A South Vietnamese General Remembers the Indochina War to the Fall of Saigon
For Victor Hugo, the nineteenth century could be remembered by only its first two years, which established peace in Europe and France's supremacy on the continent. For Gen. Lam Quang Thi, the twentieth century had only twenty-five years: from 1950 to 1975, during which the Republic of Vietnam and its army grew up and collapsed with the fall of ......
American Soldiers in Asia and the Pacific During World War II
Recounts the harrowing experiences of American soldiers in Asia and the Pacific. Based on countless diaries and letters, it sweeps across the battlefields, from the early desperate stand at Guadalcanal to the tragic sinking of the U.S.S. Indianapolis at war's very end.
Long isolated by rigid military rule, Burma, or Myanmar, is one of the least known, significantly sized states in the world. This title sheds light on this reclusive state by exploring issues of authority and legitimacy in its politics, economics, social structure, and culture since the popular uprising and military coup of 1988.
Japan's jazz community - both musicians and audience - has been begrudgingly recognised for its talent, knowledge, and level of appreciation. Underpinning this tentative admiration, however, has been a tacit agreement that, for cultural reasons, Japanese jazz "can't swing." In Blue Nippon E. Taylor Atkins shows how, strangely, Japan's own attitude ......
The Mongol conquests, culminating with the invasion of Europe in the middle of the thirteenth century, were of a scope and range never equaled. These nomadic peoples from central Asia briefly held sway over an empire that stretched across Asia to the frontiers of Germany and the shores of the Adriatic. Surprisingly little has been written on this ......
The Eight Banners and Ethnic Identity in Late Imperial China
In 1644, the Manchus, a relatively unknown people inhabiting China's northeastern frontier, overthrew the Ming, Asia's mightiest rulers, and established the Qing dynasty, which endured to 1912. From this event arises one of Chinese history's great conundrums: How did a barely literate alien people manage to remain in power for nearly 300 years ......
The earliest known author of written literature was a woman named Enheduanna, who lived in ancient Mesopotamia around 2300 BCE. High Priestess to the moon god Nanna, Enheduanna came to venerate the goddess Inanna above all gods in the Sumerian pantheon. The hymns she wrote to Inanna constitute the earliest written portrayal of an ancient goddess. ......
At the height of the Vietnam War, American society was so severely fragmented that it seemed that Americans may never again share common concerns. The media and other commentators represented the impact of the war through a variety of rhetorical devices, most notably the emotionally charged metaphor of "the wound that will not heal." References in ......