Pitzer Faculty Books

A Cognitive Theory of Cultural Meaning

Claudia Strauss et al. — Thu, 16 Aug 2012 09:56:13 PDT

"Culture" and "meaning" are central to anthropology, but anthropologists do not agree on what they are. Claudia Strauss and Naomi Quinn propose a new theory of cultural meaning, one that gives priority to the way people's experiences are internalized. Drawing on "connectionist" or "neural network" models as well as other psychological theories, they argue that cultural meanings are not fixed or limited to static groups, but neither are they constantly revised or contested. Their approach is illustrated by original research on understandings of marriage and ideas of success in the United States.

The Dependent Gene: The Fallacy of "Nature vs. Nurture"

David S. Moore — Tue, 14 Aug 2012 15:09:47 PDT

A much-needed antidote to genetic determinism, The Dependent Gene reveals how all traits-even characteristics like eye and hair color-are caused by complex interactions between genes and the environment at every stage of biological and psychological development, from the single fertilized egg to full-grown adulthood. How we understand the nature versus nurture debate directly affects our thoughts about such basic issues as sex and reproduction, parenting, education, and crime, and has an enormous impact on social policy. With life-and-death questions in the balance surrounding stem-cell research, cloning, and DNA fingerprinting, we can no longer afford to be ignorant of human development. An enlightening guide to this brave new world, The Dependent Gene empowers us to take control of our own destiny.

The Disordered Police State: German Cameralism as Science and Practice

Andre Wakefield — Tue, 14 Aug 2012 13:58:25 PDT

Probing the relationship between German political economy and everyday fiscal administration, The Disordered Police State focuses on the cameral sciences—a peculiarly German body of knowledge designed to train state officials—and in so doing offers a new vision of science and practice during the seventeenth and eighteenth-centuries. Andre Wakefield shows that the cameral sciences were at once natural, technological, and economic disciplines, but, more important, they also were strategic sciences, designed to procure patronage for their authors and good publicity for the German principalities in which they lived and worked. Cameralism, then, was the public face of the prince's most secret affairs; as such, it was an essentially dishonest enterprise. In an entertaining series of case studies on mining, textiles, forestry, and universities, Wakefield portrays cameralists in their own gritty terms. The result is a revolutionary new understanding about how the sciences created and maintained an image of the well-ordered police state in early modern Germany. In raising doubts about the status of these German sciences of the state, Wakefield ultimately questions many of our accepted narratives about science, culture, and society in early modern Europe.

The Calculus as Algebra: J. L. Lagrange, 1736-1813

Judith V. Grabiner — Tue, 14 Aug 2012 12:15:39 PDT

In The Calculus as Algebra: J.-L. Lagrange, 1736–1813, Grabiner shows what Lagrange’s mathematical practice was like, in order to understand the genesis of the rigorous analysis of Cauchy, Bolzano, and Weierstrass. For Lagrange, the calculus was not about rates of change or ratios of differentials, or even about limits as then understood. Lagrange thought that the calculus should be reduced to “the algebraic analysis of finite quantities.” This sounds as though he was about to introduce deltas and epsilons. But instead he believed that there was an algebra of infinite series, and that every function had a power-series expansion except perhaps at finitely many isolated points. Lagrange defined the derivative as the coefficient of the linear term in the function’s power-series expansion. Why he thought this was justified tells us both about his philosophy of mathematics and about the way many mathematicians practiced their subject in the eighteenth century.

A Historian Looks Back: The Calculus as Algebra and Selected Writings

Judith V. Grabiner — Tue, 14 Aug 2012 11:36:44 PDT

Judith Grabiner has written extensively on the history of mathematics. This collection, representing some of Grabiner's finest work, highlights the benefits of studying the development of mathematical ideas and the relationship between culture and mathematics. A large part of the book—Part I—is a welcome reprinting of Grabiner's “The Calculus as Algebra: J.-L. Lagrange, 1736–1813” (1990), which focuses on Lagrange's pioneering effort to reduce the calculus to algebra. Ten articles—Part II—span a range of other mathematical topics, including widely held myths about the history of mathematics and the work of such mathematicians as Descartes, Newton, and Maclaurin. Six of these articles won awards from the MAA for expository excellence.This collection is an inspiring resource for courses on the history of mathematics. It reveals the creativity that has produced the mathematics we see as the finished product in textbooks.

The Origins of Cauchy's Rigorous Calculus

Judith V. Grabiner — Tue, 14 Aug 2012 10:58:08 PDT

This book explores the background of a major intellectual revolution: the rigorous reinterpretation of the calculus undertaken by Augustin-Louis Cauchy and his contemporaries in the first part of the 19th century. Their generation changed the calculus from a method of solving problems to a collection of theorems, based on precise definitions, about limits, continuity, series, derivatives, and integrals. The book shows how Cauchy reshaped inherited 18th-century concepts to create an approach to rigor that we still accept today. In so doing, The Origins of Cauchy's Rigorous Calculus provides fresh insights and a new perspective on the foundations of analysis. After defining rigor and describing the characteristics of 19th-century thinking about analysis, the book examines 18th-century views of the calculus and the manifest lack of interest in the foundations of analysis. The greater part of the book concerns itself with tracing how specific achievements of 18th-century mathematics were transformed by Cauchy into the basis of his rigorous calculus (especially the development of the algebra of inequalities: ideas on limits, continuity, and convergence; and certain 18th-century treatments of the derivative and integral), with the work of Joseph-Louis Lagrange shown to be crucial in the transition to new ways of thinking.

An Introduction to the Sociology of Work and Occupations

Rudi Volti — Tue, 31 Jul 2012 11:48:36 PDT

The Sociology of Work and Occupations connects work and occupations to the key subjects of sociological inquiry: social and technological change, race, ethnicity, gender, social class, education, social networks, and modes of organization. In 15 chapters, Rudi Volti succinctly but comprehensively covers the changes in the world of work, encompassing everything from gathering and hunting to working in today's Information Age. This book introduces students to a highly relevant analysis of society today. In this new and updated edition, globalization and technology are each given their own chapter and discussed in great depth.

Society and Technological Change

Rudi Volti — Tue, 31 Jul 2012 11:19:59 PDT

Comprehensive in his discussion of both historical and contemporary technological advance, Volti never fails to explore the societal implications of each technology he presents. The new Sixth Edition has been fully updated to include recent technological innovation in such areas as genetics, communications, terrorism, and medicine. Further, updated photos throughout the book bring Volti's words to life.

Learning from YouTube

Alexandra Juhasz et al. — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 10:40:33 PST

"YouTube is a mess. YouTube is for amateurs. YouTube dissolves the real. YouTube is host to inconceivable combos. YouTube is best for corporate-made community. YouTube is badly baked. These are a few of the things Media Studies professor Alexandra Juhasz (and her class) learned about YouTube when she set out to investigate what actually happens within new media settings that proclaim to be radically "democratized."

Native Moderns: American Indian Painting, 1940 - 1960

Bill Anthes — Fri, 22 Jul 2011 11:37:54 PDT

Between 1940 and 1960, many Native American artists made bold departures from what was considered the traditional style of Indian painting. They drew on European and other non-Native American aesthetic innovations to create hybrid works that complicated notions of identity, authenticity, and tradition. This richly illustrated volume focuses on the work of these pioneering Native artists, including Pueblo painters José Lente and Jimmy Byrnes, Ojibwe painters Patrick DesJarlait and George Morrison, Cheyenne painter Dick West, and Dakota painter Oscar Howe. Bill Anthes argues for recognizing the transformative work of these Native American artists as distinctly modern, and he explains how bringing Native American modernism to the foreground rewrites the broader canon of American modernism.

In the mid-twentieth century, Native artists began to produce work that reflected the accelerating integration of Indian communities into the national mainstream as well as, in many instances, their own experiences beyond Indian reservations as soldiers or students. During this period, a dynamic exchange among Native and non-Native collectors, artists, and writers emerged. Anthes describes the roles of several anthropologists in promoting modern Native art, the treatment of Native American “Primitivism” in the writing of the Jewish American critic and painter Barnett Newman, and the painter Yeffe Kimball’s brazen appropriation of a Native identity. While much attention has been paid to the inspiration Native American culture provided to non-Native modern artists, Anthes reveals a mutual cross-cultural exchange that enriched and transformed the art of both Natives and non-Natives.

Reframing Photography: Theory and Practice

Bill Anthes et al. — Fri, 22 Jul 2011 11:36:42 PDT

To fully understand photography, it is essential to study both the theoretical and the technical.

In an accessible yet complex way, Rebekah Modrak and Bill Anthes explore photographic theory, history and technique to bring photographic education up-to-date with contemporary photographic practice. Reframing Photography is a broad and inclusive rethinking of photography that will inspire students to think about the medium across time periods, across traditional themes, and through varied materials. Intended for both beginners and advanced students, and for art and non-art majors, and practicing artists, Reframing Photography compellingly represents four concerns common to all photographic practice:

vision
light/shadow
reproductive processes
editing/ presentation/ evaluation.

Each part includes an extensive and thoughtful essay, providing a broad cultural context for each topic, alongside discussion of photographic examples. Essays introduce the work of artists who use a diverse range of subject matter and a variety of processes (straight photography, social documentary, digital, mixed media, conceptual work, etc.), examine artists' conceptual and technical choices, describe cultural implications and artistic influences, and analyze how these concerns interrelate. Following each essay, each part continues with a "how-to" section that describes a fascinating range of related photographic equipment, materials and methods through concise explanations and clear diagrams.