Justin Jesty – UW News /news Tue, 27 Oct 2020 18:35:01 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.9.4 UW Books in brief: Poetry of India’s Bani-Thani, equitable parent-school collaboration, building military cultural competence — and a 2019 National Jewish Book Award /news/2020/02/03/uw-books-in-brief-poetry-of-indias-bani-thani-equitable-parent-school-collaboration-building-military-cultural-competence-and-a-2019-national-jewish-book-award/ Mon, 03 Feb 2020 22:01:19 +0000 /news/?p=66003

 

Notable new books by ӰӴý faculty members include studies of military cultural education programs and equitable collaboration between schools and families. Also, National Endowment for the Humanities support for a coming book on an 18th century India poet, and a National Jewish Book Award.

Volume of essays co-edited by Naomi Sokoloff wins 2019 National Jewish Book Award for anthologies, collections

Naomi Sokoloff

A book co-edited by , UW professor of Hebrew and comparative literature, has won a 2019 National Jewish Book Award for anthologies and collections from the .

“),” edited by Sokoloff with of Washington University, is a volume of scholars, writers and translators discussing the changing status of Hebrew in the United States. The book was published by ӰӴý Press in June 2018.

The book features a diverse group of distinguished contributors discussing the questions, publisher notes state: “Why Hebrew, here and now? What is its value for contemporary Americans? To what extent is that sta­tus affect­ed by evolv­ing Jew­ish iden­ti­ties and shift­ing atti­tudes toward Israel and Zion­ism? Will Hebrew pro­grams sur­vive the cur­rent cri­sis in the human­i­ties on uni­ver­si­ty cam­pus­es? How can the vibran­cy of Hebrew lit­er­a­ture be con­veyed to alarg­er audience?”

The Jewish Book Council established the in 1950. Winners of the 2019 awards, across 18 categories, will be honored at a ceremony March 17 in New York.

To learn more, contact Sokoloff at naosok@uw.edu.

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Heidi Pauwels receives National Endowment for the Humanities fellowship for book on ‘India’s 18th century Mona Lisa’

, professor in the Department of Asian Languages & Literature, has been awarded a $45,000 National Endowment for the Humanities fellowship to work on her planned book, “The Voice of India’s 18th Century Mona Lisa: Songs by Rasik Bihari of Kishangarh.”

The book will explore the poetry and life of an 18th-century woman known as , or Rasik Bihari, who was an elegant court performer and favorite of the Indian crown prince Sāvant Singh (1699-1764) of , a city in the Indian state of Rajasthan. She turns out to have been a composer in her own right under the pseudonym of Rasik Bihari.

Pauwels, who also coordinates the department’s South Asia Program, recently wrote a book about Singh. “” was published in 2017 by ӰӴý Press.

The fellowship was announced Jan. 14, part of a NEH of $30.9 million in grants supporting 188 humanities projects in 45 states. Read more on the Simpson Center for the Humanities .

To learn more, contact Pauwels at hpauwels@uw.edu.

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Ann Ishimaru pens book on equitable school-family collaboration

Ann Ishimaru

Teachers College Press has published “,” by , associate professor in the UW College of Education. The book examines the challenges and possibilities of creating more equitable forms of collaboration among nondominant families, communities and schools.

“As we’ve been trying to make changes to the long-standing and persistent racial inequities that exist in our schools and really transform education, my argument is that we’ve overlooked a vital source of expertise and leadership — and that resides in the families and communities of students themselves,” Ishimaru said in an .

The book is drawn on Ishimaru’s work as principal investigator of the UW-based and the project over more than a decade. The book describes core concepts for equitable collaboration and provides multiple examples of effective practices.

Listen to a College of Education-produced with Ishimaru. To learn more, contact Ishimaru at aishi@uw.edu.

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Paula Holmes-Eber co-edits book on building military cultural competence

Paula Holmen-Eber

As recent international conflicts have shown, the military officer of today must be both warrior and diplomat, combatant and humanitarian worker, soldier and peacekeeper. An anthology coedited by , affiliate professor in the Jackson School of International studies, explores how today’s militaries can prepare their leaders for such complex roles.

“,” edited by Holmes and Kjetil Enstad of The Norwegian Defence University College, compares research on the successes and failures of military cultural education and training programs in seven countries: The United States, Canada, Argentina, Norway, Denmark, Germany and the Netherlands.

“Warriors or Peacekeepers” will be published in March by Springer. To learn more, contact Holmes-Eber at pholmese@uw.edu.

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Justin Jesty’s ‘Arts and Engagement in Early Postwar Japan’ honored

Justin Jesty

“,” a 2018 book by , associate professor of Japanese language and literature, has been awarded the by the Association for the Study of the Arts of the Present, known as ASAP for short.

The book, a cultural history of post-World War II Japan, was published in September 2018 by Cornell University Press. The award was announced in late 2019.

To learn more, contact Jesty at jestyj@uw.edu or visit his .


UW Notebook is a section of the UW News site dedicated to telling stories of the good work done by faculty and staff at the ӰӴý. Read all posts here.

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UW books in brief: Postwar Japan, American Indian businesses, dictatorship to democracy — and more /news/2018/10/29/uw-books-in-brief-postwar-japan-american-indian-businesses-dictatorship-to-democracy-and-more/ Mon, 29 Oct 2018 20:55:49 +0000 /news/?p=59611 Collage illustration for UW Books in Brief, Oct. 29, 2018

 

Recent notable books by ӰӴý faculty members study politics and culture in post-World War II Japan, explore regime change, nonprofit management, documents from the ancient world and more.

‘Japan in the American Century” explores postwar relations, current geopolitical changes

After the United States ended World War II by dropping atomic weapons on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, it then conducted “the most intrusive international reconstruction of another nation in modern history,” according to a new book by , professor emeritus at the UW’s . Only now, amid geopolitical changes of the 21st century, is Japan pulling free from American dominance and constraints placed on it after the war.

“,” published this month by Harvard University Press, examines how Japan, with its conservative heritage, responded to the imposition of a new liberal order. The book offers a thoughtful history of the now-changing relationship between the two nations.

“The price Japan paid to end the occupation was a Cold War alliance with the United States that ensured America’s dominance in the region,” Pyle writes. “Still traumatized by its wartime experience, Japan developed a grand strategy of dependence on U.S. security guarantees so that the nation could concentrate on economic growth.” Meanwhile, he adds, Japan “reworked the American reforms” to fit its own cultural and economic circumstances and social institutions.

Today that postwar world is in retreat, Pyle argues, and Japan is changing its foreign policy, “returning to an activist, independent role in global politics not seen since 1945” — and that has repercussion for its continuing relations with the U.S. and its role in Asian geopolitics.

The book distills a lifetime of work on Japan and the U.S. by Pyle, a former director of the Jackson School, who joined the UW in 1964. “The American Century,” referring to global political, economic and cultural dominance by the United States, is a term famously coined by , publisher of , Time and Fortune magazines, in a Life editorial in 1941.

To learn more, contact kbp@uw.edu.

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When authoritarianism becomes democracy: New boss, same as the old boss?

When authoritarian governments transition to democracy, sometimes those running the old system are the ones creating the new system — and design it to their own advantage. So argues UW political scientist , co-author of the book “,” published this summer by Cambridge University Press. He wrote the book with of the University of Chicago.

“We examine … how does this process occur and what are the consequences?” Menaldo, associate professor of political science, said in an posted on the Political Science Department website. “Since World War 2, the outgoing authoritarian regime has drafted the new democratic constitution in over two-thirds of the countries that have made this transition.” Menaldo and Albertus studied such transitions globally across two centuries.

“There are many ways [for outgoing regimes] to do this,” Menaldo said. “One is to require a supermajority for future amendments to the constitution they have written. Others include barriers to voting, malapportionment, and giving veto power to unelected political bodies in which elites from the old guard are over-represented.”

Some of this may have a familiar ring to those interested in American history. Though the book is not about the United States, Menaldo said, the findings are consistent with a longstanding argument about the U.S. Constitution and its authors — that they were a small elite group who in writing the document partly protected their own interests.

“The United States continues to hold indirect elections for the presidency, and its federal system long protected subnational enclaves in which a majority of citizens in some states were deprived of basic rights,” Menaldo said.

To learn more, contact Menaldo at vmenaldo@uw.edu.

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Principles, practices of American Indian business

American Indian business is booming overall in recent years, but not thriving as much on reservations, notes a new book co-edited by , associate professor in the UW Bothell School of Business titled “.”

Despite healthy growth in American Indian and Alaska Native-owned businesses, they are largely absent from reservations “and Native Americans own private businesses at the lowest rate per capita for any ethnic or racial group in the United States,” say notes from the publisher, ӰӴý Press.

“Many Indigenous entrepreneurs face unique cultural and practical challenges in starting, locating, and operating a business, from a perceived lack of a culture of entrepreneurship and a suspicion of capitalism to the difficulty of borrowing startup funds when real estate is held in trust and cannot be used as collateral.”

The book discusses the history and state of such businesses as well as business practices and education. It ranges “from early trading posts to today’s casino boom.”

A review in praised the book as “so well done that it can be used by higher education institutions to acquaint students on how to better understand doing business in Indian Country.”

Kennedy, a member of the Cherokee Nation, edited the book with Charles F. Harrington of the University of South Carolina-Upstate, Amy Klemm Verbos of the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, Daniel Stewart of Gonzaga University, Joseph Scott-Gladstone of the University of New Haven and Gavin Clarkson of New Mexico State University.

To learn more, contact Kennedy at 425-352-5321 or deannak@uw.edu.

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Evans School’s Mary Kay Gugerty honored for book on nonprofits management, ‘The Goldilocks Challenge’

, professor in the Evans School of Public Policy & Governance, has been announced the recipient of the from the for her book, “ The book, which Gugerty wrote with of Northwestern University, was published this year by Oxford University Press.

The award “highlights the very best thinking in management, governance and capacity-building, and helps expose practitioners to new knowledge and approaches in the field,” according to the group’s website. Gugerty is the Nancy Bell Evans Professor of Nonprofit Management in the Evans School, and faculty director of the .

The book is about “measuring impact,” a statement from the reviewing committee says. “We all want to do it, know we have to do it … and are all too often frustrated by one-size-fits-all expectations of how to do it. ‘The Goldilocks Challenge’ offers a solution: an impact measurement framework that helps organizations decide what elements they should monitor and measure.” That framework is based on having data that is at once credible, actionable, responsible and transportable.

To learn more, contact Gugerty at 206-221-4599 or gugerty@uw.edu.

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Rethinking post-World War II art, politics in Japan

In a new cultural history of post-World War II Japan, , UW associate professor of Asian languages and literature, explores art and politics — and consolidations of political and cultural life — in the years leading to the Cold War. His new book “,” was published in September by Cornell University Press.

Jesty focuses on social realists on the radical left who, “hoped to wed their art with anti-capitalist and anti-war activism, a liberal art education movement whose focus on the child inspired innovation in documentary film, and a regional avant-garde group split between ambition and local loyalty.”

The book, Jesty writes, has the two main goals, the first being to reframe that history and its relevance to the present. The second is to show a way of studying the relationship between art and politics that views art as a mode of intervention “but insists artistic intervention move beyond the idea that the artwork of artist unilaterally authors political significance, to trace how creations and expressive acts may (or may not) actually engage the terms of shared meaning and value.”

To learn more, contact Jesty at jestyj@uw.edu or visit his .

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Exploring India’s ‘political economy of electricity’

Electricity is critical to India’s continued growth and economic health, but despite decades of reform the country remains unable to provide high-quality and affordable energy for all. A new book co-edited by , an associate professor in the Jackson School, explores these issues. “” was published earlier this year by Oxford University Press.

The book tracks power sectors in 15 states in India, giving an analysis of their political economy of electricity. A historically grounded study of the country’s political economy, the book suggests, helps better understand the past and inform new reforms to “improve sectoral outcomes and generate political rewards.”

Kale’s co-editors were Navroz K. Dubash of India’s Centre for Policy Research and Ranjit Bharvirkar of the Regulatory Assistance Project, a multinational nonprofit organization. Kale is also director of the Jackson School’s South Asia Center and chair of its South Asia Studies Program.

To learn more, contact Kale at 206-221-4852 or kale@uw.edu

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Book chapter by Rajesh Rao offers new view of ancient Indus script

, UW professor in the , has written an article about the that will appear in the book “.” The Indus script, also known as the Harappan script, is one of the last major undeciphered scripts of the ancient world. The article can be downloaded .

The book celebrates the contributions to South Asian archaeology of , professor of anthropology at the University of Wisconsin. Rao’s article, focusing on a set of miniature tablets discovered by Kenoyer in 1997, sets forth the “potentially provocative” conclusion that such stamps may have been used as a sort of currency in a barter-based economy.

“Walking with the Unicorn” will be published Oct. 30 by . Rao’s earlier work on the Indus script was described in UW News articles in and of 2009. Rao is the of computer science and engineering and electrical engineering.

To learn more, contact Rao at rao@cs.washington.edu.

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