España connection (review)

246 Arizona Journal of Hispanic Cultural Studies is a lot of theory implicit in his ethnographic craft. Her concluding comments on the merits of some postmodern criticisms I find balanced and revealing. An author central to this work is Kuhn. I was lucky to attend one of his courses at Princeton and he made us read an article of his entitled "Metaphor in Science." Max Black's book on models and metaphors was a key reference. The lesson for me was that one could work on cultural metaphors and do cutting-edge social science. And the more one studies expressive culture, the more one tends to agree with Vico that "the first science to be learned should be mythology or the interpretations of fables." Brilliant instances of such projects harnessed to imagination and rigor, metaphor and cognition, could be found in the works of James Fernandez, Lakoff and Lakoff, Friedrich, Victor Turner, not to mention in Kenneth Burke or Gregory Bateson, all of whom are conspicuously absent from the bibliography. Metaphor is not Gonzalez Echevarria's forte. The book ends with nine methodological theses, the first one being "Certainties, conjectures and the limits of falsification." A typical paragraph reads: What is implied by this analysis is that if T is constituted by a system of axioms, from the falsity of O cannot be deduced the falsity of T, but of one or various ofthe axioms that constitute T, and to avoid its refutation it might be sufficient to modify one or several ofthe hypotheses. But something unexpected happens soon after her trying formula comparing Carnap and Nagel's axiomatic theories. "[A] theory is like an octopus," she declares to the surprise of the reader, and goes on to quote at length Moulines's zoological metaphor: "The head of the octopus is the nucleus; the sea's bottom, from which the nucleus is nourished, is the field of applications; and the tentacles represent the special laws..." For an an-trope-ologist like me, the epiphanic metaphor is the embodiment ofthe book. Definitely , each new step in social science, each one of our concepts and descriptions and experiences , it all is deeply and inextricably enmeshed in the tentacles of the octopus of theory. Joseba Zulaika The University of Nevada, Reno España connection RBA Libros, 2005 By Luis Gómez Arrojo España connection is a series of in-depth articles on organized crime in Spain written by Luis Gómez, a former editor of El Pais where he is presently an investigative reporter. On the best-seller list in Spain at one time, the book brings to light the growing criminal and drug culture in Spain by centering each chapter on a particular criminal activity, citing official police reports, using eyewitness testimony by field investigators as well as national and international statistics by Interpol, Europol, and the Spanish Guardia Civil, among other official bodies. Gómez then reminds readers about well-known—some might even say infamous —cases of police seizures and arrests which made the international headlines since the early 1990s. Overall, the book reads like an in-depth journalist's report which necessarily shields its sources and arbitrarily documents its statistics. The Innoduction presents the overall scope of the book and cites important information regarding growing criminal activity in Spain and the groups carrying it out. The next chapter, "Spanish connection ," centers on Spain's role as a point of entry, transfer as well as destination for contraband and drugs. Gómez wishes to show that since the Transition and Constitution of 1978 contraband was never a serious criminal offense since it centered mosdy on tobacco. Today, Spain is the point of importation, transfer and sale of cocaine, heroine and hashish because its lax contraband laws make it a more appealing location for criminal activity than even Gibraltar, long famous for its lenient penalties. Arizona Journal of Hispanic Cultural Studies 247 Gómez is at his best when he is able to show the cultural impact that these criminal activities and arrests have made on Spain. Consider the chapter, "HeroÃ-na, lazos de colores y una dedicatoria: Urfi Cetinkaya, ElParalÃ-tico," which relates the pursuit and capture of El...