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Early Modern History
Early Modern History August 12, 2022

Natural Disaster at the Closing of the Dutch Golden Age

Adam Sundberg

Hosted by Douglas Bell
By the early eighteenth century, the economic primacy, cultural efflorescence, and geopolitical power of the Dutch Republic appeared to be waning. The end of this Golden Age was also an …

Early Modern History

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Interviews with scholars of early modern history about their new books.

General History August 12, 2022

A Brief History of the Atlantic

Jeremy Black

Hosted by Charles Coutinho
The Atlantic has borne witness to major historic events that have drastically shaped humanity with each crossing of its path. In A Brief History of the Atlantic (Robinson, 2022), Jeremy …
Asian Review of Books August 11, 2022

Empire of Salons

Conquest and Community in Early Modern Ottoman Lands

Helen Pfeifer

Hosted by Nicholas Gordon
It’s the sixteenth century, and the Ottoman Empire has just defeated the Mamluk Sultanate, conquering Damascus and Cairo, important centers of Arab learning and culture. But how did these two …
Political Science August 11, 2022

Stars and Shadows

The Politics of Interracial Friendship from Jefferson to Obama

Saladin Ambar

Hosted by Lilly Goren
Slavery and its lingering remnants remain a plague on the United States, continuing to foster animosity between races that hinders the understanding and connection conducive to dismantling the remains of …
Environmental Studies August 9, 2022

Encountering Water in Early Modern Europe and Beyond

Redefining the Universe Through Natural Philosophy, Religious Reformations, and Sea Voyaging

Lindsay Starkey

Hosted by Aspen Brown
What is holding the oceans back from entirely flooding the earth? While a twenty-first century thinker may approach the answer to this question within a framework of gravity and geologic deep-time, Lindsay Starkey …
Military History August 5, 2022

The Castle

A History

John Goodall

Hosted by Miranda Melcher
In The Castle: A History (Yale University Press, 2022) Dr. John Goodall presents a vibrant history of the castle in Britain, from the early Middle Ages to the present day …
General History August 5, 2022

The Last Witches of England

A Tragedy of Sorcery and Superstition

John Callow

Hosted by Miranda Melcher
On the morning of Thursday 29 June 1682, a magpie came rasping, rapping and tapping at the window of a prosperous Devon merchant. Frightened by its appearance, his servants and …
Writ Large August 4, 2022

On "The Story of the Stone"

A Discussion with Ronald Egan

Ronald Egan

Hosted by Zachary Davis
The 1750s are remembered as a high point of China's Qing Dynasty: a time of power, prestige, and social harmony. But The Story of the Stone paints a different picture …
History of Science August 4, 2022

Minerva's French Sisters

Women of Science in Enlightenment France

Nina Rattner Gelbart

Hosted by Victor Monnin
In Minerva’s French Sisters: Women of Science in Enlightenment France (Yale University Press, 2021), Nina Gelbart, Professor of History and Anita Johnson Wand Professor of Women’s Studies at Occidental College …
Japanese Studies August 2, 2022

Sino-Japanese Reflections

Literary and Cultural Interactions between China and Japan in Early Modernity

Joshua A. Fogel and Matthew Fraleigh

Hosted by Jingyi Li
Joshua A. Fogel and Matthew Fraleigh's edited volume Sino-Japanese Reflections: Literary and Cultural Interactions between China and Japan in Early Modernity (de Gruyter, 2022) offers ten richly detailed case studies that …
General History August 2, 2022

The King's Peace

Law and Order in the British Empire

Lisa Ford

Hosted by Vladislav Lilic
Dr. Lisa Ford, Professor of History at the University of New South Wales, is the author of prize-winning monographs and a luminary in the field of global legal history. Her new …
On Religion August 1, 2022

On the Krampus Conundrum

A Discussion with Madison Tarleton

Madison Tarleton

Hosted by Gregory Soden
Madison Tarleton is a Ph.D. candidate and scholar of Medieval Judaism in Christian Europe, antijudaism and antisemitism. Madison is studying at the University of Denver and Iliff School of Theology’s joint PhD …
Literary Studies July 29, 2022

Bad Humor

Race and Religious Essentialism in Early Modern England

Kimberly Anne Coles

Hosted by John Yargo
Kimberly Anne Coles is Professor of English at the University of Maryland; her first book, Religion, Reform and Women’s Writing in Early Modern England, was published with Cambridge University Press …
General History July 29, 2022

Cornwallis

Soldier and Statesman in a Revolutionary World

Richard Middleton

Hosted by Charles Coutinho
Charles, First Marquis of Cornwallis (1738-1805), was a leading figure in late eighteenth-century Britain. His career spanned the American War of Independence, Irish Union, the French Revolutionary Wars, and the …
African American Studies July 29, 2022

Black Majority

Negroes in Colonial South Carolina from 1670 Through the Stono Rebellion

Peter H. Wood

Hosted by Adam McNeil
Welcome to New Books in African American Studies, a podcast channel on the New Books Network. I am your host, Adam Xavier McNeil. Today’s podcast is special, not because …
Native American Studies July 28, 2022

Seeing Red

Indigenous Land, American Expansion, and the Political Economy of Plunder in North America

Michael John Witgen

Hosted by John Cable
Against long odds, the Anishinaabeg resisted removal, retaining much of their land in the Old Northwest—what’s now Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minnesota. Their success rested partly on their roles as sellers …
Military History July 28, 2022

The Medieval Crossbow

A Weapon Fit to Kill a King

Stuart Ellis-Gorman

Hosted by Miranda Melcher
The crossbow is an iconic weapon of the Middle Ages and, alongside the longbow, one of the most effective ranged weapons of the pre-gunpowder era. Unfortunately, despite its general fame …
Women's History July 26, 2022

Cacicas

The Indigenous Women Leaders of Spanish America, 1492-1825

Margarita R. Ochoa and Sara V. Guengerich

Hosted by Jane Scimeca
The term cacica was a Spanish linguistic invention, the female counterpart to caciques, the Arawak word for male indigenous leaders in Spanish America. But the term’s meaning was adapted and …
Religion July 25, 2022

The Story of Religion in America

An Introduction

James P Byrd and James Hudnut-Beumler

Hosted by Jackson Reinhardt
The Story of Religion in America: An Introduction (Westminster John Knox Press, 2021) presents the broad scope of the story of religion in the American colonies and the United States. While …
Medieval History July 22, 2022

Orthodox Cyprus Under the Latins, 1191-1571

Society, Spirituality, and Identities

Chrysovalantis Kyriacou

Hosted by Evan Zarkadas
Medieval and Renaissance Cyprus was a fascinating place of ethnic, cultural, and religious encounters. Following almost nine centuries of Byzantine rule, Cyprus was conquered by the Crusaders in 1191, becoming …