Post: #1

Anyone got any suggestions? I think its a subject that would interest rvf members as many of us strive to be emigrants ourselves.

Personally I would be especially interested in early migrations such as when man first emigrated out of Africa or from Asia to the Americas.

Post: #2

It's not about ancient Bering Strait type stuff, but Thomas Sowell's "Ethnic America" was fascinating. He examines the behavioral patterns of Italians, Germans, Irish, Chinese, Mexicans, etc. as they migrated to America. Lots of interesting tidbits on how the cultures of the home countires influenced how they acted once they came here.

Post: #3

(02-26-2013 11:59 AM)solo Wrote:  Anyone got any suggestions? I think its a subject that would interest rvf members as many of us strive to be emigrants ourselves.

Personally I would be especially interested in early migrations such as when man first emigrated out of Africa or from Asia to the Americas.

Clive Ponting's World History covers migratory movements extensively. The whole first fifth of the book or so is dedicated to the spread of humans across the earth and the slow transition between nomadic and agriculture-based existence.

http://www.amazon.com/World-History-New-...0712665722

Post: #4

(02-26-2013 12:09 PM)Martel Wrote:  It's not about ancient Bering Strait type stuff, but Thomas Sowell's "Ethnic America" was fascinating. He examines the behavioral patterns of Italians, Germans, Irish, Chinese, Mexicans, etc. as they migrated to America. Lots of interesting tidbits on how the cultures of the home countires influenced how they acted once they came here.

Thomas Sowell? That's one of the reasons that I love this forum, name dropping of intellectuals and great books to read that aren't pop culture bullshit.

Post: #5

Saxons, Vikings, and Celts: The Genetic Roots of Britain and Ireland by Bryan Sykes

http://www.amazon.com/Saxons-Vikings-Cel...0393330753

Post: #6

"Cultures in Motion - mapping key contacts and their imprints in world history" Peter Stearns 2001 Yale UP

"Atlas Historique des Migrations" G Chaliand et al 1994 Editions du Seuil
(text is in French, but the maps are in picture-language)

"An Historical Atlas of Central Asia" Yyri Bregel (Ghengis Kahn and much more! - I found a copy on the internet and printed it a couple of years ago - didn't keep note of the url but)

Historical Atlases by Colin McEvedy (Penguin books): he has atlases of Ancient, Medieval, Modern, and Recent history (the last three only covering Europe and the Near East); North American, and African history. There are various editions of some of these, from 1967 until 2002). All highly recommended.

Post: #7

Mapping Human History: Genes, Race, and Our Common Origins

Pretty vanilla; also, dated from an Out-of-Africa standpoint (well, like anything that came before the Green and Reich 2010 papers). However, easy to read and a great overview if you're new to the subject.

Post: #8

When I first saw the OP, I got the idea that he was asking specifically for books of maps.

Now, on re-reading, this was just my imagining, probably because such books of maps are what I am into.

Funny thing is, I am currently teaching an adult ed course on this subject right at the moment ...

Some things from my booklist: Steven Oppenheimer "Out of Eden" (I think the same book is possibly also under another title, one for the US market, and one for the UK). Excellent read. Highly recommended.

"Genes, Languages, and Peoples" by Cavalli-Sforza (2000) - this is his popular-consumption abridgement of the enormous meta-study "The History and Geography of Human Genes", which might be found in some large academic libraries. The first-mentioned book goes a bit too far in simplifying things, in my opinion; the latter has 500 quarto pages of text, followed by 500 maps - fascinating if you are into that sort of thing, but certainly not light reading!

Spencer Wells, of "The Genographic Project" has written a few popular books, including "The Journey of Man". I'd recommending looking at the web for information about this; the books aren't my favourites.

Look on the web for "towards a theory of modern human origins: geography, demography, and diversity in recent human evolution", by Lahr and Foley (1998). Nearly forty pages, may or may not be too technical. I handed out copies of this to my class today.

Post: #9

When I saw this, I immediately thought of "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire". Gibbon is a bit wordy, but if you really want to see what mass migration and cultural decay + feminism of a society can do, check it.

It may happen in another 300 years.