...of phrase, or a particularly witty conversation, and it works. In fact, I’m so glad he adds in this humor because Nation would be quite depressing otherwise.    The book covers a lot of big themes: imperialism, gender roles in society, culture clash/prejudice, religion, and grief to name just a few. It is written for a younger audience, so there’s nothing too graphic, but I don’t think I’d recommend...

Looking up the reference on the New Coke fiasco in the book I have which mentions it ( You Did What? ), I came across something else I'd bookmarked to post about sometime. I don't have the time to write...but it's one of those things that I don't remember seeing anything blogged about it previously, so this is a start: British "Totem" nuclear weapons testing, Maralinga, Australia (begun Oct 1953)

The below interesting new item on the genesis of HIV/AIDS comes ultimately from Nature . A biopsy taken from an African woman nearly 50 years ago contains traces of the HIV genome, researchers have...conglomerate in the Congo Free State--might have had something to do with the virus' emergence. We already knew that colonialism kills. It turns out that it can do so in rather unexpected ways, too

When folk use the term imperialism nowadays, it is almost taken as read that one means Western imperialism. Yet, if we take Western civilisation to have arisen from the collapse of Classical civilisation, then, from the C7th to the C15th, Western civilisation was more likely to be the victim of imperialism than the perpetrator of it. Apart from the Reconquista (which was, after all, a re...

... in fighting, 'left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing,' and shifts corresponding with changing of the guard in domestic politics. Mastusaka concludes that by 1931, the 'moderate' imperialism plans were untenable, and the choices were either total withdrawal or 'total empire.' The adaptive nature of Japanese imperialism also fueled escalation: Many of the initiatives launched...

...damaging, not only to the terrorists' efforts in Iraq, but had the effect of depleting them worldwide." I'd say that's a pretty fucking strong argument. There's no denying that oil is involved, though: As far as imperialism goes, booting your psychopath dictator, sacrificing young men to stabilize your country, then offering to pay you for the treasure you've been sitting on...is probably not so bad.

Peter Duus, Ramon H. Myers, Mark R. Peattie, eds. The Japanese Informal Empire in China, 1895-1937 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1989). Concerning itself from the period of the first Sino...empires weren't. Not exactly surprising, though information regarding just how much Japan relied on trade with China - their informal empire - versus Korea or Taiwan is certainly enlightening

Chong-sik Lee, Counterinsurgency in Manchuria: the Japanese Experience, 1931-1940 (Santa Monica: The Rand Corp., 1967). The publisher & timing of this book should make it obvious why it was commissioned... - the bulk of attention is paid to Communist elements, Chinese Communists at that (Lee mentions the Minshengtuan incident which really wreaked havoc on collaboration between Chinese & Korean CP members)

...in an attempt to study the clash between bigger powers. Park’s ambitious study of the interactions of Korean, Japanese, and Chinese interests in Manchuria examines social structure, nationalism, and imperialism in relation to capitalist structures and returns the Korean experience to the center. Frequently echoing the ‘bed’ trope of the title, Park illustrates how competing interests were often coupled...

...of Hokkaidō - referred to here as Ezo, which is sort of a catch all descriptor for norther lands; one of the most interesting aspects of this work is we get a look at Japanese colonialism and imperialism with 'training wheels.' Should Japanese expansionism really be viewed as a post-Meiji phenomenon? No, says Walker - the 'conquest of the Ainu lands' was just as much a colonial action as Japan's...