Service Alert
Delay in delivery of ZIP and Direct to Player materials
You may experience a delay in delivery of Direct to Player materials. All requests for materials will be delivered as soon as possible. Thank you for your patience.
You may experience a delay in delivery of Direct to Player materials. All requests for materials will be delivered as soon as possible. Thank you for your patience.
Showing 161 - 180 of 50040 items
By Johannes Krause. 2021
&“Thrilling . . . a bracing summary of what we have learned [from] &‘archaeogenetics&’—the study of ancient DNA . .…
. Krause and Trappe capture the excitement of this young field.&”—Kyle Harper, The Wall Street Journal Johannes Krause is the director of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology and a brilliant pioneer in the field of archaeogenetics—archaeology augmented by DNA sequencing technology—which has allowed scientists to reconstruct human history reaching back hundreds of thousands of years before recorded time. In this surprising account, Krause and journalist Thomas Trappe rewrite a fascinating chapter of this history, the peopling of Europe, that takes us from the Neanderthals and Denisovans to the present. We know now that a wave of farmers from Anatolia migrated into Europe 8,000 years ago, essentially displacing the dark-skinned, blue-eyed hunter-gatherers who preceded them. This Anatolian farmer DNA is one of the core genetic components of people with contemporary European ancestry. Archaeogenetics has also revealed that indigenous North and South Americans, though long thought to have been East Asian, also share DNA with contemporary Europeans. Krause and Trappe vividly introduce us to the prehistoric cultures of the ancient Europeans: the Aurignacians, innovative artisans who carved flutes and animal and human forms from bird bones more than 40,000 years ago; the Varna, who buried their loved ones with gold long before the Pharaohs of Egypt; and the Gravettians, big-game hunters who were Europe&’s most successful early settlers until they perished in the ice age. Genetics has earned a reputation for smuggling racist ideologies into science, but cutting-edge science makes nonsense of eugenics and &“pure&” bloodlines. Immigration and genetic exchanges have always defined our species; who we are is a question of culture, not biological inheritance. This revelatory book offers us an entirely new way to understand ourselves, both past and presentBy Rebecca E. Hirsch. 2021
In the history of life on this planet, 99.9 percent of all species have gone extinct. But a few have…
survived almost unchanged. Author Rebecca E. Hirsch introduces readers to six living fossils, including the chambered nautilus, the horseshoe crab with its sticky blue blood, and venomous platypuses that sting, as well as a comprehensive explanation of evolution and extinction for readers who may not be familiar with the terms yet. Readers will also discover a a spectacular timeline of the history of animal life on Earth. Dive into the stories of these incredible animals and find out how they help scientists piece together evolutionary historyBy R. David Lankes. 2021
Many of what we think of as Information Age tools and media-computers, cell phones, the Internet, encryption, and more-evolved directly…
out of modern warfare. These tools started with World War I, accelerated through World War II and the Cold War, and now play a center role in both declared and non-declared conflicts like election interference and cyberbattles. We buy phones and smart speakers because they are new and unlock great potential. Voice assistants like Siri and Alexa help us do our work and answer that one piece of trivia that bugs us. Yet these devices are data gatherers. They collect, repackage, and monetize our questions, purchases, photographs, web surfing to form a data industry now larger than the oil industry. Well over 100 years ago the data industry put in place a business model that trades our attention for news and entertainment. That model has evolved into a complex art and science of message targeting and content ownership that has splintered communities while simultaneously concentrating media ownership to a few massive corporations. Forged in War takes a critical look at the systems we use and how we ended up in a society that values data over personal liberty and commerce over the public goodBy Jillian Roberts. 2019
On the Internet: Our First Talk About Online Safety introduces children to the basics of online safety in a story-based,…
conversational style. Using real-world examples set within the context of a child who is using the Internet for the first time and watching an older sibling interact with social media, Dr. Roberts takes readers through several common scenarios around parental supervision, online bullying and anonymity. She also includes examples of people who use the Internet to make the world a better place. On the Internet addresses common safety concerns in a child-centered way and offers easy-to-understand rationales as to why it's important to maintain boundaries online just as in real life. The World Around Us series introduces children to complex cultural, social and environmental issues that they may encounter outside their homes, in an accessible way. Sidebars offer further reading for older children or care providers who have bigger questions. For younger children just starting to make these observations, the simple question-and-answer format of the main text will provide a foundation of knowledge on the subject matterBy David Graeber, David Wengrow. 2021
Renowned activist and public intellectual David Graeber teams up with professor of comparative archaeology David Wengrow to deliver a trailblazing…
account of human history, challenging our most fundamental assumptions about social evolution--from the development of agriculture and cities to the emergence of "the state," political violence, and social inequality--and revealing new possibilities for human emancipation.For generations, our remote ancestors have been cast as primitive and childlike--either free and equal innocents, or thuggish and warlike. Civilization, we are told, could only be achieved by sacrificing those original freedoms, or alternatively, by taming our baser instincts. Graeber and Wengrow show how such theories first emerged in the eighteenth century as a conservative reaction to powerful critiques of European society posed by Indigenous observers and intellectuals. Revisiting this encounter has startling implications for how we make sense of human history today, including the origins of farming, property, cities, democracy, slavery, and civilization itself.Drawing on path-breaking research in archaeology and anthropology, the authors show how history becomes a far more interesting place once we learn to throw off our conceptual shackles and perceive what's really there. If humans did not spend 95% of their evolutionary past in tiny bands of hunter-gatherers, what were they doing all that time? If agriculture, and cities, did not mean a plunge into hierarchy and domination, then what kinds of social and economic organization did they lead to? What was really happening during the periods that we usually describe as the emergence of "the state"? The answers are often unexpected, and suggest that the course of human history may be less set in stone, and more full of playful, hopeful possibilities, than we tend to assume.The Dawn of Everything fundamentally transforms our understanding of the human past and offers a path toward imagining new forms of freedom, new ways of organizing society. This is a monumental book of formidable intellectual range, animated by curiosity, moral vision, and a faith in the power of direct action.By Alexander Langlands. 2018
Archaeologist examines the meaning of the Old English word "craeft," which denoted a sense of knowledge, wisdom, and resourcefulness through…
the history of production of goods made by human hands. Topics include making hay, sticks and stones, beekeeping, textiles, homebuilding, agriculture, and more. 2017By John J. McKay. 2017
Examination of the evolving scientific study of fossils and the development of the modern understanding of mammoths and other related,…
extinct animals. Discusses significant discoveries across the world from the time of Ancient Greece through to the nineteenth century. 2017Author of Bringing Down the House and Sex on the Moon examines the work of researchers to bring the woolly…
mammoth back from extinction through the use of DNA extracted from a frozen specimen combined with the DNA of a modern elephant.By Safiya Umoja Noble. 2018
Information scientist examines the hidden biases in algorithms used by search engines. Explores the concept of technological redlining, which describes…
the ways capital, race, and gender interact and intersect to invisibly promote white and male supremacy in interactions with an everyday part of life in the twenty-first century. 2018By John Man. 2018
An exploration of the mythos of the Amazons, a tribe of female warriors. Discusses the stories told in many cultures…
about them and the past conclusions that they must have been merely myth. The author, however, uses research and archeological discoveries to demonstrate that they did, in fact, exist. 2018By Lois Miner Huey. 2016
By Bruce Pascoe. 2018
Examination of the ways aboriginal Australians developed the land to support their societies long before colonization of the continent by…
European explorers. Topics include agriculture, aquaculture, population and housing, storage and preservation, fire, cultural norms, non-Aboriginal agriculture techniques, and understanding history to improve the future. 2018By David Frye. 2018
A historian discusses the role of man-made edifices and barriers throughout history. Explores the importance of walls in ancient civilizations,…
a thousand-mile-long wall in Asia, sieges of fortified cities, political conflicts centered upon walls, gated communities, and more. 2018By Suzanne Slade, Veronica Miller Jamison. 2019
The story of pioneering African American mathematician Katherine Johnson, who performed calculations vital to America's first manned space flight, its…
first manned orbit of Earth, and the first trip to the moon. For grades K-3. 2019By Nora A. Draper. 2019
Communications scholar examines the meaning of privacy in the digital age, paying particular attention to the politics of identity and…
self-presentation. Interviews industry experts and analyzes media coverage, promotional materials, and government policies to explore the ways digital information has been commodified. 2019By Patti Richards. 2018
What does it mean to be biased? Emerging readers need to know the differences between facts, fiction, and opinions. Readers…
will also learn how facts, fiction, and opinions affect advertisements, news reports, blogs, and more. Straightforward, neutral text and vivid photographs provide readers with the tools they need to evaluate and understand the media literacy concept of facts, fiction, and opinionsBy Emily Arnold McCully. 2019
This illuminating biography reveals how the daughter of Lord Byron, Britain's most infamous Romantic poet, became the world's first computer…
programmer. Even by 1800s standards, Ada Byron Lovelace had an unusual upbringing. Her strict mother worked hard at cultivating her own role as the long-suffering ex-wife of bad-boy poet Lord Byron while raising Ada in isolation. Tutored by the brightest minds, Ada developed a hunger for mental puzzles, mathematical conundrums, and scientific discovery that kept pace with the breathtaking advances of the industrial and social revolutions taking place in Europe. At seventeen, Ada met eccentric inventor Charles Babbage, a kindred spirit. Their ensuing collaborations resulted in ideas and concepts that presaged computer programming by almost two hundred years, and Ada Lovelace is now recognized as a pioneer and prophet of the information age. Award-winning author Emily Arnold McCully opens the window on a peculiar and singular intellect, shaped—and hampered—by history, social norms, and family dysfunction. The result is a portrait that is at once remarkable and fascinating, tragic and triumphantBy Grace Campbell. 2021
From your cell phone signal to your search history, digital clues can help investigators solve crimes. Readers will learn the…
ins and outs of digital forensics in this fascinating high/low titleBy Mary Lindeen. 2018
Using technology to bully others is a serious problem many kids face. Learn about cyberbullying, including the effects it has,…
as well as how to identify and prevent it. Digital Safety Smarts: Preventing Cyberbullying , from the trusted Searchlight Books brand, teaches readers about the dangers of online interaction and what to do when inappropriate contact happens. It also young people how to use the Internet responsibly. The book helps students become good digital citizens in our increasingly digital world