1105, 2017

Some book reviews of recent publications in SOAS Library

By Mary Fisk|May 11, 2017|Ancient Near East, Semitics and Judaica, Art and Archaeology, History, Middle East, Central Asia & Islamica, Religions|0 comments

(1) Mohammed Gharipour, ed. Sacred Precincts: The Religious Architecture of Non-Muslim Communities across the Islamic World. Leiden: Brill, 2015. xxxviii + 542 pp. $254.00 (cloth), ISBN 978-90-04-27906-3. Reviewed by Nancy Demerdash-Fatemi (Princeton University) Published on H-AMCA (April, 2017) This “prodigious compilation” also underscores the growing need for more studies in global art and architectural histories, ones which investigate how aspects of trade, exchange, circulation, reception, transmission, as well as processes of

2705, 2016

Book review: Syriac Christians and the early Muslim world

By Mary Fisk|May 27, 2016|Ancient Near East, Semitics and Judaica, History, Middle East, Central Asia & Islamica, Religions|0 comments

SOAS Library recently acquired Michael Penn’s Envisioning Islam: Syriac Christians and the Early Muslim World. Divinations: Rereading Late Ancient Religion. (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2015) This review of Envisioning Islam (by Christopher Sahner, of St John’s College, Cambridge) has just been posted on Indiana University’s The Medieval Review, calling the book a “mighty achievement” in its study of the non-Muslim sources on Islamic origins through the large body of Syriac

0802, 2016

Archaeology and religion: two book reviews

By Mary Fisk|February 8, 2016|Ancient Near East, Semitics and Judaica, Anthropology and Sociology, Art and Archaeology, History, Middle East, Central Asia & Islamica, Religions|0 comments

Two books recently acquired by SOAS Library have been reviewed online: Defining the Sacred: Approaches to the Archaeology of Religion in the Near East / edited by Nicola Laneri (Oxford: Oxbow, 2015) Reviewed by Aren M. Maeir (Bar-Ilan University) in the Bryn Mawr Classical Review An “excellent” collection of studies “dealing with various cultures, finds, issues and periods, ranging from the early Neolithic period until the Iron Age“. Regions studied include ancient

0608, 2015

Two SOAS Library Book Reviews

By Mary Fisk|August 6, 2015|Ancient Near East, Semitics and Judaica, Art and Archaeology, History, Middle East, Central Asia & Islamica|0 comments

A couple of reviews for books recently acquired by SOAS Library … 1.Denial of Violence: Ottoman Past, Turkish Present and Collective Violence against the Armenians, 1789-2009 by Fatma Müge Göçek. Reviewed by Dr. Joanne Laycock(Sheffield Hallam University) in the Institute of Historical Research’s Reviews in History This book “is representative of the growing engagement of historians of this region and period with an expanding range of source material and a willingness

0505, 2015

Recent Acquisitions to SOAS Library reviewed

By Mary Fisk|May 5, 2015|Ancient Near East, Semitics and Judaica, Gender, History, Middle East, Central Asia & Islamica, Music, Media and Film Studies, Religions|0 comments

The following books have all been recently acquired by SOAS Library either in print or as e-books. Slandering the Jew: sexuality and difference in early Christian texts / Susanna Drake. [e-book only, via ebrary] – reviewed by Gail Labovitz on H-Net (who states that there is “much to be learnt” from this study on gender, sexuality and stereotypes of Jews within early Christian writings) Ancient Syria : a three thousand year

1602, 2015

Ancient Near Eastern studies book reviews

By Mary Fisk|February 16, 2015|Ancient Near East, Semitics and Judaica|0 comments

Two recent acquisitions by SOAS Library on ancient Near Eastern studies and comparative ancient Near Eastern literatures have been reviewed in the Society of Biblical Literature’s Review of Biblical Literature Poetic astronomy in the ancient Near East : the reflexes of celestial science in ancient Mesopotamian, Ugaritic, and Israelite narrative / Jeffrey L. Cooley. (Eisenbrauns, 2013) – reviewed by Stephen C. Russell of John Jay College (City University of New

2701, 2015

Reviews of four recently acquired books in SOAS Library

By Mary Fisk|January 27, 2015|Africa, Ancient Near East, Semitics and Judaica, History, Religions|0 comments

Review of Biblical Literature Postcolonial perspectives in African biblical interpretations / edited by Musa W. Dube, Andrew M. Mbuvi, and Dora R. Mbuwayesango (Society of Biblical Literature, 2012) – U220 /742744 (“well-written, … and useful to both teachers and students of biblical studies interested in postcolonial approaches.) Cursed are you!: the phenomenology of cursing in cuneiform and Hebrew texts / Anne Marie Kitz (Eisenbrauns, 2014) QC133.44 /758375 (“ambitious and meticulously executed

2111, 2014

Two new resources for Jewish studies

By Mary Fisk|November 21, 2014|Ancient Near East, Semitics and Judaica, Archival collections, History, Religions|0 comments

Ancient Jew Review (follow on Twitter at @ancientjew) is a web platform for the study of ancient Judaism containing “original pieces, surveys of the field, book reviews” and video content. It is edited by PhD students at Columbia and Yale Recent content includes Ayyssa Gray’s retrospective on her first book A Talmud in exile and a podcast interview with Dr Richard Kalmin of the Jewish Theological Seminary on his recently published

0611, 2014

Book review: Muslim Identities: An Introduction to Islam / Aaron Hughes

By Mary Fisk|November 6, 2014|Middle East, Central Asia & Islamica, Religions|0 comments

Published in 2013 by Columbia University Press (New York), Aaron Hughes’ Muslim identities: an introduction to Islam is reviewed on H-Net (https://www.h-net.org) by Keren Abbou Hershkovits of the Middle Eastern Studies Department of the Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Israel. She concludes that this introductory study is “helpful and illuminating” . Click here to read the full review and see further reading suggestions Muslim identities can be found in SOAS Library at N297 /

2010, 2014

“Principles of Akkadian textual criticism” by Martin Worthington : Book Review

By Mary Fisk|October 20, 2014|Ancient Near East, Semitics and Judaica, Linguistics|0 comments

Martin Worthington’s recent “Principles of Akkadian textual criticism” (de Gruyter, 2012) has been reviewed in the Bryn Mawr Classical Review by SOAS alumnus Dr.Wolfgang de Melo (currently Associate Professor of Classical Philology at the Ioannou Centre for Classical and Byzantine Studies,University of Oxford) who describes it as an “excellent contribution to both textual criticism and Assyriology” Dr Martin Worthington was a British Academy Postdoctoral Research Fellow at SOAS for two years and

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