Support Kritika | Support H-Net | Buy Books Here | Join the NBN and NBN en Español on Patreon | Visit New Books Network en Español!
- African Studies
- African American Studies
- American Politics
- American Studies
- American South
- American West
- Asian American Studies
- Australian and New Zealand Studies
- British Studies
- Canadian Studies
- Caribbean Studies
- Central Asian Studies
- Chinese Studies
- East Asian Studies
- Eastern European Studies
- European Politics
- French Studies
- German Studies
- Iberian Studies
- India Studies
- Indian Ocean World
- Indigenous Studies
- Iranian Studies
- Irish Studies
- Israel Studies
- Italian Studies
- Japanese Studies
- Korean Studies
- Latino Studies
- Latin American Studies
- Mexican Studies
- Middle Eastern Studies
- Pacific Studies
- Polish Studies
- Russian and Eurasian Studies
- Southeast Asian Studies
- South Asian Studies
- Taiwan Studies
- Turkish Studies
- Ukrainian Studies
- Western European Studies
- World Affairs
- Animal Studies
- Anthropology
- Archaeology
- Business, Management, and Marketing
- Media and Communications
- Critical Theory
- Disability Studies
- Drugs, Addiction and Recovery
- Education
- Economics
- Finance
- Geography
- Gender Studies
- Genocide Studies
- Higher Education
- Human Rights
- Journalism
- Language and Translation
- Law
- LGBTQ+ Studies
- National Security
- Philanthropy
- Philosophy
- Policing, Incarceration, and Reform
- Political Science
- Politics & Polemics
- Public Policy
- Sex, Sexuality, and Sex Work
- Sociology
- Sound Studies
- Sports
- Urban Studies
- Big Ideas
- Celebration Studies
- Co-Authored
- Cover Story
- Historical Materialism
- History Ex Silo
- Interpretive Political and Social Science
- Invested Investor
- Landscape Architecture
- Mormonism
- NBN Seminar
- New Books with Miranda Melcher
- On the Cusp: Between Strategy and Ethics
- Postscript: Conversations on Politics and Political Science
- Practical History
- Preparing for Life After Grad School
- Psychology and Climate Change
- Syriac Studies
- The Chair: In The Room at the Fed
- Oceanic Studies
About Miranda Melcher
I have had the pleasure of interviewing over 1,300 authors on the New Books Network, on a range of topics! I tend to interview authors of interdisciplinary books that seek to interrogate and subvert preconceptions about elements of history that have either been neglected in scholarship, or authors who are analysing history through a novel lens.
You can follow all of my episodes on the channel New Books with Miranda Melcher, available on all podcast players.
I completed my PhD in Defense Studies at King's College London, where I researched how to negotiate and implement peace treaties. My book on the topic was released in April 2024 from Bloomsbury: Securing Peace in Angola and Mozambique. Prior to my PhD, I earned an MA in Intelligence and International Security from the Department of War Studies at King's College London and a BA in Political Science from Yale University.
Dr. Miranda Melcher (Ph.D. in Defense Studies from Kings College London) is the host of New Books with Miranda Melcher where she interviews authors on a wide range of books related to history and politics.
NBN Episodes hosted by Miranda:
June 16, 2026
The Hobo
From the mid-nineteenth century through the dust bowl years of the Great Depression, a new kind of migrant worker became a familiar sight in communiti…
June 9, 2026
Shanghai
Home to 25 million people, Shanghai is the most populous and wealthiest city in China. A meeting point between China and the wider world, the city …
June 8, 2026
Translating hell
In the Middle Ages, hell was useful because it was vaguely defined. Canonical scriptures scarcely mention hell, leaving much to the imaginations of …
June 8, 2026
Explosivity
Offering a novel approach to contemporary landscape studies, Explosivity: Following What Remains (U Minnesota Press, 2025) unearths the hidden leg…
June 6, 2026
Walmart
Walmart: Made in China (Stanford University Press, 2026) by Dr. Eileen Otis tells the story of Walmart's expansion in China, making the case that…
June 6, 2026
Smog and Sunshine
Los Angeles and smog have been synonymous for decades. From the 1940s through the 1980s, children breathed air so heavy with lead that their blood…
June 5, 2026
Connoisseurs and Conmen
Connoisseurs and conmen: The contest for cultural authority in early twentieth-century Britain (Manchester University Press, 2026) by Dr. Lewis Ryder…
June 5, 2026
Microphone
Since its invention more than 150 years ago, the microphone transformed the world in an instant. Yet its evolution and integration into our daily li…
June 2, 2026
Assembling Religion
Henry Ford did not just mass produce cars. As a member of the Episcopal Church, reader of New Thought texts, believer in the "gospel of reincarnation,…
June 1, 2026
Picky
Are children naturally picky? It sure seems that way. Yet, amazingly, pickiness used to be almost nonexistent. Well into the 20th century, Americans s…
June 1, 2026
A Praxis of Persistence
A Praxis of Persistence: Central American Feminist Testimony and Sustainable Activism (SUNY Press, 2026) by Dr. Kenna Neitch establishes persistence a…
May 31, 2026
A Scourge of Humanity
As the First World War came to a chaotic end, Europeans feared that a wave of crime and anarchy would sweep across their continent. The upheavals …
May 31, 2026
Food Porn
Is food porn a vibrant and democratic new expression of modern food culture or a superficial addition to an image-saturated world? Tracing its o…
May 30, 2026
How Plague Got Rats
Today, rats are nearly synonymous with plague, but this association is surprisingly recent. For centuries, plague devastated populations without b…
May 30, 2026
American-Designed Shopping Malls in China
China’s remarkable journey from poverty to becoming the world’s second-largest economic power is marked by extraordinary urban growth and consumpt…
May 29, 2026
Scottish Plant Names
Names are incredibly powerful things and are a crucial part of the way we see and classify the world around us. Plant names are especially fasci…
May 29, 2026
Nourishing Networks
For much of the Crescent City's history, days began with the cries of roaming street vendors and the percussive thwack of butchers' meat cleavers echo…
May 28, 2026
After Barbary
After Barbary: Algeria's Roles in the French and American Empires (Cornell University Press, 2025) by Dr. Timothy Mason Roberts explores the connectio…
May 28, 2026
Prophecy and the Battle for Spiritual Authority, 1360–1400
The end of the fourteenth century was a time of upheaval and contested authority among the traditional institutions of medieval Europe. In response to…
May 28, 2026
What They Stole
In 1955, following the devastation of the Korean War, Bertha and Harry Holt made headlines for adopting eight Korean children. Driven by evangelical c…
May 27, 2026
Gothic
Castles speak. Especially in an age when they are no longer necessary. The Act of Union of 1800, which brought Ireland into closer association wit…
May 27, 2026
Campus Whisper Networks
Campus Whisper Networks: Knowing with Sexual Assault Survivors (Rutgers University Press, 2026) examines how personal knowledge about student sexu…
May 26, 2026
Finding Mary
During a robbery on 10 March 1844, 14-year-old servant Mary Doherty was murdered in a farmhouse near Culdaff, Co. Donegal. There was no doubt locally …
May 26, 2026
Lost Worlds
There’s a familiar story about us humans: we went from hunting and gathering to farming, wandering bands to villages and cities, clans and chieftains …