Fall
1999
Crossing linguistic and cultural boundaries
Super-power sense and sensibility
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Book notes
Noam Chomsky Profit over People. Seven Stories Press, 1998. Critiques neo-liberalism and the pro-corporate system of economic and political policies.
Noam Chomsky The New Military Humanism: Lessons from Kosovo. Common Courage Press, 1999. Analyzing the NATO bombing, Chomsky challenges the new military humanism associated with post-Cold War U.S. foreign policy. Noam Chomsky is Institute Professor of Linguistics.
Joshua Cohen and Joel Rogers, eds., The New Inequality and Representing Us All. Beacon Press, 1999. The first two books in a Boston Review/Beacon Press series called New Democracy Forum. Joshua Cohen is Arthur and Ruth Sloan Professor of Political Science and professor of philosophy and head of the Department of Political Science.
Michel DeGraff, ed. Language Creation and Language Change: Creolization, Diachrony, and Development. MIT Press, 1999. A comparison of language growth from a number of linguistic-theoretic and empirical perspectives, using data from both speech and gestural modalities and diverse acquisition environments. Michel De Graff is assistant professor of linguistics.
Anita Desai Fasting, Feasting. Chatto Press (England), 1999. A novel full of wit and sensuality, farce and deep pathos, illuminating the heart of family life in Indian and American cultures. Anita Desai is professor of writing.
Peter A. Diamond, ed. Issues in Privatizing Social Security: A Report of an Expert Panel of the National Academy of Social Insurance. MIT Press, 1999. Explores issues arising from proposals to build and maintain a sizable Social Security Trust Fund, partially invested in stocks and corporate bonds, and introduce individual defined-contribution accounts. Peter A. Diamond is Institute Professor of Economics.
John W. Dower Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II. W.W. Norton, 1999. Illuminates how shattering defeat, followed by more than six years of American military occupation, affected every level of Japanese society in ways that neither the victor nor the vanquished could anticipate. John W. Dower is Elting E. Morison Professor of History.
Evelynn Maxine Hammonds Childhood's Deadly Scourge: The Campaign to Control Diphtheria in New York City, 1880-1930. Johns Hopkins University Press, 1999. Shows how the success of anti-diphtheria programs in New York City depended ultimately on public and physician perception that the campaigns were classless, rather than class-conscious, interventions. Evelynn M. Hammonds is associate professor of the history of science.
John Hildebidle Defining Absence. Salmon Books (Ireland), 1999. A collection of original poems. John Hildebidle is professor of literature.
James Howe A People Who Would Not Kneel: Panama, the United States, and the San Blas Kuna. Smithsonian Institution, 1998. Argues that the terms of the Kuna struggle were set as much by native practices and demands as by the preoccupations of missionaries, bureaucrats and explorers. James Howe is professor of anthropology and Head of the Anthropology Program.
Henry Jenkins and Justine Cassell, eds., From Barbie to Mortal Kombat: Gender and Computer Games. MIT Press, 1998. A critical inquiry into the girls game movement, exploring issues of gender, technology, popular culture and entrepreneurial feminism. Henry Jenkins, Ann Fetter Friedlaender Professor of the Humanities, is director of the Comparative Media Studies Program.
Susanne Klingenstein Enlarging America: The Cultural Work of Jewish Literary Scholars, 1930-1990. Syracuse University Press, 1998. Examines the gradual opening of literary academe to Jewish faculty and the critical work Jewish scholars undertook to integrate into an exclusive WASP domain. Susanne Klingenstein is associate professor of writing.
Helen Elaine Lee Water Marked. Scribner, 1999. A richly textured novel about two estranged African-American sisters who reunite in an effort to understand their father and family history. Helen Elaine Lee is assistant professor of writing.
Bruce Mazlish The Uncertain Sciences. Yale University Press, 1998. A new view of the achievements, failings, possibilities and meaning of the human sciences, which include the social sciences, literature, psychology and hermeneutic studies. Bruce Mazlish is professor of history.
Victor McElheny Insisting on the Impossible: The Life of Edwin Land. Perseus Books, 1998. Explores the life of the great inventor, Edwin Land, demonstrating his major innovations in photography, optics, industry and science policy. Victor McElheny is senior research associate in the Science, Technology and Society Program and former director of the Knight Science Journalism Fellowships Program.
David Woodruff Money Unmade: Barter and the Fate of Russian Capitalism. Cornell University Press, 1999. Demonstrates that the struggles of the new Russian state have much to teach about the political history of money worldwide. David Woodruff is assistant professor of political science.
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