Indiana University Press blog

Book review: A Military History of India and South Asia

"The historical chapters on the expansion of the East India Company, the martial races and the role of the Indian Army during the First and Second World Wars shed new light on these subjects and make readers aware of new histography" —Harsh Pant, Asian Affairs

Book review: Negotiating With The Enemy

"Dr. Yafeng Xia's study is premised on a rich array of U.S. and Chinese sources. His analysis is powerful and conclusions trustworthy. This book is one of best recent works on the history of Sino-American relations." —Hui He, Leng zhan guo ji shi yan jiu (Cold War International History Studies)

Interview: Henry Glassie on WFHB

Prince Twins Seven-Seven author Henry Glassie was interviewed about his latest book on WFHB's Interchange program (91.3 FM, Bloomington, IN). You can listen to the full audio of the interview here.

Transforming Race: Crisis and Opportunity in the Age of Obama

Cross-posted at the IU Press Journals blog:

By Andrew Grant-Thomas

Americans tend to draw a sharp line between their country's racial past and its racial present: Before the 1960s we had slavery and Jim Crow, Native American genocide and the theft of Indian lands, anti-Asian immigration laws and the internment of Japanese Americans, Plessy v. Ferguson and Bull Connor. After the civil rights movement, in contrast, we've seen dramatic progress in terms of policies and especially with respect to racial attitudes. "Racists" are few are far between; the goal of equal opportunity across lines of race has more or less been achieved, Barack Obama’s election serving as the capstone to America's triumphant racial march.
 
While this story has much to recommend it, unfortunately it hardly captures the whole truth about the continuing significance of race in the United States today. Indeed, over the course of the year that President Obama has been in office, the racialized counterpoints have come fast and furious: the disparate racial impacts of our credit, lending and foreclosure crises; the ongoing economic recession that has widened preexisting racialized gaps in well-being; the debate over health care, now seemingly doomed to an unhappy ending; the hullabaloo over Sonia Sotomayor’s “wise Latina” claim, the “Birthers” phenomenon… on and on.

We have a lot of work ahead of us. Our challenge, as ever, is to muster the insight and will to see our way forward.

When the Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity wanted to create a forum in which scholars and practitioners from a wide range of disciplines and fields could meet to exchange ideas about these and related issues we teamed up with Indiana University Press to produce Race/Ethnicity: Multidisciplinary Global Contexts. In order to provide a public space to facilitate thoughtful discussion on issues of race, ethnicity, social hierarchy, marginalized populations, democratic principles, and social justice, we created RaceTalk.

Now, we invite you to join us for a real-time, face-to-face conversation. On March 11-13, 2010 at the Hyatt Hotel on Capitol Square in downtown Columbus, Ohio, the staff of the Kirwan Institute and some 600-700 advocates, activists, scholars, students, spoken-word artists and other performers and practitioners of all stripes will engage pressing issues of race and ethnicity in the United States.  We’ll have more than 50 plenary sessions and panels, workshops and performances, and plenty of challenging questions and provocative insights.

Race is not the only edge along which we divide in the United States and around the world, but it remains perhaps the sharpest. The Kirwan Institute, and Transforming Race, are dedicated to the proposition that we can transform the meanings and operations of race through informed dialogue, practices, and policies that create and expand opportunity for all. We invite you to contribute your energy and your ideas. We hope you'll agree that the agenda is spectacular.

Registration is open! See you in March!

Andrew Grant-Thomas
Associate Editor, Race/Ethnicity: Multidisciplinary Global Contexts

Director, Transforming Race: Crisis and Opportunity in the Age of Obama

Deputy Director, Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity

Subscribe to Race/Ethnicity: Multidisciplinary Global Contexts at the IU Press/Journals site, INscribe. 

By Andrew Grant-Thomas

Americans tend to draw a sharp line between their country's racial past and its racial present: Before the 1960s we had slavery and Jim Crow, Native American genocide and the theft of Indian lands, anti-Asian immigration laws and the internment of Japanese Americans, Plessy v. Ferguson and Bull Connor. After the civil rights movement, in contrast, we've seen dramatic progress in terms of policies and especially with respect to racial attitudes. "Racists" are few are far between; the goal of equal opportunity across lines of race has more or less been achieved, Barack Obama’s election serving as the capstone to America's triumphant racial march.
 
While this story has much to recommend it, unfortunately it hardly captures the whole truth about the continuing significance of race in the United States today. Indeed, over the course of the year that President Obama has been in office, the racialized counterpoints have come fast and furious: the disparate racial impacts of our credit, lending and foreclosure crises; the ongoing economic recession that has widened preexisting racialized gaps in well-being; the debate over health care, now seemingly doomed to an unhappy ending; the hullabaloo over Sonia Sotomayor’s “wise Latina” claim, the “Birthers” phenomenon… on and on.

We have a lot of work ahead of us. Our challenge, as ever, is to muster the insight and will to see our way forward.

When the Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity wanted to create a forum in which scholars and practitioners from a wide range of disciplines and fields could meet to exchange ideas about these and related issues we teamed up with Indiana University Press to produce Race/Ethnicity: Multidisciplinary Global Contexts. In order to provide a public space to facilitate thoughtful discussion on issues of race, ethnicity, social hierarchy, marginalized populations, democratic principles, and social justice, we created RaceTalk.

Now, we invite you to join us for a real-time, face-to-face conversation. On March 11-13, 2010 at the Hyatt Hotel on Capitol Square in downtown Columbus, Ohio, the staff of the Kirwan Institute and some 600-700 advocates, activists, scholars, students, spoken-word artists and other performers and practitioners of all stripes will engage pressing issues of race and ethnicity in the United States.  We’ll have more than 50 plenary sessions and panels, workshops and performances, and plenty of challenging questions and provocative insights.

Race is not the only edge along which we divide in the United States and around the world, but it remains perhaps the sharpest. The Kirwan Institute, and Transforming Race, are dedicated to the proposition that we can transform the meanings and operations of race through informed dialogue, practices, and policies that create and expand opportunity for all. We invite you to contribute your energy and your ideas. We hope you'll agree that the agenda is spectacular.

Registration is open! See you in March!

Andrew Grant-Thomas
Associate Editor, Race/Ethnicity: Multidisciplinary Global Contexts

Director, Transforming Race: Crisis and Opportunity in the Age of Obama

Deputy Director, Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity

Subscribe to Race/Ethnicity: Multidisciplinary Global Contexts at the IU Press/Journals site, INscribe. 

60 Days of Giveaways: Day 5

The answer to yesterday's trivia question was D. The Library. Today's question is about the National Book Award:

Which IU Press title was the first to win a National Book Award?

A. Saint Joan of the Stockyards
B. Soren Kierkegaard's Journals and Papers Vol. 1
C. Are Quanta Real?
D. Indian Man

Post your answer (one entry per person, please!) in the comments section below. Entries must be received by 11:59 p.m. EDT tonight for a chance to win Rush, Rock Music, and the Middle Class. Good luck!

Two IU Press books honored by AAUP for outstanding design

The Association of American University Presses selected two IU Press books as some of the very best examples in design for its "Book, Jacket, and Journal Show." From more than 280 entries, the judges honored 56 books, 1 journal, and 40 jackets/covers. The two IU Press books, both selected for the "Trade Typographic" category, are:

The Speed of Light: Constancy and Cosmos by David A. Grandy
Designer: Jamison Cockerham
Production Coordinator: Sarah Jacobi
Acquiring Editor: Robert Sloan
Project Editor: June Silay

The Year’s Work in Lebowski Studies by Edward P. Comentale and Aaron Jaffe
Designer: Jamison Cockerham
Production Coordinator: Sarah Jacobi
Acquiring Editor: Jane Behnken
Project Editor: Brian Herrmann

To see a complete list of titles, visit the AAUP website.

Author events: Bonnie Morris in Chattanooga, Tennessee

Author Bonnie Morris (Revenge of the Women's Studies Professor) will be on the University of Tennessee Chattanooga campus for its Women's Studies Lecture Series. Morris will present her one woman show Revenge of the Women's Studies Professor March 4. The event is free and open to the public. For more details, visit the Women's Studies Lecture Series website.

The following day, Morris will give a lunch talk entitled "The Female Gaze: A conversation with Bonnie Morris" at the Hunter Museum of American Art. For more details, visit the museum's website.

60 Days of Giveaways: Day 4

The answer to yesterday's trivia question was B. Progress. IU Press's colophon was an adaptation of an Indian pictograph that symbolized progress, for it depicted two Indian hunters striking out on a trail.

Today's trivia question focuses on a different kind of trail—IU Press's journey through various offices. Our current home is on 601 N. Morton St. Which of the following has NOT been a former location for IU Press offices:

A. The Graduate School
B. Wylie House
C. Ashton Center
D. The Library

Post your answer (one entry per person, please!) in the comments section below. Entries must be received by 11:59 p.m. EDT tonight for a chance to win Rush, Rock Music, and the Middle Class. Good luck!

Catherine M. Cole essay on ROROTOKO

Catherine M. Cole, author of Performing South Africa's Truth Commission, wrote an essay about her book for ROROTOKO. Of her latest work, Cole says:

Performing South Africa’s Truth Commission is about the messy, uncertain process of transition from authoritarian to democratic rule, and the quasi-judicial ritual that South Africa used to help accomplish such a transition. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) was an attempt to draw a line in the sand, to say, “that was then, this is now.” The TRC tried to separate the massive atrocities and gross violations of human rights so routinely perpetrated during forty years of apartheid from the country’s new dispensation post 1994—a multi-racial democracy with one of the most progressive constitutions in the world.

This is the first book to examine a unique and defining feature of South Africa’s TRC: its public iteration in front of audiences. Prior to South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which began in 1996, there had been sixteen other truth commissions in the world, in places ranging from Uganda to Argentina. Yet South Africa’s truth commission had the distinction of being the first to transpire overtly in the public eye. Hearings happened on raised platforms and stages throughout the country, with spectators attending in person, and radio and television broadcasts transforming the commission into a media event in which thousands participated.

Read the full text of the essay here.

Book review: Burden or Benefit?

"...Burden or Benefit: Imperial Benevolence and Its Legacies will prove of interest to many students and scholars of British imperialism who will welcome this impressive work that reinterprets the complexities of the imperial past and sheds light on the present legacies." —Dr. Andrzej Diniejko, The Victorian Web