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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6676
Gregory Heller, “Ed Bacon: Planning, Politics, ...
Gregory Heller is the author of Ed Bacon: Planning, Politics, and the Building of Modern Philadelphia (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2013). Heller is Senior Advisor at Econsult Solutions, Inc. in Philadelphia.
29 min
6677
Charlene M. Boyer Lewis, “Elizabeth Patterson B...
What is a celebrity? And how has the definition of celebrity changed over the course of American history? Those questions are central to Charlene M. Boyer Lewis‘s book Elizabeth Patterson Bonaparte: An American Aristocrat in the Early Republic (Univers...
60 min
6678
Elizabeth A. Armstrong and Laura T. Hamilton, “...
One of the basic rules of human behavior is that people generally want to do what their peers do. If your friends like jazz, you’ll probably like jazz. If your friends want to go to the movies, you’ll probably want to go to the movies.
68 min
6679
Matthew W. Hughey, “White Bound: Nationalists, ...
Whiteness studies has confirmed that race is a social construction, even for whites, and that the identity we understand as white is also a social invention. Those who benefit from this invention accrue privileges that others either must pay dearly to ...
40 min
6680
Dan LeRoy, “Paul’s Boutique” (Continuum, 2009)
After spending millions to steal superstar Brooklyn-based rappers the Beastie Boys away from Def Jam Records in 1988, Capitol Records had high hopes for the act’s follow up effort. And why not? License to Ill (1986) had sold over five million copies wh...
83 min
6681
David Garland, “Peculiar Institution: America’s...
Why is it that the United States continues to enforce the death penalty when the rest of the Western world abolished its use a little over three decades ago? That question, along with many other equally important questions, is at the heart of Dr.
53 min
6682
Ron Schmidt (et al.), “Newcomers, Outsiders, an...
Ron Schmidt is the co-author (with Yvette M. Alex-Assensoh, Andrew L. Aoki, and Rodney Hero) of Newcomers, Outsiders, and Insiders: Immigrants and the American Racial Politics in the Early 21st Century (University of Michigan Press, 2013).
21 min
6683
William G. Howell (with David Brent), “Thinking...
William G. Howell (with David Brent) is the author of the new book Thinking about the Presidency: The Primacy of Power (Princeton UP, 2013). Howell is the Sydney Stein Professor in American Politics at the University of Chicago,
21 min
6684
Marian Moser Jones, “The American Red Cross fro...
Is there an institution in the United States that enjoys a better reputation than the American Red Cross? In her thorough, accessible new book The American Red Cross from Clara Barton to the New Deal (Johns Hopkins UP, 2012),
65 min
6685
Jonathan V. Last, “What to Expect When No One’s...
Most people who listen to this podcast will know that places like Japan, Italy, and Germany are in the midst of a demographic crisis. The trouble is that people in those countries are not having enough children to replace those of any age who are dying...
52 min
6686
Edward J. Blum and Paul Harvey, “The Color of C...
Jesus has inspired millions of people to both strive for social justice and commit horrific acts of violence. In the United States, Jesus has remained central in the construction of American identities and debates about Jesus have frequently revolved a...
65 min
6687
Steve Bergsman, “The Death of Johnny Ace” (Danc...
It’s Christmas Eve at the Houston City Auditorium, 1954, and Big Mama Thornton is belting out “Hound Dog,” her hit from the previous year. It’s the years just before Elvis, before rock and roll, when white and black musics were still segregated,
62 min
6688
Barbara Palmer and Dennis Simon, “Women and Con...
Barbara Palmer and Dennis Simon are authors of Women and Congressional Elections: A Century of Change (Lynne Rienner, 2012). Palmer is associate professor of political science at Baldwin Wallace University and Dixon is professor of political science at...
27 min
6689
Michael Streissguth, “Outlaw: Waylon, Willie, K...
In the late 1960s, Nashville’s recording industry was a hit-making machine. A small clique of writers, producers, engineers and session musicians gave sonic shape to the pop-friendly “Nashville Sound” and generated hit after hit for artists like Jim Re...
51 min
6690
Carmen Kynard, “Vernacular Insurrections: Race,...
You know you are not going to get the same old story about progressive literacies and education from Carmen Kynard, who ends the introduction to her book with a saying from her grandmother: “Whenever someone did something that seemed contradictory enou...
56 min
6691
Andrew J. Taylor, “Congress: A Performance Appr...
Andrew J. Taylor is the author of Congress: A Performance Appraisal (Westview Press, 2013). Taylor is professor of political science in the School of Public and International Affairs at North Carolina State University.
27 min
6692
John Earl Haynes, et al., “Spies: The Rise and ...
For decades, the American Right and Left argued about the degree to which the KGB infiltrated the U.S. political and scientific establishment. The Right said “A lot”; the Left said “Much less than you think.
60 min
6693
H. Paul Thompson Jr., “A Most Stirring and Sign...
The American Temperance Movement remains an interesting and important topic. Considering the various attitudes that influenced laws about alcohol sale and consumption of the past are often referred to when reviewing issues related to liquor legislation...
53 min
6694
Noelani Goodyear-Kapua, “The Seeds We Planted: ...
“School was a place that devalued who we are as Indigenous people,” says Noelani Goodyear-Kapua. These were institutions — at least since white settlers deposed the Indigenous government in the late 19th century — that Native students “tolerated and su...
55 min
6695
Andrew Karch, “Early Start: Preschool Politics ...
Over the last several months, I’ve had the pleasure to have a number of political scientists who study education policy on the podcast. Jesse Rhodes, Jeff Henig, and Sarah Reckhow have brought their new books that have focused mainly on the K-12 educat...
19 min
6696
Gary Greenberg, “The Book of Woe: The DSM and t...
It is common today to treat depression and other mental disorders as concrete illnesses – akin to having pneumonia or the flu. In fact, being prescribed a pill after complaining to your family doctor about feeling depressed is a common occurrence.
46 min
6697
Nathaniel Comfort, “The Science of Human Perfec...
“This is a history of promises.”So begins Nathaniel Comfort‘s gripping and beautifully written new book on the relationships between and entanglements of medical genetic and eugenics in the history of the twentieth century.
68 min
6698
Dale Maharidge, “Bringing Mulligan Home: The Ot...
Dale Maharidge‘s Bringing Mulligan Home: The Other Side of the Good War (PublicAffairs, 2013) is something of a departure from our regular offerings. Normally our authors are established academics specializing in the field of military history.
71 min
6699
D.X. Ferris, “Reign in Blood” (Continuum, 2008)
By the fall of 1986, the Los Angeles heavy metal band Slayer had two solid but unspectacular records, 1984’s Haunting the Chapel and 1985’s Hell Awaits, to their name. Meanwhile, producer Rick Rubin had started a record company, Def Jam,
59 min
6700
Christine Trost and Lawrence Rosenthal, eds. “S...
Christine Trost is program director of the Center for Right-Wing Studies and associate director of the UC Berkeley’s Institute for the Study of Societal Issues. Her co-editor is Lawrence Rosenthal, executive director and lead researchers of Center for ...
21 min