In The Price and Promise of Specialness, Jin Li Lim revises narratives on the overseas Chinese and the People's Republic of China by analysing the Communist approach to 'overseas Chinese affairs' in New China's first decade as a function of a larger political economy. Jin Li Lim shows how the party-state centred its approach towards the overseas Chinese on a perception of their financial utility and thus sought to offer them a special identity and place in New China, so as to unlock their riches. Yet, this contradicted the quest for socialist transformation, and as its early pragmatism fell away, the radicalising party-state abandoned its promises to the overseas Chinese, who were left to pay the price for their difference.

Thoroughly updated and revised for 2024, JERUSALEM: THE BIOGRAPHY is the history of the Middle East through the lens of the Holy City and the Holy Land, from King David to the wars and chaos of today.

The history of Jerusalem is the story of the world: Jerusalem is the universal city, the capital of two peoples, the shrine of three faiths. The Holy City and Holy Land are the battlefields for today's multifaceted conflicts and, for believers, the setting for Judgement Day and the Apocalypse.

How did this small, remote town become the Holy City, the 'centre of the world' and now the key to peace in the Middle East? Why is the Holy Land so important not just to the region and its many new players, but to the wider world too? Drawing on new archives and a lifetime's study, Montefiore reveals this ever-changing city and turbulent region through the wars, love affairs and revelations of the kings, empresses, amirs, sultans, caliphs, presidents, autocrats, imperialists and warlords, poets, prophets, saints and rabbis, conquerors and whores who created, destroyed, chronicled, and believed in Jerusalem and the Holy Land.

A classic of modern literature, this is not only the epic story of 3,000 years of faith, slaughter, fanaticism, co-existence, power and myth, but also a freshly updated, carefully balanced history of the Middle East, from King David to the new players and powers of the twenty-first century, from the birth of Judaism, Christianity and Islam to the Israel-Palestine conflict and the mayhem of today.

This is how today's Middle East was forged, how the Holy Land became sacred and how Jerusalem became Jerusalem - the only city that exists twice - in heaven and on earth.

During the early medieval Islamicate period (800-1400 CE), discourses concerned with music and musicians were wide-ranging and contentious, and expressed in works on music theory and philosophy as well as literature and poetry. But in spite of attempts by influential scholars and political leaders to limit or control musical expression, music and sound permeated all layers of the social structure. Lisa Nielson here presents a rich social history of music, musicianship and the role of musicians in the early Islamicate era. Focusing primarily on Damascus, Baghdad and Jerusalem, Lisa Nielson draws on a wide variety of textual sources written for and about musicians and their professional/private environments - including chronicles, literary sources, memoirs and musical treatises - as well as the disciplinary approaches of musicology to offer insights into musical performances and the lives of musicians. In the process, the book sheds light onto the dynamics of medieval Islamicate courts, as well as how slavery, gender, status and religion intersected with music in courtly life. It will appeal to scholars of the Islamicate world and historical musicologists.

The fifth in the CAIW series, this title reflects 50 years of experience of Cambridge (UK)-based World of Information, which since 1975 has followed the region's politics and economics. In the period following the Second World War, Saudi Arabia - a curious fusion of medieval theocracy, unruly dictatorship and extrovert wealth - has been called a country of 'superlatives.' The modernisation of the Kingdom's oil industry has been a smooth process: its oilfields are highly sophisticated. However, social modernisation has not kept pace. 'Reform', long a preoccupation among the Peninsula's leaders does not necessarily go hand in hand with religion.

In Arthur Upham Pope and A New Survey of Persian Art, fourteen scholars explore the legacy of Arthur Upham Pope (1881-1969) by tracing the formation of Persian art scholarship and connoisseurship during the twentieth century. Widely considered as a self-made scholar, curator, and entrepreneur, Pope was credited for establishing the basis of what we now categorize broadly as Persian art. His unrivalled professional achievement, together with his personal charisma, influenced the way in which many scholars and collectors worldwide came to understand the art, architecture and material culture of the Persian world. This ultimately resulted in the establishment of the aesthetic criteria for assessing the importance of cultural remains from modern-day Iran. With contributions by Lindsay Allen, Sheila S. Blair, Jonathan M. Bloom, Talinn Grigor, Robert Hillenbrand, Yuka Kadoi, Sumru Belger Krody, Judith A. Lerner, Kimberly Masteller, Cornelia Montgomery, Bernard O'Kane, Keelan Overton, Laura Weinstein, and Donald Whitcomb.

The studies in this volume explore central topics characterizing the political, social and economic systems of Egypt and Syria under Mamluk rule (1250-1517). Drawing on Arabic sources including archival material, poetry and chronicles as well as modern research literature, twelve leading scholars in the field analyze a vast range of issues in Mamluk history and provide new perspectives on pivotal features such as European-Mamluk diplomacy, social relationships and identity in Mamluk society, rural and urban economy and water management in late medieval Egypt and Syria, reflecting major research trends in Mamluk history over the last four decades. With contributions by Frederic Bauden, Stuart J. Borsch, Joseph Drory, Kurt Franz, Yehosua Frenkel, Daisuke Igarashi, Yaacov Lev, Amalia Levanoni, Li Guo, Carl F. Petry, Jo Van Steenbergen, Koby Yosef.

Michael Loewe calls on literary and material evidence to examine three problems that arose in administering China's early empires. Religious rites due to an emperor's predecessors must both pay the correct services to his ancestors and demonstrate his right to succeed to the throne. In practical terms, tax collectors, merchants, farmers and townsmen required the establishment of a standard set of weights and measures that was universally operative and which they could trust. Those who saw reason to criticise the decisions taken by the emperor and his immediate advisors, whether on grounds of moral principles or political expediency, needed opportunities and the means of expressing their views, whether as remonstrants to the throne, by withdrawal from public life or as authors of private writings.

This book comprehensively investigates the position of China's working class between the 1980s and 2010s and considers the consequences of economic reforms in historical perspective. It argues the case that, far from the illusion during the Maoist period that a new society had been established where the working classes held greater political and economic autonomy, economic reforms in the post-Mao era have led to the return of traditional Marxist proletariats in China. The book demonstrates how the reforms of Deng Xiaoping have led to increased economic efficiency at the expense of economic equality through an extensive case study of an SOE (state-owned enterprise) in Sichuan Province as well as wider discussions of the emergence of state capitalism on both a micro and macroeconomic level. The book also discusses workers' protests during these periods of economic reform to reflect the reformation of class consciousness in post-Mao China, drawing on Marx's concept of a transition from a 'class-in-itself' to a 'class-for-itself'. It will be valuable reading for students and scholars of Chinese economic and social history, as well as political economy, sociology, and politics.

Developed as an exploratory study of artworks by artists of Singapore and Malaysia, Retrospective attempts to account for contemporary artworks that engage with history. These are artworks that reference past events or narratives, of the nation and its art. Through the examination of a selection of artworks produced between 1990 and 2012, Retrospective is both an attribution and an analysis of a historiographical aesthetic within contemporary art practice. It considers that, by their method and in their assembly, these artworks perform more than a representation of a historical past. Instead, they confront history and its production, laying bare the nature and designs of the historical project via their aesthetic project. Positing an interdisciplinary approach as necessary for understanding the historiographical as aesthetic, Retrospective considers not only historical and aesthetic perspectives, but also the philosophical, by way of ontology, in order to broaden its exposition beyond the convention of historical and contextual interpretation of art. Yet, in associating these artworks with a historiographical aesthetic, this exposition may be regarded as a historiographical exercise in itself, affirming the significance of these artworks for the history of Singapore and Malaysia. In short, which history rarely is, Retrospective is about the art of historicisation and the historicisation of art.

From a renowned historian who writes with "maximum vividness" ("The New Yorker") comes the most authoritative, readable single-volume history of the brutal struggle for the holy land

Nine hundred years ago, a vast Christian army, summoned to holy war by the Pope, rampaged through the Muslim world of the eastern Mediterranean, seizing possession of Jerusalem, a city revered by both faiths. Over the two hundred years that followed, Islam and Christianity fought for dominion of the Holy Land, clashing in a succession of chillingly brutal wars: the Crusades. Here for the first time is the story of that epic struggle told from the perspective of both Christians and Muslims. A vivid and fast-paced narrative history, it exposes the full horror, passion, and barbaric grandeur of the Crusading era, revealing how these holy wars reshaped the medieval world and why they continue to influence events today.

In The Making of Modern Japan, Myles Carroll offers a sweeping account of post-war Japanese political economy, exploring the transition from the post-war boom to the crisis of today and the connections between these seemingly discrete periods. Carroll explores the multifarious international and domestic political, economic, social and cultural conditions that fortified Japan's post-war hegemonic order and enabled decades of prosperity and stability. Yet since the 1990s, a host of political, economic, social and cultural changes has left this same hegemonic order out of step with the realities of the contemporary world, a contradiction that has led to three decades of crisis in Japanese society. Can Japan make the bold changes required to reverse its decline?

"State, Economy and the Great Divergence" provides a new analysis of what has become the central debate in global economic history: the 'great divergence' between European and Asian growth. Focusing on early modern China and Western Europe, this book offers a new level of detail on comparative state formation that has wide-reaching implications for European, Eurasian and global history.Beginning with a comprehensive overview of the historiography, Peer Vries goes on to extend and develop the debate, critically engaging with the huge volume of literature published on the topic to date. Incorporating new insights into the case of Europe, he offers a compelling alternative to the exaggerated claims to East-West equivalence, or Asian superiority, which have come to dominate discourse surrounding this issue.This is a vital update to a key issue in global economic history and, as such, is essential reading for students and scholars interested in keeping up to speed with the on-going debates.

In conjunction with the Jawaharlal Nehru Memorial Fund in New Delhi, Oxford proudly announces the reissue of Glimpses of World History and The Discovery of India, two famous works by Jawaharlal Nehru. One of modern day's most articulate statesmen, Jawaharlal Nehru wrote a on a wide variety of subjects. Describing himself as "a dabbler in many things," he committed his life not only to politics but also to nature and wild life, drama, poetry, history, and science, as well as many other fields. These two volumes help to illuminate the depth of his interests and knowledge and the skill and elegance with which he treated the written word.