum.

Some features new to the ninth edition include:

New Think about It and This One's for You features in each chapter.
New lists of Additional Readings at the end of each chapter.
New and updated Software for Children references in each chapter and updated information on software companies with contact information in Appendix H.
New activities for preschool, kindergarten to grade 3, and grades 4 to 5 in every chapter.
A section on Bloom's taxonomy, how to plan lessons encouraging children's higher-level thinking, and appropriate activities for each level of thinking.
A new section on early childhood learning standards, including a summary of current national status, discussion of what is included in these standards, and their benefits and drawbacks.
Teaching strategies for children with special needs.
Expanded section on play theories, including information on theories of Vigotsky, Piaget, Elkind, Parten, and Smilansky.
Activities using the Internet in all curriculum chapters (Chapters 15-23).
Teaching strategies on effective use of Internet resources to enhance older students' aesthetic experiences with two types of virtual museums.
Discussion of new technologies, including iPods, interactive white boards, blogs, wilds, and Google Earth.
Expanded section on theories of children's art development, including theories of Lowenfeld, Read, and Kellogg.
New two-dimensional activities, including mosaics and montage.
New three-dimensional activities, including mobiles and stabiles.
Expanded section on the importance and use of puppets throughout the curriculum, as well as Web resources for puppet patterns and activities.
New information on uses of flannel/story boards across the curriculum as well as Web sites references for flannel board character patterns.
A new Section 6. The new Section 6, Creativity: A Multicultural View, includes the following chapters: Chapter 24: Creativity, Diversity, and the Early Childhood Program; Chapter 25: Creative Multicultural Ideas; and Chapter 26: Developmentally Appropriate Celebrations.

A key supplement to the ninth edition of Creative Activities for Young Children is the Instructor's Manual. It includes answers to review questions, multimedia resources, and discussion topics for every chapter of the text. It also includes Observation Sheets, Student Activity Sheets, Small-Group Activity Sheets, and masters for overhead transparencies. The new e-Resource component provides instructors with the tools they need in one CD-ROM. The Professional Enhancement booklet for students focuses on key topics of interest to future early child-hood teachers and caregivers.

The Online Companion to accompany the ninth edition of Creative Activities for Young Children is a teachers’ link to early childhood education on the Internet. It contains many features to enhance and enrich readers’ understanding of creative activities for the young child including the Critical Thinking Forum, Web Activities, Web Links, Sample Quizzes, Online Early Education Survey, Observation Sheets, and PowerPoint Presentations.

This book is very comprehensive and covers the topics I am looking for in a text. It is apparent that the author has a wealth of information and experience to share in a mentoring style. – Linda Aiken, M.Ed., Southwestern Community College
Many of my students over the years have decided to keep the textbook for use in their classrooms. That is high praise and quite a tribute to the author’s work. – Carol Anderson, M.S., Colorado Community College
The text is an easy read and is loaded with excellent applicable examples. – Phygenia Young, M.S., Forthsyth Technical Community College

Creative Activities for Young Children, 9th edition is a terrific book filled with fun, creative, and easy-to implement activities for young children. All the activities have been classroom-tested. Readers will enjoy exercising their own creativity, as well as helping young children do the same. Hundreds of activities, and up-to-date research make this book an invaluable resource for those planning to work creatively with children across the curriculum.

Entertainment / Sports / Biographies & Memoirs / History / Civil Rights / African American Studies

Across the Line: Profiles in Basketball Courage: Tales of the First Black Players in the ACC and SEC by Barry Jacobs (The Lyons Press)

Remarkably, despite the groundbreaking role of players such as Perry Wallace, Charles Scott, Wendell Hudson, and their compatriots from Louisiana to Maryland, their actions in advancing civil rights and transforming the game of basketball have gone largely untold – until Across the Line. The book is set within the context of the tumultuous 1960s and early 1970s, grounded in the civil rights struggles on campus and within the larger community, and enriched by the viewpoint of players, relatives, coaches, teammates, opponents, and other observers. Across the Line recounts the experiences of the pioneering African-American basketball players at eighteen schools in the Atlantic Coast and Southeastern Conferences, the South's most prominent, historically white intercollegiate leagues. The book was written by Barry Jacobs, who for 20 years covered college basketball, as well as news and other sports for the New York Times.

As told in Across the Line, Perry Wallace feared he would be shot when he stepped onto a basketball court in a Vanderbilt uniform. Georgia's Ronnie Hogue jumped atop a press table, swinging a chair in self-defense, as a menacing crowd approached following a road game. Craig Noble joined other threatened black students in a rare, en masse flight from the Clemson campus. Maryland's Pete Johnson seethed when a teammate used a racial epithet in a supervised workout and his coaches let it pass. C. B. Claiborne could not attend the Duke team banquet his freshman year because it was held at a white country club.

Collis Temple, whose father carried a pistol for protection against marauding whites in rural Louisiana, scuffled with an opposing player each season he played at LSU. Wendell Hudson's mother cried when the Birmingham native, whose family routinely hit the deck each time racists' bombs exploded in their neighborhood, decided to become the first black athlete at the University of Alabama. Al Heartley and other black students locked themselves in a campus dorm at North Carolina State, fearing the actions of an unruly white crowd the night Martin Luther King was assassinated.

For the last three decades, Barry Jacobs has been among the most respected and dedicated sportswriters covering the world of college basketball. Across the Line is his finest work. This book tells the important stories of the brave young men who were only looking to play a game, but ended up making history. Exhaustively researched and eloquently written, Across the Line is a must-read for sports and non-sports fans alike. – Seth Davis, college basketball analyst, Sports Illustrated/CBS

As someone who has been involved with the issue of race and sport for more than forty years, I know too well that there is a huge void in our knowledge of the history of integrating our college athletics teams. Barry Jacobs' Across the Line brings us the rich history of the African-American basketball players who courageously broke the color barriers in the ACC and SEC schools. It is a must read for anyone who wants to know that history. – Richard Lapchick, Chair of DeVos Sport Business Management Program Director, Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport Director, National Consortium for Academics and Sports

Richly marbled with history and always nestled in context, the stories in Across the Line make up a marvelous narrative of race, basketball, higher education and the South – and with his grasp of all four, Barry Jacobs is the ideal guide. The path-breakers he chronicles each walked his own road; for every inspirational tale of a Perry Wallace or Wendell Hudson, there's a Henry Harris, Norwood Todmann or Tom Payne who met a tragic fate. Their journeys will be of profound interest to anyone who cares about the interplay of America's great social issue and homegrown game. – Alexander Wolff, Sports Illustrated senior writer and author of Big Game, Small World: A Basketball Adventure

Across the Line tells an important and long-neglected story in sports as well as in social history. Jacob's exhaustive interviews and impeccable research present a clear picture of the obstacles the athletes encountered. This book should be required reading for sports fans of all backgrounds.

Health, Mind & Body / Disorders & Diseases / Biographies & Memoirs

Never Give In: Battling Cancer in the Senate by Sen. Arlen Specter, with Frank J. Scaturro (Thomas Dunne Books)

Never Give In is not simply the memoir of a cancer survivor.

Nor is it just the memoir of a respected senator.

Senator Arlen Specter, a Republican, is Pennsylvania’s senior senator. First elected in 1980, he is now serving his fifth term. Throughout his Senate career, he has served on the Judiciary Committee, which he chaired in the 109th Congress (2005-2007) and continues to serve as its ranking member. Among his many other Senate duties, he is also a former chairman and current ranking member of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education. In early 2004, was in the midst of a grueling primary race, facing significant opposition from the right as he worked to win his party’s nomination to run for reelection for his Pennsylvania senate seat. It would be the most difficult election in his quarter-century career in the Senate. Following on its heels were two more challenges – the general-election race and opposition to his elevation as Chairman of the Judiciary Committee, his lifelong ambition. He overcame these three challenges in time for his seventy-fifth birthday.
But exhaustion and fatigue – initially thought to be the after-effects of months of vigorous campaigning – were found to be far more serious. After a series of tests and consultation with several doctors, Specter was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s disease, Stage IVB, the most advanced stage. As he reports in Never Give In, he had received death sentences before and lived to tell about it. To Specter, this diagnosis was another challenge. After all, he still had a job to do.
His cancer treatments came as he reached the height of his power – surrounded by political storms that polarized Washington and threatened to shut the Senate down. His leadership positions made it his job to manage Supreme Court nominations and public- health appropriations as he faced his own illness. He had fought on public-health issues for years, but now it added potency to the message that the messenger was ailing himself.
The phrase ‘Never give in’ became Specter’s mantra, invoking the famous words from Churchill in his battle with cancer. Never Give In describes the treatment the Senator received and offers his advice on how to handle the side effects, hair loss, and of course, maintain a nearly daily squash regimen.

Specter says he has great respect for the medical community. No one, though, would blame him if he felt otherwise. On four separate occasions he has been misdiagnosed. In 1979, one of the nation's leading neurologists erroneously diagnosed Specter with A.L.S., a.k.a., Lou Gehrig's Disease. The misdiagnoses was later explained away as what appeared to be lingering symptoms from a bought of a form of childhood polio.

Specter's second brush with a death sentence came in 1993 when the chief neurosurgeon at Bethesda Naval Hospital looked at an MRI of Specter's skull and said he had a malignant brain tumor and three to six weeks to live. While Specter did have a tumor on his brain, it was not malignant. His third scare came in 1998, when double bypass surgery left Specter with fluid in his lungs, necessitating two more operations and two-and-a-half more weeks in the hospital.

But the fourth medical misadventure was perhaps the most avoidable. Specter had Hodgkin’s disease. But the diagnosis was delayed and valuable time was lost.

How has he been able to pull through? As he explains in Never Give In, he has sought multiple opinions, maintained a strong belief in making it through, kept up a rigorous exercise routine, and focused on work to keep him from dwelling on health concerns. Specter is a battler and his political career has mirrored his ability to beat the odds during his health struggles. In both cases, as things seemed to be at their most grim, Specter always found a way to push through. He has triumphed in tough primaries and tough elections. A loyal Republican, he is also his own man, a true moderate, not afraid to go against the party grain and follow his conscience. He has won admirers – and adversaries – on both sides of the political fence for his strong stances. Yet, he wonders if his political career – and the inherent stress that comes with it – could have contributed to his health dilemmas. But he has also come to the conclusion that one of his staunchest sources of support during his recoveries was his work.
Never Give In is coauthored by Frank J. Scaturro, counsel for the Senate Judiciary Committee on Senator Specter’s staff, where he specializes in judicial nominations and constitutional law issues.

Understanding Arlen Specter's steely endurance is a key to understanding his success in the Senate and in life. Look up tenacity in the dictionary and you'll find Arlen's picture. Trial by fire has tempered him and made him stronger, and wiser. – Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT, Chairman, Senate Judiciary Committee)
Written in Senator Specter’s trademark candor, Never Give In is a compelling tale of survival – both personal and political – from one of the Senate's most independent voices. Riding the train home with him now for almost 25 years, I count Arlen among my closest friends in the Senate. The words courageous and inspiring hardly do him justice – but trust me, he is both. – Senator Joe Biden (D-DE)

I've been privileged to work side by side with Arlen for over 18 years. While I respect his intelligence and honesty, and value his friendship, perhaps most of all I have admired his toughness in the face of adversity. He just never gives up. – Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA)

As Specter notes, time will humble the most powerful, but it should not prevent anyone from doing their best with what they have. Specter is living proof of this. Specter recalls his triumphs and medical scares in one of the most honest and revealing political memoirs in years with Never Give In, a moving glimpse into the life of a tenacious senator. It is inspiration for people of all political persuasions, of how to persevere and succeed – despite what the doctors may say, despite what the tests might show.
Health, Mind & Body / Psychology & Counseling / Relationships / Sociology / Marriage & Family

The Mating Game: A Primer on Love, Sex, and Marriage, Second Edition by Pamela C. Regan (Sage Publications, Inc.)

Love, sexuality, and mate selection are fundamental human experiences that only relatively recently have begun to receive scientific attention.

The Mating Game, Second Edition, is a comprehensive, multidisciplinary, introductory text about human mating relationships aimed specifically at a university audience. It progresses beyond a psychological or biological/physiological stance and encompasses a wide array of disciplines. This review of theory and empirical research takes an integrated perspective on the human experiences of love and sex.
Author Pamela Regan, Associate Professor of Psychology and Director of the Social Relations Lab at California State University, Los Angeles, is an ‘up-and-coming’ professor who has established a name for herself by publishing over 40 journal articles, book chapters, and reviews on the dynamics of sex, love, and human mating. She is the coauthor, with Ellen Berscheid, of Lust: What We Know about Human Sexual Desire.

According to Regan, the intimate connections that a person establishes with other people, whether for a few moments or for a lifetime, affect their emotional and physical well-being and even the survival of the species. Without love and sex – without mating and pair bonding and reproduction – humans would feel empty, isolated, and lonely; societies would wither; and humankind would perish.

The Mating Game brings together in one text past and present theory, supposition, and knowledge about human mating relationships. The first section of the text focuses on mate selection and marriage. It begins with an examination of theoretical frameworks for understanding human mating, and considers research on men's and women's mate preferences. Regan then explores the early stages of romantic relationship formation with a particular focus on attraction, flirting, and courtship. Theories of relationship development are discussed, along with research on mate choice and marriage, conflict and dissolution, and therapeutic interventions for distressed relationships. The next two sections focus on two important aspects of mating relationships – love and sexuality.

First, The Mating Game considers the topic of love, beginning with an exploration of theoretical discourse (and empirical investigation) into the nature of love. Special attention is given to the two love types that have received the most scrutiny from social and behavioral scientists: passionate and companionate love. The section ends with a consideration of problematic aspects of love relationships, including unrequited love, obsession and relational stalking, mismatched love styles, and loss of passion. Then The Mating Game explores relational sexuality. Regan examines men's and women's beliefs and attitudes about the role of sex in dating and marital relationships, and sexuality – frequency, preferences, and practices – in beginning and established relationships. Problematic aspects of relational sexuality are considered, including sexual aggression, sexual dissatisfaction, sexual infidelity, and sexual jealousy. The final section summarizes what is currently known about individual differences in relationship orientation. The text considers how maleness and femaleness, global personality traits, and interpersonal belief systems may influence a person's romantic opportunities, behaviors, and outcomes.

New to the Second Edition of The Mating Game:

The reorganized text provides a smoother transition between major sections.
Reviews of the most recent theoretical and empirical work in the areas of love, sexuality, mate selection, and marriage.
New information on the phenomenon of cyber-flirting and the development of romantic relationships over the Internet.
Inclusion of cutting-edge biochemistry research, including a discussion of cutting-edge research on the biochemistry of passion and affection.
Discussion of emerging research on non-heterosexual relationships and cross-cultural dynamics.
Expanded chapters on critical topics.
A new chapter on relationship intervention.

The Mating Game remains ‘reader friendly.’ The comprehensive review and up-to-date information contained in The Mating Game not only provides answers to questions about important life events but also encourages readers' interest in the field of interpersonal relationships and human mating. Essential pedagogical elements – outlines, key concepts, recommended readings, and discussion questions – promote active learning and enhance readers' educational experience. Strongly grounded in methodology and research design, Regan offers relevant examples and anecdotes along with ample pedagogy that will spark debate and discussion on these provocative and complex topics. The Mating Game is ideal for upper level undergraduate or graduate students in psychology, family studies, and sociology, who will find this engaging text a valuable tool for course-related research activities, as well as for self-awareness.

Health, Mind & Body / Psychology & Counseling / Sexuality / Religion & Spirituality / New Age

Tantra for Erotic Empowerment: The Key to Enriching Your Sexual Life by Mark A. Michaels & Patricia Johnson, with a foreword by Tristan Taormino (Llewellyn Publications)

If you've ever wanted to explore Tantra, but didn't know where to begin, you'll want to start with a copy of this book. – Many Hands: New England's Magazine for Holistic Health

Tantra for Erotic Empowerment exhorts readers to embrace their sexuality and discover their own source of erotic power. This step-by-step guide takes readers on a Tantric journey of sexual exploration and personal empowerment. Mark A. Michaels and Patricia Johnson, tantra teachers, demystify the Tantric tradition, teaching readers how to experience sexual pleasure with consciousness and intention. With renewed sexual confidence, readers discover new ways to physically and spiritually satisfy their partners and themselves. This illustrated guide is unique in its holistic approach, showing readers how Tantric practice not only greatly enhances sexual pleasure, but also leads to richer and more satisfying experiences in every area of life. Relevant for anyone, regardless of relationship status or sexual orientation, Tantra for Erotic Empowerment features original techniques, self-exploration exercises, and provocative selections from classical and contemporary Hindu Tantric literature to help readers discover the source of their own erotic power.

Michaels and Johnson say that Tantra for Erotic Empowerment grew out of their experience together as Tantra teachers and practitioners. In their early explorations, they were exposed only to Western Neo-Tantra, initially through reading and then in workshops. To delve into the Tantric tradition more deeply, they began to study with Dr. Jonn Mumford (Swami Anandakapila Saraswati), one of the few Westerners with traditional Tantric training. Mumford later named them lineage holders of the OM Kara Kriya system and initiated them as Swami Umeshanand Saraswati and Devi Veenanand.

Gradually, under Mumford's influence, the substance of their teaching became somewhat more traditional as they fused the best elements of contemporary Neo-Tantra with the material they learned from him. They designed a course, The Fundamentals of Tantric Sexuality, and began offering it over the Internet in 2001. The response of their online students inspired them to write Tantra for Erotic Empowerment. The book expands upon The Fundamentals of Tantric Sexuality, incorporates a few key concepts from their first book, The Essence of Tantric Sexuality, and includes exercises that they have developed over the last eight years in their workshops and private teaching. The book also incorporates some historical background and social commentary. Few Westerners know much about the Tantric tradition, and most have been heavily influenced by cultural attitudes toward sexuality. In order to develop a form of Tantric practice that is at once suitable for contemporary life and true to the authentic tradition, it is important to have a sense of history and an understanding of how culture has shaped them. Thus, this is not a book on traditional Tantra, although they do borrow from that body of knowledge. Readers’ journey through this book's fourteen dalas, or chapters, will be one of sexual self-discovery. The practice includes a brief daily meditation as well as a total of fifty-two exercises, several in each dala.

Tantra for Erotic Empowerment is designed for both individuals and partners. According to Michaels and Johnson, many single people are reluctant to explore Tantra due to the misguided belief that it is for couples only. In fact, most Tantric practices are solo practices. Most people are so focused on relationships with others that they tend to lack awareness of their own internal worlds. It is important to cultivate this relationship with the self, since it provides the strongest foundation for interacting with others in a positive way. Thus, some exercises are presented in two formats, solo and partnered, and couples will benefit from doing both forms.

Michaels & Johnson are a Masters & Johnson for the 21st Century. Written with clarity and a passion for mystical experience and rigorous logic, Tantra for Erotic Empowerment is grounded in ancient spiritual truth, practice, wisdom, and personal experience. Radical, practical, and open-hearted, this book is a straight-forward transformative guide to self-knowledge. Michaels & Johnson's vision of Divine pleasure as a spiritual and sensual path of liberation is a gift to all seekers--for the curious, the novice and initiate alike. – Donna Gaines, Ph.D., Sociologist, author of Teenage Wasteland and Misfit's Manifesto

Tantra for Erotic Empowerment combines a clear-eyed overview of Tantra with multi-faceted Tantric insights in a rare method, allowing readers to pursue Tantra using traditional learning methods, but at their own pace and to the appropriate level of their current (and soon to be expanded) understanding. This book achieves its ambition to inform the casual reader, challenge the student of Tantra and inspire diverse communities to spiritual growth. – Bruce Anderson (Somananda), author of Tantra for Gay Men

This is a fearless and brilliant work, at once scholarly, technically accurate, challenging, and immensely readable. The writing is economical and lucid. The exercises are absorbing and profoundly therapeutic in the 'human' sense. It is a genuine original, and I enjoyed it immensely. – Paul Skye (Swami Ajnananda Saraswati), author of The Mastery of Stress

Tantra for Erotic Empowerment is packed full of useful exercises that can help individuals and couples discover their best erotic selves and find a holistic way of making sexuality a positive force in their lives and in their relationships. – Helen Boyd, author, She's Not the Man I Married and My Husband Betty

With illumination should come empowerment and the exercise of illuminated power. Mark and Patricia have once again given generously of themselves to all seekers fortunate enough to read this marvelous and enlightened work. Profound, practical, and precisely what the western psyche is ready for! – Lon Milo DuQuette, author of The Magick of Aleister Crowley

Tantra for Erotic Empowerment is creative, authentic and engaging. The wisdom, reflections and meditations engage readers’ intellect and inspire thoughtful self-exploration. At the same time, the exercises make the process highly experiential.

History / Americas / Civil War / Biographies & Memoirs

Troubled State: Civil War Journals of Franklin Archibald Dick by Gari Carter (Truman State University Press)

At night, I can in my mind's eye, see these opposing armies & behind them, the two divisions of the country, opposed to each other. And what a sight for this nation thus to be standing before their God.... The Rebels are doing enormous mischief in Missouri – rising up all through the State – They seem to be ubiquitous. – Franklin Archibald Dick, September 6, 1861

Last Friday, the 28th, I read Grant's telegram of the 26th from Raleigh, saying that Johnston had surrendered his whole army to Sherman, on the terms of Lee's surrender. This, of course, was an end of the war. I felt it so myself relief & joy – but oh how inadequate was this relief & joy compared with the immensity of the fact.... At this time, the People of Missouri are dividing over the new constitution to be voted on by them in a few weeks – So perverse are the union men there, that they split up on every question that arises. If political power is to be struggled for, with these scoundrels who have aided the rebellion, certainly that state is not fit to live in. – Franklin Archibald Dick, May 1, 1865

Steeped in family history and documents from a young age, author Gari Carter was given her great-great-grandfather's journals from the Civil War era. These writings of Franklin Archibald Dick awakened her respect and appreciation for the adversity he dealt with and the wisdom it offered her in dealing with her own journey. She spent ten years deciphering his handwriting and researching his life for Troubled State.

In his private journals, Franklin Dick, a St. Louis attorney, Union officer, Missouri assistant adjunct general, and provost marshal general, wrote of his concerns about keeping Missouri pro-Union during the turbulent Civil War years. His firsthand perspective of important historical events include the early Camp Jackson incident when he was Captain Nathaniel Lyon's assistant adjutant general, and when he served as Missouri's provost marshal general under Major General Samuel Curtis. Dick was troubled by the slow progress and terrible cost of the war. For him, the divided city of St. Louis was heartbreaking, and his journal entries changed from early optimism to later doubts about his future due to the war and his loyalty to the Union. After the war, Dick practiced law with Montgomery Blair, President Lincoln's postmaster general.

A benefit to scholars and buffs alike, the journals of Franklin Dick offer readers a different perspective on the Civil War from the contested and bloody battleground that was Missouri. The diaries provide valuable insights on how Unionists reacted to the shifting fortunes of war in Missouri and in St. Louis in particular, and how the life of a St. Louis attorney-turned-provost-marshal changed for all time. The annotations are helpful without being obtrusive, allowing Dick's personality to come through. – David Goldfield, University of North Carolina

Buried for years in family files, this important firsthand Civil War account gives a new view of politics, power, and divided loyalties in the state of Missouri. Filled with intrigue and emotion, Troubled State is a new resource for library collections, historians and Civil War buffs.

History / Europe / Medicine / Public Policy / Literature

Cleansing the City: Sanitary Geographies in Victorian London by Michelle Allen (Ohio University Press)

In Cleansing the City, Michelle Allen, assistant professor of English at the U.S. Naval Academy, explores not only the challenges faced by Victorian London’s reformers as they strove to clean up an increasingly filthy city but the resistance to their efforts.
From the novels of Charles Dickens and George Gissing to anonymous magazine articles and pamphlets, resistance to reform found expression in the nostalgic appreciation of a threatened urban landscape and anxiety about domestic autonomy in an era of networked sanitary services.

As told in Cleansing the City, the rapid development of London in the nineteenth century brought new challenges not only to the health but also to the social order and cultural identity of the metropolis. Epidemic diseases, such as cholera and typhus, swept through the city. An unprecedented volume of waste matter overflowed from cesspools, rotted in out-of-the-way streets, and flooded the River Thames. Growing numbers of poor residents, who found their house space contracting as the city modernized, took refuge in filthy, overcrowded tenements. And the economic and social divide separating respectable citizens from the debased lower classes grew ever wider. Beginning in the 1830s, reform-minded citizens began to promote public health legislation and magnificent projects of sanitary engineering. Individuals and associations from fields as diverse as medicine, journalism, and engineering campaigned in various ways to improve the health and welfare of the city.

Sanitary reform, however, was not always met with enthusiasm. While some improvements, such as slum clearances, the development of sewerage, and the embankment of the Thames, may have made London a cleaner place to live, these projects also destroyed and reshaped the built environment, and in doing so, altered the meanings and experiences of the city.

Each chapter in Cleansing the City addresses the social challenge and imaginative resonance of filth and purification within the context of one of several key sanitary initiatives: waste disposal, river purification, and housing reform. The first chapter reveals the surprising resistance to reform excited by the London sewer. Although the developing sewerage technology seemed to exemplify sanitary progress, many social observers represented the underground network of pipes as an instrument of social chaos, threatening the ideals of spatial division and social hierarchy in the urban context. In the second chapter, centered on debates about the pollution and purification of the Thames in the 1850s and 1860s, Allen focuses on expressions of resistance to the Thames Embankment, one of Victorian London's most celebrated engineering achievements. Despite wide support, many observers lamented the loss of an eccentric and vital riverside culture that the Embankment was imagined to displace. Chapter 3 continues the discussion of the polluted river in the context of the imagined geography of the Thames in Dickens's Our Mutual Friend. In his great novel of the period, Dickens unsettles the prevailing negative perceptions of the river: although the novel places a high value on moral and material purification, it also deliberately exploits the imaginative energy of filth. While the first three chapters highlight moments of resistance to reform, chapters 4 and 5 record a more pervasive disillusionment with reform that was characteristic of attitudes later in the century. Chapter 4 traces this disillusionment to the perceived failure of housing reform policies and initiatives in the 1870s and 1880s, as well as to more pessimistic ideas about poverty and social change, influenced by social Darwinism. We find a similar pessimism about the capacity of reform to reclaim the lives of the urban poor in Gissing's Nether World, the central text of chapter 5.

According to Cleansing the City, this point about the shift in attitude toward sanitary reform, from optimism to pessimism, from idealism to disillusionment, requires qualification. Slums were cleared, streets widened, and sewers built, but were the poor better off physically and morally than they had been? One of the defining principles of sanitary reform and the source of much of its imaginative resonance was the understanding that urban improvement and human improvement – were complementary processes. Indeed, purifying the environment and uplifting a potentially dangerous underclass were conceived as a unitary mission. But in the latter decades of the century, the mission began to seem less coherent. Reformers were carving out new limits concerning the kinds of people they felt they could help: the upper strata of the working classes could benefit from better-quality housing equipped with sanitary appliances, but the abject poor were perhaps beyond the reach of such help.

Sanitary reform did not by any means disappear from British social life. Its achievements, especially in terms of urban infrastructure, were too significant and its program and approach had become too institutionalized to be discounted. Moreover, social reformers did not simply give up. This change was marked by increasing specialization, as sanitation developed into a highly technical field requiring the expertise of scientists and municipal engineers and by a loss of the coherent vision that sanitary reform in its early decades had so satisfactorily supplied. As Allen states at the outset of the introduction, sanitary reform comprehended the challenges of the Victorian city. It brought the authority of science and religion to bear on these challenges, and it used the tools provided by engineering, medicine, government, and literature to imagine and to build a healthier city. Such a comprehensive vision of social and spatial life also bore the seeds of its own resistance, and the story of that resistance is what Cleansing the City tells.

Cleansing the City stands as a fine corrective to the often triumphalist, Whiggish, ‘march of inevitable progress’ approach to many public health and housing studies. It evokes, sympathetically yet objectively, the sensitivity of those who had doubts about the way the planners and politicians were implementing urban reforms. This is the first work to relate the voices of concern, including the two powerful voices of Dickens and Gissing, to broader considerations of social geography. Professor Allen is to be congratulated on rescuing those who had a pessimistic view of reform, or who opposed it in principle, from obscurity or the facile dismissal of scholars. She investigates what is clearly a powerful and recurring undercurrent in Victorian thought and elevates it into the mainstream. – Anthony Wohl, author of Endangered Lives: Public Health in Victorian Britain

By recovering these sometimes oppositional, sometimes ambivalent responses, Allen in Cleansing the City brings a significant voice of Victorian resistance to sanitary reform up into the mainstream and thus provides insight into the contested nature of sanitary modernization.

History / Europe / Social Sciences

Sex, Thugs and Rock 'N' Roll: Teenage Rebels in Cold-War East Germany by Mark Fenemore (Monographs in German History Series, Volume 16: Berghahn Books)

Living on the frontline of the Cold War, young people in East Germany were subject to a number of competing influences. For young men from the working class in particular, a conflict developed between the culture they inherited from their parents and the new official culture taught in schools. Merging with street gangs, new youth cultures took shape, which challenged authority and provided an alternative vision of modernity. Taking their fashion cues, music and icons from the West, they rapidly came into conflict with a didactic and highly controlling party-state. Charting the clashes which occurred between teenage rebels and the authorities, Sex, Thugs and Rock 'N' Roll by Mark Fenemore, Senior Lecturer in Modern European History at Manchester Metropolitan University, explores what happened when gender, sexuality, Nazism, communism and rock 'n' roll collided during a period, which also saw the building of the Berlin Wall.

Sex, Thugs and Rock 'N' Roll is a study of what happens when all these int

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