Founded in 1956, Penn State University Press publishes rigorously reviewed, high-quality works of scholarship and books of regional and contemporary interest, with a focus on the humanities and social sciences. The publishing arm of the Pennsylvania State University and a division of the Penn State University Libraries, the Press promotes the advance of scholarship by disseminating knowledge—new information, interpretations, methods of analysis—widely in books, journals, and digital publications.
Scholarly publishing has faced monumental challenges over the past few decades. The Press takes its place among those institutions moving the enterprise forward. Its innovative projects continue to identify and embrace the technological advances and business models that ensure scholarly publishing will remain feasible, and widely accessible, well into the future.
Baba Tuekles and Conversion to Islam in Historical and Epic Tradition
This book is the first substantial study of Islamization in any part of Inner Asia from any perspective and the first to emphasize conversion narratives as important sources for understanding the dynamics of Islamization. Challenging the prevailing notions of the nature of Islam in Inner Asia, it explores how conversion to Islam was woven ......
Seduction, Patriarchal Society, and Literary Tradition
In Don Juan and the Point of Honor, James Mandrell undertakes a systematic examination of the many questions surrounding the legendary character. On the one hand, it might be argued that Don Juan threatens society, since he is supposedly an agent of social anarchy. On the other hand, given his intriguing sexual accomplishments, he ......
This book presents the major teachings of Mahāyāna Buddhism in a precise, dramatic, and even humorous form. For two millennia this Sūtra, called the “jewel of the Mahāyāna Sūtras,” has enjoyed immense popularity among Mahāyāna Buddhists in India, central and southeast Asia, Japan, and ......
Essays in Honor of David Noel Freedman in Celebration of His Sixtieth Birthday
This volume contains fifty-two essays composed in honor of David Noel Freedman and organized around the topics: Hebrew Poetry and Prophecy, The Prose of the Hebrew Bible, History and Institutions of Israel, Northwest Semitic Epigraphy, and Other Perspectives. A bibliography of the honoree is included.
First published in 1979, this volume offers students and teachers a unique view of American history prior to the Civil War. Distinguished historian David Brion Davis has chosen a diverse array of primary sources that show the actual concerns, hopes, fears, and understandings of ordinary antebellum Americans. He places these sources within a ......
In Russia and the Americas, from 1763 to the Present
Catherine the Great recruited thousands of colonists “to populate her lower Volga River frontier with dependable permanent settlers who not only would bring stability to this lawless, underdeveloped, and uncharted region, but also would reclaim the vast wasteland there”—an area larger than the state of Maryland. This ......
