5 comments about Out of Mao's Shadow: The Struggle for the Soul of a New China.

1. Excellent. I couldn't put it down. I would like to read more about the people in China and their fight for democracy. I hope Philip Pan writes another book.



2. There are a lot of excellent books on modern China out there, but this one is a cut above. I think, as a newspaperman, Mr. Pan knows how to grab and hold his reader's attention. I was unable to put it down for a few days. He also gets very deep into the story, talking to the affected people, but also putting everything into historical context. Lastly, I'm glad this book doesn't try to shoehorn everything into some grand hypothesis about China's imminent superpower status. I was happy to learn about the general trends of public discourse and human rights since the Mao era through the stories of some particular citizens who turn out to be heroes in their own way.



3. In his China book Philip Pan, former Washington Post bureau chief in Beijing, chooses to write about the heroic individuals who dared to defy the inexorable force that is the Communist Party of China. He writes about an unemployed documentary filmmaker Hu Jie whose life passion is resurrecting a young woman who dared speak up against Mao Zedong. There's this doctor who -- defying government censors -- revealed the SARS epidemic to the nation, thus saving thousands of lives. There are the labor activists who rallied their fellow laid-off workers against corruption. And then there are the lawyers and the journalists who are always pushing the envelope, trying inch by inch to create institutions -- rule of law and freedom of expression -- that can restrain the abusive authority of the Party.
   
   Philip Pan is a very fluid writer but the book nevertheless feels thin. And worse than feeling thin it feels irrelevant and insignificant. Two thousand and eight is, after all, China's Olympic year -- when America's economy suffers from recession China's economy is booming. In surveys nine out of ten Chinese are optimistic and positive about their country and where China is heading. And the people that Philip Pan writes about so admiringly in his new book are the marginalized intellectuals and the disaffected poor who nostalgically yearn for a time that never was and dream of a future that can never be. And so for Americans and Chinese alike they're irrelevant and insignificant.
   
   That's sad because Philip Pan and his heroes are right. China is a complete mess, and rather than being subversive these individuals who defy the system are the true patriots because with their criticisms and actions they are trying to make the nation-state stronger and more stable.
   
   China right now suffers from a corrupt and ossified bureaucracy determined at all costs to maintain power. China's curious and cowardly blend of authoritarianism and capitalism means that China's Gini co-efficient is comparable to that of Latin America, its pollution problem is a national shame and seriously threatens China's future growth, and China never before has witnessed so much crime and moral decay. And yet -- because multinationals are still pouring into China, because Americans cannot shopping at Walmart, and because China itself is spending hundreds of billions on new infrastructure and factories -- the Chinese economy in the past two decades has managed to create a middle-class that is now the bedrock of Communist Party support. And what the middle-class in their steadfast support blithely ignores is that China's "socialism with Chinese characteristics" is a system built on contradictions and lies and illusions.
   
   And that's what the characters in Philip Pan's book refuse to ignore. The Party's greatest contradiction, lie, and illusion is that it's possible to have economic reform without political reform.
   
   Consider the free market. The free market needs independent media and channels of information to create efficient pricing and distribution and marketing -- but the Party insists on maintaining control over newspapers and the Internet. Now the Party may say that it'll allow economic reporting but not political reporting but what's important for the media to have any real impact on consumers is perceived independence -- so it's in the media's self-interest to report on SARS because that makes their economic reporting more credible.
   
   Consider also the free movement of goods, which is crucial to the free market. The Chinese provinces are controlled by local party bosses which adamantly protect their self-interest and the interest of their constituents. So that means they'll protect local industry by preventing competition from coming into town -- which hampers the economy. And they'll also tax peasants, and steal their land.
   
   So here the Party's interest in strengthening the Chinese economy is perfectly aligned with peasant lawyers who want to break the local tyranny of the Party bosses. But in these cases the Party chooses to side with the Party bosses. Why? Because at the end of the day the Party is only interested in maintaining its monopoly of power, and that in turn means turning a blind eye to the rapacious and corrupt behavior of local bosses in return for their fealty.
   
   That is the sad unfortunate conclusion that the lawyers, journalists, and labor activists come to -- and which we also come to -- at the end of Mr. Pan's book. They always believed that they could change the system gradually from within -- and that weakness is ultimately what will make them irrelevant and insignificant in history's eyes.
   
   As China's economic contradictions finally collapse into each other causing a financial earthquake that will rent society asunder this current generation of activists will be very soon supplanted by another generation of activists -- people who immediately see that the problem is the system itself, and their first reaction will be violence not discussion.
   
   That's even more sad because in these individuals who believed in themselves, in China, and ultimately in the Party stood China's last best chance for real progress.



4. There's a pejorative that we Chinese overseas hold about American-born Chinese, i.e. the "jook-sing." In Chinese parlance, this is a bamboo section which is closed on both ends of the nodes.
   
   Phillip Pan is a "joon-sing" trying to interpret China and Chinese society through his biased, filtered lenses as a Westernized Chinese-American living in a society assigned to China as a Washington Post bureau chief living in privileged expat enclaves.
   
   His type often tries to flush out the bizzarre, the unorthodox, the rebels, the mavericks, the non-conformists in a country of 1.3 billion people. Similarly, having lived here in America, as a Chinese, I can easily flush out the "armpit" side of America, in the stories of many of America's rebels, mavericks, dissidents, and "political prisoners" and "prisoners of conscience."
   
   Mr. Pan sees the trees, but not the forest. It is apparent that he is befuddled by his Europeanized, Westernized baggage, and he swallows "hook, line, sinker" the false notion that "The Western Moon is rounder; and the Western Fart smells much much more fragrant."\
   
   Frankly, in any society, and political governments, whether in the U.S. or China, you can find the "armpit" smelly sides.
   
   Official corruption in China ? Big deal. How about in the USA ?
   
   At this writing, California is deep in the hole by a tune of US$ 17 billion in a fiscal year which has operated with a gridlocked legislature and a grandstanding showboating governor, Arnaud, Mr. Hollywood.
   
   Our public officials and civil servants have become so uncivil and parasitic that they have fundamentally leeched and fed on government largeese and sucked the public till dry. And these pigs feeding off the public troll are not corrupt ? Holly Dolly.
   
   Gimme a break. Mr. Pan worships the American fart, which he deems to smell much more fragrant.
   
   That he elects to hype and markets his book in order to make mucho dinero points to the intellectual naivite of this obviously smart "jook sing."
   
   The only problem is he sees the trees in detail but can't see the forest.
   
   He is what I call a "white man trapped in a Chinese body." How sad. And he is acting as a shill for China bashers and Chinese Demonizers. In America today, being a CB and a CD sells. And it is PC.



5. This book provides great insight into a handful of cases that highlight corruption, greed and failed politics in China over time. It will likely stir emotions in many native Chinese readers as a hard look at reality.
   
   We all may have different views, theories and experiences with China. However, we all must agree that there is a need for greater transparency, improved human rights and a deep revealing look into the corruption of many highly regarded party members. No country is perfect, but China heavily struggles with aligning the interests of its citizens, with those of its few officials.
   
   I read this book during the Beijing Olympic games. Afterwards, it made me pay extra attention seeing stories like today's "Two seventy year old women sentenced to re-education for attempting to register for the official protests", and "China Practically Unreachable By Western SMS?".

1 comments about Cultural Anthropology: The Human Challenge.

1. I use this book in my cultural anthropology courses in part because it does what is expected: cover the major divisions of what an introductory class should expose students. However, the plus to me is that the last couple of chapters cover culture contact and change based on a dominant culture coming in contact with smaller groups and also covers "globalization" which is directly relevant to the lives of my students. So at the end of our term we can switch a bit from abstract academic discussions to issues happening the in the world today. We examine concepts like "modernization" and whether the western dominant perspective that this is always good (for everyone) is true and we look at global issues that affect our species, nation, security, and subsistence from a diverse perspective. Adding Annual Editions brings the text to life, as well.

5 comments about Racial and Ethnic Groups, 11th Edition.

1. Racial and Ethnic Groups is extremely well researched, informative and entertaining. I read this book from cover to cover for pleasure. Then I read several of the books listed in the bibliography. This is clearly the best book available for anyone taking or teaching a course on human diversity. Each section tells a fascinating story with just the right combination of history, facts and relevant statistics.



2. Thank you so much, the book was just as described and shipped direct fast!!



3. This is an excellent book for someone who is learning about diversity. This book isn't 100% perfect but it's a start for someone to learn about diversity in society. The author tried to address each group without bias (as much as possible).



4. Thankfully my college has a textbook rental system, but I think that if I were required to purchase this book, it is one that I would actually end up keeping. I have never really been able to sit down and read a textbook, but this one is different.
   
   It may just be personal opinion, but I think that learning about the origins and evolution of various racial/ethnic/religious groups is incredibly interesting. I feel that Schaefer's presentation of the mateiral is very comprehensive (but not overly detailed) and, as far as I can tell, free of bias. A wide spectrum of groups are covered, the material is easy to read, and the graphics in the text--especially the charts and maps--help visually represent the text.
   
   Overall, I think that this is one of the best textbooks that I have come into contact with, and I would highly recommend it.



5. I needed this book for college, item was much cheaper then purchasing from school. Shipped very fast, arrived in excellent condition. No marks, highlighting, no damage. The book also came with a cd-rom.

5 comments about Your Inner Fish: A Journey into the 3.5-Billion-Year History of the Human Body.

1. I am enjoying reading this, 30 years after taking a course covering much of the portion of the book I have so far completed. The authors enthusiasm for the subject and articulate writing style would make this a good read for anyone with out a lot of biology background who wants to have a better understanding of form and function and how it came to be.



2. Through extensive fossil records and geneology, Mr. Shubin takes the reader through the development of single celled organisms (bacteria), multi-cell (jellyfish), bodies (worms), skull (fish), hands and feet (reptiles), three-boned middle ear (mammals), and finally, bipedal with large brain (humans).
   
   We have in us anatomical design improvements that can take us only so far from our water borne ancestors. Mr. Shubin asserts if humans were designed from scratch, "we would not have to suffer everything from hemorrhoids to cancer."
   
   If, like me, you have always wondered why the male scrotum tucks close to the body in chilly weather, "Your Inner Fish" is an excellent source.
   
   Curiously, Mr. Shubin made no mention of how a Cro-Magnon was able to win the U.S. presidency twice; in 2000 and 2004.



3. Neil Shubin, codiscoverer of the Tiktaalit, shows in this book that to become a human you must first become a fish. Its a wonderful argument against the notion of `intelligent design'. Or would you call a car manufacturer intelligent who makes a Mercedes by first building a wooden coach? Nevertheless there is an unwholesome streak of creationism and anti-darwinism in Shubins otherwise lucid descriptions, a streak which seems to belong to US-American culture like Samba belongs to Brazil. For example, he criticizes Haeckels `ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny' understanding of the way evolution shows up in embryos when Haeckel "would compare a human embryo to an adult fish". But any changes in the features of an embryo - like going from fish to human - require the action of natural selection to have acted once. Now, natural selection operates on the reproduction success of an animal, and that means adults. Therefore, for any developmental stage of an embryo, there must have existed an adult creature that had evolved just to this stage; and when you trace the embryonic development, a fossil must exist at every level that had achieved just this stage. To understand the embyro, you need to understand Natural selection, which means you must understand the reproduction success of the adult. It does not suffice to compare the embryos of different species - their "blueprints" ; Shubin just loves to talk all the time about "blueprints", which is a typical design term. Tracing embryos runs parallel to tracing the fossils of adults.
   For another example, look at the way he describes the recent research situation when it was found that "in many single-celled animals, much of the molecular machinery for cell adhesion, interaction, and so on is just not there", which "would seem to support the notion that the genes that help cells unite to make bodies arose together with the origin of bodies. And at first glance, it seems to make sense that the tools to build bodies should arise in lockstep with the bodies themselves." This idea makes sense, yes - if you are a creationist. If you think like Haeckel, this is nonsense because for selection to produce bodies there must have been a single cell animal with all the needed machinery existing. And as Shubin beautifully narrates, just such an animal turned up : the choanoflagellates.
   Science has been kind to Haeckel, contrary to what Shubin asserts in the book.
   Despite my reservations, I highly recommend his book because of Shubins genuine enthusiasm for his subject, and the wealth of new results that he presents. If it had more of Dawkins and much less Gould in it, it would have been splendid. The pictures are as miserable as I have come to expect nowadays in good books about science.



4. Written in an informal, but informative style, "Your Inner Fish" communicates the relationships between living organisms and the coping strategies involved in the adaptation to a changing environment. This book was a joy to read.



5. It does not take a trained eye to see that there are basic similarities between animals -- this is, after all what allows humans to "play" horses and dragons and cats with just a wee bit of makeup and costuming. Most mammals, birds, lizards, fish and even insects have a head, a body and various appendages stick out for locomotion, manipulation and catching prey. But are these similarities just apparent, or do they go deeper?
   
   Biologist Neil Shubin documents the fascinating truth that human beings (and birds, bees, etc.) share fundamental body patterns with each other. And that these patterns are well-nigh ubiquitous. Shubin examines the common animal limb pattern: one upper bone, connected to two lower bones, connected to blobs of wrist bones, connected to a number of elongated digits. To make a bat wing, lengthen the digits and cover them with skin. To make a horse hoof, elongate the middle finger and fused the others into a solid mass. But our similarities go much deeper, and Shubin provides a fascinating tour through the world of embryology. It's here that scientists have discovered, by painstaking trial and error, the chemical messengers that form our bodies from formless blobs of cells. He discusses the Hox gene (found in humans, mice, fruit lies and much animal life) that programs an embryo's head-to-tail features. He shows how distance from ZPA (a patch of organizing tissue) determines the length of fingers, turning some into pinkies and some into thumbs.
   
   The book is interesting, often exhilarating, and hard to put down. What's neat is the glimpse we get into the toilsome work of the scientists who collect, prepare and analyze fossils. It takes years of work, sharp eyes, luck and a knack for puzzle solving to piece together, say, the story of how mammals developed precise chewing - an ability that reptiles do not have. A tiny tooth found on a beach in Nova Scotia can fill in the gaps of how and when the transition from reptile-style toothedness and mammal-style dentition came about.
   
   I had only two criticisms. Unlike Stephen Jay Gould, who tends to write far above the heads of intelligent readers, Shubin tends to write down a bit. Unlike Gould, Shubin avoids scientific jargon, to a degree that is curious. Secondly, he leaves some rather large gaps in his tale. While it is interesting that animals tend to have the same skeletal limb structure, why did they adopt this structure? Is the one bone/two bone/blobs/digits model the only one that works out of water? And why/how did the creatures begin to move in the direction of limbedness? In the ongoing debate between evolution and creationism, such insights would have helped answer the nagging questions that even proponents of evolution have about the mechanisms behind it.
   
   Still, "Your Inner Fish" is an accessible and informative read about the personal process of collecting bones and the intriguing conclusions that science has made about our relationship with all (and I mean all!) animal life. The next time you listen to the radio, thank the ancient fish whose jawbones evolved into the bones of your ears. And give a thought to box jellies, with whom we share the basic mechanisms of sight.

5 comments about Human: The Science Behind What Makes Us Unique.

1. Michael Gazzaniga, a preeminent brain scientist who has made the study of the human mind scientifically viable, has hit a grand slam with his new book. In it he tackles a fundamental question of our existence, one that has been largely avoided by modern science: what makes humans beings unique? In a breezy and easy to understand style, he weaves a story that combines cutting-edge information from diverse disciplines, ranging from molecular biology to social psychology. The result is a book that is as entertaining as it is informative. HUMAN is a must read for every thinking person.



2. Dr. Gazzaniga elegantly explores what makes humans unique by drawing from a large body of research and presenting it with seemingly effortless wit. Whether he is talking about the anatomy of specific parts of the brain or deciding whether a human would have a good time on a date with a chimp, he keeps the reader engaged and entertained. All in all, this book was a wonderful way to learn about some of the fascinating research that has been done on the brain.



3. To understand human social behavior it is necessary to be familiar with most (if not all) of the material Michael Gazzaniga covers in this seminal summary of how humans are alike and different from other animals. Since Dr. Gazzaniga is not only a pioneering neuroscientist, but also an accomplished writer noted for his ability to render scientific material understandable and entertaining, there is likely no better way to become familiar with leading edge thinking on human behavior than by reading "Human: The Science Behind What Makes Us Unique."
   
   Dr. Gazzaniga's stance (as proclaimed in the Prologue) is that although most human activity can be related to antecedents in other animals, somewhere in the evolution of our brain the equivalent of a "phase shift" occurred and we became unique: His rallying cry is "... let us start the journey of understanding why humans are special, and let's have some fun doing it." "Human" succeeds in doing that throughout its nine chapters.
   
   All of the recent discoveries and salient theories from the fields of neuroscience, molecular biology, genetics, evolutionary and cognitive psychology, and artificial intelligence (among others) are presented in a cogent and evenhanded way; whenever Dr. Gazzaniga favors one theory over another, he carefully explains why, and the result is that readers can weigh the data and various viewpoints themselves to improve their comprehension of human behavior.
   
   The final chapter looks into the near future and considers likely advances in the emerging neuroprosthetic fields, where brain signals are tapped to control prosthetic devices; in robotics and artificial intelligence, where manmade devices take over Man's "dull, dangerous, or dirty" chores; and in gene therapy and "genetic engineering," where the Pandora's Box of manipulating our very nature may be creaking open. Dr. Gazzaniga's extensive work with the Council on Bioethics (which led to a previous book, "The Ethical Brain") makes him almost uniquely qualified to address the promises and dangers of gene manipulation.
   
   And, yes, a summary can indeed be "seminal" if it brings together findings from many disciplines, lays them out in parallel, and shows how they have a common thread and converge toward a common conclusion.
   
   Adam Leonard (Author of "Man by Nature: The Hidden Programming Controlling Human Behavior.")



4. This is a comprehensive and readable account of what we know thus far--about ourselves. Human is a compendium of thought-provoking research concerning what makes us unique as a species, as well as what connects us to all other living things. Gazzaniga does not shy from celebrating human life, giving credit to nature where credit is due. We are complex beyond measure. It is amazing how much information the author can relay while still remaining accessible and downright fun. The Brain's the thing!



5. This fascinating book contains the latest in scientific research. It presents in an unbiased manner, information that is on the bleeding edge of our knowledge of the brain. The areas of research where there is no consensus yet are very clearly disclosed. Even if you aren't a biology major, this book is not just readable, it is captivating.

5 comments about "Why Are All The Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?": A Psychologist Explains the Development of Racial Identity.

1. I love the way this book is written. It walks the reader through some very interesting and complicated social issues that are crucial. I recommend that ALL high school teachers read this book.



2. Mrs. Tatum's book is a demonstration of great craftmanship in the form of literature. This book will open your mind to a new understanding of race, racism, prejudice, and priviledge. If you are thinking about whether to buy this book or not go ahead and buy it, you will not regret it. "Why Are All The Black Kids Sitting Together In The Cafeteria" is a masterpiece of a book.



3. Fast shipping and received the item in excellent condition. Thank you; I look forward to ordering from you in the future!



4. The work that she put together in the form of this book is chuck full of groundbreaking ideas. I am in complete agreement with her on the process of identity acquisition. Where we diverge is when she shows entirely to much sensitivity going as far as attaching deeper meaning to a children's cartoon. Yes I know that cartoons where very racist back in the day, but I think that a multi million dollar modern day disney cartoon would be a bit of stretch to call racist. But if anyone can do it while being a dean of a $40,000 a year school Dr. Tatum most certainly can. I wonder if she told her son about the discrimatory practices that her school openly practiced for decades. Don't let my personal disgust stop you from reading this book its ideas are sane just wish I could say the same about the author.



5. The title of this book is provocative, and may lead some to be surprised by what they find in it.
   
   It is not a book for white people who see the formation of racial identity groups---in the cafeteria or otherwise---as a problem and want confirmation that this is a separatist or "reverse racist" practice that should be denounced. It is a book for those who honestly want to understand this phenomenon and what it says about the society we live in. I've recommended this book to several white friends and all have said it's one of the most readable and insightful works they've read.
   
   I admit I was skeptical about how relevant this book would be to me, as an Asian-American woman. In fact, it is one of the most valuable---dare I say "lifesaving"?---books I have ever read on race issues in the United States. Tatum explains the development of racial identity in a way that helped me understand for the first time that the confusion, anger, and isolation I have felt in trying to claim my Asian-ness is normal and a natural consequence of living in a culture where whiteness is the norm. She describes the pre-encounter stage, where people aren't fully aware of the consequences of being non-white, but nonetheless pick up on a perpetual feeling of otherness, of being less accepted. The encounter stage, where we realize the full implications of living in a white-dominated culture, is frequently accompanied by anger and a feeling of being cheated or betrayed. I have felt this keenly and it was a relief to have those feelings validated. Then there is the immersion/emersion stage, which I find myself in right now; wanting to be among Asians, to claim the heritage I feel I've had to deny for so long by learning everything I can about my history and culture, reading writings by Asian-American authors, etc. The fourth and fifth stages, which I haven't reached yet, are those associated with a healthier understanding of one's race and identity. And while I'm not there yet, I now recognize that I am on a journey and that I need not deny who I am, nor try to suppress my anger, nor feel guilty for wanting to be with people who understand me and have gone through this same process. The clarity I've achieved by reading this book has been tremendously valuable.
   
   I think the genius of this book is that Tatum knows how to address both white people and people of color in a manner that is honest, personal, and engaging. I believe all those who approach these questions with an open mind and true willingness to listen and understand will come away having learned something they can use.

No comments about The Cultural Landscape: An Introduction to Human Geography (9th Edition).

5 comments about Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies.

1. Many reviews claim this book to be biased and bereft of some important additional components that have influenced human evolutionary history. Diamond actually does mention many of these components, but seems to think they're merely subsidiaries of the broader agents behind history's patterns (which he lists as government/religion, germs, writing, and technology).
   
   This book isn't perfect, but it's a great start and leaves the door wide open for those interested in pursuing the study of human evolution. It's boldest claim is that geography was the greatest SINGLE determinant of the evolution of human societies (continental axes, climate, biology, geology, etc.). He doesn't claim geography did it all and does indeed discuss important other factors such as cultural receptivity to new technology, progress, and change. But I think it's interesting that he goes so far as to claim that the essence of it all is mere geographical location, and from that simple starting point our many complex differences have spawned.



2. While this book is difficult for many high school students, its ideas and the methods used to create his thesis are concepts your students can get. This would be a great jumping off point for an interdisciplinary unit and as the years go on, history and social studies teachers need to change the way we present history if we want students to be ready for the 21st century. In a time when students can get facts right off of Google faster than we could give it to them, we need to teach history as concepts and not focus on students learning only facts. Diamond interprets the facts to create a a thesis on why certain societies excel and come out on top. You could compare and contrast his thesis to the Human Web or the Kennedy's Rise and Fall of Great Powers. On its own, GGS could be a powerful tool in the classroom and teachers of all disciplines should read this text. All texts are biased and no one should expect perfection so if you want to be convinced of one particular view then you shouldn't read it. But if you are open to learning more and having more questions when you are finished (which is not a bad thing), then you should read this and give select passages to students.
   For non-teachers, this book really makes learning history easy and interesting which may be different from your own educational experience.



3. Without a doubt, this has got to be the worst book I have read in a long time. What would have been an interesting blurb in the sociology section of 'Time' magazine, becomes hundreds of pages of pure mindless dreck in the hands of Jared Diamond. Let me save you a few days of your life by summing up the book: The reason why white, western / European societies flourished and the rest of the of the non-white, non-western world did not was because the European climate and terrain favored domestication of plants and animals while the rest of the world's terrain and climate did not. Therefore, western man had more free time on his hands to invent stuff and put a man on the moon, while the rest of the world, to this day, is still screwed up. Wow. I am so annoyed I read this book and wasted so much time doing so.



4. This book is interesting for those who prefer non-fiction. I bought this book for a friend.



5. Diamond traces the spread of human culture, language, and empire-building across the globe in terms of "geographic determinism"--a pejorative term he deplores: ". . . Societies developed differently on different continents because of differences in continental environments, not in human biology."
   
   Specifically, he traces the ultimate causes that some human societies who (literally and sometimes figuratively) developed guns, germs and steel were able to subjugate the continental areas of the globe: domestication of plants for food, domestication of animals for food, transportation, power, and military purposes, and east/west continental axes that enabled food production techniques and the resulting political organization, language, and technology to spread most quickly.
   
   Diamond makes a compelling case in a way that takes the racism out of much of the "manifest destiny" writing that surrounds this topic. Doing so, however, he takes a purely evolutionary view of human history. No allowance is made, for example, for events such as a single point of creation, dispersal of language from Babel outward (even though it would address a mystery he is unable to solve), or a world-wide flood which wiped out existing patterns of human dispersal and restarted human history from another single point.

5 comments about The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down.

1. This was an outstanding book. You may need to be a social anthropologist at heart to really love it, but the book was so enlightening on so many different levels. The background and customs of the Hmong are fascinating, and their clash with western culture is eye opening. I learned so much, not just about the Hmong, but about my own beliefs.



2. A fascinating case study of a Hmong family's profoundly frustrating encounter with a county medical center in rural California. The book is very well written, and gave me fresh insight into what it really means for us to be a "nation of immigrants." My only frustration was with the organization of the book. As it jumped backed and forth between the micro and the macro, and between the recent and more distant past, the narrative lost some of its momentum. But that said, it is one of those rare books that has made me look at the world in a new way, and for that reason, I highly recommend it.



3. As the title implies, this book offers an alternative perspective of epilepsy, or seizures, as seen through the lens of the Hmong people. It also provides a fresh view of Western so-called civilization itself, and most particularly Western medicine.
   
   I doubt there's any American today who doesn't harbor at least some ambivalence about how medicine's practiced in the United States, and I'm not just talking bills and insurance. Foua and Nao Kao Lee didn't trust the doctors who tended to their baby daughter Lia when she began to have seizures; they worried about doing damage to their baby's soul. In the Hmong culture, sickness is a signal of disturbance to the soul, and healing is a matter of tending to that soul. When did you last see an American doctor do that?
   
   Even had the doctors who cared for Lia known of this tenet of the Lees' belief system, they probably wouldn't have given it consideration. As things were, they knew little about their patient's family: not only did the Lees not understand English, but the Hmong culture is so far from that of anything remotely American, the doctors hadn't the ears to hear, eyes to see, or consciousness to absorb any of it. To them, as to many Americans, the Hmong are a "Stone Age" people, ignorant and superstitious.
   
   Certainly Hmong rituals and healing ceremonies are strange and arcane--but no stranger than those of the Catholic or Jewish faith: all utilize symbols, whether it's wine standing in for the blood of Jesus, drops of wine spilled onto a plate for Egyptian plagues, or a wooden bench transformed into a winged horse carrying a healer in search of a sick person's soul. Why is it that the good citizens of the United States laugh only at the latter?
   
   Writer Anne Fadiman decided to look at American medicine through the prism of Lia Lee's sad story. She discovered, and conveyed to readers, the richness of Hmong culture, devoid of sentimentality. Fadiman is careful not to imbue the Hmong with the kind of romanticism that European Americans tend to hold about Native Americans: she does not evade the fact that they can be extremely difficult. By allowing them full humanity, she brings them vividly to life the same way a novelist does her characters--though non-fiction, thi book is as compelling as a great novel.
   
   The Hmong came to America in the 1980s courtesy of war in Southeast Asia. They'd been living in the mountains of Laos, to which they'd migrated from China. The Hmong never assimilate into the culture of the country they inhabit, and have suffered persecution for centuries. Much like the Roma or the Jews, they're a migratory tribe without a homeland--but I doubt they ever felt quite as displaced as they did when they got to the United States. Because they helped the CIA in Laos, the Hmong were promised they'd be welcome in the U.S.--but when the troops left, they jetted only generals and hotshots out of the country, leaving the rest of the populace to fend for themselves. With the Laotian army hunting them down as enemies of the state, Hmong families set off on foot, carrying whatever they could manage. Many, particularly the old and the young, died along the way. Most possessions were shed, too heavy to carry, on the days-long journey. When they arrived in Thailand they were placed in refugee camps, where they waited to be rescued by the Americans. Those who were finally brought to America were `resettled' all over the map, without regard for family cohesion or transferability of survival skills: in Detroit, Minneapolis, Utah, Vermont--the Hmong were distributed all over the country so as to not unduly `burden' any one locality.
   
   The Hmong tend to have large broods of 12 or 13 children, who they deeply adore, and they view disability as a consequence of some parental transgression, for which they atone by treating children with disabilities extra lovingly. They're used to living near relatives, who they see frequently, if not daily. The diaspora of the Hmong represented unspeakable hardship--which they resolved with what they call their `second resettlement.'One family would pack up a hastily purchased jalopy and drive off, looking for a spit of land hospitable to growing vegetables and the herbs necessary for healing rituals. They'd end up where all pioneers do, in California, and send news to relatives in Detroit or Chicago or Billings, Montana. Eventually, pockets of Hmong were clustered in a few locations around the country. Of these, Merced, California, where the Lee family settled, is one of the largest.
   
   About one in every six residents of Merced, formerly an all-white rural area, is now Hmong. Here their culture and community thrived, parallel to the dominant culture, assimilating as little as possible. One way they did have to assimilate is medically: since 80% receive some form of government assistance, social services closely monitor them. American social workers do not have a high level of tolerance for cultural difference, and many Hmong practices, like gardening on the living room floor, or animal sacrifice, put parents in danger of losing their children to foster care--an unthinkable consequence that did occur, for a period of time, to Lia Lee.
   
   The Hmong had heard about Western medicine even before arriving on these shores. They approved of antibiotics--swallow a pill and get well in a week--but not of much else. Surgery was anathema, since cutting the flesh or removing organs risks the flight of the soul. When their daughter Lia fell into the hands of the medical establishment, the Lees suffered deep agony over every procedure, from IV insertion to spinal taps.
   
   Fadiman explores the interactions between the Lees and their daughter's medical caretakers in exhaustive detail. Whenever Lia suffers a setback, the Lees blame the doctors and their methods. The doctors accuse the Lees of "noncompliance" when they fail to properly dose Lia with three different kinds of anti-convulsants at the various times of day prescribed, not realizing that the Hmong don't even use clocks. Fadiman presents a balanced picture, blaming neither the family nor the hospital, but cultural barriers, for what goes wrong--and eventually things do go terribly wrong. By the age of four Lia is brain dead. The hospital hooks her up to feeding tubes, expecting her to die within days, but the Lees insist on taking her home, where they disconnect every tube and treat Lia as a favored family member. They take turns carrying her around on their backs; like a mama bird, Foua pre-chews her daughter's food and feeds it to her orally; they sacrifice pigs in healing ceremonies; and Lia sleeps with her parents every night. To the astonishment of the medical community, Lia does not die, and by the end of the book, years after being declared brain dead, she's still alive. As I write this, Lia Lee is still alive and lovingly cared for by her mother and siblings. Her medical condition has not changed. Her father, Nao Kao Lee, died in January of 2003.
   
   This book enriched, and possibly changed, my life. I can't recommend it too highly.



4. Well-written, gripping, thoughtful, thorough investigation into the tragic and seemingly unavoidable events in the life of a sick young girl and her loving family. Everyone wanted the best, but it all went terribly wrong. A compelling example of why we all need to keep learning from each other.



5. The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down
   Never received the book. Was very upset. Would never utilize a 3rd party buyer again. A complete waste of my time.

5 comments about The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals.

1. I read this book a little while ago and didn't have time to review it, but the essential messages keep popping into my consciousness as I go about my day-to-day life. Before reading this book, for example, I had never realized that Corn has cunningly taken over the world and turned us all into "Corn People." Pollan's simple plan - to make three meals - turns into an exploration of all things wrong with the modern industrial food production and delivery system. Pollan's prose is wonderful and his thinking nothing short of brilliant. Even if some of his ideas are not completely original, as some critical reviews argue, this is still a remarkable book that will enrich your life - and the world, if enough people read it.



2. This book contains a clear accounting of the farming of corn and the use
   of corn to make corn syrup and other corn products used in human foods,
   and the problem with the destruction of farming soil and pollution of
   the environment with fertilizers used to increase the yield per acre of
   corn. The Author does not address the problem with adding corn by-products to our dog and cat foods, among which are the basic indigestibility of corn in these animals, and the problem of pet illness that results from the feeding of pet foods with corn products in them.
   This is a great book. To learn more about pet nutrition please
   go to www.amiespetcuisine.com, and see HOW TO COOK FOR YOUR PET.



3. Pollan presents this discussion in an easy-to-read format and gives the reader a well-rounded story. I highly recommend this book and hope that more agriculture schools and nutrition classes use it in the classroom.



4. This is a non-fiction account of the history behind the food we eat. This book describes the great industrial food complex and advocates local, organic foods. Extremely well-researched and well-presented. This was a compelling book and will likely convince you to change your eating habits.



5. I am going to write a review here that I am sure that will get pummeled and give me nothing but nasty comments and a billion negative votes. So let me say some good things first. Pollan is a gifted writer, is engaging and entertaining to read. The book and it's premises though are a sure recipe for global disaster. Pollan is more even-handed and fair than most of the books trumpeting the perils of industrial farming, but let me please try to explain why these arguments are dangerously flawed. I will try and give and intelligent and considered response and those of you who must blast back at me, I only ask that your comments are equally considered.
   
   Many people are scared of industrial farming, the inputs that are used, and the genetic engineering that is advancing farm science. Most of these fears are based upon "frankenscience" designed delilberately to be scary. Scary and sensational sells books, magazines, and newsprint. The "organic" label has been profitable to the tune of billions of dollars and will continue to be so. There is so much momentum in the press about the dangers of industrial farming and too much money to be made for it to stop. On the other hand industrial farming is not going to stop either. We have to eat.
   
   In our society the best way to control how people think is to control the questions posed. When industrial farming is discussed it is presumed to be bad because it is "industrial" and there are chemicals involved. Ergo we have the slew of reporting biased against industrial farming. All of these books may even be right and everything they maintain may prove to be true. I doubt it, but even if it so we have a problem that is ignored by the media when experts pontificate about agricultural issues. The question isn't whether industrial farming is good or bad. The real question is, "there are over 6 billion people on the planet, and the population will grow to be over 9 billion. How are we going to feed everybody?"
   
   The prescription of this book, more local farming and more organic food, is simply a recipe for billions of deaths through starvation. Many people hate it when facts don't fit their preconceived notions or agendas. In fact, I never seen a political party that doesn't suffer from this flaw. My response is neither political nor do I have an agenda. Although you may not listen to what I have to say, I feel compelled to try and point out the simple holes in the logic of this book. You may not thank me for it, but at least I will have tried. This book is irrational because it refuses to face the real question of how to feed everyone. A rationalist is a person who plays the hand of cards they are dealt, not the hand of cards they wish they had. They solutions offered in this book amount to playing the cards we wish to have rather than the ones we do have.
   
   Here are the cards. Land can either be good farmland, tolerable farmland, ranch land, or non-arable. All of the good farmland and tolerable farmland in the world is already being farmed. There are no reserves of land in this world that would make good farmland. You can try to farm ranch ground, or poor farm ground, and you can pursue slash and burn farming in rainforests, but the problem is that the land will only be productive for a few years. After that it is uneconomical to farm it. By that I mean you will put more calories into the farming than you can withdraw. Moreover this land then is subject to erosion and other environmental problems. The simple math is this: there are roughly one billion arable hectares in the world and there are just over 6 billion people. Those are the cards we hold. Can we feed everyone? Yes, for now.
   
   Here are the problems with local production and organic food: local production is fabulous when you can do it, but many people do not live where food is produced. Think of New York City. Obviously NYC cannot grow all the food it needs for its population. They need to import food. This is not a new problem. Ancient Rome was entirely dependent upon food produced in Egypt and other provinces. When people choose to live where the food isn't, there is a cost associated with getting the food to those people. There always has been. However, you also can't wish those people to move to where the food is, because their housing would take up all the farmground. So local markets theoretically work great for certain groups, but it is simply not rational to suggest local production as a solution to world food shortages. There is also a reason why the world looks like it does with densely populated non-agricultural areas and thinly populated agricultural ones. People can't live on the good farmground. Plants have to live there. Therefore, when you really think about it, suggesting local production as a solution is just a preconceived bias that in practical application would cause a lot of people to starve. Sure, some people get to live near the food, and it would be more efficient if they would eat the food produced right next to them rather than food that is shipped halfway round the world. Getting people to do so would make the system slightly more efficient, but it is not going to be the solution. It would be a bandaid on a sucking chest wound. Moreover, it wouldn't work anyway....people don't want it. They like eating bananas from central America, grapes from Chile, lamb from New Zealand, cashews from Vietnam, and cornflakes from Michigan. A diet of only local foods would be very bland compared to the diet to which we have become accustomed. So, you can wish for local production all you want, but those pesky humans are going to mess you up every time. They will pay lots of good money to have tasty foods imported from far distant places.
   
   Local production means local foods only. You won't get others to agree to that after they've tasted the goodies of the rest of the world. I sincererly doubt that most readers of this book are actually willing to eat only on what can be organically grown within 20 miles of their residence. If they are not, then they are just chanting, "do as I say, not as I do", which is the fault I find with this book and the author.
   
   Suggesting organic farming as a solution though is frightening. Let's do that simple math again.....one billion hectares and six billion people. Right now, with incredible amounts of oil-based fertilizer, herbicides, pesticides, chemical inputs, and, whoa, even scarier, genetic technology, we are just managing to basically keep those six billion people fed. Organic farming does without those inputs....and produces about 1/4 the equivalent yield. If the world switched to organic farming then 4.5 bilion people would have to starve to death. Even if you are willing to become the biggest mass murderer in the history of the world, people are not just going to sit there and slowly starve to death for you. No, they will fight for food for themselves and their children. When you do the math you will realize that organic farming is much more harmful than the "bad meat" chant (I'll get to that in a second). Organic farming simply equates into less food output. Less food = less people. Westerners, in a shocking display of hypocrisy, can extoll the virtues of organic farming, decry the use of chemical inputs, suggest local production, etc., while they are chewing on their bananas, dining in expensive restaurants, wearing their leather shoes, burning their oil in their luxury SUV. But we can't have it both ways. To the third world we appear as insufferable, arrogant, self-righteous, and astoundingly stupid hypocrites. Imagine yourself in a west African village explaining organic food and local market approaches. I've been there....they've done it that way for thousands of years. They'd think you were retarded for suggesting back-breaking labor and risk of starvation to have organic food. They have organic food, and they would love to swap places with you. After trying to grow your own food there for a year, organically, you'd want out too. Those villagers would love the chance to use modern inputs to increase their yields, and a trip to a US grocery store would seem like something out of a fairy tale to them. Before espousing organic farming and local production imagine yourself as the person who had to do the labor, moreover you life depends upon your success, and, additionally, say goodbye to anything more intersting than gruel to eat. This book offers answers that sound great in theory, but in real practice you'd find absolutely horrifying.
   
   There are real problems with industrial agriculture, primarily its dependency on oil, but I'd prefer to see the author looking at the real problems and trying to craft solutions that can actually be made to work. Solutions that the other 6 billion people on the planet can live with and you can live with too.
   
   Complaining about the $75 billion that the feds plug into American agriculture is not very well thought out. I'm not going to defend a single thing the USDA does.....but I am going to defend the reason why it started and why it has to stay. Despite being a capitalist country, we can't not have a safety net in regards to food. If we don't produce enough food in this country then people will DIE. Get it? It's a concept called food security because food is the most important thing in a society. If you don't believe that, just don't eat for two weeks. You can go without gasoline for two weeks, you can sleep outside if you have too, you can live without your DVDs....but try living without food. Since it is the one necessary item before all others, for thousands of years nations have had food security policies and practices. The people in power have to keep the people fed. If they don't, they won't be in power long. The United States is no different and never has been. We have been so blessed with good farmland and good practices that it has been 80 years since we had food shortages. Starvation is not a place any person or any country wants to be. Ergo, governments spend money on agriculture. Yes, sometimes they do stupid things, but food security can't be left to chance. The US Govt is not going to stop, nor should it, implementing policies for our food security. They may not get it right, there may be incompetence and corruption, but it is up to us to do something about it when they get it wrong. We should be deeply thankful that they don't leave food security to the "Free Market".
   
   Another problem overlooked in this book is one of labor. Before the green revolution about 90% of the world population had to work in agriculture. In America today less than 1% of our population has to do so. That frees up the other 99 of us to build cars and houses, write novels, practice medicine, run utilities, make movies and clothing....to do everything that brings us to the level of technology, wealth, and health we enjoy today. Without industrial farming we can't have those 99 people creating and sustaining our level of technology.
   
   One last point. The whole "meat is bad because it takes eight pounds of grain to make one pound of meat". That's just embarassingly wrong, pure proganda, and thankfully Mr. Pollan doesn't fall into this particular trap. What that argument is really saying is that midwestern style feedlots that feed corn to cows are inefficient and oh my gosh! People could eat that corn instead! Then no one would have to starve. I've heard this argument meaning times before, from many likable people. The problem is that it's not true; moreover it is obviously not true if you think about it. It's an argument that serves the agenda of people who don't like people eating meat. It's an effectively convincing lie apparently, but it is misinformation serving to score political points. I don't care if people eat meat or not, but I do care when deliberate misinformation is used to create a public opinion. Well let me point out the glaringly obvious. Most of the livestock in this world, well over 98%, will never see a feedlot and they will never get to eat anything a person would eat. Hunh? What? By using a small fact, that to fatten a cow in a Kansas feedlot can take eight pounds of corn to creat one pound of gain, and shouting that to the world, you're left to assume that all meat takes eight pounds of grain to create. Not so. No, most of the cows, goats, sheep, chicken, and other beasties in the world that are slated to be our dinners eat things like grass, insects and weeds. Things we can't eat. In fact, I could make a perfectly good argument that based upon on the meat produced for consumption in the world, against all the grain used to create that meat, that it only take 2 ounces of grain to make one pound of meat! Therefore by not eating meat we're going to cause everyone to starve. As Mark Twain once said, "there are lies, there are damn lies, and then there are statistics". Watch out for the lies and the damn liles, but never believe a statistic. Not even mine. Also be careful of believing what others tell you without thinking it through. If you think about it yourself you will realize that most livestock in the world forage for their food. They're not eating anything a human would eat. The "meat is inefficient" argument is only true if applied to an American feedlot and even then it is still specious (a damn lie) for two reasons. Here is the first reason: even those 2% of animals who get to spend a few weeks eating corn and millet in a Kansas feedlot, so that they wind up tasting better to us, still aren't eating human food. Pollan points out they are eating corn that humans can't eat and wouldn't want to eat. Therefore it is a damn lie that what the feedlot cow ate can have been equivalent to 8 times more food for the starving whomever. Now, the anti-meat group's rejoinder is going to be, "yeah, but the land that grows that non-human corn could have been used to grow real human food." Not really. Anti-meat people, because of their bias, tend not to really undrestand much about agriculture as a science. Yes, some of that land used to produce corn to feed cows could be put into human food production; and I guarantee once the need for it is there it will be put into human food production. Farmers make a lot more money on human food than they do on animal feed (humans have more disposable income than cows). So again, the implication of the anti-meat crowd is that we lost 8 times the calories we could have had....not true. If we needed those calories then humans would have gotten them and the pro-meat crowd would have to eat veal rather than steak. Humans are going to get fed before cows do. But the real problem with the "that land could have grown human food" argument is that it is wrong. Those people, because they don't know even the basics about agriculture, conveniently leave out the need for a little thing called crop rotation. It means you don't keep planting the exact same crop over and over again in the same place. You have to rotate crops. Some of our major crops, such as millet, sorghum, and corn, are grown for reasons other than direct human consumption. That turns out to be handy because it means we can rotate crops and keep yields up year after year. Let me try to explain. I could plant wheat five times in a row, but my yields will fall if I do. If I rotate millet into the cycle then maybe I only grow wheat three years and millet one year and sunflower seeds one year during a five year cycle. However, I'll have as much wheat out of my farm as you will have on yours if you tried growing wheat five times in a row. So it turns out the the millet I feed to my dairy or beef cows didn't really cost the world any extra food, did it? Indeed, now I get to eat milk, cheese and ice cream, maybe even a steak once in a while....
   
   Most arguments about food production can be picked apart like I tried to do in the above. The arguments are created to support someone's idea of how they think things should be. They have an agenda, and then they seek facts to support their agenda. I don't have an agenda, but I do see that we have problems. An increasing world population, decreasing genetic variety, soil getting tired, erosion, lack of technology, experience, and inputs for Africa and much of the rest of the third world, depleting phospate reserves, depleting oil reserves, and inconstant weather are all going to be challenges as we go forward. I'd love to see a well-reasoned and rationally sound blueprint that, politics and agendas aside, considers how we are really going to feed 6 billion people now, 9 billion people in 30 years, and how to do it consistently for the next thousand years. This is the real question, and billions of people are relying on us to provide real solutions, ones that everyone can live with. This book unfortunately doesn't do that.