New observations on the persistence of God in modern times and why “authentic” atheism is so very hard to come by How to live in a supposedly faithless world threatened by religious fundamentalism?
Whether drinking Red Bull, relieving chronic pain with oxycodone, or experimenting with Ecstasy, Americans participate in a culture of self-medication, using psychoactive substances to enhance or manage our moods.
One of the most important political transitions to occur in South Asia in recent decades was the ouster of Nepals monarchy in 2006 and the institution of a democratic secular republic in 2008.
This new edition of Frank Ledwidge’s eye-opening analysis of British involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan unpicks the causes and enormous costs of military failure.
This audacious and illuminating memoir by Richard Baum, a senior China scholar and sometime policy advisor, reflects on forty years of learning about and interacting with the Peoples Republic of China, from the height of Maoism during the authors UC Berkeley student days in the volatile 1960s through globalization.
An exploration of what it means to be fabulous-and why eccentric style, fashion, and creativity are more political than everPrince once told us not to hate him 'cause he's fabulous.
The Ahmadiyya Muslim community represents the followers of Mirza Ghulam Ahmad (1835-1908), a charismatic leader whose claims of spiritual authority brought him into conflict with most other Muslim leaders of the time.
An account of eighteenth-century global commerce as seen through the lives of three Scottish traders, "e;written with verve and filled with arresting details"e; (Tonio Andrade, author of The Gunpowder Age).
'AN INTELLIGENTLY PRESENTED HISTORICAL FANTASY THAT PROVOKES THOUGHT FROM THE START' THE BRITISH FANTASY SOCIETYWhere once new ideas and beliefs were accepted, now the country's military dictator, the Shogun is shutting his country down to any outside influences.
Taiwans modern legal system--quite different from those of both traditional China and the Peoples Republic--has evolved since the advent of Japanese rule in 1895.
Mapping Chinese Rangoon is both an intimate exploration of the Sino-Burmese, people of Chinese descent who identify with and choose to remain in Burma/Myanmar, and an illumination of twenty-first-century Burma during its emergence from decades of military-imposed isolation.
An urgently needed “risk map” of the many dangers that could derail Asia’s growth and stability Since Marco Polo, the West has waited for the “Asian Century.
Fighting for the Enemy explores the participation of Koreans in the Japanese military and supporting industries before and during World War II, first through voluntary enlistment and eventually through conscription.
The first major study to draw upon unknown or neglected sources, as well as original interviews with figures like Billy Graham, Awakening the Evangelical Mind uniquely tells the engaging story of how evangelicalism developed as an intellectual movement in the middle of the 20th century.
The period from 1876 to 1946 in Korea marked a turbulent time when the country opened its market to foreign powers, became subject to Japanese colonialism, and was swept into agricultural commercialization, industrialization, and eventually postcolonial revolutionary movements.
Between the late sixteenth and early twentieth centuries, Banaras, the iconic Hindu center in northern India that is often described as the oldest living city in the world, was reconstructed materially as well as imaginatively, and embellished with temples, monasteries, mansions, and ghats (riverfront fortress-palaces).
An assessment of how Israel’s extraordinary population growth undermines the country’s environment, social equity, and quality of life—and what must be done about it During the past sixty-eight years, Israel’s population has increased from one to eight million people.
An ethnography of the Mongolian capital city of Ulaanbaatar during the nation’s transition from socialism to a market-based economic systemUrban Hunters is an ethnography of the Mongolian capital city, Ulaanbaatar, during the nation’s transition from socialism to a market-based economic system.
The Black Flags raided their way from southern China into northern Vietnam, competing during the second half of the nineteenth century against other armed migrants and uplands communities for the control of commerce, specifically opium, and natural resources, such as copper.
In this provocative study, Hazel Hutchison takes a fresh look at the roles of American writers in helping to shape national opinion and policy during the First World War.
A look at how the desire to improve international status affects Russia's and China's foreign policies Deborah Welch Larson and Alexei Shevchenko argue that the desire for world status plays a key role in shaping the foreign policies of China and Russia.
A moving portrait of the lives of six poor city-dwellers, set in early twentieth century colonial Saigon Historian Haydon Cherry offers the first comprehensive social history of the urban poor of colonial French Saigon by following the lives of six individuals—a prostitute, a Chinese laborer, a rickshaw puller, an orphan, an incurable invalid, and a destitute Frenchman—and how they navigated the ups and downs of the regional rice trade and the institutions of French colonial rule in the first half of the twentieth century.
Rich in detail and broad in scope, this majestic book is the first to reveal the interaction of politics and religion in France during the crucial years of the long seventeenth century.
Defined by its distinct performance style, stage practices, and regional and dialect based identities, Cantonese opera originated as a traditional art form performed by itinerant companies in temple courtyards and rural market fairs.
A fascinating analysis of the recent history of the beautiful but troubled Southeast Asian nation of Cambodia To many in the West, the name Cambodia still conjures up indelible images of destruction and death, the legacy of the brutal Khmer Rouge regime and the terror it inflicted in its attempt to create a communist utopia in the 1970s.
Heroines of the Qing introduces an array of Chinese women from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries who were powerful, active subjects of their own lives and who wrote themselves as the heroines of their exemplary stories.
Essential primary sources reveal the central tensions between American politics and religion throughout the nation’s history Despite the centrality of separation of church and state in American government, religion has played an important role in the nation’s politics from colonial times through the present day.
With fresh and provocative insights into the everyday reality of politics in post-Soviet Central Asia, this volume moves beyond commonplaces about strong and weak states to ask critical questions about how democracy, authority, and justice are understood in this important region.
A surprisingly hopeful assessment of the prospects for human rights in the Middle East, and a blueprint for advancing them The enormous sense of optimism unleashed by the Arab Spring in 2011 soon gave way to widespread suffering and despair.
Scholar-officials of late medieval China were not only enthusiastic in amateur storytelling, but also showed unprecedented interest in recording stories on different aspects of literati life.
From the Flint water crisis to the Dakota Access Pipeline controversy, environmental threats and degradation disproportionately affect communities of color, with often dire consequences for peoples lives and health.
More than three-and-a-half million men served in the British Army during the Second World War, the vast majority of them civilians who had never expected to become soldiers and had little idea what military life, with all its strange rituals, discomforts, and dangers, was going to be like.
A timely and illuminating history of Tibet, from the seventh century to what it means to be Tibetan today Situated north of the Himalayas, Tibet is famous for its unique culture and its controversial assimilation into modern China.
Both a refraction of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and a protest against Western values, butoh is a form of Japanese dance theater that emerged in the aftermath of World War II.
A trusted economic commentator provides a penetrating account of the threats to China's continued economic rise Under President Xi Jinping, China has become a large and confident power both at home and abroad, but the country also faces serious challenges.
Forests Are Gold examines the management of Vietnam's forests in the tumultuous twentieth centuryfrom French colonialism to the recent transition to market-oriented economicsas the country united, prospered, and transformed people and landscapes.
An authoritative study of food politics in the socialist regimes of China and the Soviet Union During the twentieth century, 80 percent of all famine victims worldwide died in China and the Soviet Union.
