Bücher veröffentlicht von Beacon Press

Published originally as part of C. Eric Lincoln''s series on the black religious experience, Is God a White Racist? is a landmark critique of the black church''s treatment of evil and the nature of suffering. In this powerful examination of the early liberation methodology of James Cone, J. Deotis Roberts, and Joseph Washington, among others, Jones questions whether their foundation for black Christian theism—the belief in an omnibenevolent God who has dominion over human history—can provide an adequate theological foundation to effectively dismantle the economic, social, and political framework of oppression.Seeing divine benevolence as part of oppression''s mechanism of disguise, Jones argues that black liberation theologians must adopt a new theism that is informed by humanism and its principle of the functional ultimacy of wo/man, where human choice and action determine whether our condition is slavery or freedom.

Living Islam Out Loud presents the first generation of American Muslim women who have always identified as both American and Muslim. These pioneers have forged new identities for themselves and for future generations, and they speak out about the hijab, relationships, sex and sexuality, activism, spirituality, and much more. Contributors: Su'ad Abdul-Khabeer, Sham-e-Ali al-Jamil, Samina Ali, Sarah Eltantawi, Yousra Y. Fazili, Suheir Hammad, Mohja Kahf, Precious Rasheeda Muhammad, Asra Q. Nomani, Manal Omar, Khalida Saed, Asia Sharif-Clark, Khadijah Sharif-Drinkard, Aroosha Zoq Rana, Inas Younis

The Message of the Alien God and the Beginnings of Christianity

The radical sexuality of gay American men in the 1970s is often seen as a shameful period of excess that led to the AIDS crisis. Beyond Shame claims that when the gay community divorced itself from this allegedly tainted legacy, the tragic result was an intergenerational disconnect because the original participants were unable to pass on a sense of pride and identity to younger generations. Indeed, one reason for the current rise in HIV, Moore argues, is precisely due to this destructive occurrence, which increased the willingness of younger gay men to engage in unsafe sex.Lifting the'veil of AIDS,' Moore recasts the gay male sexual culture of the 1970s as both groundbreaking and creative-provocatively comparing extreme sex to art. He presents a powerful yet nuanced snapshot of a maligned, forgotten era. Moore rescues gay America's past, present, and future from a disturbing spiral of destruction and AIDS-related shame, illustrating why it's critical for the gay community to reclaim the decade.

On September 9, 1919, an American nightmare came true. The entire Boston police force deserted their posts, leaving the city virtually defenseless. Women were raped on street corners, stores were looted, and pedestrians were beaten and robbed while crowds not only looked on but cheered. The police strike and the mayhem that followed made an inconspicuous governor, Calvin Coolidge, known throughout America, turning him into a national hero and, eventually, a president. It also created a monster: for two days, more than 700,000 residents of Boston's urban core were without police protection, and the mob ruled the streets.

Charles C. Calhoun's Longfellow gives life, at last, to the most popular American poet who ever lived, a nineteenth-century cultural institution of extraordinary influence and the"e;one poet average, nonbookish Americans still know by heart"e; (Dana Gioia).Calhoun's Longfellow emerges as one of America's first powerful cultural makers: a poet and teacher who helped define Victorian culture; a major conduit for European culture coming into America; a catalyst for the Colonial Revival movement in architecture and interior design; and a critic of both Puritanism and the American obsession with material success. Longfellow is also a portrait of a man in advance of his time in championing multiculturalism: He popularized Native American folklore; revived the Evangeline story (the foundational myth of modern Acadian and Cajun identity in the U.S. and Canada); wrote powerful poems against slavery; and introduced Americans to the languages and literatures of other lands.Calhoun's portrait of post-Revolutionary Portland, Maine, where Longfellow was born, and of his time at Bowdoin and Harvard Colleges, show a deep and imaginative grasp of New England cultural history. Longfellow's tragic romantic life-his first wife dies tragically early, after a miscarriage, and his second wife, Fannie Appleton, dies after accidentally setting herself on fire-is illuminated, and his intense friendship with abolitionist and U.S. senator Charles Sumner is given as a striking example of mid-nineteenth-century romantic friendship between men. Finally, Calhoun paints in vivid detail Longfellow's family life at Craigie House, including stories of the poet's friends-Hawthorne, Emerson, Dickens, Fanny Kemble, Julia Ward Howe, and Oscar Wilde among them.

Khaled Abou El Fadl, a prominent critic of Islamic puritanism, leads off this lively debate by arguing that Islam is a deeply tolerant religion. Injunctions to violence against nonbelievers stem from misreadings of the Qur'an, he claims, and even jihad, or so-called holy war, has no basis in Qur'anic text or Muslim theology but instead grew out of social and political conflict.Many of Abou El Fadl's respondents think differently. Some contend that his brand of Islam will only appeal to Westerners and students in "e;liberal divinity schools"e; and that serious religious dialogue in the Muslim world requires dramatic political reforms. Other respondents argue that theological debates are irrelevant and that our focus should be on Western sabotage of such reforms. Still others argue that calls for Islamic "e;tolerance"e; betray the Qur'anic injunction for Muslims to struggle against their oppressors.The debate underscores an enduring challenge posed by religious morality in a pluralistic age: how can we preserve deep religious conviction while participating in what Abou El Fadl calls "e;a collective enterprise of goodness"e; that cuts across confessional differences?With contributions from Tariq Ali, Milton Viorst, and John Esposito, and others.

A lyrical literary memoir that explores the exhilarating, discomforting, and ultimately healing process of Polish-Jewish reconciliation taking place in Poland today Although an estimated 80 percent of American Jews are of Polish descent, many in the postwar generation and those born later know little about their families' connection to their ancestral home. In fact, many Jews continue to think of Poland as a bastion of anti-Semitism, since nearly the entire population of Polish Jewry was killed in the Holocaust. The reality is more complex: although German-occupied Poland was the site of great persecution towards Jews, it was also the epicenter of European Jewish life for centuries. Louise Steinman sets out to examine the burgeoning Polish-Jewish reconciliation movement through the lens of her own family's history, joining the ranks of Jews of Polish descent who are confronting both Poland's heroism and occupation-afflicted atrocities, and who are seeking to reconnect with their families' Polish roots

Boston Firsts is about everything (well, almost!) that happened first in Boston and changed life elsewhere: from the first lighthouse and public library to the first madam and ready-made suit. Boston-based journalist and essayist Lynda Morgenroth has written forty original essays on the city's long history of innovation, from the colonial era to the present. These lively takes on Boston's innovative history range from the first use of ether in publicly performed surgery to the first school desegregation court case to the one-and only-automatic bargain basement.Consider this: Ice cut from Boston ponds and shipped to hot climates became a worldwide industry. A controversial kidney transplant between twin brothers marked the start of organ transplantation. The glorious Massachusetts 54th Regiment was the first black army regiment in U.S. history. First newspaper, novel, subway, telephone, gay marriage-the beat goes on!Ranging from advances in science and engineering-the smallpox inoculation and the Boston Harbor cleanup-to innovations in culture and society-Fannie Farmer's cookbook and the YMCA-the collection investigates, celebrates, and integrates America's workshop of ideas.

Renowned conservationist Aldo Leopold once wrote, "e;A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it does otherwise."e;Few have taken Leopold's vision more to heart than Steven I. Apfelbaum, who has, over the last thirty years, transformed his eighty-acre Stone Prairie Farm in Wisconsin into a biologically diverse ecosystem of prairie, wetland, spring-fed brook, and savanna. In healing his land, Apfelbaum demonstrates how humans might play a starring role in healing the planet.