AV星球

A powerful contribution to the debate on intellectual property

Knowledge as Commons traces the historical path towards the privatization of knowledge, situating science, technology and the emergence of modern nations in a larger historical framework. Author Prabir Purkayastha asks: Do the needs of society drive science and technology? Or do developments in science and technology provide the motor force of history? Has this relationship changed over time? Purkayastha shows us that, with profit as its sole aim, capital claims to own human knowledge and its products, fencing them in with patents and intellectual property rights. Neoliberal institutions and policy diktats from the West have installed a global system in which knowledge, that limitless resource, is made artificially scarce鈥攚hile limited resources such as water and clean air are treated as though they were infinite.

Arguing that rapid technological change, from pharmaceuticals to electronics, should be an opportunity to deliver quicker cures, affordable access, and global cooperation in the production of knowledge, Purkayastha examines the consequences of this privatization for universities, healthcare, distributive justice, the domestic politics of developing countries, and their prospects vis-脿-vis the West.

Predicaments of Knowledge explores the difficult questions South African universities face after apartheid: Is there a difference between Africanising a university and decolonising a university? What about differences between deracialising and decolonising the curricula taught at universities across disciplines?

Through a range of reflections on race, language, colonial, postcolonial and decolonial knowledge projects from Africa and Latin America, this book explores the pitfalls and possibilities that face a post-apartheid generation inventing the future of knowledge.

The distinctions between Africanisation, decolonisation and deracialisation are often conflated in the political demands put to universities. Suren Pillay emphasises all three as important but distinct imperatives. If an intervention is undertaken with the aim of decolonising the university while actually addressing deracialisation, it can undermine the effort to decolonise. Similarly, if an initiative to Africanise the university does not address decolonisation, both processes can be undermined.

Drawing on more than two and a half decades of the author鈥檚 participation in these debates, these essays aim to intervene in and elucidate questions and predicaments, rather than offering blue prints; they are dialogical in spirit even when polemical in tone. In conversation with existing continental African and Latin American experiences, they offer incisive reflections on current South African debates.

Histoire des isles Marianes (History of the Mariana Islands), was published in Paris in 1700 with authorship attributed to French Jesuit priest Charles Le Gobien, S.J. It provides a detailed glimpse into a tumultuous and critically significant period in the history of the Mariana Islands and the CHamoru people鈥攖he period commonly referred to as the CHamoru-Spanish Wars. It includes detailed accounts of the first 30 years of the Jesuit mission in the Marinas. It also features speeches by CHamoru chiefs, including the famous speech by Maga鈥檒氓hi Hurao that is etched onto the wall at the entrance of the Guam Museum.

Using research conducted in several national and international archives in Madrid, Barcelona, Rome, and at the Richard F. Taitano Micronesian Area Research Center in Guam, Alexandre Coello de la Rosa produced this English translation of the first Spanish edition of Le Gobien鈥檚 text. This present edition also stems from a manuscript preserved in the Arxiu de la Companyia de Jesus a Catalunya archive in Barcelona, with authorship attributed to Spanish Jesuit priest Luis de Morales, S.J., who had been part of the Jesuit mission to the Marianas in the late 1600s. Thus, this text calls into question Le Gobien's authorship. This edition opens with an in-depth introduction analyzing the context of the publication鈥檚 history, as well as its significance over time. The book also features annotated notes that expand the narrative by providing details about the history of the Jesuit mission in the Marianas.

Winner, Sexuality and Politics Book Award - American Political Science Association

Finalist, PROSE Award - Government and Politics


What the evolving fight for transgender rights reveals about government power, regulations, and the law

Every government agency in the United States, from Homeland Security to Departments of Motor Vehicles, has the authority to make its own rules for sex classification. Many transgender people find themselves in the bizarre situation of having different sex classifications on different documents. Whether you can change your legal sex to 鈥淔鈥� or 鈥淢鈥� (or more recently 鈥淴鈥�) depends on what state you live in, what jurisdiction you were born in, and what government agency you鈥檙e dealing with. In Sex Is as Sex Does, noted transgender advocate and scholar Paisley Currah explores this deeply flawed system, showing why it fails transgender and non-binary people.

Providing examples from different states, government agencies, and court cases, Currah explains how transgender people struggle to navigate this confusing and contradictory web of legal rules, definitions, and classifications. Unlike most gender scholars, who are concerned with what the concepts of sex and gender really mean, Currah is more interested in what the category of 鈥渟ex鈥� does for governments. What does 鈥渟ex鈥� do on our driver鈥檚 licenses, in how we play sports, in how we access health care, or in the bathroom we use? Why do prisons have very different rules than social service agencies? Why is there such resistance to people changing their sex designation? Or to dropping it from identity documents altogether?

In this thought-provoking and original volume, Sex Is as Sex Does reveals the hidden logics that have governed sex classification policies in the United States and shows what the regulation of transgender identity can tell us about society鈥檚 approach to sex and gender writ large.Ultimately, Currah demonstrates that, because the difficulties transgender people face are not just the result of transphobia but also stem from larger injustices, an identity-based transgender rights movement will not, by itself, be up to the task of resolving them.

A comprehensive history of the battle over sex education in the United States

Mid-century America had a problem talking about sex. Dr. Mary Calderone first diagnosed this condition and, in 1964, led the uphill battle to de-stigmatize sex education. Supporters hailed her as the 鈥済randmother of modern sex education鈥� while her detractors painted her as an 鈥渁ging libertine,鈥� but both could agree that she was quickly shaping the way sex was discussed in the classroom.

Part biography, part social history, The Transformation of American Sex Education for the first time situates Dr. Mary Calderone at the center of decades of political, cultural, and religious conflict in the fight for comprehensive sex education. Ellen S. More examines Americans鈥� attempts to come to terms with the vexed subject of sex education in schools from the late 1940s to the early twenty-first century. Using Mary Calderone鈥檚 life and career as a touchstone, she traces the origins of modern sex education in the United States from the work of a group of reformers who coalesced around Calderone to create the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States (SIECUS) in 1964, to the development and use of the competing approaches known as 鈥渁bstinence-based鈥� and 鈥渃omprehensive鈥� sex education from the 1980s into the twenty-first century.

A fascinating and timely read, The Transformation of American Sex Education provides a substantial contribution to the history of one of America鈥檚 most intense and protracted culture wars, and the first account of the woman who fought those battles.

Provides compelling and manageable solutions for how to reform the criminal justice system from the inside out

A racial reckoning in the US criminal justice system was long overdue well before the highly publicized murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and many others in 2020. Progressive Prosecution argues that prosecutors, having helped build our failed system of mass incarceration, must now lead the charge to dismantle it.

With contributions from practicing district attorneys as well as leading scholars in the fields of law and criminal justice, Taylor-Thompson and Thompson鈥檚 volume offers an unapologetically ambitious vision for reform. The contributors draw from empirical evidence and years of combined research experience to argue that change must happen at the local level, with prosecutors choosing to adopt race-conscious approaches. These prosecutors must do the hard work themselves, actively focusing on the ways that race misshapes perceptions of criminality, influences discretionary calls, affects how we select juries, and induces a reliance on punitive responses. Progressive Prosecution acts as both a call to action and a practical guide, instructing prosecutors on what they need to do to bring about lasting and meaningful change. Progressive Prosecution is an urgent work of scholarship, a must-read for anyone committed to racial equity and meaningful criminal justice reform.

Shines a light on the emerging field of law dedicated to responding to and resolving the crises of the twenty-first century

In an increasingly globalized world, a complex and interlocking web of nations, governments, non-state actors, laws, and rules affect human behavior. When crisis hits鈥攚hether that be extrajudicial detention, unprompted deportation, pandemics, or natural disasters鈥攍awyers are increasingly among the first responders, equipped with the knowledge necessary to navigate the regulations of this ever more complex world.

Crisis Lawyering explores this phenomenon and attempts to identify and define what it means to engage in the practice of law in crisis situations. In so doing, it hopes to sketch out the contours of the emerging field of crisis lawyering. Contributors to this volume explore cases surrounding domestic violence; dealing with immigrants in detention and banned from travel; policing in Ferguson, Missouri; the kidnapping of journalists; and climate change, among other crises. Their analysis not only serves as guidance to lawyers in such situations, but also helps others who deal with crises understand those crises鈥攁nd the role of lawyers in them鈥攂etter so that they may respond to them more effectively, efficiently, collaboratively and creatively.

Crisis Lawyering shines a light on the emerging field of law dedicated to responding to and resolving the complex crises of the twenty-first century.

A scathing critique of the colonial legal system鈥檚 denial of children鈥檚 rights

One afternoon in 2016, law professor Robin Hansen receives a call. On the other end of the line is 鈥淛acquie鈥濃�攁 pregnant Indigenous woman, nine weeks from her due date and terrified for the welfare of her unborn son. Jacquie has been sentenced to a custodial prison sentence and her son will be automatically separated from her immediately after his birth.

As Hansen works to help Jacquie with her appeal, she uncovers the legal system鈥檚 inherent discrimination against mothers in custody and the children born to them. Using Access to Information requests along with extensive research, Hansen examines the legal rights of these women鈥攖he majority of whom are Indigenous鈥攁nd finds that Jacquie and her son are by no means alone: automatic mother-infant separation without due process remains the norm in most jurisdictions in Canada.

Prison Born calls attention to the colonial and gendered assumptions that continue to underpin the legal system鈥攁ssumptions that so frequently lead to the violation of the rights and denial of personhood for children and their mothers.

Explores the integral roles that M茅tis women assumed to ensure the survival of their communities during the fur trade era and onward

M茅tis Matriarchs examines the roles of prominent M茅tis women from across Western Canada from the late 19th to the mid-20th century, providing a rare glimpse into the everyday lives of these remarkable women who were recognized as Matriarchs and respected for their knowledge, expertise, and authority within their families and communities.

This edited collection provides an opportunity to learn about the significant contributions made by M茅tis women during a transitional period in Western Canadian history as the fur trade gave way to a more sedentary, industrialized, and agrarian economy. Challenging how we think about Western Canadian settlement processes that removed Indigenous peoples from the land, this collection of stories examines the ways M茅tis matriarchs responded to colonial and settler colonial interventions into their lives and livelihoods and ultimately ensured the cultural survival of their communities.

Encounters, transformations, and reflections from in-prison and post-release theater workshops

See Me is a collection of intimate dialogues about collective experiences in the context of prison theater workshops. Each essay is a collaboration between two or three people who connected profoundly in the temporary community that a workshop can create. Part I is an exchange grounded in the prison theater workshop between the author and one of the incarcerated participants. They alternately tell the story of what they found in the workshop, each other, the future they imagined together, and the social turmoil and utopian aspirations of the times. Part II consists of essays jointly written by eight other people impacted by close relationships spawned in diverse in-prison and re-entry theater workshops.

Uncovers what Christian seminaries taught about Islam in their formative years

Throughout the nineteenth century, Islam appeared regularly in the curricula of American Protestant seminaries. Islam was not only the focus of Christian missions, but was studied as part of the history of the Church as well as in the new field of comparative religions. Moreover, Arabic was taught as a cognate biblical language to help students better understand biblical Hebrew. Passages from the Qur鈥檃n were sometimes read as part of language instruction.

Christian seminaries were themselves new institutions in the nineteenth century. Though Islam had already been present in the Americas since the beginning of the slave trade, it was only in the nineteenth century that the American public became more aware of Islam and had increasing contact with Muslims. It was during this period that extensive trade with the Ottoman empire emerged and more feasible travel opportunities to the Middle East became available due to the development of the steamship.

Providing an in-depth look at the information about Islam that was available in seminaries throughout the nineteenth century, Muhammad in the Seminary examines what Protestant seminaries were teaching about this tradition in the formative years of pastoral education. In charting how American Christian leaders鈥� ideas about Islam were shaped by their seminary experiences, this volume offers new insight into American religious history and the study of Christian-Muslim relations.

Sufism through the eyes of a legal scholar

In The Requirements of the Sufi Path, the renowned North African historian and jurist Ibn Khald奴n applies his analytical powers to Sufism, which he deems a bona fide form of Islamic piety. Ibn Khald奴n is widely known for his groundbreaking work as a sociologist and historian, in particular for the Muqaddimah, the introduction to his massive universal history. In The Requirements of the Sufi Path, he writes from the perspective of an Islamic jurist and legal scholar. He characterizes Sufism and the stages along the Sufi path and takes up the the question of the need for a guide along that path. In doing so, he relies on the works of influential Sufi scholars, including al-Qushayr墨, al-Ghaz膩l墨, and Ibn al-Kha峁�墨b. Even as Ibn Khald奴n warns of the extremes to which some Sufis go鈥攊ncluding practicing magic鈥攈is work is essentially a legal opinion, a fatwa, asserting the inherent validity of the Sufi path.

The Requirements of the Sufi Path incorporates the wisdom of three of Sufism鈥檚 greatest voices as well as Ibn Khald奴n鈥檚 own insights, acquired through his intellectual encounters with Sufism and his broad legal expertise. All this he brings to bear on the debate over Sufi practices in a remarkable work of synthesis and analysis.

An English-only edition.

Harold Rhenisch’s poems balance the settler and Indigenous experiences of land and water in the Pacific Northwest
A collection of shanties (songs) laid out in couplets that move between English and Chinook Wawa, The Salmon Shanties celebrates a poetic tradition deeply rooted on the West Coast. Harold Rhenisch explores memories of people, place, and of returning home, speaking the land’s names as a music of its own and creating a series of aural maps.
Imbued with rhythms of Secwepemc grass dances, the colloquial chatter of the Canadian poet Al Purdy, and the voice of poet and historian Charles Lillard, Rhenisch’s work sings of roots to the land lifted up by the sea into the sky—as if Ezra Pound had sung of Cascadia instead of Europe.
Do not be in Mareuil and Périgeux tonight; it is 1912 no longer.
We, the land’s singers, are walking the star road on the long way home
with the crickets of a July evening above Tuc el Nuit,
the burrowing owls of N’kmp,
and the long memories of the dwarf shrews of Nighthawk.
Breath cannot be denied. Poh cannot be forsaken. Ezra, shantie.

A stinging critique of Western Marxism, counterposing its complicity with imperialist logic against a resurgent anti-imperialism

Western Marxism: How It Was Born, How It Died, How It Can Be Reborn is a paradigm-shifting book that provides a trenchant critique of the Western left intelligentsia. It reveals how its dominant ideological orientation鈥攃haracterized by defeatism, utopianism, and anti-communism鈥攊s rooted in the political economy of imperialism. Internationally acclaimed theorist Domenico Losurdo thus provides a fresh and challenging perspective on purportedly radical thinkers who have been widely promoted in the imperial core, including those affiliated with the Frankfurt School, French Theory, and operaismo, as well as Hannah Arendt, Giorgio Agamben, Michael Hardt, and Slavoj 沤i啪ek, among others. His critique also has wide-reaching implications for trend-setting discourses inspired by this coterie of intellectuals, from postcolonial and decolonial theory to subaltern studies and beyond. Far from being a negative undertaking, however, this book is grounded in the positive project of reigniting anti-imperialist Marxism.

As a complement to the Italian edition of Western Marxism, this first-ever English translation also features the unprecedented publication of a major lecture that demystifies 鈥淲estern Marxism鈥� and its role in imperialists鈥� efforts to denigrate the achievements of actually existing socialism. Raising the stakes of what it means to produce critical theory, Western Marxism will surely provoke wide debate and a reevaluation of hallowed canons.

Before Hacks and The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, there was the comedienne who started it all

First Lady of Laughs tells the story of Jean Carroll, the first Jewish woman to become a star in the field we now call stand-up comedy. Though rarely mentioned among the pantheon of early stand-up comics such as Henny Youngman and Lenny Bruce, Jean Carroll rivaled or even outshone the male counterparts of her heyday, playing more major theaters than any other comedian of her period. In addition to releasing a hit comedy album, Girl in a Hot Steam Bath, and briefly starring in her own sitcom on ABC, she also made twenty-nine appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show.

Carroll made enduring changes to the genre of stand-up comedy, carving space for women and modeling a new form of Jewish femininity with her glamorous, acculturated, but still recognizably Jewish persona. She innovated a newly conversational, intimate style of stand-up, which is now recognized in comics like Joan Rivers, Sarah Silverman, and Tiffany Haddish. When Carroll was ninety-five she was honored at the Friars Club in New York City, where celebrities like Joy Behar and Lily Tomlin praised her influence on their craft. But her celebrated career began as an impoverished immigrant child, scrounging for talent show prize money to support her family.

Drawing on archival footage, press clippings, and Jean Carroll鈥檚 personal scrapbook, First Lady of Laughs restores Jean Carroll鈥檚 remarkable story to its rightful place in the lineage of comedy history and Jewish American performance.

Frames restorative justice as a form of moral and spiritual practice with the capacity to transform injustice

In the United States 鈥渞estorative justice鈥� typically refers to small-scale measures that divert alleged wrongdoers from a standard path through the criminal justice system by funneling them into alternative justice programs. These aim not to punish the offender, but to constructively address the harm that wrongdoing may have caused to individuals or to the community, engaging with the wrongdoer to come to a response that might heal and repair the harm.

Yet restorative justice initiatives generally fail to challenge and transform the racist system of mass incarceration. This book argues that these initiatives have the potential to do so, but that we need to better understand what restorative justice is, and how it should be implemented. It claims that restorative justice can achieve its desired effect only insofar as it provides a mode of association between people that is, at its core, moral and spiritual. The book explores the ways in which restorative justice ethics and practices exhibit moral and spiritual dynamics, and what difference such 鈥渓ived religious鈥� dynamics can make for purposes of transforming structural violence.

Looking to Chicago鈥檚 restorative justice network as a model for developing these transformational and sustainable social changes, the volume showcases real-life examples of the kinds of practices and initiatives needed to shift the entrenched dynamics that fuel the prison-industrial complex across the United States.

Meet the Black Brooklynites who defined New York City鈥檚 most populous borough through their search for social justice

Before it was a borough, Brooklyn was our nation鈥檚 third largest city. Its free Black community attracted people from all walks of life鈥攂usinesswomen, church leaders, laborers, and writers鈥攚ho sought to grow their city in a radical anti-slavery vision. The residents of neighborhoods like DUMBO, Fort Greene, and Williamsburg organized and agitated for social justice. They did so even as their own freedom was threatened by systemic and structural racism, risking their safety for the sake of their city. Brooklynites recovers the lives of these remarkable citizens and considers their lasting impact on New York City鈥檚 most populous borough.

This cultural and social history is told through four ordinary families from Brooklyn鈥檚 nineteenth-century free Black community: the Crogers, the Hodges, the Wilsons, and the Gloucesters. The book illustrates the depth and scope of their activism, cementing Brooklyn鈥檚 place in the history of social justice movements. Their lives offer valuable lessons on freedom, democracy, and family鈥攂oth the ones we鈥檙e born with and the ones we choose. Their powerful stories continue to resonate today, as borough residents fill the streets in search of a more just city.

This is a story of land, home, labor, of New Yorkers past, and the legacy they left us. This is the story of Brooklyn.