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Books > Humanities
Late in 1755, an army of British regulars and Massachusetts
volunteers completed one of the cruelest, most successful military
campaigns in North American history, capturing and deporting seven
thousand French-speaking Catholic Acadians from the province of
Nova Scotia, and chasing an equal number into the wilderness of
eastern Canada. Thousands of Acadians endured three decades of
forced migrations and failed settlements that shuttled them to the
coasts of South America, the plantations of the Caribbean, the
frigid islands of the South Atlantic, the swamps of Louisiana, and
the countryside of central France. The Acadian Diaspora tells their
extraordinary story in full for the first time, illuminating a
long-forgotten world of imperial desperation, experimental
colonies, and naked brutality. Using documents culled from archives
in France, Great Britain, Canada, and the United States,
Christopher Hodson reconstructs the lives of Acadian exiles as they
traversed oceans and continents, pushed along by empires eager to
populate new frontiers with inexpensive, pliable white farmers.
Hodson's compelling narrative situates the Acadian diaspora within
the dramatic geopolitical changes triggered by the Seven Years'
War. Faced with redrawn boundaries and staggering national debts,
imperial architects across Europe used the Acadians to realize
radical plans: tropical settlements without slaves, expeditions to
the unknown southern continent, and, perhaps strangest of all,
agricultural colonies within old regime France itself. In response,
Acadians embraced their status as human commodities, using
intimidation and even violence to tailor their communities to the
superheated Atlantic market for cheap, mobile labor. Through vivid,
intimate stories of Acadian exiles and the diverse, transnational
cast of characters that surrounded them, The Acadian Diaspora
presents the eighteenth-century Atlantic world from a new angle,
challenging old assumptions about uprooted peoples and the very
nature of early modern empire.
Political theory, from antiquity to the present, has been divided
over the relationship between the requirements of justice and the
limitations of persons and institutions to meet those requirements.
Some theorists hold that a theory of justice should be utopian or
idealistic-that the derivation of the correct principles of justice
should not take into account human and institutional limitations.
Others insist on a realist or non-utopian view, according to which
feasibility-facts about what is possible given human and
institutional limitations-is a constraint on principles of justice.
In recent years, the relationship between the ideal and the real
has become the subject of renewed scholarly interest. This
anthology aims to represent the contemporary state of this classic
debate. By and large, contributors to the volume deny that the
choice between realism and idealism is binary. Rather, there is a
continuum between realism and idealism that locates these extremes
of each view at opposite poles. The contributors, therefore, tend
to occupy middle positions, only leaning in the ideal or non-ideal
direction. Together, their contributions not only represent a wide
array of attractive positions in the new literature on the topic,
but also collectively advance how we understand the difference
between idealism and realism itself.
This book contains fifteen essays, each first presented as the
annual Tanner Lecture at the conference of the Mormon History
Association by a leading scholar. Renowned in their own specialties
but relatively new to the study of Mormon history at the time of
their lectures, these scholars approach Mormon history from a wide
variety of perspectives, including such concerns as gender,
identity creation, and globalization. Several of these essays place
Mormon history within the currents of American religious
history-for example, by placing Joseph Smith and other Latter-day
Saints in conversation with Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nat Turner, fellow
millenarians, and freethinkers. Other essays explore the creation
of Mormon identities, demonstrating how Mormons created a unique
sense of themselves as a distinct people. Historians of the
American West examine Mormon connections with American imperialism,
the Civil War, and the wider cultural landscape. Finally the
essayists look at continuing Latter-day Saint growth around the
world, within the context of the study of global religions.
Examining Mormon history from an outsider's perspective, the essays
presented in this volume ask intriguing questions, share fresh
insights and perspectives, analyze familiar sources in unexpected
ways, and situate research on the Mormon past within broader
scholarly debates.
During the nineteenth century, nearly one hundred symphonies were
written by over fifty composers living in the United States. With
few exceptions, this repertoire is virtually forgotten today. In
Orchestrating the Nation: The Nineteenth-Century American Symphonic
Enterprise, author Douglas W. Shadle explores the stunning
stylistic diversity of this substantial repertoire and uncovers why
it failed to enter the musical mainstream. Throughout the century,
Americans longed for a distinct national musical identity. As the
most prestigious of all instrumental genres, the symphony proved to
be a potent vehicle in this project as composers found inspiration
for their works in a dazzling array of subjects, including Niagara
Falls, Hiawatha, and Western pioneers. With a wealth of musical
sources at his disposal, including never-before-examined
manuscripts, Shadle reveals how each component of the symphonic
enterprise-from its composition, to its performance, to its
immediate and continued reception by listeners and
critics-contributed to competing visions of American identity.
Employing an innovative transnational historical framework,
Shadle's narrative covers three continents and shows how the music
of major European figures such as Beethoven, Schumann, Wagner,
Liszt, Brahms, and Dvorak exerted significant influence over
dialogues about the future of American musical culture. Shadle
demonstrates that the perceived authority of these figures allowed
snobby conductors, capricious critics, and even orchestral
musicians themselves to thwart the efforts of American symphonists
despite widespread public support of their music. Consequently,
these works never entered the performing canons of American
orchestras. An engagingly written account of a largely unknown
repertoire, Orchestrating the Nation shows how artistic and
ideological debates from the nineteenth century continue to shape
the culture of American orchestral music today.
Abstract objects have been a central topic in philosophy since
antiquity. Philosophers have defended various views about abstract
objects by appealing to metaphysical considerations, considerations
regarding mathematics or science, and, not infrequently, intuitions
about natural language. This book pursues the question of how and
whether natural language allows for reference to abstract objects
in a fully systematic way. By making full use of contemporary
linguistic semantics, it presents a much greater range of
linguistic generalizations than has previously been taken into
consideration in philosophical discussions, and it argues for an
ontological picture is very different from that generally taken for
granted by philosophers and semanticists alike. Reference to
abstract objects such as properties, numbers, propositions, and
degrees is considerably more marginal than generally held. Instead,
natural language is rather generous in allowing reference to
particularized properties (tropes), the use of nonreferential
expressions in apparent referential position, and the use of
"nominalizing expressions," such as quantifiers like "something."
Reference to abstract objects is achieved generally only by the use
of 'reifying terms', such as "the number eight."
This book examines how religion and related beliefs have varied
impacts on the needs and perceptions of practitioners, service
users, and the support networks available to them. The authors
argue that social workers need to understand these phenomena, so
that they can become more confident in challenging discriminatory
and oppressive practices. The centrality of religion and associated
beliefs in the lives of many is emphasised, as are their
potentially liberating (and potentially negative) impacts. In line
with the "Social Work in Practice" series style, the book allows
readers to explore issues in depth. It focuses on knowledge
transmission, and the encouragement of critical reflection on
practice. Each chapter is built around 'real-life' case scenarios
using a problem-based learning approach. This book is the first to
deal with social work and religion so comprehensively and will
therefore be essential reading for social work students, as well as
practitioners in a range of areas, social work academics and
researchers in the UK and beyond.
Gurus of Modern Yoga explores the contributions that individual
gurus have made to the formation of the practices and discourses of
yoga in today's world. The focus is not limited to India, but also
extends to the teachings of yoga gurus in the modern, transnational
world, and within the Hindu diaspora. Each of the sections deals
with a different aspect of the guru within modern yoga. Included
are extensive considerations of the transnational tantric guru; the
teachings of modern yoga's best-known guru, T. Krishnamacharya, and
those of his principal disciples; the place of technology, business
and politics in the work of global yoga gurus; and the role of
science and medicine. Although the principal emphasis is on the
current situation, some of the essays demonstrate the continuing
influence of gurus from generations past. As a whole, the book
represents an extensive and diverse picture of the place of the
guru in contemporary yoga practice.
Starring New York considers twenty-one films in detail, and more
generally discusses many others, that were shot on location and
released between 1968 and 1981. Corkin looks at their complex
relationship to the fortunes of New York City during that era,
probing the multiple connections among film, history, and
geography. This period was a volatile moment in the history of the
city as it went from the hopefulness of the Lindsay years (1966 to
1973) to financial default in 1975, under the leadership of Abe
Beame to its reemergence as a center of international finance in
the 1980s, under the leadership of Edward I. Koch (1978 to 1989).
These changing regimes and fortunes form the backdrop for films
that picture New York's racial and ethnic populations, its decaying
districts, its violent street-life, and its emerging gentrification
by the later years of the decade. The films, directed by an
emerging generation of filmmakers influenced both by the Italian
neo-realists and the French auteurs, sought a higher realism than
that offered in conventional Hollywood productions. Martin
Scorsese, Francis Coppola, Sidney Lumet, Paul Mazursky, Woody
Allen, and John Schlesinger, all of whom became noted by a general
audience during this period, capture the excitement and volatility
of the period. More broadly, Starring New York proposes that this
concentration of popular films that picture the city in transition
provide viewers with a means to begin reorienting their view of New
York's space, their significance, and their relation to other
places of the globe.
God of Justice deals with ritual healing in the Central Himalayas
of north India. It focuses on the cult of Bhairav, a local deity
who is associated with the lowest castes, the so-called Dalits, who
are frequently victims of social injustice. When powerless people
are exploited or abused and have nowhere else to go, they often
turn to Bhairav for justice, and he afflicts their oppressors with
disease and misfortune. In order to end their suffering, they must
make amends with their former victims and worship Bhairav with
bloody sacrifices. Many acts of perceived injustice occur within
the family, so that much of the book focuses on the tension between
the high moral value placed on family unity on the one hand, and
the inevitable conflicts within it on the other. Such conflicts can
lead to ghost possession, cursing, and other forms of black magic,
all of which are vividly described. This highly readable book
includes a personal account of the author's own experiences in the
field as well as fascinating descriptions of blood sacrifice,
possession, exorcism and cursing. Sax begins with a straightforward
description of his fieldwork and goes on to describe the god
Bhairav and his relationship to the weak and powerless. Subsequent
chapters deal with the lives of local oracles and healers; the main
rituals of the cult and the dramatic Himalayan landscape in which
they are embedded; the moral, ritual, and therapeutic centrality of
the family; the importance of ghosts and exorcism; and practices of
cursing and counter-cursing. The final chapter examines the
problematic relationship between ritual healing and modernity.
This comprehensive manual is aimed especially at oblates and
associates of Benedictine communities, those who regularly spend
retreats or quiet days in Benedictine centres and all those who
want to order their life to be more in tune with Benedictine
spirituality. The book contains: the text of the Rule of St
Benedict; an introduction to the essentials of Benedictine
spirituality; a simple daily office and other Benedictine prayers;
a "who's who" introducing us to 100 Benedictine saints and
followers; a guide to living the Rule in the world and community
and a tour of the Benedictine family worldwide. Many notable
authors have contributed to this volume which is designed to last a
lifetime. They include Esther de Waal, Columba Stewart, Kathleen
Norris and Patrick Barry.
In 1517, the Ottoman Sultan Selim "the Grim" conquered Egypt and
brought his empire for the first time in history into direct
contact with the trading world of the Indian Ocean. During the
decades that followed, the Ottomans became progressively more
engaged in the affairs of this vast and previously unfamiliar
region, eventually to the point of launching a systematic
ideological, military and commercial challenge to the Portuguese
Empire, their main rival for control of the lucrative trade routes
of maritime Asia.
The Ottoman Age of Exploration is the first comprehensive
historical account of this century-long struggle for global
dominance, a struggle that raged from the shores of the
Mediterranean to the Straits of Malacca, and from the interior of
Africa to the steppes of Central Asia. Based on extensive research
in the archives of Turkey and Portugal, as well as materials
written on three continents and in a half dozen languages, it
presents an unprecedented picture of the global reach of the
Ottoman state during the sixteenth century. It does so through a
dramatic recounting of the lives of sultans and viziers, spies,
corsairs, soldiers-of-fortune, and women from the imperial harem.
Challenging traditional narratives of Western dominance, it argues
that the Ottomans were not only active participants in the Age of
Exploration, but ultimately bested the Portuguese in the game of
global politics by using sea power, dynastic prestige, and
commercial savoir faire to create their own imperial dominion
throughout the Indian Ocean.
Early work in conflict resolution and peace research focused on why
wars broke out, why they persisted, and why peace agreements failed
to endure. Later research has focused on what actions and
circumstances have actually averted destructive escalations,
stopped the perpetuation of destructive conduct, produced a
relatively good conflict transformation, or resulted in an enduring
and relatively equitable relationship among former adversaries.
This later research, which began in the 1950s, recognizes that
conflict is inevitable and is often waged in the name of rectifying
injustice. Additionally, it argues that damages can be minimized
and gains maximized for various stakeholders in waging and settling
conflicts. This theory, which is known as the constructive conflict
approach, looks at how conflicts can be waged and resolved so they
are broadly beneficial rather than mutually destructive. In this
book, Louis Kriesberg, one of the major figures in the school of
constructive conflict, looks at every major foreign conflict
episode in which the United States has been involved since the
onset of the Cold War to analyze when American involvement in
foreign conflicts has been relatively effective and beneficial and
when it has not. In doing so he analyzes whether the US took
constructive approaches to conflict and whether the approach
yielded better consequences than more traditional coercive
approaches. Realizing Peace helps readers interested in engaging or
learning about foreign policy to better understand what has
happened in past American involvement in foreign conflicts, to
think freshly about better alternatives, and to act in support of
more constructive strategies in the future.
Ex nihilo nihil fit. Philosophy, especially great philosophy, does
not appear out of the blue. In the current volume, a team of top
scholars-both up-and-coming and established-attempts to trace the
philosophical development of one of the greatest philosophers of
all time. Featuring twenty new essays and an introduction, it is
the first attempt of its kind in English and its appearance
coincides with the recent surge of interest in Spinoza in
Anglo-American philosophy. Spinoza's fame-or notoriety-is due
primarily to his posthumously published magnum opus, the Ethics,
and, to a lesser extent, to the 1670 Theological-Political
Treatise. Few readers take the time to study his early works
carefully. If they do, they are likely to encounter some surprising
claims, which often diverge from, or even utterly contradict, the
doctrines of the Ethics. Consider just a few of these assertions:
that God acts from absolute freedom of will, that God is a whole,
that there are no modes in God, that extension is divisible and
hence cannot be an attribute of God, and that the intellectual and
corporeal substances are modes in relation to God. Yet, though
these claims reveal some tension between the early works and the
Ethics, there is also a clear continuity between them. Spinoza
wrote the Ethics over a long period of time, which spanned most of
his philosophical career. The dates of the early drafts of the
Ethics seem to overlap with the assumed dates of the composition of
the Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect and the Short
Treatise on God, Man, and His Well Being and precede the
publication of Spinoza's 1663 book on Descartes' Principles of
Philosophy. For this reason, a study of Spinoza's early works (and
correspondence) can illuminate the nature of the problems Spinoza
addresses in the Ethics, insofar as the views expressed in the
early works help us reconstruct the development and genealogy of
the Ethics. Indeed, if we keep in mind the common dictum "nothing
comes from nothing "-which Spinoza frequently cites and appeals
to-it is clear that great works like the Ethics do not appear ex
nihilo. In light of the preeminence and majesty of the Ethics, it
is difficult to study the early works without having the Ethics in
sight. Still, we would venture to say that the value of Spinoza's
early works is not at all limited to their being stations on the
road leading to the Ethics. A teleological attitude of such a sort
would celebrate the works of the "mature Spinoza " at the expense
of the early works. However, we have no reason to assume that on
all issues the views of the Ethics are better argued, developed,
and motivated than those of the early works. In other words, we
should keep our minds open to the possibility that on some issues
the early works might contain better analysis and argumentation
than the Ethics.
Ever since Roman tourists scratched graffiti on the pyramids and
temples of Egypt over two thousand years ago, people have travelled
far and wide seeking the great wonders of antiquity. In From
Stonehenge to Samarkand, noted archaeologist and popular writer
Brian Fagan offers an engaging historical account of our enduring
love of ancient architecture-the irresistible impulse to visit
strange lands in search of lost cities and forgotten monuments.
Here is a marvellous history of archaeological tourism, with
generous excerpts from the writings of the tourists themselves.
Readers will find Herodotus describing the construction of Babylon;
Edward Gibbon receiving inspiration for his seminal work while
wandering through the ruins of the Forum in Rome; Gustave Flaubert
watching the sunrise from atop the Pyramid of Cheops. We visit
Easter Island with Pierre Loti, Machu Picchu with Hiram Bingham,
Central Africa with David Livingstone. Fagan describes the early
antiquarians, consumed with a passionate and omnivorous curiosity,
pondering the mysteries of Stonehenge, but he also considers some
of the less reputable figures, such as the Earl of Elgin, who sold
large parts of the Parthenon to the British Museum. Finally, he
discusses the changing nature of archaeological tourism, from the
early romantic wanderings of the solitary figure, communing with
the departed spirits of Druids or Mayans, to the cruise-ship
excursions of modern times, where masses of tourists are hustled
through ruins, barely aware of their surroundings. From the Holy
Land to the Silk Road, the Yucatan to Angkor Wat, Fagan follows in
the footsteps of the great archaeological travellers to retrieve
their first written impressions in a book that will delight anyone
fascinated with the landmarks of ancient civilization.
As the Atlantic Ocean was transformed from a terrifying barrier
into a highway uniting four continents, the lives of people all
around the ocean were transformed. After 1492 merchants and
political leaders around the Atlantic refocused their attention
from trade highways in their interiors to the coasts. Those who
emigrated, willingly or unwillingly, had their lives changed
completely, but many others became involved in new trades and
industries that necessitated consolidation of populations. American
gold and silver contributed to the emergence of nation-states. New
foods enriched diets all over the world. American foods such as
fish, cassava, maize, tomatoes, beans, and cacao fed burgeoning
populations. Sugar grown around the Atlantic transformed tastes
everywhere. Tobacco was the first great consumer craze. Furs
provided the raw material for fashionable broad hats. Chains of
commodity exchange linked the Atlantic to the Pacific; they also
linked Americans to the Mediterranean and the goods of the Middle
East. Creation of Atlantic economies required organization of labor
and trade on a scale previously unknown. Generations of Europeans
who signed up for servitude for a number of years in order to pay
their passage over were gradually supplanted by enslaved Africans,
millions of whom were imported into slavery. Wars, fueled by the
need for ever more slaves, spread throughout West and Central
Africa. The African end of the slave trade produced powerful rulers
and great confederations in Africa. Consolidation of displaced
tribal groups and remnants of populations depleted by epidemic
disease led to the emergence of the Six Nations of the Iroquois
League in northern North America, and the Creeks, Cherokees, and
others in the south. Those who made a choice to travel across the
Atlantic did so for economic advancement, but many also were
influenced by religious concerns. Conflict between Roman Catholics
and Protestants in Europe, and the power of political leaders to
force conformity, caused many to feel that their right to worship
was under threat. They were willing to accept servitude to make
emigration possible, in order to protect their religious lives.
Attempting to create and control vast networks of settlement and
trade enhanced the rise of nation-states in Europe and contributed
to the growth of national identities. The wars of independence in
the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries changed the nature of
relationships, but did not end them. Abolitionism serves as a vivid
example of the collision of religious, philosophical, and economic
realities and the ways in which the Atlantic context posed new
possibilities and new answers.
In the United States and Europe, an increasing emphasis on equality
has pitted rights claims against each other, raising profound
philosophical, moral, legal, and political questions about the
meaning and reach of religious liberty. Nowhere has this conflict
been more salient than in the debate between claims of religious
freedom, on one hand, and equal rights claims made on the behalf of
members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT)
community, on the other. As new rights for LGBT individuals have
expanded in liberal democracies across the West, longstanding
rights of religious freedom - such as the rights of religious
communities to adhere to their fundamental teachings, including
protecting the rights of conscience; the rights of parents to
impart their religious beliefs to their children; and the liberty
to advance religiously-based moral arguments as a rationale for
laws - have suffered a corresponding decline. Timothy Samuel Shah,
Thomas F. Farr, and Jack Friedman's volume, Religious Freedom and
Gay Rights brings together some of the world's leading thinkers on
religion, morality, politics, and law to analyze the emerging
tensions between religious freedom and gay rights in three key
geographic regions: the United States, the United Kingdom, and
continental Europe. What implications will expanding regimes of
equality rights for LGBT individuals have on religious freedom in
these regions? What are the legal and moral frameworks that govern
tensions between gay rights and religious freedom? How are these
tensions illustrated in particular legal, political, and policy
controversies? And what is the proper way to balance new claims of
equality against existing claims for freedom of religious groups
and individuals? Religious Freedom and Gay Rights offers several
explorations of these questions.
In writing about international affairs in the 1960s, historians
have naturally focused on the Cold War. The decade featured
perilous confrontations between the United States and the Soviet
Union over Berlin and Cuba, the massive buildup of nuclear
stockpiles, the escalation of war in Vietnam, and bitter East-West
rivalry throughout the developing world. Only in recent years have
scholars begun to realize that there is another history of
international affairs in the 1960s. As the world historical force
of globalization has quickened and deepened, historians have begun
to see that many of the global challenges that we face today -
inequality, terrorism, demographic instability, energy dependence,
epidemic disease, massive increases in trade and monetary flows, to
name just a few examples - asserted themselves powerfully during
the decade. The administration of President Lyndon B. Johnson
confronted tectonic shifts in the international environment and
perhaps even the beginning of the post-Cold War world. While the
ideologically infused struggle between the United States and the
Soviet Union was indisputably crucial, new forces and new actors
altered international relations in profound and lasting ways. This
book asks how the Johnson administration responded to this changing
landscape. To what extent did U.S. leaders understand the changes
that we can now see clearly with the benefit of hindsight? How did
they prioritize these issues alongside the geostrategic concerns
that dominated their daily agendas and the headlines of the day?
How successfully did Americans grapple with these long-range
problems, with what implications for the future? What lessons lie
in the efforts of Johnson and his aides to cope with a new and
inchoate agenda of problems? This book reconsiders the 1960s and
suggests a new research agenda predicated on the idea that the Cold
War was not the only - or perhaps even the most important - feature
of international life in the period after World War II.
This book supplies fundamental information about the diverse
religious beliefs of Africa, explains central tenets of the African
worldview, and overviews various forms of African spiritual
practices and experiences. Africa is an ancient land with a
significant presence in world history-especially regarding the
history of the United States, given the ethnic origins of a
substantial proportion of the nation's population. This book
presents a broad range of information about the diverse religious
beliefs of Africa that serves to describe the beliefs, practices,
deities, sacred places, and creation stories of African religions.
Readers will learn about key forms of spiritual practices and
experiences, such as incantations and prayer, dance as worship, and
spirit possession, all of which pepper African American religious
experiences today. The entries also discuss central tenets of the
African worldview-for example, the belief that humankind is not to
fight nature, but to integrate into the natural environment. This
volume is specifically written to be highly accessible to students.
It provides a much-needed source of connections between the
religious traditions and practices of African Americans and those
of the people of the continent of Africa. Through these
connections, this work will inspire tolerance of other religions,
traditions, and backgrounds. The included selection of primary
documents provides users first-hand accounts of African religious
beliefs and practices, serving to promote critical thinking skills
and support Common Core State Standards. Presents approximately 100
alphabetically arranged entries written by a team of expert
contributors Overviews the plurality of African religious cultures
and identifies the distant origins of African American religious
experiences today Includes primary documents discussing African
religious beliefs and practices
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