New Books Network Podcast

Political Science December 4, 2023

Gun Country

Gun Capitalism, Culture, and Control in Cold War America

Andrew C. McKevitt

Hosted by Susan Liebell

The United States has more guns than people – a condition that is “unprecedented in world history.” Scholars often focus on gun culture, the Second Amendment, or the history of …

Critical Theory November 28, 2023

The Age of Insecurity

Coming Together as Things Fall Apart

Astra Taylor

Hosted by Louisa Hann

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These days, everyone feels insecure. We are financially stressed and emotionally overwhelmed. The status quo isn’t working for anyone, even those who appear to have it all. What is going …

Sociology November 24, 2023

Trailer Park America

Reimagining Working-Class Communities

Leontina Hormel

Hosted by Michael Johnston

In rural northern Idaho in the winter of 2013-2014, Syringa Mobile Home Park’s water system was contaminated by sewage, resulting in residents’ water being shut off for 93 days. By …

Food November 22, 2023

Spoiled

The Myth of Milk as Superfood

Anne Mendelson

Hosted by Melek Firat Altay

Why is cows' milk, which few nonwhite people can digest, promoted as a science-backed dietary necessity in countries where the majority of the population is lactose-intolerant? Why are gigantic new …

Food November 10, 2023

From Label to Table

Regulating Food in America in the Information Age

Xaq Frohlich

Hosted by Nathan Hopson

Xaq Frohlich’s From Label to Table: Regulating Food in America in the Information Age (U California Press, 2023) is a biography of the Nutrition Facts label that adorns millions of food …

Psychoanalysis November 7, 2023

Advancing Psychotherapy for the Next Generation

Humanizing Mental Health Policy and Practice

Linda L. Michaels, Tom Wooldridge, Nancy Burke, and Janice R. Muhr

Hosted by Judith Tanen

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Advancing Psychotherapy for the Next Generation: Humanizing Mental Health Policy and Practice (Routledge, 2023) brings together a global community of mental health professionals to offer an impassioned defense of relationship-based …

Sociology November 7, 2023

Waste and the City

The Crisis of Sanitation and the Right to Citylife

Colin McFarlane

Hosted by Michael Johnston

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In an age of pandemics the relationship between the health of the city and good sanitation has never been more important. Colin McFarlane, through Waste and the City: The Crisis of …

Van Leer Institute Series on Ideas with Renee Garfinkel November 5, 2023

The Power of Placebos

Unlocking Their Potential to Improve Health Care

Jeremy Howick

Hosted by Renee Garfinkel

Should your doctor prescribe a placebo for you, instead of conventional medicine? And if she did, would it work? Is the double-blind placebo-controlled paradigm really the gold standard for medical …

Public Health October 24, 2023

Project UnLonely

Healing Our Crisis of Disconnection

Jeremy Nobel

Hosted by Ron Winslow

Even before the Covid pandemic began in 2020, chronic loneliness was a private experience of profound anguish that had become a public health crisis. Since then it has reached new heights …

Sociology October 20, 2023

The Reproduction of Inequality

How Class Shapes the Pregnant Body and Infant Health

Katherine Mason

Hosted by Deidre Tyler

Can you run a marathon, drink coffee, eat fish, or fly on a plane while pregnant? Such questions are just the tip of the iceberg for how most pregnant women's …

Capitalism and Freedom in the Twenty-First Century October 16, 2023

Jay Bhattacharya on the COVID-19 Pandemic and the Public Health Response

A conversation with Jay Bhattacharya

Jay Bhattacharya

Hosted by Jon Hartley

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Jay Bhattacharya (Stanford University Professor of Medicine) joins to the podcast to discuss his beginnings being born in Calcutta, India, his journey to Stanford as a student obtaining four degrees …

Southeast Asian Studies October 15, 2023

COVID-19 in Southeast Asia

Insights for a Post-pandemic World

Hyun Bang Shin, Murray McKenzie, and Do Young Oh

Hosted by Nicole Curato

COVID-19 in Southeast Asia: Insights for a Post-pandemic World (Ubiquity Press, 2021) brings together an ensemble of social scientists who offer critical reflections on how the pandemic was experienced in …

Public Policy October 14, 2023

Why SNAP Works

A Political History--And Defense--of the Food Stamp Program

Christopher John Bosso

Hosted by Stephen Pimpare

How did the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program evolve from a Depression-era effort to use up surplus goods into America's foundational food assistance program? And how does SNAP survive? Incisive and …

Food October 9, 2023

Anxious Eaters

Why We Fall for Fad Diets

Janet Chrzan and Kima Cargill

Hosted by Garrett Broad

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What makes fad diets so appealing to so many people? And how did these fads become so central to conversations about food and nutrition? Anxious Eaters: Why We Fall for …

Drugs, Addiction and Recovery October 8, 2023

Christian Nationalism and the Birth of the War on Drugs

Andrew Monteith

Hosted by Miranda Melcher

Many people view the War on Drugs as a contemporary phenomenon invented by the Nixon administration. But as Dr. Andrew Monteith shows in Christian Nationalism and the Birth of the …

Psychology October 8, 2023

Violence and Mental Illness

Rethinking Risk Factors and Enhancing Public Safety

Eric B. Elbogen and Nico Verykoukis

Hosted by Deidre Tyler

Mass shootings have become a defining issue of our time. Whenever the latest act of newsworthy violence occurs, mental illness is inevitably cited as a preeminent cause by members of …

Sociology October 8, 2023

Homelessness in the 21st Century

Living the Impossible American Dream

Stephanie Southworth and Sara Brallier

Hosted by Ari Barbalat

An accessible and engaging introductory text on homelessness and housing policy, this timely book uses a sociopolitical framework for understanding issues of homelessness in the United States. The authors, leading …

Disability Studies September 20, 2023

Fixing the Poor

Eugenic Sterilization and Child Welfare in the Twentieth Century

Molly Ladd-Taylor

Hosted by Shu Wan

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Between 1907 and 1937, thirty-two states legalized the sterilization of more than 63,000 Americans. In Fixing the Poor: Eugenic Sterilization and Child Welfare in the Twentieth Century (Johns Hopkins UP, 2020) …

Disability Studies September 20, 2023

Not Good Enough for Canada

Canadian Public Discourse Around Issues of Inadmissibility for Potential Immigrants with Diseases And/Or Disabilities

Valentina Capurri

Hosted by Shu Wan

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Valentina Capurri's book Not Good Enough for Canada: Canadian Public Discourse Around Issues of Inadmissibility for Potential Immigrants with Diseases And/Or Disabilities (U Toronto Press, 2020) investigates the development of Canadian …

African American Studies September 19, 2023

The Black Angels

The Untold Story of the Nurses Who Helped Cure Tuberculosis

Maria Smilios

Hosted by Katrina Anderson

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New York City, 1929. A sanatorium, a deadly disease, and a dire nursing shortage. In the pre-antibiotic days when tuberculosis stirred people’s darkest fears, killing one in seven, white nurses …