Caroline Frank, Objectifying China, Imagining America: Chinese Commodities in Early America (Chicago: U of Chicago P, 2011), 257 pp.

Caroline Frank, Objectifying China, Imagining America: Chinese Commodities in Early America (Chicago: U of Chicago P, 2011), 257 pp. Amerikastudien/ American Studies, 62.4     According to data released by China and the U.S., by the end of 2015, the U.S. had become China’s second largest trading partner, its largest export market, and the fourth…

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Mark G. Spencer, ed., The Bloomsbury Encyclopedia of the American Enlightenment (New York: Bloomsbury Academic, 2015), 2 vols., xxxvi + 1215 pp.

Mark G. Spencer, ed., The Bloomsbury Encyclopedia of the American Enlightenment (New York: Bloomsbury Academic, 2015), 2 vols., xxxvi + 1215 pp. Amerikastudien/ American Studies, 62.4     As to its scope, substance, and usability, this new reference work deserves nothing but praise. Interdisciplinary in perspective and over ten years in the making, The Bloomsbury…

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Peter Nicolaisen and Hannah Spahn, eds., Cosmopolitanism and Nationhood in the Age of Jefferson (Heidelberg: Winter, 2013), viii + 256pp.

Peter Nicolaisen and Hannah Spahn, eds., Cosmopolitanism and Nationhood in the Age of Jefferson (Heidelberg: Winter, 2013), viii + 256pp. Amerikastudien/ American Studies, 62.4     Die Aufsätze, die hier zusammengetragen sind, basieren auf einer Konferenz, die zusammen mit dem Robert J. Smith International Centre for Jefferson Studies in Charlottesville, VA, vom John F. Kennedy…

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Kurt Mueller-Vollmer, Transatlantic Crossings and Transformations: German-American Cultural Transfer from the 18th to the End of the 19th Century (Frankfurt am Máin: Lang, 2015), 418pp.

Kurt Mueller-Vollmer, Transatlantic Crossings and Transformations: German-American Cultural Transfer from the 18th to the End of the 19th Century (Frankfurt am Máin: Lang, 2015), 418pp. Amerikastudien/ American Studies, 62.4     Usually, book reviews evaluate whether a study provides an original, innovative, or new contribution to scholarship.  However, Kurt Mueller-Vollmer’s book almost exclusively reprints chapters…

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Kendahl Radcliffe, Jennifer Scott, and Anja Werner, eds., Anywhere But Here: Black Intellectuals in the Atlantic World and Beyond (Jackson, Miss.: UP of Mississippi, 2015), 270 pp.

Kendahl Radcliffe, Jennifer Scott, and Anja Werner, eds., Anywhere But Here: Black Intellectuals in the Atlantic World and Beyond (Jackson, Miss.: UP of Mississippi, 2015), 270 pp. Amerikastudien/ American Studies, 62.4     Fields as diverse as postcolonial studies, diaspora studies, African American studies, American studies, intellectual history, sociology, and rock music studies have been…

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Elisabeth Bronfen and Daniel Kampa, eds., Eine Amerikanerin in Hitlers Badewanne: Drei Frauen berichten über den Krieg; Margaret Bourke-White, Lee Miller und Martha Gellhorn (Hamburg: Hoffmann und Campe, 2015), 360 pp.

Elisabeth Bronfen and Daniel Kampa, eds., Eine Amerikanerin in Hitlers Badewanne: Drei Frauen berichten über den Krieg; Margaret Bourke-White, Lee Miller und Martha Gellhorn (Hamburg: Hoffmann und Campe, 2015), 360 pp. Amerikastudien/ American Studies, 62.4     Eine Amerikanerin in Hitlers Badewanne [An American Woman in Hitler’s Bathtub] features an intriguing collection of photographs and German…

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Katja Kurz, Narrating Contested Lives: The Aesthetics of Life Writing in Human Rights Campaigns (Heidelberg: Winter, 2015), 271 pp. 

Katja Kurz, Narrating Contested Lives: The Aesthetics of Life Writing in Human Rights Campaigns (Heidelberg: Winter, 2015), 271 pp.  Amerikastudien/ American Studies, 62.4       More than any other genre, life writing illustrates the interdependence of narrative strategies and cultural understandings of selfhood and recognition. Selves are performed narratively, through memories pieced together anew…

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Markus Nehl, Transnational Black Dialogues: Re-Imagining Slavery in the Twenty-First Century (Bielefeld: transcript, 2016), 212 pp.

Markus Nehl, Transnational Black Dialogues: Re-Imagining Slavery in the Twenty-First Century (Bielefeld: transcript, 2016), 212 pp. Amerikastudien/ American Studies, 62.4     ‘Postslavery Studies’ might be a more appropriate denominator for this relevant study that appeared in Transcript’s Postcolonial Studies series and focusses on the ways in which “second generation neo-slave narratives” (32) address the…

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