Project 1: Review of a Popular Science Book

Projects

One way in which science is communicated to the public is through a thriving "popular science" literature. Both science writers and actual scientists have forayed into the field, writing books that frequently become bestsellers. These books pursue diverse purposes: to educate or entertain, to sound the alarm or to reassure the alarmed, to explain scientific concepts by means of more accessible subjects or to use science to explain other subjects familiar to the lay reader. These books also sometimes earn scientists and science writers a great deal of money and fame.

In most cases, however, the book's strength resides in the writer's ability to make the scientific content of the book meaningful to readers.

In this project, you will read and review the popular science book of your choice. You may choose a book from my list or, with my permission, find one on your own.

Imagine that your review is destined to appear in one of the many book review forums that commonly review popular science books, such as the New York Times Review of Books. Your purpose is not only to describe the book, but to recommend (or not recommend) it to your readers. Of course, you will also want to explain why you believe that the book is (or is not) worth reading.

N.B.: While book reviewers are expected to voice their "opinion" about a text, their role is more complicated than that: they are also expected to evaluate the book on its own terms. That is, they must determine what the book is attempting to do, then evaluate its success in fulfilling that goal. So your first step is to determine just what the author is trying to accomplish in the book.

Criteria for choosing a book

Apply these criteria to select a book:

  1. Nonfiction, not fiction or biography or reference. Find a book that tells a story, not a purely practical text (i.e., avoid reference books, dictionaries, Physics for Dummies-type texts, etc.).
  2. Popular rather than "scholarly" or "academic" treatment. Find something intended for the mainstream public, not (or not just) for researchers or scholars. One way to tell the difference is to examine who publishes the book (an academic or popular press?), who wrote the blurbs on the back, and who is acknowledged in the acknowledgements--if it's a bunch of PhD's, it may be an academic rather than popular book. Another clue is to skim the introduction. If it's identifying "problems in the research" that the present book tries to solve, it's probably an academic book. If you have questions about whether your choice is academic or popular, just ask--we can consider it together.
  3. Topic in a fairly mainstream area of science (including medical science): astronomy, biology, botany, geology, biochemistry, chaos theory, physical anthropology, genomics, environmental science, and the like.
  4. Full-length treatment of a single topic or tight constellation of topics, not an article-length piece or an encyclopedia-style collection of short pieces. The book should be designed to be read cover to cover, not piecemeal.
  5. Single-authored text, except by permission. (I'm willing to let a couple folks use anthologies like the annual Best American Science Writing anthology to provide some counterpoint to the single-authored approach, but I'd rather not have everyone take this route.)
  6. Essay collections, if single-authored, are also acceptable as long as the collection itself has a coherent theme. For instance, Oliver Sacks' Uncle Tungsten is a series of essays that trace Sacks' singular development as a psychologist (through optics, chemistry, and other scientific topics)--it'd work fine. But Sacks' Anthropologist on Mars is a collection of more or less separate case studies--quite interesting, but less appropriate for this assignment unless you can make a strong argument for the text's coherence.
  7. Current, except by permission. If you wish to read something more than four or five years old, make a case for its enduring value.

Selected bibliography of popular science books

This list is is merely a selection of books that I have recently read, heard about, or spotted on the shelves of a bookstore. You're welcome to choose a book from this list, but only after studying it further to see if you truly find the topic compelling. In other words, don't simply pick from the list--find something that you'd actually choose to read while relaxing on the beach on vacation. One function of this assignment, I hope, is to make it possible for you to do some pleasure reading, even if, admittedly, that pleasure reading will lead to a course project!

One useful list of (mostly) popular science books is the "Science Friday Bookshelf" (http://www.sciencefriday.com/pages/biz/books/allbooks.shtml), a list of all the books that have been mentioned on NPR's weekly science program, Talk of the Nation: Science Friday with Ira Flatow. Not all of these books are appropriate for this assignment, but some are. Or simply visit the local bookstore's "science and nature" section; peruse the virtual shelves of Amazon.com or BN.com; read the dust jackets and skim the introductions. Find a popular science book that truly fascinates you!

Once you've selected one or two good prospects, send me an email that lists the following:

I'll respond as soon as possible so that you can start reading!

Links on this page

http://www.sciencefriday.com/pages/biz/books/allbooks.shtml ("Science Friday Bookshelf")

Amazon.com (Amazon.com online bookstore)

BN.com (Barnes and Noble online bookstore)

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Last modified: 01/06/04