Visit New Books Network en Español!

New Books Network
General History
Literary Studies June 27, 2022

Citizens and Rulers of the World

The American Child and the Cartographic Pedagogies of Empire

Mahshid Mayar

Hosted by John Yargo
In this episode of New Books in Literary Studies, John Yargo spoke with Mahshid Mayar about how children’s puzzles and schoolbooks at the turn of the 20th century helped shape …

General History

Subscribe:

Interviews with historians about their new books.

Literary Studies June 27, 2022

Ahab Unbound

Melville and the Materialist Turn

Meredith Farmer and Jonathan D. S. Schroeder

Hosted by John Yargo
Today’s guests are Meredith Farmer and Jonathan D.S. Schroeder, the co-editors of a bracing new collection of essays about the figure of Ahab in Melville’s novel Moby-Dick. Meredith is the …
Princeton UP Ideas Podcast June 24, 2022

Flying Snakes and Griffin Claws

And Other Classical Myths, Historical Oddities, and Scientific Curiosities

Adrienne Mayor

Hosted by Mark Klobas
Adrienne Mayor is renowned for exploring the borders of history, science, archaeology, anthropology, and popular knowledge to find historical realities and scientific insights--glimmering, long-buried nuggets of truth--embedded in myth, legends …
Middle Eastern Studies June 24, 2022

Nine Quarters of Jerusalem

A New Biography of the Old City

Matthew Teller

Hosted by Roberto Mazza
In Jerusalem, what you see and what is true are two different things. Maps divide the walled Old City into four quarters, yet that division doesn’t reflect the reality of …
Latin American Studies June 24, 2022

The Condor Trials

Transnational Repression and Human Rights in South America

Francesca Lessa

Hosted by Kenneth Sanchez
In this episode of the New Books in Latin America Studies podcast, Kenneth Sánchez spoke with Dr Francesca Lessa about her interesting new book The Condor Trials: Transnational Repression and …
Biography June 24, 2022

German, Jew, Muslim, Gay

The Life and Times of Hugo Marcus

Marc David Baer

Hosted by Armanc Yildiz
Hugo Marcus (1880–1966) was a man of many names and many identities. Born a German Jew, he converted to Islam and took the name Hamid, becoming one of the most …
Military History June 24, 2022

The Great Battles of All Time

Jeremy Black

Hosted by Charles Coutinho
Cannae and Agincourt, Waterloo and Gettysburg, Stalingrad and Midway, this compact volume, edited by master historian, Professor Jeremy Black, collects the most influential battles and conflicts in history. Covering the …
Middle Eastern Studies June 23, 2022

The Fate of Abraham

Why the West is Wrong about Islam

Peter Oborne

Hosted by James M. Dorsey
Peter Oborne’s The Fate of Abraham: Why the West is Wrong about Islam (Simon and Schuster 2022) is as much a history of US, British, and French attitudes towards Islam …
Eastern European Studies June 23, 2022

Jozef Pilsudski

Founding Father of Modern Poland

Joshua D. Zimmerman

Hosted by Piotr Kosicki
In the 1920s, Józef Piłsudski was a household name not just in Poland, but across Europe and across the Atlantic Ocean as well. Yet this complex and contradictory figure – …
Asian Review of Books June 23, 2022

Everest 1922

The Epic Story of the First Attempt on the World's Highest Mountain

Mick Conefrey

Hosted by Nicholas Gordon
It can be hard to think of Everest as unknown anymore. While it’s certainly a challenge to climb the world’s tallest mountain, someone–with enough time and money–has a good chance …
Policing, Incarceration, and Reform June 23, 2022

The Streets Belong to Us

Sex, Race, and Police Power from Segregation to Gentrification

Anne Gray Fischer

Hosted by Patrick Reilly
Anne Gray Fischer speaks about her path to and through research, including how sex workers informed her analysis of policing and state violence, the role of law enforcement in struggles over economic …
Economic and Business History June 23, 2022

Why We Fight

The Roots of War and the Paths to Peace

Christopher Blattman

Hosted by Javier Mejia
In Why We Fight: The Roots of War and the Paths to Peace (Viking, 2022), Chris Blattman explains the five reasons why conflict (rarely) blooms into war, and how to interrupt that deadly …
Indian Religions June 23, 2022

The Transformation of Tamil Religion

Ramalinga Swamigal and Modern Dravidian Sainthood

Srilata Raman

Hosted by Raj Balkaran
Srilata Raman's book The Transformation of Tamil Religion: Ramalinga Swamigal and Modern Dravidian Sainthood (Routledge, 2022) analyses the religious ideology of a Tamil reformer and saint, Ramalinga Swamigal of the 19th …
Jewish Studies June 22, 2022

Jewish Internationalism and Human Rights after the Holocaust

Nathan A. Kurz

Hosted by Amber Nickell
In Jewish Internationalism and Human Rights after the Holocaust (Cambridge UP, 2020), Nathan A. Kurz charts the fraught relationship between Jewish internationalism and international rights protection in the second half of …
Critical Theory June 22, 2022

The Homoerotics of Orientalism

Joseph A. Boone

Hosted by Morteza Hajizadeh
One of the largely untold stories of Orientalism is the degree to which the Middle East has been associated with "deviant" male homosexuality by scores of Western travelers, historians, writers …
Women's History June 22, 2022

Laboratory of Deficiency

Sterilization and Confinement in California, 1900-1950s

Natalie Lira

Hosted by Jennifer Davis Cline
Mirelsie Velázquez (Associate Professor & Rainbolt Family Endowed Presidential Professor, University of Oklahoma) speaks with Natalie Lira (Associate Professor, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign) about Lira’s recent book, Laboratory of …
Middle Eastern Studies June 22, 2022

European Cultural Diplomacy and Arab Christians in Palestine, 1918–1948

Between Contention and Connection

Karène Sanchez Summerer and Sary Zananiri

Hosted by Roberto Mazza
European Cultural Diplomacy and Arab Christians in Palestine (1918-1948) (Palgrave Macmillan, 2020) investigates the transnationally connected history of Arab Christian communities in Palestine during the British Mandate (1918-1948) through the lens of …
South Asian Studies June 21, 2022

The 24th Mile

An Indian Doctor's Heroism in War-torn Burma

Tehmton S. Mistry

Hosted by Shatrunjay Mall
The story of India and Indians in World War II has been overshadowed by other historical events of the 1940s, a busy decade that included such historical watersheds as Indian …
Music June 21, 2022

Singing Like Germans

Black Musicians in the Land of Bach, Beethoven, and Brahms

Kira Thurman

Hosted by Kristen Turner
Singing Like Germans: Black Musicians in the Land of Bach, Beethoven, and Brahms by Kira Thurman (Cornell University Press, 2021) is a truly interdisciplinary study. Dr. Thurman’s work sits at …
The Future of . . . with Owen Bennett-Jones June 21, 2022

The Future of Public Opinion

A Conversation with Susan Herbst

Susan Herbst

Hosted by Owen Bennett-Jones
Politicians and corporations cannot only measure public opinion but also manipulate and create it. And they have been doing so since the 1930s when serious polling began. And as Professor …