The Uneasy Relation Between American Jews and Israel
Trouble In The Tribe explores the way Israel has gone from one of the unifying pillars of American Jewish identity to perhaps the single most divisive issue in the community.
Trouble In The Tribe explores the way Israel has gone from one of the unifying pillars of American Jewish identity to perhaps the single most divisive issue in the community.
Visotzky offers us a gift in his animated and multi-dimensional study of the interface of Jewish and Greco-Roman cultures. He highlights how Jews creatively engaged with another civilization, creating a Jewish culture that was, and is, fluid, innovative, and diverse.
While weather and its effects on both battlefields and trenches was a recurring theme during World War I, in no battle was this problem more pronounced than what occurred during the battle of Passchendaele in the late summer and early fall of 1917. Rain and mud were the defining…
At the end of Chuck Klosterman X: A Highly Specific, Defiantly Incomplete History of the Early 21st Century (2017, Blue Rider Press), Klosterman makes the curious curatorial decision to group seven essays about heavy metal before concluding with four essays about death. I say this is curious because…
In order to get a sense of what it was like to experience those early days of Passchendaele, one has only to listen to the voices of those who were there. In looking at the accounts written by those who were involved with the battle, you can come to an…
Identifying racism is an important step in stemming its tide, but we (and I speak specifically to white people) must be willing and able to consider that racism might look and sound like ourselves.
Diacritical marks might seem like a tiny blip in the larger picture of tumultuous politics and proposed policies that actively harm our minority populations, yet they serve as a reminder of our important presence and contribution to this nation.
Readers who share a “revisionist” desire to understand the American intervention in Vietnam as a “lost victory” (as the CIA’s William Colby described it) will find a lot to like in Shaw's book. But those looking for a more historical and contextual reading of Ngo Dinh Diem and the South Vietnam state he led may have to wait a while longer.
Commentators have debated for almost a century the reasons why America entered the First World War. In the wake of the centennial observance, a raft of new books on the subject has appeared. Together they contribute information and interpretations that challenge readers to rethink their ideas about the subject and its significance for understanding present predicaments.
Glück’s essays in American Originality contain many occasional pieces, such as the introductions to collections she picked for first book prizes, but the strongest pieces move outward and inward at the same time, drawing on autobiographical material to better identify and evaluate the characteristics of our milieu.