Published this week

AMERICAN STUDIES

Remembering Scottsboro: The Legacy of an Infamous Trial. By James A. Miller, professor of English and American studies, George Washington University. Princeton University Press, £32.95 and £16.95. ISBN 9780691090801 and 1140476.

Miller considers how the tragic and provocative case of Scottsboro persists as a point of reference in contemporary US life and suggests that the civil rights movement begins much earlier than the Montgomery bus boycott of 1955.

BIOLOGY

Natural Acts: A Sidelong View of Science and Nature. By David Quammen, Wallace Stegner chair in Western American studies, Montana State University. W.W. Norton, £17.99. ISBN 9780393058055.

A revised and expanded edition of Quammen's first book of nonfiction, reprinting some of his most acclaimed "Natural Acts" columns for Outside magazine. He ranges from Romania to New Mexico, mosquitoes to dinosaurs and cloning to dyslexia.

GEOLOGY

Of Rocks and Rivers: Seeking a Sense of Place in the American West. By Ellen Wohl, professor of geology, Colorado State University. University of California Press, £14.95. ISBN 9780520257030.

Wohl traces her 20 years of living and conducting research in the natural landscapes of the West as she investigates the conflict between environmental history and the widely held romanticised views of the region. These essays tell of her training as a geomorphologist and provide an account of her research on the rivers of the West.

MEDIA STUDIES

Television Drama: Form, Agency, Innovation. By Trisha Dunleavy, senior lecturer in the school of English, film, theatre and media studies, Victoria University of Wellington. Palgrave Macmillan, £50.00. ISBN 9780230545519.

Investigating the leading drama genres of different television eras in both Britain and the US, this book traces the evolution of television drama from the "high culture" aspirations and technical limitations of its early days to the intense commercial competition that informs the creation of television drama today.

MEDICINE

The Art and Science of Mental Health Nursing. By Ian Norman, professor of nursing and interdisciplinary care, King's College London, and Iain Ryrie, head of research at the Sainsbury centre for mental health, King's College London. Open University Press, £32.99. ISBN 9780335222933

The authors cover topics including patients with dementia, future directions in public mental health and taking recovery to society. Case studies are integrated throughout to illustrate the application of the material along with overviews, conclusions and questions for reflection and discussion.

POLITICS

Carl Schmitt and the Politics of Hostility, Violence and Terror. By Gabriella Slomp, senior lecturer in international policy thought, University of St Andrews. Palgrave Macmillan, £50.00. ISBN 9780230002517.

Schmitt's friend/enemy principle is exposed to in-depth philosophical analysis and historical examination with the aim of showing that the political follows hostility, violence and terror as form follows matter. The book argues that the partisan is an umbrella concept that includes the national and global terrorist.

URBAN STUDIES

Evicted from Eternity: The Restructuring of Modern Rome. By Michael Herzfeld, professor of anthropology, Harvard University. University of Chicago Press, £51.50 and £19.00. ISBN 9780226329116 and 29123

Tensions between the past and the present, the global and the local, make Rome fertile ground for studying urban social life, the construction of the past, the role of religion in daily life, and how a capital city relates to the rest of the nation. Herzfeld here focuses on Rome's historic Monti district and the wrenching dislocation caused by rapid economic, political and social change.