Books, University of Chicago Magazine, August 1996

The University of Chicago Magazine

August 1996

America's Game (see History/Current Events).

Herstory (see Fiction and Poetry).

ART AND ARCHITECTURE

Martha Moss Kreisel, AM'72, Papercutting: An International Bibliography and Selected Guide to U.S. Collections (Scarecrow Press). This bibliography covers articles and books on papercutting and includes a listing of where examples of the art may be seen.

BIOGRAPHY AND LETTERS

Edgar Marquess Branch, AM'38, Studs Lonigan's Neighborhood and the Making of James T. Farrell (Arts End Books). Branch's book is an exploration of the life of the late James T. Farrell, X'29; his portrayal of the Washington Park neighborhood and the University in his fiction; and the neighborhood's pervasive influence upon Farrell's Studs Lonigan trilogy and Danny O'Neill pentalogy.

Martin Gardner, AB'36, The Night Is Large: Collected Essays, 1938-1995 (St. Martin's Press). Spanning Gardner's seven-decade career, this collection of essays addresses topics as diverse as physical science, social science, pseudoscience, mathematics, the arts, philosophy, and religion.

BUSINESS AND ECONOMICS

Abdulkader (Steven) Thomas, AB'79, What Is Permissible Now!? (Muslim Converts' Association of Singapore). Thomas examines the key issues governing financial contracts in Islamic Sharia, or law, and their application to Western banking systems.

CRITICISM

Joanna Frueh, AM'71, PhD'81, Erotic Faculties (University of California Press). Exploring such subjects as aging, love, sex, contemporary art, and the body as a site and vehicle of knowledge, Frueh seeks to free the power of our underutilized erotic faculties and to expand the possibilities of art criticism.

Fred L. Gardaphe, AM'82, Italian Signs, American Streets: The Evolution of Italian-American Narrative (Duke University Press). Gardaphe presents an interpretive overview of Italian-American literary history and develops a new perspective by which American writers of Italian descent can be read.

FICTION AND POETRY

Ed Beamish, MBA'66, Wind Shear (Vantage Press). Beamish's novel combines murder, high finance, and ruthless business types in a convoluted web.

Jay Jennings, AM'81, editor, Tennis and the Meaning of Life (hardcover: Breakaway Books; paperback: Harcourt Brace). A collection of fiction and poetry about tennis, this book includes short stories by William Trevor, Somerset Maugham, and former Wimbledon champion Bill Tilden, as well as poetry by Robert Pinsky, Sir John Betjeman, and E. B. White.

Mario Andino Lopez, AM'67, Versos para no versados/Verses for the Unversed (The Interamerican Publisher). These 33 poems, written in Spanish, are collected from publications throughout the Spanish-speaking world.

Martha Roth, AB'58, Goodness (Spinsters Ink). Roth's novel follows a group of feminist activists during 30 years of cataclysmic social and political changes in American history, from the Vietnam War through the Reagan revolution.

Susan G. Woolridge, X'68, poemcrazy (Clarkson Potter). Woolridge, a poet and a teacher, recreates a workshop atmosphere by including stories about her own work; sections on how to use poetic tools such as journal writing, imagery, comparison, and awareness of detail; and poetry-writing practice exercises.

HISTORY/CURRENT EVENTS

Frank J. Allston, MBA'88, Ready for Sea: The Bicentennial History of the U.S. Navy Supply Corps (Naval Institute Press). Allston offers a representative sample of personal stories about Supply Corps personnel from 1795 to the present era, placing their stories within the context of American naval history.

Charles J. Beirne, PhD'73, Jesuit Education and Social Change in El Salvador (Garland Publishing). A history of the University of Central America where six Jesuit priests, including Ignacio Martín-Baró, AM'77, PhD'79, as well as two women, were murdered by Salvadoran government forces in 1989.

Douglas H. Daniels, AB'64, translator, Charlemagne Pralte and the First American Occupation of Haiti (Kendall/Hunt). This is the English translation of Georges Michel's Charlemagne Pralte: Un Centenaire, 1885-1985, a tribute to the Haitian hero.

Linda T. Darling, MAT'73, AM'80, Revenue-Raising and Legitimacy: Tax Collection and Finance Administration in the Ottoman Empire, 1560-1660 (E. J. Brill). Darling examines finance procedures and documents from the early post-classical era of the Ottoman Empire and reformulates the period as a time of consolidation and continuity rather than of decline.

Joshua Fogel, AB'72, The Literature of Travel in the Japanese Rediscovery of China, 1862-1945 (Stanford University Press). Using travelogues written by Japanese travelers in China, Fogel gauges changing Japanese views of China and the Chinese.

David Goodman, PhD'92, Gold Seeking: Victoria and California in the 1850s (Stanford University Press). A comparative cultural history of the response to the discovery of gold in Victoria, Australia, and in California, this book argues that the apprehensions raised by the gold rush--and the kind of self-interested society it seemed to prefigure--have been lost in the celebratory memories passed down in both societies.

Jonathan D. Hill, AB'76, editor, History, Power, and Identity (University of Iowa Press). This collection of essays documents cultural and political struggles for existence, as well as the historical consciousness of these struggles, within indigenous and African-American communities throughout the Americas.

Martha Moss Kreisel, AM'72, Guide to Civil War Books: An Annotated Selection of Modern Works on the War between the States (American Library Association). This resource guide brings together books of general interest about the Civil War published during the last 20 years.

Thomas Parrish, AB'49, AM'79, The Cold War Encyclopedia (Henry Holt). Written for general readers and students alike, this book is organized in two sections--an A-Z series of 700 articles and a 110-page chronology stretching from 1917 to Mikhail Gorbachev's resignation in 1991.

Paul Rabinow, AB'65, AM'67, PhD'70, Making PCR (University of Chicago Press). Combining narrative description and interviews, Rabinow explores the culture of biotechnology as it emerged during the 1980s at Cetus, the corporation that invented PCR--the polymerase chain reaction that has extended scientists' ability to identify and manipulate genetic material.

Gerald Schwab, AB'49, OSS Agents in Hitler's Heartland: Destination Innsbruck (Greenwood Press). Based on extensive interviews with the agents and on OSS files obtained under the Freedom of Information Act, this book is a case study of one of the most successful OSS operations of WWII.

Joel Zoss, AB'66, and John Bowman, Diamonds in the Rough: The Untold History of Baseball (Contemporary Books). Zoss and Bowman's anecdotal history of the game includes myth, fact, history, and trivia.

MEDICINE AND HEALTH

Ronald M. Andersen; Thomas H. Rice; and Gerald F. Kominski, AB'78, editors, Changing the U.S. Health Care System: Key Issues in Health Services, Policy, and Management (Jossey-Bass). This volume examines current trends in health-care costs, quality, and access and discusses options for reforming the U.S. health-care system in the aftermath of the defeat of national reform.

Stephen M. Davidson, PhD'74; Marion McCollom; and Janelle Heineke, The Physician-Manager Alliance: Building the Healthy Health Care Organization (Jossey-Bass). The authors articulate a vision of what good medical care in the era of health-care organizations is like, discuss obstacles to achieving such care, and outline an approach to overcoming those obstacles.

MUSIC

Ethan Haimo, AB'72, Haydn's Symphonic Forms: Essays in Compositional Logic (Clarendon Press). Using the symphonies as his subject, the author attempts to clarify Haydn's fundamental principles of formal logic. Showing how Haydn employed those basic compositional principles to structure his forms, he provides explanations that account for specific details of individual movements as well as the relationship between movements.

Jeffrey Kallberg, AM'78, PhD'82, Chopin at the Boundaries: Sex, History, and Musical Genre (Harvard University Press). Combining social history, literary theory, musicology, and feminist thought, Kallberg situates Chopin's music historically within his native Polish and adopted French cultures and explores the relationship between 19th-century gender constructions, Chopin's sexual identity, and his reputation as a "woman's composer."

POLITICAL SCIENCE AND LAW

Omar Dahbour, PhD'87, and Micheline R. Ishay, editors, The Nationalism Reader (Humanities Press). This book collects a number of classical and contemporary writings on the nation-state. The works included range from essays by Enlightenment philosophers to works by current thinkers.

Dale F. Eickelman, AM'68, PhD'71, and James Piscatori, editors, Muslim Politics (Princeton University Press). In an attempt to demystify "Muslim politics" for a wide audience, the editors explore how the politics of Islam play out in the daily lives of Muslims around the world.

Helen Fedor, AB'79, Belarus and Moldova: Country Studies (U.S. Government Printing Office). Fedor's book, written as a part of the ongoing production of the Department of the Army's "Area Handbook" series, is one of a subseries that covers the former Soviet Republics.

Robert Freilich, AB'54, Model Subdivision Regulations: Planning and Law, 2nd ed. (APA Planners Press). This revised edition shows communities how to use subdivision regulations to shape civic growth.

Michael J. Gerhardt, JD'82, The Federal Impeachment Process: A Constitutional and Historical Analysis (Princeton University Press). In his analysis of the constitutional, historical, and political dimensions of the federal impeachment process, the author argues that impeachment not only is a far more effective process than commonly supposed, but also constitutes a special power, confined solely to the nonreviewable discretion of Congress, for punishing certain executive and judicial misconduct.

David G. Lawrence, PhD'75, The Collapse of the Democratic Presidential Majority: Realignment, Dealignment, and Electoral Change from Franklin Roosevelt to Bill Clinton (Westview). Lawrence combines a detailed analysis of presidential elections in the post-war world with an elaboration and application of competing theories of electoral change.

Michelle A. McFaddin, AB'82, Oil and Gas Field Waste Regulations Handbook (PennWell Publications). Directed at attorneys, environmental consultants, and the oil and gas industry, this book describes the various federal and state environmental programs that regulate oil and gas exploration and production.

Joshua Parens, AM'88, PhD'92, Metaphysics as Rhetoric: Alfarabi's "Summary of Plato's Laws" (State University of New York Press). Parens controverts the widely accepted belief that Plato attempted to ground politics on a rational metaphysics, using the 10th-century Muslim philosopher Alfarabi's interpretation of Plato to argue that what appears to be Plato's metaphysics was intended as a rhetorical defense of his politics.

David L. Schaefer, AM'67, PhD'71, and Roberta R. Schaefer, AM'69, PhD'77, editors, The Future of Cities (University Press of America). A collection of essays on contemporary urban political, economic, and social issues by prominent political scientists, journalists, and students of urban affairs, this book includes works by John Fund, Hadely Arkes, David Rusk, and William Galston.

Morley Winograd and Dudley Buffa, AM'68, PhD'80, Taking Control: Politics in the Information Age (Henry Holt). Drawing on interviews and research from the private sector, this study demonstrates the authors' theory that information-driven systems can be used to solve the nation's major problems, including quality education, health care, protection of the environment, and public safety.

PSYCHIATRY/PSYCHOLOGY

Dennis Klass, AB'70, PhD'74; Phyllis R. Silverman; and Steven Nickman, editors, Continuing Bonds: New Understandings of Grief (Taylor & Francis). Revising the current model of grief and bereavement--one which holds that the function of mourning is to sever the bonds with the deceased--this book presents data showing that the resolution of grief allows survivors to maintain a bond with the deceased that supports healthy functioning in the present.

RECREATION

Marian K. Towne, AM'58, A Midwest Gardener's Cookbook (Indiana University Press). A product of 50 years of cooking according to seasonal principles, this cookbook includes many ways, from appetizers to desserts, to use produce.

RELIGION AND PHILOSOPHY

Peter W. Bakken, AM'80, PhD'91; Joan Gibb Engel; and J. Ronald Engel, AM'71, PhD'77, Ecology, Justice, and Christian Faith: A Critical Guide to the Literature (Greenwood Press). More than 500 books and articles dealing with the intersection of environmental ethics, social justice, and Christian theology are annotated; grouped into categories; and indexed by author, title, and subject in this guide.

John W. Dixon, Jr., PhD'53, Images of Truth: Religion and the Art of Seeing (Scholars Press). Taking up topics that cut across all religions, Dixon's introduction to the study of images outlines their place in human life and religion, and introduces ways of interpreting images (mostly works of art) as a part of religious thinking and worship.

Robert C. Fuller, AM'75, PhD'78, Religion and Wine: A Critical History of Winedrinking in the United States (University of Tennessee Press). Fuller explores the special relationship between wine and the spiritual dimension of human experience while also making connections between wine drinking and the particularities of the American religious experience. This book includes a foreword by Jerald C. Brauer, PhD'48, former dean of the Divinity School.

Everett C. Goodwin, AB'66, The New Hiscox Guide for Baptist Churches (Judson Press). Intended as a resource for the general reader as well as church leaders, this book is a major restatement of much of Edward T. Hiscox's work in terms appropriate for contemporary readers and has been expanded to include approaches to the concerns facing churches today.

John Holt, PhD'77, The Religious World of Kirti Sri: Buddhism, Art, and Politics in Late Medieval Lanka (Oxford University Press). Holt's book examines the role of Buddhism in shaping culture in the history of Sri Lanka.

Lawrence LeShan, PhD'54, An Ethic for the Age of Space (Samuel Weiser). The author offers an ethical guideline for the next millennium and his ideas for an educational system built on these ethics.

A. J. Mattil, Jr., AB'49, The Seven Mighty Blows to Traditional Beliefs (The Flatwoods Free Press). A course in biblical studies and the relation between science and religion, this second, revised edition of a 1986 study uses astronomy, biology, archeology, geology, biblical criticism, and world religion to refute traditional belief.

Lynn H. Nelson, AB'50, translator, The Restoration of the Monastery of Saint Martin of Tournai, by Herman of Tournai, (Catholic University of America Press). Nelson's translation of Herman's account reveals the personal motives, political undercurrents, and social tensions that surrounded the establishment of this monastic community at the end of the 11th century.

Dennis E. Tamburello, PhD'90, Ordinary Mysticism (Paulist Press). Focusing on several medieval mystics, Tamburello shows how mysticism is not restricted to visions and raptures, but includes more ordinary ways to experience God's presence.

Stephen H. Webb, AM'84, PhD'89, The Gifting God: A Trinitarian Ethics of Excess (Oxford University Press). Webb develops a mutually critical correlation between various postmodern theories of generosity or gift giving and several theological models of God's benevolence, arguing that acts of generosity demand religious articulation.

Catherine H. Zuckert, AM'66, PhD'70, Postmodern Platos: Nietzsche, Heidegger, Gadamer, Strauss, Derrida (University of Chicago Press). The author examines the work of major philosophical figures through the lens of their own decidedly postmodern readings of Plato.

SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

Harry H. Hull, SM'40, The Thermodynamics of Rheology (Society of Plastic Engineers). This book shows how the classic functions of thermodynamics can be extended and applied to the steady state for viscoelastic materials.

SOCIAL SCIENCES

Kenneth C. Carstens and Patty Jo Watson, AM'56, PhD'59, editors, Of Caves and Shell Mounds (University of Alabama Press). This book offers new evidence to dispute earlier assumptions regarding the stability and homogeneity of ancient human groups in the eastern woodlands of North America, demonstrating the vigor and complexity of prehistoric peoples in the North American Midwest and Midsouth.

Pamela McCorduck and Nancy Ramsey, AM'64, The Futures of Women: Scenarios for the 21st Century (Addison-Wesley). Using current statistics to predict a wide range of economic and social possibilities, the authors refute the belief that women are moving toward equality with men, and explore four radically different scenarios for the future.

Janis B. Nuckolls, AM'83, PhD'90, Sounds Like Life: Sound-symbolic Grammar, Performance, and Cognition in Pastaza Quechua (Oxford University Press). Nuckolls challenges the traditional conceptions of aspect grammar, demonstrating that in Pastaza Quechua, grammatical representations of duration and completiveness depend on the speakers' spatial and perceptual experience, and are embodied within the nature of linguistic communication.

Silvia Pedraza, AM'77, PhD'80, and Rubn G. Rambaut, editors, Origins and Destinies: Immigration, Race, and Ethnicity in America (Wadsworth Publishing Company). A collection of essays exploring immigration, race, and ethnicity in America in historical and contemporary contexts, this book combines different disciplines, approaches, methods, and perspectives to bring to life some central themes of the American experience.

Margaret Peil, PhD'63, Social Science Research Methods: A Handbook for Africa (East African Educational Publishers). Peil's text, for classes or individuals, deals with the problems of conducting survey research and assessing statistics in Africa.

Bonnie Urciuoli, AM'76, PhD'84, Exposing Prejudice: Puerto Rican Experiences of Language, Race, and Class (Westview). Drawing from several years of work with Puerto Rican families in New York's Lower East Side and the Bronx, this text lays out the fabric of people's experience of English and Spanish and examines how class and ethnic judgments are mapped onto notions about language and experienced as prejudice.

TRAVEL AND LEISURE

Emma Bickham Pitcher, AB'37, Of Woods and Other Things (Kalamazoo Nature Center). Edited to appeal to a broad audience, this book surveys a wide variety of birds, flowers, trees, and habitats.

For inclusion in "Books by Alumni," please send the book's name, author, publisher, field, and a short synopsis to the Books Editor, University of Chicago Magazine, 5757 Woodlawn Ave., Chicago, IL 60637, or by E-mail: uchicago-magazine@ uchicago.edu.

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