March 19, 2008

Interview with Jonathan Freedman, author of Klezmer America

Question: So, why did you write this book? Jonathan Freedman: The question any author dreads—and hopes for! I’ve been teaching and writing a lot about the Jews in America and was wondering why so much of the critical writing of...

March 18, 2008

Perspectives on Tibet

With events of the past week, China’s rule over Tibet is once again in the news. Sites such as Radio Free Asia, Students for a Free Tibet, the BBC, and NPR, which interviewed Robert Barnett yesterday, offer news on events...

March 17, 2008

Books to bring out the Irish in you

Happy St. Patrick’s Day! In honor of the Irish today we bring you books that celebrate the achievements of the Irish and Irish-Americans. We begin with acclaimed The Columbia Guide to Irish American History by Timothy J. Meagher. Named a...

March 14, 2008

Houston Baker on the "Prison-Industrial" Complex

According to a new report from the Pew Center on the States, for the first time in the nation’s history, more than one in 100 American adults are now in prison. For minority groups the rate is even higher: one...

March 13, 2008

Lust, Caution, and Eileen Chang: A Posting from Darrell William Davis

We invited film scholars to comment on films relating to their work. In this posting, Darrell William Davis, coauthor with Emilie Yueh-yu Yeh of Taiwan Film Directors: A Treasure Island, considers Ang Lee’s recent film Lust, Caution and its adaptation...

March 12, 2008

Books for Understanding: The Former Yugoslavia

The Association of American University Presses offers a fantastic free online resource tool for people looking for the best books to make sense of current events. Called Books for Understanding, each list compiles university press titles under specific subject headings...

March 11, 2008

Living Ink in Pacific and United States Tattoo: A Posting from Juniper Ellis

(Note this was cross-posted on anthropology.net) Tattooing the World: Pacific Designs in Print and Skin is inspired first by sheer love of the designs and their meanings. What an amazing story it is to consider the way modern tattoo was...

March 10, 2008

Book for National Women’s History Month: Women’s Religious History

We continue with our series of postings on books relating to National Women’s History Month with today’s look at women’s religious history. I’ve chosen one book to represent each of the four major religious traditions, Buddhism, Christianity, Islam, and Judaism....

March 7, 2008

The Song of Everlasting Sorrow: Reading the World 2008

We have not had time to post about this yet but we are very excited to announce that The Song of Everlasting Sorrow: A Novel of Shanghai, by Wang Anyi, translated from the Chinese by Michael Berry and Susan Chan...

March 6, 2008

Winning the Battle Losing the War: A NYT Op-ed from James Willbanks

James Willbanks’s op-ed “Winning the Battle, Losing the War” appeared in yesterday’s New York Times. James Willbanks is the author of The Tet Offensive: A Concise History. In the piece, Willbanks looks at how the Tet Offensive, while considered a...