New Books Network

New Books in Science, Technology, and Society
Jeannette Eileen Jones, “Search of Brightest Africa: Reimagining the Dark Continent in American Culture, 1884-1936” (U Georgia Press, 2011)
Jeannette Eileen Jones
In Search of Brightest Africa
Reimagining the Dark Continent in American Culture, 1884-1936
University of Georgia Press, 2011

New Books in African StudiesNew Books in American StudiesNew Books in HistoryNew Books in Intellectual HistoryNew Books in Peoples & PlacesNew Books in Politics & SocietyNew Books in Science & TechnologyNew Books in Science, Technology, and SocietyNew Books Network June 17, 2019 Michael F. Robinson

When President Trump talked of Africa as a continent of “shithole countries” where people lived in huts, he was drawing on a set of ideas made popular in the 19th century. “Darkest Africa” became a favorite trope of explorers like Henry Morton Stanley who promoted his books and lectures by... Read More
Terence Keel, “Divine Variations: How Christian Thought Became Racial Science” (Stanford UP, 2018)
Terence Keel
Divine Variations
How Christian Thought Became Racial Science
Stanford University Press, 2018

New Books in Christian StudiesNew Books in HistoryNew Books in Intellectual HistoryNew Books in Politics & SocietyNew Books in ReligionNew Books in Religion & FaithNew Books in Science & TechnologyNew Books in Science, Technology, and SocietyNew Books Network June 17, 2019 Lance C. Thurner

We often think of scientific racism as a pseudo-science of a bygone age, yet in both academic population genetics and popular ancestry testing, the specter of race continues to inflect our senses of biology and being.  In Divine Variations: How Christian Thought Became Racial Science (Stanford University Press, 2018), Professor... Read More
Heidi Tworek, “News from Germany: The Competition to Control World Communications, 1900-1945” (Harvard UP, 2019)
Heidi Tworek
News from Germany
The Competition to Control World Communications, 1900-1945
Harvard University Press, 2019

New Books in CommunicationsNew Books in German StudiesNew Books in HistoryNew Books in Peoples & PlacesNew Books in Politics & SocietyNew Books in Science & TechnologyNew Books in Science, Technology, and SocietyNew Books in World AffairsNew Books Network June 17, 2019 Dexter Fergie

In our current moment marred by media monopolies and disinformation campaigns, it is easy to get caught up in the dizzying temporality of the news cycle and think these are new phenomena. Heidi Tworek’s impressive new book, News from Germany: The Competition to Control World Communications, 1900-1945 (Harvard University Press, 2019),... Read More
Thomas Dodman, “What Nostalgia Was: War, Empire, and the Time of a Deadly Emotion” (U Chicago Press, 2018)
Thomas Dodman
What Nostalgia Was
War, Empire, and the Time of a Deadly Emotion
University of Chicago Press, 2018

New Books in French StudiesNew Books in HistoryNew Books in Intellectual HistoryNew Books in Military HistoryNew Books in Peoples & PlacesNew Books in Politics & SocietyNew Books in Science & TechnologyNew Books in Science, Technology, and SocietyNew Books Network June 12, 2019 Roxanne Panchasi

Feelings have a history and nostalgia has its own. In What Nostalgia Was: War, Empire, and the Time of a Deadly Emotion (University of Chicago Press, 2018) Thomas Dodman explores the history of nostalgia from the late seventeenth to the late nineteenth century. Beginning with the coining of the term... Read More
Nara Milanich, “Paternity: The Elusive Quest for the Father” (Harvard UP, 2019)
Nara Milanich
Paternity
The Elusive Quest for the Father
Harvard University Press, 2019

New Books in Gender StudiesNew Books in HistoryNew Books in Latin American StudiesNew Books in LawNew Books in Peoples & PlacesNew Books in Politics & SocietyNew Books in Religion & FaithNew Books in Science & TechnologyNew Books in Science, Technology, and SocietyNew Books Network June 11, 2019 Rachel Grace Newman

Nara Milanich’s Paternity: The Elusive Quest for the Father (Harvard University Press, 2019) explains how fatherhood, long believed to be impossible to know with certainty, became a biological “fact” that could be ascertained with scientific testing. Though the advent of DNA testing might seem to make paternity less elusive, Milanich’s... Read More
Abigail De Kosnik and Keith P. Feldman, “#Identity: Hashtagging Race, Gender, Sexuality, and Nation” (U Michigan Press, 2019)
Abigail De Kosnik and Keith P. Feldman, eds.
#Identity
Hashtagging Race, Gender, Sexuality, and Nation
University of Michigan Press, 2019

New Books in CommunicationsNew Books in Critical TheoryNew Books in Gender StudiesNew Books in Political ScienceNew Books in Politics & SocietyNew Books in Science & TechnologyNew Books in Science, Technology, and Society June 5, 2019 Lilly Goren

In the new book #Identity: Hashtagging Race, Gender, Sexuality, and Nation (University of Michigan Press, 2019), Abigail De Kosnik and Keith Feldman bring together a broad array of chapters that dive into multiple perspectives on social media engagement, especially around hashtag activism and the ways that individuals think about and... Read More
Scott Wallace, “The Unconquered: In Search of the Amazon’s Last Uncontacted Tribes” (Broadway Books, 2012)
Scott Wallace
The Unconquered
In Search of the Amazon’s Last Uncontacted Tribes
Broadway Books, 2012

New Books in AnthropologyNew Books in GeographyNew Books in HistoryNew Books in Latin American StudiesNew Books in Peoples & PlacesNew Books in Politics & SocietyNew Books in Science & TechnologyNew Books in Science, Technology, and SocietyNew Books Network June 3, 2019 Michael F. Robinson

Journalist Scott Wallace talks about a 2002 FUNAI expedition to find the Arrow People, one of the last uncontacted tribes in the world. Wallace is a writer and photojournalist who covered the wars in El Salvador and Nicaragua in the 1980s for CBS and The Guardian. Since then he has... Read More