About Brian Hamilton

Brian Hamilton is a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Wisconsin–Madison where he is researching African American environmental history. A Maine native, he lives in Western Massachusetts and chairs the History and Social Science Department at Deerfield Academy.

Brian Hamilton is a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Wisconsin–Madison where he is researching African American environmental history. A Maine native, he lives in Western Massachusetts and chairs the History and Social Science Department at Deerfield Academy.

Brian's website

NBN Episodes hosted by Brian:

Rachel S. Gross, "Shopping All the Way to the Woods: How the Outdoor Industry Sold Nature to America" (Yale UP, 2024)

March 26, 2024

Shopping All the Way to the Woods

Rachel S. Gross
Hosted by Brian Hamilton

Rachel S. Gross's Shopping All the Ways to the Woods (Yale University Press, 2024) tells the fascinating history of the profitable paradox of the Amer…

Jennifer Thomson, "The Wild and the Toxic: American Environmentalism and the Politics of Health" (UNC Press, 2019)

January 10, 2024

The Wild and the Toxic

Jennifer Thomson
Hosted by Brian Hamilton

The first wealth is health, according to Emerson. Among health’s riches is its political potential. Few know this better than environmentalists. In he…

Katie J. Wells et al., "Disrupting D.C.: The Rise of Uber and the Fall of the City" (Princeton UP, 2023)

September 16, 2023

Disrupting D.C.

Katie J. Wells, Kafui Attoh, and Declan Cullen
Hosted by Brian Hamilton

The first city to fight back against Uber, Washington, D.C., was also the first city where such resistance was defeated. It was here that the company …

Lyndsie Bourgon, "Tree Thieves: Crime and Survival in North America's Woods" (Little, Brown Spark, 2023)

August 22, 2023

Tree Thieves

Lyndsie Bourgon
Hosted by Brian Hamilton
Listen:

In Tree Thieves: Crime and Survival in North America's Woods (Little, Brown Spark, 2022), Lyndsie Bourgon takes us deep into the underbelly of the ill…

Christopher C. Sellers, "Race and the Greening of Atlanta: Inequality, Democracy, and Environmental Politics in an Ascendant Metropolis" (U Georgia Press, 2023)

August 21, 2023

Race and the Greening of Atlanta

Christopher C. Sellers
Hosted by Brian Hamilton
Listen:

Race and the Greening of Atlanta: Inequality, Democracy, and Environmental Politics in an Ascendant Metropolis (U Georgia Press, 2023) turns an enviro…

Stevan Harrell, "An Ecological History of Modern China" (U Washington Press, 2023)

August 8, 2023

An Ecological History of Modern China

Stevan Harrell
Hosted by Brian Hamilton
Listen:

Is environmental degradation an inevitable result of economic development? Can ecosystems be restored once government officials and the public are com…

Simone M. Müller, "The Toxic Ship: The Voyage of the Khian Sea and the Global Waste Trade" (U Washington Press, 2023)

August 8, 2023

The Toxic Ship

Simone M. Müller
Hosted by Brian Hamilton
Listen:

In 1986 the Khian Sea, carrying thousands of tons of incinerator ash from Philadelphia, began a two-year journey, roaming the world's oceans in search…

Amy Brady, "Ice: From Mixed Drinks to Skating Rinks--a Cool History of a Hot Commodity" (G. P. Putnam's Sons, 2023)

June 6, 2023

Ice

Amy Brady
Hosted by Brian Hamilton
Listen:

Ice is everywhere: in gas stations, in restaurants, in hospitals, in our homes. Americans think nothing of dropping a few ice cubes into tall glasses …

Christina Gerhardt, "Sea Change: An Atlas of Islands in a Rising Ocean" (U California Press, 2023)

May 23, 2023

Sea Change

Christina Gerhardt
Hosted by Brian Hamilton

Atlases are being redrawn as islands are disappearing. What does an island see when the sea rises? Sea Change: An Atlas of Islands in a Rising Ocean (…

Henry Grabar, "Paved Paradise: How Parking Explains the World" (Penguin, 2023)

May 9, 2023

Paved Paradise

Henry Grabar
Hosted by Brian Hamilton

Parking, quite literally, has a death grip on America: each year a handful of Americans are tragically killed by their fellow citizens over parking sp…

Brett Christophers, "Our Lives in Their Portfolios: Why Asset Managers Own the World" (Verso, 2023)

April 25, 2023

Our Lives in Their Portfolios

Brett Christophers
Hosted by Brian Hamilton

Banks have taken a backseat since the global financial crisis over a decade ago. Today, our new financial masters are asset managers, like Blackstone …

Andrew Curley, "Carbon Sovereignty: Coal, Development, and Energy Transition in the Navajo Nation" (U Arizona Press, 2023)

April 11, 2023

Carbon Sovereignty

Andrew Curley
Hosted by Brian Hamilton

For almost fifty years, coal dominated the Navajo economy. But in 2019 one of the Navajo Nation’s largest coal plants closed.This comprehensive new wo…

Joseph Giacomelli, "Uncertain Climes: Debating Climate Change in Gilded Age America" (U Chicago Press, 2023)

April 5, 2023

Uncertain Climes

Joseph Giacomelli
Hosted by Brian Hamilton

Even people who still refuse to accept the reality of human-induced climate change would have to agree that the topic has become inescapable in the Un…

Anna Zeide, "US History in 15 Foods" (Bloomsbury, 2023)

February 20, 2023

US History in 15 Foods

Anna Zeide
Hosted by Brian Hamilton

From whiskey in the American Revolution to Spam in WWII, food reveals a great deal about the society in which it exists. Selecting 15 foods that repre…

Malcolm Harris, "Palo Alto: A History of California, Capitalism, and the World" (Little, Brown, 2023)

February 14, 2023

Palo Alto

Malcolm Harris
Hosted by Brian Hamilton

Palo Alto is nice. The weather is temperate, the people are educated, rich, healthy, enterprising. Remnants of a hippie counterculture have synthesize…

Caroline Grego, "Hurricane Jim Crow: How the Great Sea Island Storm of 1893 Shaped the Lowcountry South" (UNC Press, 2022)

November 22, 2022

Hurricane Jim Crow

Caroline Grego
Hosted by Brian Hamilton

On an August night in 1893, the deadliest hurricane in South Carolina history struck the Lowcountry, killing thousands—almost all African American. Bu…

John Suval, "Dangerous Ground: Squatters, Statesmen, and the Antebellum Rupture of American Democracy" (Oxford UP, 2022)

October 19, 2022

Dangerous Ground

John Suval
Hosted by Brian Hamilton

The squatter—defined by Noah Webster as "one that settles on new land without a title"—had long been a fixture of America's frontier past. In the ante…

Nancy Fraser, "Cannibal Capitalism: How our System is Devouring Democracy, Care, and the Planet and What We Can Do About It" (Verso, 2022)

September 20, 2022

Cannibal Capitalism

Nancy Fraser
Hosted by Brian Hamilton

Capital is currently cannibalizing every sphere of life–guzzling wealth from nature and racialized populations, sucking up our ability to care for eac…

Abby L. Goode, "Agrotopias: An American Literary History of Sustainability" (UNC Press, 2022)

September 20, 2022

Agrotopias

Abby L. Goode
Hosted by Brian Hamilton

In Agrotopias: An American Literary History of Sustainability (UNC Press, 2022), Abby L. Goode reveals the foundations of American environmentalism an…

Mathew Lawrence and Adrienne Buller, "Owning the Future: Power and Property in an Age of Crisis" (Verso, 2022)

August 23, 2022

Owning the Future

Mathew Lawrence and Adrienne Buller
Hosted by Brian Hamilton

Adrienne Buller (The Value of a Whale) and Mathew Lawrence (Planet on Fire) have penned a radical manifesto for the transformation of post-pandemic po…

David Silkenat, "Scars on the Land: An Environmental History of Slavery in the American South" (Oxford UP, 2022)

July 12, 2022

Scars on the Land

David Silkenat
Hosted by Brian Hamilton

They worked Virginia's tobacco fields, South Carolina's rice marshes, and the Black Belt's cotton plantations. Wherever they lived, enslaved people fo…

Jo Guldi, "The Long Land War: The Global Struggle for Occupancy Rights" (Yale UP, 2022)

May 3, 2022

The Long Land War

Jo Guldi
Hosted by Brian Hamilton

Jo Guldi tells the story of a global struggle to bring food, water, and shelter to all. Land is shown to be a central motor of politics in the twentie…

Megan Kate Nelson, "Saving Yellowstone: Exploration and Preservation in Reconstruction America" (Scribner, 2022)

March 1, 2022

Saving Yellowstone

Megan Kate Nelson
Hosted by Brian Hamilton

From historian and critically acclaimed author of The Three-Cornered War comes the propulsive and vividly told story of how Yellowstone became the wor…

Gregg Mitman, "Empire of Rubber: Firestone's Scramble for Land and Power in Liberia" (New Press, 2021)

November 2, 2021

Empire of Rubber

Gregg Mitman
Hosted by Brian Hamilton

In the early 1920s, Americans owned 80 percent of the world’s automobiles and consumed 75 percent of the world’s rubber. But only one percent of the w…