“Appealing to a strong public fascination with local history, more presses have turned to issuing more regional books. Fred Nachbaur, head of Fordham University Press, started Empire State Editions, focused on New York stories. The forthcoming ‘The Accidental Playground: Brooklyn Waterfront Narratives of the Undesigned and Unplanned’ by Daniel Campo tells of a Brooklyn waterfront’s reclamation.” —Chicago Tribune 

 

Across the industry, academic presses have crafted a host of new strategies to meet the changing landscape of books. To replace lost monograph and journal sales, presses now rely on more paperbound and e-book offerings, an increased emphasis on reprinting all or some of their backlist (Harvard’s backlist accounts for two-thirds of its sales) and doubling or tripling prices on more specialized, hardbound editions.

Because 80 percent of all titles are in the humanities and social sciences, university presses have a deep investment in the liberal arts. The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has funded a number of press initiatives to bolster the humanities. Cornell has Signale, a series of new English-language manuscripts of German literature plus translations of key German-language texts.

Minnesota has Quadrant, an initiative that brings university faculty and visiting fellows together around four research areas: design, architecture and culture; environment, culture and sustainability; global cultures; and health and society. Kent State University Press, Indiana University Press and Temple University Press collaboratively publish ethnomusicology titles.

The most successful humanities venture is Project MUSE, an innovative, nonprofit collaboration between libraries and publishers. MUSE is an aggregator of full-text digital content in humanities and social science journals from 200 scholarly publishers. Libraries have unlimited access to 550 journals.

It was founded and has been operated by Johns Hopkins University Press since 1995. It now numbers 2,600 library subscribers in 80 countries. Since 2000 the project has produced $100 million in savings to libraries and an equal amount in royalty payments to publishers, according to MUSE Director Dean Smith.

Most presses today follow a “portfolio” strategy, a move pioneered by Yale, to diversify titles over a wider range of book subjects. Yale University Press has a lucrative partnership with 26 art museums to publish their exhibition catalogs. Director John Donatich says that niche now supplies up to 40 percent of Yale’s yearly revenue.

Like the University of Chicago Press, many presses have started issuing more popular “midlist trade” books — a travel or music series, even fiction — and resurrecting out-of-print titles. Chicago reissued a hard-boiled detective series by Richard Stark, the writing pseudonym of Donald E. Westlake. Harvard has a “Wonders of the World” series, pocket-size editions of famous world sites or monuments such as Piazza San Marco, the Parthenon or Stonehenge, its newest. Minnesota has issued 30 music titles in the last 20 years, a very strong area for University Press of Mississippi and University of Illinois Press as well. READ MORE

Copyright © 2013 Chicago Tribune Company, LLC

If you are interested in the history of the community that surrounds Katz’s, we recommend curling up with a pastrami sandwich and a copy of The Synagogues of New York’s Lower East Side or Mornings at the Stanton Street Shul. You’ll learn about the goldene medinah (promised land) that became home to many fleeing persecution, poverty, and oppression.

MAY 30 – JUNE 1, JACOB JAVITS CONVENTION CENTER, NYC

FORDHAM UNIVERSITY PRESS

Booth #1752

Visit Books@BEA, the official online catalog for BEA!

Yesterday, several dolphins were spotted in the Hudson River near Inwood Hill Park. They then headed up towards the George Washington Bridge.

Why are they here now? What does this say about our waterways? With so many dolphin sightings, could this be the new normal for this urban setting? Perhaps our waters here are not as polluted as we once thought…

In Heartbeats in the Muck: The History, Sea Life, and Environment of New York Harbor, Revised Edition, author John Waldman, talks about the incredibly rich and biologically diverse ecosystem that exists in New York Harbor and its surrounding waterways.

In the broadest sense life is the user of water and habitat, and thus life is the great indicator of water quality and habitat suitability and “how the harbor is doing.” And the news concerning life in the harbor is cause for optimism—I remain bullish. Sea turtles have been spotted in the Verrazano Narrows and the East River. A pair of bottle-nosed dolphins were seen near the Tappan Zee Bridge, and a “Florida” manatee swam up the East River. Harbor seals were sighted on Belmont Island and on Robbins Reef where they were common three hundred years ago; they’ve also been seen in Newark Bay, and in the Hudson near Hoboken, Yonkers, and Tarrytown, where they’ve bitten off the heads of shad caught in gill nets. READ MORE

The Hudson River and the NYC Watershed are healthy ecosystems teeming with life. Residents and visitors care for and help protect these ecosystems, which provide safe drinking water and abundant opportunities for swimming, fishing, boating and other recreational activities. Visit www.RiverKeeper.org to find out more.

John Waldman is Professor of Biology at Queens College, City University of New York. He is recipient of the New York Society Library Award in Natural History and the Norcross Wildlife Conservation Award and is an occasional contributor to the New York Times and other periodicals. He is also the author of Still the Same Hawk: Reflections on Nature and New York (Fordham University Press).

Related Links:
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Keep the Clean Water Act Strong

Beczak Environmental Education Center

My Neighborhood: Hudson River is Bob Walters’ Backyard

1/20/13

In 1967, King led the largest antiwar demonstration to date in New York City. More than 1,100 people marched with King from Central Park to U.N. headquarters to protest the Vietnam War.

He is remembered today in New York with a street named in his honor. Martin Luther King Junior Boulevard is an alternative name for Manhattan’s 125th Street. There is also a Martin Luther King, Jr. High School on Amsterdam Avenue and a Martin Luther King Triangle, a park space in Manhattan’s Mott Haven neighborhood (Austin Place and East 149th Street).

Since the 1960s, most U.S. history has been written as if the civil rights movement were primarily or entirely a Southern history. Civil Rights in New York City edited by Clarence Taylor joins a growing body of scholarship that demonstrates the importance of the Northern history of the movement. The contributors make clear that civil rights in New York City were contested in many ways, beginning long before the 1960s, and across many groups with a surprisingly wide range of political perspectives. Civil Rights in New York City provides a sample of the rich historical record of the fight for racial justice in the city that was home to the nation’s largest population of African-Americans in mid-twentieth century America.

Also of interest…

Red Tail Captured, Red Tail Free
Memoirs of a Tuskegee Airman and POW

For more information on Red Tails visit or www.Redtailsfilm.com.

“. . .Hurricane Sandy reminded New Yorkers that the waterways surrounding them can be a dire threat as well as a great asset. This is a good time to explore their history. John Waldman, a biology professor at Queens College, offers a brief and elegantly written tour in “Heartbeats in the Muck: The History, Sea Life and Environment of New York Harbor” (Fordham University Press, $18).

This updated edition was published before the storm struck, but as Mr. Waldman breezily chronicles the harbor’s ecological decline and rebirth over several centuries, he never underestimates the waters that in one way or another have always defined New York.

Also notable is a new volume edited by Mr. Waldman: “Still the Same Hawk: Reflections on Nature and New York” (Fordham University Press, $18), a collection of essays by writers including Phillip Lopate and Robert Sullivan.”

Read Sam Roberts’ entire column.

CAP offers specialist academic sales, marketing and distribution covering Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Fordham University Press will work with CAP to further expand our reach in these important international markets.

Fordham University Press publishes primarily in the humanities and the social sciences, with an emphasis on the fields of anthropology, philosophy, theology, history, classics, communications, economics, sociology, business, political science, and law, as well as literature and the fine arts.

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Gay Talese, author of A Writer’s Life says, “This book pays artistic tribute to the existence of great bridges—a wonderful achievement.”

We may be biased, but we’re certain this beautiful book is on everyone’s holiday wish list!

In a city of over 8 million people, this is not surprising. What is surprising is that there is often little time for contemplation on the history of our roads and bridges and the cultural changes they have created. But today, the George Washington Bridge celebrates 80 years. To honor the engineering feats that created bridges and revolutionized the commerce of New York, the country, and the world, I will offer a short meditation on the “bridge.”

Bridge [brij] noun, verb, bridged, bridg•ing, adjective*

noun
1. A structure spanning and providing passage over a river, chasm, road, or the like.

The best part of the Henry Hudson Parkway is the view. Leading up to the George Washington Bridge is a winding view of trees and river. The Hudson river, which the GWB spans, is breathtaking in all seasons. From the summer when the palisades are ruddy and dry to the fall when the trees burst forth in colors, the sight is not to be missed. As a small child I would strain to see the river itself, full of tugboats and sailboats as we crossed over the bridge.

2. Connecting, transitional, or intermediate route or phase between two adjacent elements, activities, conditions, or the like: Working at the hospital was a bridge between medical school and private practice.

Even though the lives we lead can seem harried or fast-paced, we sometimes need to take time out to focus internally on our well-being. The yoga pose of Setu Bandha Sarvangasana or “Bridge Pose” helps me form an actual bridge of my body to wind down my yoga practice and metaphorically gives me a “bridge” into a calmer place. In our lives, it is just as important for reflection, as well as action.

3. Nautical
a. a raised transverse platform from which a power vessel is navigated: often includes a pilot house and a chart house.
b. any of various other raised platforms from which the navigation or docking of a vessel is supervised.
c. a bridge house or bridge superstructure.
d.a raised walkway running fore-and-aft.

A bridge can refer to the power center of the boat. It is a place to chart and set a course. Often these types of bridges are present on war ships. Not too far from the George Washington Bridge is one of New York’s unique museums. Housed on the aircraft carrier Intrepid, The Intrepid, Sea, Air, and Space Museum has a range of activities, exhibits, and events. The museum also hosts the annual Fleet Week in Manhattan.

4. Anatomy. the ridge or upper line of the nose.

I find this definition applicable to the George Washington Bridge because my mind makes the leap from the George Washington Bridge to another inspiring engineering feat where George Washington is present—Mount Rushmore. The same engineers that made bridges had to have the imagination to see what could be created in a space that nature fully inhabited.

5. Dentistry. an artificial replacement, fixed or removable, of a missing tooth or teeth, supported by natural teeth or roots adjacent to the space.

While this meaning of the word “bridge” does not seem applicable to the bridge that lends itself to transporting the masses, I think it is necessary to note the second half of the definition “supported by …roots adjacent to the space.” It is the roots of immigrant history that have in fact made bridges like the GWB and the Tappan Zee possible.

New York’s Golden Age of Bridges by Antonio Masi and Joan Marans Dim traces the roots of New York’s bridges, but also the stories behind the people who made them possible. Antonio’s grandfather, Francesco Masi, an Italian immigrant helped build the 59th Street (the recently renamed Ed Koch Queensboro) Bridge. Fascinated with bridges his entire life, Antonio has been capturing bridges with his brush for over a decade. Antonio’s work speaks to me, as it may speak to many others. Growing up, I was taught that my great-great grandfather, an Italian immigrant went to Cooper Union and became a painter. His paintings hung in our home, a constant reminder of the roots we have. I think Antonio and Joan’s narrative, accompanied by striking paintings will resonate with many others whose roots lie in a unique, yet collective American experience.

–Katie Sweeney

*Courtesy of Dictionary.com