The Penguin Atlas of Women in the World: Fourth Edition

The most up-to-date global perspective on how women are living today across continents and cultures

In this completely revised and updated fourth edition of her groundbreaking atlas, Joni Seager provides comprehensive and accessible analysis of up-to-the-minute global data on the key issues facing women today: equality, motherhood, feminism, the culture of beauty, women at work, women in the global economy, changing households, domestic violence, lesbian rights, women in government, and more. The result is an invaluable resource on the status of women around the world today.

I have always loved maps. I have never particularly cared for "women's issues." This book is a bridge.

One of my friends had to use this book for a women's studies course, and I happened to take a peek at it, having sensed the presence of maps. I decided to get my own copy to further study the deliciously colored curves of the continents and the cute little charts and graphs protruding from them. While it is obvious that a portion of the information contained within this book is either biased or presented in a misleading fashion, going through the pages will make people think about the state of women around the world.

As other reviewers have stated, there is very little to "read" in this book--that is because it is an atlas. The maps are political and discuss (in their maptastic key-wielding way) topics ranging from women in government to violence against women to the beauty industry. For the little I spent on this book, and for the relative brevity of it, it has inspired an outstanding number of conversations about culture and the sexes. If you are looking for a way to get both men and women talking about related issues, without digressing into "men are evil, women are dumb," this may be it.

I used this atlas in an Intro to Women's Studies and a Feminist Theory course. It is a great source of material for paper-writing, with very up-to date statistics, and fascinating maps. Of course, it does not always have as much indepth information as I'd like, but the maps would have to be significantly larger to incorporate 'everything'.

I absolutely love this book. For anybody who is interested in gender issues, geography, politics, or sociology, it is a must read. It's not actually much of a "read" at all. It is a very visual book, with lots of colorful maps and graphs with very interesting statistics that you might not have otherwise thought about.