Chemistry in Context: Applying Chemistry to Society (2nd ed.), by the American Chemical Society

Reviewed by Edward J. Neth Department of Chemistry, Elizabethtown College, Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania 17022

Chemistry in Context: Applying Chemistry to Society (2nd edition), by the American Chemical Society. WCB/McGraw-Hill, 1997. ISBN 0-697-29158. 502 pages.

Chemistry in Context is aimed at presenting chemistry to nonchemists, many of whom are taking a chemistry course to fulfill a science elective as part of their undergraduate program. The book shows the relevance of chemistry to everyday life, particularly in the applications of chemistry to current environmental problems: ozone depletion, global warming, the need for energy and water, acid rain, etc.

The book is structured around an environmental theme, starting with such issues as air pollution, ozone depletion, global warming, water and water purity, and acid rain. After these introductory chapters, the book examines the issue of the pollution of Onondaga Lake (near Syracuse, New York), largely by byproducts of the Solvay and chloralkali processes. Other topics in later chapters include nuclear fission, alternative sources of energy, plastics and polymers, pharmaceuticals, nutrition, and genetic engineering. All the major scientific issues are covered in these chapters.

The authors recommend covering the first six chapters, and then choosing one or more from the subsequent seven chapters. My experience with this textbook is that such advice is quite sound. Cursory examination of the table of contents might lead one to believe that many chemical principles are absent from the text; however, upon reading (and teaching from) the first six chapters, the quantity of chemistry presented is quite large. Fundamental concepts of chemical bonding and molecular structure, for example, are interwoven with the chapters on ozone depletion and global warming. Acid–base chemistry is presented in the context of the acid-rain problem. Before adopting this textbook, a thorough reading is strongly recommended—it is not the usual textbook, in which a cursory reading is sufficient to discern the tone and content of the text.

The reaction of students to the first six chapters of the text was interesting—many found the chapters relatively dense with information, and therefore somewhat difficult to comprehend. Any instructor choosing to use this text with nonchemists (especially with those who do not have any chemical background whatsoever) will do well to guide students through those chapters slowly and thoroughly. What sometimes is presented in an offhand way is in reality a fundamental concept that is vital to understanding the problem posed in the chapter, and to understanding some of the material from subsequent chapters. That said, the first six chapters are relatively lengthy, and are best covered fairly slowly and with extensive guidance for the students, many of whom are overwhelmed by the volume of information.

After the fundamentals are covered in the first six chapters, the tone in the second half of the text changes markedly. Single issues are raised in each chapter (the pollution of Onondaga Lake, for example). My finding is that students had much less difficulty with these later chapters than with the earlier ones. The later chapters are shorter and more consistently written. To me (and to some students to whom I talked) it seems that the latter chapters are more coherently written—the writing style is clearer and more unified within each chapter. I found the initial six chapters to be confusing at times, as if they had been written by a committee, which probably was the case. If the book has a fault, it is here; the writing styles change from section to section within the first six chapters.

When I initially planned the course I taught using this book (a course titled "Chemistry and the Citizen" at Bloomsburg University in Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania), I had planned to cover far more than I actually managed to cover, largely because of the density of the first six chapters and the difficulty in focusing students' attention on the chemical principles required for understanding the problems and issues presented. Were I to teach a similar course with this text, that limitation could easily be circumvented. Additionally, I found the thematic presentation of chemistry useful in maintaining student interest. It was relatively simple to use the environmental theme of the book as a motif for the entire course, though I did not attempt to cover the material on pharmaceuticals or nutrition, which probably would have been out of place for the course as I had structured it.

The text's current-issue, topical nature lends itself to extensive use of the Internet in lecture; the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has a wealth of information on many of the issues presented in the book. I was disappointed that the ACS and the publisher did not provide more in the way of hypertext support for the book; there is a web site for the text, but it is disappointing, perhaps because it is relatively new.

The in-chapter and end-of-chapter problems and questions range from relatively simple reinforcement of material presented in the chapter, to much more thought-provoking questions that deal, especially in later chapters, with multiple issues and multiple chemical concepts simultaneously. While I had a large class with which extensive writing assignments were impractical, a small class would lend itself well to group discussion and individual or group paper-writing; some of the questions posed are sufficiently involved that a term paper could be written on any of them. Having students search the Web as part of the project seems a good idea as well; while I did most of the searching during the course I taught, assigning searches that show the dynamic nature of scientific knowledge would mesh well with the tone of the book.

When I set out to use this textbook, I chose it because it seemed like an excellent manner in which to communicate to nonscientists that chemistry holds much relevance for their lives both now, and for those decisions regarding the environment that they will be called upon to make in the future. In that sense, the book did not disappoint; many students seemed genuinely curious about such issues, and the text is an excellent springboard for further investigation of any topic it presents. Students' reactions were mostly positive, though, as mentioned earlier, the volume of information is daunting in places.

In short, Chemistry in Context is a well-organized, mostly well-focused attempt at presenting chemistry as being vital to society. It falls short in focus in the first six chapters, but remains an excellent text for a course for nonscientists.