Recently added articles from The Historian:
Martyrdom in Islam.(Book review)
Jun 22, 2009; ... Martyrdom in Islam. By David Cook. (New York, N.Y.: Cambridge University Press, 2007. Pp. xiv, 206. $75.00.) The role of martyrdom in Islam has taken center stage in recent years due to the burgeoning terrorist tactic of "self-designated martyrdoms," often referred to as ...
Darfur's Sorrow: A History of Destruction and Genocide.(Book review)
Jun 22, 2009; ... Darfur's Sorrow: A History of Destruction and Genocide. By M. W. Daly. (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 2007. Pp. xix, 368. $22.99.) The appearance of the Darfur crisis in news reports around the world has acted as a catalyst for a number of studies trying to ...
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East, 1776 to the Present.(Book review)
Jun 22, 2009; ... Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East, 1776 to the Present. By Michael B. Oren. (New York, N.Y.: W. W. Norton & Co., 2007. Pp. xxi, 737. $29.95.) Israeli scholar Michael B. Oren has a Ph.D. in history and is a fellow at the Shalem Institute in Jerusalem, a ...
Postal Systems in the Pre-Modern Islamic World.(Book review)
Jun 22, 2009; ... Postal Systems in the Pre-Modern Islamic World. By Adam J. Silverstein. (New York, N.Y.: Cambridge University Press, 2007. Pp. xii, 214. $95.00.) Who would want to read a book on postal systems in the premodern Islamic world? Anyone who has heretofore taken postal systems for ...
A Tribal Order: Politics and Law in the Mountains of Yemen.(Book review)
Jun 22, 2009; ... A Tribal Order: Politics and Law in the Mountains of Yemen. By Shelagh Weir. (Austin, Tex.: University of Texas Press, 2007. Pp. xi, xv, 390. $50.00.) This author's detailed ethnography describes the political and legal life of the small tribes of the Rezih region in northwest ...
The Devil of Great Island: Witchcraft and Conflict in Early New England.(Book review)
Jun 22, 2009; ... The Devil of Great Island: Witchcraft and Conflict in Early New England. By Emerson W. Baker. (New York, N.Y.: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007. Pp. xiv, 233. $24.95.) Witchcraft studies often fall prey to two temptations: one is to construct an overarching theory that will account for ...
The Work of the Heart: Young Women and Emotion, 1780-1830.(Book review)
Jun 22, 2009; ... The Work of the Heart: Young Women and Emotion, 1780-1830. By Martha Tomhave Blauvelt. (Charlottesville, Va.: University of Virginia Press, 2007. Pp. 275. $39.50.) If diarists are chroniclers of history, then The Work of the Heart is an invaluable study of what the author ...
Sexual Reckonings: Southern Girls in a Troubling Age.(Book review)
Jun 22, 2009; ... Sexual Reckonings: Southern Girls in a Troubling Age. By Susan K. Cahn. (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2007. Pp. 375. $29.95.) In this study, the author traces the history of Southern adolescent girls' sexuality from the 1920s through the beginnings of the modern ...
Margaret Fuller: An American Romantic Life. Vol. 1. The Public Years.(Book review)
Jun 22, 2009; ... Margaret Fuller: An American Romantic Life. Vol. 1. The Public Years. By Charles Capper. (New York, N.Y.: Oxford University Press, 2007. Pp. xxi, 649. $40.00.) Although Margaret Fuller's life was very short, it overflowed with learning, thinking, writing, teaching, travel, and ...
Voices from an American Convent: Marie Madeleine Hachard and the New Orleans Ursulines, 1727-1760.(Book review)
Jun 22, 2009; ... Voices from an American Convent: Marie Madeleine Hachard and the New Orleans Ursulines, 1727-1760. Edited by Emily Clark. (Baton Rouge, La.: Louisiana State University Press, 2007. Pp. x, 138. $25.00.) The editor of this book is one among only a handful of recent historians ...
Family Life in 20th-Century America.(Book review)
Jun 22, 2009; ... Family Life in 20th-Century America. By Marilyn Coleman, Lawrence H. Ganong, and Kelly Warznik. (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 2007. Pp. xvii, 326. $65.00.) This study uses a topical approach to cover the most salient of the broad changes affecting family life in ...
Nixon and Kissinger: Partners in Power.(Book review)
Jun 22, 2009; ... Nixon and Kissinger: Partners in Power. By Robert Dallek. (New York, N.Y.: HarperCollins, 2007. Pp. xii, 740. $32.50.) The author of this book, a renowned biographer of John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson, has turned his attention to the next president, Richard M. Nixon ....
Slavery, Emancipation, and Freedom: Comparative Perspectives.(Book review)
Jun 22, 2009; ... Slavery, Emancipation, and Freedom: Comparative Perspectives. By Stanley L. Engerman. (Baton Rouge, La.: Louisiana State University Press, 2007. Pp. x, 114. $25.00.) Historians, especially those trained in the 1970s, identify Stanley L. Engerman as the coauthor with Robert W ....
Havana: Autobiography of a City.(Book review)
Jun 22, 2009; ... Havana. Autobiography of a City. By Alfredo Jose Estrada. (New York, N.Y.: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007. Pp. x, 277. $24.95.) This author joins hundreds of travelers who over the years have penned their impressions of Cuba and its capital city of Havana. A cursory "subject heading" ...
James Fenimore Cooper: The Early Years.(Book review)
Jun 22, 2009; ... James Fenimore Cooper: The Early Years. By Wayne Franklin. (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 2007. Pp. xxxiv, 708. $40.00.) This year's much anticipated publication of the first volume of Wayne Franklin's biography of James Fenimore Cooper, covering the author's life to ...
No Caption Needed: Iconic Photographs, Public Culture, and Liberal Democracy.(Book review)
Jun 22, 2009; ... No Caption Needed: Iconic Photographs, Public Culture, and Liberal Democracy. By Robert Hariman and John Louis Lucaites. (Chicago, Ill.: University of Chicago Press, 2007. Pp. xi, 419. $30.00.) No Caption Needed is a snappy title. However, the subtitle, Iconic Photographs, ...
The Secret Leprosy of Modern Days: Narcotic Addiction and Cultural Crisis in the United States, 1870-1920.(Book review)
Jun 22, 2009; ... The Secret Leprosy of Modern Days: Narcotic Addiction and Cultural Crisis in the United States, 1870-1920. By Timothy A. Hickman. (Amherst, Mass.: University of Massachusetts Press, 2007. Pp. xiv, 190. $22.95.) The author has written an important, yet ultimately unsatisfying, ...
Frontiers: A Short History of the American West.(Book review)
Jun 22, 2009; ... Frontiers: A Short History of the American West. By Robert V. Hine and John Mack Faragher. (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 2007. Pp. vii, 248. $28.00.) This volume is the abridged, updated edition of the authors' now classic study The American West: A New Interpretive ...
Unruly Americans and the Origins of the Constitution.(Book review)
Jun 22, 2009; ... Unruly Americans and the Origins of the Constitution. By Woody Holton. (New York, N.Y.: Hill and Wang, 2007. Pp. 370. $27.00.) This book follows a neo-Beardian interpretation of the Constitution. The author presents a more subtle and nuanced perspective than Charles Beard by ...
Lincoln and the American Manifesto.(Book review)
Jun 22, 2009; ... Lincoln and the American Manifesto. By Allen Jayne. (Amherst, N.Y.: Prometheus Books, 2007. Pp. 392. $28.00.) Although the author wants to give the impression that this book is about Abraham Lincoln's understanding of the Declaration of Independence (hence the title), it starts ...