Surprise Encounters invites readers to engage in provocative encounters with riveting explorers-whether artists or scientists-who have as pioneers, opened new ways for seeing the world and our place in it. Through wide ranging and inspiring stories with internationally famous "path-finders" devoted to transformative change, McVay also reveals the challenge of placing funds strategically, a sacred charge, in education, the arts, critical issues, and the welfare of animals.

• pt.
• 1. Changing seas. Four and a half billion years ; Food from the sea ; Fewer fish in the sea ; Winds and currents ; Life on the move ; Rising tides ; Corrosive seas ; Dead zones and the world's great rivers ; Unwholesome waters ; The age of plastic ; The not so silent world ; Aliens, invaders, and the homogenization of life ; Pestilence and plague ; Mare incognitum ; Ecosystems at your service
• pt.
• 2. Changing course. Farming the sea ; The great cleanup ; Can we cool our warming world? ; A new deal for the oceans ; Life renewed ; Saving the giants of the sea ; Preparing for the worst ; Epilogue : the sea ahead
• Appendix 1. Seafood with a clear conscience
• Appendix 2. Conservation charities working to protect ocean life.

A "Silent Spring" for oceans, written by "the Rachel Carson of the fish world" ("The New York Times")Who can forget the sense of wonder with which they discovered the creatures of the deep? In this vibrant hymn to the sea, Callum Roberts--one of the world's foremost conservation biologists--leads readers on a fascinating tour of mankind's relationship to the sea, from the earliest traces of water on earth to the oceans as we know them today. In the process, Roberts looks at how the taming of the oceans has shaped human civilization and affected marine life.We have always been fish eaters, from the dawn of civilization, but in the last twenty years we have transformed the oceans beyond recognition. Putting our exploitation of the seas into historical context, Roberts offers a devastating account of the impact of modern fishing techniques, pollution, and climate change, and reveals what it would take to steer the right course while there is still time. Like "Four Fish" and "The Omnivore's Dilemma, " "The Ocean of Life" takes a long view to tell a story in which each one of us has a role to play.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

For more than ten thousand years, Native Americans from Alaska to southern California relied on aquatic animals such as seals, sea lions, and sea otters for food and raw materials. Archaeological research on the interactions between people and these marine mammals has made great advances recently and provides a unique lens for understanding the human and ecological past. Archaeological research is also emerging as a crucial source of information on contemporary environmental issues as we improve our understanding of the ancient abundance, ecology, and natural history of these species. This groundbreaking interdisciplinary volume brings together archaeologists, biologists, and other scientists to consider how archaeology can inform the conservation and management of pinnipeds and other marine mammals along the Pacific Coast.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• Different seas?
• Concepts of the sea
• Navigation and the arts of performance
• Ships as societies
• Beaches
• The sea on the land.

'There is nothing more enticing, disenchanting, and enslaving than the life at sea' wrote Joseph Conrad. In The Sea: A Cultural History John Mack considers the ways in which human beings interact because of the sea, navigate their course across it, and live on and around it - whether promontories, estuaries, ports or coves. The Sea considers the characteristics of different seas and oceans and investigates how the sea is conceptualized in various cultures. It looks at the diversity of maritime technologies, especially the practice of navigation and the 'society' of the sea - in many cultures all-male, often cosmopolitan, always hierarchical. The separation of the sea and the land is evident in the use of different vocabularies for the same things, the change in a mariner's behaviour when on land for a period, and in the liminal status of points of interaction between the two realms, notably on beaches and at ports. Ships are also deployed in symbolic contexts on land from ship burials, such as that at Sutton Hoo, to ecclesiastical and public architecture. The two realms are thus in dialogue in both symbolic and economic terms, rather than irrevocably separated. In describing the diversities of maritime cultures, this book moves beyond conventional boundaries, using histories, maritime archaeology, biography, art history and literary sources to provide an innovative and experiential account of 'the great blue yonder'.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

Humanity can make short work of the oceans' creatures. In 1741, hungry explorers discovered herds of Steller's sea cow in the Bering Strait, and in less than thirty years, the amiable beast had been harpooned into extinction. It's a classic story, but a key fact is often omitted. Bering Islannd was the last redoubt of a species that had been decimated by hunting and habitat loss years before the explorers set sail.As Callum M. Roberts reveals in THE UNNATURAL HISTORY OF THE SEA, the oceans' bounty didn't disappear overnight. While today's fishing industry is ruthlessly efficient, intense exploitation began not in the modern era, or even with the dawn of industrialization, but in the 11th century in medieval Europe. Roberts explores this long and colorful history of commercial fishing, taking readers around the world and through the centuries to witness the transformation of the seas. Drawing on firsthand accounts of early explorers, pirates, merchants, fishers, and travelers, the book recreates the oceans of the past: waters teeming with whales, sea lions, sea otters, turtles, and giant fish. The abundance of marine life described by 15th century seafarers is almost unimaginable today, but Roberts both brings it alive and artfully traces its depletion. Collapsing fisheries, he shows, are simply latest chapter in a long history of unfettered commercialization of the seas. The story does not end with an empty ocean. Instead, Roberts describes how we might restore the splendor and prosperity of the seas through smarter management of our resources and some simple restraint. From the coasts of Florida to New Zealand, marine reserves have fostered spectacular recovery of plants and animals to levels not seen in a century. They prove that history need not repeat itself: we can leave the oceans richer than we found them.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

Conversations with Marco Polo is a biography of Eugene Haderlie, whose extraordinary life is deeply intertwined with the 20th century: a rough-and-tumble childhood in Wyoming during the Depression; ; sn unfrttsfustr rcprfition to Baja Mexico, where he crossed paths with John Steinbeck and had his inflamed appendix taken out by a veterinarian; two years as hard-hat diver in "World War II, defusing mines in the English Channel and enduring the trauma of D-Day. The conversations recorded here are akin to reading about Marco Polo: tales of every-day life and adventure from a world we can never experience firsthand."--p. 4 of cover.

Much has been written about Charles Darwin but this is the first biography of his strong, intelligent wife whom he referred to as 'twice refined gold'. Emma Wedgwood, granddaughter of the famous Josiah, married Charles Darwin in 1839, three years after he returned from his extraordinary voyage on the Beagle. Their life together was intellectually exciting though overshadowed by personal tragedy. Edna Healey has discovered new, and hitherto unpublished material and has the full support of the Darwin family in writing this major biography.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• 1. The archaeology of shell matrix sites--
• 2. Shelled animals: biology and predation--
• 3. Diagenesis and taphonomy--
• 4. Quantification of archaeological shells--
• 5. Palaeoenvironmental reconstruction--
• 6. Season of death techniques--
• 7. Dietary reconstruction--
• 8. The shell artifact--
• 9. Shells and social organization.
• (source: Nielsen Book Data)

Cheryl Claassen offers an authoritative, readable and clear guide to the study of shells, which is addressed to students and professional archaeologists and palaeontologists. She considers the history of archaeological interest in shells, the biology of freshwater and marine molluscs, and critically discusses current techniques, methods, and research problems. Drawing on examples worldwide, and covering prehistoric and historic periods, among the topics covered are: is shell deposit natural or cultural? How long do shells last? What can shells tell us about the environmental characteristics and ancient habitats or about the people who collected them? What symbolic roles have shells served in human societies? This is a well balanced account, and all aspects of the subject are clearly represented.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)