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Brief Contents
1 The Sociological Perspective  2 14 Gender Stratification 352

2 Sociological Investigation 28 15 Race and Ethnicity 382

3 Culture56 16 Aging and the Elderly 408

4 Society84 17 The Economy and Work 432

5 Socialization108 18 Politics and Government 464

6 Social Interaction in 19 Families496

Everyday Life 136
20 Religion528
7 Mass Media and Social Media 160
21 Education556
8 Groups and Organizations 192
22 Health and Medicine 580
9 Sexualities and Society 222
23 Population, Urbanization, and
10 Deviance250 Environment608

11 Social Stratification 280 24 Collective Behaviour and Social

Movements638
12 Social Class in Canada 302
25 Social Change: Traditional, Modern,
13 Global Stratification 326 and Postmodern Societies 664

iii
x Contents

Social Isolation 418 Corporations 455

Retirement 419 Economic Concentration 455
Aging and Income 420 Conglomerates and Corporate Linkages 456
Caregiving 421 Corporations and the Global Economy 457
WHO ARE THE CAREGIVERS? 421 • ELDER ABUSE 421 The Economy: Looking Ahead 458
Ageism 421 Summary 459 • Seeing Sociology in Everyday Life 459 • Seeing
The Elderly: A Minority? 422 Sociology in Your Everyday Life 461 • Making the Grade 461

Theories of Aging
Structural-Functional Analysis: Aging and
422
18 Politics and Government 464
Disengagement 422 The Power of Society to shape voting behaviour 465
Symbolic-Interaction Analysis: Aging Power and Authority 466
and Activity 423 Traditional Authority 466
Social-Conflict Analysis: Aging and Inequality 423 Rational-Legal Authority 467
Death and Dying 424 Charismatic Authority 467
Historical Patterns of Death 424 Politics in Global Perspective 468
The Modern Separation of Life and Death 424 Monarchy 468
Ethical Issues: Confronting Death 425 Democracy 469
WHEN DOES DEATH OCCUR? 425 • THE RIGHT-TO-DIE
DEMOCRACY AND FREEDOM: CAPITALIST AND SOCIALIST
DEBATE 425
APPROACHES 470
Aging: Looking Ahead 426 Authoritarianism 470
Summary 427 • Seeing Sociology in Everyday Life 427 •
Totalitarianism 470
Seeing Sociology in Your Everyday Life 429 • Making the
Grade 429
A Global Political System? 471
Politics in Canada 471
Culture, Economics, and Politics 472
17 The Economy and Work 432 Political Parties 475
The Power of Society to influence the kind of employment FUNCTIONS OF POLITICAL PARTIES 476 • PARTIES
AND THE POLITICAL SPECTRUM 476
one has 433
Voter Apathy 477
The Economy: Historical Overview 434
PARTY SUPPORT 477
The Agricultural Revolution 434
Political Socialization 482
The Industrial Revolution 435
THE PARTICIPATION OF WOMEN IN CANADIAN POLITICS 483
The Information Revolution and Post-Industrial
Theories of Power in Society 485
Society 435
The Pluralist Model: The People Rule 485
Sectors of the Economy 437
The Power Elite Model: A Few People Rule 485
The Global Economy 438
The Marxist Model: The System Is Biased 486
Economic Systems: Paths to Justice 441
Power beyond the Rules 486
Capitalism 441
Revolution 486
Socialism 442
Terrorism 487
Socialism and Communism 443
Welfare Capitalism and State Capitalism 443 War and Peace 488
Relative Advantages of Capitalism The Causes of War 488
and Socialism 444 Is Terrorism a New Kind of War? 489
ECONOMIC PRODUCTIVITY 444 • ECONOMIC The Costs and Causes of Militarism 489
EQUALITY 444 • PERSONAL FREEDOM 444 Nuclear Weapons 490
Changes in Socialist Countries 445 Mass Media and War 490
Work in Canada’s Post-Industrial Economy 445 Pursuing Peace 490
The Decline of Agricultural Work 445 Politics: Looking Ahead 491
From Factory Work to Service Work 447 Summary 492 • Seeing Sociology in Everyday Life 492 • Seeing
The Dual Labour Market 447 Sociology in Your Everyday Life 494 • Making the Grade 494

19
Labour Unions 447
Professions 448
Families 496
Self-Employment 451 The Power of Society to shape household structure 497
Underemployment 451 A Sociological Perspective on Families 498
UNEMPLOYMENT 452 Inclusive Definitions of Family 498
The Underground Economy 454 Government Reliance on Non-Inclusive Definitions
New Information Technology and Work 454 of Family 499
 Contents xi

Policies That Privilege Certain Types of Family Symbolic-Interaction Theory: Constructing

Structures 499 the Sacred 531
Policies That Assume Financial Support for Family Social-Conflict Theory: Inequality and Religion 532
Members 499 Feminist Theory: Gender and Religion 532
Recognition of Cohabiting Couples in Government Religion and Social Change 533
Definitions 500
Max Weber: Protestantism and Capitalism 533
How Families Have Changed over Time 500 Liberation Theology 533
Hunting and Gathering/Foraging Society 501
Types of Religious Organizations 534
Pre-Industrial Society 501
Church 534
Indigenous Communities and Families 501
Sect 534
The Industrial Era 503
Cult 535
The 1950s Family 503
Religion in History and around the World 536
The Closing Decades of the Twentieth and
Religion in Pre-Industrial Societies 536
Twenty-First Centuries 504
Religion in Industrial Societies 536
Theories of the Family 504
World Religions 536
Structural Functionalism 504
Christianity 536
Social-Conflict Theory 505
Islam 538
Symbolic Interactionism 505
Judaism 539
Feminist Theory 506
Hinduism 540
Marxist Feminist Theory 506
Buddhism 541
Postmodern Theory 506
Confucianism 542
Intersections of Paid and Unpaid Labour 507 Religion: East and West 543
The Gendered Nature of Unpaid Labour 507 Religious Trends in Canada 543
An Aging Population 508 Religious Affiliation 543
The New Reality: Providing Care While Working Religiosity 546
Full Time 508
Religious Diversity: Class, Ethnicity, and Race 546
The Challenges of Providing Care 509
SOCIAL CLASS 546 • ETHNICITY 548
Transitions and Problems in Intimate Relationships and Religion in a Changing Society 548
Families 510
Secularization 548
Transition to Adulthood 511
“New Age” Seekers: Spirituality without
Cohabitation, Marriage, and Remarriage 511 Formal Religion 549
Divorce 511 Religious Revival: “Good Old-Time Religion” 550
Transitions in Family Structure in Childhood 512 Religious Fundamentalism 550
Transitions in Child-Care Arrangements 513 The Electronic Church 552
Violence and Abuse in Intimate Relationships and Religion: Looking Ahead 552
Families 513 Summary 552 • Seeing Sociology in Everyday Life 552 •
Diversity in Contemporary Canadian Families 514 Seeing Sociology in Your Everyday Life 554 • Making the
Intersections of Intimate Relationships and Living Grade 554
Arrangements 514
Diversity in Intimate and Sexual Relationships 516 21 Education 556
Singlehood and Shifting Societal Views 517
The Power of Society to open the door to
LGBTQ+ Couples and Families 519 higher education 557
Trends in Childbearing and Parenting 520
Education: A Global Survey 558
New Reproductive Technologies and Families 521
Schooling and Economic Development 558
New Options for Parenting 523
Schooling in India 559
Summary 523 • Seeing Sociology in Everyday Life 523 • Seeing
Schooling in Japan 559
Sociology in Your Everyday Life 525 • Making the Grade 525
Schooling in Great Britain 560
Schooling in Canada 560
20 Religion 528 The Functions of Schooling 562
The Power of Society to shape our values and choices 529 Socialization 562
Religion: Concepts and Theories 530 Cultural Innovation 563
Religion and Sociology 530 Social Integration 563
Structural-Functional Theory: Functions Social Placement 563
of Religion 531 Latent Functions of Schooling 564
xii Contents

Schooling and Social Interaction 564 Social-Conflict and Feminist Theories: Inequality
The Self-Fulfilling Prophecy 564 and Health 602
ACCESS TO CARE 602 • THE PROFIT
Schooling and Social Inequality 565
MOTIVE 603 • MEDICINE AS POLITICS 603
Social Control 568
Health and Medicine: Looking Ahead 604
Standardized Testing 568
Summary 605 • Seeing Sociology in Everyday Life 605 •
Streaming or Tracking 568 Seeing Sociology in Your Everyday Life 606 • Making the
Access to Higher Education 568 Grade 606
Education and the World of Work 570
Privilege and Personal Merit 570 23 Population, Urbanization, and
Problems in the Schools 572 Environment 608
School Discipline and Violence 572
Dropping Out 573 The Power of Society to shape our view of
global warming 609
Academic Standards 573
Demography: The Study of Population 610
Current Issues in Canadian Education 574
Fertility 610
Home Schooling 574
Mortality 611
Trends in Post-Secondary Educational
Attainment 574 Migration 612
Education: Looking Ahead 575 Population Growth 613
Summary 576 • Seeing Sociology in Everyday Life 576 • Seeing Population Composition 614
Sociology in Your Everyday Life 577 • Making the Grade 578 History and Theory of Population Growth 614
Malthusian Theory 614
22 Health and Medicine 580 Demographic Transition Theory 616
The Power of Society to shape food security 581 Global Population Today: A Brief Survey 617
THE LOW-GROWTH NORTH 617 • THE HIGH-GROWTH
What Is Health? 582 SOUTH 617 • THE DEMOGRAPHIC DIVIDE 617
Health and Society 582
Urbanization: The Growth of Cities 617
Health: A Global Survey 583 The Evolution of Cities 618
Health in Low-Income Countries 583 THE FIRST CITIES 618 • PRE-INDUSTRIAL EUROPEAN
Health in High-Income Countries 583 CITIES 618 • INDUSTRIAL EUROPEAN CITIES 618

Health in Canada 583 The Growth of North American Cities 618

Age and Gender 583 SETTLEMENT IN NORTH AMERICA TO 1850 619 • URBAN
EXPANSION 620 • THE METROPOLITAN ERA 620
Social Class and Race 586
Suburbs and Central Cities 620
Disability 586
Mental Health 587 Urbanism as a Way of Life 621
Cigarette Smoking 589 Ferdinand Tönnies: Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft 621
SOCIOLOGICAL RESEARCH ON SMOKING 590 Émile Durkheim: Mechanical and Organic
Solidarity 622
Vaping 590
SOCIOLOGICAL RESEARCH ON VAPING 590
Georg Simmel: The Blasé Urbanite 622
Eating Disorders 591 The Chicago School: Robert Park and
Louis Wirth 623
Obesity 592
Urban Ecology 624
Sexually Transmitted Infections 593
Urban Political Economy 625
The Medical Establishment 594
Urbanization in Poor Nations 625
The Rise of Scientific Medicine 595
Environment and Society 626
Complementary and Alternative Medicine 596
The Global Dimension 626
Paying for Medical Care: A Global Survey 597
MEDICINE IN SOCIALIST NATIONS 597 • MEDICINE IN
Technology and the Environmental Deficit 627
CAPITALIST NATIONS 597 Culture: Growth and Limits 627
Theories of Health and Medicine 599 THE LOGIC OF GROWTH 627 • THE LIMITS TO
GROWTH 628
Structural-Functional Theory: Roles 599
Solid Waste: The Disposable Society 628
THE SICK ROLE 599 • THE PHYSICIAN’S ROLE 601
Water and Air 629
Symbolic-Interaction Theory: The Meaning
WATER SUPPLY 629 • WATER POLLUTION 630 • AIR
of Health 601
POLLUTION 631
THE SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION OF ILLNESS 601 • THE
SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION OF TREATMENT 602 • THE SOCIAL Rainforests 631
CONSTRUCTION OF PERSONAL IDENTITY 602 Global Climate Change 631
 Contents xiii

Declining Biodiversity
Environmental Racism
632
632
25 Social Change: Traditional, Modern,
and Postmodern Societies 664
Looking Ahead: Toward a Sustainable Society
and World 633 The Power of Society to shape our view of science 665
Summary 635 • Seeing Sociology in Everyday Life 635 What Is Social Change? 666
• Seeing Sociology in Your Everyday Life 635 • Making the
Causes of Social Change 667
Grade 636
Culture and Change 667
24 Collective Behaviour and Social Conflict and Change 668
Ideas and Change 668
Movements 638
Demographic Change 668
The Power of Society to encourage civic engagement 639
Visions of Modernity 669
Studying Collective Behaviour 640 Four Dimensions of Modernization 670
Localized Collectivities: Crowds 641 Ferdinand Tönnies: The Loss
Mobs and Riots 642 of Community 670
Crowds, Mobs, and Social Change 643 Émile Durkheim: The Division of Labour 671
Theories of Crowd Behaviour 643 Max Weber: Rationalization 673
CONTAGION THEORY 643 • CONVERGENCE Karl Marx: Capitalism 673
THEORY 643 • EMERGENT NORM THEORY 644
Theories of Modernity 673
Dispersed Collectivities: Mass Behaviour 644 Structural-Functional Theory: Modernity
Rumour and Gossip 644 as Mass Society 674
Public Opinion and Propaganda 645 THE MASS SCALE OF MODERN LIFE 674 • THE EVER-
Fashions and Fads 646 EXPANDING STATE 675

Panic and Mass Hysteria 646 Social-Conflict Theory: Modernity

Disasters 647 as Class Society 676
CAPITALISM 676 • PERSISTENT INEQUALITY 676
Social Movements 649
Modernity and the Individual 677
Types of Social Movements 649
MASS SOCIETY: PROBLEMS OF IDENTITY 677 • CLASS
Claims Making 650 SOCIETY: PROBLEMS OF POWERLESSNESS 679
Explaining Social Movements 650 Modernity and Progress 679
DEPRIVATION THEORY 650 • MASS SOCIETY THEORY
Modernity: Global Variation 680
651 • STRUCTURAL STRAIN THEORY 652 • RESOURCE
MOBILIZATION THEORY 653 • CULTURE Postmodernity 680
THEORY 653 • POLITICAL ECONOMY THEORY 653 • Perspectives on Global Inequality: Modernization
NEW SOCIAL MOVEMENTS THEORY 654
versus Dependency Theory 681
Gender and Social Movements 656 Wrapping Up: Canada in the Twenty-First Century 682
Stages in Social Movements 656 Summary 682 • Seeing Sociology in Everyday Life 682
STAGE 1: EMERGENCE 656 • STAGE 2: • Seeing Sociology in Your Everyday Life 684 • Making the
COALESCENCE 656 • STAGE 3: Grade 684
BUREAUCRATIZATION 656 • STAGE 4: DECLINE 657
Social Movements and Social Change 657 Glossary  686
Social Movements: Looking Ahead 658 References  694
Summary 660 • Seeing Sociology in Everyday Life 660
Author Index  749
• Seeing Sociology in Your Everyday Life 660 • Making the
Grade 661 Subject Index  765
Boxes
THINKING GLOBALLY
The Global Village: A Social Snapshot of Our World 10
The Lost Letter Experiment: Do Canadians and
Americans Differ in Their Willingness to Help a
Stranger? 65
Cross-National Differences in Incarceration 270
“God Made Me to Be a Slave” 337
Canadian Contributions to Livelihood and Food
Security in Isolated Communities of Latin America and
India 341
Taxes and Tax Freedom Day 443
THINKING ABOUT DIVERSITY
Early Contributions of Women to the Social
Sciences 21
Research Involving Indigenous Peoples in Canada 40
Indigenous Languages in Danger of Extinction 63
What Makes Quebec a “Distinct Society” within
Canada? 95
Residential Schools, Indian Day Schools, and the Sixties
Scoop 118
Physical Disability as a Master Status 140
Same-Sex Marriage in Canada 232
Suicide among Indigenous Peoples 256
The Victimization of Canadians with Disabilities 272
Titanic: Personal and Canadian Connections 284
Powerful Canadian Women 365
CONTROVERSY AND DEBATE
Ontario’s First Boot Camp as a Total Institution:
1997–2003 131
Romance Scams 181
Technology, Surveillance, and Risks to our Security and
Privacy 217
The Abortion Controversy 240
Dangerous Masculinity: Violence and Crime in
Hockey 264
Salaries: Are the Rich Worth What They Earn? 292
Basic Income Programs 321
Pay Equity in Professional Sports 361
Setting Limits: Must We “Pull the Plug” on Old
Age? 427
xiv
Brain Drain: Brain Gain 449
Islam and Politics: Is There an Islamic “Democracy
Gap”? 491
Transnational Families and Transnational
Mothering 515
The Coronavirus, SARS, West Nile, One Mad Cow, and
Bird and Swine Flu 584
A Never-Ending Disaster 648
Indonesian Democracy and Development: Welcome But
Unexpected! 674
Canadian Women in Hockey: Going for Gold 376
Black Citizens of Canada: A History Ignored 393
Diversity in Canada 396
Indigenous Elders: Cultural Custodians 416
Workplace Accommodations for Employees with
Disabilities 436
Indigenous Self-Government 473
Jugging the Demands of Paid and Unpaid Labour 510
Creating Inclusive Learning Environments for LGBTQ+
Students 566
Students with Disabilities 571
Racial Diversity in Canada in the Twenty-First
Century 623
Regional Economic Disparities 439
Migrant Workers: Exploitation in Canadian
Agriculture 446
The Free Market or Government Intervention? 458
New Reproductive Technologies 522
Does Science Threaten Religion? 551
Two-Tiered Health Care: Threat, Fact,
or Fiction? 600
Waiting for a Kidney Transplant: Canadian Patients and
the International Organ Trade 604
Apocalypse: Will People Overwhelm the Planet? 634
Body Positivity 658
Maps
GLOBAL MAPS: Window on the World
1–1  Child-Bearing in Global Perspective 7
4–1  High Technology in Global Perspective 99
5–1  A Global Perspective on Child Labour 125
6–1  Housework in Global Perspective 142
7–1  Internet Use in Global Perspective 174
9–1  Women’s Access to Abortion in Global
Perspective 241
9–2  Contraceptive Use in Global Perspective 243
10–1 Capital Punishment in Global Perspective 273
11–1 Income Inequality in Global Perspective 298
13–1 Economic Development in Global
Perspective 331
13–2 The Odds of Surviving to the Age of 65 in Global
Perspective 335
14–1 Women’s Power in Global Perspective 357
14–2 Female Genital Mutilation in Global
Perspective 368
CANADA MAPS: Seeing Ourselves
8–1  Employment in Government Service for Canada,
the Provinces, and Territories, 2011 207
10–1 Homicide Rates for Canada, Provinces, and
Territories, 2017 267
20–1 Canadians Claiming “No Religion” by Province
and Territory, 2011 545
16–1 Life Expectancy in Global Perspective 415
17–1 Agricultural Employment in Global
Perspective 440
17–2 Service-Sector Employment in Global
Perspective 441
18–1 Political Freedom in Global Perspective 469
19–1 Marital Form in Global Perspective 519
20–1 Christianity in Global Perspective 537
20–2 Islam in Global Perspective 539
20–3 Hinduism in Global Perspective 541
20–4 Buddhism in Global Perspective 542
21–1 Illiteracy in Global Perspective 559
22–1 HIV/AIDS Infection of Adults in Global
Perspective 595
23–1 Population Growth in Global Perspective 613
21–1 Population Aged 25 to 64 with Bachelor’s Degree
or Higher by Province and Territory, 2016 567
22–1 Percentage of Population 12 Years and over Who
Are Current Smokers, 2014 589
23–1 Total Fertility Rate (Number of Children per
Woman) by Province and Territory, 2016 612
xv
About This Course
From the Authors
Sociology provides students with the opportunity to con-
nect their own lived experiences to a broader societal con-
text. One of the hopes of the authors is that students will
find that the topics addressed in this book relate to their
own lives. The textbook addresses many of the press-
ing concerns facing Canadians and global citizens in the
twenty-first century. For more than 150 years, sociolo-
gists have been working to better understand how society
­operates. Sociologists may not have all the answers, but we
have learned quite a lot. A beginning course in sociology is
your introduction to the fascinating and very useful study
of the world around you. After all, we all have a stake in
understanding our world and, as best we can, improving it.
Sociology, Tenth Canadian Edition, provides a com-
prehensive view of our social world. There has been
rapid social change in so many areas of life, such as how
social media is transforming our world. Sociological
­ ning of each chapter; they guide students through their
theories provide us with unique ways of understanding
the world around us and our place in it. While the text
has a Canadian focus, the chapters also speak to broader
global trends and social problems. We encourage our
readers to develop a sense of curiosity about the world,
to ask questions about the world, and to go beyond this
text to learn more about the issues that you care about.
Content Highlights
Here’s a quick summary of the new and updated features
found throughout Sociology, Tenth Canadian Edition:
• New Power of Society figures. If you could teach your
students only one thing in the introductory course, what
would it be? Probably, most instructors would answer,
“to understand the power of society to shape people’s
lives.” Each chapter begins with a Power of Society fig-
ure that does exactly that—forcing students to give up
some of their cultural common sense that points to the
importance of “personal choice” by showing them evi-
dence of how society shapes our major life decisions.
• A brand-new chapter entitled “Mass Media and Social
Media.” This new chapter examines, among many
other topics, how social media is transforming our lives.
• The chapters “Families” and “Sexualities” have been
rewritten to reflect the realities of the social world we
live in.
• The chapters “Social Class in Canada” and “Health
and Medicine” have been heavily revised with new
research and examples.
xvi
• New photos, many of which address recent Canadian
events and/or notable Canadian or international fig-
ures, have been added.
• Recent Canadian data and sociological research pub-
lished in books and peer-reviewed journal articles
appear throughout the tenth Canadian edition of
Sociology.
Sociology in Revel: A Powerful and Interactive
Learning Program
Sociology, Tenth Canadian Edition, places a thorough revi-
sion of the discipline’s leading textbook at the centre of an
interactive learning program. Our outstanding learning
program has been designed for both high-quality content
and easy operation. Each major section of every chapter has
a purpose, which is stated simply in the form of learning
objectives. All the learning objectives are listed at the begin-
reading of the chapter, and they appear again as the orga-
nizing structure of the Making the Grade summary at the
chapter’s end.
Some sections of the text focus on more basic cogni-
tive skills—such as remembering the definitions of key
concepts and understanding ideas to the point of being
able to explain them in one’s own words—while others
ask students to compare and contrast theories and apply
them to specific topics. Questions throughout the text pro-
vide students with opportunities to engage in discovery,
analysis, and evaluation. The photos throughout the text
provide concrete examples of issues taken up in the dis-
cussion to aid learning. In addition, assessments tied to
primary chapter sections, as well as full chapter quizzes,
allow instructors and students to track progress and get
immediate feedback.
Current Events Bulletin is a new feature showcas-
ing author-written articles, updated or replaced during
the year, that put breaking news and current events in
the context of sociology. Each chapter begins with a short
­account of a recent event that will be familiar to students
and that is closely tied to the chapter at hand.
We also strive to get students writing. First, students
will consistently encounter Journal Prompts throughout
each chapter, where they’re encouraged to write a ­response
to a short-answer question applying what they’ve just
learned. A Shared Writing question at the end of each chap-
ter asks students to respond to a question and see responses
from their peers on the same question. These discussions
offer students an opportunity to interact with each other in
the context of their reading.

Finally, another key part of the Revel content is our
video program:
• In “The Big Picture” videos, sociologist Jodie Lawston
provides an introductory overview of the text chapter.
• “The Basics” videos present a review of the most
important concepts for each core topic in the course,
using an animated whiteboard format.
• “Sociology on the Job” videos, created by Professor
Tracy Xavia Karner, connect the content of each chap-
ter to the world of work and careers.
• “Sociology in Focus” videos feature a sociological
perspective on today’s popular culture.
• “Social Inequalities” videos, featuring Lester Andrist,
introduce notable sociologists who highlight their
own research, emphasizing the importance of
­inequality based on race, class, and gender.
• “Sociology Explainer” videos creatively convey
­sociological concepts by narrators that will appeal to
a university-age audience.
Videos are placed within the narrative where they
are most relevant, ensuring that students encounter the
videos at the most appropriate moment in their reading.
About the Authors
John J. Macionis (pronounced “ma-SHOW-nis”) has
been in the classroom teaching sociology for more
than forty years. Born and raised in Philadelphia,
Pennsylvania, John earned a bachelor’s degree from
Cornell University, majoring in sociology, and then com-
pleted a doctorate in sociology from the University of
Pennsylvania. His publications are wide-ranging, focus-
ing on community life in the United States, interpersonal
intimacy in families, effective teaching, humour, new
information technology, and the importance of global
About This Course xvii
education. In addition to authoring this best-seller,
Macionis has also written Society: The Basics, the most
popular paperback text in the field, now in its fifteenth
edition. He collaborates on international editions of the
texts: Sociology, Canadian editions; Society: The Basics,
Canadian editions; and Sociology: A Global Introduction.
Sociology is also available for high school students and in
various foreign-language editions. All the Macionis texts
are now available in low-cost electronic editions in the
Revel program. These exciting programs offer an inter-
active learning experience. Unlike other authors, John
takes personal responsibility for writing all electronic
content, just as he authors all the supplemental mate-
rial. John proudly resists the trend toward “outsourcing”
such material to non-sociologists.
In addition, Macionis edited the best-selling
anthology Seeing Ourselves: Classic, Contemporary, and
Cross-Cultural Readings in Sociology, also available in a
Canadian edition. Macionis and Vincent Parrillo have
written the leading urban studies text, Cities and Urban
Life, soon available in a seventh edition. Macionis is
also the author of Social Problems, now in its seventh
edition and the leading book in this field. The latest on
all the Macionis textbooks, as well as information and
dozens of internet links of interest to students and fac-
ulty in sociology, is found at the author’s personal web-
site: www.macionis.com or www.TheSociologyPage.
com. Follow John on this Facebook author page:
John J. Macionis. Additional information and
instructor resources are found at the Pearson site:
www.pearsonhighered.com.
John Macionis recently retired from full-time teach-
ing at Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio, where he
was Professor and Distinguished Scholar of Sociology.
During that time, he chaired the Sociology Department,
directed the college’s multidisciplinary program in
humane studies, presided over the campus senate and
the college’s faculty, and taught sociology to thousands
of students.
In 2002, the American Sociological Association
presented Macionis with the Award for Distinguished
Contributions to Teaching, citing his innovative use of
global material as well as the introduction of new teach-
ing technology in his textbooks.
Professor Macionis has been active in academic pro-
grams in other countries, having traveled to some fifty
nations. He writes, “I am an ambitious traveler, eager
to learn and, through the texts, to share much of what I
discover with students, many of whom know little about
the rest of the world. For me, traveling and writing are
all dimensions of teaching. First, and foremost, I am a
teacher—a passion for teaching animates everything I do.”
At Kenyon, Macionis taught a number of courses, but
his favorite classes have been Introduction to Sociology and
xviii About This Course
Social Problems. He continues to enjoy extensive contact
with students across the United States and around the world.
John now lives near New York City, and in his free
time, he enjoys tennis, swimming, hiking, and playing
oldies rock-and-roll. He is an environmental activist
in the Lake George region of New York’s Adirondack
Mountains, where he works with a number of organi-
zations, including the Lake George Land Conservancy,
where he serves as president of the board of trustees.
Professor Macionis welcomes (and responds to) com-
ments and suggestions about this book from faculty and
students. Contact him at his Facebook pages or email:
macionis@kenyon.edu.
Linda Gerber (third clockwise from the upper left) with her family
Linda M. Gerber was born in Toronto (to Finnish parents)
and raised in Thornhill (just north of Toronto). Finnish was
her first language, and she remains sufficiently ­fluent to
speak the language with relatives on regular trips to Finland.
After graduating from the Nightingale School of
Nursing (in Toronto), she toured Europe on a Eurailpass
over the summer, and spent the next year nursing in
Helsinki, Finland. Upon her return, she completed a nurs-
ing degree at the University of Toronto before switching
to sociology at the MA and PhD levels. While still an
undergraduate in nursing, she married Gerhard Gerber,
whose family had escaped from East Germany when he
was 10 years old.
As a graduate student, she was a consultant in high-
way planning, doing socio-impact assessment for a range
of highway planning projects in southern and central
Ontario. She also taught a course on Canadian Native
peoples at York University’s Glendon campus.
On completion of their PhDs in sociology and in bio-
chemistry (and three weeks after the birth of their daugh-
ter, Laura), the Gerbers moved to Boston, Massachusetts,
for continued study. After three years at Harvard’s Center
for Population Studies, Linda Gerber accepted a position
in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at the
University of Guelph. Over her 35 years at Guelph, she
taught a wide range of courses at the undergraduate and
graduate levels—most recently introductory sociology,
political sociology, contemporary Aboriginal peoples,
and Canadian society. She retired as Professor Emerita in
August 2014.
Professor Gerber’s research has focused on Canada’s
Aboriginal peoples, politics, and ethnic relations, but she
has a broader interest in Canadian society (its demo-
graphics, its identity, and its regional tensions). Her pub-
lications are in the areas of Aboriginal studies, voting
behaviour, ethnic relations, and Quebec separatism. All
of these interests inform the first nine Canadian editions
of Sociology.
Sandra Colavecchia is an assistant professor in the
Department of Sociology at McMaster University. Dr.
Colavecchia completed her PhD in the Department of
Sociology at the University of Toronto under the supervi-
sion of Dr. Bonnie Fox, Dr. Margrit Eichler, and Dr. Harriet
Friedmann. Dr. Colavecchia’s area of expertise is in the sociol-
ogy of intimate relationships and families. She teaches these
courses: Intimate Relationships and Families, Introduction
to Sociology, and Canadian Society: Social Problems, Social
Policy, and the Law. Professor Colavecchia’s research and
teaching interests include contemporary trends in intimate
relationships and families, family finances, intersections
between paid work and caregiving, and the impact of social
media and other technologies in our private lives. Prior to
working on this text, Professor Colavecchia co-authored a
textbook in the area of the sociology of families (McDaniel,
S., Tepperman, L., & Colavecchia, S. 2018. Close Relations: An
Introduction to the Sociology of Families. 6th edition. Toronto:
Pearson) and contributed book chapters to various under-
graduate textbooks in introductory sociology and families.
 About This Course xix

In Appreciation A large team of people worked collaboratively on this

project. The conventional practice of designating just three
A note of thanks from Dr. Colavecchia: I would like to
authors obscures the efforts of many individuals who
thank my family and loved ones for their love and sup-
worked on Sociology, Tenth Canadian Edition. We would
port throughout my academic career, both as a student
like to express our thanks to the Pearson Canada team,
and as a professor. I would like to thank all of the profes-
including Keriann McGoogan, Brianna Regier, Jordanna
sors who were my teachers at the University of Toronto
Caplan-Luth, Söğüt Y. Güleç, Kathryn O’Handley,
for their expertise and support. Thank you to my col-
Ainsley Somerville, Rachel Stuckey, and Meaghan Lloyd.
leagues at McMaster University who have provided
Dr. Colavecchia would like to specifically thank Kathryn
tremendous professional support and who have made
O’Handley, Content Developer, for all of her support and
working at McMaster University a privilege. Many
hard work on this project.
thanks go to the thousands of students I have taught
We are grateful to the subject matter experts who con-
over the years who have helped me grow as an educator.
tributed to authoring the Revel components for this edi-
I’m appreciative of the entire Pearson Canada team and
tion, Maja Jovanovich, Greg Nepean, and Silvia Bartolic;
of my co-authors for providing me with the opportunity
as well as to our supplement authors, Sandra Enns, Alicia
to work on a book that challenged me and allowed me
Horton, and Greg Nepean; our assessment accuracy
to learn so much about sociology and Canadian soci-
reviewer, Renu Persaud; and our Indigenous content
ety. Finally, I’m grateful to the field of sociology and
reviewer, Angelina Weenie. Thank you to the hundreds of
all of the great sociologists I have read since I was an
faculty and students who have written to offer comments
undergraduate student. I have fond memories of the
and suggestions through the years.
many brilliant books I read during my undergraduate
and graduate studies. Sociological scholarship has sus- John J. Macionis
tained me intellectually and emotionally and continues Linda M. Gerber
to excite my curiosity. Sandra Colavecchia
This book is offered to teachers of sociology in the hope that it will help our students understand their place in
today’s society and in tomorrow’s world.
Chapter 1
The Sociological Perspective

Neil Overy/Gallo Images/Alamy Stock Photo

Learning Objectives

1.1 Explain how the sociological perspective 1.4
differs from common sense.
1.2 State several reasons for the importance 1.5
of a global perspective in today’s world.
1.3 Identify the advantages of sociological 1.6
thinking for developing public policy,
for encouraging personal growth, and
for advancing in a career.
Link the origins of sociology to historical
social changes.
Summarize sociology’s major theoretical
approaches.
Apply sociology’s major theoretical
approaches to the topic of sports.

2
 Chapter 1 The Sociological Perspective 3

The Power of Society

to shape rates of cohabitation

Highest percentages of common-law unions in Quebec and Nunavut.

60%

50%
50%

40%
40% 37%

32%
30%

21% 21%
20% 19%
17% 16% 16% 17% 17%
15% 14%

10%

0%
Canada N.L P.E.I. N.S. N.B. Que. Ont. Man. Sask. Alta. B.C. Y.T. N.W.T Nvt.
Common-Law Unions

SOURCE: Statistics Canada, Portrait of Households and Families in Canada (2017). Available at https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/
pub/11-627-m/11-627-m2017024-eng.htm. Reproduced and distributed on an “as is” basis with the permission of Statistics Canada.

Up until the closing decades of the twentieth century, societal stigma prevented many couples from
cohabiting either before marriage or as an alternative to marriage. Societal attitudes started to shift
in the closing decades of the twentieth century as an increasing number of Canadians, particularly
younger Canadians in their twenties and thirties, opted for cohabitation. Sometimes cohabitation
was a phase before marriage, and sometimes it was chosen instead of marriage. In the twenty-first
century, cohabitation has become commonplace among Canadians in their twenties and thirties, and
increasingly popular among older Canadians, including seniors.
What is interesting to note about this trend is that there is tremendous regional variation in rates
of cohabitation across the country. Nunavut and Quebec have much higher rates of cohabitation
than other provinces and territories. The Northwest Territories and Yukon also have higher rates of
cohabitation compared to the rest of Canada. The higher rates of cohabitation in the North reflect the
fact that rates of cohabitation are higher among Indigenous families. The higher rates of cohabitation
in Quebec have been linked to increasing secularism, a move away from the Catholic Church, and
more generous family policies, such as affordable childcare and generous parental leave benefits.
These generous family policies may create less reliance on a traditional family structure oriented
around marriage and a male breadwinner. Canadians living in areas where rates of cohabitation are
high may feel more supported in their choice to pursue cohabitation whereas Canadians living in areas
where cohabitation is less common may feel greater societal pressure to pursue marriage as opposed
to cohabitation. The decision of whether to live with a partner or get married is a deeply personal and
private decision; yet these broader social patterns highlight the power of society to guide personal
decisions about our intimate relationships.
 4 Chapter 1 The Sociological Perspective
Chapter Overview
Many students who take sociology courses appreci-
ate how the academic discipline deals with familiar
topics and social problems. In this way, sociology
feels relevant and applicable to everyday issues. One
of the things that students find useful about sociol-
ogy is that it often provides a way of contextualizing
personal experiences. It provides a lens to under-
stand one’s own experiences and broader contempo-
rary social issues. While sociology provides a unique
perspective for understanding the social world,
many of you likely already think sociologically in your
observations of the world, particularly in n
­ ­oticing
­social patterns around you. This chapter will intro-
duce you to the sociological perspective and will also
introduce you to various types of sociological ­theory.
We can think of theory as an explanation of how
something works. A theory often makes assumptions
about the social world. Each theory provides its own
way of viewing and explaining the social world.
What does it mean to be Canadian? Many writers have ­explored
this issue, and in popular culture Canadians have earned the
reputation of being polite, nice, and more likely to apologize
(Keeler, 2018). Is saying sorry truly a Canadian social phenom-
enon, or is it merely a false stereotype? In popular culture,
Canadians have also been associated with the tendency to use
“eh” at the end of a statement (CBC News Calgary, 2017. “Eh”
was made famous by the 1980s comedy sketches of Bob and
Doug McKenzie, which were revived in 2009.
Globally Canada is often associated with multicultural-
ism, universal health care, and peacekeeping in many war-torn
Everett Collection Inc./Alamy Stock Photo
Comedians Rick Moranis (left) and Dave Thomas (right) originally portrayed fictional
brothers Bob and Doug McKenzie on Second City Television (SCTV). In their “Great White ual orientation, ability, and age, are just
North” sketches, they personified Canadian stereotypes by drinking beer, cooking
bacon, wearing toques, and using “eh” at the end of almost every sentence.
regions around the world. Canadian Terry Fox has become a
global hero, and his run showcased the vastness of the country.
Not all Canadians are prone to saying “sorry” and “eh”; however,
sociology suggests that our social world guides our actions and
shapes who we are, including how we interact with others and
even the words that we use. While sociologists do not refute
the fact that there is free will, sociologists emphasize how our
social world has a significant impact on how we live, including
impacting and constraining our life choices and opportunities.
Another way of saying this is that our life’s destiny is impacted
by broader social forces.
The Sociological Perspective
1.1 Explain how the sociological perspective differs
from common sense.
Sociology is the systematic study of human society. Sociology
provides us with the tools to connect our ideas, feelings,
behaviours, experiences, and relationships to our wider
society. This includes both local and global contexts in the
past and present. It is a way of understanding and con-
textualizing personal experiences and of drawing connec-
tions between personal experiences and broader social
forces. Sociologists use divergent theories and various
research methods, including qualitative and quantita-
tive methods, to try to understand society. This resource
­explores a range of topics studied by sociologists to help
us better understand society and our place in it.
Seeing the General in the Particular
At the heart of sociology is a special point of view called
the sociological perspective. It has
been described as the special point of view
of sociology that sees general patterns of
society in the lives of particular people. This
means that ­ sociologists identify gen-
eral patterns in the behaviour of par-
ticular individuals and social patterns
in society. While acknowledging that
each individual is unique, sociologists
recognize that society acts differently
on various categories of people (say,
children compared to adults, women
versus men, the rich as opposed to the
poor). We think sociologically when
we realize how the general categories
into which we happen to fall shape our
particular life experiences. Our social
location, ­ including our nationality,
race, ethnicity, social class, gender, sex-
some of the categories that sociologists
are ­interested in examining.

Allen Brown/Dbimages/Alamy Stock Poto Stock Photo
Jamie Marshall/Dorling Kindersley Limited
We can easily see the power of society over the individual by imagining how different our lives would be had we been born in place of any
of these children from, respectively, Kenya, Ethiopia, Myanmar, Peru, South Korea, and India.
Do you know anyone who has a university degree
yet is working at a job that requires only a high school
diploma or less? Chances are that you know someone
who has postsecondary education whose postsecondary
education has not translated into a well-paying career
either related or unrelated to their field of study. How
can we explain this? Rather than relying on explana-
tions that focus on individual-level characteristics, soci-
ologists look at outside social forces that help to explain
why we have overqualified workers. Earlier generations
of Canadians who had a postsecondary education were
more likely to obtain professional careers and to find
­careers related to their field of study. Transformations
in the economy include increased credentialism.
Credentialism refers to the fact that employers are now
demanding higher levels of education. This has resulted
in a situation where more Canadians are pursuing post-
secondary education and an increasing number of post-
secondary graduates are working at jobs that require
only a high school education or less. As our labour mar-
ket has changed, a growing number of Canadians with
university degrees and college diplomas are working in
jobs that they are overqualified for.
Canadian data reveal that the extent of overquali-
fication of Canadian workers has not changed in the
Chapter 1 The Sociological Perspective 5
Dallas and John Heaton/Travel Pictures/Alamy Stock
Eric Lafforgue/Art in All of Us/Corbis via Getty Images
Photo
Paul Liebhardt/Alamy Stock Photo
UpperCut Images/SuperStock
past several decades (LaRochelle-Côté & Hango, 2016).
Sociologists are interested in social patterns such as
uncovering whether some groups are more likely to
­
­experience overqualification. Canadian survey data find
that immigrants, particularly those who have postsec-
ondary education from outside of North America, are
more likely to be working in jobs they are overqualified
for. Younger workers are more likely to be overqualified
for their jobs, and this reflects their lack of workplace
experience, which makes it harder to find a job in their
field. Canadians with a graduate degree were less likely
to be overqualified. This suggests that increasing levels
of postsecondary education reduce the risk of becom-
ing an overqualified worker. Canadians who graduated
with degrees from programs in the humanities, social
sciences, and business administration were more likely
to be overqualified for their jobs (Uppal & LaRochelle-
Côté, 2014).
We begin to think sociologically when we realize that
our individual life experiences are shaped by the society
in which we live—as well as by the general categories
into which we fall. In the case of being an overqualified
worker, rather than suggesting that an overqualified
worker is somehow to blame for their employment situ-
ation, a sociological perspective highlights how changes
6 Chapter 1 The Sociological Perspective
in the economy have made overqualification more com-
mon, particularly for immigrants, young workers, and
those without graduate degrees. A sociological perspec-
tive would point out that overqualification has become
more common in the past two decades than in previous
historical periods.
Seeing the Strange in the Familiar
It may be strange to think that society shapes individual
attitudes and behaviours, because social forces operate
in ways that may not always be transparent. For exam-
ple, we tend to think that people fall in love and decide
to partner based on personal feelings. While sociolo-
gists do not refute the importance of personal feelings
and love, they point out that most people partner with
individuals who share similar backgrounds in terms
of race, ethnicity, social class, level of education, and
other kinds of variables. While inter-ethnic, inter-racial,
and inter-faith partnerships have increased, generally
people partner with individuals who are very similar
to themselves. The argument that society determines
our life decisions such as whom to fall in love with may
seem strange.
Understanding how society affects us may require
some practice because we live in an individualistic soci-
ety and tend to think that human agency explains all out-
comes. We can explore this more fully with the example
of how students decide whether they will pursue postsec-
ondary education and, if so, which institutions they will
attend. Why do some people pursue postsecondary edu-
cation while others do not? A commonsense explanation
is that the pursuit of higher education reflects individual-
level characteristics such as interest, values, intelligence,
focus, and work ethic. These kinds of factors are impor-
tant; however, sociologists would identify other factors
that are not as transparent.
A sociological perspective highlights how postsec-
ondary education reflects broader social forces, such as
nation of origin and parental background. If one lives
in Canada one has a very high likelihood of pursuing
postsecondary education, compared to individuals
from other countries (Duffin, 2019). Individuals who
have at least one parent who has pursued postsecond-
ary ­education are also more likely to pursue postsec-
ondary education themselves compared to individuals
whose parents do not have postsecondary education.
Thus one’s social ­location—being Canadian, and having
a parent with postsecondary education—is structural
factor that increases the odds that one will pursue post-
secondary education. Such structural factors ­underscore
the important fact that life outcomes are based not
merely on personal choices; they are impacted by
broader social forces.
Seeing Society
in Our Everyday Lives
To see how society shapes personal choices, consider fertil-
ity rates. We generally think of child-bearing as reflecting
individual-level factors such as individual’s or couple’s
preferences about family size. However, cross-national dif-
ferences in fertility reveal that child-bearing cannot be fully
explained by individual-level factors alone. In Canada and
the United States, as shown in Global Map 1–1, women have
two or fewer children on average. Fertility is much higher in
other countries, particularly poor countries like Afghanistan
and Somalia. Fertility rates reflect numerous factors, such
as the economic opportunities available to women. Many
women around the world do not have educational or em-
ployment opportunities. Fertility rates also reflect access to
contraception, abortion, and family planning.
Another illustration of the power of society to shape
even our most private choices comes from Émile Durkheim’s
classic study of suicide (1966; orig. 1897). Durkheim (1858–
1917) is a key figure in the development of sociology. His
work on suicide was important in showcasing the power
of sociological analysis. Suicide is often understood from a
psychological or psychiatric perspective. Psychological and
psychiatric explanations of suicide focus on individual-level
causes for suicide, such as mental illness and depression.
Durkheim offered a sociological explanation for suicide in
showing how rates of suicide varied by factors such as reli-
gious affiliation, gender, and marital status.
Durkheim’s theory of suicide suggests that the more
strongly anchored an individual is to society, the less
likely they are to die by suicide. For Durkheim, indi-
viduals who belong to social groups that create a lot of
­integration among their members are less likely to die by
suicide as compared to individuals who don’t belong to
social groups, or individuals who belong to social groups
that do not create a lot of integration among their mem-
bers. Durkehim asserted that suicide rates are related to
the level of social solidarity, which refers to the frequency
of interaction and level of shared beliefs within a social
group. According to Durkheim, if solidarity is very low or
very high, suicide will increase.
How might we use Durkheim’s theory to explain
whether men or women are more likely to die by ­suicide?
Women will have lower rates because they are more
strongly anchored to society through the social connec-
tions embedded in their caregiving roles. How might
we use Durkheim’s theory to explain the association
­between marital status and suicide? Married i­ndividuals
are less likely to die by suicide because marriage pro-
vides greater social integration and social solidarity.
Not only did Durkheim’s theory of suicide explain
suicide rates more than a century ago, his analysis is help-
ful in understanding contemporary suicide. For example,
 Chapter 1 The Sociological Perspective 7

Window on the World

Cindy Rucker, 29 years old, recently Although she is only 28 years old,
took time off from her job in the Baktnizar Kahn has five children,
New Orleans public school system a common pattern in Afghanistan.
Greenland
to have her first child. (Den.) Area of inset

U.S.
RUSSIA
CANADA

GEORGIA KAZAKHSTAN
MONGOLIA
UNITED UZBEKISTAN
NORTH
ARMENIA KYRGYZSTAN
STATES AZERBAIJAN TURKMENISTAN TAJIKISTAN
KOREA

TUNISIA LEBANON SYRIA CHINA SOUTH

IRAN AFGHANISTAN KOREA JAPAN
ISRAEL IRAQ
MOROCCO West Bank KUWAIT BHUTAN
30° JORDAN
PAKISTAN NEPAL 30°
ALGERIA LIBYA BAHRAIN Hong
BAHAMAS QATAR
DOM. REP.
Western Sahara EGYPT SAUDI Kong
U.S. BELIZE Puerto Rico (U.S.) (Mor.) ARABIA
U.A.E. INDIA MYANMAR Taiwan
MEXICO CUBA ST. KITTS & NEVIS OMAN
(BURMA) Macao
ANTIGUA & BARBUDA MAURITANIA MALI LAOS
BANGLADESH
JAMAICA HAITI DOMINICA CAPE NIGER ERITREA YEMEN
Martinique (Fr.) VERDE
SENEGAL THAILAND PHILIPPINES
ST. LUCIA
GUATEMALA GRENADA BARBADOS BURKINA CHAD SUDAN VIETNAM
ST. VINCENT & THE GRENADINES GAMBIA FASO NIGERIA DJIBOUTI
EL SALVADOR TRINIDAD & TOBAGO
MARSHALL
GUINEA-BISSAU CAMBODIA ISLANDS
HONDURAS VENEZUELA GUYANA GUINEA
GHANA CENT. S. ETHIOPIA PALAU
NICARAGUA French Guiana SIERRA LEONE BENIN
AFR. REP. SUDAN SRI BRUNEI FEDERATED STATES
COSTA RICA OF MICRONESIA
COLOMBIA (Fr.) LIBERIA TOGO CAM.
UGANDA
SOMALIA MALDIVES LANKA MALAYSIA
PANAMA CÔTE D’IVOIRE EQ. GUINEA RWANDA Singapore
0° KENYA 0°
ECUADOR SURINAME SAOTOME & PRINCIPE GABON NAURU
DEM. REP. KIRIBATI
OF THE BURUNDI
REP. OF THE CONGO
CONGO TANZANIA COMOROS
I N D O N E S I A PAPUA SOLOMON

PERU
BRAZIL TIMOR-LESTE
NEW GUINEA ISLANDS TUVALU
SEYCHELLES
SAMOA ANGOLA MALAWI
ZAMBIA VANUATU FIJI
BOLIVIA MADAGASCAR
ZIMBABWE
NAMIBIA MAURITIUS
TONGA BOTSWANA New
PARAGUAY Caledonia
150° 120° CHILE MOZAMBIQUE AUSTRALIA (Fr.)
SWAZILAND
30° SOUTH 30°
LESOTHO
AFRICA
URUGUAY
20° 0° 20° 40° ARGENTINA NEW
ZEALAND

EUROPE
ICELAND
SWEDEN
FINLAND
NORWAY
90° 60° 30° 0° 30° 60° 90° 120° 150° Average Number of
60° ESTONIA
RUSSIA Births per Woman
LATVIA
DENMARK
UNITED LITHUANIA
KINGDOM BELARUS
6.0 and higher
IRELAND NETH. POLAND ANTARCTICA
BEL. GERMANY
CZECH
5.0 to 5.9
UKRAINE
LUX. REP. SLVK.
AUS.
HUNG. MOLDOVA 4.0 to 4.9
SWITZ.
ROMANIA
FRANCE SLO.
SERBIA 3.0 to 3.9
CROATIA
BOS. & HERZ.
MONT. BULGARIA
KOS. MAC. 2.0 to 2.9
ITALY ALB.
40° SPAIN
PORTUGAL
GREECE TURKEY 1.0 to 1.9
MALTA CYPRUS

Global Map 1–1 Child-Bearing in Global Perspective

Is child-bearing simply a matter of personal choice? A look around the world shows that it is not. In general,
women living in poor countries have many more children than women in rich nations. Can you point to some
of the reasons for this global disparity? In simple terms, such differences mean that if you had been born into
another society (whether you are female or male), your life might be quite different from what it is now.
SOURCE: Data from Population Reference Bureau (2016).

25
Male Female
men continue to have higher rates of suicide than women 21.5
Suicides per 100,000 Population

(Figure 1–1 and Figure 1–2). 20 19.6

18.4
Durkheim’s theory can be used to explain the high 17.3 17.9
16.8 16.3
rates of suicide found in Indigenous communities, partic- 15
ularly among Indigenous youth and children. Indigenous
11.1
communities face social, political, and economic disad- 10
vantages as a result of the legacy of colonialism, the Indian
Act, the reserve system, and residential schools. Colonial, 6.4
5.4 5.1 5.2 5.4 5.1 5.4
5
patriarchal, assimilationist, and racist policies disrupted 3.6

cultural continuity when Indigenous children were

0
forcibly removed from their families and communities. 1951 1971 1995 1997 2000 2005 2008 2011
These policies reduced social solidarity in Indigenous
communities and Indigenous families by separating Figure 1–1 Suicide Rates for Canada by Sex:
1951–2011
children from their families; preventing Indigenous
Peoples from practising their spirituality, speaking their Suicide rates are consistently higher for men than for women.
The number of suicides per 100,000 men and women increased
language, practising their customs; and disrupting their
substantially between 1951 and 1995 and remained relatively high
relationship to the land and other natural resources. In thereafter.
contemporary society Indigenous communities experi- SOURCE: Compiled by L.M. Gerber from Colombo (1992:61), Statistics
ence inequalities in access to health care, social services, Canada, Catalogue no. 84F0209X and CANSIM table 102-0552.
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 CHAPTER I.
THE THRESHOLD OF BACKBONED LIFE.

Life, life, everywhere life! This was the cry with which we began our
history of the lowest forms of Life’s children, and although we did not
then pass on to the higher animals, is it not true that before we
reached the end we were overwhelmed with the innumerable forms
of living beings? The microscopic lime and flint builders, the
spreading sponges, the hydras, anemones, corals, and jelly-fish
filled the waters; the star-fish, sea-urchins, crabs, and lobsters
crowded the shores; the oysters, whelks, and periwinkles, with their
hundreds of companions, struggled for their existence between the
tides; while in the open sea thousands of crustaceans and molluscs,
with cuttle-fish and terribly-armed calamaries, roamed in search of
food. Upon the land the snails and slugs devoured the green foliage,
while the vast army of insects filled every nook and cranny in the
water, on the land, or in the air. Yes! even among these lower forms
we found creatures enough to stock the world over and over again
with abundant life, so that even if the octopus had remained the
monarch of the sea, and the tiny ant the most intelligent ruler on the
land, there would have been no barren space, no uninhabited tracts,
except those burning deserts and frozen peaks where life can
scarcely exist.
Yet though the world might have been full of these creatures,
they would not have been able to make the fullest use of it, for all
animal life would have been comparatively insignificant and feeble,
each creature moving within a very narrow range, and having but
small powers of enjoyment or activity. With the exception of the
insects, by far the greater number would, during their whole lives,
never wander more than a few yards from one spot, while, though
the locust and the butterfly make long journeys, yet the bees and
beetles, dragon-flies and ants, would not cross many miles of ground
in several generations.
What a curious world that would have been in which the stag-
beetle and the atlas-moth could boast of being the largest land
animals, except where perhaps some monster land snail might bear
them company; while cuttle-fish and calamaries would have been the
rulers of the sea, and the crabs and lobsters of the shores! A
strangely silent world too. The grasshopper’s chirp as he rubbed his
wings together, the hum of the bee, the click of the sharp jaws of the
grub of the stag-beetle, eating away the trunk of some old oak tree,
would have been among the loudest sounds to be heard; and though
there would have been plenty of marvellous beauty among the
metallic-winged beetles, the butterflies, and the delicate forms of the
sea, yet amid all this lovely life we should seek in vain for any
intelligent faces,—for what expression could there be in the fixed and
many-windowed eye of the ant or beetle, or in the stony face of the
crab?
These lower forms, however, were not destined to have all the
world to themselves, for in ages, so long ago that we cannot reckon
them, another division of Life’s children had begun to exist which
possessed advantages giving it the power to press forward far
beyond the star-fish, the octopus, or the insect. This was the
Backboned division, to which belong the fish of our seas and rivers;
the frogs and toads, snakes, lizards, crocodiles, and tortoises; the
birds of all kinds and sizes; the kangaroos; the rats, pigs, elephants,
lions, whales, seals, and monkeys.
Is it possible, then, that all these widely different creatures, which
are fitted to live not only in all parts of the land, but also in the air
above, and the seas and rivers below, and which are, in fact, all
those popularly known as “animals,” only form one division out of
seven in the real animal kingdom?
Can it be true that while the chalk-builders have one division all
to themselves, the sponges forming a transition group, the lasso-
throwers another division, the prickly-skinned animals a third, the
mollusca a fourth, the worms a fifth, and the insects a sixth, yet the
innumerable kinds of birds and beasts, reptiles and fishes, are all
sufficiently alike to be included in one single division—the seventh?
It seems at first as if this arrangement must be unequal and
unnatural; but let us go back for a moment to the beginning, and we
shall see that it is not only true, but that quite a new interest attaches
to the higher animals when we learn how wonderfully life has built up
so many different forms upon one simple plan.
Starting, then, with the first glimmerings of life, we find the
minute lime and flint builders, without any parts, making the utmost
of their little lives, filling the depths of the sea, and wandering in
pools and puddles on the land; acting, in fact, as scavengers for
such matter as is left them by other animals. But here their power
ends; to take a higher stand in life a more complicated creature is
needed, and the sponge-animal, with its two kinds of cells and its
numerous eggs, is the next step leading on to the curious division of
lasso-throwers. These, in their turn, do their utmost to spread and
vary in a hundred different ways. Possessed of a good stomach, of
nerves, muscles, powerful weapons, and means for producing eggs
and young ones, they fill the waters as hydras, sea-firs, jelly-fish,
anemones, and corals. But here they too find their limit, and, without
advancing any farther, continue to flourish in their lowly fashion.
Meanwhile the tide of life is flowing on in two other channels, striving
ever onwards and upwards. On the one hand, the walking star-fish
and sea-urchin push forward into active life under the sea, forming,
with their relations, a strange and motley group, but one which could
scarcely be moulded into higher and more intelligent beings. On the
other hand, the oyster and his comrades, with their curious mantle-
working secret protect their soft body within by a shelly covering, and
by degrees we arrive at the large army of mollusca, headed by the
intelligent cuttle-fish. And here this division too ceases to advance.
The soft body in its shelly home does not lend itself to wide and
great changes, and it was left for other channels to carry farther the
swelling tide of life. These take their rise in the lowly, insignificant
division of the worms, which may, perhaps, have had something to
do with the earliest forms even of the star-fish and mollusca, but
which soon shot upwards, on the one hand along a line of its own,
 3
while, on the other, we have seen how, in its many-ringed
segments, each bearing its leg-like bristles and its line of nerve-
telegraph, the worm foreshadowed the insects and crustacea, or the
jointed-footed animals of sea and land, forming the sixth division.
Here surely at last we must have reached animals which will
answer any purposes life can wish to fulfil. We find among them
numberless different forms, spreading far and wide through the
water and over the land, and it would seem as if the sturdy crab and
fighting lobster need fear no rival in the sea, while the intelligent bee
and ant were equal to any emergency on dry ground. But here the
tide of life met with another check. It must be remembered that the
jointed-footed animals, whether belonging to land or water, carry
their solid part or skeleton outside them; their body itself is soft, and
cased in armour which has to be cast off and formed afresh from
time to time as they grow. For this reason they are like men in
armour, heavily weighted as soon as they grow to any size, while the
body within cannot become so firmly and well knit together as if all
the parts, hard and soft, were able to grow and enlarge in common.
And so we find that large-sized armour-covered animals, such as
gigantic crabs and lobsters, are lumbering unwieldy creatures, in
spite of their strength, while the nimble intelligent insects, such as
the ant and bee, are comparatively small and delicate.
It would be curious to try and guess what might have happened
if the ant could have grown as large as man, and built houses and
cities, and wandered over wide spaces instead of being restricted to
her ant-hills for a home, and few acres for her kingdom; but she too
has found the limit of her powers in the impossibility of becoming a
large and powerful creature. Thus it remained for Life to find yet
another channel to reach its highest point, by devising a plan of
structure in which the solid skeleton should be—not a burden for the
soft body to carry, as in the sea-urchins, snails, insects, and crabs—
but an actual support to the whole creature, growing with it and
forming a framework for all its different parts.
This plan is that of the backboned animals. They alone, of all
Life’s children, have a skeleton within their bodies embedded in the
muscular flesh, and formed, not of mere hardened, dead matter, but
of bones which have blood-vessels and nerves running through
them, so that they grow as the body grows, and strengthen with its
strength. This is a very different thing from a mere outer casing
round a soft body, for it is clear that an animal with a living growing
skeleton can go on increasing in size and strength, and its
framework will grow with the limbs in any direction most useful to it.
Here, then, we have one of the secrets why the backboned
animals have been able to press forward and vary in so many
different ways; and especially useful to them has been that gristly
cord stretching along the back, which by degrees has become
hardened and jointed, so as to form that wonderful piece of
mechanism, the backbone.
Look at any active fish darting through the water by sharp
strokes of its tail,—watch the curved form of a snake as it glides
through the grass, or the graceful swan bending his neck as he sails
over the lake,—and you will see how easily and smoothly the joints
of the backbone must move one upon the other. Then turn to the
stag, and note how jauntily he carries his heavy antlers; look at the
powerful frame of the lion, watch an antelope leap, or a tiger bound
against the bars of his cage, and you will acknowledge how powerful
this bony column must be which forms the chief support of the body,
and carries those massive heads and those strong and lusty limbs.
Nor is it only by its flexibility and strength that this jointed column
is such an advantage to its possessors; the backbone has a special
part to play as the protector of a most valuable and delicate part of
the body. We have already learnt in Life and her Children to
understand the importance of the nerve-telegraph to animals in the
struggle for life. We found its feeble beginnings in the jelly-fish and
the star-fish; we saw it spreading out over the body of the snail; we
traced it forming a line of knots in the worm, with head-stations round
the neck, which became more and more powerful in the intelligent
insects. But in all these creatures the stations of nerve-matter from
which the nerves run out into the body are merely embedded in the
soft flesh, and have no special protection, with the exception of a
gristly covering in the cuttle-fish. We ourselves, and other backboned
animals, have unprotected nerve-stations like these in the throat, the
stomach, and the heart, and cavity of the body. But we have
something else besides, for very early in the history of the
backboned animals the gristly cord along the back began to form a
protecting sheath round the line of nerve-stations stretching from the
head to the tail, so that this special nerve-telegraph was safely shut
in and protected all along its course.
A careful examination of the backbone of any fish, after the flesh
has been cleared off, will show that on the top of each joint (or
vertebra) of the backbone is a ring or arch of bone; and when all the
joints are fastened together, these rings form a hollow tube or canal,
in which lies that long line of nervous matter called the spinal cord,
which thus passes, well protected, all along the body, till, when it
reaches the head, it becomes a large mass shut safely in a strong
box, the skull, where it forms the brain.
Here, then, besides the unprotected nerve-stations, we have a
much more perfect nerve-battery, the spinal cord, carried in a special
sheath formed of the arches of the backbone, which is at once
strong and yielding, so that the delicate telegraph is safe from all
ordinary danger. Now when we remember how important the nerves
are,—how they are the very machinery by which intelligence works,
so that without them the eye could not see, the ear hear, nor the
animal have any knowledge of what is going on around it,—we see
at once that here was an additional power which might be most
valuable to the backboned division. And so it has proved, for slowly
but surely through the different classes of fish, amphibia (frogs and
newts), reptiles, birds, and mammalia, this cord, especially that
larger portion of it forming the brain, has been increasing in vigour,
strength, and activity, till it has become the wonderful instrument of
thought in man himself.
We see, then, that our interest in the backboned or vertebrate
animals will be of a different kind from that which we found in the
boneless or invertebrate ones. There we watched Life trying different
plans, each successful in its way, but none broad enough or pliable
enough to produce animals fitted to take the lead all over the world.
Now we are going to trace how, from a more promising starting-
point, a number of such different forms as fish, reptile, bird, and four-
footed beast, have gradually arisen and taken possession of the
land, the water, and the air, pressing forward in the race for life far
beyond all other divisions of animal life.
On the one hand, these forms are all linked together by the fact
that they have a backbone protecting a nerve-battery, and that they
have never more than two pair of limbs; while every new discovery
shows how closely they are all related to each other. On the other
hand, they have made use of this backbone, and the skeleton it
carries, in such very different ways that out of the same bones and
the same general plan unlike creatures have been built up, such as
we should never think of classing together if we did not study their
structure.
What the lives of these creatures are, and what they have been
in past time, we must now try to understand. And first we shall
naturally ask, Where did the backboned animals begin? Where
should they begin but in the water, where we found all the other
divisions making their first start, where food is so freely brought by
passing currents, where movement from place to place is much
easier, and where there are no such rapid changes as there are on
the land from dry to damp, from heat to cold, or from bright leafy
summer, with plenty of food, to cold cheerless winter, when
starvation often stares animals in the face?
It is not easy to be sure exactly how the backboned animals
began, but the best clue we have to the mystery is found in a little
half-transparent creature about two inches long, which is still to be
found living upon our coast. This small insignificant animal is called
4
the “Lancelet,” because it is shaped something like the head of a
lance, and it is in many ways so imperfect that naturalists believe it
to be a degraded form, like the acorn-barnacle; that is to say, that it
has probably lost some of the parts which its ancestors once
possessed. But in any case it is the most simple backboned animal
we have, and shows us how the first feeble forms may have lived.
 Fig. 1.

The Lancelet, the lowest known fish-like form.

m, mouth. e, eye-spot. f, fin. r, rod or notochord, the

first faint indication of a backbone. nv, nerve cord. g, gills.
h, hole out of which water passes from the gills. v, vent for
refuse of food.

Flitting about in the water near the shore, eating the minute
creatures which come in his way, this small fish-like animal is so
colourless, and works his way down in the sand so fast at the
slightest alarm, that few people ever see him, and when they do are
far more likely to take him, as the naturalist Pallas did, for an
imperfect snail than a vertebrate animal. He has no head, and it is
only by his open mouth (m), surrounded by lashes with which he
drives in the microscopic animals, that you can tell where his head
ought to be. Two little spots (e) above his mouth are his feeble eyes,
and one little pit (n) with a nerve running to it is all he has to smell
with. He has no pairs of fins such as we find in most fishes, but only
a delicate flap (f) on his back and round his tail; neither has he any
true breathing-gills, but he gulps in water at his mouth, and passes it
through slits in his throat into a kind of chamber, and from there out
at a hole (h) below. Lastly, he has no true heart, and it is only by the
throbbing of the veins themselves that his colourless blood is sent
along the bars between the slits, so that it takes up air out of the
water as it passes.
But where is his backbone? Truly it is only by courtesy that we
can call him a backboned animal, for all he has is a cord of gristle, r
r, pointed at both ends, which stretches all along the middle of his
body above his long narrow stomach, while above this again is
another cord containing his nerve-telegraph (nv.) All other
backboned animals that we know of have brains; but, as we have
seen, he has no head, and his nerve-cord has only a slight bulge just
before it comes to a point above his mouth. Now when the higher
backboned animals are only just beginning to form out of the egg,
their backbone (which afterwards becomes hard and jointed) is just
like this gristly rod or notochord (r r) of the lancelet, with the spinal
cord (nv) lying above it; so that this lowest backboned animal lives all
his life in that simple state out of which the higher animals very soon
grow.
This imperfect little lancelet has a great interest for us, because
of his extremely simple structure and the slits in his throat through
which he breathes. You will remember that when we spoke of the
elastic-ringed animals in Life and her Children, we found that the free
worms were very active sensitive creatures, whose bodies were
made up of segments, each with a double pair of appendages; the
whole being strung together, as it were, upon a feeding tube and a
line of nerve-telegraph, but without any backbone. Now among these
worms we find many curious varieties; some have the nerve-lines at
the sides instead of below, and one sea-worm, instead of breathing
by outside gills like the others, has slits in its throat through which
the water can pass, and so its blood is purified.
You may ask, What this has to do with backboned animals?
Nothing directly, but these odd worms are like fingerposts in a
deserted and grass-grown country, showing where roads may once
have been. The lancelet, like the worm, has a line of nerve-telegraph
and a feeding-tube, only with him the nerve-telegraph lies above
instead of below. He has also slits in his throat for breathing, only
they are covered by a pouch. Thus he is so different from the worms
that we cannot call them relations; but at the same time he is in
many ways so like, that we ask ourselves whether his ancestors and
those of the worms may not have been relations.
But you will say he is quite different in having a gristly cord. True
—but we shall find that even this does not give us a sharp line of
division. By looking carefully upon the seaweed and rocks just
 beyond low tide, we may often
Fig. 2. find some curious small
creatures upon them, called
Sea-Squirts or Ascidians (B, Fig.
5
2). These creatures are shaped
very like double-necked bottles,
and they stand fixed to the rock
with their necks stretching up
into the water. Through one
neck (m) they take water in, and
after filtering it through a kind of
net so as to catch the
microscopic animals in it and
taking the air out of it, they send
it out through the other neck,
thus gaining the name of sea-
squirts. So far, they are certainly
boneless animals. But they were
not always stationary, as you
Diagram of the growth of a Sea- see them fixed to the rock. In
Squirt or Ascidian. their babyhood they were tiny
swimming creatures with tails (A
A a, Young free swimming stage. and a), and in the tail was a
a², Intermediate stage when first gristly cord (r), with a nerve cord
settling down. B b, Full-grown Sea- (nv) above it, like those we find
Squirt. in the lancelet. For this reason
m, mouth; e, hollow brain with eye; we were obliged to pass them
g, gill slits; h, heart; r, rod of gristle in by among the lower forms of life,
free swimming form; nv, nerve cord in because, having this cord (r),
same; t, tail in process of absorption
in intermediate form.
they did not truly belong to the
animals without backbones; and
yet now we can scarcely admit
them here, because when they
are grown up they are not backboned animals. They belong, in fact,
to a kind of “No Man’s Land,” behaving in many ways like the
lancelet when they are young, as if they had once tried to be
backboned; and yet they fall back as they grow up into invertebrate
animals.
So we begin to see that there may have been a time when
backbones had not gained quite a firm footing, and our lancelet, with
his friends the sea-squirts, seems to lie very near the threshold of
backbone life.
And now that we are once started fairly on our road, let us turn
aside before beginning the history of the great fish-world and pay a
visit to a little creature whose name, at least, we all know well, and
which stands half-way between the lancelet and the true fish. This is
the Lamprey, represented by two kinds; the large Sea-Lamprey,
caught by the fishermen for bait as it wanders up the rivers to lay its
eggs, and the true River-Lamprey or Lampern, which rarely visits the
sea.
What country boy is there who has not hunted in the mud of the
rivers or streams for these bright-eyed eel-like fish, with no fins, and
a fringe on back and tail? If you feel about for them in the mud they
will often come up clinging to your hand with their round sucker-
mouth, while the water trickles out of the seven little holes on each
side of their heads. The small river-lampreys do not hurt in the least
as they cling, though the inside of their mouth is filled with small
horny teeth. But the larger sea-lamprey uses these teeth as sharp
weapons, scraping off the flesh of fish for food as he clings to them.
 Fig. 3.

Figure of a full-grown Lamprey6 and of the young

Lamprey, formerly called Ammocœtes.
Showing the seven holes through which it takes in water to breathe.

These Lampreys, together with some strange creatures, the

7
“Hags” or “Borers,” belong to quite a peculiar family, called the
8
Round-mouthed fishes, and, though they stand much higher in the
world than the lancelet, yet they are very different from true fish. Like
the lancelet they have only a gristly cord for a backbone, but this
cord has begun to form arches over the nerve battery, and it swells
out at the end into a gristly skull covering a true brain. They have
clear bright eyes too, and ears, which if not very sharp, are at least
such as they can hear with; they have only one nostril, and their
mouth is both curious and useful. When it is shut it looks like a
straight slit, but when it is open it forms a round sucker with a border
of gristle, and this sucker clings firmly to anything against which it is
pressed, so that a stone weighing twelve pounds has been lifted by
taking a lamprey by the tail. Inside the mouth the palate and tongue
are covered with small horny teeth, and these are the lamprey’s
weapons.
Salmon have been caught in the rivers with lampreys hanging to
them, and where the mouth has been the salmon’s flesh is rasped
away, though he does not seem much to mind it.
Lastly, the lamprey has a peculiar way of breathing. He has
seven little holes on each side of his head, reminding us of the slits
in the worm’s throat and those hidden under the skin of the lancelet,
and behind these holes are seven little pouches lined with blood-
vessels, which take up air out of the water. These pouches are all
separate, but they open by one tube into his throat. When the
lamprey is swimming about it is possible that he may gulp water in at
his mouth and send it out at the slits. But when he is clinging to
anything he certainly sends water both in and out at the slits, so that
he can still breathe, though his mouth is otherwise occupied.
And now, what is the history of his life? For three years he lives
as a stupid little creature, with a toothless mouth surrounded by
feelers, and tiny eyes covered over with skin, and he is so unlike a
lamprey that for a long time naturalists thought he was a different
animal and called him Ammocœtes. But at the end of the three years
he changes his shape, and then he is as bright and intelligent as he
was dull and heavy before. His one thought is to find a mate and
help her to cover up her eggs. To do this a number of lampreys find
their way up the river and set to work. Sometimes one pair go alone,
sometimes several together, and they twirl round and round so as to
make a hole in the sand, lifting even heavy stones out with their
mouths if they come in the way. Then they shed the spawn into the
hole, where it is soon covered with sand and mud, to lie till it is safely
hatched, and when this is done the marine lampreys swim out to sea
to feed on the numberless small creatures in it, or to fasten upon
some unfortunate fish.
 But there are round-mouthed fishes even more greedy than
these. It is not only among the lower forms of life that some
creatures, such as worms, which are driven from the outer world,
find a refuge inside other animals. But here again we meet with the
same thing, for those relations of the lampreys, the hags or borers,
which we mentioned above, use their sharp teeth to bore their way
into other fish so as to feed upon them. These greedy little creatures
actually drill holes in the flesh of the cod or haddock and other fish,
and eat out the inside of their bodies, so that a haddock has been
found with nothing but the skin and skeleton remaining while six fat
hags lay comfortably inside.
So the round-mouthed fishes, feeble though they are, hold their
own in the world. How long ago it is since they first began the battle
of life we shall probably never know for certain; but if some little
9
horny teeth found in very ancient rocks belong to their ancestors,
they were most likely among the first backboned animals on our
globe. At any rate they are very interesting to us now, for they have
wandered far away from the true fishes, and give us a glimpse of
some of the strange by-paths which the backboned animals have
followed in order to win for themselves a place in the race for life.
 THE ANCIENT FISH & THEIR HUGE RIVAL

Note.—For description of the Picture-Headings see the Table of Contents.

 CHAPTER II.
HOW THE QUAINT OLD FISHES OF ANCIENT
TIMES HAVE LIVED ON INTO OUR DAY.

Who is there among my readers who wishes to understand the

pleasures, the difficulties, and the secrets of fish life? Whoever he may
be he must not be content with merely looking down into the water, as
one peeps into a looking-glass, or he may, perchance, only see there
the reflection of his own thoughts and ideas, and learn very little of how
the fishes really feel and live. No! if we want really to understand fish-
life we must forget for a time that we are land and air-breathing
animals, and must plunge in imagination into the cool river or the open
sea, and wander about as if the water were our true home. For the fish
know no more about our land-world than we do about their beautiful
ocean-home. To them the water is the beginning and end of
everything, and if they come to the top every now and then for a short
air-bath they return very quickly for fear of being suffocated. Their
great kingdom is the sea—the deep-sea, where strange
phosphorescent fish live, lying in the dark mysterious valleys where
even sharks and sword-fish rarely venture;—the open sea, where they
roam over wide plains when the ocean-bottom makes a fine feeding-
ground, or where they thread their way through forests of seaweed,
while others swim nearer the surface and come up to bask in the sun
or rest on a bank of floating weed;—and the shallow sea, where they
come to lay their eggs and bring up their young ones, and out of which
many of them venture up the mouths of rivers, while others have learnt
to remain in them and make the fresh water their home.
The tender little minnows that bask in the sunny shallows of the
river have never even seen the sea, their ancestors left it so long long
ago; yet to them, too, water is life and breath and everything. The
green meadow through which the river flows is just the border of their
world and nothing more, and the air is boundless space, which they
never visit except for a moment to snap at a tiny fly, or when they jump
up to escape the jaws of some bigger fish. Every one knows the
minnow, and we cannot do better than take him as our type of a fish in
order to understand how they live and move and breathe. Go and lie
down quietly some day by the side of the clear pebbly shallows of
some swiftly-flowing river where these delicate little fish are to be seen;
but keep very still, for the slightest movement is instantly detected.
There they lie

“Staying their wavy bodies ’gainst the streams

To taste the luxury of sunny beams
Tempered with coolness. How they ever wrestle
With their own sweet delight, and ever nestle
Their silver bellies on the pebbly sand!
If you but scantily hold out the hand,
That very instant not one will remain;
But turn your eye and they are there again.”
 Fig. 4.

The structure of the Minnow and the living fish.

A n, nose-pit; e, eye-nerve; ea, ear-nerve; g, gills; h,

heart; t, food-tube; s, stomach; k, kidney; v, vent; da,
dorsal-artery. a, air-bladder; b, backbone; nv, nerve cord
or spinal cord.
B n, nose; gc, gill cover; af, arm-fin; lf, leg-fins; sf,
single fins; ms, mucous scales.

If you can be motionless and not frighten them you may see a
good deal, for while some are dashing to and fro, others, with just a
lazy wave of the tail and the tiny fins, will loiter along the sides of the
stream, where you may examine their half-transparent bodies. Look
first at one of the larger ones, whose parts are easily seen, and notice
how every moment he gulps with his mouth, while at the same time a
little scaly cover (g c, B, Fig. 4) on each side of the head, just behind
the eye, opens and closes, showing a red streak within. This is how he
breathes. He takes in water at his mouth, and instead of swallowing it
passes it through some bony toothed slits (g, A Fig. 4) in his throat into
a little chamber under that scaly cover; in that chamber, fastened to the
bony slits, are a number of folds of flesh full of blood-vessels, which
take up the air out of the water; and when this is done he closes the
toothed slits and so forces the bad water out from under the scaly
cover back into the river again. It is the little heart (h), lying just behind
the gills, which pumps the blood into the channels in those red folds,
and as it keeps sending more and more, that which is freshened is
forced on and flows through the rest of the body. It goes on its way
slowly, because a fish’s heart has only two chambers instead of four as
we have, and these are both employed in pumping the blood into the
gills, so that for the rest of the journey through the body it has no
further help. For this reason, and also because taking up air out of the
water is a slow matter, fish are cold-blooded animals, not much
warmer than the water in which they are.
But while our minnow breathes he also swims. He is hardly still for
a moment, even though he may give only the tiniest wave with his tail
and fins, and he slips through the water with great ease, because his
body is narrow and tapers more or less at both ends like a boat. At
times, too, if he is frightened, he bounds with one lash of his tail right
across the river; and if you look at one of the small transparent
minnows you will see that he has power to do this because his real
body, composed of his head and gills, heart and stomach, ends at half
his length (see Fig. 4, A), and all the rest is tail, made of backbone and
strong muscles, with which he can strike firmly. This is one great secret
of fish strength, that nearly one half of their body is an implement for
driving them through the water and guiding them on their way. Still
although the tail is his chief propeller, our minnow could not keep his
balance at all if it were not for his arm and leg fins. You will notice that
it is the pair of front fins (af) which move most, while the under ones (lf)
are pressed together and almost still. Besides these two pairs he has
three single fins (sf), one under his body, one large V-shaped one at
the end of his tail, and another single one upon his back. All these
different fins help to guide him on his way; but while the single ones
are fish-fringes, as it were, like the fringe round the lancelet’s body,
only split into several parts, the two pair under his body are real limbs,
answering to the two pair of limbs we find in all backboned animals,
whether they are all four fins, or all four legs, or wings and legs, or
arms and legs.
These paired wings are most important to the minnow, for, if his
arm-fins were cut off, his head would go down at once, or, if one of
them was gone he would fall on one side, while, if he had lost his fins
altogether, he would float upside down as a dead fish does, for his
back is the heaviest part of his body. It is worth while to watch how
cannily he uses them. If you cannot see him in the stream you can do
so quite well in a little glass bowl, as I have him before me now. If he
wants to go to the left he strikes to the right with his tail and moves his
right arm-fin, closing down the left, or if he wants to go to the right he
does just the opposite; though often it is enough to strike with his tail
and single fin below, and then he uses both the front fins at once to
press forward.
But how does he manage to float so quietly in the water, almost
without moving his fins? If your minnow is young and transparent you
will be able to answer this question by looking at his body just under
his backbone, and between it and his stomach. There you will see a
long, narrow, silvery tube (a, Fig. 4) drawn together in the middle so
that the front half near his eyes looks like a large globule of quicksilver,
and the hinder half like a tiny silver sausage. This silvery tube is a
bladder full of gas, chiefly nitrogen, and is called the air-bladder. Its
use has long been a great puzzle to naturalists, and even now there is
much to be learnt about it. But one thing is certain, and that is, that fish
such as sharks, rays, and soles, which have no air-bladders, are
always heavier than the water, and must make a swimming effort to
prevent sinking. Fish, on the contrary, which have air-bladders, can
always find some one depth in the water at which they can remain
without falling or rising, and we shall see later on that this has a great
deal to do with the different depths at which certain fish live. Our
minnow floats naturally not far from the top, and, even if he were
forced to live farther down, the gas in his bladder would accommodate
itself after a few hours if the change was not too great, and he would
float comfortably again.
And now the question remains, What intelligence has the minnow
to guide him in all these movements? If you will keep minnows and