Research Catalog

Stature, living standards, and economic development : essays in anthropometric history

Title: Stature, living standards, and economic development : essays in anthropometric history / edited by John Komlos.
Publication: Chicago, IL : University of Chicago Press, 1994.

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Status	Format	Access	Call Number	Item Location
Request for On-site Use Request Scan How do I pick up this item and when will it be ready?	Text	Request in advance	GN51 .S63 1994	Off-site

Additional Authors

Komlos, John, 1944-

Description

xv, 247 pages : illustrations; 24 cm

Summary

What can body measurements tell us about living standards in the past? In this collection of essays on height and weight data from eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century Europe, North America, and Asia, fourteen distinguished scholars explore the relation between physical size, economic development, and standard of living among various socioeconomic groups.
Analyzing differences in physical stature by social group, gender, age, provenance, and date and place of birth, these essays illuminate urban and rural differences in well-being, explore the effects of market integration on previously agricultural societies, contrast the experiences of several segments of society, and explain the proximate causes of downturns and upswings in well-being.
Particularly intriguing is the researchers' conclusion that the environment of the New World during this period was far more propitious than that of Europe, based on data showing that European aristocrats were in worse health than even the poorest members of American society. The most comprehensive and detailed gathering of this kind of anthropometric research to date, this book will be vital for demographers, economists, historians, physical anthropologists, sociologists, and human biologists.

Subjects

Bibliography (note)

Contents

Preface / John Komlos -- Introduction: Growth in Height as a Mirror of the Standard of Living / James M. Tanner -- 1. The Heights of Europeans since 1750: A New Source for European Economic History / Roderick Floud -- 2. The Height of Schoolchildren in Britain, 1900-1950 / Bernard Harris -- 3. The Heights of the British and the Irish c. 1800-1815: Evidence from Recruits to the East India Company's Army / Joel Mokyr and Cormac O Grada -- 4. The Standard of Living in Scotland, 1800-1850 / Paul Riggs -- 5. Stature, Welfare, and Economic Growth in Nineteenth-Century Spain: The Case of Murcia / Jose M. Martinez Carrion -- 6. The Height of Runaway Slaves in Colonial America, 1720-1770 / John Komlos -- 7. Health and Nutrition in the American Midwest: Evidence from the Height of Ohio National Guardsmen, 1850-1910 / Richard H. Steckel and Donald R. Haurin -- 8. How Severe was the Great Depression? Evidence from the Pittsburgh Region / Jialu Wu.
9. Heights and Health in the United States, 1710-1950 / Richard H. Steckel -- 10. The Level of Living in Japan, 1885-1938: New Evidence / Ted Shay -- Comment / Stanley Engerman -- On the Significance of Anthropometric History / John Komlos.

ISBN

0226450929 (alk. paper)

LCCN

94008700

OCLC

Owning Institutions

Columbia University Libraries