Identifying Roots


Book Description

This volume presents a cultural history of Alex Haley's Roots as a case study in 'operational acts of identification.' It examines the strategy and tactics Haley employed in developing a family origin story into an acclaimed national history. Where cultural studies scholars have critiqued notions of sacrosanct 'rootedness,' this book shows the fruit of critically identifying those claims. It reframes the concept of 'roots' as a theoretical vocabulary and grammar for the anthropology of scriptures - a way of parsing the cultural texts that seem to read us back. Identifying Roots invites scholars of religion to reimagine their place in the humans sciences. Theorizing from a tradition of African American interventions in the history of religion, Richard Newton registers the social dramas and dynamic rhetoric that render the cultural logic of scriptures powerful. Creatively marshaling intellectual history, ethnographic autobiography, Close Reading and discourse analysis, Newton enumerates the consequences for signifying people and cultural texts as intrinsically significant. More than an investigation into Alex Haley's legacy, Identifying Roots unearths the politics of beginnings and belongings.







Finding Family


Book Description

Finding Family: My Search for Roots and the Secrets in My DNA is the highly suspenseful account of an adoptee trying to reclaim the biological family denied him by sealed birth records. This fascinating quest, including the author's landmark use of DNA testing, takes readers on an exhilarating roller-coaster ride and concludes with a twist that rivals anything Hollywood has to offer. In the vein of a classic mystery, Hill gathers the seemingly scant evidence surrounding the circumstances of his birth. As his resolve shores up, the author also avails of new friends, genealogists, the Internet, and the latest DNA tests in the new field of genetic genealogy. As he closes in on the truth of his ancestry, he is able to construct a living, breathing portrait of the young woman who was faced with the decision to forsake her rights to her child, and ultimately the man whose identity had remained hidden for decades. Finding Family offers guidance, insight, and motivation for anyone engaged in a similar mission, from ways to obtain information to the many networks that can facilitate adoption searches. The book includes a detailed guide to DNA and genetic genealogy and how they can produce irrefutable results in determining genetic connections and help adoptees bypass sealed records and similar stumbling blocks.




Root Methods


Book Description

A comprehensive review of all modern methods for plant root research, both in the field and in the laboratory. It covers the effects of environmental interactions with root growth and function, focussing in particular on the assessment of root distribution and dynamics. It also describes and discusses the processing of root observations, analysis and modelling of root growth and architecture, root-image analysis, computer-assisted tomography and magnetic resonance imaging. Furthermore, a survey of the application of isotope techniques in root physiology is given.




Finding Italian Roots


Book Description

A guide for family researchers of Italian descent points the way to resources in the United States as well as information available in the town halls, archives, churches, and libraries of Italy.




Polynomial Root-finding and Polynomiography


Book Description

This book offers fascinating and modern perspectives into the theory and practice of the historical subject of polynomial root-finding, rejuvenating the field via polynomiography, a creative and novel computer visualization that renders spectacular images of a polynomial equation. Polynomiography will not only pave the way for new applications of polynomials in science and mathematics, but also in art and education. The book presents a thorough development of the basic family, arguably the most fundamental family of iteration functions, deriving many surprising and novel theoretical and practical applications such as: algorithms for approximation of roots of polynomials and analytic functions, polynomiography, bounds on zeros of polynomials, formulas for the approximation of Pi, and characterizations or visualizations associated with a homogeneous linear recurrence relation. These discoveries and a set of beautiful images that provide new visions, even of the well-known polynomials and recurrences, are the makeup of a very desirable book. This book is a must for mathematicians, scientists, advanced undergraduates and graduates, but is also for anyone with an appreciation for the connections between a fantastically creative art form and its ancient mathematical foundations.




Plant Roots


Book Description

The decade since the publication of the third edition of this volume has been an era of great progress in biology in general and the plant sciences in particular. This is especially true with the advancements brought on by the sequencing of whole genomes of model organisms and the development of "omics" techniques. This fourth edition of Plant Root










A Dictionary of Austronesian Monosyllabic Roots (Submorphemes)


Book Description

This book documents an understudied phenomenon in Austronesian languages, namely the existence of recurrent submorphemic sound-meaning associations of the general form -CVC. It fills a critical gap in scholarship on these languages by bringing together a large body of data in one place, and by discussing some of the theoretical issues that arise in analyzing this data. Following an introduction which presents the topic, it includes a critical review of the relevant literature over the past century, and discussions of the following: 1. problems in finding the root (the "needle in the haystack" problem), 2. root ambiguity, 3. controls on chance as an interfering factor, 4. unrecognized morphology as a possible factor in duplicating evidence, 5. the shape/structure of the root, 6. referents of roots, 7. the origin of roots, 8. the problem of distinguishing false cognates produced by convergence in root-bearing morphemes from legitimate comparisons resulting from divergent descent, and 9. the problem of explaining how submorphemes are transmitted across generations of speakers independently of the morphemes that host them. The remainder of the book consists of a list of sources for the 197 languages from which data is drawn, followed by the roots with supporting evidence, a short appendix, and references.