The first African American fraternities and sororities were established at the turn of the twentieth century to encourage leadership, racial pride, and academic excellence among black college students confronting the legacy of slavery and the indignities of Jim Crow segregation. Among their ranks are legendary artists, politicians, theologians, inventors, intellectuals, educators, civil rights leaders, and athletes. Offering a comprehensive overview of the historical, cultural, political, and social circumstances that propelled the creation of these groups, African American Fraternities and Sororities references the profound contributions that black Greek-Letter organizations and their members have made to American history.

African Americans have had a profound impact on the economy, culture, and social landscape of southern Appalachia but only after a surge of study in the last two decades have their contributions been recognized by white culture. Appalachians and Race brings together 18 essays on the black experience in the mountain South in the nineteenth century. These essays provide a broad and diverse sampling of the best work on race relations in this region. The contributors consider a variety of topics: black migration into and out of the region, educational and religious missions directed at African Americans, the musical influences of interracial contacts, the political activism of blacks during reconstruction and beyond, the racial attitudes of white highlanders, and much more. Drawing from the particulars of southern mountain experiences, this collection brings together important studies of the dynamics of race not only within the region, but throughout the South and the nation over the course of the turbulent nineteenth century.

James Still first achieved national recognition in the 1930s as a poet. Although he is better known today as a writer of fiction, it is his poetry that many of his essential images, such as the "mighty river of earth," first found expression. Yet much of his poetry remains out of print or difficult to find. From the Mountain, From the Valley collects all of Still's poems, including several never before published, and corrects editorial mistakes that crept into previous collections. The poems are presented in chronological order, allowing the reader to trace the evolution of Still's voice. Throughout, his language is fresh and vigorous and his insight profound. His respect for people and place never sounds sentimental or dated.Ted Olson's introduction recounts Still's early literary career and explores the poetic origins of his acclaimed lyrical prose. Still himself has contributed the illuminating autobiographical essay "A Man Singing to Himself," which will appeal to every lover of his work.James Still, the first poet laureate of Kentucky, recipient of two Guggenheim Fellowships and many other awards and honors, is the author of numerous works, including his masterful novel River of Earth.Ted Olson, associate professor of Appalachian studies and English at East Tennessee State University, is the author of Blue Ridge Folklife and the editor of CrossRoads: A Southern Culture Annual.

Benjamin Franklin's Autobiography ends in 1758, some thirty years before he died. Those three decades included some of the statesman's greatest triumphs, yet instead of including them in his memoir, Franklin spent the years continually revising his original text. Paul Zall has created a new autobiographical account of Franklin's entire life. By returning to a newly recovered early draft of the Autobiography, he strips away later layers of moralizing to reveal the story as Franklin first wrote it: how a poor boy from Boston used words and hard work to become America's first world-class citizen. To cover Franklin's career as a diplomat and as the only signatory of all three key documents of the American Revolution, Zall interweaves autobiographical comments from Franklin's personal letters and private journals. Franklin emerges as different from the common perception of him as a crafty "Man of Reason." His raw words reveal the bitter infighting among both British and American politicians and his personal struggle with his son's choice of the opposite side in the fight for the future of two countries. Without the veneer of second thoughts, his lifelong struggle to control his temper carries greater poignancy, as do his later years spent nursing his wounded pride. Susceptible to both fallibility and frustration, the honest Franklin depicted in his own words nevertheless remains an uncommon common man, perhaps even more so than previously thought.

James Toner argues that the cardinal virtues are and must be the core values of the military. By embracing these values, the profession of arms serves as a moral compass in an increasingly confusing age. Building upon a bold introduction, which includes what many will regard as a surprising view of military ethics, Toner examines the four cardinal virtues -- wisdom, courage, temperance, and justice -- and places each in the context of a compelling case study from recent U. S. military history.He discusses the Flinn Case, the Lavelle Affair, a B-52 crash in Washington State, and the courageous actions of Hugh Thompson after My Lai. Morals Under the Gun connects ethics and moral theology with the armed services, demonstrating that the task of preserving virtue, both personal and professional, is a noble, if imperfectible, task.

The ancient civilization of Japan, with its Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples, is also closely associated with all that is new and modern. Looking outward, Japan sees what it has become since Hiroshima: the world's second-largest economy, a source of fury and wonder, a power without arms. Looking inward, Japan sees old ways shaken and new ones developing at a hectic pace. Japan in the Twenty-first Century offers compelling insights into the current realities of the country and investigates the crucial political, economic, demographic, and environmental challenges that face the nation. A combination of text, maps, and photographs provides an essential understanding of Japan's geography, cultural heritage, demography, economic and political development, and of many other important issues. Pradyumna P. Karan explores the obstacles and opportunities that will shape Japan and affect the world community in the coming years. He highlights strategies and policies that will facilitate economic and political change and stimulate the development of effective institutions for long-term, sustainable prosperity and economic vitality. Unique field reports drawn from direct observations of events and places in Japan illuminate Japanese traditions and sensibilities. The first full-length English-language textbook on Japan's geography, culture, politics, and economy to appear in nearly four decades, Japan in the Twenty-first Century will be a vital resource for researchers, academics, general readers, and students of Japan. Pradyumna P. Karan, professor of geography and Japan studies at the University of Kentucky, is the author or editor of numerous books on Asian geography and culture, including The Japanese City and Japan in the Bluegrass.

William H. McNeill's seminal book The Rise of the West: A History of the Human Community (1963) received the National Book Award in 1964 and was named one of the 100 best nonfiction books of the twentieth century by the Modern Library. From his post at the University of Chicago, McNeill became the first contemporary North American historian to write world history in the light of anthropological, epidemiological, and technological ideas. A candid, intellectual memoir from one of the most famous and influential historians of our era, The Pursuit of Truth maps the life and career of a man who changed the way the discipline of history is understood and taught in America.

" Winner of the 2003 Ray and Pat Browne Book Award, given by the Popular Culture Association The contributors to Hollywood's White House examine the historical accuracy of these presidential depictions, illuminate their influence, and uncover how they reflect the concerns of their times and the social and political visions of the filmmakers. The volume, which includes a comprehensive filmography and a bibliography, is ideal for historians and film enthusiasts.

Salvator Rosa (1615--1673) was a colorful and controversial Italian painter, talented musician, a notable comic actor, a prolific correspondent, and a successful satirist and poet. His paintings, especially his rugged landscapes and their evocation of the sublime, appealed to Romantic writers, and his work was highly influential on several generations of European writers. James S. Patty analyzes Rosa's tremendous influence on French writers, chiefly those of the nineteenth century, such as Stendhal, Honoré de Balzac, Victor Hugo, George Sand, and Théophile Gautier. Arranged in chronological order, with numerous quotations from French fiction, poetry, drama, art criticism, art history, literary history, and reference works, Salvator Rosa in French Literature forms a narrative account of the reception of Rosa's life and work in the world of French letters.

From The Maltese Falcon (1941) to Touch of Evil (1958), the classic film noir is easily recognizable for its unusual lighting, sinister plots, and feeling of paranoia. For critics and fans alike, these films defined an era. The Philosophy of Film Noir explores philosophical themes and ideas inherent in classic noir and neo-noir films, establishing connections to diverse thinkers ranging from Camus to the Frankfurt School. The authors, each focusing on a different aspect of the genre, explore the philosophical underpinnings of classic films such as The Big Sleep (1946), Out of the Past (1947), and Pulp Fiction (1994). They show how existentialism and nihilism dominate the genre as they explore profound themes in a vital area of popular culture.

Mary Blachford Tighe was born in Dublin in 1772 and became a poet by the age of seventeen. Her enormously popular 1805 epic poem "Psyche; or, The Legend of Love" made her a fixture of English literary history for much of the nineteenth century. For much of the twentieth century, however, Tighe was better known for her influence on Keats's poetry than the considerable merits of her own work. The Collected Poems and Journals of Mary Tighe restores Tighe to the general canon of English literature of the period. With over eighty-five poems, including the complete Psyche, and extracts from several journals, both by and about Tighe, Harriet Kramer Linkin's annotated edition is the most complete collection of Mary Tighe's work to be published in one volume.

Founded in 2002, Logos: A Journal of Modern Society and Culture was established in response to the increasing erosion of a left political culture and the new possibilities for international political engagement and cooperation produced by the Internet. Many of the best known intellectual representatives of what might be termed a "rational radicalism" soon served as the core group for this new online journal that has reached about four million readers. The Logos Reader brings together the most influential and controversial work to appear in the journal. In its pages, writers of exceptional stature such as Stanley Aronowitz, Ulrich Beck, Drucilla Cornell, Fred Dallmayr, Jürgen Habermas, Douglas Kellner, and Eric Rouleau articulate liberal and socialist values even as they retain theoretical viewpoints influenced by critical theory. The contributors deal with some of the most pressing political issues of our age, including transnational developments, U.S. foreign policy, the Iraqi War, the plight of the Palestinians, and the domestic concerns currently dominating American politics. With themes that speak to the most pertinent and enduring issues of a post-9/11 culture, the essays in The Logos Reader represent the best of modern liberal thought and will influence contemporary political discourse.

The Spanish Civil War, begun in July 1936, was a preliminary round of World War II. Hitler's and Mussolini's cooperation with General Franco resulted in the Axis agreement of October 1936 and the subsequent Pact of Steel of May 1939, immediately following the end of the Civil War.This study presents comprehensive documentation of Hitler's use of the upheaval in Spain to strengthen the Third Reich diplomatically, ideologically, economically, and militarily. While the last great cause drew all eyes to Western Europe and divided the British and especially the French internally, Hitler could pursue territorial gains in Eastern Europe.This book, based on little-known German records and recently opened Spanish archives, fills a major gap in our understanding of one of the 20th century's most significant conflicts. Its comprehensive treatment of German-Spanish relations from 1936 through 1939, bringing together diplomatic, economic, military, and naval aspects, will be of great value to specialists in European diplomacy and the political economy of Nazi imperialism, as well as to all students of the Spanish Civil War.

Southern Baptists had long considered themselves a missionary people, but when, after World War II, they embarked on a dramatic expansion of missionary efforts, they confronted headlong the problem of racism. Believing that racism hindered their evangelical efforts, the Convention's full-time missionaries and mission board leaders attacked racism as unchristian, thus finding themselves at odds with the pervasive racist and segregationist ideologies that dominated the South. This progressive view of race stressed the biblical unity of humanity, encompassing all races and transcending specific ethnic divisions. In All According to God's Plan, Alan Scot Willis explores these beliefs and the chasm they created within the Convention. He shows how, in the post-World War II era, the most respected members of the Southern Baptists Convention publicly challenged the most dearly held ideologies of the white South.

" Today, Thomas Dixon is perhaps best known as the author of the best-selling early twentieth-century trilogy that included the novel The Clansman (1905), which provided the core narrative for D.W. Griffith's groundbreaking and still-controversial film The Birth of a Nation. It was The Sins of the Father, however, that Dixon regarded as the most aesthetically satisfying child of his Ku Klux Klan saga. In this novel he telescopes the trilogy's sprawling historical canvas into one tightly scripted narrative. A best-seller in 1912, the novel's themes of interracial sex and incest outraged many upon its publication.A century later, Dixon's work is undergoing a critical reevaluation. A new introduction by Steven Weisenburger lends a valuable historical and critical perspective to this important and divisive classic of American literature.

America stocks its shelves with mass-produced goods but fills its imagination with handmade folk objects. In Pennsylvania, the "back to the city" housing movement causes a conflict of cultures. In Indiana, an old tradition of butchering turtles for church picnics evokes both pride and loathing among residents. In New York, folk-art exhibits raise choruses of adoration and protest. These are a few of the examples Simon Bronner uses to illustrate the ways Americans physically and mentally grasp things. Bronner moves beyond the usual discussions of form and variety in America's folk material culture to explain historical influences on, and the social consequences of, channeling folk culture into a mass society.