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September 11, 2001

International
• Iraq
• Israel and Palestine
• Terrorism

Public Policy & Civics
• Immigration
• Social Security
• Voting & Elections
• Same-Sex Marriage

United States
• New Orleans
• The Enron Affair & Corporate Governance
• U.S. Race Relations
• New York City

Nature & Science
• Hurricane Katrina
• Writing of Place
• Space Flight

Religion
• The Catholic Pope
• Islamic Thought and Culture

Art & Literature
• U.S. Poets Laureate
• Books for Kids

Books for Understanding is a free, easy-to-use resource to help you find books on current events. New bibliographies are compiled when a major news story breaks or public debate heats up. For more information, click here.

Iran

Political violence is increasing in Iran as Khomeini's regime retaliates against the opposition. The books on this deep bibliography offer answers to some of the questions about what is driving the political turmoil there.

Go to: • Book List • Press Release

Sample Contents:

In Iran's History:
Resistance to the Shah: Landowners and Ulama in Iran, by Mohammad Gholi

In International Relations:
Iran and the Bomb, by Therese Delpech

In Arts, Literature, and Langauage:
In a Persian Mirror: Images of the West and Westerners in Iranian Fiction, by M.R Ghanoonparvar

Cuba

The 50th anniversary of the Cuban Revolution, Fidel Castro's increasing withdrawal from the forefront of power, and a small loosening of U.S. policy restrictions are bringing the Caribbean nation into the headlines. AAUP member presses have long published insightful scholarship on Cuba's history, policies, and culture.

Go to: • Book List • Press Release

Sample Contents:

In Cuba's History:
The Archives of Cuba/Los archivos de Cuba, by
Louis A. Pérez, Jr., and Rebecca Scott

In Castro's Cuba: Economy:
Capitalism, God, and a Good Cigar: Cuba Enters the Twenty-first Century, by Lydia Chávez

In Cuba's Foreign Policy: The U.S.:
That Infernal Little Cuban Republic: The United States and the Cuban Revolution, by Lars Schoultz

The Financial Crisis

The extent of the 2008 financial crisis is still not entirely known, but a greater understanding of how and what happened is available today. Scholarship on the history of financial markets and previous panics, economic analyses of financial products and regulatory regimes, and political studies of the intertwining of government and capital offer insight and knowledge in these days of uncertainty.

Go to: • Book List • Press Release

Sample Contents:

In Wall Street & Financial Markets:
Wall Street: A History From Its Beginnings to the Fall of Enron, by Charles R. Geisst

In Financial Panics and Market Crises:
The Great Credit Squeeze by Martin Neil Baily, Douglas W. Elmendorf, and Robert E. Litan

In Market Regulation:
Vicious Cycle: Presidential Decision Making in the American Political Economy, by Constantine J. Spiliotes

New Updates:
New Orleans updated 2/3/10
Ronald Reagan updated 2/3/10
Haiti updated 1/13/10
Reproductive Rights updated 1/13/10
Financial Crisis updated 12/10/09

Earthquake in Haiti

Thousands are feared dead and a humanitarian crisis expected in the aftermath of the massive earthquake that hit near to Port-au-Prince on January 12.

Go to: • Haiti Book List • Emergency Management Book List

Terrorism

After the attempted bombing of a flight landing in Detroit, security measures are under scrutiny.

Go to: • Terrorism Book List • Iraq Book List

A Single Man

Christopher Isherwood
Minnesota, 2009

Isherwood's 1964 novel is a frank and moving examination of a gay man in midlife. Minnesota has reissued the novel as a tie-in to fashion designer Tom Ford's directorial debut, opening this December. Starring Colin Firth and Julianne Moore, the film has already won critical acclaim. While mainstream attention is returning to Isherwood's fiction and life, the University of Minnesota Press has kept many of his best works in print.
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Surviving against the Odds: Village Industry in Indonesia

S. Ann Dunham
Duke UP, 2009

Duke University Press has published the work that President Obama's mother was not able to revise from dissertation form before her early death. The work reflects Dunham's more than 10 years of research among rural Javanese metalworkers and her commitment to helping small-scale village industries survive. The American Anthropological Association dedicated a session to the book's idea at their Decmber 2009 conference.
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Scroogenomics: Why You Shouldn't Buy Presents for the Holidays

Joel Waldfogel
Princeton, 2009

Tired of the Black Friday/Cyber Monday creeping consumerism of the holidays? Waldfogel's stocking-sized treatise explains the poor economics of our less-informed, and less than satisfactory, gift purchasing habits. Not suggesting a complete break with tradition, Waldfogel offers viable alternatives. (And, of course, books are great gifts!)
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Elizabeth Blackburn and the Story of Telomeres: Deciphering the Ends of DNA

Catherine Brady
MIT Press, 2009

Blackburn, along with Carol Greider and Jack Szostak, was awarded the 2009 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine "for the discovery of how chromosomes are protected by telomeres and the enzyme telomerase." Brady's accessible and compelling story of Blackburn's research and life is a timely introduction to one of our foremost scientists.
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