Cora Du Bois

The Public Health Worker as an Agent of Socio-Cultural Change

This is the Third Annual Dorothy B. Nyswander Lecture, It was delivered in Berkeley, April 24, 1959. The lectureship was established in honor of Dr. Nyswander upon her retirement as Professor of Health Education at the University of California.

MELFORD E. SPIRO. Burmese Supernaturalism : A Study in the Explanation and Reduction of Suffering. Pp. x, 300. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1967.

one hand, that the politicization of administration can, in such circumstances, contribute greatly to the effective implementation of development plans. The autonomy of a development agency, on the other hand, can as often be an indication that political leaders feel no stake in its success as an indication that it enjoys the confidence of the political elite. In Malaysia it was only when rural development became of great political interest, when its success had electoral significance, that the necessary power and resources were devoted to the effort and that a system of rewards and penalties were enforced to

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have written ... is not a part of the study series itself but rather our interpretation and reflection on all the materials we have used. We have undertaken to present in as readable a form as possible some of the results of the churches’ effort to relate the seemingly unrelated parts of our society.&dquo; Ethics in a Business Society is more than a summary or digest of the Church series. The authors have drawn from other sources, have added valuable historical perspectives, and have given more unity than was possible in some of the Church series. They paint in broad perspective the really serious problems facing us today, such problems as the following: growing insecurity; the problem of freedom and individualism in an age of giant business; the achievements, real and spurious, of machine technology; the churches’ attitude toward imperialism, slavery, and poverty; Marx’s &dquo;fake religion&dquo;; the character and incentives of business leaders; and the alleged spread of corporations and of monopoly. The authors’ view of our present status is judicious and properly not very optimistic. This little book, with all its religious side lights, might well be called &dquo;social economics.&dquo; &dquo; It is well and interestingly written -one of the most significant books I have read recently. It would be most worthwhile reading for students, and, I venture to assert, even for most economists. JOHN ISE University of Kansas

Sociology and Education: GILLIN, JOHN (Ed.). For a Science of Social Man: Convergences in Anthropology, Psychology, and Sociology. By Howard Becker, John Gillin, A. Irving Hallowell, George Peter Murdock, Theodore M. Newcomb, Talcott Parsons, and M. Brewster Smith. Pp. vii, 289. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1954.

an instructive answer. This is one of the Library of Congress series on American Civilization. According to the original plan, science was to be the subject of a separate book and was omitted from the present volume. One may, regret this, as one may regret the omission of a variety of minor scholarly fields, but, even with these omissions, the task is of well nigh unmanageable proportions. Professor Curti’s opening essay, though not the most well-knit piece in_ the book, must have been by all odds the most difficult to prepare. Covering such disparate matters as changing emphases in scholarly pursuits, the development of scholarly organizations, sources of financial support, and freedom of inquiry, the author provides an extraordinarily useful review of the intellectual and social context in which American scholars have worked. Perhaps the most brilliant essay in the book is Rene Wellek’s piece on literary scholarship. Displaying all of the superb assurance in opinion which one has come to expect of the literary scholar, Wellek reviews the movements of the past fifty years, appraises their contributions, and suggests the path which literary scholarship must take in the years to come. One may not accept all of his judgments, but one must admire the incisiveness and erudition which characterize his thinking and writing. Equally lucid and competent are W. Stull Holt’s essay on historical scholarship and Arthur Murphy’s on philosophical scholarship. Professor Murphy’s essay, a brief history of the ideas with which philosophers have been preoccupied since 1900, provides excellent background for the other essays. In his treatment of the social sciences, the late Louis Wirth is handicapped by the necessity of reviewing several fields which have shown markedly different courses of development. His summary of the achievements of the social sciences is a bit uncritical. Walter Agard, on classical scholarship, is predictably concerned with the defense of this embattled field, but his approach is constructive. A book so brief on a topic so large can easily be criticized for its shortcomings. The principal shortcoming is that to a considerable degree each contributor deals with his special field as though it were selfcontained. Yet the effect is remarkably coherent, and the reader comes away with

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Although placed on canvasses of very different magnitude, the authors of the two preceding articles have posed similar questions. Both ask essentially, “What were the processes of adaptation during periods of culture contact in South Asia?” Neither author is particularly preoccupied with chronology and itemizing but rather with formulating the larger regularities within which events have occurred. The question they ask is the kind that social scientists rather than historians are likely to phrase. It is, however, a question of such a high level of generalization that few social scientists have had the courage to investigate it—even though its implications would be of inestimable theoretical importance to contemporary programs of international assistance.