The Hellenistic period was a pivotal moment in the history of the Jewish priesthood. The waning days of the Persian empire coincided with the continued ascendance of the high priest and Jerusalem temple as powerful political, cultural, and religious institutions in Judea. The Aramaic Scrolls from Qumran, only recently published in full, testify to …

Media studies is an emerging discipline that is quickly making an impact within the wider field of biblical scholarship. The Dead Sea Scrolls in Ancient Media Culture (Brill, 2023) is designed to evaluate the status quaestionis of the Dead Sea Scrolls as products of an ancient media culture, with leading scholars in the Dead Sea Scrolls and related…

In early modern Japan, upper status groups coveted pills and powders made of exotic foreign ingredients such as mummy and rhinoceros horn. By the early twentieth century, over-the-counter-patent medicines, and, more alarmingly, morphine, had become mass commodities, fueling debates over opiates in Japan's expanding imperial territories. The fall of…

How is Buddhism seen and practiced in Taiwan? And how do neighbouring countries influence Taiwanese Buddhism? In this episode we explore the religious landscape of Taiwan in conversation with Dr. Yushuang Yao, a leading expert on religion in contemporary Taiwan. Yushuang Yao is an Associate Professor at Fo Guang University, Taiwan, specializing in …

Nahj al-Balagha is among the most powerful, consequential, and linguistically brilliant masterpieces of Arabic and of Islamic thought and literature. Based on the orations, letters, and sayings of wisdom of ‘Ali ibn Abi Talib (d. 661), the first Imam or successor to Prophet Muhammad in Shi‘i Islam and the fourth caliph in Sunni Islam, this oral tre…

In Implications of Pre-Emptive Data Surveillance for Fundamental Rights in the European Union (Brill Nijhoff, 2023) Julia Wojnowska-Radzińska offers a comprehensive legal analysis of various forms of pre-emptive data surveillance adopted by the European legislator and their impact on fundamental rights. It also identifies what minimum guarantees ha…

Nante Japan's review of April 2024, featuring segments on the state of HYBE's Japanese operations, Billboard's article on Western songwriters in Asia, Utada Hikaru's 25th anniversary best album "SCIENCE FICTION", and more.By Nante Japan

In this beautiful new book, Dr. Youngna Kim draws on her vast understanding of Korean art to provide an overview of the peninsula’s contemporary art scene. Korean artists have become increasingly active at an international level, with many being invited for residencies and exhibitions all over the world. Nonetheless, for various reasons, the genera…

One orthodoxy of critical biblical scholarship on the Third Gospel, attributed by later Christian tradition to a companion of Paul named Luke, holds that its author was not ethnically Jewish but rather a Gentile of some kind, either a proselyte to Judaism, a “Godfearer” once attached to a diasporic synagogue, or perhaps a pagan convert to a form of…

A special episode where Coachella 2024 is discussed. Reactions to the individual performers, what they mean to the notion and expansion of Japanese music overseas, and who we would like to see perform at the festival in the future are discussed,By Nante Japan

Arjen F. Bakker's book The Secret of Time: Reconfiguring Wisdom in the Dead Sea Scrolls (Brill, 2023) contributes to the rethinking of the Dead Sea Scrolls as an essential and integral part of Judaism in the Greco-Roman period. The Qumran manuscripts attest to the reconfiguration of Jewish wisdom concepts in this period. Strikingly, reflection on t…

In Fragile Images: Jews and Art in Yugoslavia, 1918-1945 (Brill, 2019), Mirjam Rajner traces the lives and creativity of seven artists of Jewish origin. The artists - Mosa Pijade, Daniel Kabiljo, Adolf Weiller, Bora Baruh, Daniel Ozmo, Ivan Rein and Johanna Lutzer - were characterized by multiple and changeable identities: nationalist and universal…

While many have noted the general Jewishness of the Gospel of John, few have given it a seat at the ideologically crowded table of ancient Jewish practice and belief—until now. Join us as we speak with Wally Cirafesi, whose book, John Within Judaism: Religion, Ethnicity, and the Shaping of Jesus-Oriented Jewishness in the Fourth Gospel (Brill, 2021…

Global risks present formidable challenges to international law. Although they have long been identified in many other scientific disciplines, they are currently only considered on a sectoral basis in international law in the absence of a legal definition. The aim of Sarah Cassella's book Global Risks and International Law: The Case of Climate Chan…

Fabricating Founders in Early Modern England: History, Rhetoric, and the Origins of Christianity (Brill, 2023) argues that in order to understand nationalisms, we need a clearer understanding of the types of cultural myths, symbols, and traditions that legitimate them. Myths of origin and election, memories of a greater and purer past, and narrativ…

In the Shadow of War and Empire: Industrialisation, Nation-Building, and Working-Class Politics in Turkey (Brill, 2023) offers a site-specific history of Ottoman and Turkish industrialization through the lens of a mid-nineteenth-century cotton factory in the “Turkish Manchester,” the name chosen by the Ottomans for the industrial complex they built…

All can agree that the achievement of Moses Maimonides (d. 1204) set the standard for subsequent works of "Jewish philosophy". But just what were the contours of philosophical-scientific inquiry that Maimonides replaced? A fairly large array of diverse texts have been studied, but no comprehensive picture has yet emerged. The newly discovered Hebre…

Nante Japan's review of March 2024, featuring segments on the end of Sexy Zone, the birth of timelesz, the BBC Johnny Kitagawa documentary sequel, numerous film and music award shows, and more.By Nante Japan

Ahmed M. Abozaid’s Undesired Revolution: The Arab Uprising in Egypt--A Three Level Analysis (Brill, 2023) introduces new non-Western perspectives on the Arab Uprisings, decentering and decolonizing International Relations, and Middle Eastern Studies. Drawing on over ten years of fieldwork, ethnography, over 250 interviews, and empirical research, i…

Gustavo Guzmán's Attitudes of the Chilean Right toward Jews: From Acceptable Undesirables to Respected Businessmen (Brill, 2022) is the first book in English to discuss the changing attitudes of the Chilean Right toward Jewish immigrants and the State of Israel from the 1930s onwards. Jewish Chileans have ascended rapidly from the status of undesir…

Nante Japan's review of February 2024, featuring segments on Ado's New York concert, Ae! group's impending debut, LDH's rules for fan behavior, Japanese hip hop's big month, and more.By Nante Japan

In Hollow Men, Strange Women: Riddles, Codes, and Otherness in the Book of Judges (Brill, 2016), Robin Baker provides a masterly reappraisal of Israel's experience during its Settlement of Canaan as narrated in the Book of Judges, which, he argues, subtly encrypts a grim forewarning of Judah's future. In its extensive treatment of otherness, the Bo…

Law. How does the state form and use it? How do people use and shape it? How does law shape culture? How does the practice of law change over time in a modernizing colony? What was stable and what was malleable in the application of law in early modern Russia versus its Central Asian colony in the Empire’s final century? What’s the difference betwe…

Nante Japan's review of Janaury 2024, featuring segments on the marriage of KinKi Kids' Tsuyoshi Domoto & Momoiro Clover Z's Kanako Momota, Sexy Zone's impending name change & Kento Nakajima's impending graduation, Number_i's debut, the "47th Japan Academy Awards" nominations, utaite drama, and more.…

The Balkans provided the escape route for tens of thousands of German Jews, and remained a place of refuge until the Nazis brutally shut it off with the mass murder of Jewish refugees on the so-called Kladovo transport starting in September 1941, which can be considered as the beginning of the Holocaust in Europe. Responding to publications about t…

Nante Japan's review of December 2023, featuring segments on the “74th NHK Kohaku Uta Gassen”, the renaming of the company formerly known as Johnny & Associates, Snow Man's record breaking New Year's Eve livestream, Jin Akanshi and Meisa Kuroki's divorce, and more.By Nante Japan

Roman imperial epic is enjoying a moment in the sun in the twenty-first century, as Lucan, Valerius Flaccus, Statius, and Silius Italicus have all been the subject of a remarkable increase in scholarly attention and appreciation. Lucan and Flavian Epic (Brill, 2023) characterizes and historicizes that moment, showing how the qualities of the poems …

Today I talked to Klaus Buchenau about his new book From Grand Estates to Grand Corruption: The Battle Over the Possessions of Prince Albert of Thurn and Taxis in Interwar Yugoslavia (Brill, 2023). When Yugoslavia was created in 1918, noble landowners still possessed vast parts of its territory especially in the northwestern half of the country whi…

Many major political questions today revolve around questions of human nature; what sort of people we are and what sort of people we're capable of being constitute both the goals and limits of the sort of society we can and ought to try and create. Jason Read's The Politics of Transindividuality (Haymarket Books, 2017) looks at a number of figures …

Nante Japan's review of 2023, featuring segments on the trends of the year, whether the concept of an album is dead or alive in Japan, the STARTO ENTERTAINMENT (fka Johnny & Associates) scandal, our top songs and albums of the year, and more.

A special episode where the fans of STARTO ENTERTAINMENT, formerly Johnny & Associates, speak out on the monumentous year that was 2023. Fans from around the world discuss the Johnny Kitagawa abuse scandal, the changes the company has made in its wake, what they see in the company's future, their favorite company moments of the year, and more.…

Nante Japan's review of November 2023, featuring segments on the “74th NHK Kohaku Uta Gassen” lineup, Yuzuru Hanyu's divorce, the concert film "OPUS | Ryuichi Sakamoto", the year end streaming charts, Anime NYC 2023, and more.By Nante Japan

Scholarly discussions on Islam in print have focused predominantly on the role of Urdu in the development of North Indian Muslim publics (Dubrow, 2018; Robb, 2020), ʿulama and Islamic jurisprudence (Tareen, 2020) and relations between Islam and colonial modernity (Robinson, 2008; Osella & Osella, 2008). This special issue of International Journal o…

Nante Japan's review of October 2023, featuring segments on the second Johnny & Associates press conference, the fallout from the press conference, the formation of Number_i, a new book on why women aren't topping the Japanese charts, and more.By Nante Japan

Nante Japan's review of September 2023, featuring segments on the Johnny & Associates third party investigation press conference, the fallout from the press conference, the interviews with the heads of Avex and Universal Music Japan, and more.By Nante Japan

Frames That Speak: Cartouches on Early Modern Maps (Brill, 2023) is the first systematic exploration of cartographic cartouches, the decorated frames that surround the title, or other text or imagery, on historic maps. It addresses the history of their development, the sources cartographers used in creating them, and the political, economic, histor…

Nante Japan's review of August 2023, featuring segments on the United Nations press conference about Johnny & Associates, the Johnny & Associates third party investigation report, Bishonen's scandals, and more.By Nante Japan

Jeremy Land's book Colonial Ports, Global Trade, and the Roots of the American Revolution (1700-1776) (Brill, 2023) takes a long-run view of the global maritime trade of Boston, New York, and Philadelphia from 1700 to American Independence in 1776. Land argues that the three cities developed large, global networks of maritime commerce and exchange …

In Living under the Evil Pope (Brill, 2019), Martina Mampieri presents the Hebrew Chronicle of Pope Paul IV, written in the second half of the sixteenth century by the Italian Jewish moneylender Benjamin Neḥemiah ben Elnathan (alias Guglielmo di Diodato) from Civitanova Marche. The text remained in manuscript for about four centuries until the Gali…

Nante Japan's review of July 2023, featuring segments on Yamashita Tatsuro's defense of Johnny Kitagawa, Shinjiro Atae's coming out, The New York Asian Film Festival, our midyear favorites, and more.By Nante Japan

Julia Schneider’s Nation & Ethnicity: Chinese Discourses on History, Historiography, and Nationalism (1900s-1920s), published with Brill in 2017, is an erudite study of early twentieth century theories of Chinese nationalism. In the book, Schneider considers the writings of Qing reformers Liang Qichao, complicates received narratives about anti-Man…

While there is little doubt that women were active participants in medieval musical culture, their role has nevertheless been variously obfuscated, undermined, and overlooked, in large part because of the relative absence of named women composers. Work from recent decades has sought to re-insert women into our music-historical narratives, often by …

A special episode about our trip to Anime Expo 2023! In this episode, we discussed all the things we experienced at the con, including VTuber concerts, anisong clubbing, and the North American premiere of "The First Slam Dunk."By Arama! Japan

In Jewish Socratic Questions in an Age Without Plato: Permitting and Forbidding Open-Inquiry in 12-15th Century Europe and North Africa (Brill, 2021), Yehuda Halper examines Jewish depictions of Socrates and Socratic questioning of the divine among European and North African Jews of the 12th-15th centuries. Without direct access to Plato, their und…

Have you ever wondered why Paul leaves the resurrection discussion in 1 Corinthians 15 for the end of the letter? Have you pondered how 1 Corinthians 15 functions as the climax to 1 Corinthians? What precisely is Paul's rhetorical strategy in 1 Corinthians? Tune in as we speak with Timothy Christian whose recent book answers those questions by expl…

Did the author of the two-part narrative of Luke-Acts have a literary and historical paradigm in mind? Mark Giacobbe says, yes, that in certain key respects, Luke-Acts, using literary mimesis, was modeled on the two-part narrative of Samuel-Kings and Chronicles, with part one concerning a Davidic king and part two the acts of those who inherit the …

Nante Japan's review of June 2023, featuring segments on Ronald's trip to Japan to see Snow Man at Tokyo Dome, the half-year charts, this year's "Talent Power Ranking", criticism of our site's handling of the Johnny Kitagawa abuse scandal, and more.By Nante Japan

Xiaoning Lu received her BA and MA in Chinese Literature and Language from Nanjing University and Fudan University respectively. She then earned her PhD in Comparative Literature from the State University of New York at Stony Brook. Prior to joining SOAS in 2010, she had taught cinema and cultural studies, modern Chinese literature and popular cult…

Anne Giblin Gedacht’s Tōhoku Unbounded: Regional Identity and the Mobile Subject in Prewar Japan (Brill, 2022) centers cross-border mobility in its narrative of the history of Japan’s Tōhoku region in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The book is a challenge to the stereotypical image of the Northeast as static and isolated. Focusi…

Islamicate Occult Sciences in Theory and Practice (Brill, 2020) brings together the latest research on Islamic occult sciences from a variety of disciplinary perspectives, namely intellectual history, manuscript studies, and material culture. Its aim is not only to showcase the range of pioneering work that is currently being done in these areas bu…