Research clearly indicates that ethnic groups differsignificantly on levels of mental and physical health, antisocialbehavior, and educational attainment. This book explains thesevariations among ethnic groups with respect to their psychologicaland social functioning and tests competing hypotheses about themechanisms that might cause the functioning to be better, worse, ordifferent in pattern from other groups. Attention is paid toeducational attainments, antisocial behavior, schizophrenia andsuicide, and to the complex and changing patterns of ethnicidentity. The book also focuses on evidence on risk and protectivefactors that is used systematically to ask whether such factorsmight account for the differences in both migration histories andethnic mixture. It concludes with a discussion of the multiplemeanings of ethnicity, the major variations among ethnic groups,and the policy implications of the findings discussed in thebook.
In 1831, Charles Darwin embarked on an expedition that, in hisown words, determined my whole career. The Voyage of theBeagle chronicles his five-year journey around the world andespecially the coastal waters of South America as a naturalist onthe H.M.S. Beagle. While traveling through these unexploredcountries collecting specimens, Darwin began to formulate thetheories of evolution and natural selection realized in his masterwork, The Origin of Species. Travel memoir and scientific primeralike, The Voyage of the Beagle is a lively and accessibleintroduction to the mind of one of history's most influentialthinkers.
Diane Ackerman's lusciously written grand tour of the realm ofthe senses includes conversations with an iceberg in Antarctica anda professional nose in New York, along with dissertations on kissesand tattoos, sadistic cuisine and the music played by the planetEarth. "Delightful . . . gives the reader the richest possiblefeeling of the worlds the senses take in."--The New York Times.(Literature--Classics Contemporary)
The authors trace the formation and breakup of the planets,asteroids, and comets where meteorites originated, their longjourney through space, their fall to Earth, their recovery, andwhat scientists are learning from them. The book contains a greatdeal of material about the “84001 Martian meteorite,” which hasraised provocative new questions about life on the red planet.Looking forward, the authors chart the exciting new era ofplanetary, asteroidal, and cometary exploration planned for thiscentury.
Easily the most influential book published in the nineteenthcentury, Darwin’s The Origin of Species is also that mostunusual phenomenon, an altogether readable discussion of ascientific subject. On its appearance in 1859 it was immediatelyrecognized by enthusiasts and detractors alike as a work of thegreatest importance: the revolutionary theory of evolution by meansof natural selection that it presented provoked a furious reactionthat continues to this day. The Origin of Species is here published together withDarwin’s earlier Voyage of the ‘Beagle’. This 1839 accountof the journeys to South America and the Pacific islands that firstput Darwin on the track of his remarkable theories derives an addedcharm from his vivid de*ion of his travels in exotic placesand his eye for the piquant detail.