Brandeis Magazine
On the Bookshelf
Faculty Books

Many of the mixed-race children born to South Korean mothers and U.S. military fathers during the 1950s were adopted by American families who had been told the children’s biological mothers were unable or unwilling to care for them. Doolan, an assistant professor of history, shows how false this narrative tended to be and how damaging the adoptions often proved to the children and their birth mothers.

The essays in this collection take the measure of a little-studied question: What tangible objects — obsidian, perhaps, or jewels, or cotton thread — were considered most valuable in the economies of ancient Mesoamerica? Co-editor Golden, who has conducted archaeological research in Belize, Honduras, Guatemala, and Mexico, is an anthropology professor and the dean of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences.

From the 3rd century onward, storytellers mythologized the male and female monks who built Christian communities in the inhospitable Egyptian desert, dubbing them miracle workers and saints. Brooks Hedstrom, the Myra and Robert Kraft and Jacob Hiatt Associate Professor of Christian Studies, reconstructs what these monks’ day-to-day lives, conducted in the most austere of settings, were really like.

Essays by 20 scholars use a primary source — a book or a piece of art, for instance — to explore how the late-19th-century Gilded Age shaped Jewish life in the United States. Co-editor Sarna is a University Professor and the Joseph H. and Belle R. Braun Professor of American Jewish History.

The winner of the 2023 Phillis Wheatley Book Award, “We’ll Fight It Out Here” describes the barriers Black Americans have faced in their struggle for equal access to health care and the hard-won successes that are opening doors to high-quality medical care for all. Co-author Chanoff is a visiting scholar in English.

According to Anjaria, an associate professor of anthropology, even heavily congested cities like Mumbai can create and maintain bike-friendly transportation policies. The key is consulting those who actually pedal the city, to understand how they experience the city’s infrastructure from their bicycle seat.

A well-reasoned, informative book that offers a better understanding of the secular and theological debates around Israel’s legitimacy. Troen is the Stoll Professor of Israel Studies, Emeritus.
Alumni Books

Recent actions of the U.S. Supreme Court, including its 2022 decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, are placing the bench at an ever-widening remove from the principles of American democracy, writes McMahon, the John R. Reitemeyer Professor of Political Science at Trinity College. Relying on historical and contemporary data, this volume explains the developments that have expanded the gap.

A novel based on a real-life 1849 murder that transfixed Boston, “Chopped” uses details drawn from a transcript of the accused killer’s trial to re-create how the body of Boston’s wealthiest man ended up dismembered, partially burned, and stashed beneath a Harvard Medical College chemistry lab. The combination of lurid crime and straitlaced setting makes for chillingly compulsive reading.

Born into a wealthy Jewish family in Berlin, Rahel Levin Varnhagen (1771-1833) was a celebrated woman of letters in German salon culture, whose home became a meeting place for the leading artists and intellectuals of her day. Wortsman compiles and translates into English a selection of her letters, illuminating her keen observations on her world.

An unflinching account of addiction and unhealed trauma, Testa’s memoir chronicles her upbringing as the child of an abusive mother and a drug-dealing father, and her introduction to drug and alcohol use at age 13. Her long road to recovery is tortuous but ultimately successful, offering hope to others.

Two sociologists — one Jewish, the other Muslim — take stock of the commonalities their faiths share, comparing their religions’ historical evolution, sociological transformation, and beliefs and practices. Heilman is Emeritus Distinguished Professor of Sociology at Queens College.

A fascinating look at a determined group of educated women known as the Enthusiasts, who bucked 19th-century Poland’s extreme nationalism by choosing to live independently, free from the burden of spouses or children. Holding firm to convictions most Poles deemed “unpatriotic,” the Enthusiasts took on an oppressive regime by ignoring constricting gender roles.

The bonds that developed between the white residents and Black staff at a South African nursing home present a compelling picture of how people can outgrow their racist beliefs, at any age. Golomski, who spent years observing these interactions firsthand, is an associate professor of anthropology at the University of New Hampshire.

After suffering a traumatic brain injury in a car accident the summer before her senior year at Brandeis, Venell — now a program administrator at Heller — was given a 10% chance of functional recovery. Here, she explains how she beat those odds in what became a “triumph of the network,” aka the family members, friends, doctors, and therapists who served as her team.

A tale conceived as a sequel to Sir Walter Scott’s “Ivanhoe,” this novel follows the journey of the beautiful Jewish healer Rebecca Manasses, who flees England to escape being burned as a witch. Amid the prejudices roiling medieval Spain, will Rebecca find happiness and safety in Toledo’s Jewish quarter?

Troyansky, a Brooklyn College historian, sees the origin of modern-day notions about retirement in the arguments put forth by post-revolutionary France’s civil servants, who regarded pensions as a right, not a privilege. The book’s insights are rooted in the author’s knowledge of social, cultural, and political history, and gerontological theory.

The first installment in an upcoming series of “Missy and Mason” children’s books introduces readers to first grader Missy, who has outsized ideas about what her next pet should be. Fortunately, Mason, her more practical older brother, is around to point out a few potential problems.

The author draws on fieldwork in New York, Los Angeles, Long Beach, and Honolulu to show how migrants and refugees labeled as criminal aliens are organizing innovative antideportation efforts in the U.S. Das Gupta is a sociologist at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa.

Poland’s enduring relationship with antisemitism has rightly led to anti-Poland feelings among many in the American Jewish community. And yet, Stark-Blumenthal argues, Americans’ criticism of Poland should perhaps be tempered by a clearer recognition of the strains of white supremacy threaded throughout their own country’s politics.

This collection of short stories, which earned Berlin the Tartt First Fiction Award, spotlights male protagonists struggling to live up to masculinity ideals. Some of these characters work in the movie business; others, hamstrung by their tough-guy posturing, seem to believe notions the movies have fed them.

Through a close examination of advocacy groups and organizations in South Korea, a sociology professor at Vassar College traces the intricate relationship between neoliberalism and democracy in that country. Neoliberal governance both enables and constrains civic activism there, she concludes.

A biography of artist Blanche Ames (1878-1969) and her Harvard University botanist husband, Oakes (1874-1950), a Massachusetts power couple who marshaled their intellectual gifts, social skills, and considerable financial resources to advance women’s suffrage, reproductive rights, and scientific knowledge. Borderland, their North Easton estate — which Blanche designed — is now a state park.

Drawing on a story she wrote for her three daughters when their grandfather died, Warmflash has penned a rhyming book that helps youngsters grieve the loss of important people in their lives. The book also suggests activities that let readers express difficult emotions or preserve happy memories.

This roadmap for the automaking industry explains how artificial intelligence and the technology behind software-defined vehicles are intersecting to make driving more fun. Manufacturers will soon be able to tailor the driving experience to the preferences of individual consumers, even as those preferences change throughout their ownership of a vehicle.

A fictional account of a 50-something woman dealing with undiagnosed Lewy body dementia, written by an author of nonfiction books about brain health. The sea glass metaphor refers to the protein deposits that develop in the brains of those who live with Lewy body dementia, the second-most-prevalent dementia diagnosis in the U.S.

This single-issue comic book, set during the holiday of Sukkot, follows the adventures of a 14-year-old girl who befriends a boy with a terrifying secret. Shorr explores Jewish cultural themes within the outlines of a classic werewolf story.

A resource for legal practitioners and insurance executives, this compendium of insurance-regulation insights covers key themes, including the regulatory roles of the federal government and the states, and the organization and operation of state insurance departments. Liskov is a senior counsel at law firm ArentFox Schiff and a lecturer at Boston University’s School of Law.

In 2004, a small group of citizens began a fight to stop the closure of five public-library branches in low-income neighborhoods in Providence, Rhode Island. The little guys prevailed in this municipal David-and-Goliath matchup — and created a new library system in the process.

A science-fiction novel filled with twists and turns, written by a primary-care nurse practitioner. The book’s dystopian plot mines the ugly side effects of genetic engineering and the pitfalls of our relentless quest for perpetual youth.
Brandeis University Press

Before the Holocaust upended their lives, many wealthy Jews were proud owners of countryside villas in England and continental Europe. Lavishly illustrated, “Jewish Country Houses” offers an intimate look at these homes, whose designs tell a complex story of prejudice and integration, difference and connection.

A new edition of a beautiful guide for Northeastern anglers, devised by a father-and-son writer-illustrator team. The pencil-and-acrylic drawings are detailed and lifelike. The text includes information on the habits and habitats of more than 60 species of fish, including such lesser-known specimens as the blueback trout and the slimy sculpin.