logo for Southern Illinois University Press
On Manly Courage
A Study of Plato's Laches
Walter T. Schmid. Foreword by George Kimball Plochmann
Southern Illinois University Press, 1992

Walter T. Schmid offers the first original interpretation of the Laches since Hermann Bonitz in the nineteenth century in the only full-length commentary on the Laches available in English.

Schmid divides the book into five main discussions: the historical background of the dialogue; the relation of form and content in a Platonic dialogue and specific structural and aesthetic features of the Laches; the first half of the dialogue, which introduces the characters and considers the theme of the education of young men; the inquiry with Laches, which examines the traditional Greek conception of military courage; and the inquiry with Nicias in which two nontraditional conceptions of courage are mooted, one closely associated with the sophistic movement in Athens, the other with Socrates himself. Furnishing a detailed paragraph-by-paragraph reading that traces Socrates’ ongoing quest for virtue and wisdom—a wisdom founded in the action of a whole human life—Schmid conclusively shows how and why the Laches fills an important niche in Plato’s moral theory.

[more]

logo for Harvard University Press
On the Study of Indian Art
Pramod Chandra
Harvard University Press, 1983

Serious study of the art of India began only in the nineteenth century. This small volume provides a masterly overview of the scholarship of the past century and a half.

Mr. Chandra's purpose is twofold: to help present–day students understand their scholarly heritage, and to encourage them to re-examine their own methods and assumptions. His histographical approach enables him to pay tribute to the great achievements of the pioneers in the field and also to notice the manner in which errors of fact and method have crept into some of the contemporary thinking and writing on the subject. Rather than attempt to discuss the writings of every scholar of note, he restricts himself to a few whose work, in his opinion, clearly represents the various stages of the development of the discipline. In analyzing their contributions, he concentrates on the broad methodological thrust of their work and not on the details of their conclusions.

The study of architecture is considered first, because it was regarded by the ancient Indians as the most important of the visual arts and was the earliest of the arts to receive careful, analytic treatment in modern times. Sculpture is taken up second, and last the study of Indian painting, the area in which the most remarkable progress has been made in the last twenty–five years. In the course of the discussion many topics of broad interest are touched upon, including the relation of art history to the other disciplines, problems presented by various methods of classification, iconography and iconology, the relevance of style, the meaning of form, and the connection between artists and patrons.

[more]

front cover of Only in Arkansas
Only in Arkansas
A Study of the Endemic Plants and Animals of the State
Henry Robison
University of Arkansas Press, 1995
Besides extensive illustrations and photographs of each species, Only in Arkansas provides pertinent literature references to the original distributions of each form within the state and reports known information of the general biology, evolutionary relationships, and habitat occupied by each endemic form.
[more]

logo for University of Massachusetts Press
The Orwell Mystique
A Study in Male Ideology
Daphne Patai
University of Massachusetts Press, 1984
One hundred years after the publication of Looking Backward, Bellamy remains a controversial figure in American literary and social history. The collection of essays in this volume, commemorating the novel's appearance in 1888, attests to his continued importance.
[more]

front cover of Our Science, Ourselves
Our Science, Ourselves
How Gender, Race, and Social Movements Shaped the Study of Science
Christa Kuljian
University of Massachusetts Press, 2024

When Christa Kuljian arrived on the Harvard College campus as a first-year student in the fall of 1980 with copies of Our Bodies, Ourselves and Ms. magazine, she was concerned that the women’s movement had peaked in the previous decade. She soon learned, however, that there was a long way to go in terms of achieving equality for women and that social movements would continue to be a critical force in society. She began researching the history of science and gender biases in science, and how they intersect with race, class, and sexuality.

In Our Science, Ourselves, Kuljian tells the origin story of feminist science studies by focusing on the life histories of six key figures—Ruth Hubbard, Rita Arditti, Evelyn Fox Keller, Evelynn Hammonds, Anne Fausto-Sterling, and Banu Subramaniam. These women were part of a trailblazing network of female scientists in the 1970s, 80s, and 90s who were drawn to the Boston area—to Harvard, MIT, and other universities—to study science, to network with other scientists, or to take a job. Inspired by the social and political activism of the women’s movement and organizations such as Science for the People, the Genes and Gender Collective, and the Combahee River Collective, they began to write and teach about women in science, gender and science, and sexist and racist bias and exclusion. They would lead the critiques of E. O. Wilson’s sociobiology in 1975 and Larry Summers’ comments about women in science thirty years later.

Drawing on a rich array of sources that combines published journal articles and books with archival materials and interviews with major luminaries of feminist science studies, Kuljian chronicles and celebrates the contributions that these women have made to our collective scientific knowledge and view of the world.

[more]

logo for University of Illinois Press
Out of One, Many Africas
Reconstructing the Study and Meaning of Africa
Edited by William G. Martin and Michael O. West
University of Illinois Press, 1999
Even as symbols of Africa permeate Western culture in the 1990s, centers for the academic study of Africa suffer from a steady erosion of institutional support and intellectual legitimacy. Out of One, Many Africas assesses the rising tide of discontent that has destabilized the conceptions, institutions, and communities dedicated to African studies.   In vibrant detail, contributors from Africa, Europe, and North America lay out the multiple, contending histories and perspectives that inform African studies. They assess the reaction against the white-dominated consensus that has marked African studies since its inception in the 1950s and note the emergence of alternative approaches, energized in part by feminist and cultural studies. They examine African scholars' struggle against paradigms that have justified and covered up colonialism, militarism, and underdevelopment. They also consider such issues as how to bring black scholars on the continent and in the diaspora closer together on questions of intellectual freedom, accountability, and the democratization of information and knowledge production. 
 By surveying the present predicament and the current grassroots impulse toward reconsidering the meaning of the continent, Out of One, Many Africas gives shape and momentum to a crucial dialogue aimed at transforming the study of Africa
 
[more]

front cover of Ozark Vernacular Houses
Ozark Vernacular Houses
A Study of Rural Homeplaces in the Arkansas Ozarks, 1830-1930
Jean Sizemore
University of Arkansas Press, 1994
Over 160 photographs, drawings, and maps provide examples of the four traditional Ozark house types and reveal the unity of a distinctive Arkansas culture that bears identity with all hill peoples. Of importance to architects, folklorists, cultural historians, and anyone interested in the Ozarks, this fascinating examination of the Ozark house is a way toward understanding the mind of the inhabitants and their entire way of life.
[more]


Send via email Share on Facebook Share on Twitter