Jonathan Cole – författare

We are defined by our faces. They give identity but, equally importantly, reveal our moods and emotions through facial expression. So what happens when the face cannot move?This book is about people who live with Möbius Syndrome, which has as its main feature an absence of movement of the muscles of facial expression from birth. People with Möbius cannot smile, frown, or look surprised or sad. Talking and eating are problematic, since their lips do not move. Even looking around is also difficult since the eyes cannot move either. The book is unique in giving those with Möbius a voice, allowing children and adults with the condition to explain what it is like. These fascinating biographies reveal much about the relations between face and facial expression, and emotional expression and emotional experience which we normally take for granted. The narratives also show the creative ways in which those with Möbius construct their lives and how they come to terms with and express their identities with, and yet, beyond their faces. Some with Möbius have been thought to have learning difficulties and autism, since an impassive immobile face has been assumed to reflect inner cognitive problems. This book criticises such work and asks people to look not only at the face but beyond it to see the person. Throughout the book, several themes emerge, of which perhaps the most surprising is the reduced emotional experience those with Möbius can have as children and young adults and the journeys they go on as they realise this and then assimilate emotion from the outside in. The result of a 4 year collaboration between a clinician/neuroscientist and a teacher/lobbyist who lives with Möbius, 'The Invisible Smile' provides an authentic, personal, and moving account of this disorder.

What is like to live without touch or movement/position sense (proprioception)? The only way to understand the importance of these senses, so familiar we cannot imagine their absence, is to ask someone in that position. Ian Waterman lost them below the neck over forty years ago, though pain and temperature perception and his peripheral movement nerves were unaffected. Without proprioceptive feedback and touch the movement brain was disabled. Completely unable to move, he felt disembodied and frightened. Then, slowly, he taught himself to dress, eat and walk by thinking about each movement and with visual supervision. In Losing Touch, the narrative moves between biography and scientific research, theatre, documentary and zero gravity. He has been married three times, and built up successful careers in disability access audit, using his impairment to his advantage, and in rare turkey breeding and journalism. The neuroscience has led to data on movement without feedback, the pleasantness of touch, gesture, pain and body orientation in space. The account shows how the science was actually done but also reveals Ian's journey from passive subject to informed critic of science and scientists and that the science has given him both more understanding but also greater confidence personally. His unique response to such a rare condition has also led to a BBC documentary, theatrical portrayals and a weightless flight with NASA.As a young man he sought triumph over his impairment; now, nearly 65, he has more mature reflections on living with such an extraordinary loss, the limits it has imposed and the opportunities it has enabled. He gives his views on scientists and on others he has met including Oliver Sacks and Peter Brook. In an Afterword those from science, the arts and philosophy give an appreciation of his contribution. The book is the result of nearly 30 years close collaboration between author and subject.

A moving, patient-centred portrait of the social importance of speech, from a medical expert known for his humanizing explorations of health. Language comes to us through culture, environment, and family. Words embed over time, as we use our minds to comprehend them and then our mouths to say, mean, and own them. Without the ability to speak, or when talking becomes difficult, we face a challenge like few others, forced to reconnect with a world which assumes its communicators are eloquent vocally. In Hard Talk, Jonathan Cole takes a necessary look at the privilege of speech so we can better accommodate those for whom it presents problems. Cole creates space for people with a variety of conditions, including cerebral palsy, vocal cord palsy, cleft palate, Parkinson s, and post stroke dysphasia, to describe in their own words what the experience of difficult speech is like. No struggle is the same. Each develops along its own axis of factors cognitive, social, and physical that lead to unique vulnerabilities as well as extraordinary moments of adaptation and resilience. One person finds social chatter becoming more problematic than work speech. Another grows alarmed as changes in speech begin to constrain inner thoughts. Some lose the ability to find or make words though they retain awareness, while others lose self-awareness but maintain fluent speech bereft of meaning. One even loses the ability to speak with family while continuing to interact at work. Hard Talk reacquaints us with the social power of speech while affirming the humane value of listening. Cole also reflects on the neuroscientific advances we ve made in understanding barriers to speech and how we might reduce them.

Arising from the third Cary Conference held in 1989, Comparative Analyses of Ecosystems investigates the utility and limitations of cross-system comparisons in ecology. The contributors, all well-known in their field, support their conclusions on the use and meaning of such comparisons by presenting novel analyses of data utilizing a variety of cross-system approaches in marine, freshwater, and terrestrial systems.

The Reign of God constitutes the first detailed and systematic critical engagement with Oliver O’Donovan’s political theology. It argues that O’Donovan’s theological account of political authority is not tenable on the basis of exegetical and methodological problems.The book goes on to demonstrate a way to refine O’Donovan’s theology of political authority by incorporating insights from his earlier work in moral theology. This can provide a cogent basis for thinking that the Christ-event redeems the natural political authority embedded in the created order and inaugurates its new historical bene esse in the form of Christian liberalism.

The Reign of God constitutes the first detailed and systematic critical engagement with Oliver O’Donovan’s political theology. It argues that O’Donovan’s theological account of political authority is not tenable on the basis of exegetical and methodological problems.The book goes on to demonstrate a way to refine O’Donovan’s theology of political authority by incorporating insights from his earlier work in moral theology. This can provide a cogent basis for thinking that the Christ-event redeems the natural political authority embedded in the created order and inaugurates its new historical bene esse in the form of Christian liberalism.

Chekhov often said that ‘I am a doctor by trade and sometimes I do literary work in my free time’, a surprising claim, given his status as a giant of 20th century drama. This literary-biographical study uncovers new sides to him, as both a medical professional and humanitarian, and tells the story of Chekhov's trip to Sakhalin Island in the harsh wastes of Siberia.Anton Chekhov practiced medicine for most of his life and engaged in humanitarian work which took him away from writing for months. He placed one such trip though, across the unforgiving terrain of Siberia to write about the penal island of Sakhalin, above all others. Chekhov's Sakhalin Journey, written by a neuroscientist and practicing clinician, uses this trip and Chekhov's own account of it to shed light on hitherto overlooked aspects of his life. In doing so, it shows that to understand the man we need his medicine as well as his literature, and we need to assess his life from his perspective as well as ours.

Chekhov often said that ‘I am a doctor by trade and sometimes I do literary work in my free time’, a surprising claim, given his status as a giant of 20th century drama. This literary-biographical study uncovers new sides to him, as both a medical professional and humanitarian, and tells the story of Chekhov's trip to Sakhalin Island in the harsh wastes of Siberia.Anton Chekhov practiced medicine for most of his life and engaged in humanitarian work which took him away from writing for months. He placed one such trip though, across the unforgiving terrain of Siberia to write about the penal island of Sakhalin, above all others. Chekhov's Sakhalin Journey, written by a neuroscientist and practicing clinician, uses this trip and Chekhov's own account of it to shed light on hitherto overlooked aspects of his life. In doing so, it shows that to understand the man we need his medicine as well as his literature, and we need to assess his life from his perspective as well as ours.

Arising from the third Cary Conference held in 1989, Comparative Analyses of Ecosystems investigates the utility and limitations of cross-system comparisons in ecology. The contributors, all well-known in their field, support their conclusions on the use and meaning of such comparisons by presenting novel analyses of data utilizing a variety of cross-system approaches in marine, freshwater, and terrestrial systems.