"The Trump presidency has resulted in a fundamentally disruptive moment in this nation's political culture. Not only were there different policy options and directions, but the cultural artifacts of politics changed because of how this president dramatically challenged the existing norms of political behavior and action. As we have shifted from a period of American liberalism to a time of political populism, deep fissures are dividing Americans in general and Jews in particular. The Impact of the Presidency of Donald Trump on American Jewry and Israel unpacks President Donald Trump's distinctive and unique relationship with the American Jewish community and the State of Israel. Addressing the various dimensions of his personal and political connections with Jews and Israel, this publication is designed to provide an assessment of how the Trump presidency has influenced and altered American Jewish political behavior. Writers from different backgrounds and political orientations bring a broad range of perspectives designed to examine various aspects of this presidency, including Trump's particular impact on Israel-US relations, his special connection with Orthodox Jews, and his complex and uneven relationship with Jewish Republicans. For liberal American Jews, these four years represented a fundamental revolution, overturning and challenging much that a generation of activists had fought to achieve and protect. For Trump's supporters, it afforded them an opportunity to advance their priorities, while joining the forty-fifth president in changing the American political landscape. The "Trump effect" will extend well beyond his four-year tenure, creating an environment that has fomented the politics of hate and exposed a deeply embedded presence of anti-Semitism. How Americans understand this moment in time and the ways society will adapt can be reflected through the prism of the Jewish encounter with Trumpism that this volume seeks to explore"--

Explores how Latino gang culture mirrors the most destructive aspects of the American Dream through a look at novels and memoirs "There's a place for us / Somewhere a place for us." With the emergence of a rich body of literature chronicling the experiences of Latino and Latina gang members, popular understanding of this outlaw culture has advanced far beyond West Side Story. However, the diverse works discussed in this important book--ranging from the breakthrough 1967 memoir Down These Mean Streets and the crime novel Carlito's Way to the play Zoot Suit and the World War II-era historical novel Don't Spit on My Corner, to more recent works such as Always Running/La Vida Loca: Gang Days in L.A. and Chicana gang narratives like Locas and Two Badges--all share with the award-winning musical a crucial discourse on nationality, citizenship, and belonging. In Gang Nation, Monica Brown offers a sophisticated analysis of these narratives produced by former gang members and by "outside" observers writing within the Latino community. She examines the ubiquity of language and behavior within this literature that reveal the frustrated longings within gangs for greater participation in America's national culture and the desire of members to craft an alternative environment in which they are welcome. Through literature and memoirs written from within the culture, Brown illustrates how these youth mimic the rhetoric and rituals of American nationalism's most destructive aspects--intense territoriality, justification of violence, and cultural chauvinism--to assert their citizenship in an alternative nation. Before now, studies of gang culture have centered on either the choices of individual members or the social forces that inspire their unfocused rage. But through Latino and Chicano gang literature, Brown provides a more nuanced portrait of that culture, one that raises broader concerns about dominant nationalism, civil rights, the criminalization of urban youth of color, and the often unfulfilled sense of communal identity and acceptance among American youth.

"This book re-evaluates the prevailing notion that Jews in medieval Christian Europe lived under an appalling regime of ecclesiastical limitation, governmental exploitation and expropriation, and unceasing popular violence. Robert Chazan argues that, while Jewish life in medieval Western Christendom was indeed beset with grave difficulties, it was nevertheless an environment rich in opportunities; the Jews of medieval Europe overcame obstacles, grew in number, explored innovative economic options, and fashioned enduring new forms of Jewish living. His research also provides a reconsideration of the legacy of medieval Jewish life, which is often depicted as equally destructive and projected as the underpinning of the twentieth-century catastrophes of antisemitism and the Holocaust. Dr Chazan's research proves that, although Jewish life in the medieval West laid the foundation for much Jewish suffering in the post-medieval world, it also stimulated considerable Jewish ingenuity, which lies at the root of impressive Jewish successes in the modern West"--

Watershed events - including the second Palestinian uprising in 2000, September 11 2001 and the Iraq war - have created major challenges for American Jewry, leading to changes in its perceptions and environment. Through conversations with some of America's most influential Jewish leaders, Manfred Gerstenfeld sheds light on the how the tumultuous events of recent years have affected and will continue to influence the American Jewish population. These include issues surrounding education, assimilation and revitalization, relationships with other religious communities, anti-Semitism and generational change. Of enormous historical value, American Jewry's Challenge serves as a time capsule capturing American Jewry at the dawn of the 21st century.

This book advances the intriguing hypothesis that human beings bend to construct the world they inhabit from their bodies and families outward to nature and society.