Bernstein Books

Having been a practicing Licensed Clinical Social Worker for about 33 years now, I have, from time to time (thank goodness, rarely) found myself on the stand as either a 'simple' witness or, at times, as a certified expert witness. The experiences are amongst the most challenging and can be among the most awkward and unsettling of all of those a professional psychotherapist can have. How to answer questions and give helpful and relevant information without violating client confidentiality and without winding up being held in contempt for refusing to answer and chancing jail time for one's self is no situation for either amateurs, the inexperienced or the timid of heart. It is also no place for the uninformed. It is the last of these requisites that is nicely addressed in the book at hand.

Understanding that the handling of giving legal testimony requires some deeper-than-rudimentary orientation to the legal/court system itself, the meaning of testimony and the specific consequences and expectations once one is presented as an 'expert' are taken into account as one can plainly see initially by scanning the Table of Contents. The basic organization of the volume speaks volumes, in-and-of itself about the understanding by the authors of the importance of these issues. The book is presented in eight parts, as follows:
1. The Judicial System
2. Testimony Versus Therapy
3. Preparing For Testimony
4. In The Courtroom
5. The Expert Witness's Tools
6. Other Expert Witnesses
There is also an extensive set of Appendices that include sample forms, motions and other useful sources of relevant information - both in print and on line.

Testifying in court, as an expert therapist, is not simply a matter of honestly answering any question asked to you by anyone. It is FAR more complex than that. This book, presented largely in the format of sample questions and answers, descriptive exemplary vignettes, summaries of seminal information and occasional highlighted "Legal Lightbulbs" that underscore certain seminal issues and areas of attention does a reasonable thorough job of addressing most of what you would need to be aware of.

One issue that it, perhaps, does not dwell sufficiently on - from my point of view of course, is the ultimate subjective power of the judge. Yes, there are rules governing the behavior of the person in the black robe: however, judges, as a group, are not monitored seriously by either their peers or the governmental agencies of which they are a crucial part. They do what they want, when they want to - and each in his/her own way. The reality of this Wild Card in the courtroom is very difficult -perhaps even impossible to prepare for - except to be aware that it is one of the variables you may encounter once on the stand. Anyone who disagrees has not likely been on the stand in a real case - especially one where there are strong feelings and animosities involved - a situation more common than not in both Family and Criminal Court.

The authors are both attorneys and one of them (Barton Bernstein) is a Licensed Social Worker as well. They seem particularly qualified to address this need - for an accessible, clearly presented set of examples, suggestions, review of systems and expectations governing appropriate testimony from a clinical expert witness.

I have found it to be useful in my practice and I expect that most licensed mental health professionals will, too. Remember, your license and the nature of your work make winding up somewhere you would prefer not to be - on the witness stand in a court of law. When/if that happens, you want to be as prepared as possible. While the authors know nothing of YOU or YOUR CASES, they DO know what you need to know to do this correctly, well and ethically. I expect that this book, or ones like it, will ultimately be required reading for therapists in training. In the meantime, it isn't too late until it is too late. Take a look and you will see what I mean.

It does not take the place of necessary knowledge of the laws and requirements of your own State and it's laws and requirements, but what it presents is generally on the mark for all of us - wherever we practice.

To be forewarned and to be informed is to be better prepared.

Ilike the simpplicity of garys sets & the great results

We have found this book to be thorough in its explanation of applications to the code as it relates to our profession. We have attended seminars given by Mr. Yoder and Mr. Bernstein. This book together with their course should be mandatory for any engineer in our industry. An engineers book for engineers. It is obvious that they are experts in their fields. Well done.

My father is an excellent author.

Louis Zukofsky imbued criticism with the grace of his poetry. He believed that poetry was not a gesture to be revered, but a crystalization of experience, individual and general. Thus his criticism of poetry judges it against vital standards, with reference to philosophy and history, but without reference to critical fashion. The academic formulae which remove poetry from experience to convention are absent from this book: a great writer who takes pains to be an acute reader tells us what sustains him, and can sustain us.

The language of invention, of discovery must always seem strange at first, but time has brought us closer to these original explorations of sincerity in poetry. Zukofsky wrote about his contemporaries as they appeared, and helped many of them to appear. He was there. If you want to know what poetry can do, unfettered by prejudice, you can find it here. I urge you to. Prepositions, in conjuction with his poetry, can change and illuminate how you see, feel, hear, think.

He gives mostly color pictures with narative of all the why's and how's of doing the shot. Many well known Hollywood personalities are mingled with other glamor photographs. He has diagrams of the lighting equipment and does mostly Nikon camera work using 35mm Kodachrome ISO 25 film.

The book's articles (chapters) describe models of nature's way of controlling motion. The models are built in the tradition of Bernstein, which means that they assume that the motion phenomena under cosideration are aimed at solving a certain problem based on a model of the future. The model of the future exists in the brain of the person/animal performing the motion. This approach is different from the theory of reflexes. In reflex theory everything that happens now has a cause in the past, and this completely expains motor activity. The Bernstein-inspired approach proposes that motor activity is performed with some outcome in mind - the human or animal has a model of desired future according to which the actions are taken.

This is an excellent introductory text in psycholinguistics, for anyone who wants a detailed overview of the field. Text is comprehensive, but not overly technical. A wonderful dictionary is also provided in the back of the text.

Chapters are as follows: 1. Introduction to Psycholinguistics; 2. Biological Bases of Human Communicative Behavior; 3. Speech Perception; 4. Words and Meaning; 5. Sentence Processing; 6. Text and Discourse; 7. Speech Production; 8. Language Acquisition;

9. Psycholinguistic Account of Reading; 10. Bilingualism and Second Language Acquisition.

The Quotable Jewish Woman: Wisdom, Inspiration & Humor From The Mind & Heart is a grand compendium of memorible insights, zingers, platitudes, deep thoughts and much more from Jewish women throughout history up to the modern day. Contributions from more than 300 Jewish women from a wide variety of nations and backgrounds cover topics ranging from beauty to spirituality to friendship, motherhood, politics, work, holiday celebrations and much more. Categorized by subject, with a biographical index offering a paragraph of background about each notable woman quoted, The Quotable Jewish Woman is a superb resource for looking up the perfect filler to round out one's article, spice to heat up one's discussion, or just plain leisure reading with the tang of wisdom. "The wars say it to us - all of Europe, all of Vietnam - and / Nuremburg: never wait to speak against these horrors. / To act against these horrors / Do not let them be abstract and distant. / They look at you with human eyes..." - Muriel Rukeyser.`

Some awesome quotes by a guy who was on his way to put America back on track when he decided to resign. Many of his points make so much sense, you wonder why the man didn't run for President himself . . .