The ABCs of Science Fiction

Chapter 30 opens with a surprise proposal from Planetary Society founders Carl Sagan and Louis Friedman to send a digitized copy of works by the ABC authors—Asimov, Bradbury, and Clarke—to Mars in 1992. The Russian lander carrying this cargo failed, but an expanded version of the ABC project remained for a future American mission to attempt. Bradbury participated in the 1992 grand opening of the Euro Disney Resort and Park, where he had served as an occasional advisor to Imagineer executive Tim Delany as it was developed. The final episodes of the six-year Ray Bradbury Theater television series were produced and broadcast during 1992; the chapter concludes with an assessment of the series and its record of awards.

Russia in Rome

The presence of thirty-three Russian head-dresses, as well as other historical objects, in the collection of the American diplomat, George Wurts, and his wife, Henrietta Tower, is an uncommon example of collecting Russian folk objects abroad, and testifies to a universality of taste in international collecting during the late nineteenth century. The head-dress collection is part of a larger collection of around 4,000 pieces dating from antiquity to the early twentieth century, which was assembled at the Palazzo Antici Mattei and the Villa Sciarra in Rome between the end of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth century. Wurts and Tower had a particular interest in arts and crafts, which was enabled by Wurts’s career as a diplomat and secretary at the American mission in St. Petersburg for a period of ten years (1882-93). This article describes the key characteristics of the Wurts-Tower collection of folk objects, the circumstances of its formation, and its relation to the tendencies of taste during that time. It also testifies to the transformation of the kokoshnik in the eyes of collectors and viewers from a popular costume to a fashion accessory that was linked to a past world.

Choosing to Surge

This chapter traces a series of climactic meetings of the National Security Council in December of 2006. By December, Vice President Dick Cheney thought it was “pretty clear that we've got to do something different than what we've been doing. December was then devoted to sort of nailing down what that was going to be.” The president and his advisors discussed fundamental issues regarding American goals and responsibilities in Iraq and increasingly concluded that only a surge option, as part of a change in military strategy and an effort at bottom-up political reconciliation in Iraq, could salvage the American mission there. That same month, the president visited the Joint Chiefs of Staff in their meeting room to hear and address their concerns about whether an intensified military effort in Iraq might overtax the US military and even “break the force.” In December, too, public discussion about the American future in Iraq was fueled by reports from the congressionally mandated Iraq Study Group, which advocated for a regional diplomatic strategy to help quell violence in Iraq, as well as from the American Enterprise Institute, which advocated increasing US forces in Iraq and pursuing a proper counterinsurgency strategy. The impact of these external reviews on the eventual surge decision remains hotly debated; the chapter helps place these efforts within the context of the internal administration policy process and Bush's decision making.

Meeting the Communist Threat in Greece: American diplomats, ideology and stereotypes 1944-1950

This paper focuses on four US officials serving in Greece at a critical period in both Greek and American political history. The Greek Civil War (1946-9) was decisive in the development of the Cold War confrontation. The Truman Doctrine (1947) represents an ideological milestone in this respect. In particular, the paper explores the views of Lincoln MacVeagh (ambassador 1944-7), Paul A. Porter (chief of the American Economic Mission to Greece, 1947), Dwight Griswold (chief of the American Mission for Aid to Greece 1947-8) and Henry Grady (ambassador 1948-50), namely their perceptions of the Greek post-war crisis in relation to the strategic goal of anticommunism. The emphasis of the analysis is on their understanding of the Greek social and political conditions - and especially of the nature of the communist threat – and of the goals involved in the American aid to the country. These four case studies highlight the interaction between the prevailing ideology in foreign policy objectives and the personal belief systems. Cultural preconditions and stereotypes constitute the framework in the context of which US officials sought to contain the communist challenge in Greece both though military as well as through economic and ideological means.

“Publishing” the Gospel, Reading the Nahda: Protestant Print Culture in Late Ottoman Syria

Chapter 2 turns to the American Mission Press in Beirut, which was a site of American-Syrian collaboration and a resource for Syrian Protestants to participate in the Arab cultural and literary renaissance. Locating the Nahda in Beirut within the context of broader nineteenth-century Ottoman reform movements, the chapter explores the socio-cultural contributions of Protestant men who wrote for the American Mission Press beginning in the 1870s. It demonstrates that these authors - including the nahdawi scholar Ibrahim al-Hurani - engaged in Nahda production not only through Arabic poetry, scientific studies, and other “secular” publications, but also in their writings on Islam and through press debates with Jesuit missionaries, Syrian Catholics, and Greek Orthodox leaders.

A Feminist Awakening? Evangelical Women and the Arab Renaissance

Syrian Protestant women did not join in the published theological debates of the Christian presses in Beirut, but chapter 3 reveals that in the 1880s they began publishing sermons and articles on female education and child-rearing (tarbiya) for the mission periodical al-Nashra al-Usbu’iyya (The Weekly Bulletin). Along with the books and novels that women published at the American Mission Press, these largely neglected articles put Syrian Protestant women at the forefront of the Arab women’s awakening that gained momentum in the early twentieth century and united Christian, Muslim, and Jewish women activists. These proto-feminist authors occupied the traditionally masculine sphere of Arabic production and carved out a space for women’s intellectual and spiritual leadership in the Protestant community. Among these women were the acclaimed journalists Farida ’Atiya, Hanna Kurani, and Julia Tu’ma al-Dimashqiyya.

Conclusion

The networks connecting American missionaries, Syrian Protestants and other residents of Ottoman Syria expanded in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries as mission churches and institutions multiplied, as the American Mission Press advanced the Arab renaissance, and as Syrian Protestants engaged their own society through ...

Family can endure what partnership cannot: A consideration of historical, cultural, and newly arising barriers to missions in China

Relationships between American mission organizations and Chinese house church pastors are currently facing increasing difficulty and strain. To date, the dominant metaphor for how these two members of Christ’s body have related has been partnership. Rising contextual and cultural pressures render partnership inadequate to withstand what familial bonds are more suited to endure. This article first considers the overall historical and cultural context of the relationship between western missionaries and unregistered Chinese churches. Following this is an explanation of two recurring factors which place ongoing strain on their relationship: rising nationalism and government persecution of Christians. Next, new factors which compound existing relational stressors are explored: shifting economic policies and theological brain drain. Finally, initial recommendations are put forth as to how these two groups might move forward living together as family.