Rowman & Littlefield Publishers Blog

Bicentenary of the Abolition of the Slave Trade Act

2007 marks the 200^th anniversary of the abolition of the slave trade in the British Empire. March 25, 2007 was the exact anniversary of the passing of the Abolition of the Slave Trade Act, which outlawed the slave trade throughout the British Empire and made it illegal for British ships to be involved in the trade.

The website, Parliament and the British Slave Trade 1600-1807, features key documents from the period, including: an anti-slavery petition with over 2,000 signatures from 1806, part of the actual 1807 Act of Parliament, a pro-slavery trade petition, and a learning section for schools.

Upcoming conferences and events:

Beyond Slavery in the Iberian Atlantic Conference in Liverpool (UK) in September 2007

Abolition of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade: Telling the Story Conference in the Bahamas in February 2008
 Commemorating the Abolition of the Atlantic Slave Trade Conference in South Carolina in March 2008

Numerous events in the UK can be found at Abolition 200  

Plutarco Elías Calles and the Mexican Revolution Wins Award

Jürgen Buchenau’s Plutarco Elías Calles and the Mexican Revolution received the 2007 Alfred B. Thomas Award of the South Eastern Council on Latin American Studies, which is awarded annually for the best book on a Latin American subject published by a SECOLAS member in the previous year. Congratulations!

Aggression in Children: Sealing Off the Fountain

By David A. Crenshaw, Ph.D., ABPP, RPT-S

 

One of the most poignant metaphors for understanding extremely aggressive children comes not from the field of psychology but from literature. C.S. Lewis in his book, The Four Loves (1965) uses this metaphor in an entirely different context but I find it succinctly captures the heart of the pain of many aggressive children. Lewis states, “they seal off the very fountain from which they thirst to drink” (p.65). How sad, how true this is for children who adopt the strategy of keeping others at a distance by their aggressive behavior, thereby protecting from further hurt but “sealing off the very fountain from which they thirst to drink.” They ensure their isolation, their disconnection, thus depriving themselves of what makes life endurable—meaningful closeness with others. James Garbarino (1999) in the Lost Boys observes that so often we do not get close enough to notice the “traumatized child within.” Bruce Perry (2006) observes in his book, The Boy Who was Raised as Dog, that “by conservative estimates, about 40 percent of American children will have at least one potentially traumatizing experience by age eighteen: this includes the death of a parent or a sibling, ongoing physical abuse and/or neglect, sexual abuse, or the experience of a serious accident, natural disaster or domestic violence or other violent crime” (pp. 2-3). Kenneth Hardy and Tracy Laszloffy (2005) in Teens Who Hurt discuss the “invisible wounds” and profound losses aggressive and sometimes violent teens suffer. While violence is never a solution, we must appreciate the complex dimensions to these problems if we wish to address adequately the issue of youth aggression.

Sometimes we don’t see the “traumatized child within”, “the invisible wounds” or the “fawn in the gorilla suit” because we become inducted as parents, teachers, and therapists in the overly punitive climate that permeates our culture. The German poet and philosopher Goethe once said, “We see in the world, what we carry in our heart.” How is it that we don’t notice the inner pain that drives the acting-out behavior of our children? The notion that more punitive approaches, harsher punishment, and longer periods of incarceration will resolve the problem of youth violence ignores the reality pointed out by Anna Freud more than 60 years ago that these approaches are hardly novel. When these children are already broken down in spirit does it make sense to subject them to even harsher and more punitive correctional methods? As Kenneth V. Hardy, Director of the Eikenberg Institute for Relationships in New York City, has stated, “Children need less correction, and more connection. They need less confrontation, and more validation.” Raffi Cavoukian (Cavoukian & Olfman, 2006) writes, “Children who feel seen, loved, and honored are far more able to become loving parents and productive citizens. Children who do not feel valued are disproportionately represented on welfare roles and police records. Much of the criminal justice system deals with the results of childhood wounding (the vast majority of sexual offenders, for example, were themselves violated as children), and much of the social service sector represents an attempt to rectify or moderate this damage, which comes at an enormous cost to society. Most of the correctional work is too little, too late” (pp. xi-xx).

One of the most effective ways to validate children is to recognize and honor what they have to give, to highlight their strengths and talents, to find in them what Robert Brooks describes as “islands of competence” and to build on them. In support of Hardy’s and Brook’s views, sociologist Roger Curry (2004) in his book The Road to Whatever, reported on his interviews with today’s youth. He discovered that a crucial turning point in the lives of these young people was learning or relearning how to care about themselves—to view themselves as people who mattered. Clearly, these turning points are facilitated when “charismatic adults” (a term coined by the late Dr. Julius Segal) are available to the adolescents (Brooks and Goldstein, 2004). Brooks and Goldstein explain that a charismatic adult “is an adult from whom a child can gather strength.” In studies of resilience, the presence of at least one charismatic adult is one of the key factors enabling youth to overcome adversity in their lives.

While our culture is oriented toward punishment and correctional approaches, the research consistently shows that it is meaningful connections between youth and the key adults in their lives that enable young people to turn their lives around in a positive way. In the absence of healing relationships with committed adults today’s lonely and alienated youth will continue in their desperate attempts to protect from further hurt, to “seal off the very fountain from which they thirst to drink.”

References:

Brooks, R. and Goldstein, S. (2004). Raising resilient children: Fostering strength, hope, and optimism in your child. New York: McGraw-Hill.

Cavoukian, R. & Olfman, S. (2006). Child honoring: How to turn this world around. Westport, CT: Praeger.

Currie, E. (2004). The road to whatever: Middle-Class culture and the crisis of adolescence. New York: Metropolitan Books.

Garbarino, J. (1999). Lost boys: Why our sons turn violent and how we can save them. New York: Anchor Books, A Division of Random House.

Hardy, K. V., & Laszloffy, T. (2005). Teens who hurt: Clinical interventions to break the cycle of adolescent violence. New York: Guilford Press.

Lewis, C. S. (1960). The four loves. New York: Harcourt Brace.

Perry, B. D. (with Szalavitz, M.). (2006). The boy who was raised as a dog and other stories from a child psychiatrist’s notebook: What traumatized children can teach us about loss, love, and healing. New York: Basic Books.

David A. Crenshaw, Ph.D., ABPP is the founding director of Rhinebeck and Child Family Center, LLC, in Rhinebeck, New York. He is Board Certified in Clinical Psychology and a Registered Play Therapist Supervisor. He is the author of Bereavement, Evocative Strategies in Child and Adolescent Psychotherapy and a forthcoming book, Healing Paths to a Child's Soul. Additionally, he is co-author with John Mordock, Ph.D. of A Handbook of Play Therapy with Aggressive Children and Understanding and Treating the Aggression of Children: Fawns in Gorilla Suits, both published by Jason Aronson Publishers.

Is Energy a Public Good?

            Why do politicians get involved in the energy debate? Wherever a renewable energy forum appears, elected officials are sure to be present, using the open dais as an opportunity to make another pledge to clean-up our communities and our environment, to push for more green energy. Cynics believe this is just symbolic politics—elected officials appealing to constituents through public statements; pledging renewable energy incentive programs and offering various sums for “demonstration projects.” Is all of this chatter and policy of any importance? In reviewing the tremendous growth in renewable energy demand, the answer is: yes. The politicians and their policies are effecting change, they are moving the debate from the theoretical to the practical.

Green energy discussion groups and industry-related websites have proliferated in recent years. The phrase “sustainable community” has become a permanent mantra in public dialogue related to municipal development or re-development. Demand for “green energy” and the associated renewable energy technology is on the rise; solar panel shipments have taken a dramatic leap forward in recent years. The Chinese are attempting to gain a share of the international solar photovoltaic markets (WSJ, May 23, 2007, pg. C1, “The China Solar Hotbed”).

            US public policy is moving renewable forms of energy from a niche to center stage. However, externalities also exist, as pointed out in the WSJ article on the evolving food supply for domestic livestock (WSJ, May 21, 2007, pg. A1, “With Corn Prices Rising, Pigs Switch to Fatty Snacks”). Nevertheless, as a percentage of energy consumed, renewable energy has made paltry gains and is unlikely to make significant advances for quite some time. 

So, what is really happening? Is it the symbolic politics of the new millennium or is it something bigger? A substantive philosophical debate under girds the proclamations of officialdom; it is a debate certainly worthy of public attention. The debate is about the nature of energy as a good. Is energy a private good? Is it a public good? Or, is energy a marketable public good?

            What is the nature of goods? Goods can be thought of along two dimensions—in terms of rivalry and excludability. An auction is a way of considering rivalry in the marketplace. At an auction, an item is up for bid and the person with the highest bid gets the good or service. Essentially it is a “win-lose” scenario. Some individual or individuals “win” while others “lose.” Excludability refers to the nature of use of a good or service. If I’m using a good or service, can you simultaneously enjoy the good or service? Consider a canoe ride. When we pay to access a private lake, do we enjoy private use of the lake or do others use it simultaneously?

Private goods are goods that are both rivalrous and excludable—such as the auction item that was purchased. Pure public goods are neither rivalrous nor excludable—regardless of price, public goods cannot be exclusive because they are important to everyone, to every individuals’ very existence. A good example of a public good is potable water or clean air. Goods that do not fit neatly into either extreme category are often subject to political debate regarding their nature as marketable public goods or simply as marketable private goods. For example, private toll roads are not excludable—others travel down the road at the same time you do if they pay for the privilege. In traveling across the

            US or other developed nations, one quickly notices interstate systems. These roads can be justified because interstate roads can be seen as a marketable public good in a modern society—public interstate systems mean that products and services and people can more easily move around so as to meet their basic needs in a modern society. 

            So, is energy a—private good? Public good? Marketable public good? The history of the 20^th century would indicate that much of US energy policy is built around the notion of energy being, in some respects, a marketable public good—particularly when it comes to electrical energy. The Rural Electrification Act of 1936, for example, was a government program to provide cheap and affordable electricity to rural areas. At the time, private electricity generators were opposed to government projects such as TVA. They would effectively stunt their business. What would justify the great dam building exercise? Among other things, one could argue that it was an example of government accepting the idea that energy in one form was a marketable public good—in a modernizing society, electricity served a necessary function without which a large-scale modern citizenry could not easily exist. 

More recently, energy has move further down the path towards public goods status with policies that extend beyond our earlier goals—EP Act of 2005, for instance, covers a whole host of energy priorities. States effectively mandate green energy production shaping both significant aspects of energy supply and demand. Anxiety has created the perfect storm—energy supply, public health, and environmental policy are the key issues. An accepted reality, “peak oil,” threatens to disrupt the foundations of modernity; an oft-overlooked “commons,” the platform upon which all other interchange occurs. Concurrently, ever-tightening EPA emissions standards signal to any observer that fossil energy produces a public goods dilemma impacting the environment and public health.

Other nations of the world are further down this path. European nations have well-established standards on everything from the use of low energy light bulbs to public health and promotion of green energy. For the EU, the political debate has ended and the public nature of energy is widely accepted. In terms of energy supply, Hugo Chavez’s nationalization of Venezuelan petroleum could be viewed as certainly a very large step away from the private goods nature of one significant form of fossil energy.

            What happens is the U.S.A. when and if energy moves closer to the “public goods” category? As a public good, energy stands a high probability of being mismanaged. Over-consumption is a problem, commonly called the “tragedy of the commons.” One current concern focuses on Venezuelan oilfields--wells may suffer significant pressure drops due to mismanagement by government officials who are driven by different motives than private energy concerns once broadly entrusted with extraction and processing activities.   

On a positive note, the evolving energy dialogue will force a debate about the nature of modern society. In many ways, one could argue that modernity increases the vulnerability of the individual; potentially enlarging our notion of public goods. Conversely, there are those who would argue that we haven’t created more public goods; we’ve actually just expanded markets and we should let markets offer guidance. For the latter group, government encroachment on what is seen as a market will take us further down Hayek’s dystopian “road to serfdom.”  Alternatively, for those who favor the former perspective—the public goods perspective—a future involving increased government involvement in energy policy is seen in terms of social equitability.

Given what is at stake, the utterances of elected officials should be taken seriously and understood for what the words represent—a serious debate about the present and the future of a significant aspect of modern or post-modern existence.

CHRISTOPHER A. SIMON is an Associate Professor of Political Science at University of Nevada, Reno. He is the author of Alternative Energy—Political, Economic, and Social Feasibility (Rowman & Littlefield, 2007); Public Policy—Preferences and Outcomes (Longman, 2007).

More Q & A on Jamestown with Bob Deans

Q. How did tobacco save Jamestown, what did King James think of it and how did it lead to the first Anglo-American marriage on record?

A. Learning from the Indians, Colonist John Rolfe helped develop the first cash crop in English America, cultivating a strain of tobacco that grew well in the Virginia riverside loam. Virginia tobacco became an immediate hit in London, despite the rantings of King James, who found smoking "loathsome to the eye, hateful to the nose, harmful to the brain (and) dangerous to the lungs." Centuries ahead of his time medically, the king was unable to curb demand for the addictive weed, the profits from which made Rolfe, a widower, an attractive catch for Pocahontas. They were married in the spring of 1614, the first Anglo-America couple on record.

 

Q. What led to the formation of the first democratic body in the Western Hemisphere at Jamestown, just how democratic was it and what sort of legislation did the body take up?

A. With Jamestown still struggling 12 years after its founding, Virginia Company leaders decided to let the colonists themselves have a hand in running operations that, until then, were controlled in London, mostly by men who'd never seen the New World. Democracy wasn't exactly what the company had in mind: 

hands-on management is closer to the mark. But on July 30, 1619, two elected representatives from each of eleven James River settlements gathered as the

burgesses with royal Gov. George Yeardley and his six-member state council at the rustic Anglican church at Jamestown. Two burgesses were promptly dismissed as their settlement claimed to be above the assembly's law. Only men could participate, and only those who owned land at that. However rough hewn, it was the first representative government in America and it took up matters both profound and mundane, prohibiting laziness, gambling and card-playing, while calling into question the authority of the king and Parliament to set policies for the colony.

 

Q. Where did the first Africans to arrive in English American come from, what did they find when they arrived and how is it the seeds of democracy and slavery were sown side by side along the banks of the James?

A. In the summer of 1619, a Dutch man-of-war and a British corsair attacked a Portuguese slave ship off the coast of Vera Cruz and stole an unknown number of Africans. They had been captured by African mercenaries from a village far inland along the great Kwanza River and wound up in the James River settlements just three weeks after the burgesses adjourned. Slavery was not practiced in Virginia at the time, though it was well established in other European colonies in the Caribbean and South America. Some of the Africans served as indentured servants and wound up eventually free. Over the coming decades, though, the elected burgesses drew sharp distinctions between the rights of white people and those of Africans and their descendants, leading to the eventual evolution of a full-blown slave society by the later part of the 17th Century.

 

Q. When was the first colonial wife auction, why were the early shipments of women derided as the "fishing fleet" and who were these bold women who risked their lives crossing the Atlantic for a New World stake in Virginia?

A. In 1621, it dawned on the Virginia Company that without women to work the gardens, dress the game, make the clothes and bear new offspring, Jamestown would never establish itself as a place where proper Englishmen actually wanted to live. The problem: the company was broke. To raise money to send women to Jamestown, the company sold shares of stock. A handsome return was promised: settlers were charged between 120 and 150 pounds of tobacco for the privilege of taking a bride. Nearly a hundred women came to Virginia that year as part of what was derisively called the "fishing fleet," given each woman's supposed hope of landing a match.

 

For more information on the 400th anniversary of the founding of Jamestown, click here.

Bob Deans is author of The River Where America Began: A Journey Along the James.

 

Kenneth Dorter wins Canadian Philosophical Association/ Broadview Press Prize in the History of Philosophy

Lexington Books would like to congratulate Kenneth Dorter on winning Canadian Philosophical Association/ Broadview Press Prize in the History of Philosophy with his new book The Transformation of Plato's Republic. Ken Dorter, in  passage-by-passage analysis, traces Plato's depiction of how the most basic forms of human functioning and social justice contain the seed of their evolution into increasingly complex structures, as well as the seed of their degeneration. Kenneth Dorter is professor of philosophy at University of Guelph, and his book was also a CHOICE Outstanding Title for 2006.  Congratulations Dr. Dorter!

Q & A with Bob Deans on Jamestown

The Jamestown story is the original tale of the making of America. It has heightened relevance today, as the country struggles to refine its identity and redefine its purpose in a world wracked by terror and fundamentalist rage. What does Jamestown tell us about ourselves as a diverse and dynamic democracy? What does it say about he perils of culture clashes poorly understood? And how do the myths and memories of Jamestown help to shape modern day notions about what it is to be an American?

Here are some questions about the Jamestown settlement posed to Bob Deans, National Correspondent for Cox Newspapers and author of The River Where America Began, followed by his responses:

Q. How long had Native Americans roamed Virginia before the English arrived, how many Indians were there in Virginia when Jamestown was settled and how much did they depend upon the river system the English settlers occupied?

A. Native Americans were using Virginia's James River 15,000 years before the English arrived, recent archaeological evidence affirms. Archaeologists believe some 25,000 Native Americans may have lived in Virginia in 1607, though others contend the number may have been higher. They built a rich and highly organized civilization along the spine of the James River.

 

Q. Who was the most powerful leader in Virginia when the English arrived in 1607?

A. Wahunsenacawh, known to the English as Powhatan, was born in a hilltop village at present-day Richmond, overlooking the falls of the James River. By 1607, he presided over a chiefdom called Tsenacomoco, taking in some 14,000 people in an area that spanned the eastern third of present-day Virginia.

Q. Who was Pocahontas, what was her relationship to Capt. John Smith and how important of a character was she historically?

A. The favorite daughter of Powhatan’s, Pocahontas was a remarkable woman who was, at a minimum, a close ally and probably soul mate to Smith, who wrote that she twice saved his life. It's hard to imagine that Jamestown would have survived without her.

Q. What was the "Starving Time," how many settlers died, and how did Jamestown survive it?

  A. During the winter of 1609-10, a lackluster harvest, sour Indian relations and poor leadership led to famine in Jamestown, with starving settlers eating rats, boiling shoe leather and ultimately resorting to cannibalism to survive. Some 500 colonists were there in autumn; by spring all but 60 were dead. Jamestown was given up for failure and, in fact, abandoned—but only, as fate would have it, for 24 hours. As dispirited deserters headed down river in hopes of returning to London, they were met by reinforcements and a new leader who ordered them all to return to the site of their ghastly ordeal.

More Q & A with Bob Deans to come. . .

Virgilio Elizondo Named Top Catholic Theologian

The Catholic Theological Society of America, a venerable association of leading theologians in the United States, whose membership includes the outspoken Rev. Charles Curran, named Rev. Virgilio Elizondo of the University of Notre Dame its 2007 John Courtney Murray Award Winner for his distinguished work in theology. R&L proudly publishes several works by Fr. Elizondo, including The Treasure of Guadalupe (2006), A God of Incredible Surprises (2004), and Way of the Cross (2002).

The CTSA's commendation for Fr. Elizondo reads as follows:

* John Courtney Murray Award 2007:
Virgilio Elizondo *

The person who will receive the John Courtney Murray award tonight embodies many of the contending forces and identities that characterize our world today, and he does so with grace and humor. One commentator has described our honoree as someone committed to the basic message “that God cherishes, esteems, values, respects, treasures, forgives, and loves every one of us.” Another has described this person as bringing out the best in others, but our colleague would be more inclined to say that the first proclamation of the Gospel occurs when we are willing to learn from everyone, even the most inconspicuous of people.

Our honoree has reported that as a child, “the parish was the only institution where we felt fully at home” and yet today seems “at home” in a variety of nations and cultures.

Our colleague has written on topics as diverse as poverty, preaching, modern culture and Christian faith, creativity, ritual, and catechesis. He served twenty years on the editorial board of Concilium. Among the places he has taught are UC Santa Barbara, Union Seminary, Boston College, and the Claremont School of Theology.

He studied on three continents, doing his doctoral work at the Institut Catholique in Paris. He has served as faculty member, director of religious education, academic dean, and president. He has received several honorary doctorates and has been honored with awards from various universities, the National Conference of Christians and Jews, and the National Federation of Priests Councils.

His stature has been recognized beyond academe. He has appeared on the MacNeil/Lehrer News Hour and Ted Koppel’s Nightline. Time magazine recognized him as one of the leading spiritual innovators in the US. In addition, I would venture to guess that he is the only member of the CTSA who has had a city plaza named in his honor.

When our honoree decided to enter the seminary, he didn’t even have to leave his home parish. In fact, although he is an internationally renowned author and speaker, he has lived in the same neighborhood most of his life. Like the Israelites of old, our honoree is no individualist: his theological vision is fundamentally shaped by his belonging to a people, a minority culture in the United States. And of course, it is precisely those who know multiple cultures who can show us how to break down the divisive barriers between peoples.

His own experience of straddling boundaries has given him great empathy for those who must struggle to live in the present without feeling torn apart (or as he puts it, without feeling “disintegrated”) in their encounters with marginalization and injustice. For him, this very search for meaning is decisive to the experience of faith and the proclamation of the Gospel. And yet in spite of the injustices, he has also said that “the totality of life is reflected in celebration . . . which is not an escape from the world of problems but a bringing of the whole day into the recognition that life is a gift. Life is to be lived, appreciated, and celebrated.”

Our honoree tonight was born in 1935, was ordained a diocesan priest in 1963, and served as the rector of the Cathedral for twelve years. He has spoken often of the two conquests that the indigenous peoples of the region have endured: the Spanish conquest of a continent and a half and the U.S. conquest of what is now the Southwest. Thus it is out of the experience of this history that he founded a series of liturgical rituals, including the re-enactment at Christmas of the journey of Mary and Joseph, with the couple being turned away at city hall, the courthouse, and hotels, before finding shelter at the cathedral.
Our honoree founded the Mexican American Cultural Center in 1972 and was its first president. He was the executive producer, chief liturgist, and frequent celebrant of the only internationally televised live Mass in the Americas. His books include The Human Quest: A Search for Meaning through Life and Death; A God of Incredible Surprises: Jesus of Galilee; Galilean Journey: The Mexican-American Promise; Guadalupe: Mother of the New Creation; and Way of the Cross: The Passion of Christ in the Americas. He is currently Professor of Pastoral and Hispanic Theology at the University of Notre Dame.

This colleague of ours is widely recognized in the religious and academic world as “the father of U.S. Latino religious thought.” He has not only written extensively in this field but has been a mentor and even a father figure for many of our colleagues in Hispanic, Latino, and Latina theology. In fact, the highest award given by ACHTUS, the Academy of Catholic Hispanic Theologians of the United States is named in his honor. But he has also helped innumerable of us Anglos in the North to understand the insights that arise from Hispanic faith and theology in the South

For all these reasons, the Catholic Theological Society of America tonight presents the John Courtney Murray Award, its highest honor for distinguished achievement in theology, to Fr. Virgilio Elizondo.

Richard Rorty, preeminent American philosopher, dies at age 75

Rowman & Littlefield Publishers shares in the sadness over the loss of the American philosopher, Richard Rorty, who died on June 8.  In addition to the New York Times' obituary (http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/11/obituaries/11rorty.html?ex=1339214400&en=74964b043eba78bd&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss), please also read Scott McLemee's tribute on InsideHigherEd:  http://insidehighered.com/views/2007/06/13/mclemee).  Rowman & Littlefield is pleased to have published several books on Rorty's thought, including:  Richard Rorty: Politics and Vision by Christopher Voparil (2006); Richard Rorty: Education, Philosophy, and Politics, ed. by Michael Peters and Paulo Ghiraldelli; and A Pragmatist's Progress: Richard Rorty and American Intellectual History, ed. by John Pettegrew.

From the Publisher

Dear Reader,

Does any initiative better summarize the
way technology is reshaping the
relationship between author, publisher,
and reader than the proliferation of
publishers’ blogs such as the one
Rowman & Littlefield proudly launches
today? For years, publishers worked in
isolation from their readers,
interacting only through sales
figures, print reviews, and, (the
only time we came face to face
with our audience) at academic
meetings. Now, the veil has been
lifted, whether in reader responses
posted on the websites of online
booksellers, on listservs, or through
the sustained conversation that we
invite you to join.

This forum will allow authors and
readers to enter into direct dialogue
on issues spanning the breadth of our
publishing program, from teaching to
scholarship to policymaking, from
ancient history to current affairs.
It will enhance our published books
and generate ideas for new ones.
It may even offer those of us in the
publishing business an opportunity to
convey a sense of our evolving role in
the rich and invigorating intellectual
arena as communication and the
interchange of information, analysis,
and opinion evolve ever-more rapidly.

Welcome.

Sincerely,

Jonathan Sisk
Publisher