Luke Gibson – författare

This textbook offers a fresh approach to learning Sanskrit, the ancient language at the heart of South Asia’s vast religious, philosophical, and literary heritage. Designed for independent learners and classrooms alike, it provides a uniquely in-depth and immersive introduction to the language, exploring a rich selection of Sanskrit texts from the Buddhist tradition.Unlike most textbooks, Reading Sanskrit devotes as much attention to the formation of individual words (morphology) as to the various, frequently unfamiliar ways those words combine to form sentences (syntax). This approach equips students with invaluable linguistic insights into Sanskrit usage and style, enabling them to engage more confidently with original Sanskrit texts.Challenging topics are broken down into manageable sections and spread across multiple lessons. Each lesson includes plainly worded explanations, abundant annotated examples, and vocabulary notes providing the relevant cultural context needed to understand the ideas and narratives introduced in the exercises and readings. Audio recordings and other supplementary online resources help students improve their pronunciation and enhance accessibility further.Reading Sanskrit draws from the Buddhist tradition’s vast Sanskrit corpus to present a thematically coherent collection of texts covering a wide range of literary genres, including narrative, philosophical, and poetic writings. This unique choice of source material provides an engaging approach to language learning, immersing the student in one of the major strands of South Asian spirituality and culture while highlighting Buddhism’s connection to other religious and literary traditions.

The late Navjot Sodhi conceived this book as a way of bringing to the forefront of our conservation planning for the tropics the views of people who were actually working and living there.  In its 31 chapters, 55 authors present their views on the conservation problems they face and how they deal with them.  Effective long term conservation in the tropics requires the full participation of local people, organizations and governments. The human population of tropical countries is expected to grow by more than 2.5 billion people over the next several decades, with expectations of increased consumption levels growing even more rapidly than population levels; clearly there will be a need for more trained conservationists and biologists.  Significant levels of local involvement are essential to conservation success, with the rights of local people fully recognized, protected and fostered by governmental and international assistance.  Overarching conservation plans are necessary, but cannot in themselves lead to success.    The individual experiences presented in the pages of this book will provide useful models that may serve to build better and more sustainable lives for the people who live in the tropics and lead to the continued survival of as many species and functioning ecosystems as possible.