History

Gathering for the first time all of Claude L vi-Strauss's writings on Japanese civilization, The Other Face of the Moon forms a sustained meditation into the French anthropologist's dictum that to understand one's own culture, one must regard it from the...

This revisionary account of the Oromo people and the Christian kingdom of Ethiopia transforms our perception of the country's development, rebutting the common depiction of the Oromo as no more than a destructive force and demonstrating their significant...

In 1910, the Tuxedo Jazz Band played its first show at the Tuxedo Dance Hall in Storyville under Oscar Celestin. The popular ensemble went on to play all over New Orleans, as well as across the South and the nation. In 1953, it became the first jazz band...

Life in the city, for the millions who lived it, was once something less than the sum of their lifestyle choices: they woke up, they ate, they shoveled coal, loved, hated, prayed, mated, reproduced, died. For most, the home was not a display object but a...

For the first time, the definitive account of America's most powerful, most secretive, and most controversial nonprofit, and how far it has strayed from its origins. The National Rifle Association is unique in American life. Few other civic organizations...

The Norsk H stfest: A Celebration of Ethnic Food and Ethnic Identity Paul Thomas Emch SIL International* and the International Museum of Cultures Publications in Ethnography 41 What does it mean to be Norwegian-American? This study, of interest to laymen...

In 1966, journalist Charles Suhor wrote that New Orleans jazz was ready for its new Golden Age. Thomas W. Jacobsen's The New Orleans Jazz Scene, 1970-2000 chronicles the resurgence of jazz music in the Crescent City in the years following Suhor's...

Following a bitter Civil War, America ended the abhorrent practice of slavery on Dec. 6, 1865, the day the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution was ratified. Now, the African-American community, along with other minority groups, is being lead back to...

The Civil War was a revolution in many ways, writes Benjamin Quarles in this renowned work. But on one point there is common agreement: without slavery there would have been no resort to arms. Hence the slave was the key factor in the war. But the...

More than five thousand Negro cowboys joined the round-ups and served on the ranch crews in the cattleman era of the West. Lured by the open range, the chance for regular wages, and the opportunity to start new lives, they made vital contributions to the...

Every so often, a memoir comes along with the power to transcend the events in an individual's life and unite people in a collective movement of inspiration and understanding. The Nature of Shadows is such a memoir. At the risk of painting myself too...

Celebrate the mojito! This book spotlights a favorite Caribbean cocktail that has won a place in bars and eateries across the globe. Food writer Heather McPherson details everything you need to know to make mojito masterpieces, plus flavor-packed...

History lies heavily on South Africa, and Adam Hochschild brings to bear a lifetime's familiarity with the country in an eye-opening work that blends history and reportage. Hochschild looks at the tensions of modern South Africa through a dramatic prism:...

From bestselling author Gary Krist, the story of the metropolis that never should have been and the visionaries who dreamed it into reality Little more than a century ago, the southern coast of California--bone-dry, harbor-less, isolated by deserts and...

Paul Kruger was the dominating figure of Boer-and therefore South African-history of the nineteenth century. His life spanned the time of the Great Trek-the European settlement of the interior-right up to the end of the Second Boer War, and the shadow of...

An introductory guide to the mbira: the spiritual traditions, historical perspectives, and practical applications of a sacred Zimbabwean instrument. In this accessible overview steeped in history and tradition, teacher and student Māhealani Uchiyama...