ERA Reviews

This book is an excellent exposition of how supposedly democratic governments suppress civil liberties. In the 1950s, at the height of McCarthyism, many communists were harshly mistreated by the American government. They were denied the basic rights that the United States constitution guaranteed them.

The book's author, Sherman Labovitz, is a communist. He tells of how he and many others were arrested and tried for advocating communism as an economic system. Even though he wanted to bring about communism only by peaceful means, the government accused him of trying to start a violent revolution.

Labovitz recounts how he was unfairly harrassed by the authorities. He remembers how he was arrested and initially denied the right to obtain counsel. He recreates the biased and unjust trial that he was given. One can understand the reaction of the authorities, since in the 1950s, anti-communist hysteria was the tenor of the times. Nevertheless, it is unsettling to see how easily civil liberties were rolled back.

If you are a believer in the importance of America's cherished freedoms, then read this book. You don't have to be a communist to agree that McCarthyism was a subversion of the consitution. There are those who would place restraints on our civil liberties. We can't afford to naively believe that our government will continue to uphold and protect our freedoms. This, then, is the most important lesson of this book: a democracy requires vigilant defenders, even in free countries like America.

Finally, this book is instructive as an analog to contemporary American society. With the war on terrorism underway, we must pay close attention to any attempt by the government to curtail basic civil liberties.

carr does a first-rate job of analyzing these small illinois cities. . . which are really the epicenters of the surrounding area. This book reminded me a lot of Daniel Elazar's Cities of the Prairie books, demonstrating the continuing force of local political culture through time. I've lived in Galesburg and I live near Ottawa, and know something of the history of these cities, and she really does a handsome job of putting it all together.

This is a new, different telling of an old story. It really challenges what many have come to believe about slavery and the relationship between master and servant. Highlights the distinction between skilled and unskilled labor that is at the core of so many social problems (race, sex, class), yet is so often overlooked.

British Ocean Liners: A twilight era is a grand scrapbook of the British ships which plyed the worlds oceans after WWII. Each ship has its statistics and a brief history listed with them. The pictures are plentiful and are excellent recrousces for reports, art etc. This is the perfect gift for the Ocean Liner Buff

Jim Finnegan has written a trilogy of the Vietnam Era that fully captures the irony, pathos, difficulties, and humor of that controversial war period. In his character of Callaghan, we experience the confusion of that era---from the screw-up on his name through the Army bureaucracy, to his attempts to please his sometimes unreasonable and irascible bosses. One quote of his stands out in my mind, as the rounds are pinging through the fuselage of his Huey---"I guess there's no alternative to getting involved at this point. Never thought it would be this way. Then again, I've never really thought of it." Many of us shared that thought---we were just there, doing our duty and trying to keep our spirits up, while enduring the frustrations, heat, monsoons, dangers, and interminable taskings/missions that came our way. This is the first book I have read from the perspective of a "Saigon Warrior", and the verbal descriptions really brought back the experience of being there. How such a beautiful country and pleasant people could be embroiled in such a terrible war was always a mystery to us "grunts"---and through Callaghan, we walk through the story of how a young officer adjusts to the Army and sidesteps the quagmires, while developing some leadership skills of his own. This is a fine book to sit down with and reminisce about our war experience, as well as an education for those who never went to Vietnam and can't understand the controversy over our involvement. I definitely recommend it for your reading pleasure.

Another team effort by a group of specialists in various areas of 17th century philosophy, this book has an underlying disunity, like The Columbia History of Western Philosophy. It purposely departs from the "great man thinking" tradition of older histories, but this itself is a conscious return to the way a 17th century book would be organized: by subject-matter.

Thus we hear not only from Descartes, Spinoza and Leibniz, but also from their critics and detractors.

There is, here, a false and generalized humility. There is, here, no there, there.

For Hegel, the whole point of philosophy was the reflection of absolute reality by a single mind, not a team-mind, not a group-mind. The fact that absolute knowledge of that great muffin, the World Spirit, was open to all was not taken by Hegel to mean that the knowledge would be collective, and Spinoza's magnificent ending to his essay On Human Freedom, "everything excellent is difficult as it is rare", states in essence that while it is POSSIBLE for the ordinary slob to grasp what Spinoza is saying, it is also POSSIBLE for any given slob (such as one of Spinoza's correspondents, a singularly unpleasant business man who pestered him with absurd questions) to fail to understand.

But the post-modern, "administered" mind feels that the possibility entails the actuality, that the least able and even the least willing will "get it", and sees a bogus elitism when some members of the team don't "get it."

There is some question as to whether group-knowledge is knowledge at all.

It is one thing to partition a field for mere convenience and later presentation of the results in the form that could be grasped by one mind.

It is quite another for the knowledge to be virtual, and to remain in the group.

Take a simple example. A knows B: C knows D. If this is given, it is not the case that either A or C knows the proposition "B and D." But if we fire or otherwise terminate knower *manque* C (or alternatively knower A), the remaining knower works harder but at the end of the day knows more.

The most common argument for scholarly specialisation predefines how much an individual can know and also is very pessimistic about the knowers' (and the brains') ability to develop new mechanisms for integrating knowledge as a byproduct of the learning process. A false humility allows the administered mind to knock off prematurely at the task of knowledge, and play golf, for it is pessimistic about the possibility of a more Hegelian and more absolute, totalizing knowledge.

The Cambridge History therefore regresses to the post-mediaeval 17th century in its methodology, and regresses prior to the thinkers covered who at the summit replaced Scholasticism (itself a form of group think) with the in principle ability of the mind to comprehend more than a narrow subject area. This in principle ability reached its full flower in Kant and its apotheosis in Hegel.

The critique of the dead white male approach, in other words, has thrown the baby out with the bath-water. If 17th century philosophy is presented without the judgement that the guys thinking were of different abilities the student is ultimately confused, and philosophy no longer becomes the optimistic study of ascending progress. The self-reflexivity of thought entails, however, that once you introduce this pessimism, it becomes self-reinforcing.

A certain sourness, a certain nastiness, creeps into overspecialized language. For example, this book reports a 17th century syllogism, to the effect that all men are white, no Africans are white, and therefore no Africans are men. It astonished me that this syllogism is presented with no comment about its repugnance, and I speculate that the author and editor decided not to be too "politically correct." Far from being a hotbed of liberalism, many universities are hotbeds of a negative and a fearful conservatism which is anxious not to conform to a (false) caricature. One wishes that the editor had added a qualification or used a different syllogism.

Noam Chomsky has commented on the absence of really good books on scholarly fields for the general public. His ideal was Lancelot Hogben's book Mathematics for the Million. In philosophy, especially in his magisterial but outdated History, Lord Russell popularized without becoming superficial.

The intelligent general reader will understand and retain the details in the Cambridge history, and some of the chapters (especially Professor Mahoney's) are good. It also helps us to see that men did not forget the Scholastic tradition at midnight in the year 1600 and it makes the point also made by Harry Wolfson's study of Spinoza that you can't understand 17th century thought ahistorically. Spinoza and the other major league hitters were batting balls thrown by men who intellectually were of the 16th century and before (to use a baseball analogy: the editing of my review of the Columbia History made me sound like Yogi Berra, so I may as well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb.)

But ultimately the grand narrative is replaced by trivial unanswered questions, such as should Spinoza have gotten married, and settled down. Or what.

I was fortunate enought to have read this book just before reading the new John Adams book. It is a fascinating insight into the thinking and values systems that shaped our country in its early days. I don't think I ever really understood how the religious values of the early New Englanders led to many of the principles our country was built on. To those who have trouble understanding why the early leaders of our country were so compelled to sacrifice so much to create a new and independent country here in America, this is the answer. Why John and Abigail Adams were willing to sacrifice almost their entire married life and the rearing of their children for these principles, one can only understand upon reading this book. These were not men set upon a search for glory or power, but men with a vision that they believed in with all their souls. The unifying beliefs of the people led them to accomplish what the great minds of Europe felt was totally irrational and impossible. This book is an answer to a question many didn't know to ask.

Actually, I would like to give this 4.5 stars.

The Classic Era of American Comics begins where comic books almost ended. With Fredrick Wertham, "Seduction of the Innocent and the congressional hearings that followed the publication of that book.

When writer address the history of a specific character in Comics they briefly go over the history of comics. Mr. Wright and Mr. Kubert take their time and give a much fuller history of the events that created comic books. Also included are many colorful old pictures of comic strips, and later, comic books. Dividing the book into sections, they not only cover the very beginning of comics that we know, but comics that have been forgotten. Also included are sections of Animal comics, Jungle comics with "good girl Art" and many other forms that have come and gone. All with splendid pictures.

But the most important aspect of this book was context. Often glossed over, Mr. Wright emphasizes the role Fredrick Wertham had in ending an era of comics. In his book, "Seduction of the Innocent" published in 1955, Mr. Wertham contended that comic books were evil. He claimed Superman was a Nazi. He also claimed that Batman and Robin were gay and just reading about them caused children to become gay. Most important, he claimed that reading comics caused Juvenile Delinquency. A major target, of course, was the EC horror comics. In this very balanced book, Mr. Wright and Mr. Kubert show some of the artwork that should have been aimed for an adult audience. Soon, congressional hearings were held and congress forced the industry to censor itself. The censorship was so heavy it almost destroyed the industry. Rather than just going after ghouls and goblins, or giving a rating system that would put adult comics out of the reach of children, the new Comic Code went after ideas such as civil rights, anti war sentiments and the evils of drug use. It took 15 years before an anti drug theme could return to comics. It certainly ended an era.

I had two, small disappointments with the book. Often the author would refer to specific covers or events but not reprint them. Basil Wolverton's Mad covers and Mac Raboy's Captain Marvel Jr. covers are two examples. Also, much of the artwork did not give creative credit to the artists who drew them and sometimes the year was left out. These should be considered minor points.

If you do like this book my I suggest that you also read Jim Steranko's The History of Comics Volume I and II.

Grimsley and Simpson offer a brilliant collection of essays by various historians musing philosophically on the demise of Confederate States of America. With only 180+ pages of text, the six essays are nicely paced and well footnoted. From the possibility of Southern guerrilla tactics to the role of women at the homefront, this modest-sized book gives thought-provoking slants to varied aspects of the final options/last days of the CSA. I would recommend this book for readers more mature in their Civil War studies. I think the novice reader may get "lost" in the name-dropping of battles and personalities.

This book is a collection of articles written by knowledgeable, practicing collection development librarians and is targeted to working librarians who find themselves searching for guidance in the course of their collection development duties. It begins with an introduction and overview that explains the need of the book, the historical pathway behind its creation, and the need for a broader comprehensive view of library management that integrates all media formats and information sources into the planning and policy process. The body of the book is made up of eleven articles that are divided into three sections, all individually written by practicing professionals who have expertise with library collection activities in a variety of public, academic and institutional facilities.

Although now a somewhat dated publication, specifically as to the multiple types of electronic information resources currently available for library use, this book remains a very good collection development and library management guide. Much of the information and decision process factors included are independent of technical changes and focus toward the people who have to make electronic era decisions which effect the types and levels of services librarys offer.