About Todd Weir

NBN Episodes hosted by Todd:

Tam Ngo and Justine B. Quijada, eds., "Atheist Secularism and its Discontents: A Study of Religion and Communism in Eurasia" (Palgrave Macmillan, 2015)

February 3, 2016

Atheist Secularism and its Discontents

Tam Ngo and Justine B. Quijada, eds.
Hosted by Todd Weir

Secularism has emerged as a central category of twenty-first century political thought and critical theory. Following the lead of anthropologist Talal…

Stefan Berger, "The Past as History: National Identity and Historical Consciousness in Modern Europe" (Palgrave Macmillan, 2014)

December 11, 2015

The Past as History

Stefan Berger
Hosted by Todd Weir

A historiographical paradigm opened in the late 1970s with groundbreaking works on nationalism. To a large extent these were constructivist interpreta…

Edward Ross Dickinson, "Sex, Freedom and Power in Imperial Germany 1880-1914" (Cambridge UP, 2014)

November 18, 2014

Sex, Freedom and Power in Imperial Germany 1880-1914

Edward Ross Dickinson
Hosted by Todd Weir

In this interview with historian Edward Ross Dickinson we talk about sex. Well, actually we talk about the talk about sex. Since Michel Foucault's epo…

John Tresch, "The Romantic Machine: Utopian Science and Technology after Napoleon" (U Chicago Press, 2014)

October 30, 2014

The Romantic Machine

John Tresch
Hosted by Todd Weir

After the Second World War, the Hungarian Marxist Georg Lukacs described National Socialism as a triumph of irrationalism and a "destruction of reason…

Anson Rabinbach and Sander Gilman, "The Third Reich Sourcebook" (U California Press, 2013)

September 26, 2014

The Third Reich Sourcebook

Anson Rabinbach and Sander Gilman, eds.
Hosted by Todd Weir

Primary source readers represent an unusual historical genre. Unlike editions, their aim is not to enable the reader to hear, as clearly as possible, …

Ari Joskowicz, "The Modernity of Others: Jewish Anti-Catholicism in Germany and France" (Stanford UP, 2014)

July 15, 2014

The Modernity of Others

Ari Joskowicz
Hosted by Todd Weir

In 1873, the German scientist Rudolf Virchow declared in Parliament that liberals were locked in a Kulturkampf, a "culture war" with the forces of Cat…

Miranda Spieler, "Empire and Underworld: Captivity in French Guiana" (Harvard UP, 2012)

March 28, 2014

Empire and Underworld

Miranda Spieler
Hosted by Todd Weir

In Empire and Underworld: Captivity in French Guiana (Harvard University Press, 2012), historian Miranda Spieler tells of the transformation of a slav…

Nitzan Lebovic, "The Philosophy of Life and Death: Ludwig Klages and the Rise of a Nazi Biopolitics" (Palgrave Macmillan, 2013)

February 14, 2014

The Philosophy of Life and Death

Nitzan Lebovic
Hosted by Todd Weir

Thomas Mann referred to Ludwig Klages (1872-1956) as a "criminal philosopher," a "Pan-Germanist," "an irrationalist," a "Tarzan philosopher," "a cultu…

David N. Livingstone, "Adam's Ancestors: Race, Religion, and the Politics of Human Origins" (Johns Hopkins UP, 2011)

January 30, 2014

Adam's Ancestors

David N. Livingstone
Hosted by Todd Weir

A report to the General Assembly of Scottish Presbyterians of 1923 contains the following passage: "God placed the people of this world in families, a…

Samuel Moyn, "The Last Utopia: Human Rights in History" (Harvard UP, 2010)

January 14, 2014

The Last Utopia

Samuel Moyn
Hosted by Todd Weir

The Last Utopia: Human Rights in History (Harvard University Press 2010) takes the reader on a sweeping journey through the history of international l…

Vincent Geoghegan, "Socialism and Religion: Roads to Common Wealth" (Routledge, 2011)

December 12, 2013

Socialism and Religion

Vincent Geoghegan
Hosted by Todd Weir

"Christianity and socialism go together like fire and water," remarked August Bebel, Germany's leading socialist, in 1874. The anticlerical violence o…