Recognizing Heritage: The Politics of Multiculturalism in New Mexico
Author: Thomas H. Guthrie In 2006 Congress established the Northern Rio Grande National Heritage Area to recognize the four-hundred-year coexistence of Spanish and Indian peoples in New Mexico and their place in the United States. National heritage areas enable local communities to partner with the federal government to promote historic preservation, cultural conservation, and economic development. Recognizing Heritage explores the social, political, and historical context of this and other public efforts to interpret and preserve Native American and Hispanic heritage in northern New Mexico. The federal governments recognition of New Mexicos cultural distinctiveness contrasts sharply with its earlier efforts to wipe out Indian and Hispanic cultures. Yet even celebrations of cultural difference can reinforce colonial hierarchies. Multiculturalism and colonialism have overlapped in New Mexico since the nineteenth century, when Anglo-American colonists began promoting the regions unique cultures and exotic images to tourists. Thomas H. Guthrie analyzes the relationship between heritage preservation and ongoing struggles over land, water, and identity resulting from American colonization. He uses four sites within the heritage area to illustrate the unintentional colonial effects of multiculturalism: a history and anthropology museum, an Indian art market, a tricultural commemorative plaza, and a mountain village famous for its adobe architecture. Recognizing Heritage critiques the politics of recognition and suggests steps toward a more just multiculturalism that fundamentally challenges colonial inequalities.
Author: Jordan D. Finkin
This book is about Jewish language. The fact that Jews speak and write in distinctive ways is well known. (The journalist Mike Royko called it Hebonics.) These forms of expression actually draw from many sources and have been employed in popular culture from Henry Roths Call It Sleep to the novels of Saul Bellow to contemporary television. What has received less attention is what allowed these modern forms to flow from a rich body of Yiddish literature. This book fills that gap by exploring the language of modern Yiddish literature, addressing emblematically why Jews answer a question with a question. Through a series of case studies, A Rhetorical Conversation explores various distinctive aspects of Yiddish literature to explain the nature and importance of Jewish discourse: the way of speaking, writing, arguing, and thinking developed by Yiddish culture based on prolonged and intimate contact with traditional texts.
Author: Michael L. Power and Jay Schulkin
In this sweeping exploration of the relatively recent obesity epidemic, Michael L. Power and Jay Schulkin probe evolutionary biology, history, physiology, and medical science to uncover the causes of our growing girth. The unexpected answer? Our own evolutionary success. For most of the past few million years, our evolutionary ancestors' survival depended on being able to consume as much as possible when food was available and to store the excess energy for periods when it was scarce. In the developed world today, high-calorie foods are readily obtainable, yet the propensity to store fat is part of our species' heritage, leaving an increasing number of the world's people vulnerable to obesity. In an environment of abundant food, we are anatomically, physiologically, metabolically, and behaviorally programmed in a way that makes it difficult for us to avoid gaining weight. Power and Schulkins engagingly argued book draws on popular examples and sound science to explain our expanding waistlines and to discuss the consequences of being overweight for different demographic groups. They review the various studies of human and animal fat use and storage, including those that examine fat deposition and metabolism in men and women; chronicle cultural differences in food procurement, preparation, and consumption; and consider the influence of sedentary occupations and lifestyles. A compelling and comprehensive examination of the causes and consequences of the obesity epidemic, The Evolution of Obesity offers fascinating insights into the question, Why are we getting fatter?
Author: Showalter, Dennis
The battle of Tannenberg (August 2730, 1914) opened World War I with a decisive German victory over Russiaindeed the Kaisers only clear-cut victory in a non-attritional battle during four years of war. In this first paperback edition of the classic work, historian Dennis Showalter analyzes this battles causes, effects, and implications for subsequent German military policy. The author carefully guides the reader through what actually happened on the battlefield, from its grand strategy down to the level of improvised squad actions. Examining the battle in the context of contemporary diplomatic, political, and economic affairs, Showalter also reviews both armies social settings and military doctrine, and shows how the battle may be understood as a case study of problems that military organizations face in the initial stages of a major war. In addition, he demolishes many myths about the battle, such as the supposed superiority of the German military, the animosity among Russian field commanders, and the assumption that the Germans viewed their opponents as a horde of uniformed illiterates. Tannenbergs mystique later served the Weimar Republic and Third Reich propagandists. For years its legends helped to shape German nationalist ideology and military policy. In 1941, Hitlers Wehrmacht grossly underestimated Soviet military capability, leading to disaster in World War II.
Author: Edited by Paula L.W. Sabloff
With its small population and low GDP, Mongolia is frequently deemed unique or tacked onto various area studies programs: Inner Asia, Central Asia, Northeast Asia, or Eurasia. This volume is a response to the concern that countries such as Mongolia are marginalized when academia and international diplomacy reconfigure area studies borders in the postsocialist era.Would marginalized countries such as Mongolia benefit from a reconfiguration of area studies programs or even from another way of thinking about grouping nations? This book uses Mongolia as a case study to critique the area studies methodology and test the efficacy of another grouping methodology, the -scapes method proposed by Arjun Appadurai. Could the application of this approach for tracing individuals' social networks by theme (finance, ethnicity, ideology, media, and technology) be applied to nation-states or peoples? Could it then prevent Mongolia from slipping through the cracks of academia and international diplomacy? Experts from ecology, genetics, archaeology, history, anthropology, and international diplomacy contemplate these issues in their chapters on Mongolia through the ages. Their work includes over 30 maps to help situate Mongolia in its geologic, geographic, economic, and cultural matrix. By comparing maps of different time periods and intellectual orientations, readers can consider for themselves the place of Mongolia in the world community and the relative benefits of these and other grouping methodologies.
Author: Rob Reich
The troubling ethics and politics of philanthropyIs philanthropy, by its very nature, a threat to todays democracy? Though we may laud wealthy individuals who give away their money for societys benefit, Just Giving shows how such generosity not only isnt the unassailable good we think it to be but might also undermine democratic values and set back aspirations of justice. Big philanthropy is often an exercise of power, the conversion of private assets into public influence. And it is a form of power that is largely unaccountable, often perpetual, and lavishly tax-advantaged. The affluentand their foundationsreap vast benefits even as they influence policy without accountability. And small philanthropy, or ordinary charitable giving, can be problematic as well. Charity, it turns out, does surprisingly little to provide for those in need and sometimes worsens inequality.These outcomes are shaped by the policies that define and structure philanthropy. When, how much, and to whom people give is influenced by laws governing everything from the creation of foundations and nonprofits to generous tax exemptions for donations of money and property. Rob Reich asks: What attitude and what policies should democracies have concerning individuals who give money away for public purposes? Philanthropy currently fails democracy in many ways, but Reich argues that it can be redeemed. Differentiating between individual philanthropy and private foundations, the aims of mass giving should be the decentralization of power in the production of public goods, such as the arts, education, and science. For foundations, the goal should be what Reich terms discovery, or long-time-horizon innovations that enhance democratic experimentalism. Philanthropy, when properly structured, can play a crucial role in supporting a strong liberal democracy.Just Giving investigates the ethical and political dimensions of philanthropy and considers how giving might better support democratic values and promote justice.
Author: Janine Barchas
Matters of Fact in Jane Austen: History, Location, and Celebrity makes the bold assertion that Jane Austens novels allude to actual high-profile politicians and contemporary celebrities as well as to famous historical figures and landed estates. Janine Barchas is the first to conduct extensive research into the names and locations in Austens fiction by taking full advantage of the explosion of archival materials now available online. According to Barchas, Austen plays confidently with the tantalizing tension between truth and invention which characterizes the realist novel. Of course, the argument that Austen deployed famous names presupposes an active celebrity culture during the Regency, a phenomenon recently accepted by scholars. The names Austen plucks from history for her protagonists (such as Dashwood, Wentworth, Woodhouse, Tilney, Fitzwilliam, and many more) were hugely famous in her day. She seems to bank upon this familiarity for interpretive effect, often upending associations with comic intent. Barchas re-situates Austens work nearer to the historical novels of her contemporary Sir Walter Scott than to the domestic and biographical perspectives that until recently have dominated Austen studies. This forward-thinking and revealing investigation offers scholars and ardent fans of Jane Austen a wealth of juicy historical facts, while shedding an interpretive light on a new aspect of the work of a much-beloved writer.
Author: Charles Segal
This close reading of Seneca's most influential tragedy explores the question of how poetic language produces the impression of an individual self, a full personality with a conscious and unconscious emotional life.Originally published in .The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.
Author: Stuart Leibiger
Although the friendship between George Washington and James Madison was eclipsed in the early 1790s by the alliances of Madison with Jefferson and Washington with Hamilton, their collaboration remains central to the constitutional revolution that launched the American experiment in republican government. Washington relied heavily on Madison's advice, pen, and legislative skill, while Madison found Washington's prestige indispensable for achieving his goals for the new nation. Together, Stuart Leibiger argues, Washington and Madison struggled to conceptualize a political framework that would respond to the majority without violating minority rights. Stubbornly refusing to sacrifice either of these objectives, they cooperated in helping to build and implement a powerful, extremely republican constitution.Observing Washington and Madison in light of their special relationship, Leibiger argues against a series of misconceptions about the two men. Madison emerges as neither a strong nationalist of the Hamiltonian variety nor a political consolidationist; he did not retreat from nationalism to states' rights in the 1790s, as other historians have charged. Washington, far from being a majestic figurehead, exhibits a strong constitutional vision and firm control of his administration.By examining closely Washington and Madison's correspondence and personal visits, Leibiger shows how a marriage of political convenience between two members of the Chesapeake elite grew into a genuine companionship fostered by historical events and a mutual interest in agriculture and science. The development of their friendship, and eventual estrangement, mirrors in fascinating ways the political development of the early Republic.