Penn Press Log

This Week's New Books--Augustine, Sri Lanka, Landscape Architecture

Augustine's Manichaean Dilemma, Volume 2: Making a "Catholic" Self, 388-401 C.E. Jason David BeDuhn 584 pages | 6 x 9 Cloth 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4494-6 | $79.95 | £52.00 A volume in the Divinations: Rereading Late Ancient Religion series Demonstrating that as Augustine defined and became a "Catholic" self, he also intently engaged with his former Manichaean faith, Augustine's Manichaean Dilemma, Volume 2 explores the close interplay of these two processes in Augustine's works up to and including the Confessions.

When Counterinsurgency Wins: Sri Lanka's Defeat of the Tamil Tigers Ahmed S. Hashim 280 pages | 6 x 9 | 7 illus. Cloth 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4452-6 | $59.95 | £39.00 When Counterinsurgency Wins is the first book to analyze the final campaign that won the decades-long civil war in Sri Lanka in 2009. Ahmed Hashim traces the development of the counterinsurgency campaign from the early stages of the war to the later adaptations and military strategy that led to a decisive finish. Read more . . .

Unearthed: The Landscapes of Hargreaves Associates Karen M'Closkey 256 pages | 8 x 10 | 125 color, 30 b/w Cloth 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4480-9 | $59.95 | £39.00 A volume in the Penn Studies in Landscape Architecture series Unearthed examines how one of America's most significant landscape architecture firms approaches the redesign of public places to meet a range of ecological and social needs. With more than one hundred and fifty color and black-and-white images, this study uncovers the methods behind many canonical works of international landscape design. Read more . . .

Book reviewers: to request a press copy, contact Saunders Robinson. Educators: to request an exam copy for course use consideration, click here.

This Week's New Books--Locked In, Locked Out, Take Up Your Pen, and More

Locked In, Locked Out: Gated Communities in a Puerto Rican City Zaire Zenit Dinzey-Flores 232 pages | 6 x 9 | 19 illus. Cloth 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4513-4 | $65.00 | £42.50 A volume in the City in the Twenty-First Century series In Locked In, Locked Out, Zaire Zenit Dinzey-Flores examines four communities in Ponce, Puerto Rico, showing how gates—in both physical and symbolic ways—distribute power, reroute movement, sustain social inequalities, and cement boundary lines of class and race. Read more . . .

Take Up Your Pen: Unilateral Presidential Directives in American Politics Graham G. Dodds 304 pages | 6 x 9 | 1 illus. Cloth 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4511-0 | $69.95 | £45.50 A volume in the Democracy, Citizenship, and Constitutionalism series Graham G. Dodds explores the constitutional and historical development of unilateral presidential directives—the ability of presidents to bypass the legislative process and set public policy via their own executive orders—and how such a practice fits Americans' conception of democracy. Read more . . .

Human Rights in the Shadow of Colonial Violence: The Wars of Independence in Kenya and Algeria Fabian Klose. Translated by Dona Geyer 448 pages | 6 x 9 Cloth 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4495-3 | $89.95 | £58.50 A volume in the Pennsylvania Studies in Human Rights series Based on previously inaccessible material from international archives, Human Rights in the Shadow of Colonial Violence examines the relationship between emerging human rights concepts after 1945 and repressive British and French actions against anticolonial movements in Africa. Read more . . .

Bound to Read: Compilations, Collections, and the Making of Renaissance Literature Jeffrey Todd Knight 288 pages | 6 x 9 | 33 illus. Cloth 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4507-3 | $59.95 | £39.00 A volume in the Material Texts series Jeffrey Todd Knight excavates the culture of book collecting and compiling in early modern England, examining how the pervasive practice of mixing texts, authors, and genres into single bindings defined Renaissance ways of thinking and writing. Read more . . .

Multilevel Citizenship Edited by Willem Maas 288 pages | 6 x 9 Cloth 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4515-8 | $65.00 | £42.50 A volume in the Democracy, Citizenship, and Constitutionalism series Multilevel Citizenship challenges the dominant conception of citizenship as legal and political equality within a sovereign state, demonstrates how citizenship is constructed by political and legal practices, and explores alternative forms of membership in substate, suprastate, and nonstate political communities. Read more . . .

Power Sharing in Deeply Divided Places Edited by Joanne McEvoy and Brendan O'Leary 432 pages | 6 x 9 | 25 illus. Cloth 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4501-1 | $85.00 | £55.50 A volume in the National and Ethnic Conflict in the 21st Century series This volume considers an array of power-sharing systems in divided cities and states, with critical evaluations of their merits and defects as well as explanations of their emergence, maintenance, and failings. Read more . . .

Book reviewers: to request a press copy, contact Saunders Robinson. Educators: to request an exam copy for course use consideration, click here.

This Week's New Books--Beggar Thy Neighbor and As American as Shoofly Pie

Beggar Thy Neighbor: A History of Usury and Debt Charles R. Geisst 400 pages | 6 1/8 x 9 1/4 Cloth 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4462-5 | $39.95 | £26.00 From the Roman Empire to the most recent financial crisis, this comprehensive economic history examines humanity's attempts to curb the abuse of debt while reaping the benefits of credit. Read more . .

As American as Shoofly Pie: The Foodlore and Fakelore of Pennsylvania Dutch Cuisine William Woys Weaver 336 pages | 6 x 9 | 59 illus. Cloth 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4479-3 | $34.95 | £23.00 Not for sale outside North America Celebrated food historian and cookbook writer William Woys Weaver delves deeply into the history of Pennsylvania Dutch cuisine to sort fact from fiction in the foodlore of this unique American culture. Read more . . .

Book reviewers: to request a press copy, contact Saunders Robinson. Educators: to request an exam copy for course use consideration, click here.

This Week's New Books--Trade, Land, Power: The Struggle for Eastern North America, Plus Three Paperback Releases

Trade, Land, Power: The Struggle for Eastern North America Daniel K. Richter 384 pages | 6 x 9 | 35 illus. Cloth 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4500-4 | $45.00 | £29.50 Ebook | ISBN 978-0-8122-0830-6 | $45.00s | £29.50 In this sweeping collection of essays, one of America's leading colonial historians reexamines struggles between Native peoples and Europeans in early America in terms of how each understood the material basis of power. Read more . . .

Now in Paperback Buddhism and Islam on the Silk Road Johan Elverskog 352 pages | 6 x 9 | 48 illus. Cloth 2010 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4237-9 | $69.95 | £45.50 Paper 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-2259-3 | $29.95 | £19.50 EBook | ISBN 978-0-8122-0531-2 | $29.95 | £19.50 A volume in the Encounters with Asia series This groundbreaking work challenges contemporary stereotypes by revealing how both Buddhist and Muslim religious traditions were shaped by a millennium of cross-cultural exchange along the Silk Road from Iran to China. Read more . . .

Now in Paperback Empires of God: Religious Encounters in the Early Modern Atlantic Edited by Linda Gregerson and Susan Juster 344 pages | 6 x 9 | 6 illus. Cloth 2010 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4289-8 | $59.95 | £39.00 Paper 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-2260-9 | $27.50 | £18.00 Focusing on the formative period of European exploration, settlement, and conquest in the Americas, from roughly 1500 to 1760, Empires of God brings together literary scholars and historians of the English, French, and Spanish Americas to demonstrate the power of religious ideas and narratives to create kingdoms both imagined and real. Read more . . .

Now in Paperback Along an African Border: Angolan Refugees and Their Divination Baskets Sónia Silva 188 pages | 6 x 9 | 37 illus. Cloth 2011 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4293-5 | $39.95 | £26.00 Paper Apr 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-2268-5 | $24.95 | £16.50 A volume in the Contemporary Ethnography series Anthropologist Sónia Silva examines how a community of Luvale people, Angolan refugees living in Zambia, use lipele divination baskets to cope with daily life in a new land and maintain connections to their past. Read more . . .

Book reviewers: to request a press copy, contact Saunders Robinson. Educators: to request an exam copy for course use consideration, click here.

Penn Press Authors on Chechen History and Politics

As the Boston Marathon bombing investigation continues, journalists and a concerned public are turning to historians, political scientists, security researchers, and other scholars for a deeper understanding of the suspects' possible motives. It's no surprise that Penn Press authors like Philip Mudd were among the experts interviewed, but one connection was completely unexpected.

Three years ago Brian Glyn Williams, Professor of Islamic Studies at Univ of Massachusetts, Dartmouth and author of Afghanistan Declassified: A Guide to America's Longest War, received a letter from a high school student named Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. “He wanted to know more about his Chechen roots,” said Williams, as quoted in the New York Times. “He wanted to know more about Russia’s genocidal war on the Chechen people.”

In the wake of the Boston Marathon bombings, Williams provides historic background in a Huffington Post commentary, "The Missing Chechen Context on the Boston Tragedy". Williams writes:

Most Americans know very little about this small Muslim ethnic group. While nothing can legitimize the despicable act of terrorism perpetrated by Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, I believe ethnic and historical background might provide some much needed context.

First of all, the Chechens I have met, including the members of the small tight knit community here in Boston, tend to be a rather Sovietized, secularized, moderate Muslims. The ones I know tend to emulate George Washington for freeing the 13 colonies from British oppression. The Chechens dream of the same thing for themselves from their historic nemesis, imperial Russia/Soviet Union/the post-Soviet Russian Federation.

Chechnya: From Nationalism to Jihad, by James Hughes at the London School of Economics and Political Science, was cited in "Boston Marathon Bombing: What Do Chechens Have Against the U.S.?," a recent post on the Foreign Policy in Focus blog. The post argues that Hughes' work "sheds some light on possible reasons that Chechen separatists might attack the United States."

After an April 19 interview with KCBS radio in San Francisco, Lincoln Mitchell , an Associate Research Scholar at Columbia University's Harriman Institute tweeted "Wrong to assume these were radical Chechnyan terrorists, but also wrong to oppose the notion their background might be relevant." Mitchell is the author of Uncertain Democracy: U.S. Foreign Policy and Georgia's Rose Revolution and The Color Revolutions.

This Week's New Books: Citizenship and the Origins of Women's History in the United States and More

Citizenship and the Origins of Women's History in the United States Teresa Anne Murphy 240 pages | 6 x 9 Cloth 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4489-2 | $42.50 | £28.00 A volume in the Democracy, Citizenship, and Constitutionalism series Citizenship and the Origins of Women's History in the United States challenges twenty-first-century assumptions of nineteenth-century women's history by tracing the ways women's history was politicized, particularly in light of the growing activism of women and the first woman's rights movement. Read more . . .

Internationalism in the Age of Nationalism Glenda Sluga 224 pages | 6 x 9 Cloth 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4484-7 | $69.95 | £45.50 A volume in the Pennsylvania Studies in Human Rights series Glenda Sluga traces internationalism through its rise before World War I, its mid-century apogee, and its decline after 9/11. Drawing on archival material and contemporary accounts, this innovative history restores internationalism as essential to understanding nationalism in the twentieth century. Read more . . .

Everyday Occupations: Experiencing Militarism in South Asia and the Middle East Edited by Kamala Visweswaran 320 pages | 6 x 9 | 8 illus. Cloth 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4487-8 | $75.00 | £49.00 A volume in the Pennsylvania Studies in Human Rights series Everyday Occupations engages visual culture and the ethnography of space, satire and parody, poetry and political critique to examine militarization as it is wielded as a cultural and political tool, and as it is experienced as a material form of violence and symbolic domination. Read more . . .

Now in Paperback Human Rights in Our Own Backyard: Injustice and Resistance in the United States Edited by William T. Armaline, Davita Silfen Glasberg, and Bandana Purkayastha 344 pages | 6 x 9 Paper 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-2257-9 | $27.50 | £18.00 A volume in the Pennsylvania Studies in Human Rights series Human Rights in Our Own Backyard focuses on the state of human rights and responses to human rights issues in the United States, drawing on sociological literature and perspectives to interrogate assumptions of American exceptionalism. Read more . . .

Now in Paperback Morality's Muddy Waters: Ethical Quandaries in Modern America George Cotkin 272 pages | 6 x 9 Cloth 2010 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4227-0 | $29.95 | £19.50 Paper 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-2249-4 | $24.95 | £16.50 George Cotkin looks at diverse yet central issues such as the problem of evil, moral responsibility, racial identity, and capital punishment, juxtaposed against events such as the bombing of civilians during World War II, the My Lai Massacre, and the invasion of Iraq to demonstrate that moral complexity and confusion can be productive. Read more . .

Now in Paperback The New Frontiers of Jihad: Radical Islam in Europe Alison Pargeter 256 pages | 6 1/8 x 9 1/4 Paper 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-2273-9 | $29.95 | £19.50 Not for sale outside North America and the Philippines Alison Pargeter delves into the causes, motivations, and diverse forms of Islamic extremism in Europe. Drawing on original research and interviews conducted with moderates and radicals from across the continent, she shows how the lexicon of the war on terror has succeeded in distorting the complexities and peculiarities of the movement. Read more . . .

Book reviewers: to request a press copy, contact Saunders Robinson. Educators: to request an exam copy for course use consideration, click here.

This Week's New Books: Takedown and Looting and Rape in Wartime, Plus Paperbacks in Human Rights, Early American Studies, Urban Studies, and Religious Studies

Takedown: Inside the Hunt for Al Qaeda Philip Mudd 224 pages | 6 x 9 Cloth Apr 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4496-0 | $28.95 | £19.00 Former CIA Deputy Director of Counterterrorism and FBI Senior Intelligence Adviser Philip Mudd recounts his involvement in the fight against Al Qaeda, revealing how intelligence analysts understand and evaluate potential terror threats and communicate with political leaders. Read more . . .

Looting and Rape in Wartime: Law and Change in International Relations Tuba Inal 296 pages | 6 x 9 Cloth 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4476-2 | $75.00 | £49.00 A volume in the Pennsylvania Studies in Human Rights series Looting and Rape in Wartime examines the causes of the hundred-year gap between the prohibition against wartime looting and that against rape, theorizing the conditions necessary for the emergence of a global prohibition regime in which a particular practice is not tolerated. Read more . . .

Now in Paperback Forgotten Genocides: Oblivion, Denial, and Memory Edited by René Lemarchand 200 pages | 6 x 9 | 4 illus. Cloth 2011 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4335-2 | $49.95 | £32.50 Paper 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-2263-0 | $24.95 | £16.50 A volume in the Pennsylvania Studies in Human Rights series In eight case studies written by recognized experts this book offers a major contribution to the comparative analysis of genocidal phenomena. Besides tapping a rich vein of empirical data, this collective effort breaks new ground in analyzing how denial, oblivion, or manipulated memory tends to mask the hideous realities of mass killing. Read more . . .

Now in Paperback The Shame and the Sorrow: Dutch-Amerindian Encounters in New Netherland Donna Merwick 344 pages | 6 1/8 x 9 1/4 | 20 illus. Paper 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-2272-2 | $26.50 | £17.50 A volume in the Early American Studies series During the forty years of the Dutch presence in colonial America, their intrusion led to the betrayal of their own values and the betrayal of the indigenous peoples. They reaped the shame of reproaching themselves for unjust wars and faced a native insurgency that they could neither negotiate nor satisfactorily quell. Read more . . .

Now in Paperback Witchcraft and Magic in the Nordic Middle Ages Stephen A. Mitchell 384 pages | 6 x 9 | 12 illus Cloth 2010 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4290-4 | $49.95 | £32.50 Paper 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-2255-5 | $24.95 | £16.50 A volume in the Middle Ages Series Stephen A. Mitchell offers the fullest examination available of witchcraft in late medieval Scandinavia, drawing on extensive sources ranging from the Icelandic sagas to those much less familiar to the nonspecialist: legal cases, church frescoes, law codes, ecclesiastical records, and surviving runic spells. Read more . . .

Now in Paperback Neighborhood and Life Chances: How Place Matters in Modern America Edited by Harriet B. Newburger, Eugenie L. Birch, and Susan M. Wachter 392 pages | 6 x 9 | 34 illus. Cloth 2011 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4258-4 | $59.95 | £39.00 Paper 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-2265-4 | $28.95 | £19.00 A volume in the City in the Twenty-First Century series Neighborhood and Life Chances brings together researchers from a range of disciplines to demonstrate that place matters in education, physical health, crime, violence, housing, family income, mental health, and discrimination—issues that determine the quality of life among low-income residents of urban areas. Read more . . .

Book reviewers: to request a press copy, contact Saunders Robinson. Educators: to request an exam copy for course use consideration, click here.

Medieval Monday: Pope Gregory VIII, the Audita tremendi, and the Third Crusade

This excerpt from Crusade and Christendom: Annotated Documents in Translation from Innocent III to the Fall of Acre, 1187-1291, edited by Jessalynn Bird, Edward Peters, and James M. Powell, features a translation of the Audita tremendi. This letter, written by Pope Gregory VIII in 1187, was in the words of  Bird, Peters, and Powell "not only the most impassioned plea for a crusade ever issued by a pope until then, but the fullest detailed account of crusaders’ spiritual and temporal rewards and privileges to date."

    The letter circulated widely throughout Europe, inspiring the group of military expeditions that came to be known as the Third Crusade. But the impact of Audita tremendi long outlasted the Third Crusade itself. It inspired a new generation of moral theologians to consider the needs of the Holy Land and to link these to the moral regeneration of Christian Europe, one of the great themes of twelfth and thirteenth-century history. Gregory’s emphasis on the bloody circumstances of the defeat at Hattin, the loss of the True Cross, and the first cities taken by Saladin (the surrender of Jerusalem on October 2, 1187, was not yet known in the West when Audita tremendi was issued) frame his insistence that God’s anger is the result of human sin, that penance is mandatory, not optional, and that a new expedition would be an opportunity for the salvation of Christian warriors. . . .

GREGORY, bishop, servant of the servants of God, to all Christ’s faithful who receive this letter, greeting and apostolic benediction.

    When we heard of the severity of the awesome judgment that the hand of God visited on the land of Jerusalem, we and our brothers were disturbed by such a great horror, afflicted by such sorrows, that we scarcely knew what to do or what we should do, save that the psalmist laments and says, ‘‘O God, the gentiles have invaded your inheritance, they have sullied your holy temple, they have laid waste Jerusalem; they have left the dead bodies of your saints as meat for the beasts of the earth and food the birds of the air . . .’’ [Ps 78:1–2]. In fact, because of the conflict which the malice of [Christian] men has recently brought on the land by the inspiration of the devil, Saladin approached those parts with a host of armed troops. They were confronted by the king and the bishops, the Templars and the Hospitallers, the barons and the knights, with the people of the land, and with the Lord’s cross (through which from memory and faith of the suffering of Christ, who hung there and redeemed the human race, was believed to be a sure safeguard and a desired defense against the attacks of the pagans), and after the battle was joined, our side was defeated and the Lord’s cross was captured. The bishops were slaughtered, the king captured, and almost all our men were either put to the sword or taken prisoner. Very few are believed to have escaped. Also, the Templars and Hospitallers were beheaded in his [Saladin’s] presence. With the army defeated, we do not think our letter can explain how they next invaded and seized every place so that only a few remained outside their power. Still, though we use the words of the prophet: ‘‘Who will give me water for my head and a font of tears for my eyes, and I will weep night and day for the death of my people’’ [Jer 9:1], we ought not despair now and decide to mistrust and believe that God is so angry with his people that in his anger with their commission of a multitude of sins he will not quickly pardon when he is pleased by their penance and, after tears and groans, will lead them to exaltation.

Get Hep Tonight at the Free Library with Zoot Suit Author Kathy Peiss

Kathy Peiss, Zoot Suit: The Enigmatic Career of an Extreme Style
The University of Pennsylvania History Department presents The Zoot Suit in American Culture
Wednesday, March 20, 7:00 p.m.
The Free Library of Philadelphia
Parkway Central, 1901 Vine Street
Philadelphia, PA 19103
For more information, please contact Nari Baughman at nlinette@sas.upenn.edu.
Register at eventbrite.com

This Week's New Book: Lost Letters of Medieval Life English Society, 1200-1250

Lost Letters of Medieval Life English Society, 1200-1250 Edited by Martha Carlin and David Crouch 432 pages | 6 1/8 x 9 1/4 | 19 illus. Cloth Mar 2013 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4459-5 | $79.95 | £52.00 A volume in the Middle Ages Series Drawn from two medieval collections of form letters for all manner of business and personal affairs, Lost Letters of Medieval Life depicts early thirteenth-century England through the everyday correspondence of people of all classes, from peasants and shopkeepers to bishops and earls. Read more . . .

Book reviewers: to request a press copy, contact Saunders Robinson. Educators: to request an exam copy for course use consideration, click here.