Mark LeVine

Mark LeVine is an American professor of history at the University of California, Irvine, United States. He is also a musician. He received his B.A. in comparative religion and biblical studies from Hunter College and his M.A. and Ph.D. from New York University's Department of Middle Eastern Studies. He speaks Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, and Persian, as well as Italian, French, German and English.^[1]

LeVine is an accomplished rock guitarist and has played with noted rock and world beat musicians such as Mick Jagger, Chuck D, Michael Franti, and Doctor John. He recorded with Moroccan Hassan Hakmoun and the French Gypsy band Les Yeux Noirs on Ozomatli's album Street Signs which won the Grammy for Best Latin Rock/Alternative album in 2005.^[2][3]

Books

• Overthrowing Geography: Jaffa, Tel Aviv and the Struggle for Palestine; University of California Press (2005) ISBN 978-0-520-23994-4
• Why They Don't Hate Us: Lifting the Veil on the Axis of Evil; Oneworld Publications (2005) ISBN 978-1-85168-365-9
• An Impossible Peace: Oslo and the Burdens of History; Zed Books (2007) ISBN 978-1-84277-768-8
• Heavy Metal Islam: Rock, Resistance, and the Struggle for the Soul of Islam; Three Rivers Press, New York (2008) ISBN 978-0-307-35339-9

LeVine's book Why They Don't Hate Us received a mixed review in the London Sunday Times. Reviewer Bryan Appleyard is sternly critical of the book's style and organization, and disparages the ideological underpinnings, rooted in "idealism," which inform Levine's work. Appleyard nevertheless writes that "LeVine is absolutely right and, indeed, quite brave to insist on the reality of complexity. Terrorism and war both tend to simplify world views and, without doubting their intellectual status, so do the utopians of the new right... Perhaps his book’s greatest virtue is that it introduces both the many shades of opinion and cultural complexity of the, largely, Arab world... LeVine detonates the uneasy but nonetheless profound complacency that seems to have invaded politics."^[4]

Co-edited books

• Twilight of Empire: Responses to Occupation co-edited with Viggo Mortensen and Pilar Perez; Perceval Press (2004)
• Religion, Social Practices and Contested Hegemonies: Reconstructing the Public Sphere in Muslim Majority Societies co-edited with Armando Salvatore; Palgrave Press (2005)
• Reapproaching the Border: News Perspectives on the Study of Israel and Palestine co-edited with Sandra Sufian; Rowman and Littlefield (2007)

See also

• Culture jamming

References

External links

• Culturejamming.org Mark Levine's website
• Mark LeVine at Levantine Cultural Center
• Faculty Page at University of California Irvine with current bibliography
• Blog video featuring Mark LeVine
• First al-Bashir, next ... Bush?