New Books Network
American West
Critical Theory November 16, 2020

A Piece of the Action

Race and Labor in Post–Civil Rights Hollywood

Eithne Quinn

Hosted by Dave O'Brien
What is the history of equal rights in Hollywood? In A Piece of the Action: Race and Labor in Post–Civil Rights Hollywood (Columbia UP, 2019), Eithne Quinn, a senior lecturer …

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Music October 12, 2020

Tehrangeles Dreaming

Intimacy and Imagination in Southern California's Iranian Pop Music

Farzaneh Hemmasi

Hosted by Aaron Hagler
Farzaneh is the author of Tehrangeles Dreaming: Intimacy and Imagination in Southern California's Iranian Pop Music (Duke UP, 2020). The title obviously refers the song "California Dreamin'," but in this …
African American Studies October 1, 2020

Race and the Wild West

Sarah Bickford, the Montana Vigilantes, and the Tourism of Decline, 1870–1930

Laura J. Arata

Hosted by Ryan Tate
After Laura Arata first visited Virginia City, Montana in graduate school, she became fascinated by the story of one historical figure—Sarah Bickford, a former slave, who migrated to this frontier …
American Studies September 30, 2020

The Destruction of the Bison

An Environmental History, 1750-1920

Andrew C. Isenberg

Hosted by Stephen Hausmann
In 1800, tens of millions of bison roamed the North American Great Plains. By 1900, fewer than 1,000 remained. In The Destruction of the Bison: An Environmental History, 1750-1920 (Cambridge …
American Studies September 15, 2020

Bohemians West

Free Love, Family, and Radicals in Twentieth-Century America

Sherry L. Smith

Hosted by Ryan Tripp
The opening years of the twentieth century saw a grand cast of radicals and reformers fighting for a new America, seeking change not only in labor picket lines and at …
American West September 11, 2020

A Bad Peace and A Good War

Spain and the Mescalero Apache Uprising of 1795-1799

Mark Santiago

Hosted by Stephen Hausmann
In August 1795, Apaches wiped out two Spanish patrols In the desert borderlands of the what is today the American Southwest and Mexican north. This attack ended what had bene …
American Studies August 19, 2020

Unfair Labor?

American Indians and the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago

David R. B. Beck

Hosted by Stephen Hausmann
The 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition was in many ways the crowning event of the nineteenth century United States. Held in Chicago, the metropolis of the West, and visited by tens …
American Studies August 18, 2020

Union

The Struggle to Forge the Story of United States Nationhood

Colin Woodard

Hosted by Diana De Pasquale
Colin Woodard's new book Union: The Struggle to Forge the Story of United States Nationhood (Viking, 2020) tells the story of the struggle to create a national myth for the …
African American Studies August 12, 2020

Remembering Lucile

A Virginia Family's Rise from Slavery and a Legacy Forged a Mile High

Polly E. Bugros McLean

Hosted by Christina Gessler
In 1918 Lucile Berkeley Buchanan Jones received her bachelor’s degree from the University of Colorado, becoming its first female African American graduate (though she was not allowed to "walk" at …
American Studies August 5, 2020

Breakaway Americas

The Unmanifest Future of Jacksonian America

Thomas Richards Jr.

Hosted by Stephen Hausmann
In Breakaway Americas: The Unmanifest Future of Jacksonian America (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2020), Thomas Richards Jr., a history teacher at Springside Chestnut Hill Academy, argues that the map of …
American Studies July 13, 2020

Tiny You

A Western History of the Anti-Abortion Movement

Jennifer L. Holland

Hosted by Sandie Holguín
Sandie Holguín speaks with Jennifer L. Holland about her book, Tiny You: A Western History of the Anti-Abortion Movement (University of California Press, 2020). In addition to her book, Dr …
American Studies July 10, 2020

Two Suns of the Southwest

Lyndon Johnson, Barry Goldwater, and the 1964 Battle between Liberalism and Conservatism

Nancy Beck Young

Hosted by Susan Liebell
What does the 1964 presidential election have to teach us about party dynamics, civil rights and polarization? While many scholars have treated the dramatic candidates and characters such as Lyndon …
American Studies June 12, 2020

East of East

The Making of Greater El Monte

Romeo Guzman et al.

Hosted by David-James Gonzales
Romeo Guzman's and his colleague's East of East: The Making of Greater El Monte (Rutgers University Press, 2020) is an edited collection of thirty-one essays that trace the experience of …
American Studies June 4, 2020

Hobo Jungle

A Homeless Community in Paradise

Michele Wakin

Hosted by Michael Johnston
Michele Wakin’s new book Hobo Jungle: A Homeless Community in Paradise (Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2020) is an up-close exploration of the evolution that has taken place with unsheltered homelessness. She …
American West May 18, 2020

American Zion

Cliven Bundy, God &amp

Betsy Gaines Quammen

Hosted by Ryan Tate
In 2014, the cattle rancher Cliven Bundy entered the national spotlight after a showdown against federal officials over grazing rights on public lands. Two years later, his sons seized the …
American Studies May 6, 2020

Carbon County, USA

Miners for Democracy in Utah and the West

Christian Wright

Hosted by Ryan Tate
During the early 1970s, a movement of rank-and-file coal miners rose up in Appalachia to challenge mine bosses and stodgy union officials. They sought greater control over the workplace and …
American Studies March 20, 2020

From South Texas to the Nation

The Exploitation of Mexican Labor in the Twentieth Century

John Weber

Hosted by Beth English
John Weber, Assistant Professor of History at Old Dominion University, discusses his book, From South Texas to the Nation: The Exploitation of Mexican Labor in the Twentieth Century (University of …
American Studies March 9, 2020

Color Coded

Party Politics in the American West, 1950–2016

Walter Nugent

Hosted by Stephen Hausmann
The political West is far from monochrome, writes Walter Nugent in Color Coded: Party Politics in the American West, 1950–2016 (University of Oklahoma Press, 2018). Over the last half century …
Literature February 24, 2020

Midwest Futures

Phil Christman

Hosted by Stephen Dozeman
What does the future hold for the Midwest? A vast stretch of fertile farmland bordering one of the largest concentrations of fresh water in the world, the Midwestern US seems …
Literature February 19, 2020

Subduction

Kristen Millares Young

Hosted by Ryan Tate
Kristen Millares Young’s debut novel, Subduction (Red Hen Press, 2020), provides a lyrical exploration of cultural encounters in the Pacific Northwest. After a Latina anthropologist, Claudia, flees a fractured marriage …