Social Anthropology

Each of us is endowed with an inheritance—a set of evolved biases and cultural tools that shape every facet of our behavior. For countless generations, this inheritance has taken us to ever greater heights. But now, for the first time, it’s failing us. We find ourselves hurtling toward a future of unprecedented political polarization, deadlier war, and irreparable environmental destruction. In Inheritance, renowned anthropologist Harvey Whitehouse offers a sweeping account of how our biases have shaped humanity’s past and imperiled its future.

More than half a century since Roswell, UFOs have been making headlines again. On December 17, 2017, the New York Times ran a front-page story about a Pentagon program called the Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program. The article hinted, and its sources clearly said in subsequent interviews, that some of the ships in question couldn't be linked to any country. The implication was that they might be linked to other solar systems. The UFO community - those who had been thinking about, seeing, and analyzing UFOs for years - was surprisingly skeptical of the revelation.

En el tercer libro sobre su iniciación como "hombre de conocimiento", Carlos Castaneda desanda camino hasta los primeros tratos con su maestro, el brujo yaqui don Juan, y añade al recuento de prodigios las arduas labores de disciplina física y mental que desde un principio lo preparaban para un acto decisivo de poder. La historia se cierra con el relato del viaje al que alude el título, intimación de la soledad y la áspera belleza de tal vida.

Over more than 25 years of teaching and research, Christine Desdemaines-Hugon has become an unrivaled expert in the cave art and artists of the Dordogne region. In Stepping-Stones she combines her expertise in both art and archaeology to convey an intimate understanding of the "cave experience." Her keen insights communicate not only the incomparable artistic value of these works but also the near-spiritual impact of viewing them for oneself.

What is it that makes you distinct from me? Identity is a term much used but hard to define. For that very reason, it has long been a topic of fascination for philosophers but has been regarded with aversion by neuroscientists - until now. Susan Greenfield takes us on a journey in search of a biological interpretation of this most elusive of concepts, guiding us through the social and psychiatric perspectives and ultimately to the heart of the physical brain.

A Degree in a Book: Anthropology dives deep into the study of human culture and societies. Discover the impact of language on understanding how different societies approach family and kinship and how different cultures are studied, as well as how anthropology is used in our everyday lives—applied anthropology. Including theories from Herodotus to Malinowski and Durkeim to de Waal, this accessible guide covers all the major strands of anthropology that are studied today.

Is the archeologist who discovers a lost tomb a sort of hero - or a villain? If someone steals a relic from a museum and returns it to the ruin it came from, is she a thief? Craig Childs's riveting new book is a lyrical ghost story - an intense, impassioned investigation into the nature of the past and the things we leave behind. We visit lonesome desert canyons and fancy Fifth Avenue art galleries, journey throughout the Americas, Asia, the past and the present. The result is a brilliant book about man and nature, remnants and memory, a dashing tale of crime and detection.

The monumental statues of Easter Island, both so magisterial and so forlorn, gazing out in their imposing rows over the island’s barren landscape, have been the source of great mystery ever since the island was first discovered by Europeans on Easter Sunday 1722. How could the ancient people who inhabited this tiny speck of land, the most remote in the vast expanse of the Pacific islands, have built such monumental works?

In a culture in which science is believed to hold the answers to every question, spiritual realities like the soul are often ignored or ridiculed. We are told that neuroscience holds the key to explaining every aspect of human behavior. Yet Christian philosopher J. P. Moreland argues that scripture, sound philosophical reasoning, and everyday experience all point to the reality of an immaterial soul.

The church is sadly still confused about what it means to be a man or a woman. While secular society talks about sexuality in terms of liberation, many in the church define manhood and womanhood in terms of reductive roles that rob us of the dignity of personhood, created in the image of God. In her poetic, theologically contemplative style, Aimee Byrd invites you to enter the rich treasure trove of the Song of Songs as its lyrics reveal how our very bodies are visible signs that tell us something about our God.

With insight into the historical, cultural, political, legal, and economic processes that shape our use of animals as food, Fitzgerald provides a holistic picture and explicates the connections in the supply chain that are obscured in the current mode of food production. Bridging the distance in animal agriculture between production, processing, consumption, and their associated impacts, this analysis envisions ways of redressing the negative effects of the use of animals as food.

Emily Craig has been a witness to history, helping to seek justice for thousands of murder victims, both famous and unknown. It’s a personal story that you won’t soon forget. Emily first became intrigued by forensics work when, as a respected medical illustrator, she was called in by the local police to create a model of a murder victim’s face. Her fascination with that case led to a dramatic midlife career change: She would go back to school to become a forensic anthropologist - and one of the most respected and best-known “bone hunters” in the nation.

Most histories of the Cherokee nation focus on its encounters with Europeans, its conflicts with the U.S. government, and its expulsion from its lands during the Trail of Tears. This work, however, traces the origins of the Cherokee people to the third century B.C.E. and follows their migrations through the Americas to their homeland in the lower Appalachian Mountains.

Alone among the creatures of the world, man suffers a pang both bitter and sweet. It is an ache for the homecoming. The Greeks called it nostalgia. Post-modern man, homeless almost by definition, cannot understand nostalgia. If he is a progressive, dreaming of a utopia to come, he dismisses it contemptuously, eager to bury a past he despises. If he is a reactionary, he sentimentalizes it, dreaming of a lost golden age. In this profound reflection, Anthony Esolen explores the true meaning of nostalgia and its place in the human heart.

In the past 50 years, Asian Americans have helped change the face of America and are now the fastest growing group in the United States. The Making of Asian America tells the little-known history of Asian Americans and their role in American life, from the arrival of the first Asians in the Americas to the present-day.

A work of immersive journalism steeped in a distinctively American social history and sparked by a personal quest, The Unsettlers traces the search for the simple life through the stories of new pioneers and what inspired each of them to look for - or create - a better existence. Captivating and clear-eyed, it dares us to imagine what a sustainable, ethical, authentic future might actually look like.

The Mind of the Market will change the way we think about the economics of everyday life. Drawing on research from neuroeconomics, Michael Shermer explores what brain scans reveal about bargaining, snap purchases, and how trust is established in business. Utilizing experiments in behavioral economics, Shermer shows why people hang on to losing stocks and failing companies, why business negotiations often disintegrate into emotional tit-for-tat disputes, and why money does not make us happy.

The Territorial Imperative is a work of wit, of literary wealth, of high adventure. The author draws on his inexhaustible knowledge of animal ways and takes his listeners on deep excursions into the ancient animal world, and on deep penetrations of the contemporary human wilderness.

Throughout the centuries, the Amazon has yielded many of its secrets, but it still holds a few great mysteries. In 1996 experts got their first glimpse of one: a lone Indian, a tribe of one, hidden in the forests of Southwestern Brazil. Previously uncontacted tribes are extremely rare, but a one-man tribe was unprecedented. And like all of the isolated tribes in the Amazonian frontier, he was in danger.

Acclaimed author M.A.C. Farrant has been hailed as “a brave iconoclast” by Publishers Weekly and is well known for her pithy wit and maverick sensibilities. Broken into three sections, The Strange Truth About Us is a fusion of fragmented prose, probing questions and caustic satire. The result is both a meditation on absence and a commentary on the human penchant for complacency.