Social groups: religious groups and communities Books

Book SynopsisMaking a significant contribution to the large debate over the transition from scriptural to scientific culture in Europe, this book also sheds light on the centrality of Jews to medieval and Enlightenment history.Table of ContentsList of Illustrations Introduction: Typology Never Lets Go Chapter One: Christians Mapping Jews: Cartography, Temporality, and the Typological Imaginary Chapter Two: Printing Excision: The Graphic Afterlife of Medieval Universal Histories Chapter Three: Graphic Reoccupation, the Faithful Synagogue, Foucault's Genealogy Chapter Four: Lachrymose History, the Typological Imaginary, and the Lacanian Enlightenment Chapter Five: Translating the Foreskin Notes Index Acknowledgments

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Book SynopsisLooking to contexts ranging from premodern Spain and Italy to nineteenth-century Russia, Germany, and America, the contributors to this volume explore the ways the political and intellectual aspirations of successive historical presents have repeatedly reshaped the forms and narratives of Jewish cultural memory.Trade Review"An important contribution not only to Jewish studies but also to the larger study of historical memory." * American Historical Review *Table of ContentsForeword David B. Ruderman Introduction: Al-Andalus, Enlightenment, and the Renewal of the Jewish Past —Adam Sutcliffe and Ross Brann PART I. PHILOSOPHY, POETRY, AND CULTURAL EXCHANGE IN PREMODERN AL-ANDALUS AND ITALY 1. Aesthetic Models in Conflict: Classicist versus Ornamental in Jewish Poetics —Joseph Yahalom 2. The Uses of Exile in Poetic Discourse: Some Examples from Medieval Hebrew Literature —Esperanza Alfonso 3. Their Rose in Our Garden: Romance: Elements in Hebrew Italian Poetry —Dvora Bregman 4. The Crisis of Medieval Knowledge in the Work of the Fifteenth-Century Poet and Philosopher Moses da Rieti —Alessandro Guetta PART II. RENEWING TEXTS, CHANGING HORIZONS: THE JEWISH ENLIGHTENMENTS APPROPRIATION OF ANDALUSI IDEALS 5. Judah Halevis Kuzari in the Haskalah: The Reinterpretation and Re-imagining of a Medieval Work —Adam Shear 6. The Aesthetic Difference: Moses Mendelssohns Kohelet Musar and the Inception of the Berlin Haskalah —Jonathan Karp 7. Varieties of Haskalah: Sabato Moraiss Program of Sephardi Rabbinic Humanism in Victorian America —Arthur Kiron PART III: REFASHIONINGS OF THE JEWISH PAST IN THE ERA OF HASKALAH 8. Solomon Maimon and His Jewish Philosophical Predecessors: The Evidence of His Autobiography —Allan Arkush 9. Quarreling over Spinoza: Moses: Mendelssohn and the Fashioning of Jewish Philosophical Heroism —Adam Sutcliffe 10. Strategic Friendships: Jewish Intellectuals, the Abbé Grégoire, and the French Revolution —Alyssa Goldstein Sepinwall 11. Heine and Haggadah: History, Narration and Tradition in the Age of Wissenschaft des Judentums —Jonathan Skolnik List of Contributors Index

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Book SynopsisGender and Jewish Difference from Paul to Shakespeare provides the first extended examination of the linkages of gender and Jewish difference in late medieval and early modern English literature, focusing on representations of Jews and women in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, selections from medieval drama, and Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice.Trade Review"This work brings insight and impeccable scholarship to bear on a demanding issue that retains contemporary relevance. Highly recommended." * Choice *"Lampert makes an important contribution to medieval Christian aesthetics in uncovering the supersessional thematic in the literary documents she treats, for the Old Law-New Law displacement construct she analyzes is doubtless present in many more works of art in various genres." * Speculum *"Gender and Jewish Difference from Paul to Shakespeare sets out several related and ambitious agendas-to link constructions of gender and Jewishness; to show how both figurations function to establish and sustain Christian identities; and to trace these constructions through sixteen centuries of biblical, theological, and literary texts." * The Medieval Review *Table of ContentsChapter 1. Introduction: Made, Not Born Chapter 2. The Hermeneutics of Difference Chapter 3. Reprioritizing the Prioress's Tale Chapter 4. Creating the Christian in Late Medieval East Anglian Drama Chapter 5. "O what a goodly outside falsehood hath!" Exegesis and Identity in The Merchant of Venice Conclusion Abbreviations Notes Bibliography Index Acknowledgments

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Book SynopsisEric Zakim follows the literary and intellectual career of the powerful Zionist slogan to build and be built from its conceptual origin in reaction to the Kishinev pogroms of 1903, when it first served as an expression of settlement aspiration, until the end of pre-state national expansion in Palestine in 1938. Draining the swamps and making the desert bloom, the Jewish settlers imagined themselves as performing miracles on the land. By these acts, they were also meant to reinvent the very notion of what it was to be a Jew in the modern world. As Jewish settlers reshaped nature in the Holy Land by turning it from one thing into another, they too were newly constructed. Zakim argues that in the period leading up to the establishment of the state of Israel, the action of working the land and building its cities in order to transform both into something essentially Jewish increasingly came to mark a turn inward toward the reclamation of a Jewish subject tied to the very soil of PalestiTrade Review"A ambitious, scholarly study of the relationship between the meaning of the slogan, 'Livnot u lhibanot ba' ('To build and be built by / in it'-words from a popular Zionist folksong), and the actual development of the land and its people during the first four decades of the past century." * Association of Jewish Libraries Newsletter *"To Build and Be Built challenges the methodological certainties that have guided popular and academic understandings of the development of Zionist involvement in the land of Israel." * Lifestyles Magazine *Table of ContentsIntroduction. To Build and Be Built Chapter 1. Belated Romanticism Chapter 2. The Poetics of Malaria Chapter 3. The Hebrew Poet as Producer Chapter 4. The Landscape of a Zionist Orient Chapter 5. The Natural History of Tel Aviv Conclusion. The Land Bites Back Notes Bibliography Index Acknowledgments

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Book SynopsisBringing together contributions by historians and literary scholars, Culture Front explores how Jews and their Slavic neighbors produced and consumed imaginative representations of Jewish life in chronicles, plays, novels, poetry, memoirs, museums, and elsewhere.Table of ContentsPreface —David B. Ruderman Introduction: A New Look at East European Jewish Culture —Benjamin Nathans and Gabriella Safran PART I. VIOLENCE AND CIVILITY 1. Jewish Literary Responses to the Events of 1648-1649 and the Creation of a Polish- Jewish Consciousness —Adam Teller 2. "Civil Christians": Debates on the Reform of the Jews in Poland, 1789-1830 —Marcin Wodziński PART II. MIRRORS OF POPULAR CULTURE 3. The Botched Kiss and the Beginnings of the Yiddish Stage —Alyssa Quint 4. The Polish Popular Novel and Jewish Modernization at the End of the Nineteenth and Beginning of the Twentieth Centuries —Eugenia Prokop-Janiec 5. Cul-de-Sac: The "Inner Life of Jews" on the Fin-de-Siècle Polish Stage —Michael C. Steinlauf PART III. POLITICS AND AESTHETICS 6. Yosef Haim Brenner, the "Half-Intelligentsia," and Russian-Jewish Politics, 1899-1908 —Jonathan Frankel 7. Recreating Jewish Identity in Haim Nahman Bialik's Poems: The Russian Context —Hamutal Bar-Yosef 8. Not The Dybbuk but Don Quixote: Translation, Deparochialization, and Nationalism in Jewish Culture, 1917-1919 —Kenneth Moss 9. Beyond the Purim-shpil: Reinventing the Scroll of Esther in Modern Yiddish Poems —Kathryn Hellerstein PART IV. MEMORY PROJECTS 10. Revealing and Concealing the Soviet Jewish Self: The Desk-Drawer Memoirs of Meir Viner —Marcus Moseley 11. The Shtetl Subjunctive: Yaffa Eliach's Living History Museum —Jeffrey Shandler List of Contributors Index

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Book SynopsisA thirteenth-century text purporting to represent a debate between a Jew and a Christian begins with the latter''s exposition of the virgin birth, something the Jew finds incomprehensible at the most basic level, for reasons other than theological: Speak to me in French and explain your words! he says. Gloss for me in French what you are saying in Latin! While the Christian and the Jew of the debate both inhabit the so-called Latin Middle Ages, the Jew is no more comfortable with Latin than the Christian would be with Hebrew. Communication between the two is possible only through the vernacular.In Vernacular Voices, Kirsten Fudeman looks at the roles played by language, and especially medieval French and Hebrew, in shaping identity and culture. How did language affect the way Jews thought, how they interacted with one another and with Christians, and who they perceived themselves to be? What circumstances and forces led to the rise of a medieval Jewish tradition in FrenTrade Review"Vernacular Voices marks Kirsten Fudeman as a scholar whose work should be followed closely and learned from. She has written a pathbreaking book that displays her linguistic expertise and her impressive methodological sophistication." * Elisheva Baumgarten, author of Mothers and Children: Jewish Family Life in Medieval Europe *"This study by a fine scholar on the topic of the role of the vernacular in medieval French Jewry is a fascinating and an enlightening volume. . . . A significant contribution to medieval Jewish history and to the study of the popular religion of the period." * Religious Studies Review *Table of ContentsNotes on Translations and Transcription and Typological Conventions List of Abbreviations Introduction: The Medieval French Jewish Community in Its Linguistic Context Chapter 1. Language and Identity Chapter 2. Speech and Silence, Male and Female in Jewish-Christian Relations: Blois, 1171 Chapter 3. Texts of Two Colors Chapter 4. Hebrew-French Wedding Songs: Expressions of Identity Epilogue Appendices 1. Hebraico-French Glosses and Texts 2. The Medieval Jewish Wedding Song 'Uri liqra'ti yafah, gentis kallah einoreie Notes Bibliography Index Acknowledgments

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Book SynopsisIs there such a thing as a distinctive Jewish literature? The authors of the fifteen essays in this volume find the answer in a shared endeavor to use literary production and writing in general as the laboratory in which to explore and represent Jewish experience in the modern world.Table of ContentsPreface —David B. Ruderman Introduction: Intersections and Boundaries in Modern Jewish Literary Study —Sheila E. Jelen, Michael P. Kramer, L. Scott Lerner Chapter 1. Literary Culture and Jewish Space around 1800: The Berlin Salons Revisited —Liliane Weissberg Chapter 2. Joseph Salvador's Jerusalem Lost and Jerusalem Regained —L. Scott Lerner Chapter 3. The Merchant at the Threshold: Rashel Khin, Osip Mandelstam, and the Poetics of Apostasy —Amelia Glaser Chapter 4. Shmuel Saadi Halevy/Sam Lévy Between Ladino and French: Reconstructing a Writer's Social Identity —Olga Borovaya Chapter 5. I. L. Peretz's "Between Two Mountains": Neo-Hasidism and Jewish Literary Modernity —Nicham Ross Chapter 6. Neither Here nor There: The Critique of Ideological Progress in Sholem Aleichem's Kasrilevke Stories —Marc Caplan Chapter 7. Brenner: Between Hebrew and Yiddish —Anita Shapira Chapter 8. Eisig Silberschlag and the Persistence of the Erotic in American Hebrew Poetry —Alan Mintz Chapter 9. The Art of Sex in Yiddish Poems: Celia Dropkin and Her Contemporaries —Kathryn Hellerstein Chapter 10. Ethnopoetics in the Works of Malkah Shapiro and Ita Kalish: Gender, Popular Ethnography, and the Literary Face of Jewish Eastern Europe —Sheila E. Jelen Chapter 11. Eternal Jews and Dead Dogs: The Diasporic Other in Natan Alterman's The Seventh Column —Gideon Nevo Chapter 12. Inserted Notes: David Boder's DP Interview Project and the Languages of the Holocaust —Alan Rosen Chapter 13. Unpacking My Father's Bookstore —Laurence Roth Chapter 14. The Art of Assimilation: Ironies, Ambiguities, Aesthetics —Michael P. Kramer Chapter 15. Hebraism and Yiddishism: Paradigms of Modern Jewish Literary History —Anita Norich List of Contributors Index

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Book SynopsisThroughout the eighteenth century, an ever-sharper distinction emerged between Jews of the old order and those who were self-consciously of a new world. As aspirations for liberation clashed with adherence to tradition, as national, ethnic, cultural, and other alternatives emerged and a long, circuitous search for identity began, it was no longer evident that the definition of Jewishness would be based on the beliefs and practices surrounding the study of the Torah.In The Origins of Jewish Secularization in Eighteenth-Century Europe Shmuel Feiner reconstructs this evolution by listening to the voices of those who participated in the process and by deciphering its cultural codes and meanings. On the one hand, a great majority of observant Jews still accepted the authority of the Talmud and the leadership of the rabbis; on the other, there was a gradually more conspicuous minority of Epicureans and freethinkers. As the ground shifted, each individual was marked according Trade Review"A superb study. . . . Feiner lays out a more nuanced and persuasive case for locating the beginning of Jewish secularization in the second half of the 18th century, if not earlier." * Jewish Review of Books *"Feiner's contribution to the debate about the origins of Jewish modernity is profound. It is, in my view, the most significant contribution in recent decades to the literature on the decline of tradition prior to the age of political emancipation. Its great achievement is that it enlarges the stage of Jewish history, populating it with a wider cast of characters than has been the rule. It should be obligatory reading for all who wish to understand the forces that transformed European Jewish societies in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries." * Shofar *Table of ContentsPreface Introduction: Sins and Doubts —Suspicions Arise —Religion under Attack —Early Jewish Skepticism —Acculturation and Rebellion —Secularization Terminology PART I. LIBERTY AND HERESY, 1700-1760 1 Pleasures and Liberation from Religious Supervision —Insulting the Angels of God —Physical Gratifications 2 Temptations of Fashion and Passion —Life à la Mode: Temptations of the City —Temptations of Eros —Hedonism and Abandoning God 3 The Mystical Sect: Subversive Sabbateans —A New Torah to Permit the Forbidden: From Hayon to Eybeschütz —"I Will Trample on All the Laws": Antinomianism and Libertinism 4 The Rationalist Sect: Neo-Karaites and Deists —Freethinkers and the Threat of Reason —The Fool Says in His Heart That There Is No God: Skepticism and Jewish Identity PART II. A NEW WORLD, 1760-80 5 Providence Is Tested: Secularization on the Rise in the 1760s —Warning Bells Toll in Europe —To Remove the Shackles of the Commandments: Indifference and Laxity —Counterreaction: The Early Maskilim 6 The Supremacy of Nature: Deists on the Margins —A Generation without Religion: The 1770s —From the Second Spinoza to the Biological Epicurean —Religious Skeptics: The "Primitive Ebrew" and the Blasphemer 7 The Emergence of the New World For We Are All Made of Flesh: Fashionable Jews in Amsterdam and Hamburg —The Autonomous Individual: Fanny's and Henriette's Hairstyles PART III. THE OVERTURNED WORLD, 1780-90 8 Scandals and Rebellions —Religious Tolerance and Skepticism in Europe —The Sect of the Wicked Reveals Its Face —Trash Heap of the Ceremonial Laws: The Heterodox in Breslau and Berlin 9 Replacing Mosaic Laws with Laws of Freedom —The Sect of Germans Grows Stronger in Prussia —A Peek into Jewish Life in London —How to Reply to an Epicurean: Fears of Conservatives from Virginia to Lithuania PART IV. ANXIETIES AND CONFRONTATIONS, 1790-1800 10 On the Decline of Judaism: The Last Decade —Between Linitz and London: Irreligion and the Mysteries of Religion —Between Observance and Laxity: Rifts and Tensions —Epicureans on the Offensive: Provocations and Conflicts 11 Soon Our Faith Will Be Lost: Deists and Believers —Falsifications of the Rabbis: Deistic Texts —Transgressions Have Become Permissible: The Counter-War of the Congregation of Believers Summary: Free Jews and the Origins of Secularization Notes Bibliography Index Acknowledgments

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Book SynopsisIn The Third Pillar, Geoffrey Hartman, one of the most influential scholars and teachers of English and Comparative Literature of recent decades, has brought together some of the most important and eloquent essays he has written since the 1980s on the major texts of the Jewish tradition.Trade Review"In the form, substance, intellectual brio, and imaginative reach of these essays, Geoffrey Hartman has no peer. And to say it (almost) otherwise: in learning and in originality, two characteristics that are only very rarely found paired, Geoffrey Hartman is matchless. You may read him solely as a scholar if you wish, but once you stir in the 'creative,' you will have something or someone else: a poet. In these essays, Hartman as innate poet speaks to readers: to readers of poetry, to discerners of bottomless ideas, to you and to me." * Cynthia Ozick *Table of ContentsPreface PART I. BIBLE Chapter 1. The Struggle for the Text Chapter 2. The Blind Side of the Akedah Chapter 3. Numbers: Realism and Magic Chapter 4. Meaning and Music Chapter 5. The Poetics of Prophecy PART II. MIDRASH Chapter 6. Midrash as Law and Literature Chapter 7. Jewish Tradition as/and the Other Chapter 8. Angels in the Academy: The Drama of Commentary Chapter 9. Text, Spirit, and the Bat Kol PART III. EDUCATION Chapter 10. Who Is an Educated Jew? Chapter 11. Religious Literacy Chapter 12. On the Jewish Imagination Chapter 13. The Artist between Sacred and Profane Notes Index Acknowledgments

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Book SynopsisA comprehensive and nuanced historical account of the role Jews played in the Russian Civil War. Oleg Budnitskii shows that Jews were not just victims of the bloody pogroms but also active participants in the anti-Bolshevik White movement as well as the establishment of the Soviet state.Trade Review"Budnitskii's excellent study will become the starting point for all future investigations of Russia's Jews between Reds and Whites." * Donald J. Raleigh, Kritika, in a review of the Russian edition *"Oleg Budnitskii, in this thoroughly researched, clearly written, and well-documented book, shows that the story of Jews in the Civil War years is much more complicated than simply being Red or White. . . . Rather than seeing pogroms as the outcome of ideological fights between Communists and anti-Communists in times of civil war, Budnitskii situates anti-Jewish violence in the broader context of war." * David Shneer, The Russian Review, in a review of the Russian edition *Table of ContentsList of Abbreviations Introduction Chapter 1. Jews in the Russian Empire, 1772-1917 Chapter 2. The Jews and the Russian Revolution Chapter 3. The Bolsheviks and the Jews Chapter 4. "No Shneerzons!" The White Movement and the Jews Chapter 5. Trump Card: Antisemitism in White Ideology and Propaganda Chapter 6. In the Shadow of the Holocaust: The Pogroms of 1918¬-1920 Chapter 7. Russian Liberalism and the "Jewish Question" Chapter 8. The "Jewish Question," White Diplomacy, and the Western Democracies Chapter 9. Battling Balfour: White Diplomacy, the Russian Orthodox Church, and the Problem of the Establishment of the Jewish State in Palestine Chapter 10. Jews and the Red Army Conclusion Notes Bibliography of Archival Sources Index Acknowledgments

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Book SynopsisFictions of Conversion investigates the anxieties produced by the rapid and erratic religious, political, and cultural transformations in early modern England, which were often given shape in poetry, plays, and translations by the figure of the Jewish converso.Trade Review"Jeffrey Shoulson's smart, original book leads us to see hitherto unsuspected connections between early modern English concerns with "conversion" (both narrowly and broadly defined) and "the figure of Jew," encouraging others to follow the paths he has charted here." * AJS Review *"Fictions of Conversion is a timely and important book. Ambitious, beautifully written, and sweeping while not losing sight of historical context or of the telling detail, it offers a new analysis of a crucial topic, and connects that analysis to a number of compelling readings of literary works both familiar and less so." * Katherine Eggert, University of Colorado at Boulder *Table of ContentsIntroduction Chapter 1. "The Jews Perverted and the Gentiles Converted": Confessions and Conversos Chapter 2. "Thy People Shall Be My People": Typology, Gender, and Biblical Converts Chapter 3. "The Meaning Not the Name I Call": Converting the Bible and Homer Chapter 4. Alchemies of Conversion: Shakespeare, Jonson, Vaughan, and the Science of Jewish Transmutation Chapter 5. Conversion and Enthusiasm: Radical Religion and the Poetics of Paradise Regained Notes Bibliography Index Acknowledgments

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Book SynopsisIn histories of ancient Jews and Judaism, the Roman Empire looms large. For all the attention to the Jewish Revolt and other conflicts, however, there has been less concern for situating Jews within Roman imperial contexts; just as Jews are frequently dismissed as atypical by scholars of Roman history, so Rome remains invisible in many studies of rabbinic and other Jewish sources written under Roman rule.Jews, Christians, and the Roman Empire brings Jewish perspectives to bear on long-standing debates concerning Romanization, Christianization, and late antiquity. Focusing on the third to sixth centuries, it draws together specialists in Jewish and Christian history, law, literature, poetry, and art. Perspectives from rabbinic and patristic sources are juxtaposed with evidence from piyyutim, documentary papyri, and synagogue and church mosaics. Through these case studies, contributors highlight paradoxes, subtleties, and ironies of Romanness and imperial power.CTrade Review"Beginning with the editors' fundamental historiographical and programmatic essay, Jews, Christians, and the Roman Empire is the most important collection of studies on Jews in late antiquity I have ever seen. In fact, it is essential reading for all students of late antiquity. Especially admirable is the book's implicit argument that late antiquity was constituted not by a single seismic shift but by the slow accretion of small changes over time." * Seth Schwartz, Columbia University *"This volume opens up important new intellectual avenues for students of ancient religion and empire and will undoubtedly have a tremendous impact on multiple arenas of scholarly research. There is, simply, no work that tackles the intellectual question 'How do we integrate Judaism into the Roman Empire, and vice versa?' with such depth and breadth." * Andrew S. Jacobs, Scripps College *Table of ContentsList of Abbreviations Introduction: Rethinking Romanness, Provincializing Christendom —Annette Yoshiko Reed and Natalie B. Dohrmann PART I. RABBIS AND OTHER ROMAN SUBELITES Chapter 1. The Afterlives of the Torah's Ethnic Language: The Sifra and Clement on Lev 18.1-5 —Beth A. Berkowitz Chapter 2. The Kingdom of Edessa and the Creation of a Christian Aristocracy —William Adler Chapter 3. Law and Imperial Idioms: Rabbinic Legalism in a Roman World —Natalie B. Dohrmann Chapter 4. The Law of Moses and the Jews: Rabbis, Ethnic Marking, and Romanization —Hayim Lapin PART II. CHRISTIANIZATION AND OTHER MODALITIES OF ROMANIZATION Chapter 5. There Is No Place Like Home: Rabbinic Responses to the Christianization of Palestine —Joshua Levinson Chapter 6. Between Gaza and Minorca: The (Un)Making of Minorities in Late Antiquity —Hagith Sivan Chapter 7. Christian Historiographers' Reflections on Jewish-Christian Violence in Fifth-Century Alexandria —Oded Irshai Chapter 8. Narrating Salvation: Verbal Sacrifices in Late Antique Liturgical Poetry —Ophir Münz-Manor Chapter 9. Israelite Kingship, Christian Rome, and the Jewish Imperial Imagination: Midrashic Precursors to the Medieval "Throne of Solomon" —Ra'anan Boustan PART III. CONTINUITY AND RUPTURE Chapter 10. Chains of Tradition from Avot to the Avodah Piyutim —Michael D. Swartz Chapter 11. Change in Continuity in Late Legal Papyri from Palaestina Tertia: Nomos Hellênikos and Ethos Rômaikon —Hannah M. Cotton Chapter 12. The Representation of the Temple and Jerusalem in Jewish and Christian Houses of Prayer in the Holy Land in Late Antiquity —Rina Talgam Chapter 13. Roman Christianity and the Post-Roman West: The Social Correlates of the Contra Iudaeos Tradition —Paula Fredriksen Notes Select Bibliography of Secondary Sources List of Contributors Index Acknowledgments

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Book SynopsisEuropean Jews, argues Iris Idelson-Shein, occupied a particular place in the development of modern racial discourse during the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. Simultaneously inhabitants and outsiders in Europe, considered both foreign and familiar, Jews adopted a complex perspective on otherness and race. Often themselves the objects of anthropological scrutiny, they internalized, adapted, and revised the emerging discourse of racial difference to meet their own ends.Difference of a Different Kind explores Jewish perceptions and representations of otherness during the formative period in the history of racial thought. Drawing on a wide range of sources, including philosophical and scientific works, halakhic literature, and folktales, Idelson-Shein unfolds the myriad ways in which eighteenth-century Jews imagined the exotic Other and how the evolving discourse of racial difference played into the construction of their own identities. Difference of a DTrade Review"A welcome addition. . . . This book focuses on the Jewish attitude toward race as it evolved in the so-called long eighteenth century, mostly during the Jewish Enlightenment of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries." * American Historical Review *"Iris Idelson-Shein gives us a window into a far richer and much more dynamic interplay between the Jewish and the non-Jewish world than what one finds in most scholarship on the Haskalah. She contextualizes her readings with exemplary rigor, breadth, and elegance. Idelson-Shein's prose truly sparkles, and each of the chapters is a sheer pleasure to read, full of narrative drive, stylistic sophistication, and conceptual subtlety. Difference of a Different Kind is a powerful book that delivers an original argument in a lucid and elegant manner." * Jonathan Hess, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill *"A substantial and well-researched study of the complexities of racial thinking in the European Jewish Enlightenment. Iris Idelson-Shein covers an extraordinary range of topics: rape, infanticide, the savage, hirsute peoples, miscegenation, children's books, issues of translation, and the formation of scientific racism." * Felicity Nussbaum, University of California, Los Angeles *Table of ContentsNote on Translations and Transliterations Introduction 1 An East Indian Encounter: Rape and Infanticide in the Memoirs of Glikl Bas Leib 2 "And Let him Speak": Noble and Ignoble Savages in Yehudah Horowitz's Amudey beyt Yehudah 3 Whitewashing Jewish Darkness: Baruch Lindau and the "Species" of Man 4 Fantasies of Acculturation: Campe's Savages in the Service of the Haskalah Epilogue. A Terrible Tale: Some Final Thoughts on Jews and Race Notes Bibliography Index Acknowledgments

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Book SynopsisReorienting the East explores the Islamic world as it was encountered, envisioned, and elaborated by Jewish travelers from the Middle Ages to the early modern period. The first comprehensive investigation of Jewish travel writing from this era, this study engages with questions raised by postcolonial studies and contributes to the debate over the nature and history of Orientalism as defined by Edward Said.Examining two dozen Hebrew and Judeo-Arabic travel accounts from the mid-twelfth to the early sixteenth centuries, Martin Jacobs asks whether Jewish travelers shared Western perceptions of the Islamic world with their Christian counterparts. Most Jews who detailed their journeys during this period hailed from Christian lands and many sailed to the Eastern Mediterranean aboard Christian-owned vessels. Yet Jacobs finds that their descriptions of the Near East subvert or reorient a decidedly Christian vision of the region. The accounts from the crusader era, in particularTrade Review"An original, comprehensive, and clear account of medieval and early modern Jewish travel writing. Martin Jacobs discusses all known relevant Jewish writings from the period, giving the textual history of each and often comparing them to contemporary Christian and Muslim texts. Any reader of this book will come away not only with a clear picture of Jewish travel writing but also with a good introduction to the main concerns of contemporary scholarship on medieval and early modern travel writing more generally." * Iain Macleod Higgins, University of Victoria *"Impressive and unique. . . . A timely discussion of Jewish identity and reflections on self and 'other' in the premodern Islamic world. Jacobs clearly and cogently demonstrates the complexities of Jewish identity in the Mediterranean and the Islamic world." * Josef Meri, Centre of Islamic Studies, University of Cambridge *Table of ContentsMaps A Note on Translations and Transliterations List of Abbreviations Introduction PART I. TRAVELS AND TRAVEL NARRATIVES Chapter 1. Medieval Jewish Travelers and Their Writings Chapter 2. Travel Motivations: Pilgrimage and Trade Chapter 3. Levantine Journeys: Choices and Challenges PART II. TERRITORY AND PLACE Chapter 4. Facing a Gentile Land of Israel Chapter 5. Medieval Mingling at Holy Tombs Chapter 6. Marvels of Muslim Metropolises PART III. ENCOUNTERING THE OTHER Chapter 7. Ishmaelites and Edomites: Muslims and Christians Chapter 8. Near Eastern Jews: Brothers or Strangers? Chapter 9. Karaites, Samaritans, and Lost Tribes Chapter 10. Assassins, Blacks, and Veiled Women Conclusion Chronology of Travelers and Works Glossary Notes Selected Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisFaithful Republic is a collection of original essays that explores the relationship between religion and politics in the United States since the early twentieth century. Rather than focusing on the traditional question of the separation between church and state, this volume touches on many aspects of American political history.Trade Review"Faithful Republic is a magnificent collection, one that showcases the impressive scholarship of a new generation of American historians working at the intersection of religion and politics. Diverse in their topics but uniformly strong in their treatment, these essays represent the cutting edge of an important field." * Kevin M. Kruse, author of One Nation Under God: How Corporate America Invented Christian America *"The essays collected here are outstanding and bring to light some of the best scholarship on a topic in which new work is rapidly emerging and fundamentally changing. The research is excellent-the book is full of archival finds from all over the country-and the analyses are stimulating, often sparkling." * Paul Harvey, University of Colorado, Colorado Springs *Table of ContentsIntroduction —Andrew Preston, Bruce Schulman, and Julian E. Zelizer Chapter 1. "Against the Foes That Destroy the Family, Protestants and Catholics Can Stand Together": Divorce and Christian Ecumenism —David Mislin Chapter 2. American Jewish Politics Is Urban Politics —Lila Corwin Berman Chapter 3. Fighting for the Fundamentals: Lyman Stewart and the Protestant Politics of Oil —Darren Dochuk Chapter 4. A "Divine Revelation"? Southern Churches Respond to the New Deal —Alison Collis Greene Chapter 5. The Rise of Spiritual Cosmopolitanism: Liberal Protestants and Cultural Politics —Matthew S. Hedstrom Chapter 6. "A Third Force": The Civil Rights Ministry of Congressman Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. —Edward J. Blum Chapter 7. The Theological Origins of the Christian Right —Molly Worthen Chapter 8. More than Megachurches: Liberal Religion and Politics in the Suburbs —Lily Geismer Chapter 9. Knute Gingrich, All American? White Evangelicals, U.S. Catholics, and the Religious Genealogy of Political Realignment —Bethany Moreton Notes List of Contributors Index Acknowledgments

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Book SynopsisIn 1818, with a single essay of vast scope and stunning detail, Leopold Zunz launched the turn to history in modern Judaism. Despite unending setbacks, he persevered for more than five decades to produce a body of enduring scholarship that would inspire young Jews streaming into German universities and alter forever the understanding of Judaism. By the time of his death in 1886, his vision and labor had given rise to a historical discourse and intellectual movement that devolved into vibrant sub-fields as it expanded to other geographic centers of Jewish life.Yet Zunz was a part-time scholar, at best, in search of employment that would leave him time to study. In addition to his pioneering scholarship, he was as deeply engaged in ending the political tutelage of German Christians as the civil disabilities of German Jews. And to his credit, these commitments did not come at the expense of his loyalty to the Jewish community, which he was ever ready to serve.Zunz once quipTrade Review"Schorsch deftly takes his readers on a journey through Zunz's scholarship, activism and apologia, but also shows how these endeavours complemented one another . . . [A] seminal biography that brings into sharper focus the complex life and career of Leopold Zunz." * European History Quarterly *"In this masterful biography, Ismar Schorsch brings to life arguably the greatest of the nineteenth-century pioneers of Jewish scholarship. The portrait of Zunz that emerges is of a deeply learned, courageous, and visionary scholar whose work remains the starting point for many areas of inquiry. We are indebted to Schorsch for this loving and critical appraisal of a true giant." * Jay M. Harris, Harvard University *"In this gripping and elegantly written book, Ismar Schorsch illuminates not only the contours of Leopold Zunz's remarkable life and scholarship but also what was politically and intellectually at stake in the academic study of Judaism in the nineteenth century. These are issues that endure beyond their original German context, and anyone interested in Jewish Studies, modern Judaism, or the challenges of modernity more generally will learn a tremendous amount from this thoughtful study." * Leora Batnitzky, Princeton University *"Using an abundance of archival sources absent from the existing literature, Ismar Schorsch presents not only a biography of the most important figure in the nineteenth-century development of the academic study of Judaism but also an unparalleled depiction of his historical context. The book expands our understanding of both Leopold Zunz and modern Jewish Studies." * Michael A. Meyer, Hebrew Union College *

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Book SynopsisBefore Fiddler on the Roof, before The Jazz Singer, there was Deborah, a tear-jerking melodrama about a Jewish woman forsaken by her non-Jewish lover. Within a few years of its 1849 debut in Hamburg, the play was seen on stages across Germany and Austria, as well as throughout Europe, the British Empire, and North America. The German-Jewish elite complained that the playwright, Jewish writer S. H. Mosenthal, had written a drama bearing little authentic Jewish content, while literary critics protested that the play lacked the formal coherence of great tragedy. Yet despite its lackluster critical reception, Deborah became a blockbuster, giving millions of theatergoers the pleasures of sympathizing with an exotic Jewish woman. It spawned adaptations with titles from Leah, the Forsaken to Naomi, the Deserted, burlesques, poems, operas in Italian and Czech, musical selections for voice and piano, a British novel fraudulently marketed in the UniteTrade Review"Deborah and her Sisters is the result of magnificent archival research. It is also clearly a labor of love: the author takes pleasure in the story he tells of a single play's journey, making the book a delight to read . . . Hess's volume is a must-read for those who work in nineteenth-century theater, performance, or especially Jewish Studies, but it also has much to offer a general Victorianist as a case study for the importance of theater in shaping ideas, effecting change, and challenging our settled contemporary notions of aesthetic merit by confronting what many Victorians themselves valued." * Victorian Studies *"An exuberant account of the transnational performance history of a forgotten blockbuster, this book sets a new standard for Jewish cultural studies. By carefully reconstructing the contexts in which Jewish and non-Jewish theater audiences came together to cry over a melodramatic tale of Jewish suffering, Jonathan M. Hess reveals the importance of philosemitism to the nineteenth-century liberal imagination." * Maurice Samuels, Yale University *"Deborah and Her Sisters presents a new and constructively critical approach to the study of philosemitism and to the study of representations of Jews and Jewishness in general. This is cultural studies at its best-in excavating and interpreting a largely forgotten and demonstrably significant theatrical blockbuster, Jonathan M. Hess forces us to rethink key methodological questions and to reevaluate our understanding of an era." * Martha B. Helfer, Rutgers University *

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Book SynopsisIslamist political parties and groups are on the rise throughout the Muslim world, constituting a new political Islam that is global in scope and yet local in action. Emmanuel Karagiannis explains how various Islamists have endorsed human rights, democracy, and justice to gain influence and mobilize supporters.Trade Review"Karagiannis' The New Political Islam is not only an informative reading. It addresses an issue of immediate interest in modern culture, namely an increasing tension between Western philosophy and Islam. Thus, even readers less interested in learning about Islamist groups around the world may be interested to discover how Islam changes and adjusts to the world of today. Furthermore, it is difficult to overestimate the influence of globalization on different countries. However, applying its principles to for the task of understanding the new Political Islam is innovative. In addition, understanding this religion is the best way to avoid the hostility of politicians depicting Islam as the enemy. The New Political Islam helps broaden the reader's horizons." * Political Theology. *"The New Political Islam examines the phenomenon of political Islam and its transformations using the lens of glocalization, a distinct strand of social theory focusing on the processes through which global ideas are adapted, applied, and transformed in local contexts . . . [T]his is a sophisticated, erudite, and illuminating book. It is a necessary read for anyone who wishes to explore the persistent relevance of political developments in the contemporary Islamic world." * Reading Religion *

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Book SynopsisTrade Review"This study of the history of pro- and anti-Israel ideas among American Christians from the Colonial period to the present day challenges the stereotypes that often distort discussions of Christian Zionism and offers useful observations about one of the most important political forces in American life." * Foreign Affairs *"Significant and surprising. . . . [God's Country] not only traces the 200 years of scriptural interpretation and evangelical exhortation connecting Adams and Pence but also delves into 200 years of prior British Protestantism that shaped the outlook of the Revolutionary generation." * Commentary *"[A]n ambitious book . . . a highly readable overview of American Christian thought about Israel from the time of the Puritans to the modern period." * Journal of Church and State *"Goldman's book could not be more timely. If you want to understand how the Christian right, once known as anti-Semitic, can now be pro-Zionist, this is the book for you." * Alan Wolfe, Boston College *"God's Country tracks four centuries of a Bible-reading people's thoughts about the people of the Bible. Samuel Goldman tells a fascinating, surprising story." * Richard Brookhiser, author of Founders' Son: A Life of Abraham Lincoln *"A serious and substantial contribution to U.S. intellectual history. Samuel Goldman's careful reading of the relationship between American Protestants and a biblically grounded Zionism not only provides expert understanding of the deeply religious foundation of American Exceptionalism but also forces a reconsideration of the intellectual terrain." * Raymond Haberski, Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis *"Drawing from an extensive body of literature that spans several disciplines, Samuel Goldman's God's Country describes the religious and political phenomenon of American Christian Zionism in ways that are accessible to scholars, students, and general readers alike. The book is the best overview we have of this complex and timely topic." * Michael Lienesch, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill *

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Book SynopsisIn Singing in a Foreign Land, Karen A. Weisman examines the uneasy literary inheritance of British cultural and poetic norms by early nineteenth-century Anglo-Jewish authors. Focusing on a range of subgenres, from elegies to pastorals to psalm translations, Weisman shows how the writers she studies engaged with the symbolic resources of English poetry—such as the land of England itself—from which they had been historically alienated.Weisman looks at the self-conscious explorations of lyric form by Emma Lyon; the elegies for members of the British royal family penned by Hyman Hurwitz; the ironic reflections on hybrid identities written by sisters Celia and Marion Moss; and the poems of Grace Aguilar that explicitly join lyric effusion to Jewish historical concerns. These poets were well-versed in both Jewish texts and mainstream literary history, and Weisman argues that they model an extreme example of Romantic self-reflexivity: they implicitly lament their oTrade Review"Singing in Foreign Land has many strengths and will appeal to many kinds of readers, including those with interests in Coleridge and other Romantic poets’ intertextual connections with Jewish writers; those seeking a more diverse view of British Romanticism; those seeking deep and intricate analyses of the major Anglo-Jewish writers of the period; and those with particular interests in Jewish-Christian literary relations...[An] intricate, complex, and wonderfully researched volume." * The Coleridge Bulletin *"Ground-breaking and beautifully written, Singing in a Foreign Land is an extraordinary contribution to our knowledge of religious diversity during the Romantic era. Karen A. Weisman is better equipped than any critic today to give us a fine-tuned picture of Romantic Jewish cultural production, one that refuses to see it as either merely oppositional or conformist." * Mark Canuel, University of Illinois at Chicago *"I know of no other book that covers this ground of Anglo-Jewish Romantic poetry. With her meticulous scholarship and skillful readings, Karen A. Weisman shows how Anglo-Jewish Romantic poets engaged with the inherited traditions of pastoral, elegy, and lyric in a way that has earned them a place in that very tradition." * Judith W. Page, University of Florida *Table of ContentsIntroduction. Hath Not a Jew Chapter 1. Emma Lyon's Spacious Firmament Chapter 2. Mourning, Translation, Pastoral: Hyman Hurwitz Chapter 3. The Early Efforts of Celia and Marion Moss Chapter 4. Grace Aguilar and the Demands of Lyric Coda. Amy Levy's Impossible Modernity Notes Bibliography Index Acknowledgments

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Book SynopsisIn The Israeli Radical Left, Fiona Wright traces the dramatic as well as the mundane paths taken by radical Jewish Israeli leftwing activists, whose critique of the Israeli state has left them uneasily navigating an increasingly polarized public atmosphere. This activism is manifested in direct action solidarity movements, the critical stances of some Israeli human rights and humanitarian NGOs, and less well-known initiatives that promote social justice within Jewish Israel as a means of undermining the overwhelming support for militarism and nationalism that characterizes Israeli domestic politics. In chronicling these attempts at solidarity with those most injured by Israeli policy, Wright reveals dissent to be a fraught negotiation of activists'' own citizenship in which they feel simultaneously repulsed and responsible.Based on eighteen months of fieldwork, The Israeli Radical Left provides a nuanced account of various kinds of Jewish Israeli antioccupation aTrade Review"In her fine-grained ethnography, Fiona Wright offers a compelling account of the complexities and ambivalences that attend anti-occupation activism in Israel. Beyond its mooring in Israel and Palestine, The Israeli Radical Left is a powerful examination of the ways in which anticolonial politics can become intimately entangled with the colonial logic it opposes." * Rebecca L. Stein, Duke University *"How to act politically and responsibly in an environment that requires complicity with state-sanctioned oppression as part of everyday life may be the ethical dilemma of our time. Fiona Wright takes up the challenge of addressing it and makes major contributions to the fields of political anthropology and the anthropology of ethics. Read this book; it is extraordinary." * Jarrett Zigon, author of A War on People: Drug User Politics and a New Ethics of Community *"In a world increasingly driven by the search for purity in political struggles, Wright carefully and courageously focuses on the complicity and ambiguity intrinsic to ethics and politics. Examining the Israeli Radical Left, who reject the Israeli state while simultaneously being embedded in and affectively formed by it, she explores what politics means for those who desire equality and yet benefit from the privileges of inequality. This book takes the anthropology of ethics and politics into new, important terrain, opening a space for political hope in contamination." * Miriam Ticktin, The New School *"The Israeli Radical Left is a powerful book that offers a refreshing, profound, and important intervention in the literature on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Fiona Wright delves with great sensitivity and a keen critical eye into the imbrication of ethics and politics and the activists' own grappling with complicity as they try (and fail and try and fail and try) to shape the contours of their uncomfortable ethical-political engagement." * Lihi Ben Shitrit, University of Georgia *Table of ContentsA Note on Language Introduction Chapter 1. Performing Complicity Chapter 2. Love, Mourning, and Solidarity Chapter 3. Infiltrators, Refugees, and Other Others Chapter 4. The Violence of Vulnerability Chapter 5. Exiling the Self Conclusion Epilogue Notes Bibliography Index Acknowledgments

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Book SynopsisWhether forced by governmental decree, driven by persecution and economic distress, or seeking financial opportunity, the Jews of early modern Europe were extraordinarily mobile, experiencing both displacement and integration into new cultural, legal, and political settings. This, in turn, led to unprecedented modes of social mixing for Jews, especially for those living in urban areas, who frequently encountered Jews from different ethnic backgrounds and cultural orientations. Additionally, Jews formed social, economic, and intellectual bonds with mixed populations of Christians. While not necessarily effacing Jewish loyalties to local places, authorities, and customs, these connections and exposures to novel cultural settings created new allegiances as well as new challenges, resulting in constructive relations in some cases and provoking strife and controversy in others.The essays collected by Francesca Bregoli and David B. Ruderman in Connecting Histories show that wTrade Review"Connecting Histories compels historians to think beyond the boundaries of their narrowly defined fields while also demonstrating the value of context that comes from the close study of lives, texts and rituals. Two leading historians of early modern Jewry, Francesca Bregoli and David Ruderman, have compiled an impressive collection of essays that force the reader to consider both the global and local aspects of Jewish history." * European History Quarterly *"Covering a wide range of experience in the Jewish world in terms of geography, economics, class, religious proclivities, languages, and genres, Connecting Histories should be required reading for scholars of early modern Jewish history." * Matt Goldish, The Ohio State University *

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Book SynopsisEstablished in 1969, the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) is an intergovernmental organization the purpose of which is the strengthening of solidarity among Muslims. Headquartered in Jeddah, the OIC today consists of fifty seven states from the Middle East, Asia, Africa, and Latin America. The OIC''s longevity and geographic reach, combined with its self-proclaimed role as the United Nations of the Muslim world, raise certain expectations as to its role in global human rights politics. However, to date, these hopes have been unfulfilled. The Organization of Islamic Cooperation and Human Rights sets out to demonstrate the potential and shortcomings of the OIC and the obstacles on the paths it has navigated.Historically, the OIC has had a complicated relationship with the international human rights regime. Palestinian self-determination was an important catalyst for the founding of the OIC, but the OIC did not develop a comprehensive human rights approach in its Trade Review"A well designed and executed volume,The Organization of Islamic Cooperation and Human Rights offers a balanced and wide-ranging overview of both important rights issues-such as freedom of expression and the rights of the child-and the varied domains of the OIC's activities, from its participation in the United Nations to its role in resolving conflicts and facilitating foreign aid." * Jack Donnelly, University of Denver *"The Organization for Islamic Cooperation (OIC), whose member states encompass a quarter of the world's population, is an increasingly important albeit problematic actor in the human rights arena. This volume is a treasure trove of information and reflection on the OIC's human rights practices and policies and an indispensable guide for anyone interested in the international politics of human rights, the role of international human rights institutions, and the relation of Islam to human rights." * Jamie Mayerfeld, University of Washington *"This volume offers a comprehensive accounting of the OIC as a player in the global rights regime. The editors have assembled an impressive roster of well-known and respected contributors who have done thoughtful and careful research on the major topics involving the intersection of human rights and the OIC." * Haider Ala Hamoudi, University of Pittsburgh School of Law *"Exploring the origins and theoretical foundations, as well as the structure and characteristics, of the OIC, this ambitious volume is a timely resource for those who want to acquire a deeper understanding of Muslim politics and human rights." * Emmanuel Karagiannis, King's College, London *Table of ContentsIntroduction —Marie Juul Petersen and Turan Kayaoglu PART I. FOUNDATIONS Chapter 1. Setting the Scene —Anthony Tirado Chase Chapter 2. The Human Rights Agenda of the OIC: Between Pessimism and Optimism —Mashood A. Baderin Chapter 3. The OIC's Human Rights Regime —Turan Kayaoglu PART II. INTERVENTIONS: RIGHTS AND VALUES Chapter 4. The OIC's Human Rights Policies in the UN: A Problem of Coherence —Ann Elizabeth Mayer Chapter 5. The OIC and Freedom of Expression: Justifying Religious Censorship Norms with Human Rights Language —Heini í Skorini Chapter 6. Competing Perceptions: Traditional Values and Human Rights —Moataz El Fegiery Chapter 7. The Position of the OIC on Abortion: Not Too Bad, Ugly, or Just Confusing? —Ioana Cismas Chapter 8. The OIC and Children's Rights —Mahmood Monshipouri and Turan Kayaoglu PART III. INTERSECTIONS: CONFLICTS AND COOPERATION Chapter 9. The OIC and Conflict Resolution: Norms and Practical Challenges —Hirah Azhar Chapter 10. Fragmented Aid: The Institutionalization of the OIC's Foreign Aid Framework —Martin Lestra and M. Evren Tok Chapter 11. Governance of Refugees in the OIC —Zeynep Şahin Mencütek Chapter 12. The OIC and Civil Society Cooperation: Prospects for Strengthened Human Rights Involvement? —Marie Juul Petersen Contributors Index Acknowledgments

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Book SynopsisTrade Review"Penned by one of the most prominent writers in the field of Hasidic research, Ariel Evan Mayse’s newest book is a comprehensive work...In this important book, Mayse teaches us a fascinating lesson in perception of Jewish language, and undoubtedly in one of its most significant manifestations in the thought of R. Dov Ber of Mezritsh. " * Tradition *"[T]he first in-depth attempt to elucidate the linguistic theology of Rabbi Dov Ber...[Speaking Infinites] offers a new model that translates theological and metaphysical principles into the praxis of human speech, consequently rethinking classical typologies of devotional life...By elucidating the devotional and ethical implications of the Maggid’s theology, Speaking Infinities closes a gap between Hasidism and the broader intellectual and spiritual world to which Hasidism remains largely a mystery." * Journal of Religion *"Ariel Evan Mayse beautifully captures the complexity and subtlety of Rabbi Dov Ber's thought and illustrates its rich implications. For the first time, the eros and pathos of a seemingly dour and reserved writer are revealed in their compelling array." * Jonathan Garb, The Hebrew University *Table of ContentsPreface A Note on Transliteration and Style Introduction Part I. Foundations Chapter 1. The Life of the Maggid Chapter 2. Sacred Words Chapter 3. From Speech to Silence Part II. The Divine Word Chapter 4. Letters, Creation, and the Divine Mind Chapter 5. The Nature of Torah and Revelation Part III. The Devotional Life Chapter 6. Study and the Sacred Text Chapter 7. The Languages of Prayer Epilogue. Moving Mountains Appendix. The Sources: A Bibliographic Excursus Notes Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisTrade Reviewit is impossible to describe or adequately praise the breadth and depth of Jutte’s scholarship and erudition. He has collected data and examples from the widest possible number of sources, with Hasidic legends and Yiddish proverbs nestling comfortably next to quotes from Josephus and advertisements from nineteenth-century German newspapers. * Journal of Medieval Religious Cultures *The overriding impression left on the reader is wonder over the novel aspects of Judaism Jütte has managed to reveal, matched with astonishment at the breadth and depth of his scholarship and of the vast range of source material he has uncovered...The Jewish Body focuses on the most fundamental aspect of life on earth – the human body – in relation to the Jewish religion and practice, an angle of Judaism perhaps too little considered in the past. Jütte’s work is highly original in concept and encyclopedic in scope. It will instruct, amuse and entertain in equal measure. * The Jerusalem Post *A work of exemplary scholarship over a number of languages and cultures, The Jewish Body is a summa summarum of the various debates on body history, race, gender, ethnicity, and nationalism. * Sander Gilman, Emory University *This is a masterful study of all aspects of the notion of the ‘Jewish body’ across the millennia, from biblical to modern times…[T]his is a remarkable, comprehensive, and exceedingly learned work. * Choice *Table of ContentsTranslator's Note Introduction Chapter 1. The Biological Body Chapter 2. The (Un)covered and Altered Body Chapter 3. The Sex of the Body Chapter 4. The Intact Body Chapter 5. The Ailing Body Chapter 6. The Body in Need Chapter 7. The Mortal Body Notes Bibliography Index Acknowledgments

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Book SynopsisIn Biblical Women and Jewish Daily Life in the Middle Ages, Elisheva Baumgarten seeks a point of entry into the everyday existence of people who did not belong to the learned elite, and who therefore left no written records of their lives. She does so by turning to the Bible as it was read, reinterpreted, and seen by the Jews of medieval Ashkenaz. In the tellings, retellings, and illustrations of biblical stories, and especially of those centered around women, Baumgarten writes, we can find explanations and validations for the practices that structured birth, marriage, and death; women''s inclusion in the liturgy and synagogue; and the roles of women as community leaders, givers of charity, and keepers of the household.Each of the book''s chapters concentrates on a single figure or a cluster of biblical women—Eve, the Matriarchs, Deborah, Yael, Abigail, and Jephthah''s daughter—to explore aspects of the domestic and communal lives of Northern French and GermTrade Review"Ingenious scholarship...Much of Biblical Women will likely resonate with modern readers, including for the ways it illuminates some of our own concerns...Baumgarten’s clear-eyed and painstaking attention to her subjects is an act of true kindness for these long-vanished people. Her book [helps readers] care about them, their lives, and their moral imaginations purely for their own sakes, as all good social history should." * Jewish Review of Books *

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Book SynopsisTrade Review"[This book] shows just how much we have missed, and how valuable a fresh perspective on a seemingly well-trodden set of texts can be. . . . In its unassuming way, it urges us to reassess some of our most established habits when reading rabbinic literature, and to be much more courageous, methodologically and analytically, in reading Talmudic texts as literature." * Mira Balberg, in a review of the Hebrew edition *

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Book SynopsisTrade Review"Blood Inscriptions is a superb contribution to the growing literature on the blood libel in Europe in the modern era. The book is a tour de force of historical research and reasoning that leaves no stone unturned and merits a wide audience...Kieval’s analysis sheds light on the inner workings of the conspiratorial mindset and demonstrates how people may not believe in cabals but nonetheless find them politically expedient." * Quest: Issues in Contemporary Jewish History *"Hillel Kieval’s Blood Inscriptions examines the turn-of-the-century resurgence and decline of anti-Jewish murder libels...[and] sheds new light on the interplay between elite and non-elite knowledge in a new media environment and the role modern state institutions played in responding to and resisting social pressures." * Isis *"Kieval’s cogent new book examines the sudden spate of trials propelled by ritual murder accusations between 1882 and 1902 in Central Europe. This work, the culmination of two decades of research, draws upon interrogation protocols, medical examination reports, trial records, press accounts, polemical tracts, apologetic responses, contemporary reappraisals, and other Czech, German, Hebrew, and Hungarian documents in archives across Europe, Israel, and the United States...Blood Inscriptions is a worthy addition to the extensive scholarship on these trials specifically and on ritual murder accusations more generally." * Central European History *"Blood Inscriptions offers a nuanced and compelling assessment of how and why a medieval religious canard found a receptive home among rational, enlightened, and secular Europeans." * Robert Weinberg, Swarthmore College *

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Book SynopsisTrade Review"In a highly personalized way, Amos Morris-Reich unpacks five important episodes where Jewish history and the history of photography come together. For Morris-Reich, photography has changed the world not only by endowing it with better and more accessible images, but also by changing the way people think about certain things—and Jews have been particularly subject to these changes." * Michael Berkowitz, University College London *Table of ContentsPreface and Acknowledgments Introduction Chapter 1. Utopia and Photography circa 1900: Albert Kahn and the Archives of the Planet Chapter 2. The Boundaries of Photographic Intention: Helmar Lerski’s “Failed” Project Chapter 3. Album of an Extinct Race: Eugen Fischer and Photography Chapter 4. Photography for Its Own Sake: Robert Frank and The Americans Chapter 5. Photography and Rupture: S. An-sky, Solomon Yudovin, and the Documentation of Russian Jewry Conclusion. Photography and Democracy Notes Index

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a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.

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Book SynopsisIn this text leading Western, Russian, and Central Asian scholars examine the domestic and international dynamics of Muslim Central Asia and the Caucasus. They also address the circumstances that continue to affect the Muslim states of the former Soviet Union.Table of ContentsThe Emerging Muslim States of Central Asia and the Caucasus, Mohiaddin Mesbahi. Part 1 Russia, Central Asia and the Caucasus - Ethnicity and Islam: The Ethnohistorical Dynamics of Muslim Societies Within Russia and the CIS, Sergei A. Panarin; The Emerging Central Asia - Ethnic and Religious Factions, Eden Naby; Muslim Central Asia - Soviet Development Legacies and Future Challenges, M. Nazif Shahrani. Part 2 The New Muslim States - The North Caucasus and Azerbaijan: The ""Internal"" Muslim Factor in the Politics of Russia - Tatarstan and the North Caucasus, Marie Bennigsen Broxup; Azerbaijan, Yuri N. Zinin and Alexei V. Maleshenko. Part 3 The New Muslim States - Central Asia: Kazakhstan, Martha Brill Olcott; Uzbekistan, Zahid I. Munavvarov; Kyrgyzstan, Alexander O. Filonyk; Tadjikistan, Aziz Niyazi; Turkmenistan, Andrei G. Nedvetsky. Part 4 Russia and the Former Soviet South - The New Geopolitics: The Disintegration of the Soviet Eurasian Empire - an Ongoing Debate, Milan L. Hauner; Great Power Ideology and the Muslim Nations of the CIS, Arthur Sagdeev; Central Asia and the Middle East - the Emerging Links, Anthony Hyman; Russia and the Geopolitics of the Muslim South, Mohiaddin Mesbahi.

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Book SynopsisIllustrated with photographs, drawings, and cartoons gathered from popular culture, this provocative book demonstrates that the veil, the garment known in Islamic cultures as the hijab, holds within its folds a semantic versatility that goes far beyond current clichés and homogenous representations.

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Book SynopsisChallenging the assumption that modernist writer Gertrude Stein seldom integrated her Jewish identity and heritage into her work, this book uncovers Stein’s constant and varied writing about Jewish topics throughout her career.

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Book SynopsisThis volume puts to rest the myth that the Jews went passively to the slaughter like sheep. Indeed Jews resisted in every Nazi-occupied country in the forests, the ghettos, and the concentration camps. The essays presented here consider Jewish resistance to be resistance by Jewish persons in specifically Jewish groups, or by Jewish persons working within non-Jewish organisations.

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Book SynopsisAn assessment of how race, class, and gender shape social identity in the United States. The author argues that changes in racial assignment have shaped the ways American Jews of different eras have constructed their own ethnoracial identities.Trade Review"An insightful interpretation of the complexities of Jewish ethnoracial identity, in the context of a multicultural America stratified by gender, race and class that is both theoretically rich and deeply personal. By interrogating how Jews were integrated within the framework of whiteness. Brodkin illustrates just how difficult it may be to deracialize American society and culture." -- Manning MarableTable of ContentsAcknowledgments Introduction 1. How Did Jews Become White Folks? 2. Race Making 3. Race, Gender, and Virtue in Civic Discourse 4. Not Quite White: Gender and Jewish Identity 5. A Whiteness of Our Own? Jewishness and Whiteness in the 1950s and 1960s Conclusion Notes Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisHere, Vincent Brook examines the trend for American sitcoms featuring explicitly, Jewish lead characters from the period 1989 through 2002. He questions why this trend appeared at this particular historical moment and the significance of this phenomenon for Jews and non-Jews alike?Trade Review"By offering a savvy and sophisticated history of how television has showcased Jewish characters, Vincent Brook manages to illuminate both the permutations of Jewish status in pop culture and the openness of an inescapable medium to ethnic persistence. As a result, Something Ain't Kosher Here is a compulsively readable book." -- Stephen Whitfield * Dept. of American Studies, Brandeis University *"This is rigorous, passionate, readable television criticism." -- David Marc * author of Comic Visions: Television Comedy and American Culture *This is rigorous, passionate, readable television criticism. -- David Marc * author of Comic Visions: Television Comedy and American Culture *By offering a savvy and sophisticated history of how television has showcased Jewish characters, Vincent Brook manages to illuminate both the permutations of Jewish status in pop culture and the openness of an inescapable medium to ethnic persistence. As a result, Something AinÆt Kosher Here is a compulsively readable book. -- Stephen Whitfield * Department of American Studies, Brandeis University *Table of Contents1. Introduction 2. The Americanization of Molly 3. The Vanishing American Jew? Ethno-Racial Projects in the Post-Goldbergs Era 4. The More Things Change ... : The First Phase of the Jewish Sitcom Trend 5. Trans-formations of Ethnic Space from The Goldbergs to Seinfeld 6. Under the Sign of Seinfeld: The Second Phase of the Jewish Sitcom Trend 7. Un-"Dresch"-ing the Jewish Princess 8. Post-Jewishness? The Third Phase of the Jewish Sitcom Trend 9. Conclusion?

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Book SynopsisAt a time when religious fundamentalism throughout the world is inseparable from political aims, this interdisciplinary look at the mutual influences between religion and the media is essential reading for scholars from a wide variety of disciplines.Trade ReviewThe breadth of coverage given to different religious traditions in this volume is nothing short of astonishing. The reader is taken on a wide-ranging tour of religion, media, and markets across diverse social and cultural contexts. -- John P. Bartkowski * author of The Promise Keepers: Servants, Soldiers, and Godly Men *Table of ContentsPrefaceAcknowledgmentsIntroduction: Identity, Belonging, and Religious Lifestyle Branding (Fashion Bibles, Bhangra Parties, and Muslim Pop), Lynn Schofield ClarkPart ISelling, Influencing, Publishing, Purchasing: Establishing and Participating in the Mediated Religious Marketplace1. Free Grace, Free Books, Free Riders: The Economics of Religious Publishing in Early Nineteenth-Century America, David Nord2. Making Money, Saving Souls: Christian Bookstores and the Commodification of Christianity, Anne L. Borden3. Jewish Space Aliens Are Lucky to Be Free! Religious Distinctiveness, Media, and Markets in Jewish Childrens Culture, Hillary WarrenPart IIReligion and Politics in Tension: Mobilization and Mission through Media and Material Artifacts4. Literacy in the Eye of the Conversion Storm, Gauri Viswanathan5. Mary as Media Icon: Gender and Militancy in Twentieth-Century U.S. Roman Catholic Devotional Media, Maryellen Davis6. Cartoon Wars: The Prince of Egypt in Retrospect, Erica SheenPart IIIRepresentations of the Religious Other in Popular Media and in the Marketplace7. Evangelicalism and the Presidential Election of 1960: The Catholic Question in Christianity Today Magazine, Phyllis E. Alsdurf8. Religion as Rhetorical Resource: The Muslim Immigrant in (Danish) Public Discourse, Ferruh Yilmaz9. Blowing the Cover: Imaging Religious Functionaries in Ghanaian/Nigerian Films, Kwabena Asamoah-GyaduPart IVMedia Courted, Media Resisted: Popular Rituals and Artifacts in the Crafting of New Public Religious Practices10. Media Mecca: Tensions, Tropes, and Techno-Pagans at the Burning Man Festival, Lee Gilmore11. Day of the Dead as a New U.S. Holiday: Ritual, Media, and Material Culture in the Quest for Connection, Regina M. MarchiAfterword, Stewart M. HooverList of ContributorsIndex

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Book SynopsisFeatures fifteen scholars who trace the evolution of Jewish identity. This book examines Judaism from the Greco-Roman age, through medieval times, to modern western, and eastern Europe onwards.Trade Review"This extensive array of intensive historical and contemporary analyses of Judaism and Jewishness is a valuable contribution to the understanding of what it means to be Jewish." -- Chaim I. Waxman * Professor Emeritus of Sociology and Jewish Studies, Rutgers University *"We live in an age not only of fluid identities and shifting identities, but of contested identities as well. This extraordinary collection of eminently readable scholarly articles spans centuries of Jewish life, and offers an insightful, stimulating and provocative look at Jews' ongoing struggle with defining their identities. Religion? Ethnicity? Both? Neither? The answers, as we learn, depend not only on whom you ask—but when and where—and who does the asking." -- Steven M. Cohen * author of The Jew Within: Self, Family, and Community in America *"A provocative and important volume. The book elucidate[s] how the definition of the Jewish people has evolved over the centuries and has changed at different times in different places. Highly recommended." * Choice *"This extensive array of intensive historical and contemporary analyses of Judaism and Jewishness is a valuable contribution to the understanding of what it means to be Jewish." -- Chaim I. Waxman * Professor Emeritus of Sociology and Jewish Studies, Rutgers University *"We live in an age not only of fluid identities and shifting identities, but of contested identities as well. This extraordinary collection of eminently readable scholarly articles spans centuries of Jewish life, and offers an insightful, stimulating and provocative look at Jews' ongoing struggle with defining their identities. Religion? Ethnicity? Both? Neither? The answers, as we learn, depend not only on whom you ask—but when and where—and who does the asking." -- Steven M. Cohen * author of The Jew Within: Self, Family, and Community in America *"A provocative and important volume. The book elucidate[s] how the definition of the Jewish people has evolved over the centuries and has changed at different times in different places. Highly recommended." * Choice *Table of ContentsJewish religion, Jewish ethnicity: the evolution of Jewish identities / Zvi Gitelman Secularism, hellenism, and rabbis in antiquity / Yaron Eliav What is a Judaism?: perspectives from Second Temple Jewish studies / Gabriele Boccaccini Crypto-Jewish criticism of tradition and its echoes in Jewish communities / Miriam Bodian Spinoza and the origins of Jewish secularism / Steven Nadler Yiddish schools in America and the problem of secular Jewish identity / David Fishman Beyond assimilation: introducing subjectivity to German-Jewish history / Scott Spector Jewish self-identification and West European categories of belonging from the Enlightenment to World War II / Todd Endelman People of the (secular) book: literary anthologies and the making of Jewish identity in postwar America / Julian Levinson Secular-Jewish identity and the condition of secular Judaism in Israel / Charles Liebman and Yaacov Yadgar Beyond the religious-secular dichotomy: masortim in Israel / Charles Liebman and Yaacov Yadgar What kind of Jewish state do Israelis want?: the nature and determinants of Israeli attitudes toward secularism and some comparisons with Arab attitudes toward the relationship between religion and politics / Mark Tessler The construction of 'secular' and 'religious' in modern Hebrew literature / Shachar Pinsker Jewish identity and secularism in post-Soviet Russia and Ukraine / Zvi Gitelman Judaism, community, and Jewish culture in American life: continuities and transformations / Calvin Goldscheider Beyond apikorsut: a Judaism for secular Jews / Adam Chalom The nature and viability of Jewish religious and secular identities / Zvi Gitelman

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Book SynopsisRuth Behar’s An Island Called Home is a kaddish, an offering, dedicated to the exiles and to the children of the exiles and for those wandering still, searching for their homes. May they ‘not be given up for lost.Trade Review"Traversing the island, Behar becomes a confidante to a myriad of Jewish strangers. Through one-on-one interviews and black-and-white images taken by her photographer, Humberto Mayol, she uncovers the diasporic thread that connects Cuban Jews....This diligent recounting and pictorial collage of interviews with adolescents, the aging, the impoverished and the political by Behar preserves in memory the people and places that make up Cuba's Jewish story." * Publishers Weekly *"An Island Called Home is a snapshot of Cuban Jewish life and well worth a read by anyone interested in the beloved but mystifying island so close to home in America" -- Miriam Bradman Abrahams * Jewish Book Council *"Traversing the island, Behar becomes a confidante to a myriad of Jewish strangers. Through one-on-one interviews and black-and-white images taken by her photographer, Humberto Mayol, she uncovers the diasporic thread that connects Cuban Jews....This diligent recounting and pictorial collage of interviews with adolescents, the aging, the impoverished and the political by Behar preserves in memory the people and places that make up Cuba's Jewish story." * Publishers Weekly *A fascinating and vital memoir about a rarely glimpsed cultural force in Cuba; both personal and far-reaching. An Island Called Home digs deep to reveal new things about the collective soul of the Cubans. -- Oscar Hijuelos * author of The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love *This may be Behar's most personal work...she lovingly intertwines her own thoughts and feelings with the more analytical observations of her profession. The result: a narrative that tugs at the heart. * Miami Herald *"A nostalgic look at Cuban Jews, now and then. . . . her supple text is supplemented by the vivid photographs of Cuban photographer Humberto Mayol." * Canadian Jewish News *The book offers a brief historical introduction and an excellent chronology that tell why and how Jews from all over Europe and the Middle East flocked to Cuba in the early years of the twentieth century. This book tells as much about the author as it does about the Jews of Cuba. Behar has spent her life considering herself an outsider. As an academicshe has pursued that posture studying different cultures, hiding her Jewish identity, and wondering where she could take root. In this, her sixth book, Behar reveals the child whose roots are photographs in a suitcase. In Cuba she finds a home. Her tenacity in documenting even the smallest and most distant communities makes this study valuable. * Shofar *"An Island Called Home is a snapshot of Cuban Jewish life and well worth a read by anyone interested in the beloved but mystifying island so close to home in America" -- Miriam Bradman Abrahams * Jewish Book Council *Table of ContentsMap of Cuba (showing places visited) Running Away from Home to Run toward Home Part One: Blessings for the Dead Part Two: Havana Part Three: Traces Part Four: In the Provinces Part Five: Shalom to Cuba How this Book Came to Be a Photojourney Chronology Notes Bibliography Acknowledgements List of Photographs About the Author and Photographer

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Book SynopsisExplores one of the major issues in Holocaust studies - the intersection of memory and ethics in artistic expression, particularly within literature. This work examines the shifting cultural contexts for Holocaust representation and reveals how writers articulate the shadowy borderline between fact and fiction, and between event and expression.Trade Review"Bringing together some of the best known thinkers in the field of Holocaust literary studies, this volume will quickly become required reading for advanced undergraduates, graduate students and scholars of the Shoah."— Irene Kacandes, co-editor of Teaching the Representation of the Holocaust "A provocative and engaging volume." — Holocaust and Genocide StudiesTable of ContentsPreface Introduction Part One. Is the Holocaust Still to Be Written? The Holocaust, History Writing, and the Role of Fiction Nostalgia and the Holocaust Death in Language Oskar Rosenfeld and Historiographic Realism (including Sex, Shit, and Status) Part Two. A Question for Aesthetics? Nazi Aesthetics in Historical Context Writing Ruins "If I forget thee, O Jerusalem" Part Three. Does Culture Influence Memory? The Holocaust and the Economy of Memory, from Bellow to Morrison (The Technique of Figurative Allegory) "And in the Distance You Hear Music, a Band Playing" Reading Heart of Darkness after the Holocaust Theorizing the Perpetrator in Bernhard Schlink's The Reader and Martin Amis's Time's Arrow

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Trade Review"A Jewish Feminine Mystique? succeeds admirably in expanding scholarship on postwar American Jewish women." * Journal of American History *"Although no one volume can fill the 'gaping hole' in scholarship about Jewish women in the postwar years, the editors and contributors have made a valiant first effort. Recommended." * Choice *"A fascinating anthology. For readers who relish the joy of reading Jewish and American history, this book will be a delight." * Jewish Book World *"A marvelously fresh look at Jewish women in the post war period. This volume of collected essays deeply enriches our understanding of the varied experiences of Jewish women in the 1950s. Reading this volume will forever transform the way the reader thinks about Jewish women, female power, and the pervasive influence of gender." -- Shuly Schwartz * Jewish Theological Seminary *"A Jewish Feminine Mystique? succeeds in describing the complex roles of Jewish women in the time of Betty Friedan and the rise of the second wave feminist movement in America. This book provides a rich chorus of voices, further proving that whatever the lives of Jewish women in the American postwar period were, they weren't simple." * Lilith *"The essays in this fine collection help to revise our understanding of Jewish women and the feminine mystique. Jewish women were affected by the pervasive folk myths of the 1950s, but, like Friedan, they were hardly defined by the feminine mystique; they were too busy starting revolutions." * Hadassah Magazine *Table of ContentsSome of us were there before Betty : Jewish women and political activism in postwar Miami / Raymond A. Mohl The polishness of Lucy S. Dawidowicz's postwar Jewish Cold War / Nancy Sinkoff Our defense against despair : the progressive politics of the national council of Jewish women after World War II / Kathleen A. Laughlin It's good Americanism to join Hadassah : selling Hadassah in the postwar era / Rebecca Boim Wolf A lady sometimes blows the shofar : women's religious equality in the postwar reconstructionist movement / Deborah Waxman Beyond the myths of mobility and altruism : Jewish immigrant professionals and Jewish social welfare agencies in New York City, 1948-1954 / Rebecca Kobrin Negotiating new terrain : Egyptian women at home in America / Audrey Nasar The bad girls of Jewish comedy : gender, class, assimilation, and whiteness in postwar America / Giovanna P. Del Negro Judy Holliday's urban working girl characters in 1950s Hollywood film / Judith Smith The "gentle Jewish mother" who owned a luxury resort : the public image of Jennie Grossinger, 1954-1972 / Rachel Kranson Reading Marjorie Morningstar in the age of the feminine mystique and after / Barbara Sicherman We were ready to turn the world upside down : radical feminism and Jewish women / Joyce Antler Jewish women remaking American feminism : women remaking American Judaism : reflections on the life of Betty Friedan / Daniel Horowitz

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Book SynopsisIn The Feminine Mystique, Jewish-raised Betty Friedan struck out against a postwar American culture that pressured women to play the role of subservient housewives. However, Friedan never acknowledged that many American women refused to retreat from public life during these years. Now, A Jewish Feminine Mystique? examines how Jewish women sought opportunities and created images that defied the stereotypes and prescriptive ideology of the feminine mystique.As workers with or without pay, social justice activists, community builders, entertainers, and businesswomen, most Jewish women championed responsibilities outside their homes. Jewishness played a role in shaping their choices, shattering Friedan's assumptions about how middle-class women lived in the postwar years. Focusing on ordinary Jewish women as well as prominent figures such as Judy Holliday, Jennie Grossinger, and Herman Wouk's fictional Marjorie Morningstar, leading scholars explore the wide canvas upon which American JewisTrade Review"A Jewish Feminine Mystique? succeeds admirably in expanding scholarship on postwar American Jewish women." * Journal of American History *"Although no one volume can fill the 'gaping hole' in scholarship about Jewish women in the postwar years, the editors and contributors have made a valiant first effort. Recommended." * Choice *"A fascinating anthology. For readers who relish the joy of reading Jewish and American history, this book will be a delight." * Jewish Book World *"A Jewish Feminine Mystique? succeeds in describing the complex roles of Jewish women in the time of Betty Friedan and the rise of the second wave feminist movement in America. This book provides a rich chorus of voices, further proving that whatever the lives of Jewish women in the American postwar period were, they weren't simple." * Lilith *"The essays in this fine collection help to revise our understanding of Jewish women and the feminine mystique. Jewish women were affected by the pervasive folk myths of the 1950s, but, like Friedan, they were hardly defined by the feminine mystique; they were too busy starting revolutions." * Hadassah Magazine *"This engaging anthology presents a range of historical cases where the lives of Jewish women in postwar America diverged from the norm of the 1950s suburban housewife." * Journal of American Ethnic History *"A marvelously fresh look at Jewish women in the post war period. This volume of collected essays deeply enriches our understanding of the varied experiences of Jewish women in the 1950s. Reading this volume will forever transform the way the reader thinks about Jewish women, female power, and the pervasive influence of gender." -- Shuly Schwartz * Jewish Theological Seminary *"A Jewish Feminine Mystique? succeeds admirably in expanding scholarship on postwar American Jewish women." * Journal of American History *"Although no one volume can fill the 'gaping hole' in scholarship about Jewish women in the postwar years, the editors and contributors have made a valiant first effort. Recommended." * Choice *"A fascinating anthology. For readers who relish the joy of reading Jewish and American history, this book will be a delight." * Jewish Book World *"A Jewish Feminine Mystique? succeeds in describing the complex roles of Jewish women in the time of Betty Friedan and the rise of the second wave feminist movement in America. This book provides a rich chorus of voices, further proving that whatever the lives of Jewish women in the American postwar period were, they weren't simple." * Lilith *"The essays in this fine collection help to revise our understanding of Jewish women and the feminine mystique. Jewish women were affected by the pervasive folk myths of the 1950s, but, like Friedan, they were hardly defined by the feminine mystique; they were too busy starting revolutions." * Hadassah Magazine *"This engaging anthology presents a range of historical cases where the lives of Jewish women in postwar America diverged from the norm of the 1950s suburban housewife." * Journal of American Ethnic History *"A marvelously fresh look at Jewish women in the post war period. This volume of collected essays deeply enriches our understanding of the varied experiences of Jewish women in the 1950s. Reading this volume will forever transform the way the reader thinks about Jewish women, female power, and the pervasive influence of gender." -- Shuly Schwartz * Jewish Theological Seminary *Table of ContentsSome of us were there before Betty : Jewish women and political activism in postwar Miami / Raymond A. Mohl The polishness of Lucy S. Dawidowicz's postwar Jewish Cold War / Nancy Sinkoff Our defense against despair : the progressive politics of the national council of Jewish women after World War II / Kathleen A. Laughlin It's good Americanism to join Hadassah : selling Hadassah in the postwar era / Rebecca Boim Wolf A lady sometimes blows the shofar : women's religious equality in the postwar reconstructionist movement / Deborah Waxman Beyond the myths of mobility and altruism : Jewish immigrant professionals and Jewish social welfare agencies in New York City, 1948-1954 / Rebecca Kobrin Negotiating new terrain : Egyptian women at home in America / Audrey Nasar The bad girls of Jewish comedy : gender, class, assimilation, and whiteness in postwar America / Giovanna P. Del Negro Judy Holliday's urban working girl characters in 1950s Hollywood film / Judith Smith The "gentle Jewish mother" who owned a luxury resort : the public image of Jennie Grossinger, 1954-1972 / Rachel Kranson Reading Marjorie Morningstar in the age of the feminine mystique and after / Barbara Sicherman We were ready to turn the world upside down : radical feminism and Jewish women / Joyce Antler Jewish women remaking American feminism : women remaking American Judaism : reflections on the life of Betty Friedan / Daniel Horowitz

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Book SynopsisTrade Review"Kibria's groundbreaking study provides valuable insight into the process of transnational and diasporic identity formation among contemporary populations." -- Steven J. Gold * professor of sociology at Michigan State University *"Kibra's research is theoretically sophisticated and right on target. Her well-designed interviews give the reader a vivid sense of the experience of being a Bangladeshi Muslim immigrant." -- Karen Leonard * author of Locating Home: India's Hyderabadis Abroad *"Muslims in Motion is a brilliant illustration of how global sociopolitical forces shape international migrants’ experiences and aspirations. In this timely piece, Kibria explains how Bangladeshi Muslim migrants and their families in starkly different destinations insert themselves into their host societies by organizing their community life and constructing their identity." * Journal of Asian American Studies *"Linking migration and religious studies, Muslims in Motion breaks new ground by taking seriously the ways in which international migrant flows shape Islamization in migrant communities around the world." * American Journal of Sociology *Table of ContentsFigures and Tables Preface and Acknowledgments 1. Muslim Migrants, Bangladeshis Abroad 2. Bangladesh: Nationalism, Islam, and International Migration 3. Bangladeshi American Dreams 4. Becoming Muslim American 5. British Bangladeshis: Changing Transnational Social Worlds 6. Muslim Encounters in the Global Economy 7. Muslim Migrants: National Origins and Revivalist Islam Notes Bibliography Index About the Author

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Book SynopsisTrade Review"Steinberg explains in her informative Jewish Mad Men, an anti-Semitic climate existed in the advertising business even into the early 1960s. Jewish 'Mad Men' wrestled their way into mainstream firms, too, and became influential in imagining and promoting the American Dream and the Jewish American version. Although there was plenty of anti-Semitism in the so-called 'white shoe' ad world, this book is about the complexity of being Jewish and American in a field whose ultimate goal is to influence Americans’ daily behavior. Steinberg effectively shows that when Jews became a consumer market, the advertising business realized it had to cater to them, forcing the creative demographic to change as well. Today’s Madison Avenue is a mixed marriage, so that national ads do not focus on too many ethnic or religious distinctions. While that’s great, it has rendered the brilliant, ethnically rooted ads, like Levy’s, harder if not impossible to find." -- Steven Heller * Haaretz *"Even without the priming from popular culture, Steinberg's case for the importance of advertising as an indicator and shaper of the American Jewish experience is strong." * AJS Review *"This book should appeal to readers interested in learning about advertising and Jewish life in the US." * CHOICE *"Both provocative and entertaining, Jewish Mad Men is an insightful look into advertising and American Jewish life." -- Carol Leifer * writer on Seinfeld, author of How to Succeed in Business Without Really Crying *"You don't have to be Jewish to appreciate this richly detailed account of the marketing and advertising of Jewish life. Steinberg documents how religious, cultural, and communal concerns all take shape in conversation with the commercial marketplace." -- Ari Y. Kelman * author of Station Identification: A Cultural History of Yiddish Radio *"How A Corporation Convinced American Jews To Reach For Crisco," interview with Kerri P. Steinberg * NPR's "Weekend Edition Sunday" *Table of ContentsList of IllustrationsAcknowledgmentsIntroduction1 A Portrait of American Jewish Life2 The Spaces and Places of Jewish Advertising: Joseph Jacobs and Market Segmentation3 Manischewitz and Maxwell House: The M&M of Jewish Advertising4 You Say You Want a Revolution: The Mainstreaming of Jewish Identity in American Advertising5 Matchmaker, Matchmaker: JDating in the Digital AgeConclusion: More than a MirrorNotesBibliographyIndexColor plates between pages 00 and 00

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Book SynopsisTrade Review"A highly readable, tightly argued, and compelling book." * Marginalia Review of Books *"Mulder's study is an important effort that shows how congregational polity can have long-term neighborhood implications. Highly recommended." * Choice *"A sobering wake-up call for American evangelicals to see how their faith played a hand in creating ghettos and oppressing others. Shades of White Flight is simply a must-read for those researching and working on the front lines of addressing racial inequality." * Sociology of Religion *"Shades of White Flight serves as an excellent entry into this new and promising field of research." * Review of Religious Research *"This micro-history brings attention to the need to consider the role of religious institutions in shaping attitudes about place, and therefore how they contribute to the shape of urban spaces in America." * Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion *"Scholars of urban sociology, urban history, and religious institutions will find this book appealing as it sheds light on how evangelical Protestant denominations responded to urban demographic change. The book highlights the complicated role such churches play in urban neighborhoods." * Journal of Urban Affairs *"Shades of White Flight is a fascinating book on race, religion, and urbanization that provides key insights on how a uniquely American brand of evangelicalism unintentionally contributed to 'white flight' in Chicago." -- Gerardo Martí * author of Worship across the Racial Divide: Religious Music and the Multiracial Congregation *"A profound work. Mark Mulder, an astute observer of urban life and rising star in the field, opens our eyes to the role of religion in today’s intense segregation patterns and neighborhood disinvestment. I could not put this book down." -- Michael O. Emerson * Allyn & Gladys Cline Professor of Sociology, Rice University *"[Mulder's] s categories of polity, precedence, and place will prove useful guideposts to those wishing to undertake this task. The book should also serve as a cautionary tale for white evangelicals as they continue to make decisions about the location and relocation of their congregations." * American Journal of Sociology *Table of ContentsList of MapsPreface and Acknowledgments 1 Introduction: The Irony of Religion and Racial Segregation Part One The Evolution of an Evangelical Denomination 2 Mobility and Insularity3 Shuttered in Chicago4 A Case Study of the Closed Community: The Disrupted Integration of Timothy Christian School Part Two City and Neighborhood Change 5 Chicago: A Brief History of African American In-Migration and White Reaction6 The Black Belt Reaches Englewood and Roseland Part Three Congregations Respond to Neighborhood Change 7 The Insignificance of Place8 The Significance of Polity9 Second Roseland (CRC) Leaves the City10 A Contrast between Sister Denominations11 Conclusion: The Continuing Resonance of Religion in Race and Urban Patterns NotesBibliographyIndex

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Book SynopsisThe most dramatic growth of Christianity in the late twentieth century has occurred in Africa, where Catholic missions have played major roles. In Into Africa, Barbra Mann Wall reveals how Catholic medical and nursing sisters established relationships between local and international groups, sparking an exchange of ideas that crossed national, religious, gender, and political boundaries.Trade Review“A particularly striking exploration of the interplay between religion, health, gender, and politics. Wall's work enriches and challenges existing perspectives on the development of health care in sub-Saharan Africa, and provides an essential historical link between the colonial period and the present day." -- Sonya Grypma, PhD, RN * dean and professor of nursing, Trinity Western University *"The critical work of Catholic women’s religious organizations in sub-Saharan Africa comes alive in this important new book. Anyone concerned with gender, health, and transnational cooperation will be fascinated by this nuanced and thoughtful analysis that rethinks the relationship among mission work, colonialism and the post-colonial global world." -- Susan M. Reverby * professor of women's and gender studies, Wellesley College *"Barbra Mann Wall’s new history of postwar Catholic medical missions in Ghana, Uganda, Nigeria, and Tanzania is a much-needed entry into the story of women religious in the 20th century." * American Catholic Studies Newsletter *"By exploring Catholic sisters from both international and indigenous religious communities who delivered health services in Ghana, Nigeria, and Tanzania after World War II until 1985, Barbra Mann Wall sheds light on important episodes and issues, illuminating women’s experiences otherwise unknown." * The Catholic Historical Review *"Wall writes with great clarity. Her insight into the relationship between health care and history is insightful and worth quoting ... The book is an excellent read for North Americans who can see medical practices in relation to other systems, for medical students and personnel interested in working in Africa, Asia, or parts of Latin America, for people interested in expanding their knowledge of the work of women, and for missionaries, whether engaging in short or longer period of service, as a way into the culture of the country to which they are sent." * American Catholic Studies *"Into Africa is a commendable read." * Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences *"Wall has done an admirable job of showing how Catholic sisters bravely navigated political, social and cultural complexities to promote healing beyond the narrow focus on curative care." * Social History of Medicine *"Into Africa does something quite important by opening three of Africa’s late colonies and fledgling postcolonies to analytic counterpoint. This trio featuring decolonization, health, and nuns in Ghana, Nigeria, and Tanzania yields fascinating results as an unusual work in historical comparison." * Bulletin of the History of Medicine *Table of ContentsList of Figures List of Tables 1 Medical Missions in Context 2 Nursing, Medicine, and Mission in Ghana 3 Shifting Mission in Rural Tanzania 4 Catholic Medical Missions and Transnational Engagement in Nigeria 5 Transnational Collaboration in Primary Health Care 6 Appraising Women Religious and Their Mission Work Notes Index

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Book SynopsisJudaism makes the bold argument that the very concept of a religion of ‘Judaism’ is an invention of the Christian church. The intellectual odyssey of world-renowned Talmud scholar Daniel Boyarin, this book will change the study of Judaism—an essential key word in Jewish Studies—as we understand it today.Trade Review"A brilliant book that marks a fresh beginning for scholarly conversations about Judaism, religion, and even the historical utility of categories." -- Annette Yoshiko Reed * author of Jews, Christians, and the Roman Empire *"A significant and radical contribution." -- Michael Satlow * author of How the Bible Became Holy *"This book offers a reflective, and even-meta reflective discussion of the term 'Judaism.' Boyarin, as always, offers provocative, trail blazing insights to reckon with." -- Dina Stein * author of Textual Mirrors: Reflexivity, Midrash, and the Rabbinic Self *"What Boyarin does in Judaism is offer us a complex map, a detailed topography, of how the term Judaism came to be used to define Jewish 'doings,' and for some, to define Jews....One of the greatest things a scholar of Boyarin’s stature can do is make arguments that create the requisite space for future scholars to do their work. A book of this scope can never, and should never, close a conversation, but rather open one. Judaism is a term we all use reflexively but do not quite know what it actually means. Boyarin’s contribution to that reflexivity is a major contribution to scholarship." * H-Judaic *"Boyarin’s book provide[s] [the reader] to think through some of these theoretical questions, and to continue our ongoing conversation about the ancient individuals, groups, and ideas that continue to resonate down to the present." * Marginalia *" Boyarin’s provocative new book... succeeds at its primary goal: to destabilize the automatic use of 'Judaism' by scholars." * Marginalia *"A wonderfully clever argument that demands we reconsider much of what we write and teach about Judaism." * Marginalia *"Provocative and challenging." * Marginalia *"What we thus have from Boyarin’s philological genealogy is one reading of 'Judaism' that begins as a negative, is turned into a positive, and then becomes irrelevant, except for those who share it with something else....Boyarin’s genealogy teaches us that Judaism can never stand alone or be alone. If Judaism is all there is, then the term 'Judaism' ceases to exist, mostly because it is no longer necessary." * Marginalia *"Brief and powerful." * Marginalia *"Judaism: The Genealogy of a Modern Notion attests once again to Daniel Boyarin’s restlessly inquisitive mind and to his persistent need to challenge commonly held assumptions in a manner meant to be provocative and contrarian." * Marginalia *"How Christians Invented 'Judaism,' According to a Top Talmud Scholar," by Tomer Persico https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-how-christians-invented-judaism-according-to-a-top-talmud-scholar-1.7417536 * Haaretz *"Boyarin has created a very interesting argument." * Histoire sociale/Social History *Table of ContentsContentsPreface What Are We Talking About When We Talk About “Judaism”?Part 1 The Terms of the DebateChapter 1 Debate of the TermsPart 2 The State of the Lexicon: Questioning the ArchiveChapter 2 Jewry without Judaism: The Stakes of the QuestionChapter 3 Getting Medieval YahadutPart 3: A New Dispensation: The Christian Invention of “Judaism”Chapter 4 “Judaism” out of the Entrails of ChristianityChapter 5 From Yiddishkayt to Judentum; From Judentum to Yahadut;, or Philology and the Transformation of a FolkEpilogueBibliography

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Book SynopsisTrade Review"This is an exciting, provocative, path-breaking book. It is complex, textured in historical detail, and full of literally hundreds of various scenarios and possibilities of 'what if.' Gurock has done a masterful job." -- Marc Dollinger * co-editor of American Jewish History: A Primary Source Reader *"Gurock’s book is a tour de force, on the cutting edge of an emerging genre. He has mastered American political history, European military and political history, and every aspect of American Jewry over a period of about three decades, and crafted an intelligent, entertaining, imaginative, and even suspenseful narrative. I cannot think of anyone who could have duplicated this superb book." -- Marc Lee Raphael * author of The Synagogue in America: A Short History *"With imagination and erudition, courage and wit—including a suddenly stalwart Neville Chamberlain defying Hitler at Munich and a Joseph P. Kennedy (Jr.) becoming Israel's most important friend—Jeffrey Gurock ponders how a fragile and skittish American Jewry might have evolved without Pearl Harbor and Auschwitz. His surprisingly dystopian vision, filled with familiar characters in unfamiliar and intriguing roles, is sure to challenge—and, quite possibly, to infuriate." -- David Margolick * author of Beyond Glory: Joe Louis vs. Max Schmeling, and a World on the Brink *"Hot on the trail of surprise turns and eerie parallels in this 'what if' romp through the most momentous years of 20th century history, the reader ultimately confronts the dilemmas of Jewish life today." -- Jack Wertheimer * Jewish Theological Seminary *"If [Philip] Roth and [Quentin] Tarantino could rewrite the past, why not allow the historian - in this case Yeshiva University scholar Jeffrey Gurock - to play with facts and offer, with many of the trappings of scholarship, an imagined history?" * Times Higher Education *"The Holocaust Averted shows how stimulating a counterfactual drawn from social history can be … Gurock's book takes a seemingly felicitous event as a divergence point, and draws dark conclusions." * Aeon *"Gurock's emphasis on the contrast between the postwar American Jewry of his alternative Jewry and what Jews actually experienced after 1945 perhaps offers a clue as to why he wrote this engrossing volume. The book implicitly challenges those naysayers who have emphasized the deficiencies of post-war American Jewry. When placed alongside his somber alternate history of American Jews, what is noteworthy from his perspective is their actual accomplishments. For Gurock the glass of postwar American Jewry and of American Judaism is half full, not half empty." * American Jewish History *"As magical, restorative, and nearly unconceivable it is for us, his audience, to read European Jewry back into existence, Gurock directs the readers attention elsewhere in this ambitious reimagining of twentieth-century history ... This book delivers frisson upon frisson as the world we know brushes up past its fraternal twin." * The American Jewish Archives Journal *"Gurock has made a compelling contribution to the study of counterfactual history, relevant to both scholars and general reader alike." * Religious Studies Review *Table of ContentsAcknowledgementsPrologue Ghosts in the Restored Jewish Quarter in Krakow, Poland: An Entrance into Alternate Jewish HistoryChapter 1 A World at War, 1938Chapter 2 American Jewry in the Late 1930s: A Respite for an Insecure CommunityChapter 3 Conflicting Challenges for an America at Peace, 1938–1944Chapter 4 Without the “Boss”: American Jewry’s Concerns, 1940–1944Chapter 5 The Eastern European Threat and an End to U.S. Isolationism, 1944–1945Chapter 6 Divided Allegiances: American Jews and Israel, 1944–1950Chapter 7 Suburban Jewish Cul de Sacs, 1950–1960Chapter 8 The 1960s and the Trials of Acceptance for American JewsChapter 9 Unending Dilemmas: Israelis, Arabs, the World Powers, and American JewsConclusion Alternate History and the Realities of American Jewish LifeNotes

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