Jonathan Decter's Books

Dominion Built of Praise

Panegyric and Legitimacy Among Jews in the Medieval Mediterranean

By: Jonathan Decter

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Dominion Built of Praise

Panegyric and Legitimacy Among Jews in the Medieval Mediterranean

By: Jonathan Decter

A constant feature of Jewish culture in the medieval Mediterranean was the dedication of panegyric texts in Hebrew, Judeo-Arabic, and other languages to men of several ranks: scholars, communal leaders, courtiers, merchants, patrons, and poets. Although the imagery of nature and eroticism in the preludes to these poems is often studied, the substance of what follows is generally neglected, as it is perceived to be repetitive, obsequious, and less aesthetically interesting than other types of poetry from the period. In Dominion Built of Praise, Jonathan Decter demurs. As is the case with visual portraits, panegyrics operate according to a code of cultural norms that tell us at least as much about the society that produced them as the individuals they portray. Looking at the phenomenon of panegyric in Mediterranean Jewish culture from several overlapping perspectives—social, historical, ethical, poetic, political, and theological—he finds that they offer representations of Jewish political leadership as it varied across geographic area and evolved over time. Decter focuses his analysis primarily on Jewish centers in the Islamic Mediterranean between the tenth and thirteenth centuries and also includes a chapter on Jews in the Christian Mediterranean through the fifteenth century. He examines the hundreds of panegyrics that have survived: some copied repeatedly in luxurious anthologies, others discarded haphazardly in the Cairo Geniza. According to Decter, the poems extolled conventional character traits ascribed to leaders not only diachronically within the Jewish political tradition but also synchronically within Islamic and, to a lesser extent, Christian civilization and political culture. Dominion Built of Praise reveals more than a superficial and functional parallel between Muslim and Jewish forms of statecraft and demonstrates how ideas of Islamic political legitimacy profoundly shaped the ways in which Jews conceptualized and portrayed their own leadership.

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Page Count

396

Publisher

University of Pennsylvania Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0812295242

ISBN 13

9780812295245

Iberian Jewish Literature

Between al-Andalus and Christian Europe

By: Jonathan P. Decter

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Iberian Jewish Literature

Between al-Andalus and Christian Europe

By: Jonathan P. Decter

This stimulating and graceful book explores Iberian Jewish attitudes toward cultural transition during the 12th and 13th centuries, when growing intolerance toward Jews in Islamic al-Andalus and the southward expansion of the Christian Reconquista led to the relocation of Jews from Islamic to Christian domains. By engaging literary topics such as imagery, structure, voice, landscape, and geography, Jonathan P. Decter traces attitudes toward transition that range from tenacious longing for the Islamic past to comfort in the Christian environment. Through comparison with Arabic and European vernacular literatures, Decter elucidates a medieval Hebrew poetics of estrangement and nostalgia, poetic responses to catastrophe, and the refraction of social issues in fictional narratives. Published with the generous support of the Koret Foundation.

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321

Publisher

Indiana University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0253116953

ISBN 13

9780253116956

Imaging of the Pediatric Abdomen and Pelvis, An Issue of Magnetic Resonance Imaging Clinics

By: Jonathan R. Dillman,Ethan A. Smith

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Imaging of the Pediatric Abdomen and Pelvis, An Issue of Magnetic Resonance Imaging Clinics

By: Jonathan R. Dillman,Ethan A. Smith

This issue of Medical Clinics covers the current best practices surrounding the perioperative management of patients with chronic diseases. Guest edited by Jeffrey Kirsch and Ansgar Brambrink, the topics covered will include patients with pacemakers, patients with endocrine disease, immunocompromised patients, patients with heart disease, patients with renal disease, and more.

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Page Count

466

Publisher

Elsevier Health Sciences

Published Date

ISBN 10

0323242286

ISBN 13

9780323242288

After Expulsion

1492 and the Making of Sephardic Jewry

By: Jonathan S Ray

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After Expulsion

1492 and the Making of Sephardic Jewry

By: Jonathan S Ray

A “groundbreaking” portrait of the migration and resettlement of Spain’s Jewish community after 1492, and how the Sephardic identity emerged (American Historical Review). Honorable Mention, Jordan Schnitzer Book Award in Medieval and Early Modern Jewish History presented by the Association for Jewish Studies On August 3, 1492, the same day that Columbus set sail from Spain, the long and glorious history of that nation’s Jewish community officially came to a close. The expulsion of Europe’s last major Jewish community ended more than a thousand years of unparalleled prosperity, cultural vitality, and intellectual productivity. Yet, the crisis of 1492 also gave rise to a dynamic and resilient diaspora society spanning East and West. After Expulsion traces the various paths of migration and resettlement of Sephardic Jews and Conversos over the course of the tumultuous sixteenth century. Pivotally, the volume argues that the exiles did not become “Sephardic Jews” overnight. Only in the second and third generation did these disparate groups coalesce and adopt a “Sephardic Jewish” identity. This is a new and fascinating portrait of Jewish society in transition from the medieval to the early modern period—a portrait that challenges many longstanding assumptions about the differences between Europe and the Middle East. “A rich and compelling history . . . With its intense focus on one century, Ray’s book makes a distant time and trauma painfully vivid and immediate to the reader.” ―Jewish Currents Magazine

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226

Publisher

NYU Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0814729134

ISBN 13

9780814729137

Ladies and Gentlemen, the Bronx Is Burning

1977, Baseball, Politics, and the Battle for the Soul of a City

By: Jonathan Mahler

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Ladies and Gentlemen, the Bronx Is Burning

1977, Baseball, Politics, and the Battle for the Soul of a City

By: Jonathan Mahler

By early 1977, the metropolis was in the grip of hysteria caused by a murderer dubbed "Son of Sam." And on a sweltering night in July, a citywide power outage touched off an orgy of looting and arson that led to the largest mass arrest in New York's history. As the turbulent year wore on, the city became absorbed in two epic battles: the fight between Yankee slugger Reggie Jackson and team manager Billy Martin, and the battle between Ed Koch and Mario Cuomo for the city's mayoralty. Buried beneath these parallel conflicts, one for the soul of baseball, the other for the soul of the city, was the subtext of race. The brash and confident Jackson took every black myth and threw it back in white America's face. Meanwhile, Koch and Cuomo ran bitterly negative campaigns that played upon urbanites' fears of soaring crime and falling municipal budgets. These braided stories tell the history of a year that saw the opening of Studio 54, the evolution of punk rock, and the dawning of modern SoHo. As the pragmatist Koch defeated the visionary Cuomo and as Reggie Jackson finally rescued a team racked with dissension,1977 became a year of survival but also of hope. -- Publishers description.

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Page Count

380

Publisher

Macmillan

Published Date

ISBN 10

0312424302

ISBN 13

9780312424305

Jewish Life in Medieval Spain

A New History

By: Jonathan Ray

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Jewish Life in Medieval Spain

A New History

By: Jonathan Ray

Jewish Life in Medieval Spain is a detailed exploration of the Jewish experience in medieval Spain from the dawn of Sephardic society in the ninth century to the expulsion of 1492. An important contribution of the book is the integration of the rise and fall of Jewish life in Muslim al-Andalus into the history of the Jews in medieval Christian Spain. It traces the collapse of Jewish life in Muslim Spain, the emigration of Andalusi Jewry to the lands of Christian Iberia, and the long and difficult confluence of these two distinct Jewish subcultures. Focusing on internal developments of Jewish society, it offers a narrative of Jewish history from the inside out, bringing to light the various divisions and rivalries within the Jewish community. This approach, in turn, allows for a deeper understanding of the complex relations between Spanish Jews and their Muslim and Christian neighbors. Jonathan Ray's original perspective on the Jewish experience is particularly instructive when considering the widescale anti-Jewish riots of 1391. The combination of violence and mass conversion of the Jews irrevocably shifted the dynamics of inter-religious relations as well as those within the Jewish community itself. Yet even in the wake of these tragic events, the Jews of Spain continued to flourish, fostering a culture that they would carry into exile and that would preserve the memory of Jewish Spain for centuries to come.

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Page Count

353

Publisher

University of Pennsylvania Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

1512823848

ISBN 13

9781512823844

A Time for Choosing

The Rise of Modern American Conservatism

By: Jonathan Schoenwald

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A Time for Choosing

The Rise of Modern American Conservatism

By: Jonathan Schoenwald

How did American conservatism, little more than a collection of loosely related beliefs in the late 1940s and early 1950s, become a coherent political and social force in the 1960s? What political strategies originating during the decade enabled the modern conservative movement to flourish? And how did mainstream and extremist conservatives, frequently at odds over tactics and ideology, each play a role in reshaping the Republican Party? In the 1960s conservatives did nothing less than engineer their own revolution. A Time for Choosing tells the remarkable story behind this transformation. Where previous accounts of conservatism's rise tend to speed from 1964 through the start of the Reagan era in 1980, A Time for Choosing explores in dramatic detail how conservatives took immediate action following the Goldwater debacle. William F. Buckley, Jr.'s 1965 bid for Mayor of New York City and Reagan's 1966 California governor's campaign helped turn the tide for electoral conservatism. By decade's end, independent "splinter groups" vied for the right to bear the conservative standard into the next decade, demonstrating the movement's strength and vitality. Although conservative ideology was not created during the 1960s, its political components were. Here, then, is the story of the rise of the modern conservative movement. Provocative and beautifully written, A Time for Choosing is a book for anyone interested in politics and history in the postwar era.

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Page Count

349

Publisher

Oxford University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0190285508

ISBN 13

9780190285500

America Alone

The Neo-Conservatives and the Global Order

By: Stefan Halper,Jonathan Clarke

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America Alone

The Neo-Conservatives and the Global Order

By: Stefan Halper,Jonathan Clarke

America Alone explores how George W. Bush's election, and the fear and confusion of September 11, 2001, combined to allow a small group of radical intellectuals to seize the reins of US national security policy. It shows how, at this 'inflection point' in US history an inexperienced president was persuaded to abandon his campaign pledges (and the successful consensus-driven, bi-partisan diplomacy that managed the lethal Soviet threat over the past half-century) and adopt a neo-conservative foreign policy emphasizing military confrontation and 'nation-building'. To date, the costs - in blood, money and credibility - have been great and the benefits few, with traditional conservatives deploring Bush's approach. America Alone outlines the costs in terms of economic damage, distortion of priorities, rising anti-Americanism, and reduced security. Then it sets out an alternative approach emphasizing the traditional conservative principles of containing risk, consensus diplomacy and balance of power.

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Page Count

390

Publisher

Cambridge University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

1139454676

ISBN 13

9781139454674

The Oxford Handbook of Arabic Linguistics

By: Jonathan Owens

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The Oxford Handbook of Arabic Linguistics

By: Jonathan Owens

Arabic is one of the world's largest languages, spoken natively by nearly 300 million people. By strength of numbers alone Arabic is one of our most important languages, studied by scholars across many different academic fields and cultural settings. It is, however, a complex language rooted in its own tradition of scholarship, constituted of varieties each imbued with unique cultural values and characteristic linguistic properties. Understanding its linguistics holistically is therefore a challenge. The Oxford Handbook of Arabic Linguistics is a comprehensive, one-volume guide that deals with all major research domains which have been developed within Arabic linguistics. Chapters are written by leading experts in the field, who both present state-of-the-art overviews and develop their own critical perspectives. The Handbook begins with Arabic in its Semitic setting and ends with the modern dialects; it ranges across the traditional--the classical Arabic grammatical and lexicographical traditions--to the contemporary--Arabic sociolinguistics, Creole varieties and codeswitching, psycholinguistics, and Arabic as a second language - while situating Arabic within current phonetic, phonological, morphological, syntactic and lexicological theory. An essential reference work for anyone working within Arabic linguistics, the book brings together different approaches and scholarly traditions, and provides analysis of current trends and directions for future research.

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619

Publisher

Oxford University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0199344094

ISBN 13

9780199344093

The Arab-Israeli Conflict in American Political Culture

By: Jonathan Rynhold

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The Arab-Israeli Conflict in American Political Culture

By: Jonathan Rynhold

This book surveys discourse and opinion in the United States toward the Arab-Israeli conflict since 1991. Contrary to popular myth, it demonstrates that US support for Israel is not based on the pro-Israel lobby, but rather is deeply rooted in American political culture. That support has increased since 9/11. However, the bulk of this increase has been among Republicans, conservatives, evangelicals, and Orthodox Jews. Meanwhile, among Democrats, liberals, the Mainline Protestant Church, and non-Orthodox Jews, criticism of Israeli policies toward the Palestinians has become more vociferous. This book works to explain this paradox.

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315

Publisher

Cambridge University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

1316241157

ISBN 13

9781316241158

A Mannequin for President

By: Jonathan Ledwidge

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A Mannequin for President

By: Jonathan Ledwidge

Brutally audacious and satirical, A Mannequin for President is a fictionalized series of conversations, supported by a fascinating analysis of current and historical events. The result is an extraordinarily lucid portrayal of the Machiavellian intrigues of American politics, and the how's and why's of 'selecting' a President. The pundits, including Michael Moore, are wrong. Presidents are tools of the system, not malevolent leaders. The Presidency is a facade behind which the real power resides. Forget elections! Except for minor differences, changing the President is an irrelevance. The American Dream is merely one delusion that reinforces this charade. American politics today is unchanged from a hundred years ago. Ask the people of the Philippines. At the turn of the 20th Century, they lost tens of thousands, in a futile war of liberation against American colonialism. They once deceived us with communism. Now terrorism is the new communism, cynically nurtured and exploited on America's crusade for the world's oil and natural resources; Manifest Destiny II. Then there is Globalization; a range of policies specifically designed to fail those in need, in order to create The New Jerusalem. It's the system, stupid! Not the man in the White House!

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Page Count

324

Publisher

iUniverse

Published Date

ISBN 10

0595778992

ISBN 13

9780595778997

Television Directors, Race, and Gender

Written Out of the Story

By: Jonathan J. Cavallero

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Television Directors, Race, and Gender

Written Out of the Story

By: Jonathan J. Cavallero

This book challenges the predominant framing of US television as a writer’s or producer’s medium by suggesting that television directors are a vital component of TV artistry. Looking beyond a perspective that favors the narrative and economic aspects of television but undervalues the medium’s formal elements, the book explores how directors use the visual and aural to contribute layers of meaning that add to the thematic development of television texts. Starting from the belief that television aesthetics partially reveal the ways in which directors (and their collaborators) contribute to the overall thematic development of a program, the author offers five case studies that map out the ways that directors have contributed to television drama throughout the medium’s approximately 80-year history. By devoting special attention to the presence and voices of directors from marginalized backgrounds, the book creates opportunities to discuss television from perspectives that emphasize issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion. This original and insightful work will appeal to students and scholars of television studies, television production and media production, critical media studies, media authorship, gender studies, and race and media.

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Page Count

242

Publisher

Taylor & Francis

Published Date

ISBN 10

1040108636

ISBN 13

9781040108635

The History of Bethlem

By: Jonathan Andrews,Asa Briggs,Roy Porter,Penny Tucker,Keir Waddington

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The History of Bethlem

By: Jonathan Andrews,Asa Briggs,Roy Porter,Penny Tucker,Keir Waddington

Bethlem Hospital, popularly known as "Bedlam", is a unique institution. Now seven hundred and fifty years old, it has been continuously involved in the care of the mentally ill in London since at least the 1400s. As such it has a strong claim to be the oldest foundation in Europe with an unbroken history of sheltering and treating the mentally disturbed. During this time, Bethlem has transcended locality to become not only a national and international institution, but in many ways, a cultural and literary myth. The History of Bethlem is a scholarly history of this key establishment by distinguished authors, including Asa Briggs and Roy Porter. Based upon extensive research of the hospital's archives, the book looks at Bethlem's role within the caring institutions of London and Britain, and provides a long overdue re-evaluation of its place in the history of psychiatry.

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Page Count

772

Publisher

Routledge

Published Date

ISBN 10

1136098607

ISBN 13

9781136098604

Embracing Muslims in a Catholic Land: Rethinking the Genesis of Islām in Mexico

By: Jonathan Benzion

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Embracing Muslims in a Catholic Land: Rethinking the Genesis of Islām in Mexico

By: Jonathan Benzion

This work is an academic pursuit that aims to produce innovative scholarly general interest that explores, through a fresh perspective and from a historical approach and a multidisciplinary angle, an understudied subject of Colonial and Early Independent Mexico’s History: Islam.

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261

Publisher

BRILL

Published Date

ISBN 10

9004510311

ISBN 13

9789004510319

Big Government and Affirmative Action

The Scandalous History of the Small Business Administration

By: Jonathan Bean

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Big Government and Affirmative Action

The Scandalous History of the Small Business Administration

By: Jonathan Bean

David Stockman, Ronald Reagan's budget director, proclaimed the Small Business Administration a "billion-dollar waste—a rathole," and set out to abolish the agency. His scathing critique was but the latest attack on an agency better known as the "Small Scandal Administration." Loans to criminals, government contracts for minority "fronts," the classification of American Motors as a small business, Whitewater, and other scandals—the Small Business Administration has lurched from one embarrassment to another. Despite the scandals and the policy failures, the SBA thrives and small business remains a sacred cow in American politics. Part of this sacredness comes from the agency's longstanding record of pioneering affirmative action. Jonathan Bean reveals that even before the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the SBA promoted African American businesses, encouraged the hiring of minorities, and monitored the employment practices of loan recipients. Under Nixon, the agency expanded racial preferences. During the Reagan administration, politicians wrapped themselves in the mantle of minority enterprise even as they denounced quotas elsewhere. Created by Congress in 1953, the SBA does not conform to traditional interpretations of interest-group democracy. Even though the public—and Congress—favors small enterprise, there has never been a unified group of small business owners requesting the government's help. Indeed, the SBA often has failed to address the real problems of "Mom and Pop" shop owners, fueling the ongoing debate about the agency's viability.

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