How does a minority come to be? In an unusual project, a notable group of French and American scholars take the view that minorities are socially constructed. Their original studies of specific historical examples produce a series of stimulating and provocative essays useful and enjoyable for specialists and the general reader alike.
Spawned from a conference organized by the journals Annales and Comparative Studies in Society and History in concert with the Center for Historical Research at l'EHESS in Paris and the Department of History at the University of Michigan, this...

This extraordinary collection of essays recasts prevailing understandings of the role of violence in the formation of the modern world. By illuminating the links between exceptional ruptures and the routine maintenance of social order, the collection expands and redefines our understanding of political violence.
By means of a combination of detailed historical studies and imaginative reflection, this book explores the often unrecognized violent foundations of modern nations. Focusing on the relations between the state and the domestic order, it directs attention to contests over the...

This book departs from stereotypes that often dominate Western discourse about Muslim societies. The Muslim world encompasses a wide range of countries--among them Turkey, Iraq, Egypt, Senegal, Saudi Arabia, and Morocco--each with a varying degree of religious stricture. Generalizations, therefore, can be erroneous and misleading. The contributors to this book--prominent scholars in anthropology, history, sociology, and political science--examine such issues as the ideology and political practices of Iran's ruling Shi'ite clerics, the impact of state policies on the status of women, the...