Shows / New Books in Politics and Polemics
New Books in Politics and Polemics
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. Discover our 150+ channels and browse our 28,000+ episodes on our website: newbooksnetwork.com Subscribe to our free weekly Substack newsletter to get informative, engaging content straight to your inbox: https://newbooksnetwork.substack.com/…
Episodes
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Nick Couldry, "The Space of the World: Can Human Solidarity Survive Social Media and What If It Can't?" (Polity, 2024)
Is human solidarity achievable in a world dominated by continuous digital connectivity and commercially managed platforms? And what if it’s not? Professor Nick…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Pinelopi Koujianou Goldberg, "The Unequal Effects of Globalization" (MIT, 2023)
The recent retreat from globalization has been triggered by a perception that increased competition from global trade is not fair and leads to increased…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Ulises Ali Mejias and Nick Couldry, "Data Grab: The New Colonialism of Big Tech and How to Fight Back" (U Chicago Press, 2024)
In the present day, Big Tech is extracting resources from us, transferring and centralizing resources from people to companies. These companies are grabbing…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Free Inquiry in the Academy and Beyond
In this episode of Madison’s Notes, we’re joined by Professors Amna Khalid and Jeff Snyder for a thought-provoking discussion on the state of free speech in…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Postscript: Violence, Consent, and Coercion in American Football
Last week, the press focused on what the press repeatedly characterized as an “ugly” fight between American college football players that broke out after the…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Sara Cantillon et al., "Feminist Political Economy: A Global Perspective" (Agenda, 2023)
Challenging mainstream narratives in political economy, the new book Feminist Political Economy: A Global Perspective (Agenda Publishing, 2023) serves as an…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Robert Danisch, "Rhetorical Democracy: How Communication Shapes Political Culture" (Rowman and Littlefield, 2024)
Rhetorical Democracy: How Communication Shapes Political Culture (Rowman and Littlefield, 2024) offers an explanation and diagnosis of the current state of…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Barbara A. Biesecker, "Reinventing World War II: Popular Memory in the Rise of the Ethnonationalist State" (Penn State Press, 2024)
By the 1970s, World War II had all but disappeared from US popular culture. But beginning in the mid-eighties it reemerged with a vengeance, and for nearly…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Melissa B. Jacoby, "Unjust Debts: How Our Bankruptcy System Makes America More Unequal" (New Press, 2024)
In theory, bankruptcy in America exists to cancel or restructure debts for people and companies that have way too many--a safety valve designed to provide a…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Toby Manning, "Mixing Pop and Politics: A Marxist History of Popular Music" (Repeater, 2024)
From rock & roll to contemporary pop, Mixing Pop and Politics: A Marxist History of Popular Music (Repeater, 2024) is a timely and original exploration of…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
S4E18 Who Cares? A Conversation with Emily Kenway
In this episode, Emily Kenway shares insights from her powerful new book Who Cares: The Hidden Crisis of Caregiving, and How We Solve It (Seal Press, 2023), an…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Benjamin J. Shestakofsky on How Venture Capital Shapes Work, Innovation, and Inequality
Peoples & Things host, Lee Vinsel, talks to Benjamin Shestakofsky about his book, Behind the Startup: How Venture Capital Shapes Work, Innovation, and…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Daniel Steinmetz-Jenkins, "Did It Happen Here?: Perspectives on Fascism and America" (W. W. Norton, 2024)
Today I’m speaking with Daniel Steinmetz-Jenkins about the new, edited volume, Did It Happen Here? Perspectives on Fascism and America (W.W. Norton, 2024)…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Karyne E Messina, "A Psychoanalytic Study of Political Leadership in the United States and Russia: Searching for Truth" (Routledge, 2024)
A Psychoanalytic Study of Political Leadership in the United States and Russia: Searching for Truth (Routledge, 2024) provides psychoanalytic insight into the…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Eric Drott, "Streaming Music, Streaming Capital" (Duke UP, 2024)
Streaming Music, Streaming Capital (Duke University Press, 2024) provides a much-needed study of the political economy of music streaming, drawing from Western…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Larry Alan Busk, "The Right-Wing Mirror of Critical Theory: Studies of Schmitt, Oakeshott, Hayek, Strauss, and Rand" (Rowman & Littlefield, 2023)
What really separates emancipatory thinking from its opposite? The prevailing Left defines itself against neoliberalism, conservative traditionalism, and…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Helena Hansen et al., "Whiteout: How Racial Capitalism Changed the Color of Opioids in America" (U California Press, 2023)
The phrase "racial capitalism" was used by Cedric Robinson to describe an economy of wealth accumulation extracted from cheap labor, organized by racial…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Simin Fadaee, "Global Marxism: Decolonisation and Revolutionary Politics" (Manchester UP, 2024)
For much of the twentieth century, the ideas of Karl Marx provided the backbone for social justice around the world. But today the legacy of Marxism is…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
That Librarian: The Fight Against Book Banning in America
Today’s book is: That Librarian: The Fight Against Book Banning in America (Bloomsbury, 2024) by Amanda Jones, which offers her story of life as a small-town…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Alexander Guerrero, "Lottocracy: Democracy Without Elections" (Oxford UP, 2024)
Elections loom large in our everyday understanding of democracy. Yet we also acknowledge that our familiar electoral apparatus is questionable from a…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Carrie N. Baker, "Abortion Pills: US History and Politics" (Amherst College Press, 2024)
In this compelling and informative interview, Carrie N. Baker discusses her newest book, Abortion Pills: US History and Politics (Amherst College Press, 2024)…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Laura C. Chávez-Moreno, "How Schools Make Race: Teaching Latinx Racialization in America" (Harvard Education Press, 2024)
In How Schools Make Race: Teaching Latinx Racialization in America (Harvard Education Press, 2025), Dr. Laura C. Chávez-Moreno uncovers the process through…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Corey Brettschneider, "The Presidents and the People: Five Leaders Who Threatened Democracy and the Citizens Who Fought to Defend It" (W. W. Norton, 2024)
In 2024, people around the world focus on an American president who calls for the imprisonment of critics, spreads the culture of white supremacy, and upends…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
How Psychoanalytic Mechanisms of Defense Affected the 2024 Presidential Campaign and Election
Even though this is not a political show, today we will be talking about the ways in which mechanisms of defense effected both parties in the 2024 campaign and…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Sidney A. Shapiro and Joseph P. Tomain, "How Government Built America" (Cambridge UP, 2024)
How Government Built America (Cambridge UP, 2024) challenges growing, anti-government rhetoric by highlighting the role government has played in partnering…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Brett Bowden, "Now Is Not the Time: Inside Our Obsession with the Present" (Iff Books, 2024)
Human beings have an overwhelming tendency to overemphasize the significance of the present without considering context or historical perspective. For many…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Too Black and Rasul A. Mowatt, "Laundering Black Rage: The Washing of Black Death, People, Property, and Profits" (Routledge, 2024)
Laundering Black Rage: The Washing of Black Death, People, Property, and Profits (Routledge, 2024) examines the dilution and commodification of Black…
New Books in Politics and PolemicsIn Conversation: Islamophobia, Race and Global Politics
In this episode, Dr. Ismail Patel sits down with Prof. Nazia Kazi to discuss her book “Islamophobia, Race and Global Politics” Support our show by becoming a…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Sabrina Strings, "The End of Love: Racism, Sexism, and the Death of Romance" (Beacon Press, 2024)
More men than ever are refusing loving partnerships and commitment, and instead seeking out “situationships.” When these men deign to articulate what they are…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Daniel S. Goldberg, "Tackle Football and Traumatic Brain Injuries: Law, Ethics, and Public Health" (Johns Hopkins UP, 2024)
Football is the national game in the United States – and many families and friends bond over their love of the sport. While few people play professional…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Jennifer Denbow, "Reproductive Labor and Innovation: Against the Tech Fix in an Era of Hype" (Duke UP, 2024)
In Reproductive Labor and Innovation: Against the Tech Fix in an Era of Hype (Duke UP, 2024), Jennifer Denbow examines how the push toward technoscientific…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Kevin B. Smith, "The Jailer's Reckoning: How Mass Incarceration Is Damaging America" (Rowman & Littlefield, 2024)
How does a Black man in Austin get sent to prison on a 70-year sentence for stealing a tuna sandwich, likely costing Texas taxpayers roughly a million dollars?…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
The Secret Life of Central Bankers
This is the final episode of Cited’s most recent season, Use & Abuse of Economic Expertise, a season that tells stories of the political and scholarly battles…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Herbert Hoover gave us Woody Guthrie (with David Cunningham)
Welcome to the final episode of What Just Happened, a Recall This Book experiment. In it you will hear three friends of RTB reacting to the 2024 election and…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Robin Phillips and Joshua Pauling, "Are We All Cyborgs Now?: Reclaiming Our Humanity from the Machine" (Basilian Media, 2024)
All We All Cyborgs Now? (Basilian Media, 2024) is a series of 32 short essay-length reflections on "Reclaiming Our Humanity from the Machine." Now is an…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Ronald Reagan Gave Us Punk Rock (with Vincent Brown)
Welcome to What Just Happened, a Recall This Book experiment. In it you will hear three friends of RTB reacting to the 2024 election and discussing the coming…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
An Existential Fight between Green and Carbon Assets (with Mark Blyth)
Welcome to What Just Happened, a Recall This Book experiment. In it you will hear three friends of RTB reacting to the 2024 election and discussing the coming…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Erica Benner, "Adventures in Democracy: The Turbulent World of People Power" (Penguin, 2024)
Democracy is a living, breathing thing and Dr. Erica Benner has spent a lifetime thinking about the role ordinary citizens play in keeping it alive: from her…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Robert B. Talisse, "Civic Solitude: Why Democracy Needs Distance" (Oxford UP, 2024)
An internet search of the phrase "this is what democracy looks like" returns thousands of images of people assembled in public for the purpose of collective…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Serene Khader, "Faux Feminism: Why We Fall for White Feminism and How We Can Stop" (Beacon Press, 2024)
After over 175 years, the feminist movement, now in its fourth wave, is at risk of collapsing on its eroding foundation. In Faux Feminism: Why We Fall for…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Carrie J. Preston, "Complicit Participation: The Liberal Audience for Theater of Racial Justice" (Oxford UP, 2024)
In this incisive critique of the ways performances of allyship can further entrench white privilege, author Carrie J. Preston analyses her own complicit…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Nick Bernards, "Fictions of Financialization: Rethinking Speculation, Exploitation and Twenty-First Century Capitalism" (Pluto Press, 2024)
Since the global financial crisis that began in 2008, the role of the financial sector in contemporary capitalism has come under increasing scrutiny. In the…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Saadia Yacoob, "Beyond the Binary: Gender and Legal Personhood in Islamic Law" (U California Press, 2024)
Saadia Yacoob’s excellent new book, Beyond the Binary: Gender and Legal Personhood in Islamic Law (U of California Press 2024), makes a compelling argument…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Tom Theuns, "Protecting Democracy in Europe: Pluralism, Autocracy and the Future of the EU" (Hurst, 2024)
The European Union has a big problem—a potentially fatal one. How should it deal with a member state or states that reject democracy and the rule of law? So…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Whitney Kemble, "Contested Spaces: A Critical History of Canadian Public Libraries As Neutral Places, 1960-2020" (Library Juice Press, 2024)
Contested Spaces: A Critical History of Canadian Public Libraries As Neutral Places, 1960-2020 (Library Juice Press, 2024) is the first comprehensive and…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
The Disappearance and Return of Inequality Studies in Economics
This is episode three Cited Podcast’s new season, the Use & Abuse of Economic Expertise. This season tells stories of the political and scholarly battles…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Anastasia Berg and Rachel Wiseman, "What Are Children For?: On Ambivalence and Choice" (St. Martin's Press, 2024)
Anastasia Berg and Rachel Wiseman's book What Are Children For?: On Ambivalence and Choice (St. Martin's Press, 2024) presents a modern argument, grounded in…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Matthew Elia, "The Problem of the Christian Master: Augustine in the Afterlife of Slavery" (Yale UP, 2024)
The Problem of the Christian Master: Augustine in the Afterlife of Slavery (Yale UP, 2024) offers a bold rereading of Augustinian thought for a world still…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Parker Palmer on the Israel-Gaza War
In times of profound crisis, when violence and hatred seem to dominate our world, we often search for voices that can help us navigate through the darkness…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Todd Stern, "Landing the Paris Climate Agreement: How It Happened, Why It Matters, and What Comes Next" (MIT Press, 2024)
From the U.S. lead negotiator on climate change, an inside account of the seven-year negotiation that culminated in the Paris Climate Agreement in 2015—and…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
David Rowell, "The Endless Refrain: Memory, Nostalgia, and the Threat to New Music" (Melville House, 2024)
A veteran music journalist argues that the rise of music streaming and the consolidation of digital platforms is decimating the musical landscape, with dire…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Mara Kardas-Nelson, "We Are Not Able to Live in the Sky: The Seductive Promise of Microfinance" (Metropolitan Books, 2024)
In this deeply researched and compelling narrative, journalist Mara Kardas-Nelson examines the complex history and impact of microfinance - the practice of…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
The Failed Concepts That Brought Israel to October 7
The essay "The Failed Concepts That Brought Israel to October 7" (Mosaic Magazine) by Shany Mor, dated October 7, 2024, examines the intellectual and policy…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Matthew Ferrence, "I Hate It Here, Please Vote for Me: Essays on Rural Political Decay" (West Virginia UP, 2024)
Today I talked to Matthew Ferrence about his book I Hate It Here, Please Vote for Me: Essays on Rural Political Decay (West Virginia UP, 2024). When a…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Luisa Neubauer and Alexander Repenning, "Beginning to End the Climate Crisis: A History of Our Future" (Brandeis UP, 2023)
"Climate change is the biggest crisis of humankind. We can’t watch other people drive our future right against the wall.” This is a quote by Luisa Neubauer –…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Greg Epstein, "Tech Agnostic: How Technology Became the World's Most Powerful Religion, and Why It Desperately Needs a Reformation" (MIT Press, 2024)
Technology has surpassed religion as the central focus of our lives, from our dependence on smartphones to the way that tech has infused almost every aspect of…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
The Wisdom of Our Ancestors
Based on The Wisdom of Our Ancestors: Conservative Humanism and the Western Tradition (University of Notre Dame Press, 2023), this week’s conversation with…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Mark W. Geiger, "Floor Rules: Insider Culture in Financial Markets" (Yale UP, 2024)
Are financial markets lawless and irrational? It may seem that way from the outside, but for market insiders there are multiples sets of rules that they break…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Andrew deWaard, "Derivative Media: How Wall Street Devours Culture" (U California Press, 2024)
Sequels, reboots, franchises, and songs that remake old songs—does it feel like everything new in popular culture is just derivative of something old? Contrary…
- New Books in Politics and Polemics
Kostas Kampourakis, "Ancestry Reimagined: Dismantling the Myth of Genetic Ethnicities" (Oxford UP, 2023)
Recent social and political psychological research indicates that increased access to ancestry testing has strengthened the notion of genetic essentialism…