The essays in this book explore the reasons why the Jews in Central Europe and the Chinese in Southeast Asia have been both successful and stigmatized, essential but not fully accepted. They offer insights into the very formation of ethnic and national identities in the modern world and ideas about when the process is more or less likely to lead to either violent social separation and conflict or peaceful accommodation. Their careful scholarship and measured tone contribute to a balanced view of the subject and introduce a historical depth and comparative perspective that have generally been lacking in past discussions. Those who want to understand both contemporary Southeast Asia and the legacy of the Jewish experience in Central Europe will gain new insights from the book.

Nine scholars discuss one of the most critical questions posed by the events of 1989. They focus on the political and military role of the US in the 21st c.; the worldwide decline of the left; Gorbachev's search for socialist renewal; the loss of moral legitimacy in communist systems; the failure of student demonstrations in China; the need for a comprehensive plan to promote economic development in formerly communist countries. Now (20 Aug. 91) we need a revision. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

"A major contribution to the study of global events in times of global media. Owning the Olympics tests the possibilities and limits of the concept of 'media events' by analyzing the mega-event of the information age: the Beijing Olympics. . . . A good read from cover to cover." —Guobin Yang, Associate Professor, Asian/Middle Eastern Cultures & Sociology, Barnard College, Columbia University From the moment they were announced, the Beijing Games were a major media event and the focus of intense scrutiny and speculation. In contrast to earlier such events, however, the Beijing Games are also unfolding in a newly volatile global media environment that is no longer monopolized by broadcast media. The dramatic expansion of media outlets and the growth of mobile communications technology have changed the nature of media events, making it significantly more difficult to regulate them or control their meaning. This volatility is reflected in the multiple, well-publicized controversies characterizing the run-up to Beijing 2008. According to many Western commentators, the People's Republic of China seized the Olympics as an opportunity to reinvent itself as the "New China"---a global leader in economics, technology, and environmental issues, with an improving human-rights record. But China's maneuverings have also been hotly contested by diverse global voices, including prominent human-rights advocates, all seeking to displace the official story of the Games. Bringing together a distinguished group of scholars from Chinese studies, human rights, media studies, law, and other fields, Owning the Olympics reveals how multiple entities---including the Chinese Communist Party itself---seek to influence and control the narratives through which the Beijing Games will be understood. digitalculturebooks is an imprint of the University of Michigan Press and the Scholarly Publishing Office of the University of Michigan Library dedicated to publishing innovative and accessible work exploring new media and their impact on society, culture, and scholarly communication. Visit the website at www.digitalculture.org.

THE INSTANT SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER A TIMES BOOK OF THE YEAR 'Epic, moving and important' ROBERT HARRIS 'A modern classic' OBSERVER 'An unforgettable epic of a book' DAILY MAIL From longstanding political columnist and co[Bokinfo]

Reviled as a fascist by his great rival Ben-Gurion, venerated by Israel's underclass, the first Israeli to win the Nobel Peace Prize, a proud Jew but not a conventionally religious one, Menachem Begin was both complex and controversial. Born in Poland in 1913, Begin was a youthful admirer of the Revisionist Zionist movement. A powerful orator, Begin was imprisoned by the Soviets in 1940, joined the Free Polish Army in 1942, and arrived in Palestine as a Polish soldier shortly thereafter. Joining the underground paramilitary Irgun in 1943, he achieved instant notoriety for the organization's violent acts. Intentionally left out of the new Israeli government, Begin's right-leaning Herut party became a fixture of the opposition, until the surprising parliamentary victory of his political coalition in 1977 made him prime minister. Welcoming Egyptian president Anwar Sadat to Israel and cosigning a peace treaty with him on the White House lawn in 1979, Begin accomplished what his predecessors could not. His outreach to Ethiopian Jews and Vietnamese "boat people" was universally admired, and his decision to bomb Iraq's nuclear reactor in 1981 is now regarded as an act of courageous foresight. But the disastrous invasion of Lebanon, combined with his declining health and the death of his wife, led Begin to resign in 1983. He spent the next nine years in virtual seclusion, until his death in 1992. Begin was buried not alongside Israel's prime ministers, but alongside the Irgun comrades who died in the struggle to create the Jewish national home to which he had devoted his life. Daniel Gordis's perceptive biography gives us new insight into a remarkable political figure whose influence continues to be felt throughout the world.--From publisher description.

Daniel Gross, Yahoo! financial columnist and author of Dumb Money , offers a refreshingly optimistic take on our nation’s economic prospects, examining the positive trends that point to a better, stronger future. Financial meltdown, a deep recession, and political polarization—combined with strong growth outside the U.S.—have led to a global bubble of pessimism surrounding the U.S. and its economic prospects. Bloated with debt, outpaced by China, India, and other emerging markets, the U.S. has been left for dead as an economic force. But, Daniel Gross, widely respected for his Newsweek and Slate coverage of the crash and the recovery, shows that much of the talk about decline is misplaced. In the wake of the crash, rather than accept the inevitability of a Japan-style lost decade, America’s businesses and institutions tapped into the very strengths that built the nation’s economy into the global powerhouse in the first place: speed, ingenuity, adaptability, pragmatism, entrepreneurship, and, most significantly, an ability to engage with the world. As the U.S. wallowed in self-pity, the world continued to see promise in what America has to offer—buying exports, investing in the U.S., and adapting American companies and business models as their own. Global growth, it turns out, is not a zero-sum game. These same attributes can propel the world’s largest economy forward through the significant headwinds it faces. Better, Stronger, Faster is a narrative of the remarkable reconstruction and reorientation that started in March 2009, a period that Gross compares to March 1933. Both marked the start of unexpected recoveries and monumental shifts in our nation’s history. As Gross explains, through stories of innovative solutions devised by policymakers, businesses, investors, and consumers, America has the potential to emerge from this period, not as the unrivaled ruler of the global economy, but as a leader and enabler of growth.

This provocative new collection of essays by a Pulitzer Prize winner deals with the challenging themes of discovery and surprise in history. Cleopatra's Nose is not a miscellany but rather a selection of recent essays illustrating specific subjects that have preoccupied Boorstin for several decades. Tantalizing themes all: How sometimes discovery only increases our ignorance. What were the specific historical opportunities in the New World? How has the fourth kingdom - the kingdom of machines - contradicted Darwinian expectations, contributed to a confusion of statistics, created the need for the unnecessary, and highlighted the paradoxes of science and the politics of common sense? In a "personal postscript," Boorstin gives us a memorable and affectionate portrait of his father and optimistically celebrates the United States as the Land of the Unexpected.

Combines a historical and moral critique of Christian antisemitism as it culminated in the Holocaust and as it continues today. Focuses on the role of the Church during the Holocaust and its attempts since then to minimize that role by shifting discussion to individual members of the Church, to the alleged difference between modern racist antisemitism and Christian anti-Judaism, etc. Highlights political actions and failures to act by the Vatican, including collaboration with Nazi Germany, and the role of national Catholic Churches, e.g. in Germany, France, Slovakia, and Croatia. Stresses that the Catholic Church should be judged by its own proclaimed moral standards. Calls on the Church to tell the truth about its contribution to European antisemitism, admit its wrongs, and commit itself to serious repentance. Vatican II is seen as insufficient. Recommends a congress of Christian Churches and a Vatican III to deal with such issues as the Church's "Bible problem" (the inherent antisemitism of significant parts of the New Testament), continued supersessionism in doctrine, the need to accord highest priority to education that will eliminate Catholic anti-Jewish prejudice, opposing anti-Zionism, etc.

What sort of society could bind together Jacques Roubaud, Italo Calvino, Marcel Duchamp, and Raymond Queneau—and Daniel Levin Becker, a young American obsessed with language play? Only the Oulipo, the Paris-based experimental collective founded in 1960 and fated to become one of literature’s quirkiest movements. An international organization of writers, artists, and scientists who embrace formal and procedural constraints to achieve literature’s possibilities, the Oulipo (the French acronym stands for “workshop for potential literature”) is perhaps best known as the cradle of Georges Perec’s novel A Void, which does not contain the letter e. Drawn to the Oulipo’s mystique, Levin Becker secured a Fulbright grant to study the organization and traveled to Paris. He was eventually offered membership, becoming only the second American to be admitted to the group. From the perspective of a young initiate, the Oulipians and their projects are at once bizarre and utterly compelling. Levin Becker’s love for games, puzzles, and language play is infectious, calling to mind Elif Batuman’s delight in Russian literature in The Possessed. In recent years, the Oulipo has inspired the creation of numerous other collectives: the OuMuPo (a collective of DJs), the OuMaPo (marionette players), the OuBaPo (comic strip artists), the OuFlarfPo (poets who generate poetry with the aid of search engines), and a menagerie of other Ou-X-Pos (workshops for potential something ). Levin Becker discusses these and other intriguing developments in this history and personal appreciation of an iconic—and iconoclastic—group.

Film critic and author Kimmel outlines 15 of what he considers to be the greatest romantic comedies and shows how they came together, detailing the casting, controversies, script changes, edits, and ironies that came into play. He also discusses how each movie was received and the subsequent career turns for those involved.

This is the story of a rare sort of American genius, who grew up in grinding poverty in Camden, Maine. Nothing could save the sensitive child but her talent for words, music, and drama, and an inexorable desire to be loved. When she was twenty, her poetry would make her famous; at thirty she would be loved by readers the world over. Edna St. Vincent Millay was widely considered to be the most seductive woman of her age. Few men could resist her, and many women also fell under her spell. From the publication of her first poems until the scandal over Fatal Interview twenty years later, gossip about the poet's liberated lifestyle prompted speculation about who might be the real subject of her verses. Using letters, diaries, and journals of the poet and her lovers that have only recently become available, Daniel Mark Epstein tells the astonishing story of the life, dedicated to art and love, that inspired the sublime lyrics of Edna St. Vincent Millay.

Hailed for its searing emotional insights, and for the astonishing originality with which it weaves together personal history, cultural essay, and readings of classical texts by Sophocles, Ovid, Euripides, and Sappho, The Elusive Embrace is a profound exploration of the mysteries of identity. It is also a meditation in which the author uses his own divided life to investigate the "rich conflictedness of things," the double lives all of us lead. Daniel Mendelsohn recalls the deceptively quiet suburb where he grew up, torn between his mathematician father's pursuit of scientific truth and the exquisite lies spun by his Orthodox Jewish grandfather; the streets of manhattan's newest "gay ghetto," where "desire for love" competes with "love of desire;" and the quiet moonlit house where a close friend's small son teaches him the meaning of fatherhood. And, finally, in a neglected Jewish cemetery, the author uncovers a family secret that reveals the universal need for storytelling, for inventing myths of the self. The book that Hilton Als calls "equal to Whitman's 'Song of Myself,'" The Elusive Embrace marks a dazzling literary debut.

"A collection of twenty-two essays from the web magazine Reality Sandwich that discuss alternatives to the current systems of bank-financed currency and global capitalism"--Provided by publisher.

The volatility of Muslim and Middle Eastern politics has made these interrelated topics an overriding preoccupation of world and especially U.S. politics. Perhaps no region of the world has ever so dominated the American public discourse as the Middle East does today. As Daniel Pipes shows, this results mainly, but not exclusively, from the attacks of September 11, 2001 and the ensuing war on terrorism. Other sources of trouble include militant Islam, Muslims in the West, the Arab-Israeli conflict, the Iraq situation, relations with Saudi Arabia, the price of oil and gas, and U.S. policy toward all these issues. These are the central themes of the roughly one hundred essays in Daniel Pipes' Miniatures: Views of Islamic and Middle Eastern Politics.As Pipes notes, the Islamist war against America preceded the events of 9/11. Nevertheless, response to the earlier attacks had been inconsistent and somewhat nonchalant. Pipes shows how the State Department's annual report on Patterns of Global Terrorism veers into unreliability and even falsehood. He explains the problem in George W. Bush trying to decide what is true Islam and what not, in U.S. academics hiding the true meaning of the word "jihad," and in seventh-grade textbooks proselytizing for Islam. Pipes demonstrates that many seemingly devout Islamists are in fact impious frauds. When it comes to the Arab-Israeli conflict, Pipes indicates how the failure of the Oslo process could be discerned as early as 1994 and he shows how Yasir Arafat speaks one way to Arabs and another way to Israelis.This important collection, by one of the foremost experts in the field, presents original insights, accessibly written for Middle East specialists, political scientists, policymakers, journalists, and the interested public.

This is a book about politics by a historian. Though the subject matter closely resembles that of a political scientist, policy analyst, or journalist, the approach and treatment reflect the perspective available only to someone versed in the long shadow of the past. Daniel Pipes, a well-known writer on Middle East issues, offers the larger perspective so often missing. His study of the languages, religions, and culture, supplemented by years of personal experience in the region, give this book unusual depth. The Long Shadow concentrates on 5 vivid and critical topics of the Middle East. 1. The Islam and Public Life. Pipes, author of two books on Islam in politics and a recognized authority, assesses Islam in Iran, Iraq, and the Soviet Union, as well as Islam's role in anti-Semitism. 2. The Persian Gulf. Here Pipes examines the origins of the Iraq-Iran war, the curse of oil wealth, and shares insights gained from an unusual visit to Kuwait. 3. The Arab-Israeli Conflict. In some of his most original work Pipes argues that the struggle between Arabs on the question of Palestine is actually more central than the struggle between the Arabs and Israel. He sees the PLO as little more than a tool of the Arab states, and perceives the deep division between Jews and Arabs in Israel today is likely to be permanent. 4. Iranian, Lebanese, and Libyan Terrorism have greatly affected the tenor of Middle East politics. Pipes shows how they differ and why the Iranians pose the greatest threat to the United States. 5. The United States in the Middle East. Pipes examines U.S. policy toward the area and American media coverage, arguing that both follow idiosyncratic rhythms, and explaining these peculiarities against the backdrop of larger American interests in the region. While a number of Middle East specialists have written books or essays on the subjects addressed by Pipes, his book is distinguished both by its scope and its focus on the general reader as well as the specialist.

Human civilization will be forever indebted to the great thinkers of Jewish philosophy's golden age. Moses Maimonedes, Levi Gersonides, Judah Halevi, Saadia Gaon, Hasdai Crescas and their like grappled with some of the most challenging metaphysical issues, while the profundity of their solutions continue to engage philosophers today. Did God create the world? Can human freedom be reconciled with divine foreknowledge? What is the nature of the good life? Focusing on the central philosophical questions of the Middle Ages, Daniel Rynhold offers a concise introduction to topics such as God and creation, human freewill, biblical prophecy, the Commandments, the divine attributes and immortality. Structured around themes that form the common ""syllabus"" of medieval Jewish philosophy, each chapter builds a debate around a particular topic and in so doing utilizes the arguments of the chief philosophical figures of the medieval era. Explaining all concepts in a clear, non-technical fashion, the book also provides suggestions for further reading at the end of each chapter. The first dedicated textbook to introduce the great richness of medieval Jewish philosophy as a whole, this lively and comprehensive survey is the ideal introduction for undergraduate students of the subject as well as the interested general reader.

""Daniel Singer is the left's most brilliant arsonist. He sets ablaze whole forests of desiccated cliches about 'the end of history' and 'the triumph of the market' in order to light the way forward for the next generation of radical thinkers and activists."-Mike Davis An essential firsthand account of the May 1968 upheaval in France."--

"Torday is a singular American writer with a big heart and a real love for the world. He has the rare gift for writing dynamic action scenes while being genuinely funny." —George Saunders Bluegrass musician, former journalist and editor, and now PhD in English, Mark Brumfeld has arrived at his thirties with significant debt and no steady prospects. His girlfriend Cassie—a punk bassist in an all-female band, who fled her Midwestern childhood for a new identity—finds work at a “new media” company. When Cassie refuses his marriage proposal, Mark leaves New York and returns to the basement of his childhood home in the Baltimore suburbs. Desperate and humiliated, Mark begins to post a series of online video monologues that critique Baby Boomers and their powerful hold on the job market. But as his videos go viral, and while Cassie starts to build her career, Mark loses control of what he began—with consequences that ensnare them in a matter of national security. Told through the perspectives of Mark, Cassie, and Mark’s mother, Julia, a child of the '60s whose life is more conventional than she ever imagined, Boomer1 is timely, suspenseful, and in every line alert to the siren song of endless opportunity that beckons and beguiles all of us.