New Books in American Studies

This podcast is a channel on the New Books Network. The New Books Network is an academic audio library dedicated to public education. In each episode you will hear scholars discuss their recently published research with another expert in their field.

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Society & Culture
History
6076
Eitan Hersh, “Hacking the Electorate: How Campa...
Eitan Hersh is the author of Hacking the Electorate: How Campaigns Perceive Voters (Cambridge University Press, 2015). Hersh is an assistant professor of political science at Yale University. We’ve come to think of political campaigns as highly sophist...
19 min
6077
Natale Zappia, “Traders and Raiders: The Indige...
In Traders and Raiders: The Indigenous World of the Colorado Basin, 1540-1859 (UNC Press, 2014) Assistant Professor of History at Whittier College Natale Zappia provides an in-depth look into the “interior world” of the Lower Colorado River.
73 min
6078
Clare Croft, “Dancers as Diplomats: American Ch...
What’s missing from our understanding of the role of dancers in the context of American Cultural Diplomacy? Clare Croft‘s first book, Dancers as Diplomats: American Choreography in Cultural Exchange (Oxford University Press,
45 min
6079
Daniel Schlozman, “When Movements Anchor Partie...
Daniel Schlozman is the author of When Movements Anchor Parties: Electoral Alignments in American History (Princeton University Press, 2015). Schlozman is assistant professor of political science at Johns Hopkins University.
18 min
6080
Daniel Geary, “Beyond Civil Rights: The Moyniha...
Daniel Geary is the Mark Pigott Associate Professor in U.S. History at Trinity College Dublin. His book Beyond Civil Rights: The Moynihan Report and Its Legacy (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2015) is a detail and illuminating analysis of the recept...
9 min
6081
Kerry Eleveld, “Don’t Tell Me to Wait: How the ...
Kerry Eleveld is the author of Don’t Tell Me to Wait: How the Fight for Gay Rights Changed America and Transformed Obama’s Presidency (Basic Books, 2015). Eleveld is a writer for DailyKos and a former reporter for The Advocate.
29 min
6082
Jeffery S. Gurock, “The Holocaust Averted: An A...
In The Holocaust Averted: An Alternate History of American Jewry, 1938-1967 (Rutgers University Press, 2015), Jeffrey S. Gurock, the Libby M. Klaperman Professor of Jewish History at Yeshiva University, imagines an alternate history of American Jewry h...
56 min
6083
Edmund Hamann, et al., “Revisiting Education in...
Dr. Edmund Hamann, Dr. Stanton Wortham, Dr. Enrique G. Murillo (Eds.) have provided a fascinating and expansive volume on Latino education in the US that features an array of scholars from around the world,
32 min
6084
Ruben Flores, “Backroads Pragmatists: Mexico’s ...
Ruben Flores is an associate professor of American Studies at the University of Kansas. His book Backroads Pragmatists: Mexico’s Melting Pot and Civil Rights in the United States (University of Pennsylvania Press,
68 min
6085
Paul Bonin-Rodriguez, “Performing Policy” (Palg...
How has American cultural and artistic policy changed over the last 25 years? Performing Policy: How Contemporary Politics and Cultural Programmes Redefined US Artists for the Twenty-First Century (Palgrave,
58 min
6086
Sonia Song-Ha Lee, “Building A Latino Civil Rig...
In Building A Latino Civil Rights Movement: Puerto Ricans, African Americans, and the Pursuit of Racial Justice in New York City (UNC Press, 2014), Assistant Professor of History at Washington University in St.
62 min
6087
Jon Birger, “Date-onomics: How Dating Became a ...
In Date-onomics: How Dating Became a Lopsided Numbers Game (Workman Publishing Company, 2015), Jon Birger, an award-winning journalist and contributor to Fortune magazine, explores the social implications of dating markets with a shortage of college-ed...
28 min
6088
James Curry, “Legislating in the Dark: Informa...
James Curry has written Legislating in the Dark: Information and Power in the House of Representatives (University of Chicago Press, 2015). Curry is assistant professor of political science at the University of Utah. With Congress in the news,
17 min
6089
David Zang, “I Wore Babe Ruth’s Hat: Field Note...
How would you write your sports memoir? Maybe you’d recall a memorable trip to the stadium when you were young, or even getting an autograph from one of your favorite players. Was there a notable victory – or defeat – that marked your days as a player?...
50 min
6090
Annie Blazer, “Playing for God: Evangelical Wom...
In her new book, Playing for God: Evangelical Women and the Unintended Consequences of Sports Ministry (NYU Press, 2015), Annie Blazer shows through archival research and participant-observation how the paradigm of sports ministry transformed from one ...
71 min
6091
Lila Corwin Berman, “Metropolitan Jews: Politic...
In Metropolitan Jews: Politics, Race, and Religion in Postwar Detroit (University of Chicago Press, 2015), Lila Corwin Berman, Associate Professor of History, Murray Friedman Chair of American Jewish History,
32 min
6092
John Kinder, “Paying with Their Bodies: America...
John Kinder brings to life the challenges and problems faced by the disabled veteran in American history from the Civil War to the current day in his evocative book, Paying with Their Bodies: American War and the Problem of the Disabled Veteran (Univer...
76 min
6093
Ron Berger, “Leaders of Their Own Learning: Tra...
Many of us went through school not fully knowing what we were supposed to be learning or how our teachers were measuring our progress. These priorities and processes were largely hidden to us as students because they were assumed to be irrelevant or un...
52 min
6094
James E. Strick, “Wilhelm Reich, Biologist” (Ha...
“Life must have a father and mother…Science! I’m going to plant a bomb under its ass!” The author of the line above – who scrawled it in his private diary in the midst of a series of experiments in which he thought he was creating structures that were ...
67 min
6095
Lawrence M. Friedman, “The Big Trial: Law as Pu...
In the first legal history course I took as an undergraduate, I read Lawrence M. Friedman‘s A History of American Law and American Law in the 20th Century and have been fascinated with the subject ever since. His most recent work,
39 min
6096
Douglas L. Kriner and Andrew Reeves, “The Parti...
Douglas L. Kriner and Andrew Reeves have written The Particularistic President: Executive Branch Politics and Political Inequality (Cambridge University Press, 2015). Kriner is associate professor of political science at Boston University; Reeves is as...
19 min
6097
Debra Majeed, “Polygyny: What it Means When Afr...
In her wonderful new book Polygyny: What it Means When African American Muslim Women Share Their Husbands (University Press of Florida, 2015), Debra Majeed, Professor of Religious Studies at Beloit College,
46 min
6098
Ilan Stavans and Jorge J. E. Garcia, “Thirteen ...
As demographic trends continue to mark the so-called “Latinization” of the U.S., pundits across various media outlets struggle to understand the economic, cultural, and political implications of this reality. In popular discourse,
58 min
6099
Jessica Baldwin-Philippi, “Using Technology, Bu...
Jessica Baldwin-Philippi is the author of Using Technology, Building Democracy: Digital Campaigning and the Construction of Citizenship (Oxford University Press, 2015). She is an assistant professor of new media at Fordham University.
22 min
6100
David Sehat, “The Jefferson Rule: How the Found...
David Sehat is an associate professor of history at Georgia State University. His book The Jefferson Rule: How the Founding Fathers Became Infallible and the Our Politics Inflexible (Simon and Schuster, 2015) is part narrative history,
61 min