Published this week

? = Review forthcoming

BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES

- Theories of Population Variation in Genes and Genomes

By Freddy Bugge Christiansen, professor of population biology, Aarhus University. Princeton University Press, £44.95. ISBN 9780691133676

This textbook provides an introduction to both classical and coalescent approaches to population genetics, focusing on the theoretical background while emphasising the close interplay between theory and empiricism.

GEOGRAPHY AND ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES

? Apocalypse: Earthquakes, Archaeology, and the Wrath of God

By Amos Nur, professor emeritus of geophysics, Stanford University. Princeton University Press, £15.95. ISBN 9780691016023

Nur aims to bridge the gap that has separated archaeology and seismology, examining evidence of earthquakes at some of the world's most famous archaeological sites in the Mediterranean and elsewhere.

HISTORY

- Why History Matters

By John Tosh, professor of history, Roehampton University. Palgrave Macmillan, £9.99. ISBN 9780230521483

This introduction to the practical application of history makes the argument that we are in danger of missing history's principal contribution. Using examples from the Iraq War, Aids and globalisation, Tosh shows how history can provide the basis for an informed and critical understanding of our society.

LAW

- Law as Culture: An Invitation

By Lawrence Rosen, professor of anthropology, Princeton University. Princeton University Press, £11.95. ISBN 9780691136448

Rosen invites readers to consider how the facts that are adduced in a legal forum connect to the ways in which facts are constructed in other areas of everyday life.

LITERATURE

- Revenge Tragedy and the Drama of Commemoration in Reforming England

By Thomas Rist, lecturer in English, University of Aberdeen. Ashgate, £45.00. ISBN 9780754661528

The author considers major works by Kyd, Shakespeare, Middleton, Webster and others and revises the genre of revenge tragedy in light of historical revisions to England's Reformations.

PHILOSOPHY AND THEOLOGY

? Shame and Necessity

By Bernard Williams, White's professor of moral philosophy, University of Oxford, and Monroe Deutsch professor of philosophy, University of California, Berkeley, until his death in 2003. Edited by A. A. Long, professor of classics and Irving G. Stone professor of literature, University of California, Berkeley. University of California Press, £12.95. ISBN 9780520256439

Williams's book questions the traditional historical view that the ancient Greeks had primitive ideas of the self, of responsibility, freedom and shame, and that humanity has advanced from these ideas to a more refined moral consciousness.

POLITICS

The Making of a Digital World: The Evolution of Technological Change and How It Shaped our World

By Joachim K. Rennstich, assistant professor of political science, Fordham University. Palgrave Macmillan, £42.50. ISBN 9781403974488

Describing globalisation as a long-term process of intertwined technological, economic, political and cultural changes, this book identifies distinct phases in the global system development.

- Democracy Incorporated: Managed Democracy and the Specter of Inverted Totalitarianism

By Sheldon S. Wolin, professor emeritus of science, Princeton University. Princeton University Press, £17.95. ISBN 9780691135663

Wolin examines the myths and myth making that justify today's politics, the quest for an ever-expanding economy and the perverse attractions of an endless "War on Terror", arguing that hope lies in citizens learning anew to exercise power at the local level.

Biological sciences

Phycology

By Robert Edward Lee, teaching co-ordinator in biomedical sciences, Colorado State University

Cambridge University Press, £80.00 and £38.00

ISBN 9780521864084 and 6870

This revised edition on the study of algae maintains the format of previous editions but incorporates the latest information from nucleic acid sequencing studies, with life histories of important algal genera illustrated with detailed drawings.

Cultural studies

Latinos in America: Philosophy and Social Identity

By Jorge J. E. Gracia, Samuel P. Capen chair and distinguished professor of philosophy, State University of New York, Buffalo

Blackwell, £19.99

ISBN 9781405176583

Offering a fresh perspective of Latin American thought and culture, this book rejects answers based on stereotypes and fear and takes an interdisciplinary approach to the philosophical, social and political elements of Hispanic/Latino identity.

Film studies

Fight Pictures: A History of Boxing and Early Cinema

By Dan Streible, associate professor of cinema studies,

New York University

University of California Press, £38.95 and £14.95

ISBN 9780520250741 and 0758

Exploring a fascinating period in the development of modern sports and media, this work chronicles the story of how legitimate bouts, fake fights, comic sparring matches and more came to silent-era screens and became part of American popular culture.

Hollywood in the Neighborhood: Historical Case Studies of Local Moviegoing

Edited by Kathryn H. Fuller-Seeley, associate professor and associate chair in the department of communications, Georgia State University

University of California Press, £35.00 and £14.95

ISBN 9780520249738 and 30675

These essays examine how movies entered the American heartland and examine in detail the social and cultural changes this new form of entertainment brought to old opera houses and new picture palaces on main streets across America.

l Hollywood Science: Movies, Sciences and the End of the World

By Sidney Perkowitz, Charles Howard Candler professor of physics, Emory University

Columbia University Press, £14.95

ISBN 9780231142809

This book questions how much faith we can put into Hollywood’s depiction of scientists; how accurately these films capture scientific fact and theory; how realistic the scientific scenarios in films are; and the influence of films on public opinion about science.

The Decline of Sentiment: American Film in the 1920s

By Lea Jacobs, professor in the department of communication arts, University of Wisconsin-Madison

University of California Press, £38.95 and £16.95

ISBN 9780520237018 and 54572

This book seeks to characterise the radical shifts in taste that transformed American film in the jazz age, documenting the films and film genres that were considered old fashioned, as well as those held to be innovative and up to date.

Geography and environmental studies

Towards Safe City Centres? Remaking the Spaces of an Old-Industrial City

By Gesa Helms, research fellow in urban studies, University of Glasgow

Ashgate, £55.00

ISBN 9780754648048

This study examines the rising interest in quality-of-life offences, antisocial behaviour and incivilities in urban public spaces and explores the rising importance of policing, crime control and community safety policies.

Local Sustainable Urban Development in a Globalized World

Edited by Lauren C. Heberle, associate director of the Centre for Environmental Policy and Management, University of Louisville, and Susan M. Opp, assistant professor in the department of political science, Texas Tech University

Ashgate, £60.00

ISBN 9780754649946

This book brings together experts from around the world to provide a timely overview of the various methods for understanding and implementing sustainable practices at local levels.

International Development Studies: Theories and Methods in Research and Practice

By Andrew Sumner, senior lecturer in development studies, London South Bank University, and Michael A. Tribe, honorary visiting lecturer in international development studies, University of Bradford

Sage, £18.99

ISBN 9781412929455

This book, illustrated with case studies, aims to be an essential primer for students of development studies who require an overview of its foundations.

History

l The Palgrave Concise Historical Atlas of South East Asia

By Robert Cribb, senior research fellow in Pacific and Asian history, Australian National University

Palgrave Macmillan, £40.00

ISBN 9780312296254

This collection of 46 original maps with explanatory text offers a comprehensive look at the history of the region.

Understanding Conflict and Conflict Analysis

By Ho-Won Jeong, professor of conflict analysis and resolution, George Mason University

Sage, £21.99

ISBN 9781412903097

By examining the dynamic forces that shape and reshape major conflicts, this book aims to provide students with the knowledge base needed to study conflict sources, processes and transformations.

Tears from Iron: Cultural Responses to Famine in Nineteenth-Century China

By Kathryn Edgerton-Tarpley, associate professor of late imperial and modern Chinese history, San Diego State University

University of California Press, £23.95

ISBN 9780520253025

Edgerton-Tarpley explores new source materials, including songs, poems, stele inscriptions, folklore and oral accounts of the famine to show how it elicited widely divergent reactions from different levels of Chinese society.

The Tour de France: A Cultural History, Updated with a New Preface

By Christopher S. Thompson, associate professor of history, Ball State University

University of California Press, £11.50

ISBN 9780520256309

In this original history of the world’s most famous bicycle race, Thompson mines previously neglected sources and writing to tell the compelling story of the Tour de France from its creation in 1903 to the present.

Languages and linguistics

Language and Empiricism: After the Vienna Circle

By Siobhan Chapman, lecturer in English language, University of Liverpool

Palgrave, £50.00

ISBN 9780230524767

Chapman offers a fresh approach to the debate over whether the study of language is truly empirical by comparing it to some remarkably similar disagreements about data, methodology and the nature of empiricism in mid-20th century philosophy.

Doing Optimality Theory: Applying Theory to Data

By John McCarthy, distinguished university professor of linguistics, University of Massachusetts

Blackwell, £24.99

ISBN 9781405151368

This book brings together examples and practical, detailed advice for undergraduates and graduate students working in linguistics, explaining how to do analysis and research using optimality theory, a branch of phonology that has revolutionised the field since its conception in 1993.

Literature

l Petrarch in Romantic England

By Edoardo Zuccato, associate professor of English literature, Università IULM

Palgrave Macmillan, £50.00

ISBN 9780230542600

Zuccato examines the way Petrarch was read and rewritten by figures such as Thomas Gray, Sir William Jones, Charlotte Smith, Mary Robinson, and the major Romantics from Wordsworth and Coleridge to Shelley, Keats and Madame de Stael.

l Press Censorship in Caroline England

By Cyndia Susan Clegg, distinguished professor of English, Pepperdine University

Cambridge University Press, £55.00

ISBN 9780521876681

Clegg scrutinises Caroline print culture including book production in London, in the universities and on the Continent; licensing and authorisation practices in the Stationers’ Company and the ecclesiastical licensers; and trade regulation.

l Masculinity and Emotion in Early Modern English Literature

By Jennifer Vaught, Jean-Jacques and Aurore Labbé Fournet/BORSF associate professor in English, University of Louisiana at Lafayette

Ashgate, £50.00

ISBN 9780754662945

This study examines the profound impact of the cultural shift in the English aristocracy – from feudal warriors to gentlemen or emotionally expressive courtiers – on male figures in early modern English literature.

l Style and the Nineteenth-Century British Critic: Sincere Mannerisms

By Jason Camlot, associate professor of English, Concordia University

Ashgate, £50.00

ISBN 9780754653110

This book provides an important context for the 19th-century critics’ changing ideas about style, rhetoric, and technologies of communication, and shows how new print media affected the Romantic and Victorian critics’ sense of self.

l Writing Robert Greene: Essays on England’s First Notorious Professional Writer

Edited by Kirk Melnikoff, associate professor of English, University of North Carolina-Charlotte and Edward Gieskes, associate professor of English, University of South Carolina-Columbia

Ashgate, £55.00

ISBN 9780754657019

The first essay collection dedicated to the work of Robert Greene considers his writings in the contexts of his extensive engagement with the popular print market and his work as a professional dramatist for the London-based theatre companies.

l Wordsworth and the Writing of the Nation

By James M. Garrett, associate professor of English, California State University

Ashgate, £50.00

ISBN 9780754657835

Garrett argues that Wordsworth did not become a fading and withdrawn middle-aged poet but an engaged public figure attempting to “write the nation” and to position himself as the nation’s poet.

l Historical Romance Fiction: Heterosexuality and Performativity

By Lisa Fletcher, lecturer in English, University of Tasmania

Ashgate, £50.00

ISBN 9780754662020

Fletcher moves the debate about the value and appeal of heterosexual romance to new ground, testing the claims of speech-act and performativity theorists on everything from popular classics by Georgette Heyer to “bodice rippers”.

Philosophy and theology

l Global Rebellion: Religious Challenges to the Secular State, from Christian Militias to al Qaeda

By Mark Juergensmeyer, director of the Orfalea Centre for Global and International Studies, University of California, Santa Barbara

University of California Press, £16.95

ISBN 9780520255548

Basing his discussion on interviews with militant activists and case studies of rebellious movements, Juergensmeyer aims to revise readers’ notions of religious revolution and offers positive proposals for responding to religious activism.

Conceptions of God, Freedom, and Ethics in African American and Jewish Theology

By Kurt Buhring, assistant professor of religious studies, St Mary’s College

Palgrave, £40.00

ISBN 9781403984791

This is a consideration of major contemporary black and Jewish understandings of God, examining how profound faith in a just God is sustained, and even strengthened, in the face of particularly horrific and long-standing evil and suffering in a community.

Shame and Philosophy: An Investigation in the Philosophy of Emotion and Ethics

By Phil Hutchinson, lecturer in philosophy, Manchester Metropolitan University

Palgrave, £45.00

ISBN 97802305416

Hutchinson engages with philosophers of emotion in both the analytic and continental traditions, advancing a framework for understanding emotion and arguing that reductionist accounts of emotion leave us in a state of poverty regarding our understanding of our world and ourselves.

Space, Geometry and Aesthetics: Through Kant and Towards Deleuze

By Peg Rawes, lecturer in history and theory in the Bartlett Centre, University College London

Palgrave, £45.00

ISBN 9780230552913

Rawes examines a “minor tradition” of aesthetic geometries in ontological philosophy, exploring a trajectory of geometric thinking and geometric figurations in ancient Greek, post-Cartesian and 20th-century Continental philosophies.

Politics

l Shaping Strategy: The Civil-Military Politics of Strategic Assessment

By Risa Brooks, assistant professor of international relations, Northwestern University

Princeton University Press, £35.00 and £15.95

ISBN 9780691129808 and 36684

This book develops a theory of how states’ civil-military relations affect strategic assessment, arguing that to anticipate when states are prone to strategic failure abroad we must look at how civil-military relations affect the analysis of those strategies at home.

l Striking First: Preemption and Prevention in International Conflict

By Michael W. Doyle, Harold Brown professor of international affairs, law and political science, Columbia University

Princeton University Press, £14.95

ISBN 9780691136585

Tackling one of the most controversial policy issues of the post-11 September world, Doyle argues that neither the Bush doctrine nor customary international law is capable of adequately responding to the pressing security threats of our times.

l Social Justice and Development

By Behrooz Morvaridi, senior lecturer in development studies, University of Bradford

Palgrave Macmillan, £45.00

ISBN 9781403992390

Morvaridi aims to explain how the current structure of global governance could be radically changed through the principles of global social justice to deliver a mechanism for addressing inequality, poverty and environmental issues.

l Understanding the European Union: A Concise Introduction

By John McCormick, professor and chair of the department of political science, Indiana University Perdue University Indianapolis, and visiting research fellow and professor of politics, University of Sussex

Palgrave Macmillan, £55.00

ISBN 9780230201019

This updated edition aims to provide a broad-ranging yet concise introduction to the European Union, and includes fuller coverage of policy and policy-making and of theoretical approaches to the study of the European Union.

l France on the World Stage: Nation-State Strategies in the Global Era

Edited by Mairi Maclean, professor of strategy and international business, University of the West of England, and Joseph Szarka, reader in European studies, University of Bath

Palgrave Macmillan, £55.00

ISBN 9780230521261

The authors examine the ways in which France’s relations with the international community have evolved, consider the role of the nation-state and its capacity for political initiative and assess French strategies to consolidate French influence on the world stage.

‘More than an Ally’?: Contemporary Australia-US Relations

By Maryanne Kelton, lecturer in politics and international relations, Flinders University

Ashgate, £55.00

ISBN 9780754673675

This book adds to the current debate, providing an explanatory framework for understanding the Australian Government’s choices in its relations with the US across the broader spectrum of security issues.

Cultures and Globalization: The Cultural Economy

By Helmut K. Anheier, professor of public policy and social welfare, University of California, Los Angeles, and Yudhishthir Raj Isar, Jean Monnet professor of communications, American University in Paris

Sage, £29.99

ISBN 9781412934749

This is the second volume in this series in which leading experts and emerging scholars track cultural trends connected to globalisation throughout the world, resulting in an analytic toolkit that encompasses the transnational flows and scapes of contemporary cultures.

Social sciences

l Families in Converging Europe: A Comparison of Forms, Structures and Ideals

By Eriikka Oinonen, Finnish Academy research fellow in the department of sociology and social psychology, University of Tampere

Palgrave Macmillan, £45.00

ISBN 97802305249

Oinonen examines common familial trends and differences throughout Europe since the 1960s and discusses the most common theoretical explanations for convergence and divergence.

Theatre studies

l Zeami: Performance Notes

Translated by Tom Hare, William Sauter LaPorte ’28 professor of regional studies, Princeton University

Columbia University Press, £26.50

ISBN 9780231139588

Hare presents the range of medieval Japanese actor and playwright Zeami’s critical works, including thought on the aesthetic values of no and its antecedents, the techniques of playwriting, the place of allusion, and the relationship between performance and broader intellectual and critical concerns.