Dear Friends and Colleagues,
Academic Studies Press is pleased to announce our forthcoming titles for Summer / Fall 2010. We work with all library wholesalers and suppliers. If you are interested in ordering directly from us or if you need additional information about any of the titles listed, please contact us at sa...@academicstudiespress.com or visit our website at www.academicstudiespress.com. We look forward to hearing from you! New Directions in Anglo-Jewish History By Geoffrey Alderman ISBN 978-1-936235-13-1 (cloth) $65.00 / £54.50 200 pp., July 2010 The past two decades have witnessed a remarkable renaissance in the academic study of the history of the Jews in Great Britain and of their impact upon British history. In this volume Professor Geoffrey Alderman presents essays that reflect the richness of this renaissance, penned by a new generation of British and American scholars who are uninhibited by considerations of communal image and public obligation that once exercised a powerful influence on Anglo-Jewish historiography. History does not have lessons, says Alderman, but it may provide signposts, and he adds that in the case of the essays presented here "I believe there is one signpost that we would all do well to ponder: in multicultural Britain hard-working immigrants may be welcome, or they may be feared or both. They are destined to remain not quite British, and, for better or worse, they are destined to bequeath this otherness to the generations that follow them. Reviews "The essays in this neatly edited volume provide exciting new insights into Anglo-Jewish history. They represent the second generation of critical scholarship on the subject matter and are united in their innovative and subtle nature. Topics as varied as literature, film and orphanages are explored in essays that range in chronology from the mid-Victorian era through to the eve of the Second World War. They break through barriers of history from above and below, of history and culture, and of Jewish and non-Jewish responses, providing critical perspectives on new and old topics alike. Taken together they represent the coming of age of the study of Anglo-Jewry, a subject matter until recently sadly ignored in British as well as Jewish historiography." -- Professor Tony Kushner, Parkes Institute, University of Southampton "This excellent collection is the advance guard of the second wave of scholarly research into the Jewish experience in Britain since the predominance of gifted amateurs ended in the 1980s. It is multi-disciplinary, wide ranging, conceptually sophisticated, full of irony and frequently witty. There are no apologetics here. With these mainly young scholars, who hail from a variety of backgrounds, British Jewish history has reached maturity. The results are fascinating, sometimes shocking, but always illuminating." --David Cesarani is research professor in History at Royal Holloway, University of London Geoffrey Alderman (Ph.D. University of Oxford, 1969) is the Michael Gross Professor of Politics & Contemporary History at the University of Buckingham and is the acknowledged authority on the history of the Jews in modern Britain. In 2006, Oxford conferred on him with the degree of Doctor of Letters in respect of his work in this field. Democratizing Judaism By Rabbi Dr. Jack J. Cohen ISBN 978-1-936235-16-2 (cloth) $49.00 / £40.99 315 pp., October 2010 Democratizing Judaism is a two-part examination of the Reconstructionist philosophy of Mordecai M. Kaplan. Part I is largely devoted to a defense of Kaplan against several serious critics. It also provides new insight into Kaplan's theology through reference to as yet unknown passages in his Diaries. Part II provides a critical analysis of the contemporary Reconstructionist movement and how a Kaplan disciple treats problems of democracy in Israel and issues of ethical theological concern. The author, Rabbi Dr. Jack J, Cohen, has had a long career as an educator, author and public servant. Before he settled in Israel (1961), he served as the Educational Director of Park Synagogue, in Cleveland, the Director of the Jewish Reconstructionist Foundation and the Rabbi of the Society for the Advancement of Judaism. During the last six and a half years of his tenure in the States, he also taught courses in the philosophy of religion and education at the Jewish Theological Seminary. In Israel, Dr, Cohen served for 23 years as the Director of the Hillel Foundation at Hebrew University, taught an annual seminar for students of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College and a course in Jewish thought at the David Yellin College of Education. Dr. Cohen has been widely published in Jewish journals and is the author of a number of books, among them The Case For Religious Naturalism, Jewish Education in Democratic Society, The Reunion of Isaac and Ishmael, Guides for an Age of Confusion and Major Philosophers of Jewish Prayer in the 20th Century and Judaism in a Post-Halakhic Age. Series: Reference Library of Jewish Intellectual History Bieganski The Brute Polack Stereotype in Polish-Jewish Relations and American Popular Culture By Danusha V. Goska ISBN 978-1-936235-15-5 (cloth) $65.00 / £54.99 344 pp., June 2010 In this controversial study, Goska exposes one stereotype of Poles and other Eastern Europeans. In the "Bieganski" stereotype, Poles exhibit the qualities of animals. They are strong, stupid, violent, fertile, anarchic, dirty, and especially hateful in a way that more evolved humans are not. Their special hatefulness is epitomized by their Polish anti-Semitism. "Bieganski" discovers this stereotype in the mainstream press, scholarship, film, in Jews' self-definition, and in responses to the Holocaust. Bieganski's twin is Shylock, the stereotype of the crafty, physically inadequate, moneyed Jew. The final chapters of the book are devoted to interviews with Americans Jews. These reveal that Bieganski and Shylock are both alive and well among those who have little knowledge of Poles or Poland. Reviews: "A powerful, provocative, ultimately profound work of scholarship regarding the stereotypification of Poles and its implications not only for Polish-Jewish relations in the Old World and the New, but also for anyone wishing to fathom the interworkings of class and ethnicity in an America that has all too often fallen short of its promise." -- James P. Leary, folklorist, University of Wisconsin "In this most important work, Dr. Goska's style incorporates those necessary ingredients that justify writing as an art form: her grammar is impeccable, even while the pathways of her sentences can be unpredictable. Her imagery is robust, but yet it never gets in the way of the underlying premises of her arguments. Moreover, her thinking is crisp, and her knowledge of this very sensitive topic is thoroughly evident. Indeed, the reader cannot help but be persuaded by the logical unfolding of the positions she brings to this necessary work. Above all, she establishes that all-important trust in her readers: that while she may jostle their previously-held constructs, she will also protect them on a literary journey that could be harrowing and dangerous in lesser hands." -- Dr. Michael Herzbrun, Rabbi Temple Emanu-El, Rochester, NY "Stereotypes of Poles have been commonplace in Western society. Danusha V. Goska presents a comprehensive overview of such images in a balanced fashion. She offers no apologetic for genuine instance of Polish anti-Semitism. But she also exposes those rooted in outright prejudice with no foundation in fact. An important contribution to improved Polish-Jewish understanding." -- John T. Pawlikowski, OSM, Ph.D., professor of Social Ethics, Director, Catholic-Jewish Studies Program Catholic Theological Union Chicago Danusha V. Goska (Ph.D. Indiana University, Bloomington) is an experienced teacher and award-winning writer of numerous articles, essays and fiction in Polish Studies. Series: Jews of Poland Twentieth Century Jews Forging Identity in the Land of Promise and in the Promised Land By Monty Noam Penkower ISBN 978-1-936235-20-9 (cloth) $69.00 / £57.50 400 pp., December 2010 This extensively researched collection of essays lucidly explores how members of the ever beleaguered Jewish people grappled with their identity during the past century in the United States and in Eretz Israel, the new centers of Jewry's long historical experience. With the pivotal 1903 Kishinev pogrom setting the stage, the author proceeds to examine how the Land of Promise across the Atlantic exerted different influences on Abraham Selmanovitz, Felix Frankfurter, the founders of the American Council for Judaism, and Arthur Hays Sulzberger. Professor Penkower then shows how the prospect of nationalism in the biblical Promised Land engendered other tension and transformation, ranging from the plight of Haim Nahman Bialik, to rivalry within the Orthodox Jewish camp, to on-going strife between the political Left and Right over the nature of the emerging Jewish state. Monty Noam Penkower is Professor Emeritus of Jewish History at the Machon Lander Graduate Center of Jewish Studies, Jerusalem. He was Victor J. Selmanowitz Professor of Modern Jewish History at Touro College in New York City, and also taught at Bard College, Rutgers University, and Stern College, and in the graduate History Departments of New York University and Yeshiva University. His most recent work includes Decision on Palestine Deferred: America, Britain and Wartime Diplomacy, 1939-1945 (2002).The Jews Were Expendable received the B'nai B'rith A.D.L. Merit for Educational Distinction and, together with The Emergence of Zionist Thought, garnered the second Samuel Belkin Memorial Literary Award from Yeshiva University. Series: Judaism and Jewish Life Dreams of Nationhood American Jewish Communists and the Soviet Birobidzhan Project, 1924-1951 By Henry Srebrnik ISBN 978-1-936235-11-7 (cloth) $75.00 / £62.50 292 pp., August 2010 The American Jewish Communist movement played a major role in the politics of Jewish communities in cities such as Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, and Philadelphia, as well as many other centres, between the 1920s and the 1950s. Making extensive use of Yiddish-language books, newspapers, periodicals, pamphlets, and other materials, Dreams of Nationhood traces the ideological and material support provided to the Jewish Autonomous Region of Birobidzhan in the far east of the Soviet Union by two American Jewish Communist-led organizations, the ICOR and the American Birobidjan Committee. By providing a detailed historical examination of the political work of these two groups, the book makes a substantial contribution to our understanding of 20th century Jewish life in the United States. Henry Srebrnik (Ph.D., University of Birmingham, England) is Professor, Department of Political Studies, University of Prince Edward Island, Canada. His most recent books include Jerusalem on the Amur: Birobidzhan and the Canadian Jewish Communist Movement, 1924-1951 (McGill-Queen's University Press, 2008) and Jews and British Communism, 1935-1945 (London: Vallentine Mitchell, 1995) He also served on the editorial team for De Facto States: The Quest For Sovereignty (London: Routledge, 2004) with Tozun Bahcheli and Barry Bartmann. Series: Jewish Identity in Post Modern Society All the best, Christa Kling Sales and Marketing Academic Studies Press www.academicstudiespress.com --- Messages and opinions expressed on Hasafran are those of the individual author and are not necessarily endorsed by the Association of Jewish Libraries (AJL) =========================================================== Submissions for Ha-Safran, send to: hasaf...@osu.edu SUBscribing, SIGNOFF commands send to: Listproc @ lists.acs.ohio-state.edu Questions, problems, complaints, compliments;-) send to: galron.1 @ osu.edu Ha-Safran Archives: Current: http://www.mail-archive.com/hasafran%40lists.acs.ohio-state.edu/maillist.html History: http://www.mail-archive.com/hasafran%40lists.acs.ohio-state.edu/history.html AJL HomePage http://www.JewishLibraries.org
