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The Changing Of The Guard: President Clinton And The Security Of Taiwan
by Martin L LasaterThe increased military power of China since the close of the Cold War has forced the United States to reconsider its security policy toward Taiwan. In this volume, Martin Lasater explores the many new factors that are now influencing U.S. calculations of one of its more enduring and important security interests in Asia. He considers such security concerns as the reduction of U.S. military forces in the western Pacific, a new arms race in the Taiwan Strait, Sino-American tensions over human rights and arms proliferation issues, increased calls for Taiwan's independence, the Clinton administration's concentration on domestic issues, and the shifting balance of power in the Asia Pacific—especially the PRC's growing influence. Considering the difficult issues President Clinton must weigh, Lasater provides a timely analysis of Taiwan's security in the 1990s within the broader context of Sino-American relations.
The Changing Place of Europe in Global Memory Cultures: Usable Pasts and Futures (Palgrave Macmillan Memory Studies)
by Christina Kraenzle and Maria MayrThis book investigates the transnational dimensions of European cultural memory and how it contributes to the construction of new non-, supra, and post-national, but also national, memory narratives. The volume considers how these narratives circulate not only within Europe, but also through global interactions with other locations. The Changing Place of Europe in Global Memory Cultures responds to recent academic calls to break with methodological nationalism in memory studies. Taking European memory as a case study, the book offers new empirical and theoretical insights into the transnational dimensions of cultural memory, without losing sight of the continued relevance of the nation. The articles critically examine the ways in which various individuals, organizations, institutions, and works of art are mobilizing future-oriented memories of Europe to construct new memory narratives. Taking into account the heterogeneity and transnational locations of commemorative groups, the multidirectionality of acts of remembrance, and a variety of commemorative media such as museums, film, photography, and literature, the volume not only investigates how memory discourses circulate within Europe, but also how they are being transferred, translated, or transformed through global interactions beyond the European continent.
The Changing Policy-Making Process in Greater China: Case research from Mainland China, Taiwan and Hong Kong (Comparative Development and Policy in Asia)
by Bennis Wai Yip So Yuang-Kuang KaoThis book explores how the policy-making process is changing in the very volatile conditions of present day mainland China, Taiwan and Hong Kong. It considers the overall background conditions – the need to rebalance in mainland China after years of hectic economic growth; governance transition and democratic consolidation in Taiwan; and governance crisis in Hong Kong under a regime of uncertain legitimacy. It examines the various actors in the policy-making process – the civic engagement of ordinary people and the roles of legislators, mass media and bureaucracy – and discusses how these actors interact in a range of different policy cases. Throughout the book contrasts the different approaches in the three different jurisdictions, and assesses how the policy-making process is changing and how it is likely to change further.
The Changing Racial Regime (National Political Science Review Series)
by Matthew HoldenThe National Political Science Review is the official publication of the National Conference of Black Political Scientists. The Review's purpose, as described by Matthew Holden in his introduction, is to "lead to new information, insights, and findings" into the social and political status of African Americans. The volume is not exclusionist or narrow. It integrates essays that could stand alone, as they initially were written, according to the method and theory of the author in question. As presented here, however, they also lend themselves to a broader treatment of race and the political order. The present volume combines essays expressly focused on African Americans, Africa, and the African diaspora. At the same tune, it contains essays about broad generic subjects such as budgeting and interest groups, written with no explicit racial relevance. Holden integrates these essays under the theme of the changing racial regime.The integrating concept is the old word "regime," which political scientists have used in many situations before to define such more or less persistent, though not necessarily permanent, orders of precedence. If no significant benefits and no significant burdens could be forecast by knowledge of the social identity called race, then the regime could be seen as non-racial. In American experience, the regime was, at one time, purposeful and sustained white advantage. The "white race" and its preferential standing, was central to virtually all institutional practice public and private. The significant contemporary question is the degree of change hi the racial regime. Some proceed with the assumption that a large degree of change has occurred in the American political system. The view of other contributors is that the system still sustains racial stratification. In its very internal dialogue, this volume presents a panorama of current work by political scientists, African American and other, on the character of the American political system.Contributors include: Cedric Robinson, Charles Henry, Edward J. Muller, Marjorie Lewis, Katherine A. Hinckley and Bette S. Hill, Nancy Haggard-Gilson, and Vernon Johnson. The Changing Racial Regime is an essential resource for political scientists, black studies specialists, and scholars and policy analysts of race relations in the United States.
The Changing Russian University: From State to Market (Routledge Contemporary Russia and Eastern Europe Series)
by Tatiana Maximova-MentzoniWhen the Soviet Union collapsed universities were freed from state control and left to themselves. This forced universities to be much more market-oriented. This book explores this transformation from the end of the Soviet Union until the present. Based on extensive original research, the book charts the struggles of universities, showing how chaos and decline came to what had been one of the triumphs of the Soviet Union – a higher education system which provided a high standard of advanced education to large numbers of people and made major research achievements. The book shows how a lack of funds, lack of commercial experience and the ending of former means of support such as strong university-state industry links brought about huge disruption; how universities responded with a range of measures such as charging for tutoring and examinations, handling research on a commercial basis and new forms of co-operation; and how all this impacted on subjects of study and on underlying ideas about what a university is for. The book argues that the shock to the system in Russia was so severe that the Russian case serves as an excellent 'survival guide' to universities experiencing similar changes in other parts of the world. By investigating the phenomenon of Russian universities becoming more market-oriented the book contributes to developing further the marketization concept. It summarizes the existing knowledge in this field of study, offers a new framework for analysis of the phenomenon of university marketization and discusses the marketization of Russian universities in the light of comparative studies.
The Changing Soul of Europe: Religions and Migrations in Northern and Southern Europe (AHRC/ESRC Religion and Society Series)
by Inger Furseth Enzo Pace Helena Vilaça Per PetterssonThis book paves the way for a more enlarged discussion on religion and migration phenomena in countries of Northern and Southern Europe. From a comparative perspective, these are regions with very different religious traditions and different historical State/Church relations. Although official religion persisted longer in Nordic Protestant countries than in South Mediterranean countries, levels of secularization are higher. In the last decades, both Northern and Southern Europe have received strong flows of newcomers. From this perspective, the book presents through various theoretical lenses and empirical researches the impact mobility and consequent religious transnationalism have on multiple aspects of culture and social life in societies where the religious landscapes are increasingly diverse. <P><P> The chapters demonstrate that we are dealing with complex scenarios: different contexts of reception, different countries of origin, various ethnicities and religious traditions (Catholics, Orthodox and Evangelical Christians, Muslims, Buddhists). Having become plural spaces, our societies tend to be far more concerned with the issue of social integration rather than with that of social identities reconstruction in society as a whole, often ignoring that today religion manifests itself as a plurality of religions. In short, what are the implications of newcomers for the religious life of Europe and for the redesign of its soul?
The Changing Terrain of Race and Ethnicity
by Maria Krysan Amanda E. LewisThe legal institutions of overt racism in the United States have been eliminated, but social surveys and investigations of social institutions confirm the continuing significance of race and the enduring presence of negative racial attitudes. This shift from codified and explicit racism to more subtle forms comes at a time when the very boundaries of race and ethnicity are being reshaped by immigration and a rising recognition that old systems of racial classification inadequately capture a diverse America. In The Changing Terrain of Race and Ethnicity, editors Maria Krysan and Amanda Lewis bring together leading scholars of racial dynamics to study the evolution of America s racial problem and its consequences for race relations in the future. The Changing Terrain of Race and Ethnicity opens by attempting to answer a puzzling question: how is it that so many whites think racism is no longer a problem but so many nonwhites disagree? Sociologist Lawrence Bobo contends that whites exhibit what he calls laissez faire racism, which ignores historical and structural contributions to racial inequality and does nothing to remedy the injustices of the status quo. Tyrone Forman makes a similar case in his chapter, contending that an emphasis on color blindness allows whites to be comforted by the idea that all races are on a level playing field, while not recognizing the advantages they themselves have reaped from years of inequality. The book then moves to a discussion of the new ways that Americans view race. Eduardo Bonilla-Silva and Karen Glover argue that the United States is moving from a black-white divide to a tripartite system, where certain light-skinned, non-threatening minority groups are considered honorary whites. The book s final section reexamines the theoretical underpinnings of scholarship on race and ethnicity. Joe Feagin argues that research on racism focuses too heavily on how racial boundaries are formed and needs to concentrate more on how those boundaries are used to maintain privileges for certain groups at the expense of others. Manning Marable contends that racism should be addressed at an institutional level to see the prevalence of structural racism deeply entrenched patterns of inequality that are coded by race and justified by stereotypes. The Changing Terrain of Race and Ethnicity provides an in-depth view of racism in modern America, which may be less conspicuous but not necessarily less destructive than its predecessor, Jim Crow. The book s rich analysis and theoretical insight shed light on how, despite many efforts to end America s historic racial problem, it has evolved and persisted into the 21st century. "
The Changing Transitions to Adulthood in Developing Countries: Selected Studies
by National Research Council of the National AcademiesServing as a companion to Growing Up Global, this book from the National Research Council explores how the transition to adulthood is changing in developing countries in light of globalization and what the implications of these changes might be for those responsible for designing youth policies and programs. Presenting a detailed series of studies, this volume both complements its precursor and makes for a useful contribution in its own right. It should be of significant interest to scholars, leaders of civil society, and those charged with designing youth policies and programs.
The Changing U.S. Auto Industry: A Geographical Analysis
by James M. RubensteinFirst published in 1992. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.
The Changing Village Environment in Southeast Asia: Applied anthropology and environmental reclamation in the northern Philippines (The Modern Anthropology of Southeast Asia)
by Ben WallaceThis book follows the work of the 'Good Roots Project' - a multi-year forestry and agriculture research project in the Philippines. The scheme is an attempt on the part of industry, science and the government to better understand the processes of deforestation and initiate a strategy by which stressed upland ecosystems can be returned to productive stability. This comparative study aims quite simply, to help the farmers of the island to help themselves. Ben Wallace the director of the study investigates the issues surrounding the project, how the initiatives have been implemented, and the future for the island as the population growth rates continue to expand and more land is increasingly given over to agriculture.
The Changing Voice of the Anti-Abortion Movement: The Rise of "Pro-Woman" Rhetoric in Canada and the United States
by Kelly Gordon Paul SauretteWhen journalists, academics, and politicians describe the North American anti-abortion movement, they often describe a campaign that is male-dominated, aggressive, and even violent in its tactics, religious in motivation, anti-women in tone, and fetal-centric in arguments and rhetoric. Are they correct?In The Changing Voice of the Anti-Abortion Movement, Paul Saurette and Kelly Gordon suggest that the reality is far more complicated, particularly in Canada. Today, anti-abortion activism increasingly presents itself as "pro-women": using female spokespersons, adopting medical and scientific language to claim that abortion harms women, and employing a wide range of more subtle framing and narrative rhetorical tactics that use traditionally progressive themes to present the anti-abortion position as more feminist than pro-choice feminism.Following a succinct but comprehensive overview of the two-hundred year history of North American debate and legislation on abortion, Saurette and Gordon present the results of their systematic, five-year quantitative and qualitative discourse analysis, supplemented by extensive first-person observations, and outline the implications that flow from these findings. Their discoveries are a challenge to our current assumptions about the abortion debate today, and their conclusions will be compelling for both scholars and activists alike.
The Changing World of Bali: Religion, Society and Tourism (The Modern Anthropology of Southeast Asia)
by Leo HoweThe glossy guide book image of Bali is of a timeless paradise whose people are devoutly religious and artistically gifted. However, a hundred years of colonialism, war and Indonesian independence, and tourism have produced both modernizing changes and created an image of Bali as ‘traditional’. Incorporating up-to-date ethnographic field work the book investigates the myriad of ways in which the Balinese has responded to the influx of outside influence. The book focuses on the fascinating interrelationship between tourism, economy, culture and religion in Bali, painting a twenty-first century picture of the Balinese. In documenting these diverse changes Howe critically assesses some of the work of Bali’s most famous ethnographer, Clifford Geertz and demonstrates the importance of a historically grounded and broadly contextualized approach to the analysis of a complex society.
The Changing World of Caste and Hierarchy in Bengal: Depiction from the Mangalkavyas c. 1700–1931
by Sudarshana BhaumikThis book challenges the prevalent assumptions of caste, hierarchy and social mobility in pre-colonial and colonial Bengal. It studies the writings of colonial ethnographers, Orientalist scholars, Christian missionaries and pre-colonial literary texts like the Mangalkavyas to show how the concept of caste emerged and argues that the jati order in Bengal was far from being a rigidly reified structure, but one which had room for spatial and social mobility. The volume highlights the processes through which popular myths and beliefs of the lower caste orders of Bengal were Sanskritized. It delineates the linkages between sedantized peasant culture and the emergence of new agricultural castes in colonial Bengal. Moreover, the author discusses a wide spectrum of issues like marginality and hierarchy, the spread of Brahmanical hegemony, the creation of deities and the process of Sanskritization, popular Saivism, the cult of Manasa in Bengal and the revolt of 1857 and the caste question. Rich in archival sources, this book will be an essential read for scholars and researchers of colonial history, Indian history, political sociology, caste studies, exclusion studies, cultural studies, social history, cultural history and South Asian studies, especially those interested in undivided Bengal.
The Changing World of Farming in Brexit UK (Perspectives on Rural Policy and Planning)
by Michael Winter Matt Lobley Rebecca WheelerThe 2016 referendum resulted in a vote for the United Kingdom to withdraw from the European Union. This has led to frenzied political debate across the whole spectrum of policy, and agriculture is no exception. For the first time in a generation, the future of agriculture is unclear and unfettered by the constraints and incrementalism of the Common Agricultural Policy. This book makes an empirical contribution to the Brexit debate, bringing a social dimension to agri-Brexit and sustainable agriculture discourses. Understanding the social in the context of farmers is vital to developing a way forward on food security and agricultural sustainability. Farmers are the recipients of the market and policy signals that link to global uncertainties and challenges. This book is a commitment to understanding farmers as occupiers and managers of land. Chapters in this book explore farmers’ own aspirations and knowledge about patterns of land use and production, which underpin discussions around the environment and sustainability. There is a deficit in understanding what kind of agricultural industry we now have, following years of restructuring and repositioning. This book is an attempt to address that deficit and will appeal to students and researchers exploring agriculture, food politics and rural sociology.
The Changing World of Mobile Communications: 5G, 6G and the Future of Digital Services
by Annabeth Aagaard Petri AhokangasThis open access book from the world’s first 6G Flagship research program at the University of Oulu, Finland, provides a multi-disciplinary and insightful overview of the subject, with contributions from experts in the field. Today’s fourth generation of mobile connectivity services (4G) are available everywhere, and adoption of fifth generation (5G) networks is well underway. Compared to 4G, 5G has already brought about new business opportunities and enabled seamless virtual and augmented reality services, but also raised serious concerns on data privacy and security and the use of artificial intelligence. The sixth generation (6G) networks are already in R&D phase aiming at deployment in 2030. We need to understand today what 5G evolution and 6G may bring for the future of service delivery and how they will influence us. The contributions answer what 5G, its evolution, and 6G will be about; what kind of impacts 5G and 6G will have on future digital services, businesses, and society; how we could benefit from 5G and 6G innovations; and how 5G and 6G should be regulated in the future. Future 5G evolution and 6G are not only about moving toward faster, better, and more secure networks providing the basis for innovative digital services, they are also going to bring about a huge digital disruption that will affect all levels of society. This book will be of great interest to academics and students of management, telecommunications and digital innovation, as well practitioners and policymakers looking to the future of business.
The Changjiang River Civilization: Nature and Culture of the Changjiang River from a Global Perspective (Understanding China)
by Tianyu Feng Zhiliang Ma Yuan DingThis book is a comprehensive academic introduction of the natural conditions and cultural characteristics of the ChangJiang River Basin. Describing in detail the geographical location and natural conditions of the main stream and the tributaries as the starting point, the book compares the ChangJiang River Civilizations to other civilizations of large rivers of the same latitude. This book reveals the gradual deepening of the Chinese understanding the ChangJiang River, introduces the cultural divisions of the river valley, and describes the evolution of the civilizations in the basin. At the end of the book, the author points out that there are many ecological problems in the ChangJiang River valley, for which the Chinese people have taken many measures, such as water pollution control. Fishing in the main stream and important tributaries of the ChangJiang is banned for at least ten years. As a guide to analyze the natural conditions and cultural characteristics of the whole ChangJiang River Basin, this book enables researchers and common readers to have a relatively clear and comprehensive understanding in a relatively short period of time. Putting the ChangJiang River Civilization in the context of the world’s civilizations, this book makes it easier for readers to understand the uniqueness of the ChangJiang River Civilization and its contribution to the cultural diversity of the world.
The Changs Next Door to the Díazes: Remapping Race in Suburban California
by Wendy ChengU.S. suburbs are typically imagined to be predominantly white communities, but this is increasingly untrue in many parts of the country. Examining a multiracial suburb that is decidedly nonwhite, Wendy Cheng unpacks questions of how identity—especially racial identity—is shaped by place. She offers an in-depth portrait, enriched by nearly seventy interviews, of the San Gabriel Valley, not far from downtown Los Angeles, where approximately 60 percent of residents are Asian American and more than 30 percent are Latino. At first glance, the cities of the San Gabriel Valley look like stereotypical suburbs, but almost no one who lives there is white. The Changs Next Door to the Díazes reveals how a distinct culture is being fashioned in, and simultaneously reshaping, an environment of strip malls, multifamily housing, and faux Mediterranean tract homes. Informed by her interviews as well as extensive analysis of three episodic case studies, Cheng argues that people&’s daily experiences—in neighborhoods, schools, civic organizations, and public space—deeply influence their racial consciousness. In the San Gabriel Valley, racial ideologies are being reformulated by these encounters. Cheng views everyday landscapes as crucial terrains through which racial hierarchies are learned, instantiated, and transformed. She terms the process &“regional racial formation,&” through which locally accepted racial orders and hierarchies complicate and often challenge prevailing notions of race.There is a place-specific state of mind here, Cheng finds. Understanding the processes of racial formation in the San Gabriel Valley in the contemporary moment is important in itself but also has larger value as a model for considering the spatial dimensions of racial formation and the significant demographic shifts taking place across the national landscape.
The Chankas and the Priest: A Tale of Murder and Exile in Highland Peru
by Sabine HylandHow does society deal with a serial killer in its midst? What if the murderer is a Catholic priest living among native villagers in colonial Peru? In The Chankas and the Priest, Sabine Hyland chronicles the horrifying story of Father Juan Bautista de Albadán, a Spanish priest to the Chanka people of Pampachiri in Peru from 1601 to 1611. During his reign of terror over his Andean parish, Albadán was guilty of murder, sexual abuse, sadistic torture, and theft from his parishioners, amassing a personal fortune at their expense. For ten years, he escaped punishment for these crimes by deceiving and outwitting his superiors in the colonial government and church administration. Drawing on a remarkable collection of documents found in archives in the Americas and Europe, including a rare cache of Albadán’s candid family letters, Hyland reveals what life was like for the Chankas under this corrupt and brutal priest, and how his actions sparked the instability that would characterize Chanka political and social history for the next 123 years. Through this tale, she vividly portrays the colonial church and state of Peru as well as the history of Chanka ethnicity, the nature of Spanish colonialism, and the changing nature of Chanka politics and kinship from the fifteenth to the eighteenth century.
The Chaos Machine: The Inside Story of How Social Media Rewired Our Minds and Our World
by Max FisherThe Chaos Machine is an essential book for our times - Ezra KleinThe Chaos Machine is the story of how the world was driven mad by social media. The election of populists like Trump and Bolsonaro; strife and genocide in countries like Myanmar; the rampant spread of COVID-19 conspiracy theories as deadly as the pandemic itself; all of these are products of a breakdown in our social and political lives, a breakdown driven by the apps, companies and algorithms that compete constantly for our attention.Max Fisher is a leading New York Times technology reporter whose work has covered the way that social media sites - driven increasingly by artificial intelligence rather than human ingenuity - push users towards more and more extreme positions, deepening the divisions in society in pursuit of greater engagement and profit. With extraordinary access to the most powerful players in Silicon Valley, and with testimonies from around the world of the havoc being wreaked by our online selves, The Chaos Machine shows us how we got to this uniquely perilous moment - and how we might get out of it.
The Chaos Machine: The Inside Story of How Social Media Rewired Our Minds and Our World
by Max FisherHow social media is hacking our minds, our societies and the world - and what we can do about it.The Chaos Machine is the story of how the world was driven mad by social media. The election of populists like Trump and Bolsonaro; strife and genocide in countries like Myanmar; the rampant spread of COVID-19 conspiracy theories as deadly as the pandemic itself; all of these are products of a breakdown in our social and political lives, a breakdown driven by the apps, companies and algorithms that compete constantly for our attention.Max Fisher is a leading New York Times technology reporter whose work has covered the way that social media sites - driven increasingly by artificial intelligence rather than human ingenuity - push users towards more and more extreme positions, deepening the divisions in society in pursuit of greater engagement and profit. With extraordinary access to the most powerful players in Silicon Valley, and with testimonies from around the world of the havoc being wreaked by our online selves, The Chaos Machine shows us how we got to this uniquely perilous moment - and how we might get out of it.(P) 2022 Hachette Audio
The Chaos Machine: The Inside Story of How Social Media Rewired Our Minds and Our World
by Max FisherFinalist for the Helen Bernstein Book Award for Excellence in JournalismFrom a New York Times investigative reporter, this &“authoritative and devastating account of the impacts of social media&” (New York Times Book Review) tracks the high-stakes inside story of how Big Tech&’s breakneck race to drive engagement—and profits—at all costs fractured the world. The Chaos Machine is &“an essential book for our times&” (Ezra Klein). We all have a vague sense that social media is bad for our minds, for our children, and for our democracies. But the truth is that its reach and impact run far deeper than we have understood. Building on years of international reporting, Max Fisher tells the gripping and galling inside story of how Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and other social network preyed on psychological frailties to create the algorithms that drive everyday users to extreme opinions and, increasingly, extreme actions. As Fisher demonstrates, the companies&’ founding tenets, combined with a blinkered focus on maximizing engagement, have led to a destabilized world for everyone. Traversing the planet, Fisher tracks the ubiquity of hate speech and its spillover into violence, ills that first festered in far-off locales, to their dark culmination in America during the pandemic, the 2020 election, and the Capitol Insurrection. Through it all, the social-media giants refused to intervene in any meaningful way, claiming to champion free speech when in fact what they most prized were limitless profits. The result, as Fisher shows, is a cultural shift toward a world in which people are polarized not by beliefs based on facts, but by misinformation, outrage, and fear. His narrative is about more than the villains, however. Fisher also weaves together the stories of the heroic outsiders and Silicon Valley defectors who raised the alarm and revealed what was happening behind the closed doors of Big Tech. Both panoramic and intimate, The Chaos Machine is the definitive account of the meteoric rise and troubled legacy of the tech titans, as well as a rousing and hopeful call to arrest the havoc wreaked on our minds and our world before it&’s too late.
The Chapel and Burial Ground on St Ninian's Isle, Shetland: Excavations Past and Present (The Society for Medieval Archaeology Monographs)
by Rachel C. Barrowman"This volume is the definitive account of the excavation which led to the discovery of the magnificent hoard of 28 pieces of Pictish silverware on St Ninian's Isle, Shetland in 1958. It includes a reassessment of the original archives and finds, including an ogham stone found on the site in 1876 and a fantastic collection of glass beads, as well as several new small-scale excavations on the site of the chapel and its burial ground. Taken together, this work reveals a long sequence of settlement beginning in the Iron Age. The first church was built on the site in the 8th century, and accompanied by a long cist cemetery with cross-incised stones and shrine sculpture. The church may have continued in use into the 9th or 10th centuries, and the recent work has confirmed that the famous hoard was buried into its floor. There was a degree of continuity between the pre-Christian and Christian burials, with evidence that the site was a special place for burial before the advent of Christianity. The report describes these burials in detail, ending the story sometime between the 11th and end of the 12th centuries, when an adult male who had died a violent death was moved to be buried on the site. Thereafter the site was inundated with wind-blown sand. A new chapel with an accompanying long cist cemetery was then built above the earlier church, and a chancel was added later. The associated graveyard continued in use until around 1840, long after the building was demolished."
The Character Of Kinship
by Jack GoodyA collection of specially commissioned essays dealing with general aspects of kinship, family and marriage from an anthropological point of view, that is, considering the total range of human societies. In his editorial introduction, Jack Goody explains that his aim has been to provide 'essays dealing with general themes rather than ethnographic conundrums or descriptive minutiae' in the hope of achieving 're-consideration of some central problem areas including those examined by an earlier generation of anthropologists and still raised by scholars outside the discipline itself'. Individual essays cover problems such as the nature of kinship and the family; why monogamy?; intermarriage and the creation of castes. The contributors include R. G. Abrahams, J. A. Barnes, Fredrik Barth, Maurice Bloch, Derek Freeman, Jack Goody, Grace Harris, Jean La Fontaine, Edmund Leach, Julian Pitt-Rivers, Raymond T. Smith, Andrew Strathern and S. J. Tambiah.
The Character of Kingship
by Declan QuigleyWhy has monarchy been such a prevalent institution throughout history and in such a diverse range of societies? Kingship is at the heart of both ritual and politics and has major implications for the theory of social and cultural anthropology. Yet, despite the contemporary fascination with royalty, anthropologists have sorely neglected the subject in recent decades. This book combines a strong theoretical argument with a wealth of ethnography from kingships in Africa, Asia and the Pacific. Quigley gives a timely and much-needed overview of the anthropology of kingship and a crucial reassessment of the contributions of Frazer and Hocart to debates about the nature and function of royal ritual. From diverse fieldwork sites, a number of eminent anthropologists demonstrate how ritual and power intertwine to produce a series of variations around myth, tragedy and historical realities. However, underneath this diversity, two common themes invariably emerge: the attempt to portray kingship as timeless and perfect, and the dual nature of the king as sacred being and scapegoat.
The Character of Nations: How Politics Makes and Breaks Prosperity, Family, and Civility
by Angelo M. CodevillaIn this cross-cultural study, Angelo M. Codevilla illustrates that as people shape their governments, they shape themselves. Drawing broadly from the depths of history, from the Roman republic to de Tocqueville’s America, as well as from personal and scholarly observations of the world in the twentieth century, The Character of Nations reveals remarkable truths about the effects of government on a society’s economic arrangements, moral order, sense of family life, and ability to defend itself. Codevilla argues that in present-day America, government has had a profound negative effect on societal norms. It has taught people to seek prosperity through connections with political power; it has fostered the atrophy of civic responsibility; it has waged a Kulturkampf against family and religion; and it has dug a dangerous chasm between those who serve in the military and those who send it in harm’s way. Informative and provocative, The Character of Nations shows how the political decisions we make have higher stakes than simply who wins elections.