Silent Witness: How Forensic Anthropology is Used to Solve the World's Toughest Crimes

Silent Witness: How Forensic Anthropology is Used to Solve the World's Toughest Crimes

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Praise for the first edition: This book should be of considerable interest to a broad range of general readers ... recommended. --Choice An important introduction to the science of forensic anthropology. --Kliatt
Silent Witness
takes readers behind the scenes on real crime cases requiring the skills and expertise of a forensic anthropologist. It describes the techniques they use, how they locate a body and uncover evidence, and how the unique characteristics of each body bear silent witness to age, sex and cause of death as well as clues leading to who or what was responsible.Following a foreword and case study by world-renowned forensic anthropologist Cyril Wecht, the book opens with a review of the science of forensics--how bones talk. Eight chapters organize 350 color photographs and illustrations to focus on such topics as the history of forensic anthropology what bones tell us types of interment and exhumation body decomposition, facial reconstruction air disasters fires and explosives and massacres.The book uses 32 real-life case studies to illustrate the techniques used. They include the notorious (Ernesto Che Guevara, Jeffrey Dahmer) the tragic and explosive (American Airlines Flight 191, the Hinton Rail Collision) the horrific (dirty wars, genocide) and the wretched (bank robber and circus exhibit Elmer McCurdy).Since it was first published,
Silent Witness
has been used in high school and college classrooms across North America as a required text or recommended reading.

 

Race Critical Theories: Text and Context

Race Critical Theories: Text and Context

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Race Critical Theories brings together many of the key contributors to critical theorizing about race and racism over the past twenty years. Each previously published text is accompanied by a fresh statement - in most cases written by the authors themselves - regarding the political context, implications and effects of the original contribution.

 

Theory from the South: Or, How Euro-America is Evolving Toward Africa (The Radical Imagination)

Theory from the South: Or, How Euro-America is Evolving Toward Africa (The Radical Imagination)

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As nation-states in the Northern Hemisphere experience economic crisis, political corruption and racial tension, it seems as though they might be 'evolving' into the kind of societies normally associated with the 'Global South'. Anthropologists Jean and John Comaroff draw on their long experience of living in Africa to address a range of familiar themes - democracy, national borders, labour and capital and multiculturalism. They consider how we might understand these issues by using theory developed in the Global South. Challenging our ideas about 'developed' and 'developing' nations, Theory from the South provides new insights into key problems of our time.

 

Where Are We Heading?: The Evolution of Humans and Things (Foundational Questions in Science)

Where Are We Heading?: The Evolution of Humans and Things (Foundational Questions in Science)

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In this engaging exploration, archaeologist Ian Hodder departs from the two prevailing modes of thought about human evolution: the older idea of constant advancement toward a civilized ideal and the newer one of a directionless process of natural selection. Instead, he proposes a theory of human evolution and history based on “entanglement,” the ever-increasing mutual dependency between humans and things.   Not only do humans become dependent on things, Hodder asserts, but things become dependent on humans, requiring an endless succession of new innovations. It is this mutual dependency that creates the dominant trend in both cultural and genetic evolution. He selects a small number of cases, ranging in significance from the invention of the wheel down to Christmas tree lights, to show how entanglement has created webs of human-thing dependency that encircle the world and limit our responses to global crises.

 

The Origins of the English (Debates in Archaeology)

The Origins of the English (Debates in Archaeology)

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National origins remain as important as they have ever been to our sense of identity. Accounts of the early history of the peoples of Europe, including the English, are key tools in our construction of that identity. National identity has been studied through a range of different types of evidence - historical, archaeological, linguistic and most recently genetic. This has caused problems of interdisciplinary communication. In this book Catherine Hills carefully and succinctly unravels these different perceptions and types of evidence to assess how far it is really possible to understand when and how the people living in south and east Britain became 'English'.

 

The Evolution of Obesity

The Evolution of Obesity

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In this sweeping exploration of the relatively recent obesity epidemic, Michael L. Power and Jay Schulkin probe evolutionary biology, history, physiology, and medical science to uncover the causes of our growing girth. The unexpected answer? Our own evolutionary success.For most of the past few million years, our evolutionary ancestors' survival depended on being able to consume as much as possible when food was available and to store the excess energy for periods when it was scarce. In the developed world today, high-calorie foods are readily obtainable, yet the propensity to store fat is part of our species' heritage, leaving an increasing number of the world's people vulnerable to obesity. In an environment of abundant food, we are anatomically, physiologically, metabolically, and behaviorally programmed in a way that makes it difficult for us to avoid gaining weight.Power and Schulkin’s engagingly argued book draws on popular examples and sound science to explain our expanding waistlines and to discuss the consequences of being overweight for different demographic groups. They review the various studies of human and animal fat use and storage, including those that examine fat deposition and metabolism in men and women chronicle cultural differences in food procurement, preparation, and consumption and consider the influence of sedentary occupations and lifestyles.A compelling and comprehensive examination of the causes and consequences of the obesity epidemic, The Evolution of Obesity offers fascinating insights into the question, Why are we getting fatter?

 

Into the Looking-Glass Wood: Essays on Books, Reading, and the World

Into the Looking-Glass Wood: Essays on Books, Reading, and the World

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Alberto Manguel has enchanted hundreds of thousands of readers with his bestselling books, including The Dictionary of Imaginary Places. Now he has assembled a personal collection of his own essays that will enchant anyone interested in reading, writing, or the world. Through personal stories and literary reflections, in a style rich in humor and gentle scholarship, Manguel leads his readers to reflect on the links that bind the physical world to our language that describes it. The span of his attention in these twenty-three essays is enthralling: from Who Am I?, in which he recounts the first adventures of childhood reading, to Borges in Love, a memoir of the great blind writer's passions from his first encounters with the evils of prejudice to a meditation on the death of Che Guevara from a tour of his library to evocations of such of his favorite writers as Cortázar and Chesterton. A voyage deep into the subversive heart of words, Into the Looking-Glass Wood is fired by the author's humanity, insatiable curiosity, and steadfast belief in the essential power, mystery, and delight of the written word.