Film: Airplane!, Robert Hayes, Leslie Nielsen

This is a spoof of the airport disaster movies. When the crew of an airplane are struck by some form of virus, the fate of the passengers depends on an ex-war pilot who is the only one able to land the plane safely! The passengers represent a selection of interesting wacky characters who seem to take every word for its literal meaning.

Standford Biology: Fascinating Lecture

Lecture Description

Karl Deisseroth is pioneering bold new treatments for depression and other psychiatric diseases. By sending pulses of light into the brain, Deisseroth can control neural activity with remarkable precision. In this short talk, Deisseroth gives an thoughtful and awe-inspiring overview of his Stanford University lab's groundbreaking research in "optogenetics".

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Course Description

Learn about the frontiers of human health from seven of Stanford's most innovative faculty members. Inspired by a format used at the TED Conference (http://www.ted.com), each speaker delivers a highly engaging talk in just 10-20 minutes about his or her research. Learn about Stanford's newest and most exciting discoveries in neuroscience, bioengineering, brain imaging, psychology, and more.

Music: Music in the Iraq War and Pete Seeger

Sound Targets: American Soldiers and Music in the Iraq War (BOOK): by Jonathan Pieslak

Though a part of American soldiers' lives since the Revolutionary War, by World War II music could be broadcast to the front. Today it accompanies soldiers from the recruiting office to the battlefield. For this book, Jonathan Pieslak interviewed returning veterans to learn about the place of music in the Iraq War and in contemporary American military culture in general. Pieslak describes how American soldiers hear, share, use, and produce music both on and off duty. He studies the role of music from recruitment campaigns and basic training to its use "in country" before and during missions. Pieslak explores themes of power, chaos, violence, and survival in the metal and hip-hop music so popular among the troops, and offers insight into the daily lives of American soldiers in the Middle East.

"Sound Targets reveals just how pervasively popular music has shaped contemporary U.S. military culture.... This thoughtful and provocative study will certainly attract a wide audience concerned with music's roles in the time of war." – W. Anthony Sheppard, author of Revealing Masks: Exotic Influences and Ritualized Performance in Modernist Music Theater

To Everything there is a Season: Pete Seeger and the Power of Song (BOOK): by Allan M. Winkler

Folk music has long played a vital role in supporting reform movements in the United States. Radical activists, seeking to counter a variety of abuses in mid-to-late 20th century America, often used music to express their hopes, aims, and goals. In "To Everything There Is a Season": Pete Seeger and the Power of Song, Allan Winkler describes how folk singer Pete Seeger applied his musical talents to improve conditions for less fortunate people everywhere. This book uses Seeger's long life and wonderful songs to reflect on the important role folk music played in various protest movements and to answer such fundamental questions as: What was the source of Seeger's appeal? How did he capture the attention and affection of people around the world? And why is song such a powerful medium?

"Winkler's book is obviously a labor of love.... The book is carefully written by a scholar who identifies with Seeger and his causes.... Winkler's fine book should introduce readers to Seeger and encourage further exploration of Dunaway's scholarship. But of greater significance is the encouragement that Winkler gives his readers to listen and sing along with Seeger's music. Bonus benefits with the Winkler book include a preface by folksinger Tom Paxton and a compact disc of ten Seeger tunes."—History News Network

"Allan Winkler...has written the best brief biography of Seeger in print."--PopMatters
"Winkler pays welcome attention to how Toshi Seeger made possible her husband's life as protester and artist -- a fact that can escape Pete.... Winkler's includes a CD of 10 songs, the indispensable way, after all, of apprehending why Seeger's music sounds the chords of our national life."—The Plain Dealer

Art, Engineering, Photography, History: Computational Fluid Dynamics, Enterprise Engineering, IRA's History, and Controversial Photography Books

You can find all of these books on the 4th floor in the Technology and Photography section located in the T's. The range of sub-topics is amazing!

Characteristics Finite Element Methods in Computational Fluid Dynamics (BOOK): by Joe Iannelli

This book details a systematic characteristics-based finite element procedure to investigate incompressible, free-surface and compressible flows. Several sections derive the Fluid Dynamics equations from thermo-mechanics principles and develop this multi-dimensional and infinite-directional upstream procedure by combining a finite element discretization with an implicit non-linearly stable Runge-Kutta time integration for the numerical solution of the Euler and Navier Stokes equations. Based on the mathematics and physics of multi-dimensional characteristics, convection as well as acoustics, and inducing by design a controllable multi-dimensional upwind bias that can be locally optimized, the procedure crisply captures contact discontinuities, normal as well as oblique shocks, and generates essentially non-oscillatory solutions for incompressible, subsonic, transonic, supersonic, and hypersonic inviscid and viscous flows with chemical reactions and work, heat and mass transfer.

Enterprise Governance and Enterprise Engineering (BOOK): by Jan A.P. Hoogervorst

Achieving enterprise success necessitates addressing enterprises in ways that match the complexity and dynamics of the modern enterprise environment. However, since the majority of enterprise strategic initiatives appear to fail – among which those regarding information technology – the currently often practiced approaches to strategy development and implementation seem more an obstacle than an enabler for strategic enterprise success.

IRA, the Bombs and the Bullets: A History of Deadly Ingenuity (BOOK): by A.R. Oppenheimer

I was some-what unacquainted with the history of the IRA so I was overwhelmed with the detail and research that went into this comprehensive work. I began to get a real feel for their struggle and the the absolute ingenuity as I worked my way into the book and was able to absorb the intricacies of the campaigns. This isn't a book to take lightly. I takes you into the details and history of the nuts and bolts of the bombings and the challenges. It also gave me a better insight into the whys and what-fors of the "troubles". If you are looking for a thorough explanation of the bombings and the strife, this is a good book to get you grounded in the subject. – David M. Quintana

Katrina: Personal Objects, Photography (BOOK): by Jarret Schecter

Because of government failure, millions viewed political
ineptitude, social inequity and an unpaved America where the streets were lined with anything but gold.
The images in this book show the abandoned and hardest-hit district of the Lower Ninth Ward over two years later, and still counting today.

Vacant and dilapidated, the city is a shadow of its former self. However, in these seemingly lifeless shadows, and through the broken windows of empty houses, one can eerily see the ghostly reflections of life and death in the form of PERSONAL OBJECTS.

These intensely personal items have been abandoned and left, and in most cases, will never be reclaimed.
This small format book touches on the ephemeral, and
surprisingly often beautiful, remnants of belongings that once made up the memories and precious moments of peoples’ lives.

In 1990 Jarret Schecter purchased a Pentax camera. Since then he has traveled the world. Committed to socio-political issues, Schecter believes that photography can bring awareness to social injustices the world faces today. Schecter, born in 1963, lives in New York City

Water in the 21st-Century West: A High Country News Reader (BOOK): by Char Miller

Water in the 21st-Century West captures the range and nature of the arguments that have defined water politics in the region over the past decade. The collection probes the issues and explores creative attempts to find solutions, bringing a focus and clarity to the most contentious environmental issue the West faces. Water in the 21st-Century West will be an essential primer in assessing and mapping the West’s water future.

Why Photography Matters as Art as Never Before (BOOK): by Michael Fried

From the late 1970s onward, serious art photography began to be made at large scale and for the wall. Michael Fried argues that this immediately compelled photographers to grapple with issues centering on the relationship between the photograph and the viewer standing before it that until then had been the province only of painting. Fried further demonstrates that certain philosophically deep problems—associated with notions of theatricality, literalness, and objecthood, and touching on the role of original intention in artistic production, first discussed in his contro­versial essay “Art and Objecthood” (1967)—have come to the fore once again in recent photography. This means that the photo­graphic “ghetto” no longer exists; instead photography is at the cutting edge of contemporary art as never before.

History: 16th Century Filipino Migration, Mortality/Mourning/Mortuary in Indigenous Australia, Opposition to Irish Home Rule

Manila Men in the New World: Filipino Migration to Mexico and the Americas from the Sixteenth Century (BOOK): by Floro L. Mercene

The Filipino diaspora is at least four hundred years old. For two-and-a-half centuries, Filipinos by the hundreds traveled yearly to Mexico and the Americas, with many electing to stay and find a new life. The chief means for migration was the Manila galleon that sailed between the Philippines and Mexico to carry on a lively trade in Asian goods in exchange for silver from the Americas and the trappings of civilization from the West. The end of the galleon trade in 1815 did not stop the exodus of Filipinos to foreign lands as they began to discover the lure of other exotic ports in Asia and Europe. This book attempts to answer the question often asked: What happened to those Filipinos who started the diaspora? The answers are important because they fill a gap in the long history of this adventurous race.

Mortality, Mourning and Mortuary Practices in Indigenous Australia (BOOK): edited by Katie Glaskin

Drawing on ethnography of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities across Australia, Mortality, "Mourning and Mortuary Practices in Indigenous Australia" focuses on the current ways in which indigenous people confront and manage various aspects of death. The contributors employ their contemporary and long-term anthropological fieldwork with indigenous Australians to construct rich accounts of indigenous practices and beliefs and to engage with questions relating to the frequent experience of death within the context of unprecedented change and premature mortality.The volume makes use of extensive empirical material to address questions of inequality with specific reference to mortality, thus contributing to the anthropology of indigenous Australia whilst attending to its theoretical, methodological and political concerns. As such, it will appeal not only to anthropologists but also to those interested in social inequality, the social and psychosocial consequences of death, and the conceptualization and manipulation of the relationships between the living and the dead.

Popular Opposition to Irish Home Rule in Edwardian Britain (BOOK): by Daniel M. Jackson

This groundbreaking volume sheds light on the complex realities of British politics prior to 1914, showing that from the start of the Third Home Rule Bill crisis, there was considerable popular interest in the Irish issue. Isolating this movement at the end of the long nineteenth century, where communal and confessional identities were just as powerful as class, and native hostility to Catholicism and Irish migration still prevailed, Daniel Jackson demonstrates the power of the enormous Home Rule protests in Britain. Through studying these massive demonstrations, the author captures the opinions of those made voiceless by history and explores how the Ulster question allowed Conservative politicians to gain popular enthusiasm and bridge the gap between elites and the masses.

Russia's Wars of Emergence, 1460-1730 (BOOK): by Carol B. Stevens

Russia's emergence as a Great Power in the eighteenth century is usually attributed to Peter I's radical programme of Westernising' reforms. But the Russian military did not simply copy European armies. Adapting the tactics of its neighbours on both sides, Russia created a powerful strategy of its own, integrating steppe defence with European concerns. In Russia's Wars of Emergence, Carol Belkin Stevens examines the social and political factors underpinning Muscovite military history, the eventual success of the Russian Empire and the sacrifices made for power.

Sara Baartman and the Hottentot Venus: A Ghost Story and a Biography (BOOK): by Clifton Crais and Pamela Scully

Sara Baartman, a young South African woman brought to London in 1810 and displayed seminude to show off her ample bottom, was named the Hottentot Venus by her captors and managers. Historians Crais and Scully examine the cultural context of Baartman’s exploitation in Europe as Westerners grappled with issues of race and sex and later racialized science. Baartman attracted the attention of prominent British abolitionists and French scientists as well as voyeurs. After five years of researching archives and libraries and conducting genealogical research to uncover some of Baartman’s relatives, the authors also look beyond Baartman’s life as a curiosity and an exhibit to explore her life as a woman. Crais and Scully place Baartman’s contributions in such areas as the rights of the unlawfully detained, global feminism, and later—when her body was returned to South Africa from France—the politics of indigenous identity. Readers who enjoyed African Queen (2007), by Rachel Holmes, will appreciate this further examination of the life of an extraordinary woman. –Vanessa Bush, Booklist

State of Suffering: Political Violence and Community Survival in Fiji (BOOK): by Susanna Trnka

Throughout this book, Trnka focuses on the collective social process through which violence is embodied, articulated, and silenced by those it targets. Her sensitive ethnography is a valuable addition to the global conversation about the impact of political violence on community life.

Harvard Lecture Available Online!

Check it out at www.academicearth.org

Lecture Description

Part 1 - The Moral Side of Murder: If you had to choose between (1) killing one person to save the lives of five others and (2) doing nothing, even though you knew that five people would die right before your eyes if you did nothing—what would you do? What would be the right thing to do? That’s the hypothetical scenario Professor Michael Sandel uses to launch his course on moral reasoning.

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Archives: Digital Collections: Ellensburg History

<- Barge Hall in 1896. Browse through hundreds of historic photographs on CWU Brooks Library's Digital Archives page.

These publicly available collections highlight the history, nature and culture of Central Washington University, central Washington State, and a collection highlighting the history and art of manuscript illumination.

The public is also welcome to visit our new Archives and Special Collections on the 4th Floor of Brooks Library.

Film: The Breakfast Club (DVD)

Drama: They were five total strangers, with nothing in common, meeting for the first time. A brain, a beauty, a jock, a rebel and a recluse. Before the day was over, they broke the rules. Bared their souls. And touched each other in a way they never dreamed possible.

Film: Richard III

Drama: William Shakespeare's classic play is brought into the present with the setting as Great Britian in the 1930s. Civil war has erupted with the House of Lancaster on one side, claiming the right to the British throne and hoping to bring freedom to the country. Opposing is the House of York, commanded by the infamous Richard who rules over a fascist government and hopes to install himself as a dictator monarch.

Law: Maddness, ADHD, Our Changing Constitution, Gun Control

A Companion to Bordering on Madness, an American Land Use Tale: Cases, Scholarship, and Case Studies (BOOK): by Andrew F. Popper and Patricia E.

The Companion to Bordering on Madness: An American Land Use Tale, Second Edition expands the issues raised in the novel using cases, scholarship and case studies. The text serves as a foundation to understand select doctrine, theory and strategy applicable to conflicts between developers and those who oppose development. Land use is an area in which law and government become personal, direct, immediate, and, quite literally, tangible. Land use cases set the parameters for the structures in which we live, the vistas (or lack thereof) we experience quite literally, the sights, sounds and air that surround us. The mission of this text is to provide a window into this dynamic field.

A Constitution of Many Minds: Why the Founding Document Doesn't Mean What it Meant Before (BOOK): by Cass R. Sunstein

What distinguishes the most important minds is less the answers they offer than the questions they ask. Who but Cass Sunstein would think to ask what unites the arguments and assumptions of traditionalists, populists, and cosmopolitans in constitutional interpretation and elsewhere--and what influences the force of those arguments at different times and in different places? Exploring those questions with his characteristic elegance and insight, Sunstein--the most prolific and significant legal scholar of our time--has written a brilliant book for all seasons. –Laurence H. Tribe, Harvard Law School

ADHD on Trial: Courtroom Clashes Over the Meaning of "Disability" (BOOK): by Michael Gordon

In 2006 Philadelphia, graduate student Jonathan Love sued the organization that publishes the Law School Admissions Test. Love had attained average scores on the test, but claimed he should have been given extra time because he qualified as a person with a disability - and allowances provided by the Americans with Disabilities Act - due to Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. The case, which drew in author psychologist Michael Gordon as an expert witness for the defense, reached federal court and resulted in a precedent-setting ruling still as controversial as the disorder that triggered the trial. In this work, Gordon takes us into the courtroom and behind the scenes with attorneys and experts to look not only at this trial, but more than a dozen others that have involved ADHD or other psychiatric diagnoses, and the questions they raise, including what the real meaning of disability is, how malingering can be an issue with psychological disorders, and what the more far-reaching effects for the public can be if accommodations are provided to people who do not have a legally-defined disability. When does deference to an individual with a disorder like ADHD begin to invade the rights of the non-disabled?

Controversy fills these pages, from discussion of ADHD and the debate over its justifiability as a disability to public reactions regarding the ruling in Love's case and others. Comparisons and contrasts are also raised between the Love trial and earlier cases involving people claiming psychological disabilities who fought actions by The National Board of Medical Examiners, United Airlines, Toyota Motor Manufacturing, the Georgia State Board of Veterinary Medicine, and other organizations. Do the decisions help or harm disability rights and people with disabilities? Gordon offers the insights not only of a psychologist, but a seasoned legal insider who has testified as an expert witness at many of the trials.

Crimes Against Humanity: A Beginner's Guide (BOOK): by Adam Jones

In this compelling overview, Adam Jones outlines the history and current extent of key crimes against humanity, and highlights the efforts of popular movements to suppress them. Using examples ranging from the genocides in Darfur and Rwanda to the sex trade of Eastern Europe and the use of torture in the 'war on terror,' Jones explores the progress made in toughening international law, and the stumbling blocks which prevent full compliance with it. Coherent and revealing, this book is essential for anyone interested in the well-being of humanity and its future.

Essential Concepts & School-Based Cases in Special Education Law (BOOK): by Charles J. Russo and Allan G. Osborne, Jr

Covers IDEA and its accompanying regulations and analyzes cases involving procedural due process, assistive technology, disciplinary sanctions, dispute resolution, antidiscrimination laws, and special services entitlement.

Gun Control: A Documentary and Reference Guide (BOOK): by Robert J. Spitzer

Gun control is one of the most enduringly controversial issues in modern American politics. For the first time this book compiles a comprehensive array of documents that explain and illuminate the historical and contemporary context of the modern gun debate. Bringing together over 50 documents from the colonial era to the present, including early colonial laws, founding documents, letters, political debates, federal and state laws, federal and state court cases, and various political documents, this book is an indispensable reference work for those seeking to understand the origins and modern consequences of American gun policy, including the Second Amendment's right to keep and bear arms. Accompanying commentary and analysis is included to help the reader fully understand the meaning of these documents. Numerous bibliographic sources provide additional resources for interested readers. Ideal for undergraduate and high school students, this collection of primary documents surrounding one of America's oldest controversial issues is a must-have for library shelves.

Contrary to popular impression, gun laws are as old as the country, and reflect the intersection of citizens' personal gun habits and the country's early need to defend itself by citizen militias who were required to arm themselves. The nation's gun policies evolved as its needs and resources changed. Old-style militias gave way to a modern professional American military, and the settling of the American frontier ushered in modern gun laws. In the past century, political assassinations and gun-related mass violence spurred both new gun control efforts and a burgeoning modern gun rights movement. Students will be able to read and analyze primary documents surrounding these events, including the Federalist Papers, early hunting laws, Supreme Court rulings, federal and state regulations, and recent political platform statements. Ideal for undergraduate and high school students, this collection of primary documents surrounding one of America's oldest controversial issues is a must-have for library shelves.

Nazi Crimes and the Law (BOOK): edited by Nathan Stoltzfus and Henry Friedlander

This book examines the use of national and international law to prosecute Nazi crimes, the centerpiece of twentieth-century state-sponsored genocide and mass murder. Its various essays reconstruct the historical setting of crimes sponsored by Nazi Germany and discuss the limitations placed on the national and international judicial forums responsible for prosecuting German perpetrators.

Racism and Equality in the European Union (BOOK): by Mark Bell

The European Union has committed itself to combating racism as a general objective of law and policy. EU legislation requires Member States to introduce laws prohibiting racial discrimination in many aspects of everyday life, including employment, education, healthcare, and housing. Alongside legislation requiring action at national level, the EU institutions have also made periodic commitments to 'mainstream' racial equality: taking anti-racism objectives into account within all areas of EU law and policy.

This book analyses the extent to which the objectives of combating racism and promoting ethnic equality have been effectively mainstreamed throughout a wide range of EU policy fields. It begins by considering what combating racism means in the contemporary context of the enlarged EU. Bell explores what mainstreaming ethnic equality objectives entails, and whether the priorities and instruments differ from those adopted in the earlier mainstreaming of gender equality, or those used on other discrimination grounds. The second part of the book examines the extent to which EU law and policy objectives have, in practice, been integrated, exploring the effects in the key areas of employment, social inclusion (including education, health and housing), immigration, and criminal law.

Storm Center: The Supreme Court in American Politics (BOOK): by David M. O'Brien

With the abortion and school desegregation decisions, O'Brien contends, the Supreme Court has ceased to be Hamilton's "least dangerous branch." Increasingly activist, it has in fact become a "storm center" of national politics. Ever mindful of our judicial past, O'Brien likewise finds the Court is markedly more bureaucratic. His lucid text descibes the inner rules and proceduresthe cost of filings, screening procedures, certiorari petitions, the justices' give-and-take negotiations, their tentative votes and maneuverings, the oral arguments, the growing number of dissents and plurality opinions. O'Brien finds the Court rife with heated personal clashes. Rather than above the battle, it is highly sensitive to external pressures, from the President, Congress, public opinion. This is an illuminating, first-rate primer for those seeking to understand the workings of the Court. Milton Cantor, History Dept., Univ. of Massachusetts, Amherst

The Last Trials of Clarence Darrow (BOOK): by Donald McRae

The courtroom has been a dramatic setting for larger-than-life figures throughout history, but few have attained the almost mythical status of Clarence Darrow. A legend in his own time, Variety called him "America's greatest one-man stage draw." Here was a man whose flair for showmanship went hand in hand with a fierce intellect; a man whose shaky moral compass and staggering conceit collided at all turns with an unrivaled eloquence and an overwhelming compassion for humanity.

Darrow had been one of the most revered lawyers in the country, but in 1924 his reputation was still clouded after a narrow escape from a charge of jury tampering in Los Angeles. At the age of sixty-seven he thought his life and career were almost over, until he was offered an impossible assignment—the defense of the teenage "thrill killers" Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb. Darrow then went on to earn even more international acclaim in two other groundbreaking cases: a classic standoff against William Jennings Bryan in the Scopes Monkey Trial in Tennessee, and the Ossian Sweet murder trial in Detroit. Throughout two crammed and dizzying years, this lion of the court held the Western world in awe as he tackled these three starkly different, history-making cases, each in turn dubbed "the Trial of the Century."

But these trials, as important as they were to Darrow, were not the only events that helped rejuvenate him and seal his courtroom legacy. There was also his enduring relationship with Mary Field Parton, his lover and soul mate, a woman whose role toward the end of his career was larger than many have realized. With fascinating new research and discoveries, including her private journals and letters, The Last Trials of Clarence Darrow is an intimate and riveting depiction of this American icon, one of the greatest lawyers this country has ever seen.

History: Lenin's Brain and Other Tales from the Secret Soviet Archives, Poland's Secret War, Asia Relations, Reform After Stalin, Holocaust Recovery

In the Polish Secret War: Memoir of a World War II Freedom Fighter (BOOK): by Marian S. Mazgaj

Born in the Polish village of Gaj in 1923, Marian Mazgaj was a teenager when Germany invaded his country and launched Poland into the combat of World War II. Too young to join the Polish army, within a few years he became a member of the Sandomierz Flying Commando Unit, a unit which merged with the Jedrus Polish underground group.
This memoir provides a vivid record of Mazgaj's career in the military. The Sandomierz Flying Commando Unit and the Jedrus underground were actively engaged in fighting the Nazi forces in Poland during World War II, and the author provides a first-hand account of the groups' roles in attacking and disarming German military units; destroying the enemy's grain warehouses and receiving air drops of weapons, ammunition, and explosives from the Allies. He also describes the incorporation of his partisan group into the Home Army, whereby he and his comrades became the Fourth Company in the Second Regiment of the Second Division, gaining strength and destroying many more German units.

International Relations of Asia (BOOK): edited by David Shambaugh and Michael Yahuda

Want to know where the Asia region is headed? This comprehensive and well-written volume provides a clear picture of its political, economic, and social dynamics by the top scholars in the field. It is bound to become the most widely used textbook for Asian international relations courses. –Susan Shirk, University of California, San Diego, and former deputy assistant secretary of state for East Asia and Pacific Affairs

Khrushchev's Cold Summer: Gulag Returnees, Crime, and the Fate of Reform After Stalin (BOOK): by Miriam Dobson

Between Stalin's death in 1953 and 1960, the government of the Soviet Union released hundreds of thousands of prisoners from the Gulag as part of a wide-ranging effort to reverse the worst excesses and abuses of the previous two decades and revive the spirit of the revolution. This exodus included not only victims of past purges but also those sentenced for criminal offenses. In Khrushchev's Cold Summer Miriam Dobson explores the impact of these returnees on communities and, more broadly, Soviet attempts to come to terms with the traumatic legacies of Stalin's terror.

Le-natseah et Hitler (in English): The Holocaust is over we must rise from its ashes (BOOK): by Avraham Burg

“An Israeli-born son of Holocaust survivors, Burg addresses a heartfelt plea to his countrymen: remember the past, but do not be its slaves; pathology is neither patriotism nor statescraft. A compelling and eloquent cri de coeur from a veteran of Israel's wars and politics.” -- Howard M. Sachar, bestselling author of A History of the Jews in the Modern World and A History of Israel

"Burg takes a blunt, loving, painful and desperately important look at the state of the Jewish soul today. Anyone who cares about the future of the Middle East and the fate of victimized peoples needs to read this book and think hard." -- J.J. Goldberg, author of Jewish Power: Inside the American Jewish Establishment and Editorial Director of The Forward

“Short of being Prime Minister, Burg could not be higher in the Zionist establishment.” David Remnick, The New Yorker

Lenin's Brain and Other Tales from the Secret Soviet Archives (BOOK): by Paul R. Gregory

The opening of the once-secret Soviet state and party archives in the early 1990s proved to be an event of exceptional significance. When Western scholars broke down the official wall of secrecy that had stood for decades, they gained access to intriguing new knowledge they had previously only had been able to speculate about. In this fascinating volume, Paul Gregory takes us behind scenes and into the archives to illuminate the dark inner workings of the Soviet Union.

He reveals, for example, the bizarre story of the state-sponsored scientific study of Lenin's brain. Originally conceived to "prove" Lenin's genius, the plan was never revealed to the public--for to do so was more than the security-conscious Soviet leadership could have borne. Gregory also exposes the harsh features of Stalin's criminal justice system--in which the theft of state and collective property was punished far more severely than the theft of private property. Indeed, the theft of small amounts of grain was punishable by ten years in the Gulag or a death sentence. The author also illuminates the true story behind the December 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, telling how the ill-conceived incursion was ordered by a Politburo of aging and ill leaders who would not be around to deal with the long-term consequences of their decision.

In addition, the book examines such topics as Stalin's Great Terror, the day-to-day life of Gulag guards, Lenin's repression of "noncommunist" physicians and his purge of intellectuals, the 1940 Soviet execution of 20,000 Poles, and other previously well-concealed tales.

Paul Gregory, a Hoover Institution research fellow, holds an endowed professorship in the Department of Economics at the University of Houston, Texas, and is a research professor at the German Institute for Economic Research in Berlin.

History: Japanese Confinment, Russian Jews, Politically Powerful Women of the 16th Century, Roman Britain in the Iron Age

A Tragedy of Democracy: Japanese Confinement in North America (BOOK): by Greg Robinson

"A magnificent tour de force. This book will achieve the status not only of the best extant study on the topic, but also the one most widely adopted in college classrooms and purchased by the general public." –Arthur Hansen, Director of the Japanese American Evacuation History Project

Antisemitism and Philosemitism in the Twentieth and Twenty-First Centuries: Representing Jews, Jewishness, and Modern Culture (BOOK): edited by Phyllis Lassner and Lara Trubowitz

This book of essays provides a significant reappraisal of discussions of antisemitism and philosemitism. An outstanding group of contributors from political theory, film, English, gender studies, and history demonstrates that analysis of philosemitic attitudes is as crucial to the history of representations of Jews and Jewish culture as are investigations of antisemitism. The topics include F. Scott Fitzgerald's "The Great Gatsby", Hannah Arendt's politics, self-help guides such as "Boy Vey! The Shiksa's Guide to Dating Jewish Men", and contemporary cinema. This pathbreaking book shows the necessity of studying philosemitism as a critical manifestation of antisemitism and as a principle way that Jews have been and still are set apart from non-Jews. These essays will enable us to rethink historical debates surrounding the 'Jewish question'.

Phyllis Lassner teaches Holocaust Studies, Gender Studies, and Writing at Northwestern University. Lara Trubowitz is Assistant Professor of English at the University of Iowa.

Crisis, Revolution, and Russian Jews (BOOK): by Jonathan Frankel

This collection of essays examines the politicization and the politics of the Jewish people in the Russian empire during the late tsarist period. Frankel describes the dynamics of the Russian revolution and the leading role of the intelligentsia as revolutionaries, ideologues, and observers.

Daily Life in Roman Britain (BOOK): by Lindsay Allason-Jones

An introduction to the daily life of the population living in Britain from the end of the Iron Age to the end of the Roman occupation of the country, based on archaeological evidence and supported by contemporary literature and inscriptions.

Debating Women, Politics, and Power in Early Modern Europe (BOOK): by Sharon L. Jansen

The sixteenth century was an age of politically powerful women. Queens, acting in their own right, and female regents, acting on behalf of their male relatives, governed much of Western Europe. Yet even as women ruled—and ruled effectively—their right to do so was hotly contested. Men’s voices have long dominated this debate, but the recovery of texts by women now allows their voices, long silenced, to be heard once again. This book is a study of texts and textual production in the construction of gender, society, and politics in the early modern period. Jansen explores the “gynecocracy” debate and the larger humanist response to the challenge posed by female sovereignty.

Web Information vs the Library's Collection

Bob Berring, professor at Berkeley Law, talks about the differences between what free legal information on the Web offers versus professionally organized and authoritative legal research.

Film: Dr. No, Sean Connery

Films: Adveture, Drama, Comedy - Free DVD Rental!

Being John Malkovich (DVD): John Cusack, Cameron Diaz, John Malkovich (1999)

Comedy: A puppeteer discovers a hidden doorway in his office, which turns out to be a portal into John Malkovitch (the famous actor)'s mind. Upon entering the portal, one gets to be inside Malkovitch's mind for 15 odd minutes. As with any great discovery of this century, the ultimate question immediately arises : 'How can we make money out of this?' He and his co-worker promptly set out to exploit this discovery. It doesn't take long for things to go haywire.

Dr. No (DVD): Sean Connery, Ursula Andress (1963)

Adventure: James Bond (007) is Britain's top agent and is on an exciting mission, to solve the mysterious murder of a fellow agent. The task sends him to Jamacia, where he joins forces with Quarrel and a loyal CIA agent, Felix Leiter. While dodging tarantulas, "fire breathing dragons" and a trio of assassins, known as the three blind mice. Bond meets up with the beautiful Honey Ryder and goes face to face with the evil Dr. No.

Hunting the Hidden Dimension (DVD): James Garner (1997)

Documentary: This movie is a 3D IMAX film, which is exciting to watch no matter what's playing. It featured the first-time ever scanning electron microscope (SEM) movie sequences. These sequences were in synthesized color (recorded with a system patented by David Scharf) and true 3D stereoscopic imaging. The film was engaging and interesting as it used various forms of scientific imaging such as macro and micro-photography and schlieren imaging to convey the story. However, the SEM sequences of insects, which ran over 5 minutes, were the highlite of the film.

Richard III (DVD): Ian McKellen, Annette Bening (1995)

Drama: William Shakespeare's classic play is brought into the present with the setting as Great Britian in the 1930s. Civil war has erupted with the House of Lancaster on one side, claiming the right to the British throne and hoping to bring freedom to the country. Opposing is the House of York, commanded by the infamous Richard who rules over a fascist government and hopes to install himself as a dictator monarch.

Sin Nombre (DVD): Spanish (2009)

Foreign: Honduran teenager Sayra reunites with her father, an opportunity for her to potentially realize her dream of a life in the U.S. Moving to Mexico is the first step in a fateful journey of unexpected events.

The Breakfast Club (DVD): Emilio Estevez, Paul Gleason, Molly Ringwald (1985)

Drama: They were five total strangers, with nothing in common, meeting for the first time. A brain, a beauty, a jock, a rebel and a recluse. Before the day was over, they broke the rules. Bared their souls. And touched each other in a way they never dreamed possible.

The Pianist (DVD): Adrien Brody (2002)

Drama/Biography: The true story of Wladyslaw Szpilman who, in the 1930s, was known as the most accomplished piano player in all of Poland, if not Europe. At the outbreak of the Second World War, however, Szpilman becomes subject to the anti-Jewish laws imposed by the conquering Germans. By the start of the 1940s, Szpilman has seen his world go from piano concert halls to the Jewish Ghetto of Warsaw and then must suffer the tragedy of his family deported to a German concentration camps, while Szpilman is conscripted into a forced German Labor Compound. At last deciding to escape, Szpilman goes into hiding as a Jewish refugee where he is witness to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising (April 19, 1943 - May 16, 1943) and the Warsaw Uprising (1 August to 2 October 1944)

The Princess Bride (DVD): Cary Elwes, Billy Crystal, Robin Wright Penn (1987)

Adventure/Comedy/Fantasy: A classic fairy tale, with swordplay, giants, an evil prince, a beautiful princess, and yes, some kissing as read by a kindly grandfather.