New Books Network
Intellectual History
German Studies November 30, 2020

Empire of Law

Nazi Germany, Exile Scholars and the Battle for the Future of Europe

Kaius Tuori

Hosted by Craig Sorvillo
In his new book Empire of Law: Nazi Germany, Exile Scholars, and the Battle for the Future of Europe (Cambridge UP, 2020),  Kaius Tuori examines the inherent unity of European legal traditions that …

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Hindu Studies November 27, 2020

The Bhagavad-Gītā

A Critical Introduction

Ithamar Theodor

Hosted by Raj Balkaran
Ithamar Theodor's The Bhagavad-Gītā: A Critical Introduction (Routledge, 2020) is a systematic and comprehensive introduction to one of the most read texts in South Asia. The Bhagavad-gītā is at its …
Psychoanalysis November 25, 2020

Freud

The Making of an Illusion

Frederick Crews

Hosted by Cassandra Seltman
The figure of Sigmund Freud has captivated the Western imagination like few others. One hundred and twenty-five years after the publication of Studies on Hysteria, the good doctor from Vienna …
Intellectual History November 24, 2020

Digitizing Enlightenment

Digital Humanities and the Transformation of Eighteenth-Century Studies

Simon Burrows and Glenn Roe

Hosted by Alexandra Ortolja-Baird
Digitizing Enlightenment: Digital Humanities and the Transformation of 18th-Century Studies (Liverpool UP, 2020) explores how a set of inter-related digital projects are transforming our vision of the Enlightenment. The featured …
Language November 24, 2020

Indian Perspectives on Consciousness, Language and Self

The School of Recognition on Linguistics and Philosophy of Mind

Marco Ferrante

Hosted by Malcolm Keating
For many Indian philosophers, language is inextricably tied up with conceptualization. In Indian Perspectives on Consciousness, Language and Self (Routledge, 2020), Marco Ferrante shows how a set of tenth century …
Science November 24, 2020

Heredity Under the Microscope

Chromosomes and the Study of the Human Genome

Soraya de Chadarevian

Hosted by Maia Woolner
“What are chromosomes? And what does it mean to treat them as visual objects?” asks Soraya de Chadarevian in her new book, Heredity Under the Microscope: Chromosomes and the Study …
Animal Studies November 24, 2020

An Unnatural Order

The Roots of Our Destruction of Nature

Jim Mason

Hosted by Mark Molloy
First published by Simon & Schuster in 1993 and then by Continuum in 1998, Jim Mason’s An Unnatural Order: The Roots of Our Destruction of Nature has become a classic …
Eastern European Studies November 23, 2020

Intellectuals and Fascism in Interwar Romania

The Criterion Association

Cristina A. Bejan

Hosted by Steven Seegel
In 1930s Bucharest, some of the country's most brilliant young intellectuals converged to form the Criterion Association. Bound by friendship and the dream of a new, modern Romania, their members …
African American Studies November 20, 2020

Bind Us Apart

How Enlightened Americans Invented Racial Segregation

Nicholas Guyatt

Hosted by Adam McNeil
Why did the Founding Fathers fail to include blacks and Indians in their cherished proposition that “all men are created equal”? Racism is the usual answer. Yet Nicholas Guyatt argues …
Islamic Studies November 20, 2020

Minding their Place

Space and Religious Hierarchy in Ibn al-Qayyim’s Aḥkām ahl al-dhimma

Antonia Bosanquet

Hosted by SherAli Tareen
How was the relationship between Muslim and non-Muslim communities theologically and spatially imagined in the premodern world? How did religious hierarchies map onto notions of place and spatial distinction and …
Intellectual History November 19, 2020

No Future in This Country

The Prophetic Pessimism of Bishop Henry Mcneal Turner

Andre E. Johnson

Hosted by Hettie V. Williams
No Future in this Country: The Prophetic Pessimism of Bishop Henry McNeal Turner by Andre E. Johnson, an Associate Professor of Rhetoric and Media Studies at the University of Memphis …
Intellectual History November 18, 2020

Heidegger's Poietic Writings

From Contributions to Philosophy to the Event

Daniela Vallega-Neu

Hosted by Stephen Dozeman
Scholarship on the German philosopher Martin Heidegger has traditionally focused on his magnum opus Being and Time and related earlier work, his later essays and lectures often relegated to an …
Animal Studies November 17, 2020

Insect Artifice

Nature and Art in the Dutch Revolt

Marisa Anne Bass

Hosted by Akash Ondaatje
In Insect Artifice: Nature and Art in the Dutch Revolt (Princeton UP, 2019) Marissa Anne Bass explores the moment when the seismic forces of the Dutch Revolt wreaked havoc on …
African American Studies November 17, 2020

Malcolm X at Oxford Union

Racial Politics in a Global Era

Saladin Ambar

Hosted by Kirk Meighoo
In 1964, Malcolm X was invited to debate at the Oxford Union Society at Oxford University. The topic of debate that evening was the infamous phrase from Barry Goldwater's 196 …
Italian Studies November 16, 2020

Italian Neorealism

A Cultural History

Charles L. Leavitt IV

Hosted by Ellen Nerenberg
In Italian Neorealism: A Cultural History (University of Toronto Press, 2020), Charles Leavitt steps back from the micro-histories focusing more narrowly on, for example, Italian cinema so as to weave …
Medicine November 16, 2020

Bedeviled

A Shadow History of Demons in Science

Jimena Canales

Hosted by Claire Clark
Science may be known for banishing the demons of superstition from the modern world. Yet just as the demon-haunted world was being exorcized by the enlightening power of reason, a …
Russian and Eurasian Studies November 16, 2020

Russia's Capitalist Realism

Narrative Form and History in Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, and Chekhov

Vadim Shneyder

Hosted by Daniel Peris
Vadim Shneyder's new book, Russia's Capitalist Realism: Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, and Chekhov (Northwestern, 2020) examines how the literary tradition that produced the great works of Leo Tolstoy, Fyodor Dostoevsky, and Anton …
Islamic Studies November 13, 2020

The Sufi Paradigm and the Makings of a Vernacular Knowledge in Colonial India

The Case of Sindh (1851–1929)

Michel Boivin

Hosted by Shobhana Xavier
The Sufi Paradigm and the Makings of a Vernacular Knowledge in Colonial India: The Case of Sindh (1851-1929) (Palgrave Macmillan, 2020) by Michel Boivin maps the construction of a vernacular …
Christian Studies November 13, 2020

The Life and Times of Samuel Prideaux Tregelles

A Forgotten Scholar

Timothy C. F. Stunt

Hosted by Crawford Gribben
For the sixty years in which he has made a distinguished contribution to the religious history of the nineteenth century, Timothy Stunt has been working on the life and times …
History November 11, 2020

Counsel and Command in Early Modern English Thought

Joanne Paul

Hosted by Ryan Tripp
While it has often been recognized that counsel formed an essential part of the political discourse in early modern England, the precise role that it occupied in the development of …