This book presents a coherent overview of the use of ultrasonic methods to study properties of both magnetic materials and non-magnetic metals. Much of the recent work in this area was done in the former Soviet Union and is not widely known in the West. The authors discuss not only the experimental techniques for using polarization effects with ultrasonic measurements, but also the theoretical basis for interpreting the data. Such experiments yield information not only about the vibrational spectra of the material over a wide range of frequencies, but also about electromagnetic properties. The book should interest workers in the areas of materials science and engineering, solid state physics, and physical acoustics. It includes an extensive and up-to-date bibliography with more than 200 references to the published literature.