ENGL 1100: Writing I (Railton)

Immunization is regarded by many as one of the greatest advances in modern civilization. The widespread use of vaccines has led to increases in life expectancy, reductions in the occurrence of childhood diseases, and is generally credited with saving millions of lives annually. But since their discovery two centuries ago, vaccines have been dogged by pockets of persistent distrust among those who are skeptical of their science or who find compulsory immunization at odds with personal liberty. The rise of these voices in contemporary culture has contributed to trends of vaccine delay and vaccine hesitancy in some communities - a chasm between the general population and the scientific establishment that has persisted and grown at times across the last several decades.

The Anthropology of Sport explores how sport both shapes and is shaped by the social, cultural, political, and historical contexts in which we live. Core themes discussed in this book include the body, modernity, nationalism, the state, citizenship, transnationalism, globalization, and gender and sexuality.

Earth at Risk maps out the necessary transition to sustainability, detailing the innovations in science and technology, along with law, institutional design, and economics, that can and must be put to use to avert environmental catastrophe.

In the midst of government retrenchment, austerity, and growing inequality, social entrepreneurs have in recent years come to prominence as sources of ideas, innovation, and funding for solving problems in societies worldwide. In this book, author and activist Asheem Singh shows how the social entrepreneurship movement developed from a number of extremely modest initial ventures into a global humanitarian and financial juggernaut that is rethinking philanthropy, government, and even capitalism itself.

A controversial argument for reconsidering the limits of free speech   Swirling in the midst of the resurgence of neo-Nazi demonstrations, hate speech, and acts of domestic terrorism are uncomfortable questions about the limits of free speech. The United States stands apart from many other countries in that citizens have the power to say virtually anything without legal repercussions.  But, in the case of white supremacy, does the First Amendment demand that we defend Nazis?   In Must We Defend Nazis?, legal experts Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic argue that it should not.

An innovative, data-driven explanation of how public opinion shifted on LGBTQ rights  The Path to Gay Rights is the first social science analysis of how and why the LGBTQ movement achieved its most unexpected victory---transforming gay people from a despised group of social deviants into a minority worthy of rights and protections in the eyes of most Americans.

Shared Experiences of Mass Shootings develops an understanding of the collective experience, consequences and recovery processes after mass shootings. Drawing from in-depth case studies of two mass shootings in Finland and comparing them with other international cases, it explores how communities work through violent tragedies employing social memory and memorialization practices that can be seen as either tools for recovery, or as something that needs to be restricted. Contributing a novel understanding of how experiencing mass violence is deeply gendered through the social patterns and narratives of men's and women's emotions, this timely monograph will appeal to undergraduate and postgraduate students, as well as postdoctoral researchers, interested in fields such as: Sociology of Violence, Criminology, Social Work, Memory Studies, Media Studies and Cultural Trauma.

When the tough-on-crime politics of the 1980s overcrowded state prisons, private companies saw potential profit in building and operating correctional facilities. Today more than a hundred thousand of the 1.5 million incarcerated Americans are held in private prisons in twenty-nine states and federal corrections. Private prisons are criticized for making money off mass incarceration--to the tune of $5 billion in annual revenue.