D'Emilio & Freedman give a deeper understanding of how sexuality has dramatically influenced politics & culture throughout history. "The book John D'Emilio co-wrote with Estelle B. Freedman, Intimate Matters, was cited by Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy when, writing for a majority of court on July 26, he and his colleagues struck down a Texas law criminalizing sodomy. The decision was widely hailed as a victory for gay rights—& it derived in part, according to Kennedy's written comments, from the information he gleaned from D'Emilio's book, which traces the history of American perspectives on sexual relationships from the nation's founding thru the present day. The justice mentioned Intimate Matters specifically in the court's decision."—Julia Keller, Chicago Tribune "Fascinating...[they] marshall their material to chart a gradual but decisive shift in the way Americans have understood sex & its meaning in their lives."—Barbara Ehrenreich, NY Times Book Review "With comprehensiveness & care...D'Emilio & Freedman have surveyed the sexual patterns for an entire nation across four centuries."—Martin Bauml Duberman, Nation "Intimate Matters is comprehensive, meticulous & intelligent."—Jonathan Yardley, Washington Post Book World "This book is remarkable...bound to become the definitive survey of American sexual history for years to come."—Roy Porter, Journal of the History of the Behavioral SciencesAcknowledgmentsIntroductionThe reproductive matrix, 1600-1800Divided passions, 1780-1900 Toward a new sexual order, 1880-1930 The rise & fall of sexual liberalism, 1920 to the presentNotesSelected BibliographyIndex

    secularist, denomination vs. denomination, liberal vs. conservative -- in the last forty years, American Jews have increasingly found themselves torn apart by their diversity. In this chronicle of the evolution of American Jewry, Samuel G. Freedman illuminates the forces that have undermined the traditional peaceful coexistence among the Orthodox, Conservative, Reform, and Reconstructionist branches, and secular and unaffiliated Jews. Examining recent headline-making stories as well as less publicized controversies, Freedman discusses the vitriolic battles that have arisen over intermarriage, standards of conversion, the role of women in religious ritual, the Middle East peace process, and the secular influence on religious life. As he weighs the arguments of both extremes, Freedman comes to the controversial conclusion that the Jewish-American community is headed for a Reformation, a permanent fracture of one faith into many.

    It seeks to unveil the mystery of that man. Historians tell us Muhammad used to withdraw to a cave, spending days wrapped in his thoughts. He heard bells ringing and had ghostly visions. He thought he was demon possessed, until his wife reassured him he had become a prophet. Convinced of his status, he was intolerant of those who rejected him, assassinated those who criticized him, raided, looted, and massacred entire populations. He reduced thousands to slavery, raped, and allowed his men to rape female captives. All of this, he did with a clear conscience and a sense of entitlement. He was magnanimous toward those who admired him, but vengeful toward those who did not. He believed he was the most perfect human creation and the universe's raison d'être. Muhammad was no ordinary man. He was a narcissist. Understanding Muhammad, ventures beyond the stories. Focusing on the "why" rather than the "what," it unravels the mystique of one of the most enigmatic and influential men in history.

    Since women earned the right to vote a little under one hundred years ago, our progress hasn't been the Olympic sprint toward gender equality first wave feminists hoped for, but more of a slow, elderly mall walk (with frequent stops to Cinnabon) over the four hundred million hurdles we still face. Some of these obstacles are obvious-unequal pay, under-representation in government, reproductive restrictions, lack of floor-length mirrors in hotel rooms. But a lot of them are harder to identify. They're the white noise of oppression that we've accepted as lady business as usual, and the patriarchy wants to keep it that way. Erin Gibson has a singular goal-to create a utopian future where women are recognized as humans. In Feminasty -- titled after her nickname on the hit podcast "Throwing Shade" -- she has written a collection of make-you-laugh-until-you-cry essays that expose the hidden rules that make life as a woman unnecessarily hard and deconstructs them in a way that's bold, provocative and hilarious. Whether it's shaming women for having their periods, allowing them into STEM fields but never treating them like they truly belong, or dictating strict rules for how they should dress in every situation, Erin breaks down the organized chaos of old fashioned sexism, intentional and otherwise, that systemically keeps women down.

    Attention has been focused on forms of social organization, be it civil society, democratic communitarianism, or associative democracy, that can humanize the market and the administrative state. In their new Introduction the authors relate the argument of their book both to the current realities of American society and to the growing debate about the country's future. With this new edition one of the most influential books of recent times takes on a new immediacy.

    Even average Israelis are wondering if they wouldn't be better off somewhere else and whether they ought to persevere. Daniel Gordis is confident his fellow Jews can renew their faith in the cause, and in Saving Israel, he outlines how.2009 National Jewish Book Award winnerAddresses the most pressing issues faced by Israel-and American Jews-today, without recycling the same old argumentsLays to rest some of the most pernicious myths about Israel, including: Jews could thrive without Israel; Israeli Arabs just want equality, and Palestinians just want their own state; peace will come, if Israel will just do the right things""Morally powerful . . . from a writer whose reflections are consistently as intellectually impressive as they are moving. . . . Gordis addresses the exigencies of our time with the urgency they overridingly demand, and with the depth of feeling they inspire.""-Cynthia OzickGordis has written many popular personal essays and memoirs in the past, but Saving Israel is a full-throated call to arms. Never has the case for defending-no, celebrating-the existence of Israel been so clear, so passionate, or so worthy of wholehearted support.

    From the division of Jerusalem and Israeli counterterrorism measures to the security fence and the Iranian nuclear threat, his analyses are clear-headed, well-argued, and sure to be controversial. According to Dershowitz, achieving a lasting peace will require more than tough-minded negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians. In academia, Europe, the UN, and the Arab world, Israel-bashing and anti-Semitism have reached new heights, despite the recent Israeli-Palestinian movement toward peace. Surveying this outpouring of vilification, Dershowitz deconstructs the smear tactics used by Israel-haters and shows how this kind of anti-Israel McCarthyism is aimed at scuttling any real chance of peace.

    Lubavitcher Hasidim are famous for their efforts to inspire secular Jews to become more observant and for their messianic fervor. Strict followers of Orthodox Judaism, they maintain sharp gender-role distinctions. Levine spent a year living in the Lubavitch community of Crown Heights, Brooklyn, participating in the rhythms of Hasidic girlhood. Drawing on many intimate hours among Hasidim and over 30 in-depth interviews, Mystics, Mavericks, and Merrymakers offers rich portraits of individual Hasidic young women and how they deal with the conflicts between the regimented society in which they live and the pull of mainstream American life. This superbly crafted book offers intimate stories from Hasidic teenagers' lives, providing an intriguing twist to a universal theme: the struggle to grow up and define who we are within the context of culture, family, and life-driving beliefs.

    Focusing on the disorderly conduct women and some men used to break away from the Victorian Era's rigid class and sex roles, it examines the dramatic changes in male-female relations, family structure, sex, social custom, and ritual that occurred as colonial America was transformed by rapid industrialization. Included are two now classic essays on gender relations in 19th-century America, The Female World of Love and Ritual: Relations Between Women in Nineteenth-Century America and The New Woman as Androgyne: Social Order and Gender Crisis, 1870-1936, as well as Smith-Rosenberg's more recent work, on abortion, homosexuality, religious fanatics, and revisionist history. Throughout Disorderly Conduct, Smith-Rosenberg startles and convinces, making us re-evaluate a society we thought we understood, a society whose outward behavior and inner emotional life now take on a new meaning.

    His mission was straightforward: to help the refugees who had settled in the sprawling slums of Nairobi, Kenya, to begin small businesses and earn a living. He imagined that he would be teaching them much, and he did. But the Kenyans and refugees with whom the author worked - from Rwanda, Somalia, Sudan, Uganda, Ethiopia - would end up teaching him much more about life, about survival and faith, and about love and friendship.

    Lillian Faderman persuasively argues that their lesbianism may in fact have facilitated their accomplishments. A book of impeccable research and compelling readability, TO BELIEVE IN WOMEN will be a source of enlightenment for all, and for many a singular source of pride.

    Second Hand Smoke is the story of Mila's sons, Issac and Duncan, the one secretly abandoned in Poland, and the other, American-born, raised as an avenging Nazi hunter, poisoned with rage.Told in bursts of fractured realism and dark comedy, Second Hand Smoke is a postmodern mystery of great lyrical power, deep insight, and emotional resonance.

    Rami Elhanan is Israeli. They inhabit a world of conflict that colors every aspect of their daily lives, from the roads they are allowed to drive on, to the schools their daughters, Abir and Smadar, each attend, to the checkpoints, both physical and emotional, they must negotiate.Their worlds shift irreparably after ten-year-old Abir is killed by a rubber bullet and thirteen-year-old Smadar becomes the victim of suicide bombers. When Bassam and Rami learn of each other's stories, they recognize the loss that connects them and they attempt to use their grief as a weapon for peace.McCann crafts Apeirogon out of a universe of fictional and nonfictional material. He crosses centuries and continents, stitching together time, art, history, nature, and politics in a tale both heartbreaking and hopeful. Musical, cinematic, muscular, delicate, and soaring, Apeirogon is a novel for our time.

    Her Great-Aunt Resi had been married to a Jew in Czechoslovakia before World War II--a marriage that, while happy, created tremendous difficulties for the extended family once the Nazis took over their hometown in 1938, and ultimately did not survive the pressures of the time. Annette and Harry's love, meanwhile, was the ultimate nightmare for Harry's family of Holocaust survivors. Weighed down by the burdens of their family histories, Annette and Harry kept their relationship secret for three years, until they could forge a path into the future and create a new life in Chicago. As time went on, however, Annette found a spiritual home in Judaism--a choice that paved the way toward acceptance by Harry's family, and redemption for some of the wounds of her own family's past.

    The poems are haunting, the evocation of emotional life vivid. But her analysis also reveals how deeply implicated poetry and sentiment are in the play of power and the maintenance of a system of social hierarchy. What begins as a puzzle about a single poetic genre becomes a reflection on the politics of sentiment and the relationship between ideology and human experience.