Roger Smith

Challenging commonly held biological, religious, and ethical beliefs, internationally well known historian of science Roger Smith boldly argues that human nature is not some "thing" awaiting discovery but is active in understanding itself. According to Smith, "being human" is a self-creation made possible through a reflective circle of thought and action, with a past and a future, and studying this "history" from a range of perspectives is fundamental to human self-understanding. Smith's argument brings together historical and contemporary debates concerning materialism and human nature and the relations of the different fields of knowledge. He draws on classic writings from across the human sciences, touching on sociology, anthropology, brain sciences, history, philosophical hermeneutics, and critical theory, and demonstrates that there is no position outside history for an absolutely objective or eternally valid view of human nature. The question "what is human?" does not have and could not possible have one answer. Instead, there exists a variety of answers for different purposes, and there are good reasons for the many conceptions of what it is to be human.Smith does not treat human nature as only biological, economic, or moral, but as a multidimensional subject that should be considered in its proper historical context. By understanding this context, Smith believes, we can come to a truer understanding of ourselves. Persuasively and elegantly written, Being Human takes an important new turn in the philosophical study of being human.

Values and their application are a continuing area of concern for those involved in work with children and families. This book provides a means of understanding models of social welfare and children's services, and relating these to the challenges of practice. Key debates about values in children's services are identified and examined, in their legislative, policy and practice contexts. The text develops a range of approaches to practice, utilizing case examples to illustrate the challenges, and to help practitioners with the task of reconciling competing expectations in their work with children.

Launching the new Kogan Page Primary Essentials series, this indispensable handbook for all practising and aspiring primary headteachers will help primary school leaders rise to the many challenges that face them in the task of effectively managing a busy primary school. Some of the key areas examined are:* staff development* recruiting and managing staff* the school as an organisation* leadership* managing a successful inspection.As well as acting as a guide to best practice for those tasked with the role of headship, this comprehensive and straightforward handbook will also assist governors, deputies, senior teachers, those studying for NPQH, to understand how an effective head can create and sustain an effective school.

A key role for primary school leaders is to develop strategies for promoting and ensuring high quality learning. This practical and accessible handbook has been written by an experienced primary leader, and will offer anyone seeking guidance on creating or maintaining a more effective primary school with a valuable and friendly resource. Extensive coverage in this book includes:* using organisation and leadership to create a positive ethos* developing good relationships and creating teams* managing the curriculum and raising pupil achievement* the role of targets and planning in raising achievement* fostering successful teaching and good classroom management and relationships* working with the inspection process* performance management* dealing effectively with stress and time management.Launching the new Kogan Page Primary Essentials series, this book will be welcomed by any primary leader who is seeking to develop their pupil's and their school's strengths and expectations.

Because science has assumed an ever larger role in culture, scientists have become public figures, role models, and even heroes. Accordingly, scientific biography has grown steadily in popularity. Biographies of Scientists provides more than 500 sources of information on scientists for young and adult general readers and for scholars. These sources explain scientists' accomplishments in the context of the personal and career developments that made those accomplishments possible. Among the sources are encyclopedias, periodicals, and individual biographies and autobiographies of researchers in astronomy and cosmology, chemistry, earth sciences, life sciences, mathematics, medical sciences, and physics. An introduction traces the general history and themes of scientific biography, and each entry in the bibliography includes an annotation that discusses and evaluates the biographical source and indicates the most suitable readership for it. The bibliography concludes with indexes of authors, scientists who are the subjects of biographies, and scientific topics.

In everyday parlance, "inhibition" suggests repression, tight control, the opposite of freedom. In medicine and psychotherapy the term is commonplace, its definition understood. Relating how inhibition - the word and the concept - became a bridge between society at large and the natural sciences of mind and brain, Smith constructs a history of our view of ourselves. Not until the late 19th century did the term "inhibition" become common in English, connoting the dependency of reason and of civilization itself on the repression of "the beast within". This usage followed a century of Enlightenment thought about human nature and the nature of the human mind. Smith traces theories of inhibitory control from the moralistic psychologies of the early 19th century to the famous 20th-century schools of Sherrington, Pavlov and Freud. He finds that the meanings of "inhibition" cross disciplinary boundaries and outline the growth of our belief in the self-regulated person.