In the Polish city of Lodz, the Brothers Ashkenazi grew up very differently in talent and in temperament. Max, the firstborn, is fiercely intelligent and conniving, determined to succeed financially by any means necessary. Slower-witted Jacob is strong, handsome, and charming but without great purpose in life. While Max is driven by ambition and greed to be more successful than his brother, Jacob is drawn to easy living and decadence. As waves of industrialism and capitalism flood the city...

While Willy has neither the multi-generational sweep nor the moral gravitas of I. J. Singer’s family sagas, its themes are nonetheless timeless, its struggles archetypal. A father and son quarrel, and, in the process, a richly compact narrative emerges. Their respective stories define what is lost and what is gained in immigrant passage to the new world. The eponymous hero, Volf Rubin—Willy (Vili) Robin in America—is the rare agon who shares center stage with his antagonist, that is, his m...

In the Polish city of Lodz, the twin brothers Ashkenazi grow up with contrasting characters. Max, depicted as sickly and cunning, is driven by ambition and greed to be more successful than his brother, whereas Yakub, robust and a dolt in school, is drawn to easy living and decadence. Historically and geographically expansive, the novel begins after the Napoleonic Wars and ends after World War I, more than a century later, the rise and fall of Lodz and its Jewish inhabitants emerging as the...

As one of the most well-known Yiddish writers of the twentieth century, Israel Joshua Singer produced an impressive opus - presented in three volumes in Collected Works - in which he tackles religious, social, and political challenges facing the Jewish people. Unabashedly critical, he does not offer substitutes for what he views as failed ideologies, instead seeing the writer's role in the honest expression of and engagement with this inescapable predicament.In this volume, Singer'...

It was the autumn of 1926 when Israel Joshua Singer, at the invitation of the editor of the New York Yiddish daily Forverts, traveled to the Soviet Union for a reportage that would take him several months. “These images and impressions are written in a moment, as is always the case with travelers,” he would comment on his work, which nevertheless constitutes an exceptional, and in many ways unique, testimony.I.J. Singer, who had already observed the Soviet country in depth at the h...

Killer Commodities enters the increasingly heated debate regarding consumer culture with a critical examination of the relationship between corporate production of goods for profit and for public health. This collection analyzes the nature and public health impact of a wide range of dangerous commercial products from around the world, and it addresses the question of how policies should be changed to better protect the public, workers, and the environment.

Food makes philosophers of us all. Death does the same . . . but death comes only once . . . and choices about food come many times each day. In The Ethics of Food, Gregory E. Pence brings together a collection of voices who share the view that the ethics of genetically modified food is among the most pressing societal questions of our time. This comprehensive collection addresses a broad range of subjects, including the meaning of food, moral analyses of vegetarianism and starvation, the ...

The fully revised new edition of the defining reference work in the field of medical anthropologyA Companion to Medical Anthropology, Second Edition provides the most complete account of the key issues and debates in this dynamic, rapidly growing field. Bringing together contributions by leading international authorities in medical anthropology, this comprehensive reference work presents critical assessments and interpretations of a wide range of topical t...

Teaching to Learn, Learning to Teach uniquely addresses three problems that frequently concern pre-service and beginning teachers: classroom control, satisfying state and federal mandates, and figuring out exactly what is the role of the teacher. Integrating practical, theoretical, and critical teaching considerations, it presents a model student-centered approach for designing lessons, developing personal connections with students, and building classroom communities: PRO/CLASS Pr...

Winner of the American Society of Criminology 2015 Michael J. Hindelang Book Award for the Most Outstanding Contribution to Research in CriminologySince the mid-1990s, the fast-growing suburb of Amherst, NY has been voted by numerous publications as one of the safest places to live in America. Yet, like many of America’s seemingly idyllic suburbs, Amherst is by no means without crime—especially when it comes to adolescents. In America’s Safest City, noted juvenile ...

The most important questions in life are questions about what we should do and what we should believe. The first kind of question has received considerable attention by normative ethicists, who search for a complete systematic account of right action. This book is about the second kind of question. Right Belief and True Belief starts by defining a new field of inquiry named 'normative epistemology' that mirrors normative ethics in searching for a systematic account of right belief...

Now in its fifth edition, this popular text for secondary social studies methods courses integrates discussions of educational goals and the nature of history and social studies with ideas for organizing social studies curricula, units, lessons, projects, and activities. Advocating an inquiry and activity-based view of social studies teaching that respects the points of view of students and teachers, it offers systematic support and open, honest advice for new teachers.Based in pra...