Whole Earth: Life and Politics on a Small Planet

By Richard Oliver Collin
Longman Publishing Group

Frustrated by the various imperfections of mainstream political science textbooks, veteran Coastal politics professor Richard Collin decided to write his own. Based on his long experience as an instructor in undergraduate classrooms, Collin determined to create a book that focused more on practical knowledge and application than on political theory.

Collin points out in the book's preface that many poli-sci textbooks have an outdated Cold War-oriented worldview. He describes Whole Earth as "a thoroughly 21st century, post-Cold War book that reflects the kind of conflict and political turmoil the planet has experienced since the tragedy of 11 September 2001…" The book endeavors to convey the complex overlapping linkages—involving history, sociology, economics and technology—that influence contemporary international relations. "In the 21st century, the increased pace of globalization ensures that almost everything is connected to almost everything else," writes Collin.

An Oxford alumnus whose career has included military intelligence work and novel writing, Collin employs the gifts of a highly knowledgeable storyteller to produce a unique and useful new introduction to world politics.

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 Prologues, Epilogues, Curtain-Raisers, and Afterpieces: The Rest of the Eighteenth-Century London Stage

By Daniel J. Ennis and Judith Bailey Slagle
University of Delaware Press

The 18th century was a brilliant age in the history of British theater. The restoration of the monarchy in 1660 released an abundance of pent-up theatrical energy that had been suppressed during the 18-year ban on live performances imposed by the Puritan regime during the civil war. The English stage of the next century or so is closely identified with the baroquely bewigged, tartly satirical and unblushingly bawdy comedy of manners popularized by such literary wits as Sheridan, Fielding and Dryden.

Recent scholarship has gone beyond the standard masterpieces of these authors to indicate the variety and bustle of the total London theater scene during this era. Coastal English professor Daniel J. Ennis has co-edited a new book of essays that contribute further to our understanding of this golden age of dramatic art. Epilogues, Curtain-Raisers, and Afterpieces: The Rest of the Eighteenth-Century London Stage is a collection of eight articles that plunder, in the most creative sense, the margins of this rich world. Some of the pieces (one is by Ennis) are literary criticism examining little known short pieces—prologues, pantomimes and the like—that served as regular added attractions to the feature presentations of a typical London theater evening. Other essays explore artistic activities that flourished at the fringe of theater life, such as portrait painting of actors and actresses.

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Calculated Risks: Highly Radioactive Waste and Homeland Security

By Kenneth A. Rogers and Marvin B. Kingsley
Ashgate Publishing Ltd.

The management of highly radioactive waste has been an issue of national concern since the advent of nuclear-powered energy plants in the early 1950s. Since the terror attacks on 9/11 and the new age of security risks they unleashed, the perennial questions associated with nuclear waste, particularly its transportation and storage, have assumed a new and grave sense of urgency.

As Coastal politics professor (and department chair) Ken Rogers and Marvin Kingsley of Arkansas Tech University point out in this new book, decisions on what to do with our radioactive waste have from the beginning been complicated by politics. The book examines the complex history of highly radioactive waste storage and disposal policy and how it has been influenced by federal, state and local policymaking. Three specific sites in the Western U.S. are examined in detail: Skull Valley in Utah, Owl Creek in Wyoming and the Yucca Mountain project in Nevada.

The authors' extensive research enables them to present a comprehensive, multi-dimensional study that includes a careful analysis of the options for a long-term solution. "In the final analysis, the problem of what to do with the ever-increasing amounts of highly radioactive waste is a pressing issue that must be dealt with in the near-term to avoid a real and visible threat to the country's security," they write.

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Old Times in Horry County: A Narrative History

By Randall Wells
The History Press

A native of Glen Ellyn, Ill., Randall Wells became fascinated with the people and history of Horry County after moving to Conway in 1974, when he joined the CCU English faculty. His experience as a newcomer to the area was the subject of his first book, Along the Waccamaw (1990).

From 1989 to 2004 Wells served as the founding director of the Horry County Oral History Project, for which he conducted more than 100 interviews with county people of every class, color and culture. In 2004 he used the transcripted interviews as a basis for an oral history of the county called Swamp, Strand and Steamboat: Voices of Horry County, South Carolina, 1732-1954.

His new book, Old Times in Horry County: A Narrative History, chronicles the history of the area through interviews with 13 early 20th century Horry residents. Local "living libraries" featured in the new book include David Carr, Florence "Flossie" Sarvis Morris, Lillie Louise Brown Latimer and Ruth Clay "Sabe" Woodbury, Woodrow W. Long, Link Vereen, Carrie Daniels Doyle, Rilla Cook McCrackin, Gary M. Mincey and Douglas B. Bailey, S.F. Horton, Andrew Stanley and Julia Pryor Macklen.

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Teaching at the University Level: Cross Cultural Perspectives from the United States and Russia

By Dennis Wiseman, Gilbert Hunt, V.I. Zhukov and L.V. Mardahaev
Charles C. Thomas Publishers

This English language version of a textbook first published in 2006 in Russia as a collaboration between Coastal Carolina University and Russian State Social University of Moscow examines topics in higher education from the viewpoints of practicing education scholars at both institutions.

Dennis Wiseman, director of the Biddle Center for Teaching and Learning in CCU's Spadoni College of Education, and Gilbert Hunt, dean of the Spadoni College, contributed four chapters to Teaching at the University Level: Cross-Cultural Perspectives from the United States and Russia and served as co-editors. Five chapters were contributed by faculty members of Russian State Social University, one of three institutions in Russia with which Coastal has partnership agreements.

The book, written especially for those who teach at colleges and universities, introduces specific teaching techniques, including how to motivate and manage students, methods of active teaching, instructing multinational groups and promoting diversity.

Wiseman notes that Russian and American educators share many common views on the purpose of their work at the university level and on teaching, including a belief in the value of an interdisciplinary perspective, a respect for diversity, and an emphasis on "active" rather than "passive" learning.

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