History

History

episodes
Patrick Brodie, "Wild Tides: Media Infrastructure and Financial Crisis in Ireland" (Duke UP, 2026)

June 13, 2026

Wild Tides

Patrick Brodie
Hosted by Sadie Couture

In Wild Tides: Media Infrastructure and Financial Crisis in Ireland (Duke University Press, 2026), Patrick Brodie maps the shifting fortunes of the Ir…

Curtis Dozier, "The White Pedestal: How White Nationalists Use Ancient Greece and Rome to Justify Hate" (Yale UP, 2026)

June 13, 2026

The White Pedestal

Curtis Dozier

Curtis Dozier's The White Pedestal: How White Nationalists Use Ancient Greece and Rome to Justify Hate (Yale University Press, 2026) explores how whit…

The Legacy of Chaim Grade

June 13, 2026

The Legacy of Chaim Grade

Ruth Wisse, Ofer Dynes, Curt Leviant, and Justin Camm
Hosted by YIVO Institute

Chaim Grade was born in 1910 in Vilna, Poland. In his youth, Grade was a student of the Novaredok Musar Yeshiva and of Avraham Yeshaya Karelitz. He wa…

How Does the Second-Hand Book Business Really Work? with WeBuyBooks Co-Founder Mike Lane

June 12, 2026

How Does the Second-Hand Book Business Really Work?

Mike Lane
Hosted by Caleb Zakarin

Today I’m speaking with Mike Lane, Managing Director and co-founder of WeBuyBooks about the economics of the second-hand book business. WeBuyBooks is …

Richard Bennet and Alexander Noyes, "War at Arm's Length: How America Can Build Effective Partners Through Military Assistance" (Yale UP, 2026)

June 12, 2026

War at Arm's Length

Richard Bennet and Alexander Noyes

An in-depth examination of how the United States can build more effective partner militaries. Military assistance has a bad reputation. Large-scale a…

Jake Dyble, "Managing Maritime Risk in Early Modern Europe: General Average in Law and Practice in Seventeenth-Century Tuscany" (Boydell Press, 2025)

June 12, 2026

Managing Maritime Risk in Early Modern Europe

Jake Dyble
Hosted by Lewis Wade

Commercial seafaring, both dangerous and with large amounts of capital at stake, was the source of the risk-management institutions that still und…

Robert Templer, "The Shah's Party: And the Iranian Revolution That Followed (Hurst, 2026)

June 11, 2026

The Shah's Party

Robert Templer
Hosted by Nicholas Gordon

In 1971, Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi threw a party to celebrate the 2,500-year anniversary of the Persian Empire. It was planned to be a massive party,…

“America’s Founding Son”: Author & Musician Bob Crawford on the Life of John Quincy Adams

June 11, 2026

“America’s Founding Son”

Moderated by Brian McCarthy
Hosted by Max Rudin

John Quincy Adams was the great visionary of America’s post-founding era, a writer and orator of consummate skill who reframed the origins and princip…

Manasicha Akepiyapornchai, "Surrender to God Across Languages: Multilingual Intellectual History of Premodern India" (Oxford UP, 2026)

June 11, 2026

Surrender to God Across Languages

Manasicha Akepiyapornchai
Hosted by Raj Balkaran

Surrender to God Across Languages: Multilingual Intellectual History of Premodern India (Oxford UP, 2026) explores the role of languages in the intell…

Sarah McNamara, "Ybor City: Crucible of the Latina South" (UNC Press, 2023)

June 11, 2026

Ybor City

Sarah McNamara

Decades before Miami became Havana USA, a wave of leftist, radical, working-class women and men from prerevolutionary Cuba crossed the Florida Straits…

Justin F Jackson, "The Work of Empire: War, Occupation, and the Making of American Colonialism in Cuba and the Philippines" (UNC Press, 2025)

June 10, 2026

The Work of Empire

Justin F Jackson
Hosted by Jack R. Werner

In 1898, on the eve of the Spanish-American War, the US Army seemed minuscule and ill-equipped for global conflict. Yet over the next fifteen years, i…

Natalia Rogach Alexander, "Growing People: The Enduring Legacy of John Dewey" (Columbia UP, 2025)

June 10, 2026

Growing People

Natalia Rogach Alexander

John Dewey is among history’s most celebrated thinkers on democracy and education, yet he has often been underappreciated and misunderstood as a …

Arlene W. Saxonhouse, "Athenian Democracy: Modern Mythmakers and Ancient Theorists" (U Notre Dame Press, 2026)

June 10, 2026

Athenian Democracy

Arlene W. Saxonhouse

Athenian Democracy provides innovative readings of ancient theorists to reveal both the complexity of democracy's achievements and its limits. In Ath…

Michael Staudenmaier, "White, Black, Brown: Becoming Puerto Rican in Chicago" (UNC Press, 2026)

June 10, 2026

White, Black, Brown

Michael Staudenmaier
Hosted by Michael Stauch

Independent historian Michael Staudenmaier joins Michael Stauch to discuss his new book about “becoming Puerto Rican” in Chicago. Staudenmaier’s b…

Michael Dillon, "Shanghai: The Story of China's Most Dynamic City" (Yale UP, 2026)

June 9, 2026

Shanghai

Michael Dillon
Hosted by Miranda Melcher

Home to 25 million people, Shanghai is the most populous and wealthiest city in China. A meeting point between China and the wider world, the city …

Matti Friedman, "Out of the Sky: Heroism and Rebirth in Nazi Europe" (Spiegel & Grau, 2026)

June 9, 2026

Out of the Sky

Matti Friedman
Hosted by Renee Garfinkel

Was it one of the war’s most memorable feats of valor or an act of desperation, even madness? In Out of the Sky: Heroism and Rebirth in Nazi Europe…

Understanding Themistocles: A Discussion with Author Michael Scott

June 9, 2026

Understanding Themistocles

Hosted by Paul Starobin

Themistocles is one of the great personages of ancient Athens, known for his heroics in warfare as well as for his overweening and ultimately tragic a…

Joanna Stalnaker, "The Rest Is Silence: Enlightenment Philosophers Facing Death" (Yale UP, 2025)

June 9, 2026

The Rest Is Silence

Joanna Stalnaker

What would the Enlightenment look like if we viewed it through the eyes of the philosophers as they were facing death? Joanna Stalnaker turns our usua…

Margaret O’Mara on the Clintons, Tech, and Memory

June 8, 2026

The Clintons, Tech, and Memory

Margaret O’Mara

We were joined by Professor Margaret O’Mara of the University of Washington, who had a front row seat to the Clinton campaign and went on to become an…

Bruce Dearstyne, "Revolutionary New York: 250 Years of Social Change" (SUNY Press, 2026)

June 8, 2026

Revolutionary New York

Bruce W. Dearstyne
Hosted by Robert Snyder

Revolutionary New York: 250 Years of Social Change⁠ (SUNY Press, 2026), edited by Bruce Dearstyne and published by SUNY Press, examines what the volum…