Staff Picks
#BroaderBookshelf 2021: Read A Social Science Book (30 Must-Read Titles)
- Mona Verma
- Monday, January 11, 2021
Collection
The Social Animal
The Hidden Sources of Love, Character, and Achievement
Published in 2011
Looks at current research from a variety of disciplines by following the lives and unconscious motivations of a hypothetical American couple as they grow, meet, and change throughout their lives.
Chokehold
Policing Black Men
Published in 2017
"Cops, politicians, and ordinary people are afraid of black men. The result is the Chokehold: laws and practices that treat every African American man like a thug. In this explosive new book, an African American former federal prosecutor shows that the system is working exactly the way it's supposed to. Black men are always under watch, and police violence is widespread--all with the support of judges and politicians. In his no-holds-barred style, Butler, whose scholarship has been featured on 60 Minutes, uses new data to demonstrate that white men commit the majority of violent crime in the United States. For example, a white woman is ten times more likely to be raped by a white male acquaintance than be the victim of a violent crime perpetrated by a black man. Butler also frankly discusses the problem of black on black violence and how to keep communities safer--without relying as much on police. Chokehold powerfully demonstrates why current efforts to reform law enforcement will not create lasting change. Butler's controversial recommendations about how to crash the system, and when it's better for a black man to plead guilty--even if he's innocent--are sure to be game-changers in the national debate about policing, criminal justice, and race relations"-- Provided by publisher.
Quiet Power
The Secret Strengths of Introverts
Published in 2016
"The monumental bestseller Quiet has been recast in a new edition that empowers introverted kids and teens. Susan Cain sparked a worldwide conversation when she published Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking. With her inspiring book, she permanently changed the way we see introverts and the way introverts see themselves. The original book focused on the workplace, and Susan realized that a version for and about kids was also badly needed. This book is all about kids' world--school, extracurriculars, family life, and friendship. You'll read about actual kids who have tackled the challenges of not being extroverted and who have made a mark in their own quiet way. You'll hear Susan Cain's own story, and you'll be able to make use of the tips at the end of each chapter. There's even a guide at the end of the book for parents and teachers. This insightful, accessible, and empowering book, illustrated with amusing comic-style art, will be eye-opening to extroverts and introverts alike"-- Provided by publisher.
Invisible Women
Data Bias in a World Designed for Men
Published in 2019
"Data is fundamental to the modern world. From economic development, to healthcare, to education and public policy, we rely on numbers to allocate resources and make crucial decisions. But because so much data fails to take into account gender, because it treats men as the default and women as atypical, bias and discrimination are baked into our systems. And women pay tremendous costs for this bias, in time, money, and often with their lives. Celebrated feminist advocate Caroline Criado Perez investigates the shocking root cause of gender inequality and research in Invisible Women, diving into women's lives at home, the workplace, the public square, the doctor's office, and more. Built on hundreds of studies in the US, the UK, and around the world, and written with energy, wit, and sparkling intelligence, this is a groundbreaking, unforgettable exposé that will change the way you look at the world."--provided by publisher.
The Origin of Species
By Means of Natural Selection of the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life
Published in 2003
States the evidence for a theory of evolution, explains how evolution takes place, and discusses instinct, hybridism, fossils, distribution and classification.
Excellent Sheep
The Miseducation of the American Elite and the Way to a Meaningful Life
Published in 2014
"A groundbreaking manifesto for people searching for the kind of insight on leading, thinking, and living that elite schools should be--but aren't--providing"-- Provided by publisher.
Guns, Germs, and Steel
The Fates of Human Societies
Published in 2005
Guns, Germs, and Steel is a brilliant work answering the question of why the peoples of certain continents succeeded in invading other continents and conquering or displacing their peoples. This edition includes a new chapter on Japan and all-new illustrations drawn from the television series. Until around 11,000 BC, all peoples were still Stone Age hunter/gatherers. At that point, a great divide occurred in the rates that human societies evolved. In Eurasia, parts of the Americas, and Africa, farming became the prevailing mode of existence when indigenous wild plants and animals were domesticated by prehistoric planters and herders. As Jared Diamond vividly reveals, the very people who gained a head start in producing food would collide with preliterate cultures, shaping the modern world through conquest, displacement, and genocide. The paths that lead from scattered centers of food to broad bands of settlement had a great deal to do with climate and geography. But how did differences in societies arise? Why weren't native Australians, Americans, or Africans the ones to colonize Europe? Diamond dismantles pernicious racial theories tracing societal differences to biological differences. He assembles convincing evidence linking germs to domestication of animals, germs that Eurasians then spread in epidemic proportions in their voyages of discovery. In its sweep, Guns, Germs and Steel encompasses the rise of agriculture, technology, writing, government, and religion, providing a unifying theory of human history as intriguing as the histories of dinosaurs and glaciers. Thirty-two illustrations.
Collapse
How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed
Published in 2011
"A magisterial effort packed with insight and written with clarity and enthusiasm. It's also the deal of the year--the equivalent of a year's college course by an engaging, brilliant professor, all for the price of a book."
White Fragility
Why It's So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism
Published in 2018
"In this groundbreaking and timely book, antiracist educator Robin DiAngelo deftly illuminates the phenomenon of white fragility. Referring to the defensive moves that white people make when challenged racially, white fragility is characterized by emotions such as anger, fear, and guilt, and by behaviors including argumentation and silence. These behaviors, in turn, function to reinstate white racial equilibrium and prevent any meaningful cross-racial dialogue. In this in-depth exploration, DiAngelo explores how white fragility develops, how it protects racial inequality, and what we can do to engage more constructively."--Back cover.
Integration Nation
Immigrants, Refugees, and America at Its Best
Published in 2016
"Integration Nation takes readers on a spirited and compelling cross-country journey, introducing us to the people challenging America's xenophobic impulses by welcoming immigrants and collaborating with the foreign-born as they become integral members of their new communities. In Utah, we meet educators who connect newly arrived Spanish-speaking students and U.S.-born English-speaking students, who share classrooms and learn in two languages. In North Carolina, we visit the nation's fastest-growing community-development credit union, serving immigrants and U.S.- born depositors and helping to lower borrowing thresholds and crime rates alike. In recent years, politicians in a handful of local communities and states have passed laws and regulations designed to make it easier to deport unauthorized immigrants or to make their lives so unpleasant that they'd just leave. The media's unrelenting focus on these ultimately self-defeating measures created the false impression that these politicians speak for most of America. They don't. Integration Nation movingly reminds us that we each have choices to make about how to think and act in the face of the rapid cultural transformation that has reshaped the United States. Giving voice to people who choose integration over exclusion, who opt for open-heartedness instead of fear, Integration Nation is a desperately needed road map for a nation still finding its way beyond anti-immigrant hysteria to higher ground"-- Provided by publisher.
Nickel and Dimed
On (not) Getting by in America
Published in 2011
"Millions of Americans work full-time, year-round, for poverty-level wages. In 1998, Barbara Ehrenreich decided to join them. She was inspired in part by the rhetoric surrounding welfare reform, which promised that a job--any job--can be the ticket to a better life. But how does anyone survive, let alone prosper, on $6 an hour? To find out, Ehrenreich left her home, took the cheapest lodgings she could find, and accepted whatever jobs she was offered. Moving from Florida to Maine to Minnesota, she worked as a waitress, a hotel maid, a cleaning woman, a nursing home aide, and a Wal-Mart sales clerk. She lived in trailer parks and crumbling residential motels. Very quickly, she discovered that no job is truly "unskilled," that even the lowliest occupations require exhausting mental and muscular effort. She also learned that one job is not enough; you need at least two if you intend to live indoors. Nickel and Dimed reveals low-rent America in all its tenacity, anxiety, and surprising generosity--a land of Big Boxes, fast food, and a thousand desperate strategems for survival. Read it for the smoldering clarity of Ehrenreich's perspective and for a rare view of how "prosperity" looks from the bottom. You will never see anything--from a motel bathroom to a restaurant meal--quite the same way again. "-- Provided by publisher.
Outliers
The Story of Success
Published in 2008
The best-selling author of Blink identifies the qualities of successful people, posing theories about the cultural, family, and idiosyncratic factors that shape high achievers, in a resource that covers such topics as the secrets of software billionaires, why certain cultures are associated with better academic performance, and why the Beatles earned their fame.
The Mismeasure of Man
Published in 1996
This book was immediately hailed as a masterwork when first published in 1981, the answer to those who would rank people according to their supposed genetic gifts and limits. And yet the idea of innate limits--of biology as destiny--dies hard, as witness the attention devoted to "The Bell Curve," whose arguments are here so effectively anticipated and thoroughly undermined by biologist Gould. In this revised edition, Dr. Gould traces the subsequent history of the controversy on innateness. Further, he has added five essays on questions of "The Bell Curve" in particular and on race, racism, and biological determinism in general.--From publisher description.
The Righteous Mind
Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion
Published in 2012
A groundbreaking investigation into the origins of morality, which turns out to be the basis for religion and politics. The book explains the American culture wars and refutes the "New Atheists."
Sapiens
A Brief History of Humankind
Published in 2015
A narrative history of humanity's creation and evolution explores how biology and history have defined understandings of what it means to be human, detailing the role of modern cognition in shaping the ecosystem, civilizations and more.
Thinking, Fast and Slow
Published in 2011
Kahneman exposes the extraordinary capabilities and also the faults and biases of fast thinking, and the pervasive influence of intuitive impressions on peoples' thoughts and choices.
Freakonomics
A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything
Published in 2006
"Which is more dangerous, a gun or a swimming pool? What do schoolteachers and sumo wrestlers have in common? Why do drug dealers still live with their moms? How much do parents really matter? How did the legalization of abortion affect the rate of violent crime? These may not sound like typical questions for an economist to ask. But Steven D. Levitt is not a typical economist. He is a much-heralded scholar who studies the riddles of everyday life--from cheating and crime to sports and child rearing--and his conclusions regularly turn the conventional wisdom on its head ... Through forceful storytelling and wry insight, Levitt and Dubner show that economics is, at root, the study of incentives--how people get what they want, or need, especially when other people want or need the same thing. In Freakonomics, they explore the hidden side of, well--everything ... If morality represents how we would like the world to work, then economics represents how it actually does work."-- Book jacket, front flap.
The Communist Manifesto.
Published in 2013
One of the world's most influential political manuscripts. Commissioned by the Communist League and written by communist theorists Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, it laid out the League's purposes and program. It presents an analytical approach to the class struggle (historical and present) and the problems of capitalism, rather than a prediction of communism's potential future forms.
Capital in the Twenty-first Century
Published in 2014
Piketty analyzes a unique collection of data from twenty countries, ranging as far back as the eighteenth century, to uncover key economic and social patterns and shows that modern economic growth and the diffusion of knowledge have allowed us to avoid inequalities. He argues, however, that the tendency of returns on capital to exceed the rate of economic growth will generate extreme inequalities that stir discontent and undermine democratic values if political action is not taken.
Enlightenment Now
The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress
Published in 2018
An assessment of the human condition in the twenty-first century presents data demonstrating that life quality, health, prosperity, safety, peace, knowledge, and happiness are on the rise throughout the world because of the Enlightenment ideal of using reason and science.
Everybody Lies
Big Data, New Data, and What the Internet Can Tell Us About Who We Really Are
Published in 2017
Hillbilly Elegy
A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis
Published in 2016
Shares the story of the author's family and upbringing, describing how they moved from poverty to an upwardly mobile clan that included the author, a Yale Law School graduate, while navigating the demands of middle class life and the collective demons of the past.
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Taste in an Age of Endless Choice
Published in 2016
"From the best-selling author of Traffic, a brilliant and entertaining exploration of our personal tastes--why we like the things we like, and what it says about us,"--NoveList.
American Character
A History of the Epic Struggle Between Individual Liberty and the Common Good
Published in 2016