The Enculturated Gene

The Enculturated Gene

Author: Duana Fullwiley

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2011-11-07

Total Pages: 369

ISBN-13: 1400840414

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In the 1980s, a research team led by Parisian scientists identified several unique DNA sequences, or haplotypes, linked to sickle cell anemia in African populations. After casual observations of how patients managed this painful blood disorder, the researchers in question postulated that the Senegalese type was less severe. The Enculturated Gene traces how this genetic discourse has blotted from view the roles that Senegalese patients and doctors have played in making sickle cell "mild" in a social setting where public health priorities and economic austerity programs have forced people to improvise informal strategies of care. Duana Fullwiley shows how geneticists, who were fixated on population differences, never investigated the various modalities of self-care that people developed in this context of biomedical scarcity, and how local doctors, confronted with dire cuts in Senegal's health sector, wittingly accepted the genetic prognosis of better-than-expected health outcomes. Unlike most genetic determinisms that highlight the absoluteness of disease, DNA haplotypes for sickle cell in Senegal did the opposite. As Fullwiley demonstrates, they allowed the condition to remain officially invisible, never to materialize as a health priority. At the same time, scientists' attribution of a less severe form of Senegalese sickle cell to isolated DNA sequences closed off other explanations of this population's measured biological success. The Enculturated Gene reveals how the notion of an advantageous form of sickle cell in this part of West Africa has defined--and obscured--the nature of this illness in Senegal today. Some images inside the book are unavailable due to digital copyright restrictions.


Book Synopsis The Enculturated Gene by : Duana Fullwiley

Download or read book The Enculturated Gene written by Duana Fullwiley and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2011-11-07 with total page 369 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the 1980s, a research team led by Parisian scientists identified several unique DNA sequences, or haplotypes, linked to sickle cell anemia in African populations. After casual observations of how patients managed this painful blood disorder, the researchers in question postulated that the Senegalese type was less severe. The Enculturated Gene traces how this genetic discourse has blotted from view the roles that Senegalese patients and doctors have played in making sickle cell "mild" in a social setting where public health priorities and economic austerity programs have forced people to improvise informal strategies of care. Duana Fullwiley shows how geneticists, who were fixated on population differences, never investigated the various modalities of self-care that people developed in this context of biomedical scarcity, and how local doctors, confronted with dire cuts in Senegal's health sector, wittingly accepted the genetic prognosis of better-than-expected health outcomes. Unlike most genetic determinisms that highlight the absoluteness of disease, DNA haplotypes for sickle cell in Senegal did the opposite. As Fullwiley demonstrates, they allowed the condition to remain officially invisible, never to materialize as a health priority. At the same time, scientists' attribution of a less severe form of Senegalese sickle cell to isolated DNA sequences closed off other explanations of this population's measured biological success. The Enculturated Gene reveals how the notion of an advantageous form of sickle cell in this part of West Africa has defined--and obscured--the nature of this illness in Senegal today. Some images inside the book are unavailable due to digital copyright restrictions.

The Enculturated Gene

The Enculturated Gene

Author: Duana Fullwiley

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2011-11-27

Total Pages: 370

ISBN-13: 0691123179

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In the 1980s, a research team led by Parisian scientists identified several unique DNA sequences, or haplotypes, linked to sickle cell anemia in African populations. After casual observations of how patients managed this painful blood disorder, the researchers in question postulated that the Senegalese type was less severe. The Enculturated Gene traces how this genetic discourse has blotted from view the roles that Senegalese patients and doctors have played in making sickle cell "mild" in a social setting where public health priorities and economic austerity programs have forced people to improvise informal strategies of care. Duana Fullwiley shows how geneticists, who were fixated on population differences, never investigated the various modalities of self-care that people developed in this context of biomedical scarcity, and how local doctors, confronted with dire cuts in Senegal's health sector, wittingly accepted the genetic prognosis of better-than-expected health outcomes. Unlike most genetic determinisms that highlight the absoluteness of disease, DNA haplotypes for sickle cell in Senegal did the opposite. As Fullwiley demonstrates, they allowed the condition to remain officially invisible, never to materialize as a health priority. At the same time, scientists' attribution of a less severe form of Senegalese sickle cell to isolated DNA sequences closed off other explanations of this population's measured biological success. The Enculturated Gene reveals how the notion of an advantageous form of sickle cell in this part of West Africa has defined--and obscured--the nature of this illness in Senegal today.


Book Synopsis The Enculturated Gene by : Duana Fullwiley

Download or read book The Enculturated Gene written by Duana Fullwiley and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2011-11-27 with total page 370 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the 1980s, a research team led by Parisian scientists identified several unique DNA sequences, or haplotypes, linked to sickle cell anemia in African populations. After casual observations of how patients managed this painful blood disorder, the researchers in question postulated that the Senegalese type was less severe. The Enculturated Gene traces how this genetic discourse has blotted from view the roles that Senegalese patients and doctors have played in making sickle cell "mild" in a social setting where public health priorities and economic austerity programs have forced people to improvise informal strategies of care. Duana Fullwiley shows how geneticists, who were fixated on population differences, never investigated the various modalities of self-care that people developed in this context of biomedical scarcity, and how local doctors, confronted with dire cuts in Senegal's health sector, wittingly accepted the genetic prognosis of better-than-expected health outcomes. Unlike most genetic determinisms that highlight the absoluteness of disease, DNA haplotypes for sickle cell in Senegal did the opposite. As Fullwiley demonstrates, they allowed the condition to remain officially invisible, never to materialize as a health priority. At the same time, scientists' attribution of a less severe form of Senegalese sickle cell to isolated DNA sequences closed off other explanations of this population's measured biological success. The Enculturated Gene reveals how the notion of an advantageous form of sickle cell in this part of West Africa has defined--and obscured--the nature of this illness in Senegal today.

Culture, Mind, and Brain

Culture, Mind, and Brain

Author: Laurence J. Kirmayer

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2020-09-24

Total Pages: 683

ISBN-13: 1108580572

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Recent neuroscience research makes it clear that human biology is cultural biology - we develop and live our lives in socially constructed worlds that vary widely in their structure values, and institutions. This integrative volume brings together interdisciplinary perspectives from the human, social, and biological sciences to explore culture, mind, and brain interactions and their impact on personal and societal issues. Contributors provide a fresh look at emerging concepts, models, and applications of the co-constitution of culture, mind, and brain. Chapters survey the latest theoretical and methodological insights alongside the challenges in this area, and describe how these new ideas are being applied in the sciences, humanities, arts, mental health, and everyday life. Readers will gain new appreciation of the ways in which our unique biology and cultural diversity shape behavior and experience, and our ongoing adaptation to a constantly changing world.


Book Synopsis Culture, Mind, and Brain by : Laurence J. Kirmayer

Download or read book Culture, Mind, and Brain written by Laurence J. Kirmayer and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2020-09-24 with total page 683 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Recent neuroscience research makes it clear that human biology is cultural biology - we develop and live our lives in socially constructed worlds that vary widely in their structure values, and institutions. This integrative volume brings together interdisciplinary perspectives from the human, social, and biological sciences to explore culture, mind, and brain interactions and their impact on personal and societal issues. Contributors provide a fresh look at emerging concepts, models, and applications of the co-constitution of culture, mind, and brain. Chapters survey the latest theoretical and methodological insights alongside the challenges in this area, and describe how these new ideas are being applied in the sciences, humanities, arts, mental health, and everyday life. Readers will gain new appreciation of the ways in which our unique biology and cultural diversity shape behavior and experience, and our ongoing adaptation to a constantly changing world.

Medicating Race

Medicating Race

Author: Anne Pollock

Publisher: Duke University Press

Published: 2012-10-02

Total Pages: 277

ISBN-13: 082235344X

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In Medicating Race, Anne Pollock traces the intersecting discourses of race, pharmaceuticals, and heart disease in the United States over the past century, from the founding of cardiology through the FDA's approval of BiDil, the first drug sanctioned for use in a specific race. She examines wide-ranging aspects of the dynamic interplay of race and heart disease: articulations, among the founders of American cardiology, of heart disease as a modern, and therefore white, illness; constructions of "normal" populations in epidemiological research, including the influential Framingham Heart Study; debates about the distinctiveness African American hypertension, which turn on disparate yet intersecting arguments about genetic legacies of slavery and the comparative efficacy of generic drugs; and physician advocacy for the urgent needs of black patients on professional, scientific, and social justice grounds. Ultimately, Pollock insists that those grappling with the meaning of racialized medical technologies must consider not only the troubled history of race and biomedicine but also its fraught yet vital present. Medical treatment should be seen as a site of, rather than an alternative to, political and social contestation. The aim of scholarly analysis should not be to settle matters of race and genetics, but to hold medicine more broadly accountable to truth and justice.


Book Synopsis Medicating Race by : Anne Pollock

Download or read book Medicating Race written by Anne Pollock and published by Duke University Press. This book was released on 2012-10-02 with total page 277 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Medicating Race, Anne Pollock traces the intersecting discourses of race, pharmaceuticals, and heart disease in the United States over the past century, from the founding of cardiology through the FDA's approval of BiDil, the first drug sanctioned for use in a specific race. She examines wide-ranging aspects of the dynamic interplay of race and heart disease: articulations, among the founders of American cardiology, of heart disease as a modern, and therefore white, illness; constructions of "normal" populations in epidemiological research, including the influential Framingham Heart Study; debates about the distinctiveness African American hypertension, which turn on disparate yet intersecting arguments about genetic legacies of slavery and the comparative efficacy of generic drugs; and physician advocacy for the urgent needs of black patients on professional, scientific, and social justice grounds. Ultimately, Pollock insists that those grappling with the meaning of racialized medical technologies must consider not only the troubled history of race and biomedicine but also its fraught yet vital present. Medical treatment should be seen as a site of, rather than an alternative to, political and social contestation. The aim of scholarly analysis should not be to settle matters of race and genetics, but to hold medicine more broadly accountable to truth and justice.

Aesop's Anthropology

Aesop's Anthropology

Author: John Hartigan (Jr.)

Publisher: Forerunners: Ideas First

Published: 2014

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9780816696840

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Aesop's Anthropology is a guide for thinking through the perplexing predicaments and encounters that arise as the line between human and nonhuman shifts in modern life. Recognizing that culture is not unique to humans, John Hartigan Jr. asks what we can learn about culture from other species. He pursues a variety of philosophical and scientific ideas about what it means to be social using cultural dynamics to rethink what we assume makes humans special and different from other forms of life. Through an interlinked series of brief essays, Hartigan explores how we can think differently about being human. Forerunners: Ideas First is a thought-in-process series of breakthrough digital publications. Written between fresh ideas and finished books, Forerunners draws on scholarly work initiated in notable blogs, social media, conference plenaries, journal articles, and the synergy of academic exchange. This is gray literature publishing: where intense thinking, change, and speculation take place in scholarship.


Book Synopsis Aesop's Anthropology by : John Hartigan (Jr.)

Download or read book Aesop's Anthropology written by John Hartigan (Jr.) and published by Forerunners: Ideas First. This book was released on 2014 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Aesop's Anthropology is a guide for thinking through the perplexing predicaments and encounters that arise as the line between human and nonhuman shifts in modern life. Recognizing that culture is not unique to humans, John Hartigan Jr. asks what we can learn about culture from other species. He pursues a variety of philosophical and scientific ideas about what it means to be social using cultural dynamics to rethink what we assume makes humans special and different from other forms of life. Through an interlinked series of brief essays, Hartigan explores how we can think differently about being human. Forerunners: Ideas First is a thought-in-process series of breakthrough digital publications. Written between fresh ideas and finished books, Forerunners draws on scholarly work initiated in notable blogs, social media, conference plenaries, journal articles, and the synergy of academic exchange. This is gray literature publishing: where intense thinking, change, and speculation take place in scholarship.

Advanced Genetic Counseling

Advanced Genetic Counseling

Author: Barbara B. Biesecker

Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA

Published: 2019

Total Pages: 241

ISBN-13: 0190626429

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A CRITICAL NEW APPROACH FOR LEARNING AND THRIVING IN A FIELD OF CHANGE The scope and responsibilities of today's genetic counselors exceed the reasonable capacity of any one educational resource. While the field's first-year curriculum may be relatively fixed, the landscape of what comes after that -- a dizzying mix of practice, ethics, research design, and professional competencies -- is increasingly broad. Advanced Genetic Counseling offers an overdue extension of the field's core curriculum. From navigating ethical dilemmas and potential conflicts of interest to confronting the biases and patterns of thought that can limit counselors' interactions with clients, it prepares readers to face the profession's most challenging aspects with confidence. Drawing on techniques from psychotherapy, social psychology, and health behavior, Advanced Genetic Counseling is an essential resource for trainees and mid-career professionals. It offers a roadmap not just for addressing client needs, but for the future of genetic counseling education.


Book Synopsis Advanced Genetic Counseling by : Barbara B. Biesecker

Download or read book Advanced Genetic Counseling written by Barbara B. Biesecker and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2019 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A CRITICAL NEW APPROACH FOR LEARNING AND THRIVING IN A FIELD OF CHANGE The scope and responsibilities of today's genetic counselors exceed the reasonable capacity of any one educational resource. While the field's first-year curriculum may be relatively fixed, the landscape of what comes after that -- a dizzying mix of practice, ethics, research design, and professional competencies -- is increasingly broad. Advanced Genetic Counseling offers an overdue extension of the field's core curriculum. From navigating ethical dilemmas and potential conflicts of interest to confronting the biases and patterns of thought that can limit counselors' interactions with clients, it prepares readers to face the profession's most challenging aspects with confidence. Drawing on techniques from psychotherapy, social psychology, and health behavior, Advanced Genetic Counseling is an essential resource for trainees and mid-career professionals. It offers a roadmap not just for addressing client needs, but for the future of genetic counseling education.

Expanded Cinema

Expanded Cinema

Author: Gene Youngblood

Publisher: Fordham University Press

Published: 2020-03-03

Total Pages: 464

ISBN-13: 0823287432

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Fiftieth anniversary reissue of the founding media studies book that helped establish media art as a cultural category. First published in 1970, Gene Youngblood’s influential Expanded Cinema was the first serious treatment of video, computers, and holography as cinematic technologies. Long considered the bible for media artists, Youngblood’s insider account of 1960s counterculture and the birth of cybernetics remains a mainstay reference in today’s hypermediated digital world. This fiftieth anniversary edition includes a new Introduction by the author that offers conceptual tools for understanding the sociocultural and sociopolitical realities of our present world. A unique eyewitness account of burgeoning experimental film and the birth of video art in the late 1960s, this far- ranging study traces the evolution of cinematic language to the end of fiction, drama, and realism. Vast in scope, its prescient formulations include “the paleocybernetic age,” “intermedia,” the “artist as design scientist,” the “artist as ecologist,” “synaesthetics and kinesthetics,” and “the technosphere: man/machine symbiosis.” Outstanding works are analyzed in detail. Methods of production are meticulously described, including interviews with artists and technologists of the period, such as Nam June Paik, Jordan Belson, Andy Warhol, Stan Brakhage, Carolee Schneemann, Stan VanDerBeek, Les Levine, and Frank Gillette. An inspiring Introduction by the celebrated polymath and designer R. Buckminster Fuller—a perfectly cut gem of countercultural thinking in itself—places Youngblood’s radical observations in comprehensive perspective. Providing an unparalleled historical documentation, Expanded Cinema clarifies a chapter of countercultural history that is still not fully represented in the arthistorical record half a century later. The book will also inspire the current generation of artists working in ever-newer expansions of the cinematic environment and will prove invaluable to all who are concerned with the technologies that are reshaping the nature of human communication.


Book Synopsis Expanded Cinema by : Gene Youngblood

Download or read book Expanded Cinema written by Gene Youngblood and published by Fordham University Press. This book was released on 2020-03-03 with total page 464 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Fiftieth anniversary reissue of the founding media studies book that helped establish media art as a cultural category. First published in 1970, Gene Youngblood’s influential Expanded Cinema was the first serious treatment of video, computers, and holography as cinematic technologies. Long considered the bible for media artists, Youngblood’s insider account of 1960s counterculture and the birth of cybernetics remains a mainstay reference in today’s hypermediated digital world. This fiftieth anniversary edition includes a new Introduction by the author that offers conceptual tools for understanding the sociocultural and sociopolitical realities of our present world. A unique eyewitness account of burgeoning experimental film and the birth of video art in the late 1960s, this far- ranging study traces the evolution of cinematic language to the end of fiction, drama, and realism. Vast in scope, its prescient formulations include “the paleocybernetic age,” “intermedia,” the “artist as design scientist,” the “artist as ecologist,” “synaesthetics and kinesthetics,” and “the technosphere: man/machine symbiosis.” Outstanding works are analyzed in detail. Methods of production are meticulously described, including interviews with artists and technologists of the period, such as Nam June Paik, Jordan Belson, Andy Warhol, Stan Brakhage, Carolee Schneemann, Stan VanDerBeek, Les Levine, and Frank Gillette. An inspiring Introduction by the celebrated polymath and designer R. Buckminster Fuller—a perfectly cut gem of countercultural thinking in itself—places Youngblood’s radical observations in comprehensive perspective. Providing an unparalleled historical documentation, Expanded Cinema clarifies a chapter of countercultural history that is still not fully represented in the arthistorical record half a century later. The book will also inspire the current generation of artists working in ever-newer expansions of the cinematic environment and will prove invaluable to all who are concerned with the technologies that are reshaping the nature of human communication.

Global Health and the New World Order

Global Health and the New World Order

Author: Jean-Paul Gaudilliere

Publisher:

Published: 2020-11-09

Total Pages: 248

ISBN-13: 9781526149671

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This book proposes an encompassing view of the transition from international public health to global health, bringing together historians and anthropologists exploring the relationship between knowledge, practices and policies. Historical and anthropological studies of the governance of health outside Europe and North America leave us with two gaps. The first is a temporal gap between the historiography of international public health through the 1970s and the numerous current anthropological studies of global health. The second gap originates in problems of scale. Macro-inquiries of institutions and politics abound, as do micro-investigations of local configurations. The book interrogates these gaps through an engagement between the disciplines, the harnessing of concepts (circulation, scale, transnationalism) that cross both domains, and the selection of four domains of interventions and globalisation: tuberculosis, mental health, medical genetics and traditional (Asian) medicines.


Book Synopsis Global Health and the New World Order by : Jean-Paul Gaudilliere

Download or read book Global Health and the New World Order written by Jean-Paul Gaudilliere and published by . This book was released on 2020-11-09 with total page 248 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book proposes an encompassing view of the transition from international public health to global health, bringing together historians and anthropologists exploring the relationship between knowledge, practices and policies. Historical and anthropological studies of the governance of health outside Europe and North America leave us with two gaps. The first is a temporal gap between the historiography of international public health through the 1970s and the numerous current anthropological studies of global health. The second gap originates in problems of scale. Macro-inquiries of institutions and politics abound, as do micro-investigations of local configurations. The book interrogates these gaps through an engagement between the disciplines, the harnessing of concepts (circulation, scale, transnationalism) that cross both domains, and the selection of four domains of interventions and globalisation: tuberculosis, mental health, medical genetics and traditional (Asian) medicines.

Race, Monogamy, and Other Lies They Told You

Race, Monogamy, and Other Lies They Told You

Author: Agustín Fuentes

Publisher: Univ of California Press

Published: 2015-05

Total Pages: 290

ISBN-13: 0520285999

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There are three major myths of human nature: humans are divided into biological races; humans are naturally aggressive; and men and women are truly different in behavior, desires, and wiring. In an engaging and wide-ranging narrative, Agustín Fuentes counters these pervasive and pernicious myths about human behavior. Tackling misconceptions about what race, aggression, and sex really mean for humans, Fuentes incorporates an accessible understanding of culture, genetics, and evolution, requiring us to dispose of notions of “nature or nurture.” Presenting scientific evidence from diverse fields—including anthropology, biology, and psychology—Fuentes devises a myth-busting toolkit to dismantle persistent fallacies about the validity of biological races, the innateness of aggression and violence, and the nature of monogamy and differences between the sexes. A final chapter plus an appendix provide a set of take-home points on how readers can myth-bust on their own. Accessible, compelling, and original, this book is a rich and nuanced account of how nature, culture, experience, and choice interact to influence human behavior.


Book Synopsis Race, Monogamy, and Other Lies They Told You by : Agustín Fuentes

Download or read book Race, Monogamy, and Other Lies They Told You written by Agustín Fuentes and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 2015-05 with total page 290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: There are three major myths of human nature: humans are divided into biological races; humans are naturally aggressive; and men and women are truly different in behavior, desires, and wiring. In an engaging and wide-ranging narrative, Agustín Fuentes counters these pervasive and pernicious myths about human behavior. Tackling misconceptions about what race, aggression, and sex really mean for humans, Fuentes incorporates an accessible understanding of culture, genetics, and evolution, requiring us to dispose of notions of “nature or nurture.” Presenting scientific evidence from diverse fields—including anthropology, biology, and psychology—Fuentes devises a myth-busting toolkit to dismantle persistent fallacies about the validity of biological races, the innateness of aggression and violence, and the nature of monogamy and differences between the sexes. A final chapter plus an appendix provide a set of take-home points on how readers can myth-bust on their own. Accessible, compelling, and original, this book is a rich and nuanced account of how nature, culture, experience, and choice interact to influence human behavior.

The WEIRDest People in the World

The WEIRDest People in the World

Author: Joseph Henrich

Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Published: 2020-09-08

Total Pages: 420

ISBN-13: 0374710457

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A New York Times Notable Book of 2020 A Bloomberg Best Non-Fiction Book of 2020 A Behavioral Scientist Notable Book of 2020 A Human Behavior & Evolution Society Must-Read Popular Evolution Book of 2020 A bold, epic account of how the co-evolution of psychology and culture created the peculiar Western mind that has profoundly shaped the modern world. Perhaps you are WEIRD: raised in a society that is Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic. If so, you’re rather psychologically peculiar. Unlike much of the world today, and most people who have ever lived, WEIRD people are highly individualistic, self-obsessed, control-oriented, nonconformist, and analytical. They focus on themselves—their attributes, accomplishments, and aspirations—over their relationships and social roles. How did WEIRD populations become so psychologically distinct? What role did these psychological differences play in the industrial revolution and the global expansion of Europe during the last few centuries? In The WEIRDest People in the World, Joseph Henrich draws on cutting-edge research in anthropology, psychology, economics, and evolutionary biology to explore these questions and more. He illuminates the origins and evolution of family structures, marriage, and religion, and the profound impact these cultural transformations had on human psychology. Mapping these shifts through ancient history and late antiquity, Henrich reveals that the most fundamental institutions of kinship and marriage changed dramatically under pressure from the Roman Catholic Church. It was these changes that gave rise to the WEIRD psychology that would coevolve with impersonal markets, occupational specialization, and free competition—laying the foundation for the modern world. Provocative and engaging in both its broad scope and its surprising details, The WEIRDest People in the World explores how culture, institutions, and psychology shape one another, and explains what this means for both our most personal sense of who we are as individuals and also the large-scale social, political, and economic forces that drive human history. Includes black-and-white illustrations.


Book Synopsis The WEIRDest People in the World by : Joseph Henrich

Download or read book The WEIRDest People in the World written by Joseph Henrich and published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. This book was released on 2020-09-08 with total page 420 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A New York Times Notable Book of 2020 A Bloomberg Best Non-Fiction Book of 2020 A Behavioral Scientist Notable Book of 2020 A Human Behavior & Evolution Society Must-Read Popular Evolution Book of 2020 A bold, epic account of how the co-evolution of psychology and culture created the peculiar Western mind that has profoundly shaped the modern world. Perhaps you are WEIRD: raised in a society that is Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic. If so, you’re rather psychologically peculiar. Unlike much of the world today, and most people who have ever lived, WEIRD people are highly individualistic, self-obsessed, control-oriented, nonconformist, and analytical. They focus on themselves—their attributes, accomplishments, and aspirations—over their relationships and social roles. How did WEIRD populations become so psychologically distinct? What role did these psychological differences play in the industrial revolution and the global expansion of Europe during the last few centuries? In The WEIRDest People in the World, Joseph Henrich draws on cutting-edge research in anthropology, psychology, economics, and evolutionary biology to explore these questions and more. He illuminates the origins and evolution of family structures, marriage, and religion, and the profound impact these cultural transformations had on human psychology. Mapping these shifts through ancient history and late antiquity, Henrich reveals that the most fundamental institutions of kinship and marriage changed dramatically under pressure from the Roman Catholic Church. It was these changes that gave rise to the WEIRD psychology that would coevolve with impersonal markets, occupational specialization, and free competition—laying the foundation for the modern world. Provocative and engaging in both its broad scope and its surprising details, The WEIRDest People in the World explores how culture, institutions, and psychology shape one another, and explains what this means for both our most personal sense of who we are as individuals and also the large-scale social, political, and economic forces that drive human history. Includes black-and-white illustrations.