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Books > Humanities > History > Asian / Middle Eastern history > General
'Beautifully written and deeply researched' The Observer Upon
victory in 1945, Britain still dominated the Middle East. But her
motives for wanting to dominate this crossroads between Europe,
Asia and Africa were changing. Where 'imperial security' - control
of the route to India - had once been paramount, now oil was an
increasingly important factor. So, too, was prestige. Ironically,
the very end of empire made control of the Middle East precious in
itself: on it hung Britain's claim to be a great power. Unable to
withstand Arab and Jewish nationalism, within a generation the
British were gone. But that is not the full story. What ultimately
sped Britain on her way was the uncompromising attitude of the
United States, which was determined to displace the British in the
Middle East. Using newly declassified records and long-forgotten
memoirs, including the diaries of a key British spy, James Barr
tears up the conventional interpretation of this era in the Middle
East, vividly portraying the tensions between London and
Washington, and shedding an uncompromising light on the murkier
activities of a generation of American and British diehards in the
region, from the battle of El Alamein in 1942 to Britain's
abandonment of Aden in 1967. Reminding us that the Middle East has
always served as the arena for great power conflict, this is the
tale of an internecine struggle in which Britain would discover
that her most formidable rival was the ally she had assumed would
be her closest friend. 'Bustles impressively with detail and
anecdote' Sunday Times 'Consistently fascinating' The Spectator
'Barr draws on a rich and varied trove of sources to knit a
sequence of dramatic episodes into an elegant whole. Great events
march through these pages' Wall Street Journal
This insightful book provides a comprehensive survey of urban
development in Hong Kong since 1841. Pui-yin Ho explores the ways
in which the social, economic and political environments of
different eras have influenced the city's development. From
colonial governance, wartime experiences, high density development
and adjustments before and after 1997 through contemporary
challenges, this book explores forward-looking ideas that urban
planning can offer to lead the city in the future. Evaluating the
relationship between town planning and social change, this book
looks at how a local Hong Kong identity emerged in the face of
conflict and compromise between Chinese and European cultures. In
doing so, it brings a fresh perspective to urban research,
providing historical context and direction for the future
development of the city. Hong Kong's urban development experience
offers not only a model for other Chinese cities but also a better
understanding of Asian cities more broadly. Urban studies scholars
will find this an exemplary case study of a developing urban
landscape. Town planners and architects will also benefit from
reading this comprehensive book as it shows how Hong Kong can be
taken to the next stage of urban development and modernisation.
What is the origin of the many Black populations in Asia. What are
their links to Africa in prehistoric times and in recent times? Has
history been distorted by other dominant populations? This is an
immense subject which Runoko Rashidi investigates diligently.
Rashidi's reputation was initially based on his earlier work on the
African presence in Asia. This book incorporates his earlier work
as well as more recent researches and insights. It refers to the
research of earlier scholars and explores the Black presence in
Iraq, Arabia, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Japan, China, Cambodia,
Vietnam and the Philippines. It also covers the 'age of
enslavement'. The second part of the book is a more personal record
of Rashidi's travels and encounters with black people in many Asian
and Middle Eastern countries. It also includes articles on the same
subject by other Black scholars and is backed up by copious
references and a thorough bibliography. The book has 95 colour and
black and white photographs which support the author's arguments.
Market: General, Undergraduate and Postgraduate, Student Reading
List, Library, Black Interest, Asia Interest. Keywords: Black
History, World History, Race, Asia, Middle East, Africa. Europe
'A narrative of startling originality ... As discussions of
Britain's colonial legacy become increasingly polarised, we are in
ever more need of nuanced books like this one' SAM DALRYMPLE,
SPECTATOR 'Fascinating and provocative' LITERARY REVIEW Rebels
Against the Raj tells the little-known story of seven people who
chose to struggle for a country other than their own: foreigners to
India who across the late 19th to late 20th century arrived to join
the freedom movement fighting for independence. Of the seven, four
were British, two American, and one Irish. Four men, three women.
Before and after being jailed or deported they did remarkable and
pioneering work in a variety of fields: journalism, social reform,
education, organic agriculture, environmentalism. This book tells
their stories, each renegade motivated by idealism and genuine
sacrifice; each connected to Gandhi, though some as acolytes where
others found endless infuriation in his views; each understanding
they would likely face prison sentences for their resistance, and
likely live and die in India; each one leaving a profound impact on
the region in which they worked, their legacies continuing through
the institutions they founded and the generations and individuals
they inspired. Through the entwined lives, wonderfully told by one
of the world's finest historians, we reach deep insights into
relations between India and the West, and India's story as a
country searching for its identity and liberty beyond British
colonial rule.
Written by the refugees themselves, this highly original anthology
of Palestinians forced to live outside their homeland brings
together stories of what it means to be exiled, reflections on the
events that led to being displaced, and the raw experience of daily
life in a camp. The 11 lives given voice here are unique, each an
expression of the myriad displacements that war and occupation have
forced upon Palestinians since the Nakba of 1948. At the same time,
they form a collective testament of a people driven from their
homes and land by colonial occupation. Each story is singular; and
each tells the story of all Palestinians. As Edward Said argued in
1984, the object of Israel's colonial warfare is not only
material-seeking to minimise Palestinian existence as such-but is
also a narrative project that aims to obliterate Palestinian
history "as possessed of a coherent narrative direction pointed
towards self-determination." In these pages, Palestinian refugees
narrate their own histories. The product of a creative-writing
workshop organized by the Institute for Palestine Studies in
Lebanon, 11 Lives tells of children's adventures in the alleyways
of refugee camps, of teenage martyrs and ghosts next-door, of an
UNRWA teacher's dismay at the shallowness of her colleagues, and of
the love, labour, and land that form the threads of a red keffiyeh.
What unites these 11 stories is "the inadmissible existence of the
Palestinian people" highlighted by Said. Their words persist, as
one contributor writes, "between the Nakba and the Naksa,
throughout defeats and massacres, love affairs and revolutions."
The stories of Palestinians in exile are also open-ended, and will
continue to reverberate across borders until Palestine is free.
With contributions by: Nadia Fahed, Intisar Hajaj, Yafa Talal
El-Masri, Youssef Naanaa, Ruba Rahme, Hanin Mohammad Rashid, Mira
Sidawi, Wedad Taha, Salem Yassin, Taha Younis, Mahmoud Mohammad
Zeidan Co-published with the Institute of Palestine Studies.
Henrietta is a true original. Clever, vivacious and interested in
everything, she managed to balance the demands of high profile
public life with that of a caring mother. She was the home-schooled
daughter of a bankrupt Earl and more than just a little bit in love
with her handsome wayward brother, but had been married off to a
plump pudding of a man, the nabob Edward Clive, governor of Madras.
And her partial escape was to ride across southern India (in a vast
tented caravan propelled by dozens of elephants, camels and a
hundred bullock carts) and write home. For centuries this account,
the first joyful description of India by a British woman, remained
unread in a Welsh castle. Fortunately it was transcribed by a Texan
traveller, who went on to splice this already evocative memoir with
complementary sections from the diary of Henrietta's precocious
daughter, the 12-year old Charly and images of their artist
companion, Anna Tonelli. The resulting labour of love and
scholarship is Birds of Passage, a unique trifocular account of
three very different women travelling across southern India in the
late 18th century, in the immediate aftermath of the last of the
Mysore Wars between Tipoo Sahib and the Raj. Half a generation
later, the well travelled Charly would be chosen as tutor for the
young princess Victoria, the First Empress of India.
A fascinating insight into the complexity, history and
unpredictability of Iraq. By September 2003, six months after the
US-led invasion of Iraq, the anarchy had begun. Rory Stewart, a
young Biritish diplomat, was appointed as the Coalition Provisional
Authority's deputy governor of a province of 850,000 people in the
southern marshland region. There, he and his colleagues confronted
gangsters, Iranian-linked politicians, tribal vendettas and a full
Islamist insurgency. Occupational Hazards is Rory Stewart's inside
account of the attempt to rebuild a nation, the errors made, the
misunderstandings and insurmountable difficulties encountered. It
reveals an Iraq hidden from most foreign journalists and soldiers.
Stewart is an award-winning writer, gifted with extraordinary
insight into the comedy, occasional heroism and moral risks of
foreign occupation. 'Beautifully written, highly evocative . . . a
joy to read' - John Simpson 'A marvellous book . . . a devastating
narrative' - Simon Jenkins 'Absolutely absorbing' - Ken Loach
'Strikes gut and brain at once' - James Meek 'Wonderfully observed,
wise, evocative' - Observer
In late-eighteenth-century India, the glory of the Mughal emperors
was fading, and ambitious newcomers seized power, changing the
political map forever. Enter the legendary Maharajah Ranjit Singh,
whose Sikh Empire stretched throughout northwestern India into
Afghanistan and Tibet. Priya Atwal shines fresh light on this
long-lost kingdom, looking beyond its founding father to restore
the queens and princes to the story of this empire's spectacular
rise and fall. She brings to life a self-made ruling family,
inventively fusing Sikh, Mughal and European ideas of power, but
eventually succumbing to gendered family politics, as the Sikh
Empire fell to its great rival in the new India: the British.
Royals and Rebels is a fascinating tale of family, royalty and the
fluidity of power, set in a dramatic global era when new stars rose
and upstart empires clashed.
Ancient Alexandria was built by the Greek Macedonians. Ptolemy
started the dynasty and in thirty years completed the first
lighthouse, and the grand library and museum, which functioned as a
university with an emphasis on science, known as "The Alexandrian
School". Scholars attended as "the birthplace of science" from all
over the ancient world. Two of the most eminent were Euclid, the
father of geometry, and Claudios Ptolemy, writer of The Almagest, a
book on astronomy. These are the oldest surviving science
textbooks. Herein there are stories about scientists, poets and
religious philosophers, responsible for influencing the western
mind with their writings.Modern Alexandria was rebuilt in 1805 by
multi-ethnic communities who created a successful commercial city
and port with an enviable life-style for its inhabitants for 150
years. In 1952 the Free Officers of the Egyptian Army masterminded
a coup to free the country from the monarchy and British
domination. In 1956 the socialist regime under Colonel Gamal Abdel
Nasser closed the Suez Canal, resulting in the Anglo-French-Israeli
invasion. This outburst of Egyptian nationalism and military
revolution by this understandably anti-Western regime included the
confiscation of property belonging to foreigners and the subsequent
mass exodus of business and artisan classes that hitherto had made
the city so successful. The author was an eye-witness to these
events and he sets out the political errors and failures of both
Egyptian and Western leaders. The legacy of the resulting political
and social confusions is deeply apparent in the continuing unrest
in the Middle East, and in particular in Egypt.
'Another India' tells the story of the world's biggest religious
minority. Weaving together vivid biographical portraits of a wide
range of Indian Muslims--elite and subaltern, secular and clerical,
activist and apolitical--it brings the experience of the country's
Muslims under a single focus; and, by throwing light on the Indian
Muslim condition during the first thirty years of independence,
reflects on the true character of democratic India. What we have
here is a rather different picture from received accounts of the
'world's largest democracy'. Challenging traditional histories of
Nehru's India, Pratinav Anil shows that minority rights were
neglected right from independence. Despite its best intentions, the
Congress regime that ruled for three decades was often illiberal,
intolerant and undemocratic. Muslims had to contend with
discrimination, disadvantage, deindustrialisation, dispossession
and disenfranchisement, as well as an unresponsive leadership. Anil
demonstrates how the Muslim elite encouraged depoliticisation,
taking up seemingly noble but largely inconsequential causes with
little bearing on the lives of ordinary members of the community.
There was no room for mass protests or collective solidarity in
this version of Muslim politics. Another India explores this elite
betrayal, whose consequences are still felt by India's 200 million
Muslims today.
Kate Webb, an Australian iconoclast, Catherine Leroy, a French dare
devil photographer, and Frances FitzGerald, a blue-blood American
intellectual, arrived in Vietnam with starkly different life
experiences but one shared purpose: to report on the most
consequential story of the decade. At a time when women were
considered unfit to be foreign reporters, Frankie, Catherine and
Kate paid their own way to war, arrived without jobs, challenged
the rules imposed on them by the military, ignored the belittlement
and resentment of their male peers and found new ways to explain
the war through the people who lived through it. In You Don't
Belong Here, Elizabeth Becker uses these women's work and lives to
illuminate the Vietnam War from the 1965 American buildup, through
the Tet Offensive, the expansion into Cambodia, the American defeat
and its aftermath. Arriving herself in the last years of the war,
Elizabeth writes as an historian and a witness to what these women
accomplished. What emerges is an unforgettable story of three
journalists forging their place in a land of men, often at great
personal sacrifice, and forever altering the craft of war reportage
for generations. Deeply reported and filled with personal letters,
interviews, and profound insight, You Don't Belong Here fills a
void in the history of women and of war.
Palestine in Black and White is an intimate and powerful portrayal
of life under occupation from one of the most talented cartoonists
working today. Mohammad Sabaaneh has gained worldwide renown for
his black and white sketches. His stark geometric figures and
landscapes are rich with Palestinian visual traditions and symbols,
while his haunting figures depict a vivid perspective of the
occupation. This first collection brings together one hundred of
Sabaaneh's most striking works, including cartoons that portray the
experience of Palestinian prisoners, drawn while Sabaaneh himself
was detained in an Israeli prison. The drawings do not flinch from
revealing the reality that confronts Palestinians, from Israel's
injustices in the West Bank to their military operations on Gaza.
Addressing major political developments in Iraq over the past
century, this book provides an up-to-date and accessible study of
the country, advancing a sympathetic yet balanced understanding of
its critical role in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region
and in global affairs. The Author introduces three concepts to
understand Iraq's historical trajectory: the pursuit of power, the
impact of state institutions, and the transformation of social
identities. Using this analytical paradigm, the book illuminates
the unique political, economic, and social dimensions of Iraqi
national life. As well as providing comparison points with MENA
countries, the book evaluates Iraqi relations with external actors,
including the Arab states, Iran and Israel, Europe, and the United
States. Though conscious of Iraq's long and complex history,
special attention is paid to contemporary events, ranging from
Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait in 1990 to the American-led
invasion in 2003, and more recent struggles with elections, the
Islamic State, and democracy. It is nevertheless argued that,
despite its challenges, Iraq's story remains hopeful moving forward
in time. Both wide-ranging and closely focused, the book is vital
reading for students, scholars and general audiences interested in
political economy, international relations, and the history of
Iraq.
Answers the questions: what is the background to issues in external
and internal politics? What is the Turks' opinion on European and
Turkish identity? On Cyprus? On the role of the generals? Why do
human rights problems linger on? What is behind the Kurdish
question? Is Turkey religiously split? What are the pros and cons
of Turkish association with the EU?
This book deals with the representation of the Partition of India -
the experience of trauma and violence - through fiction, literary
motifs and narratives, and shows that in examining the nature of
such testimony through history, cultural memory has a significant
role to play.
First published in 1989. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor &
Francis, an informa company.
This book uses gender as a framework to offer unique insights into
the socio-cultural foundations of Buddhism. Moving away from
dominant discourses that discuss women as a single monolithic,
homogenous category-thus rendering them invisible within the
broader religious discourse-this monograph examines their sustained
role in the larger context of South Asian Buddhism and reaffirms
their agency. It highlights the multiple roles played by women as
patrons, practitioners, lay and monastic members, etc. within
Buddhism. The volume also investigates the individual experiences
of the members, and their equations and relationships at different
levels-with the Samgha at large, with their own respective Bhiksu
or Bhiksuni Sangha, with the laity, and with members of the same
gender (both lay and monastic). It rereads, reconfigures and
reassesses historical data in order to arrive at a new
understanding of Buddhism and the social matrix within which it
developed and flourished. Bringing together archaeological,
epigraphic, art historical, literary as well as ethnographic data,
this volume will be of interest to researchers and scholars of
Buddhism, gender studies, ancient Indian history, religion, and
South Asian studies.
Exhaustively researched and updated, South Asia 2022 is an in-depth
library of information on the countries and territories of this
vast world region. General Survey Essays by specialists examine
issues of regional importance. Country Surveys Individual chapters
on each country, containing: - essays on the geography, recent
history and economy of each nation - up-to-date statistical surveys
of economic and social indicators - a comprehensive directory
providing contact details and other useful information for the most
significant political and commercial institutions. In addition,
there are separate sections covering each of the states and
territories of India. Regional Information - detailed coverage of
international organizations and their recent activities in South
Asia - information on research institutes engaged in the study of
the region - a survey of the major commodities of South Asia -
bibliographies of relevant books and periodicals. Additional
features - biographical profiles of almost 300 prominent
individuals in the region.
First Published in 2001. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor &
Francis, an informa company.
"In vivid detail... examines the little-known history of two
extraordinary dynasties."--The Boston Globe "Not just a brilliant,
well-researched, and highly readable book about China's past, it
also reveals the contingencies and ironic twists of fate in China's
modern history."--LA Review of Books An epic, multigenerational
story of two rival dynasties who flourished in Shanghai and Hong
Kong as twentieth-century China surged into the modern era, from
the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist The Sassoons and the
Kadoories stood astride Chinese business and politics for more than
one hundred seventy-five years, profiting from the Opium Wars;
surviving Japanese occupation; courting Chiang Kai-shek; and nearly
losing everything as the Communists swept into power. Jonathan
Kaufman tells the remarkable history of how these families ignited
an economic boom and opened China to the world, but remained blind
to the country's deep inequality and to the political turmoil on
their doorsteps. In a story stretching from Baghdad to Hong Kong to
Shanghai to London, Kaufman enters the lives and minds of these
ambitious men and women to forge a tale of opium smuggling, family
rivalry, political intrigue, and survival.
In the past decade, Sri Lanka has been engulfed by political
tragedy as successive governments have failed to settle the
grievances of the Tamil minority in a way acceptable to the
majority Sinhala population. The new Premadasa presidency faces
huge economic and political problems with large sections of the
island under the control of the Indian Peace-Keeping Force (IPKF)
and militant separatist Tamil groups operating in the north and
south. This book is not a conventional political history of Sri
Lanka. Instead, it attempts to shed fresh light on the historical
roots of the ethnic crisis and uses a combination of historical and
anthropologial evidence to challenge the widely-held belief that
the conflict in Sri Lanka is simply the continuation of centuries
of animosity between the Sinhalese and the Tamils. The authors show
how modern ethnic identities have been made and re-made since the
colonial period with the war between Tamils and the
Sinhala-dominant government accompanied by rhetorical wars over
archeological sites and place-name etymologies, and the political
use of the national past. The book is also one of the first
attempts to focus on local perceptions of the crisis and draws on a
broad range of sources, from village fieldwork to newspaper
controversies. Its interest extends beyond contemporary politics to
history, anthropology and development studies.
In this seminal study, Jane Hathaway presents a wide-ranging
reassessment of the effects of Ottoman rule on the Arab Lands of
Egypt, Greater Syria, Iraq and Yemen - the first of its kind in
over forty years. Challenging outmoded perceptions of this period
as a demoralizing prelude to the rise of Arab nationalism and Arab
nation-states in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, Hathaway
depicts an era of immense social, cultural, economic and political
change which helped to shape the foundations of today's modern
Middle and Near East. Taking full advantage of a wide range of
Arabic and Ottoman primary sources, she examines the changing
fortunes of not only the political elite but also the broader
population of merchants, shopkeepers, peasants, tribal populations,
religious scholars, women, and ethnic and religious minorities who
inhabited this diverse and volatile region. With masterly concision
and clarity, Hathaway guides the reader through all the key current
approaches to and debates surrounding Arab society during this
period. This is far more than just another political history; it is
a global study which offers an entirely new perspective on the era
and region as a whole.
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