Briefly Noted

Reorganized, condensed, tightened, and expanded, Society and Culture, An Introduction to Sociology, Fourth Edition, by Francis E. Merrill '26, Professor of Sociology, Emeritus, Dartmouth College, features a new chapter on deviance and presents the general theory with brief illustrations from sexual behavior. Instructors may supplement the chapter with paperbacks dealing with concrete and spectacular forms like alcoholism, drug addiction, mental disorders, delinquency, and suicide. Largely rewritten, the chapter on social problems emphasizes the "emerging" forms of problem behavior and methods of solving them: war, civil disobedience, racial discrimination, civil rights, protest movements, and mass demonstrations. Although Mr. Merrill makes no attempt to cover such difficult topics in detail, he discusses their nature and the attempts to solve or ameliorate the problems in the context of social change. Updated, other chapters attempt to demonstrate the essential nature of sociology as a dynamic discipline. Footnotes and selected bibliographies are particularly impressive, and 37 illustrations give the book vividness and vitality. It runs to 449 pages and costs $8.95. The publisher is Prentice-Hall, Inc.

Speak for YSpeak for Yourself, Daniel Webster, ALife of Webster in His Own Words, edited and arranged by Walker Lewis, contains 32 illustrations of which 19 are printed by courtesy of the Trustees of Dartmouth College. In essence the book is an autobiography with Webster himself doing most of the talking with editor's additions only when needed as splices. Because Webster rarely described himself, Mr. Lewis has chosen eight illustrations with appropriate explanations to show him at different ages and in different moods. Webster's words are drawn from his autobiography, letters, court cases, and speeches. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company, the book runs to 505 pages and costs $8.95.