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Why did America invade Iraq? Why do nations choose to fight certain wars and not others? How do we bring ourselves to believe that the sacrifice of our troops is acceptable? For most, the answers to these questions are tied to struggles for power or resources and the machinations of particular interest groups. Philip Smith argues that this realist answer to the age-old "why war?" question is insufficient. Instead, Smith suggests that every war has its roots in the ways we tell and interpret stories. Comprised of case studies of the War in Iraq, the Gulf War, and the Suez Crisis, Why War? decod

Abstract
This contribution addresses the challenges that face any attempt to render the Holocaust knowable through fiction, for children in particular: namely the need to balance truth with propriety, while giving form to an event that eludes depiction. Analyzing Gavriel Savit's novel Anna and the Swallow Man, it argues that the text contains deliberate gaps and ambiguities. All of these gaps, to borrow Perry Nodelman's term, suggest a "shadow text"—a version of the story unavailable to a younger reader, but hinted at throughout. This shadow text should prompt the child reader to approach an adult to learn more about the Second World War. Yet as Anna approaches her own more adult understanding, Savit reveals that the reality beyond the text remains essentially beyond articulation.

ABSTRACT
This article seeks to examine three works of fiction: Nava Semel's Isra Isle (2005), Michael Chabon's The Yiddish Policeman's Union (2007), and Philip Jose Farmer's Jesus on Mars (1979). All three of these works imagine a Jewish state other than Israel. These works speak specifically to two fundamental questions that informed Zionist thought—that of safety and that of identity. While each novel implies skepticism toward contemporary Israel, the utopias presented, too, fail to guarantee security for the Jewish people or a solution to the "Jewish question" of cohesive identity. Each novel acknowledges the centrality of a return to Zion in Jewish culture and beliefs, suggesting that, even if Israel itself falls short of its mythic potential, the promise of a return ensures that no alternative Jewish homeland will ever provide an adequate final home.

In 2016 Wonder Woman served, briefly, as an honorary UN ambassador. Her appointment was met with protest and a petition that argued, among other complaints, that Wonder Woman's sexualized appearance made her unsuitable as a representative of the UN. This paper seeks to argue the contrary. It charts the use of the character as a political figure, both on and off the page, noting that her role as UN ambassador has significant historical precedent. While recognizing the often problematic representation of women in many iterations of the superhero genre, this paper also seeks to understand complaints over Wonder Woman's mode of dress in the context of arguments that have historically been used to bar women's entry into politics.