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[Introduction To] Sprawl, Justice, And Citizenship : The Civic Costs Of The American Way Of Life, Thad Williamson

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Must the strip mall and the eight-lane highway define 21st century American life? That is a central question posed by critics of suburban and exurban living in America. Yet despite the ubiquity of the critique, it never sticks--Americans by the scores of millions have willingly moved into sprawling developments over the past few decades. Americans find many of the more substantial criticisms of sprawl easy to ignore because they often come across as snobbish in tone. Yet as Thad Williamson explains, sprawl does create real, measurable social problems. Williamson's work is unique in two important ways. First, while he highlights …

[Introduction To] Leadership And Discovery, George R. Goethals, J. Thomas Wren

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Leadership and Discovery explores the idea of leadership by approaching discovery as the product of interaction and collaboration, and through a wide range of topics: from the discovery of the new world by Christopher Columbus to the NASA Space Program. Contributors include historian Felipe Fernández-Armesto, astronomer Karen Kwitter, psychologist David A. Dunning, theologian Ronald F. Thiemann, and former NASA astronaut Jeffrey A. Hoffman.

[Introduction To] Leadership And The Liberal Arts: Achieving The Promise Of A Liberal Education, J. Thomas Wren, Ronald E. Riggio, Michael A. Genovese

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A collection of essays by presidents of prominent liberal arts colleges and leading intellectuals who reflect on the meaning of educating individuals for leadership and how it can be accomplished in ways consistent with the missions of liberal arts institutions. Edited by faculty from the Jepson School for Leadership Studies at the University of Richmond, the Jepson Studies in Leadership series will reflect the school's broad-based, liberal arts approach to the study of leadership. The Jepson School has faculty representatives from the disciplines of English literature, history, philosophy, political science, psychology, public administration, religious studies, and organizational leadership. No other …

[Introduction To] Political Humor Under Stalin: An Anthology Of Unofficial Jokes And Anecdotes, David Brandenberger

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Political Humor Under Stalin is an anthology of jokes, wisecracks, and satire from the Soviet 1930s and 40s that provides a glimpse of everyday dissembling and dissent in one of the modern world's most repressive societies. More than merely a joke book, it offers no less than a folkloric counter narrative to the "official" history of the USSR, as well as a ground-breaking discussion of the culture of joke-telling under Stalin.

[Introduction To] Medicating Children: Adhd And Pediatric Mental Health, Rick Mayes, Catherine Bagwell, Jennifer L. Erkulwater

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Why and how did ADHD become the most commonly diagnosed mental disorder among children and adolescents, as well as one of the most controversial? Stimulant medication had been used to treat excessively hyperactive children since the 1950s. And the behaviors that today might lead to an ADHD diagnosis had been observed since the early 1930s as “organic drivenness,” and then by various other names throughout the decades.

The authors argue that a unique alignment of social and economic trends and incentives converged in the early 1990s with greater scientific knowledge to make ADHD the most prevalent pediatric mental disorder. New …

[Introduction To] Church, State And Citizen: Christian Approaches To Political Engagement, Sandra F. Joireman

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In Church, State, and Citizen, Sandra F. Joireman has gathered political scientists to examine the relationship between religion and politics as seen from within seven Christian traditions: Catholic, Lutheran, Reformed, Anabaptist, Anglican, Evangelical and Pentecostal. In each chapter the historical and theological foundations of the tradition are described along with the beliefs regarding the appropriate role of the state and citizen. While all Christian traditions share certain beliefs about faith (e.g. human sin, salvation, Christ's atonement) and political life (e.g. limited government, human rights, the incompleteness and partiality of all political action) there are also profound differences. The authors …

[Introduction To] Legalizing Identities: Becoming Black Or Indian In Brazil's Northeast, Jan Hoffman French

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Anthropologists widely agree that identities--even ethnic and racial ones--are socially constructed. Less understood are the processes by which social identities are conceived and developed. Legalizing Identities shows how law can successfully serve as the impetus for the transformation of cultural practices and collective identity. Through ethnographic, historical, and legal analysis of successful claims to land by two neighboring black communities in the backlands of northeastern Brazil, Jan Hoffman French demonstrates how these two communities have come to distinguish themselves from each other while revising and retelling their histories and present-day stories.

French argues that the invocation of laws by these …