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Showing 1 - 20 of 6202 items
British ceramic artist relates tracing his family's history through the ownership of a collection of netsuke, ornamental Japanese carvings, which…
he inherited in 1994. Describes the wealthy Ephrussi clan's lives in Vienna and Paris and their origins as Jewish merchants from Odessa, Russia. 2010
Panorama des faits marquants de l'égyptologie depuis le début du XIXe siècle : la découverte des momies royales et de…
la tombe de Toutankhamon, le déchiffrement des hiéroglyphes ou encore le déplacement des obélisques en Europe.
British Museum director profiles one hundred pieces from the institution's collection that trace human history, from a stone chopping tool…
discovered in Tanzania in 1931--and estimated to be one of the first manmade objects--to a solar-powered lamp and charger manufactured in China in 2010. Bestseller. 2010
Uses extracts from diaries and memoirs to describe Terezín, Czechoslovakia, in 1941-1945, when the Nazis turned the small town into…
a transit camp for imprisoning Jewish people before sending them to the gas chambers at Auschwitz. Relates the prisoners' feelings and their observations about camp events. For grades 5-8. 2011
Inspired by her mother Jutta's poesiealbum--an album of poems written by friends--and Jutta's diary, Levy presents a blank-verse recollection of…
the rapidly increased danger for Jews in Nazi Germany, which culminated in Jutta's family moving to the United States before World War II. For grades 5-8. 2010
Relic hunter and naturalist exposes the dark side of archaeology. Discusses the reasons people loot, citing cases of antiquities traffickers,…
immoral museum curators, and wealthy collectors. Argues that taking artifacts separates them from their history. Explains his own low-impact method of exploration. 2010
After the 9/11 attacks three American women--one Jewish, one Christian, and one Muslim--decided to collaborate on an interfaith children's book…
to show the similarities among their religions. They discovered that their own misunderstandings had to be addressed first, leading to candid dialogue as their faith club sought common ground. 2006
Author, born in the 1980s, describes being raised by her Hasidic grandparents in Brooklyn's Williamsburg neighborhood after her mother left…
her developmentally disabled father. Discusses being an outcast and her arranged marriage, limited access to reading material, and lack of educational or employment opportunities. Bestseller. 2012
Renowned activist and public intellectual David Graeber teams up with professor of comparative archaeology David Wengrow to deliver a trailblazing…
account of human history, challenging our most fundamental assumptions about social evolution--from the development of agriculture and cities to the emergence of "the state," political violence, and social inequality--and revealing new possibilities for human emancipation.For generations, our remote ancestors have been cast as primitive and childlike--either free and equal innocents, or thuggish and warlike. Civilization, we are told, could only be achieved by sacrificing those original freedoms, or alternatively, by taming our baser instincts. Graeber and Wengrow show how such theories first emerged in the eighteenth century as a conservative reaction to powerful critiques of European society posed by Indigenous observers and intellectuals. Revisiting this encounter has startling implications for how we make sense of human history today, including the origins of farming, property, cities, democracy, slavery, and civilization itself.Drawing on path-breaking research in archaeology and anthropology, the authors show how history becomes a far more interesting place once we learn to throw off our conceptual shackles and perceive what's really there. If humans did not spend 95% of their evolutionary past in tiny bands of hunter-gatherers, what were they doing all that time? If agriculture, and cities, did not mean a plunge into hierarchy and domination, then what kinds of social and economic organization did they lead to? What was really happening during the periods that we usually describe as the emergence of "the state"? The answers are often unexpected, and suggest that the course of human history may be less set in stone, and more full of playful, hopeful possibilities, than we tend to assume.The Dawn of Everything fundamentally transforms our understanding of the human past and offers a path toward imagining new forms of freedom, new ways of organizing society. This is a monumental book of formidable intellectual range, animated by curiosity, moral vision, and a faith in the power of direct action.
Anthropology professor and author of Cro-Magnon (DB 72886) surveys fifteen thousand years of Native American history and culture in North…
America. Discusses controversies over the first settlement and humans' role in animal extinction. Covers immigration routes and the diversity of hunter-gatherer societies. 2011
Historical background for Jewish festivals and feast days. Uses details of the celebrations to help explain the basic precepts of…
Judaism. Describes the biblical origin of observances and traces the ways they have evolved. Translated from Yiddish by Samuel Jaffe with a 1996 foreword by Rabbi Harold S. Kushner. 1938
Autobiography recounts the author's childhood friendship in 1920s Poland with Karol Wojtyla (1920-2005), who became Pope John Paul II in…
1978. Kluger, a Jew, describes surviving World War II and reuniting with his friend after almost thirty years. Translated from Polish. 2011
An exploration of the mythos of the Amazons, a tribe of female warriors. Discusses the stories told in many cultures…
about them and the past conclusions that they must have been merely myth. The author, however, uses research and archeological discoveries to demonstrate that they did, in fact, exist. 2018
This collection of biographies of brave and brilliant Jewish female role models—selected in collaboration with Ruth Bader Ginsburg and including…
an introduction written by the iconic Supreme Court justice herself— provides young people with a roster of inspirational role models, all of whom are Jewish women, who will appeal not only to young people but to people of all ages, and all faiths. The fascinating lives detailed in this collection—more than thirty exemplary female role models—were chosen by Ruth Bader Ginsburg, or RBG, as she was lovingly known to her many admirers. Working with her friend, journalist Nadine Epstein, RBG selected these trailblazers, all of whom are women and Jewish, who chose not to settle for the rules and beliefs of their time. They did not accept what the world told them they should be. Like RBG, they dreamed big, worked hard, and forged their own paths to become who they deserved to be. Future generations will benefit from each and every one of the courageous actions and triumphs of the women profiled here. Real Wonder Women , the passion project of Justice Ginsburg in the last year of her life, will inspire readers to think about who they want to become and to make it happen, just like RBG
One of the world's most dangerous volcanoes and capable of destroying entire cities, Vesuvius has fascinated many for over two…
millennia. Scarth draws on research, eyewitness accounts, and other sources to depict the story of this violent volcano from ancient times until the early twenty-first century. 2009
Woman recounts growing up as a devout Christian and finding out that her father's family was actually Jewish and had…
fled to Canada at the start of World War II, though some were lost to the Holocaust. Discusses her exploration of Judaism and eventual conversion. 2014
Discussion and analysis of the prophecies presented in author's novel The Harbinger (DB 76704). Expands on perceived evidence for the…
phenomenon called the Shemitah, which is purported to be behind such events as financial market crashes, tragic world events, and the rise and fall of nations. 2014
El celebrado estudio de Alfred Edersheim (1825-1889), biblista nacido en Viena y judío convertido al cristianismo, que reconstruye las costumbres…
sociales del pueblo judío en los tiempos de Jesús de Nazaret. Publicado originalmente en Inglés en 1876 cuando el autor era el Vicario de Loders, en Dorset, Inglaterra
Examination of those who choose a career in the field of archaeology--the study of the material remains of culture. Discusses…
the ways in which people are drawn into the field--such as a love of Indiana Jones--challenges archaeologists face in the twenty-first century, and day-to-day lives of practitioners. 2014
Professor of religion examines regional variants of the ancient Jewish tradition. In New Orleans, Hanukkah means decorating a door with…
a menorah made of hominy grits; latkes in Texas are seasoned with cilantro and cayenne pepper; children in Cincinnati sing Hanukkah songs and eat oranges and ice cream. 2013