REVIEW by Carol Poll

The eminent architectural historian Gerald R. Wolfe captures early synagogue and community life on the Lower East Side and recent synagogue restoration efforts in his fascinating book The Synagogues of New York’s Lower East Side: A Retrospective and Contemporary View (Fordham University Press 2012, 232 Pages $29.95, ISBN: 978-0-8232-5000-4). The history of American Jews is very much entwined with the history of New York City’s Lower East Side. Four out of five Eastern European Jews can “trace their ‘roots’” to the Lower East Side. Close to 500,000 Jews came to the United States in the 1880s to be followed by another 1.5 million in the period between 1990 and 1924 and the majority settled on the Lower East Side. The passage of the National Origins Act in 1924, with its tiny quotas for Southern and Eastern Europe immigrants, put an end to large scale Jewish immigration. READ MORE

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

Questions:

What is are the working titles of the books?

I am in between two books. My second collection of poetry FANNIE + FREDDIE/The Sentimentality of Post-9/11 Pornography (Fordham University Press) just appeared, so predictably it feels undone. I am completing my first critical monograph, “REMEX: Toward an Art History of the NAFTA Era.” I have not had to negotiate “REMEX”’s title yet, but the final preparations of FANNIE + FREDDIE/The Sentimentality of Post-9/11 Pornography taught me a lot about how a title can be “working,” or not. Originally I struck through FANNIE + FREDDIE à la the Strike Debt Movement. Meta-data issues got in the way of FANNIE + FREDDIE/The Sentimentality of Post-9/11 Pornography being the volume’s title though. According to Fordham’s able staff, the strikethrough would have made it impossible for the press to register, distribute, and market the book. The result? I am haunted. I cannot not see the title as anything but under faux erasure. I mean, What does it mean to re-instate “FANNIE + FREDDIE”? I enjoin active readers to “share the labor, share the work.” Strike through the collection’s title on your copy of the book!

Where did the ideas come from for the books? How long did it take you to write the first drafts of the manuscripts?

FANNIE + FREDDIE/The Sentimentality of Post-9/11 Pornography’s idea and composition was palimpsestic. I rapidly wrote individual poems in the volume (roughly between the years 2001 and 2008) before ordering them into a collection. I then un-wrote or set out to ‘destroy’ the pieces. I wanted to materialize indecision or ambivalence, in effect reconceptualizing the collection as a whole. The idea of “REMEX” came in stages, too, as the last twenty years unfolded. I began researching “REMEX” in 1999 as a dissertation project. At the time, I did not realize that I was writing about what economists now routinely refer to as the second phase of Mexico’s neoliberal transition. The dissertation became something else—this book that I call “REMEX”—around 2008 when reviewing the official website of the North American Free Trade Agreement, I realized that NAFTA was implemented over a fifteen year period.

What genres does do your books fall under?
FANNIE + FREDDIE/The Sentimentality of Post-9/11 Pornography is a compilation of some of my visual, concrete, and performance poetry. “REMEX” is a work of creative critical writing, an experimental art history that incidentally I organized something like a collection of poetry, too. FANNIE + FREDDIE/The Sentimentality of Post-9/11 Pornography and “REMEX” are transdisciplinary, multi-mediated, feminist, queer… I hear the projects in garrulous conversation.

What actors would you choose to play the part of your characters in a movie rendition?
For both books, the actors/actresses would have to be non-professional, ideally my friends, acquaintances, family (including those whom I’ve tagged here—Micha Cárdenas, Beth Frost, Bruna Mori, Rachel Price & Shambhavi Kaul, Brian Whitener—and E.J. McAdams who tagged me). Consider this post an open call.

What is are the one sentence synopsis synopses of your books?

In FANNIE + FREDDIE/The Sentimentality of Post-9/11 Pornography, I ‘undocument’ the quotidian’s shades of gray/grey, the contingencies of post-Fordist relationality in the pre-Occupy window of time between September 11, 2001 and the 2008 Great Recession. In “REMEX” I offer close readings of artwork—performance, body art, conceptual art, installation, net art, video, cabaret-theater, experimental documentary and built environment—that are attentive to place “greater Mexico” and period, the complete implementation of NAFTA (1994-2008).

Who or what inspired you to write this these books?

My six year old son Césaire (Zé) Carroll-Domínguez—the artist responsible for FANNIE + FREDDIE/The Sentimentality of Post-9/11 Pornography’s cover illustration “صورة عائلية/Retrato de familia/Family Portrait”—(more than any other person) and the “atmosphere conditions” of the United States between September 11, 2001 and the 2008 Great Recession inspired me to write the collection. A critical mass of Mexico City- and Mexico-U.S. border-based artists and the “atmosphere conditions” associated with the neoliberal restructuring of the continent inspire me to finish “REMEX.”

What else about your books might pique the reader’s interest?

Filmmaker Vicky Funari once explained to me that she, her collaborator Sergio De La Torre, and the promotoras involved in the documentary Maquilapolis’s making did not intend to tell the tale of Tijuana’s bust, but, life intervened: Funari had a baby, De La Torre began his MFA, De La Torre and she had to seek extra funding, 9/11 (2001) happened, the women of Maquilapolis were juggling their own work/life obligations—everyone took a break from filming mid-2002 through 2004. And, when Maquilapolis’s production resumed, the course of events in Tijuana redirected the film. Put differently, 2000-2001 became pivotal years for Maquilapolis because they were pivotal years for Tijuana; 2000 being the year when factory flight began, 2001 being the year when one could tally the evidence of the exodus. The fact that Funari and De La Torre took longer than they’d anticipated to wrap up Maquilapolis facilitated an Other story: the apparent end of an era. Funari’s story has stuck with me because FANNIE + FREDDIE/The Sentimentality of Post-9/11 Pornography ‘interrupted’ “REMEX.” I finished the collection of poetry before I finished “REMEX” in part because I had to deal with a series of ‘extreme weather events’ in my life and in the lives of those nearest and dearest to me. Still, since undergraduate school, I have ‘code-switched’ between poetry and criticism. The mediums cross-pollinate one another in my work. I cannot imagine my dissertation without my first collection of poetry Secession (Hyperbole Books, 2012). I cannot imagine FANNIE + FREDDIE/The Sentimentality of Post-9/11 Pornography without “REMEX” and a collaborative project that I’ve coproduced since 2008, the Transborder Immigrant Tool.

Will your books be self-published or represented by an agency?

Fordham University Press recently published FANNIE + FREDDIE/The Sentimentality of Post-9/11 Pornography. Another press is considering “REMEX” for publication (fingers crossed).

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Two Hawaii residents are among those recognized for their service in World War II

The state Senate honored Friday three members of the Tuskegee Airmen, the celebrated group of African-American combat pilots who fought in World War II.

Romaine Goldsborough, Philip Baham and Alexander Jefferson (author of Red Tail Captured, Red Tail Free: Memoirs of a Tuskegee Airman and POW, Fordham University Press), each received a Certificate of Recognition during the Senate’s floor session.

Goldsborough and Baham are both Hawaii residents, while Jefferson is from Michigan.

Sen. Will Espero said the certificates are intended to show appreciation for the veterans’ service.

“It was such an honor to meet these veterans who faced so much adversity yet still had the strength to fight in the war. It was important to acknowledge and share their story and the contributions they made to our American history,” Espero (D, Ewa Beach-Iroquois Point), chairman of the Senate Committee on Public Safety, Intergovernmental and Military Affairs, said in a news release.

The Tuskegee Airmen are members of the 332nd Fighter Group and 477th Bombardment Group who helped pave the way for desegregation in the U.S. military. The group has received eight Purple Hearts, three Distinguished Unit Citations and 14 Bronze Stars.

To read full article. . .

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Speakers: Niza Yanay, Ph.D., professor of sociology and anthropology at Ben Gurion University of the Negev, and Judith Butler, Ph.D., Maxine Elliot Professor in the Departments of Rhetoric and Comparative Literature and the co-director of the Program of Critical Theory at the University of California, Berkeley. Sponsored by Fordham University Press.

Tuesday, February 19, 2013  | 7:30 p.m. | Fordham University | 12th-Floor Lounge/Corrigan Center, Lowenstein Center, Lincoln Center Campus

Contact: Fordham University Press (718) 817-4795

On Love: In the Muslim Tradition by Rusmir Mahmutcehajic, is a study of the Islamic faith, most specifically Sufism. In addition to being an astute scholarly collection, the book looks at the relationship between love and faith, knowledge and spirituality. Sufism is Islamic Mysticism, but the book is written in a language that is universal and simple to understand–like the language of love itself.

In Poets of Divine Love: The Rhetoric of Franciscan Spiritual Poetry, Alessandro Vettori examines the vernacular of a different faith–that of the pre-Renaissance Franciscans. The poets in this case are St. Francis of Assisi and Jacopone da Todi, two Franciscans writing in Umbria during the 13th century. The resulting poems form a backbone of vernacular Italian literary tradition, and establish an essential relationship between faith and love.

Switching gears completely, Love and Other Technologies: Retrofitting Eros for the Information Age takes a look at love through the lens of modern technology–what is love’s place in our contemporary plugged-in culture? Love, as Dominic Pettman sees it, is every society’s interpretation of self in relation to others. So in today’s world, is love just another form of technology? For Pettman, the articulation of love is a technique of belonging: a way of responding to the basic plurality of everyone’s identity, a process that becomes increasingly complex as the forms of mediated communication, from cell phone and text messaging to the mass media, multiply and mesh together. This book brings love from the romance-cloaked past firmly into the here and now.

Vist our website and receive a 20% discount on all books this Valentine’s Day!

Lincoln Revisited is a brilliant gathering of important scholarship by the leading Lincoln historians of our time. The Lincoln Forum tackles uncharted territory as well as taking a fresh look at established debates (including those about their own landmark works).

Lincoln and Leadership: Military, Political, and Religious Decision Making offers many fresh perspectives. The book explores Lincoln’s leadership through essays focused, respectively, on Lincoln as commander-in-chief, deft political operator, and powerful theologian.

The assassination of President Abraham Lincoln remains one of the most prominent events in U.S. history. It continues to attract enormous and intense interest from scholars, writers, and armchair historians alike, ranging from painstaking new research to wild-eyed speculation.

The Lincoln Assassination: Crime and Punishment, Myth and Memory offers a close look at the assassination itself and the immediate aftermath, chronicling the pursuit and prosecution of the conspirators–a relentless period that isn’t often well covered. All of the contributors are leading Lincoln scholars, and each essay offers a different perspective on an event that shook a still-fledgling nation.

Summers with Lincoln: Looking for the Man in the Monuments won the 2009 J. Owen Grundy History Award for its provoking look at what the 200 statues erected in Lincoln’s honor mean to us as Americans. James Percoco, a high school history teacher, embarked on a journey spanning four summers and an entire country, seeking to understand the significance behind Lincoln’s being the single most commemorated American in history. Along the way, he documents each monument’s history and impact in and on its respective community, discovering the human stories behind the immutable stone. Acclaimed author and Civil War historian James M. McPherson says of the book, “This splendid evocation of Lincoln’s image in sculpture combines poetic description, human-interest anecdotes, and incisive analysis. James Percoco shows how the different styles of public art shed light on the changing memories of our greatest president. Each chapter alone is worth the price of this book.”

To find more books on Lincoln, visit our website.

*Photo 1

In the summer of 2006, as a member of the PHMC’s scholars-in-residence program, I spent a month in Harrisburg researching at the Pennsylvania State Archives. I spent time sifting through Record Group 19, the records of Pennsylvania’s adjutant general, examining Civil War commissions’ files.

*Photo 2

Early on, a particular set of correspondence captured my attention. I encountered a stack of letters related to the promotion of Lieutenant Colonel Gustavus Town. In 1862, Pennsylvania’s adjutant general had to answer a hefty stack of letters about Town’s promotion to colonel. As I read the ill-toned epistles, the reason for the controversy became obvious. A cluster of Union generals, all of them well-known Democrats, wanted to deny Town—a Republican—his promotion to colonel. Meanwhile, state politicians—all Republicans—insisted upon Town’s elevation. I expressed shock to learn that the promotion of a single junior officer could paralyze the functioning of Pennsylvania’s executive office for months, and I wondered what made Lieutenant Colonel Town’s case so special. But then, as I examined the commissions’ files for other Pennsylvania regiments, I noticed similar stacks of papers, all of them filled with vicious, petty squabbles over promotions. I must have examined over 100 Pennsylvania regiments that summer, and I had yet to find a single regiment that did not bicker like petty school children.

When I left Harrisburg, I wondered why Pennsylvanians were so quick to argue about promotions. Did something make them particularly factious? I kept this question in my pocket until the next summer, when I visited the state archives in Albany, New York. When examining the records of these adjutants-general, I noticed the same trend. Indeed, for four years, New York’s three adjutants-general answered volumes of letters from irate Union officers demanding promotion, usually on account of their partisan loyalty. After Albany, I visited more state archives and at each one I found the same kinds of letters. “Goodness,” I wondered, “what was wrong with the Union army?” No group of people in nineteenth-century America appeared more vindictive, more ruthless, more back-stabbing, and more ambitious than the junior officer corps of the Union army. Clearly, I had discovered a dysfunction of the Union army that had never appeared in the literature. What, though, should I make of this?

*Photo 3

My eyes opened when I presented my initial findings at the Society for Military History’s annual conference. Mark Neely, for whom This Distracted and Anarchical People honors, served as commentator. In his remarks, he announced, “Timothy Orr shows us that the typical Union regiment was as corrupt as the New York Customs House.” I let this sink in. Is that what I proved? The Union army was a crooked system founded on political spoils? As a military historian, such an idea seemed alarmingly contrarian. I understood that all modern officers derive their promotions through the Defense Officer Personnel Management Act of 1980, which set into place specific parameters that determined a person’s promotion eligibility and fitness. I always knew that in regards to command-fitness, Civil War officers lived in a pre-modern world, but until then—until Neely pointed it out to me—I never comprehended how different that world really was.

Later on, after the conference had ended, Neely offered me more advice, saying, “I see politics in everything. In fact, I borrow an idea from the historian Roy Franklin Nichols: the nineteenth-century suffered from ‘too much politics.’ Introduce a little Roy Franklin Nichols into your problem, and I think you’ll come up with an answer.”

Following Neely’s direction, I used political history to make sense of a military history problem. The result is my contribution to This Distracted and Anarchical People. I hope that readers might stand in awe of the subject as I do. Nowadays, we live in a world where the U.S. government takes strenuous precaution to elevate the most qualified officers to positions so they can lead our servicemen and servicewomen into battle competently. During the Civil War, no such system of meritocracy existed. From 1861-1865, state governments directed the course of promotions, using partisan loyalty unashamedly as the barometer for leadership in the U.S. Army.

Leadership is a fascinating thing, and I think it is an enlightening exercise to contrast the way Americans have defined the meaning of military leadership over the course of 150 years.
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Dr. Timothy J. Orr is Assistant Professor at Old Dominion University. He specializes in American Military History and History of the Civil War Era. In particular, he has written on Union mobilization and the lives of Union soldiers. His latest research focuses on partisan conflict within the officer corps of the Army of the Potomac and also upon U.S. Naval dive bombing during the Battle of Midway. Dr. Orr teaches courses on American Military History, American Naval History, Virginia History, and the History of the Civil War and Reconstruction.

Captions for the photos:
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*Photo 1: The first image depicts King’s accuser, Arthur Harper Grimshaw (seated, center). In 1862, Grimshaw became colonel of the 4th Delaware Infantry. (In this photograph, Grimshaw is surrounded by his fellow officers.) The commissions’ files kept in the Delaware Public Archives reveal that Grimshaw never stopped intervening in matters of promotion. During the war, he deluged the office of Delaware’s Secretary of State (who assumed the duties of an adjutant general during a time of war) with opinionated letters, most of them aimed at elevating his Republican officers or denying promotions to the 4th Delaware’s Democrats. (Image courtesy of the Delaware Historical Society.)