Anachronism and Its Others: Sexuality, Race, Temporality

Valerie Rohy’s exploration of the efforts to define both queer and Black identities and their subsequent intersections is as interesting as it is illuminating, as presented in Anachronism and Its Others, whether it is a discussion of the temporal implications of Frederick Douglass’ thought presented in his autobiography or demystifying the nebulous concepts of "queer time." _[Anachronism and Its Others](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1438428650?ie=UTF8&tag=f

CosmoGIRL 250 Things You Can Do to Green the World

I never really considered myself a “green” person until I went to the Power Shift conference in Washington, DC last year. Things I or my family had done for years—recycling, composting, using reusable bags and cutlery—were second nature to me, and it did not quite click with me that we had been going green for years. After going to Power Shift, I made a decision to do more to help the environment, so when I saw CosmoGirl!

The Age of Independence: Interracial Unions, Same-Sex Unions, and the Changing American Family

Michael Rosenfeld’s The Age of Independence is refreshing, yet scholarly application of demography. Though demography is often seen as merely a slew of statistics flat on a page, in actuality it is the soul of society spelled out as best we can.

Goodbye Wifes and Daughters

In 1943, as the world dealt with trauma and tragedy in Europe and the Pacific during World War II, another catastrophe unfolded in Bearcreek, Montana. The Smith Coal Mine was one of the largest employers for the town, and the men worked six days a week around the clock to help provide coal for the war effort. But one morning, a fire broke out in the mine and 80 miners were trapped underground with little hope for escape.

The Gloria Anzaldúa Reader

I should probably start by saying that I absolutely love Gloria Anzaldúa. She was a writer whose work focused mostly on her identities as a woman, Chicana, lesbian, feminist, etc.—identities she insisted could not be separated from one another.

Trailer Girl: And Other Stories

One of my favorite short story collections of all time is Black Tickets, a masterpiece written by Jayne Anne Phillips in the 1970s. So hauntingly poetic and impressive were these stories written about rootless misfits by a young and relatively unknown writer that a giant of the short story genre, Raymond Carver, contributed a blurb to the book’s back cover. He wrote: “These stories of America’s disenfranchised are unlike any in our literature.

The Last Empress: Madame Chiang Kai-shek and the Birth of Modern China

No one will fail to notice this giant red book on your bookshelf.

Between the Sheets: Nine 20th Century Women Writers and Their Famous Literary Partnerships

The adage, “Behind every great man is a great woman,” is a backhanded compliment to women, and one that implicitly avers a submissive feminism of codependency.

Shot

It seems like it has become very fashionable for poetry collections to have short and ambiguous titles. We are long past the era where poems’ titles were incredibly detailed, as in “To my Lover, Upon Discovering that I Forgot to Do the Dishes and Churn the Butter. Autumn 1864.” I was drawn to Christine Hume’s Shot because it sounded promising, between the edgy title and the vague descriptions I could find through online previews.

Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet

Some of the best American literature tells the story of the immigrant experience. Numerous writers have written about the sense of loss both material and psychological that comes with leaving your country and everything that is familiar to start a new life. Many of the characters in these novels never seem completely at home in their new land, but they soldier on for economic reasons, or because they’re committed to making a life in this new world Equally compelling is the story of first-generation Americans who have one foot in the modern world and one foot in the past.

Vegetarian Dishes from Across the Middle East

The late Arto der Haroutunian first published this book in 1983 when how-to's for vegetarian cooking—let alone for Middle Eastern vegetarian cooking—were relatively rare in the U.S. Ahead of his time, der Haroutunian's tome of some 250 recipes laid dormant and out of print for 20 years.

Women and Judaism: New Insights and Scholarship

Why is it that so many scholars—people well-versed in captivating ideas and history—are dry writers? Being a feminist with Jewish roots, I was really excited to review Women and Judaism. Divided into four sub-categories: classical tradition, history, contemporary life, and literature—the volume did present some very interesting thoughts on women's role within the Jewish religion.

The Cuban Revolution (1959-2009): Relations with Spain, the European Union, and the United States

Joaquín Roy’s study is, to my knowledge, the most comprehensive attempt to define Cuba’s relationship to the Western World (Europe and the U.S.) in the past fifty years. There is no question of its timely publication—to coincide with the fifty year anniversary of the Cuban Revolution (1959-2009).

Self-Defense for Radicals: A to Z Guide for Subversive Struggle

While it’s true that most conflict can and should be resolved with nonviolence, even peace-loving radicals like Mickey Z., the author of this alphabetical guide to self-defense, acknowledge that an absolute aversion to violence is nearly impossible in our war-loving (yet God-fearing) society that seems to tolerate blood-n-guts for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. In a country where a woman is raped every forty-six seconds, peaceful resolution can quickly become a warm fuzzy afterthought. The reality is that standing up for something usually requires standing up against something.