Rutgers University Press Blog

Steve Adubato on the TODAY show

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We all make mistakes. The key is to apologize, and do it right. Commentator Steve Adubato, author of WHAT WERE THEY THINKING? Crisis Communication: The Good, the Bad, and the Totally Clueless, appeared on NBC's Today show this morning with some tips.

Ed Brooke, Barack Obama, and the Color of American Politics

Jason Sokol, writing on the site HISTORY NEWS NETWORK, compares Barack Obama to Edward Brooke, author of Bridging the Divide :

Obama faces a taller task than Brooke, and a much different one. Obama’s message must resonate beyond Massachusetts – below the Mason-Dixon line and west of the Mississippi River. And although 2008 presents us with a very different political and racial world than 1966, Brooke’s campaign anticipated Obama’s in some crucial ways: from the prodigious obstacles Brooke confronted to his unique interracial appeal.

Below, Senator Brooke with Rutgers University Press Director Marlie Wasserman at the Eagleton Institute of Politics last February.

New Website

Rutgers University Press has unveiled a new website! Check it out here.

Gods and Goddesses of the Garden

A short excerpt from Gods and Goddesses of the Garden, by Peter Bernhardt:

TAGES-Mexican marigolds (Tagetes erecta) are such cheerful annuals of summer window boxes and autumn borders it is astonishing that Linnaeus named the genus after an Etruscan underworld god. Domesticated by inhabitants of Mexico and Guatemala, long before conquistadors brought the seeds to Europe, marigolds were death flowers. The Aztecs used them in rituals of human sacrifice. In modern Mexico some graves are strewn with marigolds on the Day of the Dead. Mayan descendents, living in the mountains of Guatemala, left trails of marigold petals from the graveyard to their houses. A marigold trail allowed the spirit of a loved one to find its way back to the netherworld after enjoying the hospitality of the living.

Backstory in Blue

Earlier this year, we published John Fass Morton's Backstory in Blue, which recounts Duke Ellington's set at Newport in 1956. Listen to the famous track, Diminuendo and Crescendo in Blue, featuring Paul Gonsalves's solo:

Buy the album here.

New in paper: Science Talk by Daniel Thurs

Each and every day, the great world of science advances as new discoveries are made. Americans are often confused by these new scientific developments, which frequently leads people to abandon any hope of understanding such discoveries as they leave it up to scientists, doctors, and others in the scientific community to grapple with. As the realm of innovations broadens, as does the term “science” and its many sub-categories. It has become increasingly difficult in recent years to determine what is considered “science” and what falls into other, variant categories of existence.

In Daniel Patrick Thurs’s Science Talk, recently released in paperback by Rutgers University Press, the author examines how scientific controversies have changed, and will likely continue to alter, the way in which Americans view issues connected to the world of science.

Not in Front of the Children by Marjorie Heins

On March 17, 2008, the Supreme Court agreed to hear a case that has had a significant impact on free speech over the airwaves. The Court granted the Federal Communication Commission’s request that it review last year’s decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in Fox Television v. FCC, which rejected the FCC’s strict new “fleeting expletives” regulation that prohibited the use of inappropriate language on broadcast stations during the day-time hours. This directive was instituted after Janet Jackson’s infamous "wardrobe malfunction" during the 2004 Super Bowl half-time show. The rule issued by the FCC later recognized exceptions to the decree, as it stated that it was acceptable for inappropriate language so long as it was in context and not patently offensive, but the FCC refused to apply this stipulation to The Blues, a 2006 documentary which aired on PBS, because they maintained that director Martin Scorsese could have replaced the musicians actual language with more appropriate words. The Second Circuit ruled that the “fleeting expletives” order is “arbitrary and capricious” as it is applied only when the FCC feels like applying the rule. What extent is speaking openly in America an expression of individuality and freedom, and where does such speech turn into an unlawful offense to others?

In Marjorie Heins's Not in Front of the Children, recently published in paperback by Rutgers University Press, the author examines the historical evolution of “indecency” laws that began as an attempt to protect our nation’s impressionable youth.   

New in paperback: Karla Holloway's Bookmarks

Readers know what it feels like to purposely hide the title of a book that they are reading because it is slightly embarrassing or because it might paint an inaccurate image of the reader to those who view her. Or, some individuals intentionally flaunt the book that they indulge in so as to make them appear learned or sophisticated in their interests; and there are always those individuals who are significantly unaware of the fact that what they read reflects them, and can sometimes affect those around them.
        In Bookmarks, Karla FC Holloway examines the “public” aspect of books as it relates to the African American, historical, and literary image. Holloway allows the reader to accompany her to the confines of children’s reading rooms, prison libraries, and “Negro” libraries of the early twentieth centuries, and comments on how these places have affected the choice of books that African Americans have undertaken, and the limits to black reading.  -Elizabeth Christman

Ajzenberg-Selove awarded National Medal of Science

At a White House ceremony on September 29, Fay Ajzenberg-Selove, author of A Matter of Choices, accepted the National Medal of Science from President Bush: 

For her pioneering contributions in nuclear physics that have advanced research into many applications, including energy generation from fusion, dating of artifacts, and nuclear medicine; her passion for teaching; and her outstanding service to her profession...In her engaging memoir, "A Matter of Choices: Memoirs of a Female Physicist," Ajzenberg-Selove wrote candidly about her difficult journey to international recognition in physics. She came to America at the age of 15 after narrowly escaping the Nazi takeover of France. She had planned to become an engineer like her father, but switched to physics after she was told the only engineering jobs open to women were in drafting. Marie Curie's example proved to her that women could do physics. Though she deemed her first attempt at graduate work at Columbia University a disaster, she was struck with the intellectual beauty of the field. When she became a nuclear physicist, the number of women in the field could be counted on one hand. Among her victories, she overcame battles to become a tenured professor and to overcome breast cancer--concurrently.

First Win!

After a rough start, the football team edged out Morgan State over the weekend, 38-0, improving their record to 1-3. Last year we published a history of the team, Rutgers Football by Mike Pellowski. Greg Schiano called the book, "A must read for Rutgers football fans."