1840 research outputs found
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The second gold rush: Oakland and the East Bay in World War II
No full textMore than any event in the twentieth century, World War II marked the coming of age of America's West Coast cities. Almost overnight, new war industries prompted the mass urban migration and development that would trigger lasting social, cultural, and political changes. For the San Francisco Bay Area, argues Marilynn Johnson, the changes brought by World War II were as dramatic as those brought by the gold rush a century earlier.Focusing on Oakland, Richmond, and other East Bay shipyard boomtowns, Johnson chronicles the defense buildup, labor migration from the South and Midwest, housing issues, and social and racial conflicts that pitted newcomers against longtime Bay Area residents. She follows this story into the postwar era, when struggles over employment, housing, and civil rights shaped the urban political landscape for the 1950s and beyond. She also traces the cultural legacy of war migration and shows how Southern religion and music became an integral part of Bay Area culture.Johnson's sources are wide-ranging and include shipyard records, labor histories, police reports, and interviews. Her findings place the war's human drama at center stage and effectively recreate the texture of daily life in workplace, home, and community. Enriched by the photographs of Dorothea Lange and others, The Second Gold Rush makes an important contribution to twentieth-century urban studies as well as to California history
Suspended music: chime-bells in the culture of Bronze Age China
No full textThe Chinese made the world's first bronze chime-bells, which they used to perform ritual music, particularly during the Shang and Zhou dynasties (ca. 1700-221 B.C.). Lothar von Falkenhausen's rich and detailed study reconstructs how the music of these bells - the only Bronze Age instruments that can still be played - may have sounded and how it was conceptualized in theoretical terms. His analysis and discussion of the ritual, political, and technical aspects of this music provide a unique window into ancient Chinese culture.This is the first interdisciplinary perspective on recent archaeological finds that have transformed our understanding of ancient Chinese music. Of great significance to the understanding of Chinese culture in its crucial formative stage, it provides a fresh point of departure for exploring later Asian musical history and offers great possibilities for comparisons with music worldwide
Latin America in the 1940's: war and postwar transitions
No full textLatin America in the 1940s addresses the significant impact that World War II and the onset of the Cold War had on the political development of Latin America. During the middle of this crucial decade many Latin American countries turned from authoritarian regimes toward democracy and the rapid growth of labor unions. By the end of the decade, however, the fledgling democracies had collapsed, the unions were in shambles, and authoritarianism asserted itself once more. This collection of essays by an international group of historians, political scientists, economists, and sociologists confronts a central debate in Latin American studies: Were these events the immediate result of external forces - that is, of the war - or the culmination of internal movements that originated in the 1930s?This book is among the first in its field to evaluate the early Cold War period through the lens of the immediate post-Cold War era. While powerfully reinterpreting the brief resurgence of democracy in Latin America in the 1940s, it offers a comparative foundation from which to judge the renewed trend toward democracy that began in the 1980s and continues during the early 1990s
Kinship with strangers: adoption and interpretations of kinship in American culture
No full textAdoption challenges our understanding of the core symbols of kinship in American culture - birth, biology, and blood. Through the lens of anthropological theory, Judith Modell examines these symbols and the way they affect people who experience the "fictive" kinship of adoption. Her findings are timely and profoundly moving and contribute valuable insights to the current debate about removing the veil of secrecy from adoption records and procedures.Modell draws on interviews with birthparents, adoptive parents, and adoptees, some of whom are involved in reforming the adoption process. That reform - the opening of records, the acknowledgment of a biological and a legal parent, the blending of families that are related only through a child - spotlights the very meanings of mother and father, "blood," and identity in this country. Thus her book complements other recent anthropological literature that argues for a radical rethinking of the way we define, and use, those concepts.Certain rhetorical motifs emerge in the language used by members of the adoption triad: "surrender" is the critical motif for birthparents, "telling" for adoptees, "love at first sight" for adopting parents, and "reunion" for the search process. Throughout, we hear the words of those involved in adoption, and we come to understand the ambiguities regarding love and responsibility, nurture and competence, well-being and wealth - concepts that underlie the "transaction in parenthood" in American culture. Modell's findings should have important ramifications for policy, practice, and individual participation in the adoption experience
The rice economies: technology and development in Asian societies
No full textThe contrast in the rate of growth between Western and Eastern societies since 1800 has caused Asian societies to be characterized as backward and resistant to change, though until 1600 or so certain Asian states were technologically far in advance of Europe. The Rice Economies , drawing on original source materials, examines patterns of technological and social evolution specific to East-Asian wet-rice economies in order to clarfiy some general historical trends in economic development
Wordsworth and the cultivation of women
No full textFocusing on the poems of Wordsworth's "Great Decade," feminist critics have tended to see Wordsworth as an exploiter of women and "feminine" perspectives. In this original and provocative book, Judith Page examines works from throughout Wordsworth's long career to offer a more nuanced feminist account of the poet's values. She asks questions about Wordsworth and women from the point of view of the women themselves and of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century culture. Making extensive use of family letters, journals, and other documents, as well as unpublished material by the poet's daughter Dora Wordsworth, Page presents Wordsworth as a poet not defined primarily by egotistical sublimity but by his complicated and conflicted endorsement of domesticity and familial life
Henry Edwards Huntington: a biography
No full textA legendary book collector, a connoisseur of fine art, a horticulturist, and a philanthropist, Henry Edwards Huntington is perhaps best known as the founder of the world-renowned Huntington Library, Art Gallery, and Botanical Gardens in San Marino, California. James Thorpe's comprehensive biography of Huntington tells the richly human story of the man who became America's greatest book collector and was a leading figure in the development of southern California.Henry Edwards Huntington was born in New York State in 1850. He began working at the age of 17, eventually moved to California, and in later years was hailed for his vision in developing the street railway system that created the structure of the Los Angeles area. Always a lover of books, Huntington acquired many spectacular volumes - among them the complete Gutenberg Bible on vellum and the library of the Earl of Bridgewater. He also built a splendid art collection and established a grand botanical garden on the grounds of the buildings that would house his art and books. Then, in an act of philanthropy seldom equaled, he gave these great treasures to the public.The intimate side of Huntington's life appears in these pages, too. Thorpe has culled a vast trove of private letters, diaries, and other documents that reveal Huntington's exceptional personal qualities. The author's well-rounded biography of this unassuming yet gifted American is also richly evocative of the times in which Henry Edwards Huntington lived
Printing, propaganda, and Martin Luther
No full textMartin Luther, the first Protestant, was also the central figure in the West's first media campaign. But to what extent was the Reformation a "print event"? And what, finally, was Luther's role in the movement? With Mark Edwards's study of Protestant and Catholic pamphlets published in the early years of the Reformation (1518-1530), these and other questions surrounding Reformation printing are at last given their full due.Edwards couples his findings with a provocative analysis of the ways in which they challenge the accepted history of the Reformation. His determination of who knew what, and when, as well as how readers interpreted Luther's message makes Edwards's work one that will influence the study of printing and the early Reformation for years to come
California forests and woodlands: a natural history
No full textFrom majestic Redwoods to ancient Western Bristlecone Pines, California's trees have long inspired artists, poets, naturalists - and real estate developers. Verna Johnston's splendid book, illustrated with her superb color photographs and Carla Simmons's detailed black-and-white drawings, now offers an unparalleled view of the Golden State's world-renowned forests and woodlands.In clear, vivid prose, Johnston introduces each of the state's dominant forest types. She describes the unique characteristics of the trees and the interrelationships of the plants and animals living among them, and she analyzes how fire, flood, fungi, weather, soil, and humans have affected the forest ecology. The world of forest and woodland animals comes alive in these pages - the mating games, predation patterns, communal life, and the microscopic environment of invertebrates and fungi are all here.Johnston also presents a sobering view of the environmental hazards that threaten the state's trees: acid snow, ozone, blister rust, over-logging. Noting the interconnectedness of the diverse life forms within tree regions, she suggests possible answers to the problems currently plaguing these areas. Enriched by the observations of early naturalists and Johnston's many years of fieldwork, this is a book that will be welcomed by all who care about California's treasured forests and woodlands
Against apocalyptic history
No full textMichael André Bernstein's passionate denunciation of apocalyptic thinking provides a moral, philosophical, and literary challenge to the way most of us make sense of our worlds. In our search for coherence, Bernstein argues, we tend to see our lives as moving toward a predetermined fate. This "foreshadowing" demeans the variety, the richness, and especially the unpredictability of everyday life. Apocalyptic history denies the openness and choice available to its actors.Bernstein chooses the Holocaust as the prime example of our tendency toward foregone conclusions. He argues eloquently against politicians and theologians who depict the Holocaust as foreordained and its victims as somehow implicated in a fate they should have been able to foresee. But his argument ranges wider. From recent biographies of Kafka to the Israeli-P.L.O. peace accords, from campus cultural diversity debates to the Crown Heights riots, Bernstein warns against our passive acceptance of historical or personal victimization.An essential contribution to Holocaust studies, this book is also a lucid call to transform the way we read and write history and the way we make sense of our lives