Tuck captures Book Award for 'Paraguay' (The Boston Globe) 

By David Mehegan, Globe Staff  |  November 18, 2004

New York-based writer Lily Tuck last night won the 2004 National Book Award for her historical novel of Latin America, ''The News from Paraguay," in a New York ceremony.

The runners-up were:

In nonfiction: ''Washington's Crossing," by Brandeis University historian David Hackett Fischer; ''Life on the Outside: The Prison Odyssey of Elaine Bartlett," by Jennifer Gonnerman; ''Will in the World: How Shakespeare Became Shakespeare," by Harvard University literature professor Stephen Greenblatt.

http://www.boston.com/ae/books/articles/2004/11/18/tuck_captures_book_award_for_paraguay/ click url to read

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Running Extra Mile Sets Humans Apart in Primates' World (The New York Times) 

By JOHN NOBLE WILFORD

Published: November 18, 2004

Endurance running, unique to humans among primates and uncommon in all mammals other than dogs, horses and hyenas, apparently evolved at least two million years ago and probably let human ancestors hunt and scavenge over great distances. That was probably decisive in the pursuit of high-protein food for development of large brains.

The apparently crucial role of running in human evolution has been largely overlooked in previous research. But today, the two scientists, Dr. Dennis M. Bramble of the University of Utah and Dr. Daniel E. Lieberman of Harvard, report in the journal Nature that their analysis of the fossil record found striking anatomical evidence for the capability of prolonged running in the Homo genus, beginning about two million years ago.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/18/science/18run.html click url to read

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Republicans Outnumbered in Academia, Studies Find (The New York Times) 

By JOHN TIERNEY

Published: November 18, 2004

One of the studies, a national survey of more than 1,000 academics, shows that Democratic professors outnumber Republicans by at least seven to one in the humanities and social sciences.

In first and second place, ahead of Time Warner, Goldman Sachs and Microsoft, were the University of California system and Harvard, whose employees contributed $602,000 and $340,000, respectively, to Senator John Kerry. At both universities, employees gave about $19 to the Kerry campaign for every dollar for the Bush campaign.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/18/education/18faculty.html click url to read

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Report lauds community hospitals (The Boston Globe) 

By Liz Kowalczyk, Globe Staff  |  November 18, 2004

A Harvard University researcher found that community hospitals did just as good a job treating most common illnesses as academic medical centers, but provided that care far more cheaply.

Nancy Kane, a professor at the Harvard School of Public Health, studied how patients fared for 41 basic illnesses and conditions in community hospitals versus teaching hospitals in Massachusetts, Virginia, Illinois, Florida, New York, and California.

http://www.boston.com/business/articles/2004/11/18/report_lauds_community_hospitals/ click url to read

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Around New England: Increase sought in school exercise (The Boston Globe) 

November 18, 2004

A coalition of health activists led by scientists at the Harvard School of Public Health filed legislation on Beacon Hill yesterday that would require public elementary schools to provide 150 minutes of physical education weekly. Middle and high schools would have to provide 224 minutes weekly. The advocates said increased exercise would help combat obesity among children.

http://www.boston.com/news/education/k_12/articles/2004/11/18/stabbing_victims_condition_improves/
click url to read

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The real story of Nazi's Harvard visit (The Boston Globe) 

By Andrew Schlesinger  |  November 18, 2004

At A conference on the Holocaust at Boston University last Sunday, Stephen H. Norwood, a historian at the University of Oklahoma, claimed that Harvard University was "complicit in enhancing the prestige of the Nazi regime" and cited the "welcome" given to the Nazi publicist Ernst Hanfstaengl when he attended his 25th reunion in 1934.

But a close examination of the Hanfstaengl affair reveals that the university and its president, James Bryant Conant, rejected Hanfstaengl's advances; it was Harvard students and alumni who embraced him. The real story is more shocking than Norwood's flawed reconstruction in revealing the common anti-Semitism of the time.

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2004/11/18/the_real_story_of_nazis_harvard_visit/

click url to read

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Study: Learning to Run Propelled Evolution (Associated Press) 

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Published: November 17, 2004

Filed at 9:27 p.m. ET

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) -- No one has ever doubted that, in the beginning, primitive man learned to walk before he could run. But how about it taking three million years for that second part -- after the whole walking thing was already down? Or, when it finally happened, the idea that simply being able to run radically propelled our evolution as a species?

That's the conclusion from new research authored by University of Utah biology professor Dennis Bramble and Harvard anthropologist Daniel Lieberman and published in Thursday's edition of the journal Nature.

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/science/AP-Running-Study.html click url to read

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Robbery, assault put Harvard students on alert (Boston Herald) 

By Tom Farmer

Thursday, November 18, 2004

Harvard University is warning students to be wary after two incidents near campus Tuesday night in which a male student was robbed at gunpoint and a Lesley College coed was indecently assaulted.

``We've put out an advisory to our students,'' said Harvard spokesman Joe Wrinn. ``We're working with Cambridge police on these investigations.''

Just after 6 p.m. Tuesday, the female Lesley student was groped by a man near Harvard Law School in the 12th indecent assault near Harvard since October 2003.

http://news.bostonherald.com/localRegional/view.bg?articleid=54622 click url to read

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Unlike apes, humans were born to run, study says (San Francisco Chronicle) 

David Perlman, Chronicle Science Editor

Thursday, November 18, 2004

A Utah biologist and a Harvard anthropologist have concluded that a dramatic anatomical shift more than 2 million years ago endowed ancestral members of our human family tree with bodies uniquely adapted for long- distance running -- a crucial difference between earlier ape-like relatives and the long-limbed forms that mark us all today.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2004/11/18/MNG7M9TG5U1.DTL click url to read

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Survey Shows Fear of Medical Errors (The Washington Post) 

By Ceci Connolly

Washington Post Staff Writer

Thursday, November 18, 2004; Page A14

Americans are increasingly worried about dangerous -- even deadly -- mistakes in hospitals, but an overwhelming majority say the solution lies in easy-to-read, published safety report cards, not more medical lawsuits, a national survey released yesterday found.

More than half of the 2,000 adults surveyed said they are dissatisfied with the quality of health care, up from 44 percent in 2000. At the same time, 92 percent said reporting of medical errors should be mandatory, according to the poll, by the Kaiser Family Foundation, the Harvard School of Public Health and the federal Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A58502-2004Nov17.html click url to read