Columbia University Press: 2355 books
Edo Kabuki in Transition
From the Worlds of the Samurai to the Vengeful Female Ghost
Language: English
Release Date: April 26, 2016
Satoko Shimazaki revisits three centuries of kabuki theater, reframing it as a key player in the formation of an early modern urban identity in Edo Japan and exploring the process that resulted in its re-creation in Tokyo as a national theatrical tradition. Challenging the prevailing understanding...
The Land of the Five Flavors
A Cultural History of Chinese Cuisine
Language: English
Release Date: November 26, 2013
Renowned sinologist Thomas O. Höllmann tracks the growth of food culture in China from its earliest burial rituals to today's Western fast food restaurants, mapping Chinese cuisine's geographical variations and local customs, indigenous factors and foreign influences, trade routes, and ethnic associations....
The Birth of Conservative Judaism
Solomon Schechter's Disciples and the Creation of an American Religious Movement
Language: English
Release Date: May 22, 2012
Solomon Schechter (1847–1915), the charismatic leader of New York's Jewish Theological Seminary (JTS), came to America in 1902 intent on revitalizing traditional Judaism. While he advocated a return to traditional practices, Schechter articulated no clear position on divisive issues, instead preferring...
by
Language: English
Release Date: March 29, 2016
Language: English
Release Date: March 29, 2016
Modern Chinese history told from a Buddhist perspective restores the vibrant, creative role of religion in postimperial China. It shows how urban Buddhist elites jockeyed for cultural dominance in the early Republican era, how Buddhist intellectuals reckoned with science, and how Buddhist media contributed...
Sources of Indian Traditions
Modern India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh
Language: English
Release Date: April 8, 2014
For more than fifty years, students and teachers have made the two-volume resource Sources of Indian Traditions their top pick for an accessible yet thorough introduction to Indian and South Asian civilizations. Volume 2 contains an essential selection of primary readings on the social, intellectual,...
by Caroline Walker Bynum
Language: English
Release Date: November 21, 2017
Language: English
Release Date: November 21, 2017
A classic of medieval studies, The Resurrection of the Body in Western Christianity, 200–1336 traces ideas of death and resurrection in early and medieval Christianity. Caroline Walker Bynum explores problems of the body and identity in devotional and theological literature, suggesting that medieval...
Sufi Bodies
Religion and Society in Medieval Islam
Language: English
Release Date: August 23, 2011
Between 1300 and 1500 C.E. a new form of Sufi Islam took hold among central Islamic peoples, joining individuals through widespread networks resembling today's prominent paths and orders. Understanding contemporary Sufism requires a sophisticated analysis of these formative years. Moving beyond a...
by
Language: English
Release Date: July 29, 2009
Language: English
Release Date: July 29, 2009
The Lotus Sutra proclaims that a unitary intent underlies the diversity of Buddhist teachings and promises that all people without exception can achieve supreme awakening. Establishing the definitive guide to this profound text, specialists in Buddhist philosophy, art, and history of religion address...
Love Letters from Golok
A Tantric Couple in Modern Tibet
Language: English
Release Date: December 6, 2016
Love Letters from Golok chronicles the courtship between two Buddhist tantric masters, Tāre Lhamo (1938–2002) and Namtrul Rinpoche (1944–2011), and their passion for reinvigorating Buddhism in eastern Tibet during the post-Mao era. In fifty-six letters exchanged from 1978 to 1980, Tāre Lhamo...
by Kurtis Schaeffer
Language: English
Release Date: July 6, 2009
Language: English
Release Date: July 6, 2009
The history of the book in Tibet involves more than literary trends and trade routes. Functioning as material, intellectual, and symbolic object, the book has been an instrumental tool in the construction of Tibetan power and authority, and its history opens a crucial window onto the cultural, intellectual,...
Being Human in a Buddhist World
An Intellectual History of Medicine in Early Modern Tibet
Language: English
Release Date: January 20, 2015
Critically exploring medical thought in a cultural milieu with no discernible influence from the European Enlightenment, Being Human in a Buddhist World reveals an otherwise unnoticed intersection of early modern sensibilities and religious values in traditional Tibetan medicine. It further studies...
Criminal Justice at the Crossroads
Transforming Crime and Punishment
Language: English
Release Date: May 5, 2015
Over the past forty years, the criminal justice system in the United States has engaged in a very expensive policy failure, attempting to punish its way to public safety, with dismal results. So-called "tough on crime" policies have not only failed to effectively reduce crime, recidivism,...
The 7/7 London Underground Bombing: Not So Homegrown
A Selection from The Evolution of the Global Terrorist Threat: From 9/11 to Osama bin Laden's Death
Language: English
Release Date: September 2, 2014
This chapter analyzes the July 7, 2005 suicide bomb attacks against four London transportation targets that killed over 50 people and injured hundreds others. It was among the most important operations directed by core al Qaeda leaders in years following the events of September 11th 2001. Initially,...
Lineages of Political Society
Studies in Postcolonial Democracy
Language: English
Release Date: November 29, 2011
Partha Chatterjee, a pioneering theorist known for his disciplinary range, builds on his theory of "political society" and reinforces its salience to contemporary political debate. Dexterously incorporating the concerns of South Asian studies, postcolonialism, the social sciences, and the...