This is the real thing, the truth that is stranger than fiction, presented here in some 600 items abridged from the news as footprints left behind to mark the year 2010

In the Fourth Edition of Cultures and Societies in a Changing World, author Wendy Griswold illuminates how culture shapes our social world and how society shapes culture. She helps students gain an understanding of the sociology of culture and explore stories, beliefs, media, ideas, art, religious practices, fashions, and rituals from a sociological perspective. Cultural examples from multiple countries and time periods will broaden students′ global understanding. They will develop a deeper appreciation of culture and society, gleaning insights that will help them overcome cultural misunderstandings, conflicts, and ignorance; equip them to be more effective in their professional and personal lives, and become wise citizens of the world.

The Global Atlas of Marine Fisheries is the first and only book to provide accurate, country-by-country fishery catch data. This groundbreaking information has been gathered from independent sources by the world's foremost fisheries experts. Edited by Daniel Pauly and Dirk Zeller of the Sea Around Us Project, the Atlas includes one-page reports on 273 countries and their territories, plus fourteen topical global chapters. Each national report describes the current state of the country's fishery; the policies, politics, and social factors affecting it; and potential solutions. The global chapters address cross-cutting issues, from the economics of fisheries to the impacts of mariculture. Extensive maps and graphics offer attractive and accessible visual representations.

In 1850, after the Gold Rush and Californias admission to the union, two brothers acquired some valuable land. There was a young tree on that land. It was growing fast and began to exhibit a peculiar feature. Its roots didnt seem to go deep but instead spread out above-ground. One brother became concerned. Why didnt the roots go down? He thought something sinister must be buried beneath that tree. The roots seemed to balk at going there. His brother thought it wasnt anything to get worried about, just the natural way of that tree. It didnt look right though, even to him, and as the tree continued to grow, he wondered too. A century and a half later, the tree is still there, with roots, tendrils and knobs extending in every direction, strange, unnatural, at times bizarre. We still wonder, not even sure what to call it.

Many people in the western world maintain the contradictory notions that the pirates of old were romantic social bandits while their modern brethren are brutal thugs, thieves, and villains. In Global Piracy, James E. Wadsworth compiles and contextualizes a wealth of primary source documents which illustrate the global phenomenon of piracy through the eyes and voices of those who experienced it: both the pirates or privateers themselves and their victims. The book allows us to confront our stereotypes by giving us access to “real” pirates in a wide range of historical periods and global regions, from ancient Greece to modern day Nigeria, unfiltered as much as possible by authorial voice or interpretation. Global Piracy seeks neither to romanticize nor vilify pirates, but simply to understand them in the context of their times and the broader world they inhabited. Departing from run-of-the-mill narratives, it selects documents which provide new and fascinating insights into piracy around the globe. With documents introduced by contextual information, and supplemented by study questions, suggested reading lists, illustrations and maps, this book is an essential companion for anyone studying the history of piracy.

With Papa off to sea and Mama despondent, Ida must go outside over there to rescue her baby sister from goblins who steal her to be a goblin's bride.

Disability is of central concern to the developing world but has largely been under-represented in global development debates, discourses and negotiations. Similarly, disability studies has overlooked the theorists, or the social experience, of the global South and there has been a one-way transfer of ideas and knowledge from the North to the South in this field. This volume seeks to redress the processes of scholarly colonialism by drawing together a diverse set of understandings, theorizing and experiences. The chapters situate disability within the Southern context and support the work of Southern disabled scholars and activists seeking to decolonize Southern experiences, knowledges and absences in the field while simultaneously attempting to make an intervention into able-bodied (mainstream) development discourses, practices and politics. This book was originally published as a special issue of Third World Quarterly.