Weekly Book List, January 25, 2010

ANTHROPOLOGY

Adoring the Saints: Fiestas in Central Mexico by Yolanda Lastra, Joel Sherzer, and Dina Sherzer (University of Texas Press; 211 pages; $38.95). A study of two linked patron saint festivals in the state of Guanajuato: the fiestas of the village of Cruz del Palmar and the town of San Luis de la Paz.

The Anthropology of News and Journalism: Global Perspectives edited by S. Elizabeth Bird (Indiana University Press; 328 pages; $65 hardcover, $24.95 paperback). Essays on such topics as newspaper literacies in India, news and myth in Venezuela, and going beyond “newsroom-centricity” in ethnographic studies of journalism.

The Art of the Gut: Manhood, Power, and Ethics in Japanese Politics by Robin M. LeBlanc (University of California Press; 229 pages; $60 hardcover, $24.95 paperback). Explores ethical codes in Japanese masculinity through an ethnographic study of two men entering political life---one the rural leader of a citizens’ referendum movement, the other working to succeed his father in a Tokyo ward assembly.

Too Smart for Our Own Good: The Ecological Predicament of Humankind by Craig Dilworth (Cambridge University Press; 546 pages; $90 hardcover, $29.99 paperback). Argues that ecologically disruptive behavior has its origins in the nature of humans as a species.

Toward an Anthropology of Government: Democratic Transformations and Nation Building in Wales by William R. Schumann (Palgrave Macmillan; 216 pages; $79.95). Offers an ethnographic perspective on legitimacy as a political and cultural practice in the wake of Wales’ establishment of a parliament in 1999, the first such body for nearly six centuries.

Wild Games: Hunting and Fishing Traditions in North America edited by Dennis Cutchins and Eric A. Eliason (University of Tennessee Press; 252 pages; $48). Essays on such topics as coyote tracking, the culture of the deer camp, and the role of gender in outdoor life.

ARCHAEOLOGY

The Beginnings of Mesoamerican Civilization: Inter-Regional Interaction and the Olmec by Robert M. Rosenswig (Cambridge University Press; 350 pages; $95). Examines debates over Early Formative society in Mesoamerica; draws on data from the Soconusco area of Pacifica Chiapas and Guatemala.

The Life of the Longhouse: An Archaeology of Ethnicity by Peter Metcalf (Cambridge University Press; 384 pages; $85). Draws on oral histories and colonial records in a study of how trade figured in the practice of constructing massive buildings along rivers in Borneo.

TIbes: People, Power, and Ritual at the Center of the Cosmos edited by L. Antonio Curet and Lisa M. Stringer (University of Alabama Press; 329 pages; $53 hardcover, $34.95 paperback). Research on a prehistoric civic and ceremonial center north of Ponce on the southern coast of Puerto Rico.

ART AND ARCHITECTURE

Ingres: Painting Reimagined by Susan L. Siegfried (Yale University Press; 320 pages; $75). A study of the 19th-century French artist’s rethinking of pictorial narrative.

A Keener Perception: Ecocritical Studies in American Art History edited by Alan C. Braddock and Christoph Irmscher (University of Alabama Press; 298 pages; $60 hardcover, $29.95 paperback). New and previously published essays on such topics as vivification and the early art of William Bartram (1739-1823) and the “sumptuary ecology” of Buckminster Fuller’s designs.

New Deal Art in Arizona by Betsy Fahlman (University of Arizona Press; 203 pages; $49.95). Discusses the American Indian muralist Gerald Nailor and other artists working in the state under New Deal programs.

Salvador Dali’s Literary Self-Portrait: Approaches to a Surrealist Autobiography by Carmen Garcia de la Rasilla, translated by Fernando Gonzalez de Leon (Bucknell University Press; 200 pages; $48.50). A study of the artist’s 1942 book A Secret Life.

The Self in Black and White: Race and Subjectivity in Postwar American Photography by Erina Duganne (Dartmouth College Press/University Press of New England; 236 pages; $29.95). Topics include “Profile of Poverty,” a government-sponsored exhibition in 1965 designed to build support for the “War on Poverty.”

The Urban Spectator: American Concept Cities From Kodak to Google by Eric Gordon (Dartmouth College Press/University Press of New England; 248 pages; $35). Considers how media and technologies shaped the development of modern cities and produced a particular way of seeing, here termed “possessive spectatorship.”

The World Created in the Image of Man: The Conflict Between Pictorial Form and Space in Defiance of the Law of Temporality by Vladimir Brodsky (Peter Lang Publishing; 124 pages; $64.95). Traces the evolution of the third dimension in painting.

CLASSICAL STUDIES

Freud’s Rome: Psychoanalysis and Latin Poetry by Ellen Oliensis (Cambridge University Press; 160 pages; $80 hardcover, $26.99 paperback). Considers the value of psychoanalytic theory in the study of Latin poetry; draws on Freud’s ideas on slips and dreams in relation to themes of mourning, motherhood, and sexual difference and the poetry of Catullus, Virgil, and Ovid.

Lucretian Receptions: History, the Sublime, Knowledge by Philip Hardie (Cambridge University Press; 316 pages; $90). Discusses Lucretius’ De Rerum Natura as a model for Virgil and Horace as well as other ancient and later poets.

COMMUNICATION

The Media’s Role in Defining a Nation: The Active Voice by David A. Copeland (Peter Lang Publishing; 326 pages; $34.95). Considers how changes in technology have altered the practices of participatory journalism over the course of American history.

Porn.Com: Making Sense of Online Pornography edited by Feona Attwood (Peter Lang Publishing; 287 pages; $32.95). Essays on such topics as the visual culture of online swinging, the concept and classification of child pornography, and the discourse of online “porn fandom.”

CRIMINOLOGY

Criminology and Public Policy: Putting Theory to Work edited by Hugh D. Barlow and Scott H. Decker (Temple University Press; 292 pages; $79.50 hardcover, $29.95 paperback). Essays on major theories in criminology and their application to such issues as crime reduction, prisoner reentry, gang behavior, and treatment courts.

ECONOMICS

Economics and Marijuana: Consumption, Pricing, and Legalisation by Kenneth W. Clements and Xueyan Zhao (Cambridge University Press; 440 pages; $99). A study of marijuana consumption and pricing in Australia, where the drug has been decriminalized in some states; topics include taking the option of taxation.

Global Imbalances, Exchange Rates, and Stabilization Policy by Anthony J. Makin (Palgrave Macmillan; 200 pages; $89.95). Offers a macro-foundations approach.

Industrial Policy in Europe, Japan, and the USA: Amounts, Mechanisms, and Effectiveness by Pierre-Andre Buigues and Khalid Sekkat (Palgrave Macmillan; 232 pages; $90). Evaluates industrial policy in Britain, France, Germany, Japan, and the United States.

EDUCATION

Critical Pedagogy, Ecoliteracy, and Planetary Crisis: The Ecopedagogy Movement by Richard Kahn (Peter Lang Publishing; 186 pages; $32.95). Draws on such theorists as Paulo Freire, Ivan Illich, and Herbert Marcuse in an argument for radicalized environmental education for the global north.

ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES

Challenged by Carbon: The Oil Industry and Climate Change by Bryan Lovell (Cambridge University Press; 212 pages; $90 hardcover, $29.99 paperback). Describes how the industry could help stabilize emissions through capture and storage underground of large volumes of carbon dioxide.

FILM STUDIES

Beckett on Screen: The Television Plays by Jonathan Bignell (Manchester University Press, distributed by Palgrave Macmillan; 230 pages; $74.95). Draws on BBC archives in a study of the relationship between TV adaptations of Beckett and the wider television culture in Britain and Continental Europe; includes comparative discussion of film and theater.

A Grammar of Murder: Violent Scenes and Film Form by Karla Oeler (University of Chicago Press; 282 pages; $80 hardcover, $30 paperback). Uses the murder scene to explore wider issues of cinematic history and technique; directors discussed include Eisenstein, Renoir, Hitchcock, Dassin, Kubrick, and Jarmusch.

The Radio Eye: Cinema in the North Atlantic, 1958-1988 by Jerry White (Wilfrid Laurier University Press; 281 pages; US$85). Examines experimental uses of film, video, and television to advocate for marginalized communities in Quebec, Newfoundland, the Faroe Islands, and Gaelic-speaking Ireland.

Reframing Bodies: AIDS, Bearing Witness, and the Queer Moving Image by Roger Hallas (Duke University Press; 319 pages; $89.95 hardcover, $24.95 paperback). Focuses on documentaries, autobiographical works, museum installations, and other films and videos made in response to the epidemic in North America, Europe, Australia, and South Africa.

GAY AND LESBIAN STUDIES

“Is the Rectum a Grave?” and Other Essays by Leo Bersani (University of Chicago Press; 211 pages; $75 hardcover, $25 paperback). Includes previously unpublished and previously untranslated essays on sexuality, psychoanalysis, and culture.

GEOGRAPHY

Borderlines and Borderlands: Political Oddities at the Edge of the Nation-State edited by Alexander C. Diener and Joshua Hagen (Rowman & Littlefield; 281 pages; $75 hardcover, $29.95 paperback). Topics include the “Green Line” between Israel and the West Bank, the Caprivi Strip of Namibia, the Uzbekistan-Kyrgyzstan boundary, and the Wakhan Corridor in Afghanistan.

HISTORY

Bodies of War: World War I and the Politics of Commemoration in America, 1919-1933 by Lisa M. Budreau (New York University Press; 315 pages; $50). Traces competing interests involved in commemorations of soldiers in the first war in which the U.S. military took full responsibility for the identification, burial, and memorialization of those killed in battle.

Bomb Power: The Modern Presidency and the National Security State by Garry Wills (Penguin Press; 278 pages; $27.95). Considers how the invention of the atomic bomb and the secrecy precedent of the Manhattan Project transformed U.S. politics and expanded the role of the executive.

Byzantine Jewry in the Mediterranean Economy by Joshua Holo (Cambridge University Press; 298 pages; $99). Documents how both the Jewish community’s inward and outward economic orientations reinforced their integration in wider society.

Celebrating the Republic: Presidential Ceremony and Popular Sovereignty, From Washington to Monroe by Sandra Moats (Northern Illinois University Press; 243 pages; $36). A study of how the first five presidents used symbolism to link the public to the national government.

Clausewitz Reconsidered by H.P. Willmott and Michael B. Barrett (Praeger Publishers; 236 pages; $49.95 hardcover, $22.95 paperback). Reevaluates the viability of the theories in Clausewitz’s seminal On War in light of war conducted by and against non-state actors.

The Color of the Land: Race, Nation, and the Politics of Landownership in Oklahoma, 1832-1929 by David A. Chang (University of North Carolina Press; 293 pages; $59.95 hardcover, $22.95 paperback). A study of rural land tenure in the Creek nation and eastern Oklahoma.

Cow Boys and Cattle Men: Class and Masculinities on the Texas Frontier, 1865-1900 by Jacqueline M. Moore (New York University Press; 288 pages; $42). Describes how as the frontier was settled, cowboys were pressured to restrain their fighting, gambling, and other behaviors once deemed most manly.

Delaware Tribe in a Cherokee Nation by Brice Obermeyer (University of Nebraska Press; 319 pages; $45). A study of the Delaware Indians, a tribe that was incorporated into the unrelated Cherokees because of forced removal in 1867; traces their efforts to gain federal recognition as a separate entity.

Domestic Economies: Family, Work, and Welfare in Mexico City, 1884-1943 by Ann S. Blum (University of Nebraska Press; 351 pages; $30). Topics include how evolving family law reflected ideas about class differences and the social roles and responsibilities of parents and children.

Echoes of Chongqing: Women in Wartime China by Danke Li (University of Illinois Press; 215 pages; $70 hardcover, $25 paperback). Presents annotated oral histories of 20 women who lived in the city during China’s war of resistance against Japan.

Eichmann’s Men by Hans Safrian, translated by Ute Stargardt (Cambridge University Press; 317 pages; $85 hardcover, $23.99 paperback). First English translation of the German historian’s influential 1993 work on the men who helped Eichmann carry out deportations of Jews across Europe; includes updating for the translation.

Entering the Fray: Gender, Politics, and Culture in the New South edited by Jonathan Daniel Wells and Sheila R. Phipps (University of Missouri Press; 272 pages; $44.95). Topics include conservative activism by white women in 1920s Georgia, children’s challenges to segregated recreational space in 1940s New Orleans, and black women’s political involvement in 1950s Memphis.

For Both Cross and Flag: Catholic Action, Anti-Catholicism, and National Security Politics in World War II San Francisco by William Issel (Temple University Press; 216 pages; $35). Focuses on Sylvester Andriano, an Italian-American Catholic activist who was falsely accused of having Fascist sympathies in state and federal Un-American Activities Committee hearings.

Ghosts of Home: The Afterlife of Czernowitz in Jewish Memory by Marianne Hirsch and Leo Spitzer (University of California Press; 362 pages; $39.95). Combines scholarly and personal perspectives in a study of the history and collective memory of a Ukrainian city (renamed in 1918) that was once known by Jews as the “Vienna of the East.”

Here in This Year: Seventeenth-Century Nahuatl Annals of the Tlaxcala-Puebla Valley edited and translated by Camilla Townsend with an essay by James Lockhart (Stanford University Press; 224 pages; $55). Edition of a document by an indigenous writer recounting politics, epidemics, and other events in Puebla, Mexico.

The Heroic City: Paris, 1945-58 by Rosemary Wakeman (University of Chicago Press; 401 pages; $35). Discusses protest marches, festivals, and other aspects of life on Parisian streets in the decade after liberation.

Historians of the Jews and the Holocaust by David Engel (Stanford University Press; 320 pages; $65). Describes how many historians of the Jews have argued for a partition between their field and histories of the Holocaust; links that phenomenon to developments in Jewish historical profession in the 1920s.

“If You Leave Us Here, We Will Die": How Genocide Was Stopped in East Timor by Geoffrey Robinson (Princeton University Press; 319 pages; $35). Combines scholarly and personal perspectives in a study of intervention in East Timor and the previous history and politics of the violence that followed Indonesia’s invasion of the former Portuguese colony in 1975.

Imaginary Lines: Border Enforcement and the Origins of Undocumented Immigration, 1882-1930 by Patrick Ettinger (University of Texas Press; 244 pages; $60). Traces the shifting history of enforcement along both the Northern and Southern borders.

Imperial Alchemy: Nationalism and Political Identity in Southeast Asia by Anthony Reid (Cambridge University Press; 262 pages; $75 hardcover, $29.99 paperback). Traces the mid-20th-century formation of political identities in the multiethnic region.

Indology, Indomania, and Orientalism: Ancient India’s Rebirth in Modern Germany by Douglas T. McGetchin (Fairleigh Dickinson University Press; 296 pages; $66.50). Examines the scholarly and political significance of Indology in Germany, said here to have had more Indologists by the end of the 19th century than all other European powers combined.

An Infinity of Things: How Sir Henry Wellcome Collected the World by Frances Larson (Oxford University Press; 343 pages; $34.95). A “biography” of the massive and eclectic collection of objects assembled by the British businessman and philanthropist (1853-1936).

The Japanese Consumer: An Alternative Economic History of Modern Japan by Penelope Francks (Cambridge University Press; 262 pages; $90 hardcover, $32.99 paperback). Focuses on consumption and preferences in an economic history of Japan since the 18th century, with comparative discussion of Europe and North America.

Madame Vieux Carre: The French Quarter in the Twentieth Century by Scott S. Ellis (University Press of Mississippi; 240 pages; $28). Combines scholarly and personal perspectives in a study of the original settlement in what became New Orleans.

Mexico, la patria! Propaganda and Production During World War II by Monica A. Rankin (University of Nebraska Press; 366 pages; $30). Discusses both domestic and foreign propaganda campaigns during the war; topics include how the war was used by the government of Avila Camacho to justify a massive industrialization effort.

Negotiating in the Press: American Journalism and Diplomacy, 1918-1919 by Joseph R. Hayden (Louisiana State University Press; 320 pages; $45). Documents the influence of journalists at the Paris Peace Conference.

Offenders or Victims? German Jews and the Causes of Modern Catholic Antisemitism by Olaf Blaschke (University of Nebraska Press; 224 pages; $50). Examines the roots of Catholics’ negative perceptions of Jews in 19th- and early 20th-century Germany.

The Other Alliance: Student Protest in West Germany and the United States in the Global Sixties by Martin Klimke (Princeton University Press; 346 pages; $29.50). Draws on interviews and previously classified documents in a study of links between the two student movements, and government responses to those relations.

The Politics of Procurement: Military Acquisition in Canada and the “Sea King” Helicopter by Aaron Plamondon (University of British Columbia Press; 288 pages; US$85). A critique of Canada’s weapons-procurement process since confederation; focuses on the Liberal Party’s quashing of an order to replace the Sea King maritime helicopter in 1993.

Power Over Peoples: Technology, Environments, and Western Imperialism, 1400 to the Present by Daniel R. Headrick (Princeton University Press; 472 pages; $35). Examines the weapons and other technologies that assured imperialist victory on many occasions, but were ineffective at other times.

The Protestant International and the Huguenot Migration to Virginia by David E. Lambert (Peter Lang Publishing; 222 pages; $74.95). Discusses the combined patronage of Britain’s King William III and Henri de Ruvigny, Lord Galway, in the sponsorship of the Manakin settlement in 1700.

Revolutionary Conceptions: Women, Fertility, and Family Limitation in America, 1760-1820 by Susan E. Klepp (University of North Carolina Press; 352 pages; $65 hardcover, $24.95 paperback). Traces women’s efforts to exert control over their bodies, reproduction, marriages, and daughters’ opportunities.

Schooling Citizens: The Struggle for African American Education in Antebellum America by Hilary J. Moss (University of Chicago Press; 274 pages; $37.50). Argues that the rise of public schooling, with its link to American identity, increased white hostility to black education; focuses on Boston and New Haven, where white residents opposed black schooling, and slaveholding Baltimore where there was little opposition.

Slavery in Brazil by Herbert S. Klein and Francisco Vidal Luna (Cambridge University Press; 364 pages; $95 hardcover, $28.99 paperback). Examines the political economy of slavery from Portuguese colonial times to the late 19th century, as well as the daily lives of slaves.

A Story of Ambivalent Modernization in Bangladesh and West Bengal: The Rise and Fall of Bengali Elitism in South Asia by Pranab Chatterjee (Peter Lang Publishing; 294 pages; $80.95). Topics include how forces of Sanskritization, Islamization, and Anglicization have affected Bengali culture.

Ten Hills Farm: The Forgotten History of Slavery in the North by C.S. Manegold (Princeton University Press; 317 pages; $29.95). Traces five generations of slave owners linked to a 600-acre estate passed from the Winthrop, Usher, and Royall families just north of Boston.

The Two Hendricks: Unraveling a Mohawk Mystery by Eric Hinderaker (Harvard University Press; 354 pages; $35). Reconstructs the lives of two 18th-century Mohawk Indian leaders, Tejonihokarawa and Theyanoguin, who both shared an English name of Hendrick and who were once thought to be the same man.

An Uncompromising Generation: The Nazi Leadership of the Reich Security Main Office by Michael Wildt, translated by Tom Lampert (University of Wisconsin Press; 568 pages; $36.95). Discusses the radicalization of young Germans who became leading members of the Reich Security Main Office, which fused together the Gestapo, the Criminal Police, and the security service of the SS.

The Unconverted Self: Jews, Indians, and the Identity of Christian Europe by Jonathan Boyarin (University of Chicago Press; 192 pages; $32.50). Links the European Christian relationship toward the Jews as “other” to later attitudes toward the colonized peoples of the New World.

Vegas at Odds: Labor Conflict in a Leisure Economy, 1960-1985 by James P. Kraft (Johns Hopkins University Press; 304 pages; $55). Examines the struggles of casino and hotel workers in Las Vegas.

We Were All Like Migrant Workers Here: Work, Community, and Memory on California’s Round Valley Reservation, 1850-1941 by William J. Bauer Jr. (University of North Carolina Press; 320 pages; $49.95). Draws on oral-history interviews in a study of the Round Valley Indians’ experience of forced and wage labor, and its role in their survival and identity.

HISTORY OF SCIENCE

Predicting the Unpredictable: The Tumultuous Science of Earthquake Prediction by Susan Hough (Princeton University Press; 260 pages; $24.95). Traces the history of both the science and pseudoscience of earthquake prediction.

Species, Serpents, Spirits, and Skulls: Science at the Margins in the Victorian Age by Sherrie Lynne Lyons (State University of New York Press; 245 pages; $75). Discusses the blurred boundaries of science and pseudoscience through a study of public and scientific interest in phrenology, sea serpents, spiritualism, and Darwin’s theory of evolution.

HISTORY OF TECHNOLOGY

Engineering Play: A Cultural History of Children’s Software by Mizuko Ito (MIT Press; 234 pages; $24.95). Describes how philosophies of instruction, exploration, and construction have shaped the development of software for children; sources include interviews with developers and observations of children’s play.

JOURNALISM

The Death and Life of American Journalism: The Media Revolution That Will Begin the World Again by Robert W. McChesney and John Nichols (Nation Books; 334 pages; $26.95). Links the current crisis in journalism to issues of corporate control that precede the Internet and the current economic troubles; argues for a new form of independent journalism.

LAW

Feminized Justice: The Toronto Women’s Court, 1913-34 by Amanda Glasbeek (University of British Columbia Press; 240 pages; US$85). Discusses the defendants, cases, and officials of a police court run by and for women.

LINGUISTICS

Chomsky Notebook edited by Jean Bricmont and Julie Franck (Columbia University Press; 351 pages; $89.50 hardcover, $29.50 paperback). Writings on the evolution of Noam Chomsky’s linguistic theory, as well as his contributions to the philosophy of mind, his politics, and his relationship to academe.

Toward a Deaf Translation Norm by Christopher Stone (Gallaudet University Press; 200 pages; $75). Draws on research on the rendering of broadcast television news into British Sign Language.

“Why Do You Ask?": The Function of Questions in Institutional Discourse edited by Alice F. Freed and Susan Ehrlich (Oxford University Press; 356 pages; $99 hardcover, $39.95 paperback). Essays by linguists, sociologists, and other scholars on the use of questions in legal, medical, office, educational, and other settings.

LITERATURE

Acts of Reading: Interpretation, Reading Practices, and the Idea of the Book in John Foxe’s “Actes and Monuments” edited by Thomas P. Anderson and Ryan Netzley (University of Delaware Press; 312 pages; $65). Essays on the impact of the 16th-century martyrologist’s Actes on early-modern reading practices; also examines how new electronic editions have affected scholarship.

Black Banners: Genre Scenes From the Turn of the Century by August Strindberg, translated by Donald K. Weaver (Peter Lang Publishing; 201 pages; $72.95). Translation of Svarta fanor, a roman a clef written in 1904 in which Strindberg attacked the decadence and immorality of Stockholm’s literary circles and cultural life.

Black, Brown, and Beige: Surrealist Writings From Africa and the Diaspora edited by Franklin Rosemont and Robin D.G. Kelley (University of Texas Press; 395 pages; $65). Edition of texts that document writers’ involvement in the Surrealist movement in Africa, the Caribbean, South America, and other regions.

Boudica and Her Stories: Narrative Transformations of a Warrior Queen by Carolyn D. Williams (University of Delaware Press; 272 pages; $65). Examines depictions of the ancient British queen, and her unsuccessful rebellion against Roman rule, from a mention in Tacitus in AD 98 to history, fiction, drama, and poetry through the present.

Collecting Women: Poetry and Lives, 1700-1780 by Chantel M. Lavoie (Bucknell University Press; 216 pages; $53). Focuses on Aphra Behn, Anne Finch, Katherine Philips, and Elizabeth Rowe in a study of the place of female writers in anthologies and other collections of the era.

The Dialectic of Counter-Enlightenment by Christian Thorne (Harvard University Press; 377 pages; $49.95). A history and critique of anti-foundationalist thought, particularly in relation to its influence in literary studies.

Don Pedro Calderon by Don W. Cruickshank (Cambridge University Press; 494 pages; $99). A biography of the 17th-century Spanish dramatist, courtier, soldier, and priest.

French and American Noir: Dark Crossings by Alistair Rolls and Deborah Walker (Palgrave Macmillan; 229 pages; $80). Identifies a French origin, back to Baudelaire, for the noir genre of French novels and films, apart from American influences.

Homo americanus: Ernest Hemingway, Tennessee Williams, and Queer Masculinities by John S. Bak (Fairleigh Dickinson University Press; 312 pages; $65). Traces literary, sociopolitical, and other ties between the two, who met only once, on April 7, 1959, in Havana.

Indian Writers: Transnationalisms and Diasporas edited by Jaspal K. Singh and Rajendra Chetty (Peter Lang Publishing; 186 pages; $76.95). Essays on such writers as Imraan Coovadia, Aziz Hassim, and Bharati Mukherjee.

The Inverted Conquest: The Myth of Modernity and the Transatlantic Onset of Modernism by Alejandro Mejias-Lopez (Vanderbilt University Press; 248 pages; $55). A study of Latin American modernismo (1880s-1920s) in Spain as the first instance in which a postcolonial literature conquered the literary realm of the former European metropolis.

The Literary Market: Authorship and Modernity in the Old Regime by Geoffrey Turnovsky (University of Pennsylvania Press; 286 pages; $59.95). Offers a revisionist perspective on the shift from patronage to market for French authors.

The Maudlin Impression: English Literary Images of Mary Magdalene, 1550-1700 by Patricia Badir (University of Notre Dame Press; 300 pages; $38). Argues that depictions of Mary Magdalene worked as a “site of memory” for writers in the wake of the Protestant Reformation.

The Networked Wilderness: Communicating in Early New England by Matt Cohen (University of Minnesota Press; 237 pages; $67.50 hardcover, $22.50 paperback). Explores colonist and Indian communication in such varied realms as books, paths, totems, recipes, and animals.

Samuel Beckett and the Postcolonial Novel by Patrick Bixby (Cambridge University Press; 246 pages; $75). Sets Beckett’s work in the context of the Irish Free State and discusses his fiction as an example of how postcolonial writing explores the relationship between private consciousness and the public sphere.

Secrets of the Oracle: A History of Wisdom From Zeno to Yeats by W. David Shaw (University of Toronto Press; 390 pages; US$65). Draws on literary, philosophical, and religious realms in a study of “wisdom writers” since ancient times.

The Seduction Narrative in Britain, 1747-1800 by Katherine Binhammer (Cambridge University Press; 254 pages; $90). Sets Richardson’s Clarissa and other fictional or actual seduction narratives in the context of a new ideal of marriage for love.

Sensation and Modernity in the 1860s by Nicholas Daly (Cambridge University Press; 264 pages; $85). Considers how fiction, drama, fine art, and other forms in high and low culture reflected anxieties before the “leap in the dark” of the 1867 Reform Bill, which greatly increased the scope of suffrage in Britain.

Thinking Poetics: Essays on George Oppen edited by Steve Shoemaker (University of Alabama Press; 283 pages; $54.50 hardcover, $34.95 paperback). New and previously published writings on the Objectivist American poet (1908-84).

Unlikely Exemplars: Reading and Imitating Beyond the Italian Canon in French Renaissance Poetry by Joann Dellaneva (University of Delaware Press; 444 pages; $57.50). Describes how Baif, Du Bellay, Saint-Gelais, and other French poets turned for models to “second-rate” poets in volumes known as the Italian anthologies.

Victorian Vogue: British Novels on Screen by Dianne F. Sadoff (University of Minnesota Press; 329 pages; $75 hardcover, $25 paperback). Describes how film adaptations of 19th-century British novels fulfill varied cultural functions in different eras.

Wounds, Flesh, and Metaphor in Seventeenth-Century England by Sarah Covington (Palgrave Macmillan; 252 pages; $80). Draws on literary, philosophical, and other texts in a study of how metaphors of woundedness were used to represent the political and religious divisions of the time.

MEDICINE

Diagnosis, Therapy, and Evidence: Conundrums in Modern American Medicine by Gerald N. Grob and Allan V. Horwitz (Rutgers University Press; 253 pages; $72 hardcover, $26.95 paperback). Combines medical history and sociology in a study of weaknesses in diagnosis and treatment, including in cancer, heart disease, and depression.

MUSIC

The Music of Django Reinhardt by Benjamin Givan (University of Michigan Press; 256 pages; $75 hardcover, $29.95 paperback). A critical and biographical study of the Belgian-born Gypsy jazz guitarist (1910-53).

PHILOSOPHY

Against the Spiritual Turn: Marxism, Realism, and Critical Theory by Sean Creaven (Routledge; 498 pages; $175). Criticizes the recent spiritual turn in the writings of the British philosopher Roy Bhaskar, beginning with From East to West (2000); argues that it undermines his earlier work.

Grounding Cosmopolitanism: From Kant to the Idea of a Cosmopolitan Constitution by Garrett Wallace Brown (Edinburgh University Press, distributed by Columbia University Press; 234 pages; $85). Discusses Kant’s cosmopolitan thought as a form of international constitutional jurisprudence that satisfies communitarian, realist, and pluralist concerns.

Husserl and the Promise of Time: Subjectivity in Transcendental Phenomenology by Nicolas de Warren (Cambridge University Press; 322 pages; $90). Discusses the evolution and centrality of the Austrian philosopher’s view of time consciousness.

Irigaray and Kierkegaard: On the Construction of the Self by Helene Tallon Russell (Mercer University Press; 264 pages; $35). Discusses the 19th-century Danish philosopher and the contemporary French thinker Luce Irigaray and their alternatives to unitary concepts of selfhood.

POLITICAL SCIENCE

The Caliphate Question: The British Government and Islamic Governance by Sean Oliver-Dee (Lexington Books; 234 pages; $70). Focuses on British foreign policy and the Islamic world from World War I through the early cold war.

Capital Ideas: The IMF and the Rise of Financial Liberalization by Jeffrey M. Chwieroth (Princeton University Press; 311 pages; $75 hardcover, $29.95 paperback). Traces the history of International Monetary Fund approaches to capital control and the internal debates that altered the IMF’s policies; draws on interviews and original survey data as well as archival research.

Carl Schmitt’s International Thought: Order and Orientation by William Hooker (Cambridge University Press; 244 pages; $90). A study of the controversial German political thinker (1888-1985) that focuses on his ideas of world order and his concepts of Grossraum, or large space, and the Partisan.

Child Soldiers in the Age of Fractured States edited by Scott Gates and Simon Reich (University of Pittsburgh Press; 312 pages; $27.95). Writings on the recruitment of children in armed conflicts, including case studies from Angola, Congo, and Liberia.

Consuming Politics: Jon Stewart, Branding, and the Youth Vote in America by Dan Cassino and Yasemin Besen-Cassino (Fairleigh Dickinson University Press; 264 pages; $60). Considers how 21st-century youth view the political world and why they are little engaged; pays particular attention the popularity of The Daily Show.

Degrees of Democracy: Politics, Public Opinion, and Policy by Stuart N. Soroka and Christopher Wlezien (Cambridge University Press; 256 pages; $80 hardcover, $25.99 paperback). Develops a “thermostatic” model of the relationship between public opinion and policy, with illustration from Britain and North America.

Faith, Politics, and Power: The Politics of Faith-Based Initiatives by Rebecca Sager (Oxford University Press; 249 pages; $49.95). Reports on research on the state implementation of faith-based initiatives from 1996 to 2007; finds that such programs were primarily aimed at expanding the reach of the Republican Party.

Getting a Poor Return: Courts, Justice, and Taxes by Robert M. Howard (State University of New York Press; 160 pages; $65). Considers how political interests affect tax litigation.

Parliamentary Reform at Westminster by Alexandra Kelso (Manchester University Press, distributed by Palgrave Macmillan; 219 pages; $84.95). Draws on interviews with MPs and peers in a history of British parliamentary reform from the beginning of the 20th century through the end of the Blair era, with a focus on the period since 1997.

Us Against Them: Ethnocentric Foundations of American Opinion by Donald R. Kinder and Cindy D. Kam (University of Chicago Press; 354 pages; $80 hardcover, $25 paperback). Considers how ethnocentric attitudes shape Americans’ views on such issues as terrorism, humanitarian assistance, and the welfare state.

Voting for Policy, Not Parties: How Voters Compensate for Power Sharing by Orit Kedar (Cambridge University Press; 240 pages; $85). Argues that the greater the mechanisms for compromise and power sharing, such as multiparty government, the more voters will compensate for the dilution of their vote.

The Women’s Movement Inside and Outside the State by Lee Ann Banaszak (Cambridge University Press; 256 pages; $80 hardcover, $25.99 paperback). Draws on interview and archival sources in a study of how activists in the federal government have contributed to the mobilization and success of the women’s movement.

POPULAR CULTURE

Stories of Oprah: The Oprahfication of American Culture edited by Trystan T. Cotten and Kimberly Springer (University Press of Mississippi; 240 pages; $50). Essays on Winfrey’s brand and influence, including what is termed her blending of New Age spirituality, neoliberal politics, and African-American preaching.

PUBLIC POLICY

Drawing the Line: Public and Private in America by Andrew Stark (Brookings Institution Press; 245 pages; $28.95). Discusses education, health care, land use, and other realms in a study of grassroots debates over the border between public and private in American society.

RELIGION

Acceptable Genes? Religious Traditions and Genetically Modified Foods edited by Conrad G. Brunk and Harold Coward (State University of New York Press; 272 pages; $70 hardcover, $24.95 paperback). Writings on ethical and religious issues raised by genetically engineered food, such as the incorporation of transgenes from foods otherwise forbidden in particular faiths.

Ancient Laws and Contemporary Controversies: The Need for Inclusive Biblical Interpretation by Cheryl B. Anderson (Oxford University Press; 240 pages; $25). Traces how Old Testament law continues to shape attitudes about the poor, women, homosexuals, and others.

Augustine’s Intellectual Conversion: The Journey From Platonism to Christianity by Brian Dobell (Cambridge University Press; 268 pages; $80). A study of the conversion described in Confessions 7.9, 13-21.27; argues that it occurred in the mid-390s rather than in 386 as has been widely assumed.

Being With Animals: Why We Are Obsessed With the Furry, Scaly, Feathered Creatures Who Populate Our World by Barbara J. King (Doubleday; 258 pages; $24.99). Explores spiritual and other aspects of the human connection to non-human animals.

An Ecofeminist Perspective on Ash Wednesday and Lent by Sylvia A. Sweeney (Peter Lang Publishing; 301 pages; $79.95). Draws on David Tracy’s concept of a “religious classic” in a study focusing on the Lenten “imposition of ashes.”

Open Secret: Postmessianic Messianism and the Mystical Revision of Menahem Mendel Schneerson by Elliot R. Wolfson (Columbia University Press; 452 pages; $35). A study of the famed seventh rebbe of the Habad-Lubavitch dynasty (1902-94); explores his uses of secrecy, his promotion of a mystical consciousness, and his apocalyptic sensibility.

Post-Metaphysics and the Paradoxical Teachings of Jesus: The Structure of the Real by Cameron Freeman (Peter Lang Publishing; 327 pages; $83.95). Combines Christian theology and postmodern philosophy in a study of the radical core in Jesus’ parables.

Religious Experience Reconsidered: A Building-Block Approach to the Study of Religion and Other Special Things by Ann Taves (Princeton University Press; 205 pages; $26.95). Topics include the contributions of cognitive neuroscience to the understanding of religious or spiritual experience.

Seeing Things Their Way: Intellectual History and the Return of Religion edited by Alister Chapman, John Coffey, and Brad S. Gregory (University of Notre Dame Press; 267 pages; $38). Essays that advocate and demonstrate greater dialogue between religious history and intellectual history; topics include anti-Semitism, philo-Semitism, Apocalypticism, and millenarianism in early modern Europe.

Vital Conflicts in Medical Ethics: A Virtue Approach to Craniotomy and Tubal Pregnancies by Martin Rhonheimer (Catholic University of America Press; 192 pages; $24.95). Translation of a work by the Swiss philosopher that draws on Thomistic virtue ethics to examine dilemmas concerning medical procedures.

SOCIOLOGY

Contesting Development: Critical Struggles for Social Change edited by Philip McMichael (Routledge; 269 pages; $145 hardcover, $39.95 paperback). Case studies of grassroots struggles in Brazil, India, Mexico, Nigeria, Pakistan, and other settings.

Free for All: Fixing School Food in America by Janet Poppendieck (University of California Press; 353 pages; $27.50). Draws on interviews with officials, workers, students, and activists in a study of the National School Lunch and Breakfast programs and the wider history, politics, economics, and experience of food provision in schools.

“I Know It’s Dangerous": Why Mexicans Risk Their Lives to Cross the Border by Lynnaire M. Sheridan (University of Arizona Press; 206 pages; $55 hardcover, $24.95 paperback). A study of how unauthorized migrants view and respond to the risks of the border crossing.

Lesbian and Gay Parenting: Securing Social and Educational Capital by Yvette Taylor (Palgrave Macmillan; 214 pages; $85). Focuses on Britain in a study of class as a factor in the experience of gay and lesbian parenting.

When Couples Become Parents: The Creation of Gender in the Transition to Parenthood by Bonnie Fox (University of Toronto Press; 335 pages; US$75 hardcover, US$35 paperback). Draws on data on 40 heterosexual couples in a study of how gender roles evolve and are challenged in the transition from late pregnancy through early parenthood.

SPORTS STUDIES

Smart Ball: Marketing the Myth and Managing the Reality of Major League Baseball by Robert F. Lewis II (University Press of Mississippi; 176 pages; $50). A study of MLB’s evolution as a brand.

THEATER

In the Eye of the Storm: Contemporary Theater in Barcelona by Sharon G. Feldman (Bucknell University Press; 416 pages; $82.50). Focuses on two companies, Els Joglars and La Fura dels Baus, and five playwrights, Carles Batile, Sergei Belbel, Lluisa Cunille, Josep M. Benet i Jornet, and Josep Peyre Peyro.

WOMEN’S STUDIES

Jewish Feminists: Complex Identities and Activist Lives by Dina Pinsky (University of Illinois Press; 168 pages; $60 hardcover, $20 paperback). Draws on interviews in a study of Jewish feminism of the 1960s and 70s; documents an ambivalence in the identity of Jewish feminists as both feminists and Jews.