Podcasts about nyu press

There's a lot in the news these days about politics on college campuses with discussions of student protests, curriculum debates, and faculty engagement serving as hot button issues. This sudden and intense focus makes it seem as if this may be a new phenomenon, though anyone who lived through the 1960s and 70s would beg to differ. Our guest today, Dr. Kelly L. Marino's recent book, Votes for College Women: Alumni, Students, and the Woman Suffrage Campaign, (NYU Press, 2024) https://nyupress.org/9781479825196/votes-for-college-women/ pushes that chronology back even further by exploring the role that female college students and alumni played in the suffrage movement as well as in shaping college activism moving into the future. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 formally established the promotion of religious freedom as a U.S. foreign policy and national security priority. Tracing its origins and passage, Prioritizing Faith: International Religious Freedom and U.S. Foreign Policy (NYU Press, 2025) by Dr. Ashlyn Hand shows how the legislation was made possible by the convergence of growing evangelical and Jewish advocacy, the expanding international human rights movement, and a broader search for post–Cold War purpose. Yet implementation across administrations has been uneven, shaped by shifting geopolitical dynamics and internal institutional constraints.Relying on expert interviews and rich archival analysis, Dr. Hand traces how Clinton, Bush, and Obama each wove international religious freedom into their foreign policy visions while navigating competing priorities and evolving strategic interests. Through case studies in China, Vietnam, and Saudi Arabia, Dr. Hand reveals the inner workings and persistent challenges of American religious freedom policy on the global stage.Timely, insightful, and deeply researched, Prioritizing Faith offers an incisive assessment of the United States' efforts to promote religious freedom abroad, highlighting the enduring tensions between normative aspirations and the complexities of foreign policy practice. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda's interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

The International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 formally established the promotion of religious freedom as a U.S. foreign policy and national security priority. Tracing its origins and passage, Prioritizing Faith: International Religious Freedom and U.S. Foreign Policy (NYU Press, 2025) by Dr. Ashlyn Hand shows how the legislation was made possible by the convergence of growing evangelical and Jewish advocacy, the expanding international human rights movement, and a broader search for post–Cold War purpose. Yet implementation across administrations has been uneven, shaped by shifting geopolitical dynamics and internal institutional constraints.Relying on expert interviews and rich archival analysis, Dr. Hand traces how Clinton, Bush, and Obama each wove international religious freedom into their foreign policy visions while navigating competing priorities and evolving strategic interests. Through case studies in China, Vietnam, and Saudi Arabia, Dr. Hand reveals the inner workings and persistent challenges of American religious freedom policy on the global stage.Timely, insightful, and deeply researched, Prioritizing Faith offers an incisive assessment of the United States' efforts to promote religious freedom abroad, highlighting the enduring tensions between normative aspirations and the complexities of foreign policy practice. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda's interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/american-studies

The International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 formally established the promotion of religious freedom as a U.S. foreign policy and national security priority. Tracing its origins and passage, Prioritizing Faith: International Religious Freedom and U.S. Foreign Policy (NYU Press, 2025) by Dr. Ashlyn Hand shows how the legislation was made possible by the convergence of growing evangelical and Jewish advocacy, the expanding international human rights movement, and a broader search for post–Cold War purpose. Yet implementation across administrations has been uneven, shaped by shifting geopolitical dynamics and internal institutional constraints.Relying on expert interviews and rich archival analysis, Dr. Hand traces how Clinton, Bush, and Obama each wove international religious freedom into their foreign policy visions while navigating competing priorities and evolving strategic interests. Through case studies in China, Vietnam, and Saudi Arabia, Dr. Hand reveals the inner workings and persistent challenges of American religious freedom policy on the global stage.Timely, insightful, and deeply researched, Prioritizing Faith offers an incisive assessment of the United States' efforts to promote religious freedom abroad, highlighting the enduring tensions between normative aspirations and the complexities of foreign policy practice. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda's interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/national-security

The International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 formally established the promotion of religious freedom as a U.S. foreign policy and national security priority. Tracing its origins and passage, Prioritizing Faith: International Religious Freedom and U.S. Foreign Policy (NYU Press, 2025) by Dr. Ashlyn Hand shows how the legislation was made possible by the convergence of growing evangelical and Jewish advocacy, the expanding international human rights movement, and a broader search for post–Cold War purpose. Yet implementation across administrations has been uneven, shaped by shifting geopolitical dynamics and internal institutional constraints.Relying on expert interviews and rich archival analysis, Dr. Hand traces how Clinton, Bush, and Obama each wove international religious freedom into their foreign policy visions while navigating competing priorities and evolving strategic interests. Through case studies in China, Vietnam, and Saudi Arabia, Dr. Hand reveals the inner workings and persistent challenges of American religious freedom policy on the global stage.Timely, insightful, and deeply researched, Prioritizing Faith offers an incisive assessment of the United States' efforts to promote religious freedom abroad, highlighting the enduring tensions between normative aspirations and the complexities of foreign policy practice. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda's interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/religion

The International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 formally established the promotion of religious freedom as a U.S. foreign policy and national security priority. Tracing its origins and passage, Prioritizing Faith: International Religious Freedom and U.S. Foreign Policy (NYU Press, 2025) by Dr. Ashlyn Hand shows how the legislation was made possible by the convergence of growing evangelical and Jewish advocacy, the expanding international human rights movement, and a broader search for post–Cold War purpose. Yet implementation across administrations has been uneven, shaped by shifting geopolitical dynamics and internal institutional constraints.Relying on expert interviews and rich archival analysis, Dr. Hand traces how Clinton, Bush, and Obama each wove international religious freedom into their foreign policy visions while navigating competing priorities and evolving strategic interests. Through case studies in China, Vietnam, and Saudi Arabia, Dr. Hand reveals the inner workings and persistent challenges of American religious freedom policy on the global stage.Timely, insightful, and deeply researched, Prioritizing Faith offers an incisive assessment of the United States' efforts to promote religious freedom abroad, highlighting the enduring tensions between normative aspirations and the complexities of foreign policy practice. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda's interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Fernando Gorab Leme is an assistant professor of Classics at the University of Oregon. He talks about his research on the significance and wedding songs in Greco-Roman antiquity and talks about the classes he teaches. Research Notes: Jessica Vasquez-Tokos, professor of Sociology and Indigenous, Race, and Ethnic Studies at the UO, talks about her new book "Burdens of Belonging: Race in an Unequal Nation" (NYU Press, 2025). The book is based on interviews with people in Oregon from various racial groups, and brings multiple racial groups' opinions together to weigh in on the ways in which race contours national belonging and affects sense of self, everyday life and wellness, and aspirations for the future. This book highlights the value of inquiring how people from various racial backgrounds perceive their fit in the nation and reveals how race matters to belonging in multifaceted ways.

Delving into the complex interplay of race, kinship, and technology, Technologies of Kinship: Asian American Racialization and the Making of Family (NYU Press, 2025) challenges conventional notions of racial identity in an era of advanced genetic testing. As Author LiLi Johnson argues, kinship, far from being solely defined by biological ties, is a social construct shaped by "technologies of kinship"—systems like government bureaucracy, immigration policies, photography, online profiles, and ancestry tests. These technologies reveal the surprisingly fluid nature of racial categories in relation to kinship, a social formation that significantly affects how race is defined, understood, and experienced. Johnson reexamines the technological systems that have shaped Asian American identity and kinship, exploring how the racialization of Asian Americans has evolved from exclusion to neoliberal multiculturalism over the last century, analyzing the political and interpersonal implications of these social and cultural changes for affected families. LiLi Johnson is an Assistant Professor of English and Gender and Women's Studies at Dalhousie University. Her research interests include Asian American family and kinship, racial formation and discourses of multiculturalism, cultural studies of science and technology, and digital and visual cultures. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/american-studies

Delving into the complex interplay of race, kinship, and technology, Technologies of Kinship: Asian American Racialization and the Making of Family (NYU Press, 2025) challenges conventional notions of racial identity in an era of advanced genetic testing. As Author LiLi Johnson argues, kinship, far from being solely defined by biological ties, is a social construct shaped by "technologies of kinship"—systems like government bureaucracy, immigration policies, photography, online profiles, and ancestry tests. These technologies reveal the surprisingly fluid nature of racial categories in relation to kinship, a social formation that significantly affects how race is defined, understood, and experienced. Johnson reexamines the technological systems that have shaped Asian American identity and kinship, exploring how the racialization of Asian Americans has evolved from exclusion to neoliberal multiculturalism over the last century, analyzing the political and interpersonal implications of these social and cultural changes for affected families. LiLi Johnson is an Assistant Professor of English and Gender and Women's Studies at Dalhousie University. Her research interests include Asian American family and kinship, racial formation and discourses of multiculturalism, cultural studies of science and technology, and digital and visual cultures. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

Delving into the complex interplay of race, kinship, and technology, Technologies of Kinship: Asian American Racialization and the Making of Family (NYU Press, 2025) challenges conventional notions of racial identity in an era of advanced genetic testing. As Author LiLi Johnson argues, kinship, far from being solely defined by biological ties, is a social construct shaped by "technologies of kinship"—systems like government bureaucracy, immigration policies, photography, online profiles, and ancestry tests. These technologies reveal the surprisingly fluid nature of racial categories in relation to kinship, a social formation that significantly affects how race is defined, understood, and experienced. Johnson reexamines the technological systems that have shaped Asian American identity and kinship, exploring how the racialization of Asian Americans has evolved from exclusion to neoliberal multiculturalism over the last century, analyzing the political and interpersonal implications of these social and cultural changes for affected families. LiLi Johnson is an Assistant Professor of English and Gender and Women's Studies at Dalhousie University. Her research interests include Asian American family and kinship, racial formation and discourses of multiculturalism, cultural studies of science and technology, and digital and visual cultures. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/asian-american-studies

Delving into the complex interplay of race, kinship, and technology, Technologies of Kinship: Asian American Racialization and the Making of Family (NYU Press, 2025) challenges conventional notions of racial identity in an era of advanced genetic testing. As Author LiLi Johnson argues, kinship, far from being solely defined by biological ties, is a social construct shaped by "technologies of kinship"—systems like government bureaucracy, immigration policies, photography, online profiles, and ancestry tests. These technologies reveal the surprisingly fluid nature of racial categories in relation to kinship, a social formation that significantly affects how race is defined, understood, and experienced. Johnson reexamines the technological systems that have shaped Asian American identity and kinship, exploring how the racialization of Asian Americans has evolved from exclusion to neoliberal multiculturalism over the last century, analyzing the political and interpersonal implications of these social and cultural changes for affected families. LiLi Johnson is an Assistant Professor of English and Gender and Women's Studies at Dalhousie University. Her research interests include Asian American family and kinship, racial formation and discourses of multiculturalism, cultural studies of science and technology, and digital and visual cultures. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/science-technology-and-society

Most of us spend some part of our lives feeling bad about ourselves and wanting to feel better. But this preoccupation is a surprisingly new one in the history of the world, and can largely be traced back to one man: a rumpled, convertible-driving California state representative named John Vasconcellos who helped spark a movement that took over schools, board rooms, and social-service offices across America in the 1990s. This week, we look at the rise and fall of the self-esteem movement and ask: is it possible to raise your self-esteem? And is trying to do so even a good idea?Special thanks to big thank you to the University of California, Santa Barbara Library for use of audio material from their Humanistic Psychology Archives and to their staff for helping located so many audio recordings. EPISODE CREDITS: Reported by - Heather Radke and Matt Kielty Produced by - Matt KietlyFlute performance and compositions by -  Ben BatchelderVoiceover work by - Dann FinkFact-checking by - Anna Pujol-Mazzini and  Angely Mercadoand Edited by  - Pat WaltersEPISODE CITATIONS:Articles - UCSB Humanistic Psychology Archive (https://zpr.io/HfVjUmvcVevE)Books - Selfie: How We Became So Self-Obsessed and What It's Doing to Us (https://zpr.io/eGRyqz9zNQHu) by Will Storr. Counterpoint, 2018.A Liberating Vision (https://zpr.io/tJn7BR5m84fv) by Vasconcellos, John. Impact Publishers, Inc., 1979The Therapeutic State (https://zpr.io/tJn7BR5m84fv) by Nolan, James, Jr. NYU Press, 1998Our newsletter comes out every Wednesday. It includes short essays, recommendations, and details about other ways to interact with the show. Sign up (https://radiolab.org/newsletter)!Radiolab is supported by listeners like you. Support Radiolab by becoming a member of The Lab (https://members.radiolab.org/) today.Follow our show on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook @radiolab, and share your thoughts with us by emailing radiolab@wnyc.org.Leadership support for Radiolab's science programming is provided by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation Initiative, and the John Templeton Foundation. Foundational support for Radiolab was provided by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.

Gaining mass popularity in the mid-1990s with the True Love Waits rally on the Washington Mall, purity culture began as an urge from evangelical conservatives for Christian adolescents to publicly commit to practicing abstinence until marriage. Throughout this decade and the next, millions of evangelical teenagers performed their commitment to sexual purity by signing pledges and wearing purity rings. Growing Up Pure: White Girls, Queer Teens, and the Racial Foundations of Purity Culture (NYU Press, 2025) by Dr. Lauren D. Sawyer examines the shaping of purity culture in the United States, looking specifically at the experiences of white youth. It shows that white girls and white queer youth were vulnerable to the purity movement, but that they were also complicit in its white supremacist oppressive structure. It makes the case that purity culture follows in the footsteps of other purity movements in the United States, and is very much tied to centuries of anti-Black racism and xenophobia in US social history, seeing white youth as in need of protection, usually from a racialized, sexualized other.While other works have focused on the ways in which purity culture has victimized young people, Dr. Sawyer argues that their perceived status as victims lets them too easily off the hook. White youth have been afforded the privilege of participating in purity culture's harmful behaviors without being called to account. Closely reading adolescents' stories of growing up in purity culture, she uncovers youth as agents, participants, and beneficiaries of its white supremacist framing, even as they were still vulnerable to its harmful teachings. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda's interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

Gaining mass popularity in the mid-1990s with the True Love Waits rally on the Washington Mall, purity culture began as an urge from evangelical conservatives for Christian adolescents to publicly commit to practicing abstinence until marriage. Throughout this decade and the next, millions of evangelical teenagers performed their commitment to sexual purity by signing pledges and wearing purity rings. Growing Up Pure: White Girls, Queer Teens, and the Racial Foundations of Purity Culture (NYU Press, 2025) by Dr. Lauren D. Sawyer examines the shaping of purity culture in the United States, looking specifically at the experiences of white youth. It shows that white girls and white queer youth were vulnerable to the purity movement, but that they were also complicit in its white supremacist oppressive structure. It makes the case that purity culture follows in the footsteps of other purity movements in the United States, and is very much tied to centuries of anti-Black racism and xenophobia in US social history, seeing white youth as in need of protection, usually from a racialized, sexualized other.While other works have focused on the ways in which purity culture has victimized young people, Dr. Sawyer argues that their perceived status as victims lets them too easily off the hook. White youth have been afforded the privilege of participating in purity culture's harmful behaviors without being called to account. Closely reading adolescents' stories of growing up in purity culture, she uncovers youth as agents, participants, and beneficiaries of its white supremacist framing, even as they were still vulnerable to its harmful teachings. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda's interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/gender-studies

Gaining mass popularity in the mid-1990s with the True Love Waits rally on the Washington Mall, purity culture began as an urge from evangelical conservatives for Christian adolescents to publicly commit to practicing abstinence until marriage. Throughout this decade and the next, millions of evangelical teenagers performed their commitment to sexual purity by signing pledges and wearing purity rings. Growing Up Pure: White Girls, Queer Teens, and the Racial Foundations of Purity Culture (NYU Press, 2025) by Dr. Lauren D. Sawyer examines the shaping of purity culture in the United States, looking specifically at the experiences of white youth. It shows that white girls and white queer youth were vulnerable to the purity movement, but that they were also complicit in its white supremacist oppressive structure. It makes the case that purity culture follows in the footsteps of other purity movements in the United States, and is very much tied to centuries of anti-Black racism and xenophobia in US social history, seeing white youth as in need of protection, usually from a racialized, sexualized other.While other works have focused on the ways in which purity culture has victimized young people, Dr. Sawyer argues that their perceived status as victims lets them too easily off the hook. White youth have been afforded the privilege of participating in purity culture's harmful behaviors without being called to account. Closely reading adolescents' stories of growing up in purity culture, she uncovers youth as agents, participants, and beneficiaries of its white supremacist framing, even as they were still vulnerable to its harmful teachings. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda's interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/sociology

Gaining mass popularity in the mid-1990s with the True Love Waits rally on the Washington Mall, purity culture began as an urge from evangelical conservatives for Christian adolescents to publicly commit to practicing abstinence until marriage. Throughout this decade and the next, millions of evangelical teenagers performed their commitment to sexual purity by signing pledges and wearing purity rings. Growing Up Pure: White Girls, Queer Teens, and the Racial Foundations of Purity Culture (NYU Press, 2025) by Dr. Lauren D. Sawyer examines the shaping of purity culture in the United States, looking specifically at the experiences of white youth. It shows that white girls and white queer youth were vulnerable to the purity movement, but that they were also complicit in its white supremacist oppressive structure. It makes the case that purity culture follows in the footsteps of other purity movements in the United States, and is very much tied to centuries of anti-Black racism and xenophobia in US social history, seeing white youth as in need of protection, usually from a racialized, sexualized other.While other works have focused on the ways in which purity culture has victimized young people, Dr. Sawyer argues that their perceived status as victims lets them too easily off the hook. White youth have been afforded the privilege of participating in purity culture's harmful behaviors without being called to account. Closely reading adolescents' stories of growing up in purity culture, she uncovers youth as agents, participants, and beneficiaries of its white supremacist framing, even as they were still vulnerable to its harmful teachings. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda's interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Gaining mass popularity in the mid-1990s with the True Love Waits rally on the Washington Mall, purity culture began as an urge from evangelical conservatives for Christian adolescents to publicly commit to practicing abstinence until marriage. Throughout this decade and the next, millions of evangelical teenagers performed their commitment to sexual purity by signing pledges and wearing purity rings. Growing Up Pure: White Girls, Queer Teens, and the Racial Foundations of Purity Culture (NYU Press, 2025) by Dr. Lauren D. Sawyer examines the shaping of purity culture in the United States, looking specifically at the experiences of white youth. It shows that white girls and white queer youth were vulnerable to the purity movement, but that they were also complicit in its white supremacist oppressive structure. It makes the case that purity culture follows in the footsteps of other purity movements in the United States, and is very much tied to centuries of anti-Black racism and xenophobia in US social history, seeing white youth as in need of protection, usually from a racialized, sexualized other.While other works have focused on the ways in which purity culture has victimized young people, Dr. Sawyer argues that their perceived status as victims lets them too easily off the hook. White youth have been afforded the privilege of participating in purity culture's harmful behaviors without being called to account. Closely reading adolescents' stories of growing up in purity culture, she uncovers youth as agents, participants, and beneficiaries of its white supremacist framing, even as they were still vulnerable to its harmful teachings. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda's interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Gaining mass popularity in the mid-1990s with the True Love Waits rally on the Washington Mall, purity culture began as an urge from evangelical conservatives for Christian adolescents to publicly commit to practicing abstinence until marriage. Throughout this decade and the next, millions of evangelical teenagers performed their commitment to sexual purity by signing pledges and wearing purity rings. Growing Up Pure: White Girls, Queer Teens, and the Racial Foundations of Purity Culture (NYU Press, 2025) by Dr. Lauren D. Sawyer examines the shaping of purity culture in the United States, looking specifically at the experiences of white youth. It shows that white girls and white queer youth were vulnerable to the purity movement, but that they were also complicit in its white supremacist oppressive structure. It makes the case that purity culture follows in the footsteps of other purity movements in the United States, and is very much tied to centuries of anti-Black racism and xenophobia in US social history, seeing white youth as in need of protection, usually from a racialized, sexualized other.While other works have focused on the ways in which purity culture has victimized young people, Dr. Sawyer argues that their perceived status as victims lets them too easily off the hook. White youth have been afforded the privilege of participating in purity culture's harmful behaviors without being called to account. Closely reading adolescents' stories of growing up in purity culture, she uncovers youth as agents, participants, and beneficiaries of its white supremacist framing, even as they were still vulnerable to its harmful teachings. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda's interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Gaining mass popularity in the mid-1990s with the True Love Waits rally on the Washington Mall, purity culture began as an urge from evangelical conservatives for Christian adolescents to publicly commit to practicing abstinence until marriage. Throughout this decade and the next, millions of evangelical teenagers performed their commitment to sexual purity by signing pledges and wearing purity rings. Growing Up Pure: White Girls, Queer Teens, and the Racial Foundations of Purity Culture (NYU Press, 2025) by Dr. Lauren D. Sawyer examines the shaping of purity culture in the United States, looking specifically at the experiences of white youth. It shows that white girls and white queer youth were vulnerable to the purity movement, but that they were also complicit in its white supremacist oppressive structure. It makes the case that purity culture follows in the footsteps of other purity movements in the United States, and is very much tied to centuries of anti-Black racism and xenophobia in US social history, seeing white youth as in need of protection, usually from a racialized, sexualized other.While other works have focused on the ways in which purity culture has victimized young people, Dr. Sawyer argues that their perceived status as victims lets them too easily off the hook. White youth have been afforded the privilege of participating in purity culture's harmful behaviors without being called to account. Closely reading adolescents' stories of growing up in purity culture, she uncovers youth as agents, participants, and beneficiaries of its white supremacist framing, even as they were still vulnerable to its harmful teachings. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda's interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/christian-studies

Read the full transcript here. The Clearer Thinking Podcast listener survey is here! If you've ever listened to the Clearer Thinking podcast before, we'd love it if you'd take our listener survey so we can learn about your experience and improve the podcast based on your feedback. Give feedback to help us improve the Clearer Thinking podcast! What would a global ban on industrial animal agriculture by 2050 actually achieve across welfare public health and climate? Can a phased transition built on price taste and convenience overcome identity, culture, and religion in shaping diets? Which mix of informational, financial, and regulatory policies shifts behavior without backlash? Where is the line between small humane farms that persist and large systems that must end? How do we align consumer values with daily choices when cognitive dissonance makes the topic uncomfortable? When does a little guilt motivate change and when does it harden resistance? What evidence would show that plant-based and cultivated options have reached parity that tips the market? How do we protect farmers and workers while shrinking harmful production at scale? What are the realistic tipping points for social norms around meat in different communities? If the expected suffering avoided each year dwarfs human history how should that reshape priorities? Jeff Sebo is the Director of the Center for Environmental and Animal Protection, Director of the Center for Mind, Ethics, and Policy, and Co-Director of the Wild Animal Welfare Program at New York University. He is also a Faculty Fellow at the Guarini Center on Environmental, Energy & Land Use Law at the NYU School of Law and an Advisor at the Animals in Context series at NYU Press. His research focuses on moral philosophy, legal philosophy, and philosophy of mind; animal minds, ethics, and policy; AI minds, ethics, and policy; and global health and climate ethics and policy. His books The Moral Circle and Saving Animals, Saving Ourselves are out now. Links: WILD Lab Eleos AI Jeff's Website Staff Spencer Greenberg — Host + Director Ryan Kessler — Producer + Technical Lead WeAmplify — Transcriptionists Igor Scaldini — Marketing Consultant Music Broke for Free Josh Woodward Lee Rosevere Quiet Music for Tiny Robots wowamusic zapsplat.com Affiliates Clearer Thinking GuidedTrack Mind Ease Positly UpLift [Read more]

Dr. Tomer Persico is a Research Fellow at the Shalom Hartman Institute, a Rubinstein Fellow at Reichman University, and a Senior Research Scholar at the UC Berkeley Center for Middle Eastern Studies. His fields of expertise include contemporary spirituality, Jewish modern identity, Jewish renewal, and forms of secularization and religiosity in Israel. In God's Image, Persico examines the central role that the idea that all people were created in the image of God played in the development of Western civilization. Focusing on five themes―selfhood, freedom, conscience, equality, and meaning―the book guides the reader through a cultural history of the West, from ancient times through modernity. It explains how each of these ideals was profoundly influenced by the central biblical conception of humanity's creation in God's image, embracing an essential equality among all people, while also emphasizing each human life's singularity and significance. The book argues that the West, and particularly Protestant Christianity, grew out of ideas rooted deeply in this notion, and that it played a core role in the development of individualism, liberalism, human rights discourse, and indeed the secularization process. Making the case for a cultural understanding of history, the volume focuses on ideas as agents of change and challenges the common scholarly emphasis on material conditions. Offering an innovative perspective on the shaping of global modernity, In God's Image examines the relationship between faith and society and posits the fundamental role of the idea of the image of God in the making of the moral ideals and social institutions we hold dear today. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/history

In Feminism in the Wild: How Human Biases Shape Our Understanding of Animal Behavior (MIT Press, 2025), Ambika Kamath and Melina Packer reveal how scientists studying animal behavior have long projected human norms and values onto animals while seeking to understand them. When scientific studies conclude that these norms and values are natural in animals, it makes it easier to think of them as natural in humans too. And because scientists, historically and to this day, largely belong to elite, powerful segments of society, the norms and values embedded in animal behavior science match those of the already powerful. How can animal behavior science escape this trap of naturalizing dominant culture? Drawing from decades of feminist, antiracist, queer, disability justice, and Marxist contributions—including those of biologists—Kamath and Packer break down persistent assumptions in the status quo of animal behavior science and offer a multitude of alternative approaches. Core concepts in animal behavior science and evolutionary biology—from sex categories and sexual selection to fitness, adaptation, biological determinism, and more—are carefully contextualized and critically reexamined. This unique collaboration between an animal behavior scientist and a feminist science studies scholar is an illuminating and hopeful read for anyone who is curious about how animals behave, and anyone who wants to break free from scientific approaches that perpetuate systems of oppression. Ambika Kamath is trained as a behavioral ecologist and evolutionary biologist. She lives, works, and grows community in Oakland, California, on Ohlone land. Melina Packer is Assistant Professor of Race, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at the University of Wisconsin, La Crosse, on Ho-Chunk Nation land. She is the author of Toxic Sexual Politics: Toxicology, Environmental Poisons, and Queer Feminist Futures (NYU Press, 2025). Kyle Johannsen is Sessional Faculty Member in the Department of Philosophy at Trent University, on Mississauga Anishnaabeg land. His most recent authored book is Wild Animal Ethics: The Moral and Political Problem of Wild Animal Suffering (Routledge, 2021). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

In Feminism in the Wild: How Human Biases Shape Our Understanding of Animal Behavior (MIT Press, 2025), Ambika Kamath and Melina Packer reveal how scientists studying animal behavior have long projected human norms and values onto animals while seeking to understand them. When scientific studies conclude that these norms and values are natural in animals, it makes it easier to think of them as natural in humans too. And because scientists, historically and to this day, largely belong to elite, powerful segments of society, the norms and values embedded in animal behavior science match those of the already powerful. How can animal behavior science escape this trap of naturalizing dominant culture? Drawing from decades of feminist, antiracist, queer, disability justice, and Marxist contributions—including those of biologists—Kamath and Packer break down persistent assumptions in the status quo of animal behavior science and offer a multitude of alternative approaches. Core concepts in animal behavior science and evolutionary biology—from sex categories and sexual selection to fitness, adaptation, biological determinism, and more—are carefully contextualized and critically reexamined. This unique collaboration between an animal behavior scientist and a feminist science studies scholar is an illuminating and hopeful read for anyone who is curious about how animals behave, and anyone who wants to break free from scientific approaches that perpetuate systems of oppression. Ambika Kamath is trained as a behavioral ecologist and evolutionary biologist. She lives, works, and grows community in Oakland, California, on Ohlone land. Melina Packer is Assistant Professor of Race, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at the University of Wisconsin, La Crosse, on Ho-Chunk Nation land. She is the author of Toxic Sexual Politics: Toxicology, Environmental Poisons, and Queer Feminist Futures (NYU Press, 2025). Kyle Johannsen is Sessional Faculty Member in the Department of Philosophy at Trent University, on Mississauga Anishnaabeg land. His most recent authored book is Wild Animal Ethics: The Moral and Political Problem of Wild Animal Suffering (Routledge, 2021). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/gender-studies

In this episode Drora Arussy speaks with historian Adam S. Ferziger about his latest book, Agents of Change: American Jews and the Transformation of Israeli Judaism (New York University Press, 2025). Ferziger, a professor at Bar-Ilan University and one of the leading voices in the study of modern religious movements, offers a compelling exploration of the transnational interactions that have reshaped Israeli Judaism and redefined the contours of religious Zionism. Agents of Change investigates how ideas, teachers, and institutions moved across the Atlantic between America and Israel, creating new hybrid forms of Jewish religious expression. Ferziger focuses on a group of North American Orthodox rabbis and educators, many of them students of Rabbi Dr. Joseph B. Soloveitchik at Yeshiva University, who immigrated to Israel between 1965 and 1983. These figures—working at the nexus of American Modern Orthodoxy and Israeli religious Zionism—introduced new educational paradigms, reimagined communal norms, and ultimately diversified the ideological landscape of Israeli Orthodoxy. The conversation delves into the shifting meaning of religious Zionism after the 1967 Six-Day War, when a movement once on the margins of Zionist politics emerged as a vital force within Israeli society. Ferziger traces how theological optimism about Israel's redemptive role led to internal debates over nationalism, messianism, and engagement with secular Israeli culture. He also shows how American-trained educators brought new emphases on intellectual openness, structured learning, and ethical responsibility that subtly reconfigured Israeli Torah study and communal life. Interwoven through the dialogue is a broader reflection on transnational educational exchange—how Jewish learning operates as both a local and global phenomenon. Ferziger emphasizes education's transformative potential: students, he argues, do not merely replicate ideas but reinterpret them within new social and cultural frames. This dynamic has fueled the growth of innovative models in contemporary Israel, from advanced programs for women's Torah study to initiatives blending religious learning with military and civic service. Arussy and Ferziger also discuss adjacent developments, including the integration of American Haredim into Israeli society, the emergence of Orthodox feminism as a transnational phenomenon, and the rise of global study networks such as Hadran, founded by Michelle Farber. Through these case studies, Ferziger illustrates how the intellectual and spiritual currents flowing between America and Israel continue to reshape what it means to live a religious Jewish life in a modern state. Throughout the interview, Ferziger reflects on the delicate balance between personal engagement and scholarly distance, underscoring the historian's task of acknowledging one's perspective while maintaining methodological transparency. His approach embodies the spirit of Agents of Change: to view Jewish history not as a story confined within national borders but as a transnational dialogue that continually evolves through exchange, adaptation, and reinterpretation. Agents of Change: American Jews and the Transformation of Israeli Judaism offers an incisive analysis of how transnational networks have redefined modern Jewish identities.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/american-studies

Human trafficking for the sex trade is a form of modern-day slavery that ensnares thousands of victims each year, disproportionately affecting women and girls. While the international community has developed an impressive edifice of human rights law, these laws are not equally recognized or enforced by all countries. Sex Trafficking and Human Rights demonstrates that state responsiveness to human trafficking is shaped by the political, social, cultural, and economic rights afforded to women in that state. While combatting human trafficking is a multiscalar problem with a host of conflating variables, this book shows that a common theme in the effectiveness of state response is the degree to which women and girls are perceived as, and actually are, full citizens. By analyzing human trafficking cases in India, Thailand, Russia, Nigeria, and Brazil, they shed light on the factors that make some women and girls more susceptible to traffickers than others. Heather Smith-Cannoy (PhD, UC San Diego, 2007) is a Professor of Political Science/Social Justice and Human Rights at the New College of Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences at Arizona State University. She is currently serving as the Interim Director of the School of Social and Behavioral Sciences. Her work explores when and under what conditions international law impacts the human rights of the most marginalized populations, focusing on both the opportunities and the challenges associated with this body of law. She has also focused on the role that international law can play in advancing the legal rights of sex trafficking victims. She has published 4 books and more than 15 articles and book chapters. Patricia C. Rodda is the Assistant Professor of Political Science at Carroll University in Waukesha, Wisconsin. She teaches international relations, comparative politics, international law, conflict and security and political theory. Her research often focuses on vulnerable populations and the challenges they face seeking human rights protections. She is currently working on a new book project that investigates the institutions and interests that facilitate or obstruct the adoption of women's rights in Muslim-majority states. Charles “Tony” Smith is a Professor in Political Science and Law at the University of California-Irvine (PhD UCSD 2004; JD UF 1987). His research concerns how institutions and the strategic interactions of political actors relate to the contestation over rights, law, and democracy. He has authored or co-authored eight books including Sex Trafficking and Human Rights: The Status of Women and State Responses (Georgetown University Press 2022) and The Politics of Perverts: The Political Attitudes and Actions of Non-Traditional Sexual Minorities (NYU Press 2024) and published over 40 articles and chapters. He is currently the Editor in Chief of Political Research Quarterly. Lamis Abdelaaty is an associate professor of political science at the Maxwell School of Syracuse University. She is the author of Discrimination and Delegation: Explaining State Responses to Refugees (Oxford University Press, 2021). Email her comments at labdelaa@syr.edu Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/gender-studies

Human trafficking for the sex trade is a form of modern-day slavery that ensnares thousands of victims each year, disproportionately affecting women and girls. While the international community has developed an impressive edifice of human rights law, these laws are not equally recognized or enforced by all countries. Sex Trafficking and Human Rights demonstrates that state responsiveness to human trafficking is shaped by the political, social, cultural, and economic rights afforded to women in that state. While combatting human trafficking is a multiscalar problem with a host of conflating variables, this book shows that a common theme in the effectiveness of state response is the degree to which women and girls are perceived as, and actually are, full citizens. By analyzing human trafficking cases in India, Thailand, Russia, Nigeria, and Brazil, they shed light on the factors that make some women and girls more susceptible to traffickers than others. Heather Smith-Cannoy (PhD, UC San Diego, 2007) is a Professor of Political Science/Social Justice and Human Rights at the New College of Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences at Arizona State University. She is currently serving as the Interim Director of the School of Social and Behavioral Sciences. Her work explores when and under what conditions international law impacts the human rights of the most marginalized populations, focusing on both the opportunities and the challenges associated with this body of law. She has also focused on the role that international law can play in advancing the legal rights of sex trafficking victims. She has published 4 books and more than 15 articles and book chapters. Patricia C. Rodda is the Assistant Professor of Political Science at Carroll University in Waukesha, Wisconsin. She teaches international relations, comparative politics, international law, conflict and security and political theory. Her research often focuses on vulnerable populations and the challenges they face seeking human rights protections. She is currently working on a new book project that investigates the institutions and interests that facilitate or obstruct the adoption of women's rights in Muslim-majority states. Charles “Tony” Smith is a Professor in Political Science and Law at the University of California-Irvine (PhD UCSD 2004; JD UF 1987). His research concerns how institutions and the strategic interactions of political actors relate to the contestation over rights, law, and democracy. He has authored or co-authored eight books including Sex Trafficking and Human Rights: The Status of Women and State Responses (Georgetown University Press 2022) and The Politics of Perverts: The Political Attitudes and Actions of Non-Traditional Sexual Minorities (NYU Press 2024) and published over 40 articles and chapters. He is currently the Editor in Chief of Political Research Quarterly. Lamis Abdelaaty is an associate professor of political science at the Maxwell School of Syracuse University. She is the author of Discrimination and Delegation: Explaining State Responses to Refugees (Oxford University Press, 2021). Email her comments at labdelaa@syr.edu Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Dr. Tomer Persico is a Research Fellow at the Shalom Hartman Institute, a Rubinstein Fellow at Reichman University, and a Senior Research Scholar at the UC Berkeley Center for Middle Eastern Studies. His fields of expertise include contemporary spirituality, Jewish modern identity, Jewish renewal, and forms of secularization and religiosity in Israel. In God's Image, Persico examines the central role that the idea that all people were created in the image of God played in the development of Western civilization. Focusing on five themes―selfhood, freedom, conscience, equality, and meaning―the book guides the reader through a cultural history of the West, from ancient times through modernity. It explains how each of these ideals was profoundly influenced by the central biblical conception of humanity's creation in God's image, embracing an essential equality among all people, while also emphasizing each human life's singularity and significance. The book argues that the West, and particularly Protestant Christianity, grew out of ideas rooted deeply in this notion, and that it played a core role in the development of individualism, liberalism, human rights discourse, and indeed the secularization process. Making the case for a cultural understanding of history, the volume focuses on ideas as agents of change and challenges the common scholarly emphasis on material conditions. Offering an innovative perspective on the shaping of global modernity, In God's Image examines the relationship between faith and society and posits the fundamental role of the idea of the image of God in the making of the moral ideals and social institutions we hold dear today. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

Dr. Tomer Persico is a Research Fellow at the Shalom Hartman Institute, a Rubinstein Fellow at Reichman University, and a Senior Research Scholar at the UC Berkeley Center for Middle Eastern Studies. His fields of expertise include contemporary spirituality, Jewish modern identity, Jewish renewal, and forms of secularization and religiosity in Israel. In God's Image, Persico examines the central role that the idea that all people were created in the image of God played in the development of Western civilization. Focusing on five themes―selfhood, freedom, conscience, equality, and meaning―the book guides the reader through a cultural history of the West, from ancient times through modernity. It explains how each of these ideals was profoundly influenced by the central biblical conception of humanity's creation in God's image, embracing an essential equality among all people, while also emphasizing each human life's singularity and significance. The book argues that the West, and particularly Protestant Christianity, grew out of ideas rooted deeply in this notion, and that it played a core role in the development of individualism, liberalism, human rights discourse, and indeed the secularization process. Making the case for a cultural understanding of history, the volume focuses on ideas as agents of change and challenges the common scholarly emphasis on material conditions. Offering an innovative perspective on the shaping of global modernity, In God's Image examines the relationship between faith and society and posits the fundamental role of the idea of the image of God in the making of the moral ideals and social institutions we hold dear today. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/religion

In this episode Drora Arussy speaks with historian Adam S. Ferziger about his latest book, Agents of Change: American Jews and the Transformation of Israeli Judaism (New York University Press, 2025). Ferziger, a professor at Bar-Ilan University and one of the leading voices in the study of modern religious movements, offers a compelling exploration of the transnational interactions that have reshaped Israeli Judaism and redefined the contours of religious Zionism. Agents of Change investigates how ideas, teachers, and institutions moved across the Atlantic between America and Israel, creating new hybrid forms of Jewish religious expression. Ferziger focuses on a group of North American Orthodox rabbis and educators, many of them students of Rabbi Dr. Joseph B. Soloveitchik at Yeshiva University, who immigrated to Israel between 1965 and 1983. These figures—working at the nexus of American Modern Orthodoxy and Israeli religious Zionism—introduced new educational paradigms, reimagined communal norms, and ultimately diversified the ideological landscape of Israeli Orthodoxy. The conversation delves into the shifting meaning of religious Zionism after the 1967 Six-Day War, when a movement once on the margins of Zionist politics emerged as a vital force within Israeli society. Ferziger traces how theological optimism about Israel's redemptive role led to internal debates over nationalism, messianism, and engagement with secular Israeli culture. He also shows how American-trained educators brought new emphases on intellectual openness, structured learning, and ethical responsibility that subtly reconfigured Israeli Torah study and communal life. Interwoven through the dialogue is a broader reflection on transnational educational exchange—how Jewish learning operates as both a local and global phenomenon. Ferziger emphasizes education's transformative potential: students, he argues, do not merely replicate ideas but reinterpret them within new social and cultural frames. This dynamic has fueled the growth of innovative models in contemporary Israel, from advanced programs for women's Torah study to initiatives blending religious learning with military and civic service. Arussy and Ferziger also discuss adjacent developments, including the integration of American Haredim into Israeli society, the emergence of Orthodox feminism as a transnational phenomenon, and the rise of global study networks such as Hadran, founded by Michelle Farber. Through these case studies, Ferziger illustrates how the intellectual and spiritual currents flowing between America and Israel continue to reshape what it means to live a religious Jewish life in a modern state. Throughout the interview, Ferziger reflects on the delicate balance between personal engagement and scholarly distance, underscoring the historian's task of acknowledging one's perspective while maintaining methodological transparency. His approach embodies the spirit of Agents of Change: to view Jewish history not as a story confined within national borders but as a transnational dialogue that continually evolves through exchange, adaptation, and reinterpretation. Agents of Change: American Jews and the Transformation of Israeli Judaism offers an incisive analysis of how transnational networks have redefined modern Jewish identities.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

In this episode Drora Arussy speaks with historian Adam S. Ferziger about his latest book, Agents of Change: American Jews and the Transformation of Israeli Judaism (New York University Press, 2025). Ferziger, a professor at Bar-Ilan University and one of the leading voices in the study of modern religious movements, offers a compelling exploration of the transnational interactions that have reshaped Israeli Judaism and redefined the contours of religious Zionism. Agents of Change investigates how ideas, teachers, and institutions moved across the Atlantic between America and Israel, creating new hybrid forms of Jewish religious expression. Ferziger focuses on a group of North American Orthodox rabbis and educators, many of them students of Rabbi Dr. Joseph B. Soloveitchik at Yeshiva University, who immigrated to Israel between 1965 and 1983. These figures—working at the nexus of American Modern Orthodoxy and Israeli religious Zionism—introduced new educational paradigms, reimagined communal norms, and ultimately diversified the ideological landscape of Israeli Orthodoxy. The conversation delves into the shifting meaning of religious Zionism after the 1967 Six-Day War, when a movement once on the margins of Zionist politics emerged as a vital force within Israeli society. Ferziger traces how theological optimism about Israel's redemptive role led to internal debates over nationalism, messianism, and engagement with secular Israeli culture. He also shows how American-trained educators brought new emphases on intellectual openness, structured learning, and ethical responsibility that subtly reconfigured Israeli Torah study and communal life. Interwoven through the dialogue is a broader reflection on transnational educational exchange—how Jewish learning operates as both a local and global phenomenon. Ferziger emphasizes education's transformative potential: students, he argues, do not merely replicate ideas but reinterpret them within new social and cultural frames. This dynamic has fueled the growth of innovative models in contemporary Israel, from advanced programs for women's Torah study to initiatives blending religious learning with military and civic service. Arussy and Ferziger also discuss adjacent developments, including the integration of American Haredim into Israeli society, the emergence of Orthodox feminism as a transnational phenomenon, and the rise of global study networks such as Hadran, founded by Michelle Farber. Through these case studies, Ferziger illustrates how the intellectual and spiritual currents flowing between America and Israel continue to reshape what it means to live a religious Jewish life in a modern state. Throughout the interview, Ferziger reflects on the delicate balance between personal engagement and scholarly distance, underscoring the historian's task of acknowledging one's perspective while maintaining methodological transparency. His approach embodies the spirit of Agents of Change: to view Jewish history not as a story confined within national borders but as a transnational dialogue that continually evolves through exchange, adaptation, and reinterpretation. Agents of Change: American Jews and the Transformation of Israeli Judaism offers an incisive analysis of how transnational networks have redefined modern Jewish identities.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/jewish-studies

In this episode Drora Arussy speaks with historian Adam S. Ferziger about his latest book, Agents of Change: American Jews and the Transformation of Israeli Judaism (New York University Press, 2025). Ferziger, a professor at Bar-Ilan University and one of the leading voices in the study of modern religious movements, offers a compelling exploration of the transnational interactions that have reshaped Israeli Judaism and redefined the contours of religious Zionism. Agents of Change investigates how ideas, teachers, and institutions moved across the Atlantic between America and Israel, creating new hybrid forms of Jewish religious expression. Ferziger focuses on a group of North American Orthodox rabbis and educators, many of them students of Rabbi Dr. Joseph B. Soloveitchik at Yeshiva University, who immigrated to Israel between 1965 and 1983. These figures—working at the nexus of American Modern Orthodoxy and Israeli religious Zionism—introduced new educational paradigms, reimagined communal norms, and ultimately diversified the ideological landscape of Israeli Orthodoxy. The conversation delves into the shifting meaning of religious Zionism after the 1967 Six-Day War, when a movement once on the margins of Zionist politics emerged as a vital force within Israeli society. Ferziger traces how theological optimism about Israel's redemptive role led to internal debates over nationalism, messianism, and engagement with secular Israeli culture. He also shows how American-trained educators brought new emphases on intellectual openness, structured learning, and ethical responsibility that subtly reconfigured Israeli Torah study and communal life. Interwoven through the dialogue is a broader reflection on transnational educational exchange—how Jewish learning operates as both a local and global phenomenon. Ferziger emphasizes education's transformative potential: students, he argues, do not merely replicate ideas but reinterpret them within new social and cultural frames. This dynamic has fueled the growth of innovative models in contemporary Israel, from advanced programs for women's Torah study to initiatives blending religious learning with military and civic service. Arussy and Ferziger also discuss adjacent developments, including the integration of American Haredim into Israeli society, the emergence of Orthodox feminism as a transnational phenomenon, and the rise of global study networks such as Hadran, founded by Michelle Farber. Through these case studies, Ferziger illustrates how the intellectual and spiritual currents flowing between America and Israel continue to reshape what it means to live a religious Jewish life in a modern state. Throughout the interview, Ferziger reflects on the delicate balance between personal engagement and scholarly distance, underscoring the historian's task of acknowledging one's perspective while maintaining methodological transparency. His approach embodies the spirit of Agents of Change: to view Jewish history not as a story confined within national borders but as a transnational dialogue that continually evolves through exchange, adaptation, and reinterpretation. Agents of Change: American Jews and the Transformation of Israeli Judaism offers an incisive analysis of how transnational networks have redefined modern Jewish identities.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/israel-studies

In this episode Drora Arussy speaks with historian Adam S. Ferziger about his latest book, Agents of Change: American Jews and the Transformation of Israeli Judaism (New York University Press, 2025). Ferziger, a professor at Bar-Ilan University and one of the leading voices in the study of modern religious movements, offers a compelling exploration of the transnational interactions that have reshaped Israeli Judaism and redefined the contours of religious Zionism. Agents of Change investigates how ideas, teachers, and institutions moved across the Atlantic between America and Israel, creating new hybrid forms of Jewish religious expression. Ferziger focuses on a group of North American Orthodox rabbis and educators, many of them students of Rabbi Dr. Joseph B. Soloveitchik at Yeshiva University, who immigrated to Israel between 1965 and 1983. These figures—working at the nexus of American Modern Orthodoxy and Israeli religious Zionism—introduced new educational paradigms, reimagined communal norms, and ultimately diversified the ideological landscape of Israeli Orthodoxy. The conversation delves into the shifting meaning of religious Zionism after the 1967 Six-Day War, when a movement once on the margins of Zionist politics emerged as a vital force within Israeli society. Ferziger traces how theological optimism about Israel's redemptive role led to internal debates over nationalism, messianism, and engagement with secular Israeli culture. He also shows how American-trained educators brought new emphases on intellectual openness, structured learning, and ethical responsibility that subtly reconfigured Israeli Torah study and communal life. Interwoven through the dialogue is a broader reflection on transnational educational exchange—how Jewish learning operates as both a local and global phenomenon. Ferziger emphasizes education's transformative potential: students, he argues, do not merely replicate ideas but reinterpret them within new social and cultural frames. This dynamic has fueled the growth of innovative models in contemporary Israel, from advanced programs for women's Torah study to initiatives blending religious learning with military and civic service. Arussy and Ferziger also discuss adjacent developments, including the integration of American Haredim into Israeli society, the emergence of Orthodox feminism as a transnational phenomenon, and the rise of global study networks such as Hadran, founded by Michelle Farber. Through these case studies, Ferziger illustrates how the intellectual and spiritual currents flowing between America and Israel continue to reshape what it means to live a religious Jewish life in a modern state. Throughout the interview, Ferziger reflects on the delicate balance between personal engagement and scholarly distance, underscoring the historian's task of acknowledging one's perspective while maintaining methodological transparency. His approach embodies the spirit of Agents of Change: to view Jewish history not as a story confined within national borders but as a transnational dialogue that continually evolves through exchange, adaptation, and reinterpretation. Agents of Change: American Jews and the Transformation of Israeli Judaism offers an incisive analysis of how transnational networks have redefined modern Jewish identities.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/religion

In the United States, local law enforcement agencies are legally and organizationally independent entities from federal law enforcement agencies like the FBI and ICE. While local police enforce local, state and federal laws, they are not required to enforce civil immigration laws. On the Side of ICE: Policing Immigrants in a Sanctuary State (NYU Press, 2025) examines the role of local police as voluntary, auxiliary reinforcements for ICE, focusing on the police force in New Jersey. It argues that even police in sanctuary jurisdictions, which explicitly label themselves as immigrant-friendly, are nonetheless still informally multiplying ICE's forces through voluntary cooperation. While to date, the ethnography of policing has been produced from participant observation with the police in “ride-alongs” during patrol work and in jails and the examination of official documents like police reports, this book employs a novel method of transcribing police body worn camera (BWC) video footage to provide immersive, ethnographic thick description narratives of instances of local police officers assisting ICE. It makes the case that BWC ethnographic methods are better able to capture realistic interactions between the police and those they stop than when participant observers are on the scene. The volume thus not only reveals the ways in which local police function to assist ICE in enforcing federal civil immigration law, but also demonstrates the significance of using BWC-based ethnographies to examine how police exercise power. From police footage, internal records, and other materials, On the Side of ICE renders intimate, on-the-ground ethnographic narratives that illuminate what policing immigration looks like in contemporary America. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

In the United States, local law enforcement agencies are legally and organizationally independent entities from federal law enforcement agencies like the FBI and ICE. While local police enforce local, state and federal laws, they are not required to enforce civil immigration laws. On the Side of ICE: Policing Immigrants in a Sanctuary State (NYU Press, 2025) examines the role of local police as voluntary, auxiliary reinforcements for ICE, focusing on the police force in New Jersey. It argues that even police in sanctuary jurisdictions, which explicitly label themselves as immigrant-friendly, are nonetheless still informally multiplying ICE's forces through voluntary cooperation. While to date, the ethnography of policing has been produced from participant observation with the police in “ride-alongs” during patrol work and in jails and the examination of official documents like police reports, this book employs a novel method of transcribing police body worn camera (BWC) video footage to provide immersive, ethnographic thick description narratives of instances of local police officers assisting ICE. It makes the case that BWC ethnographic methods are better able to capture realistic interactions between the police and those they stop than when participant observers are on the scene. The volume thus not only reveals the ways in which local police function to assist ICE in enforcing federal civil immigration law, but also demonstrates the significance of using BWC-based ethnographies to examine how police exercise power. From police footage, internal records, and other materials, On the Side of ICE renders intimate, on-the-ground ethnographic narratives that illuminate what policing immigration looks like in contemporary America. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/american-studies

In the United States, local law enforcement agencies are legally and organizationally independent entities from federal law enforcement agencies like the FBI and ICE. While local police enforce local, state and federal laws, they are not required to enforce civil immigration laws. On the Side of ICE: Policing Immigrants in a Sanctuary State (NYU Press, 2025) examines the role of local police as voluntary, auxiliary reinforcements for ICE, focusing on the police force in New Jersey. It argues that even police in sanctuary jurisdictions, which explicitly label themselves as immigrant-friendly, are nonetheless still informally multiplying ICE's forces through voluntary cooperation. While to date, the ethnography of policing has been produced from participant observation with the police in “ride-alongs” during patrol work and in jails and the examination of official documents like police reports, this book employs a novel method of transcribing police body worn camera (BWC) video footage to provide immersive, ethnographic thick description narratives of instances of local police officers assisting ICE. It makes the case that BWC ethnographic methods are better able to capture realistic interactions between the police and those they stop than when participant observers are on the scene. The volume thus not only reveals the ways in which local police function to assist ICE in enforcing federal civil immigration law, but also demonstrates the significance of using BWC-based ethnographies to examine how police exercise power. From police footage, internal records, and other materials, On the Side of ICE renders intimate, on-the-ground ethnographic narratives that illuminate what policing immigration looks like in contemporary America. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/public-policy

In the United States, local law enforcement agencies are legally and organizationally independent entities from federal law enforcement agencies like the FBI and ICE. While local police enforce local, state and federal laws, they are not required to enforce civil immigration laws. On the Side of ICE: Policing Immigrants in a Sanctuary State (NYU Press, 2025) examines the role of local police as voluntary, auxiliary reinforcements for ICE, focusing on the police force in New Jersey. It argues that even police in sanctuary jurisdictions, which explicitly label themselves as immigrant-friendly, are nonetheless still informally multiplying ICE's forces through voluntary cooperation. While to date, the ethnography of policing has been produced from participant observation with the police in “ride-alongs” during patrol work and in jails and the examination of official documents like police reports, this book employs a novel method of transcribing police body worn camera (BWC) video footage to provide immersive, ethnographic thick description narratives of instances of local police officers assisting ICE. It makes the case that BWC ethnographic methods are better able to capture realistic interactions between the police and those they stop than when participant observers are on the scene. The volume thus not only reveals the ways in which local police function to assist ICE in enforcing federal civil immigration law, but also demonstrates the significance of using BWC-based ethnographies to examine how police exercise power. From police footage, internal records, and other materials, On the Side of ICE renders intimate, on-the-ground ethnographic narratives that illuminate what policing immigration looks like in contemporary America. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The American Jewish philanthropic enterprise is unparalleled in scope, dynamism, and the diversity of funders and the causes they support. Yet even as Jewish giving has been largely successful in responding with alacrity to emergencies, it has been subjected to severe criticism. What once was regarded as a point of pride has become the object of scorn and dismissal, with skepticism--if not harsh criticism--about its work rife both within and outside Jewish communal circles. Based on 320 interviews with professionals at Jewish not-for-profits across the United States, principals of foundations and their top staff personnel, and also tax filings of major foundations, Jewish Giving: Philanthropy and the Shaping of American Jewish Life (NYU Press, 2025) provides readers with fresh perspectives to evaluate the efforts of Jewish donors, large and small. The book traces the evolution of Jewish giving from the colonial era to the present, charting the changing profile of those who give to Jewish causes and what funders have aimed to achieve through their largesse. It makes the case that philanthropy serves as a prism through which broader themes in communal life are illuminated. As society or politics change, the priorities of charitable giving adjust in response. These changes in targeted funding can help to sharpen our understanding of demographic and social patterns. Devoting much attention to twenty-first century developments in contemporary Jewish giving, the book pays special attention to the changing landscape of donors who are remaking Jewish philanthropy, including women, Orthodox Jews, Sephardi givers, and young funders. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

The American Jewish philanthropic enterprise is unparalleled in scope, dynamism, and the diversity of funders and the causes they support. Yet even as Jewish giving has been largely successful in responding with alacrity to emergencies, it has been subjected to severe criticism. What once was regarded as a point of pride has become the object of scorn and dismissal, with skepticism--if not harsh criticism--about its work rife both within and outside Jewish communal circles. Based on 320 interviews with professionals at Jewish not-for-profits across the United States, principals of foundations and their top staff personnel, and also tax filings of major foundations, Jewish Giving: Philanthropy and the Shaping of American Jewish Life (NYU Press, 2025) provides readers with fresh perspectives to evaluate the efforts of Jewish donors, large and small. The book traces the evolution of Jewish giving from the colonial era to the present, charting the changing profile of those who give to Jewish causes and what funders have aimed to achieve through their largesse. It makes the case that philanthropy serves as a prism through which broader themes in communal life are illuminated. As society or politics change, the priorities of charitable giving adjust in response. These changes in targeted funding can help to sharpen our understanding of demographic and social patterns. Devoting much attention to twenty-first century developments in contemporary Jewish giving, the book pays special attention to the changing landscape of donors who are remaking Jewish philanthropy, including women, Orthodox Jews, Sephardi givers, and young funders. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/jewish-studies

Before Hacks and The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, there was the comedienne who started it all. First Lady of Laughs: The Forgotten Story of Jean Carroll (NYU Press, 2024) tells the story of Jean Carroll, the first Jewish woman to become a star in the field we now call stand-up comedy. Though rarely mentioned among the pantheon of early stand-up comics such as Henny Youngman and Lenny Bruce, Jean Carroll rivaled or even outshone the male counterparts of her heyday, playing more major theaters than any other comedian of her period. In addition to releasing a hit comedy album, Girl in a Hot Steam Bath, and briefly starring in her own sitcom on ABC, she also made twenty-nine appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show.Carroll made enduring changes to the genre of stand-up comedy, carving space for women and modeling a new form of Jewish femininity with her glamorous, acculturated, but still recognizably Jewish persona. She innovated a newly conversational, intimate style of stand-up, which is now recognized in comics like Joan Rivers, Sarah Silverman, and Tiffany Haddish. When Carroll was ninety-five she was honored at the Friars Club in New York City, where celebrities like Joy Behar and Lily Tomlin praised her influence on their craft. But her celebrated career began as an impoverished immigrant child, scrounging for talent show prize money to support her family.Drawing on archival footage, press clippings, and Jean Carroll's personal scrapbook, First Lady of Laughs restores Jean Carroll's remarkable story to its rightful place in the lineage of comedy history and Jewish American performance. Jane Scimeca, Professor of History at Brookdale Community College Website here @janescimeca.bsky.social Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

Before Hacks and The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, there was the comedienne who started it all. First Lady of Laughs: The Forgotten Story of Jean Carroll (NYU Press, 2024) tells the story of Jean Carroll, the first Jewish woman to become a star in the field we now call stand-up comedy. Though rarely mentioned among the pantheon of early stand-up comics such as Henny Youngman and Lenny Bruce, Jean Carroll rivaled or even outshone the male counterparts of her heyday, playing more major theaters than any other comedian of her period. In addition to releasing a hit comedy album, Girl in a Hot Steam Bath, and briefly starring in her own sitcom on ABC, she also made twenty-nine appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show.Carroll made enduring changes to the genre of stand-up comedy, carving space for women and modeling a new form of Jewish femininity with her glamorous, acculturated, but still recognizably Jewish persona. She innovated a newly conversational, intimate style of stand-up, which is now recognized in comics like Joan Rivers, Sarah Silverman, and Tiffany Haddish. When Carroll was ninety-five she was honored at the Friars Club in New York City, where celebrities like Joy Behar and Lily Tomlin praised her influence on their craft. But her celebrated career began as an impoverished immigrant child, scrounging for talent show prize money to support her family.Drawing on archival footage, press clippings, and Jean Carroll's personal scrapbook, First Lady of Laughs restores Jean Carroll's remarkable story to its rightful place in the lineage of comedy history and Jewish American performance. Jane Scimeca, Professor of History at Brookdale Community College Website here @janescimeca.bsky.social Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/gender-studies

Before Hacks and The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, there was the comedienne who started it all. First Lady of Laughs: The Forgotten Story of Jean Carroll (NYU Press, 2024) tells the story of Jean Carroll, the first Jewish woman to become a star in the field we now call stand-up comedy. Though rarely mentioned among the pantheon of early stand-up comics such as Henny Youngman and Lenny Bruce, Jean Carroll rivaled or even outshone the male counterparts of her heyday, playing more major theaters than any other comedian of her period. In addition to releasing a hit comedy album, Girl in a Hot Steam Bath, and briefly starring in her own sitcom on ABC, she also made twenty-nine appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show.Carroll made enduring changes to the genre of stand-up comedy, carving space for women and modeling a new form of Jewish femininity with her glamorous, acculturated, but still recognizably Jewish persona. She innovated a newly conversational, intimate style of stand-up, which is now recognized in comics like Joan Rivers, Sarah Silverman, and Tiffany Haddish. When Carroll was ninety-five she was honored at the Friars Club in New York City, where celebrities like Joy Behar and Lily Tomlin praised her influence on their craft. But her celebrated career began as an impoverished immigrant child, scrounging for talent show prize money to support her family.Drawing on archival footage, press clippings, and Jean Carroll's personal scrapbook, First Lady of Laughs restores Jean Carroll's remarkable story to its rightful place in the lineage of comedy history and Jewish American performance. Jane Scimeca, Professor of History at Brookdale Community College Website here @janescimeca.bsky.social Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/jewish-studies

Before Hacks and The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, there was the comedienne who started it all. First Lady of Laughs: The Forgotten Story of Jean Carroll (NYU Press, 2024) tells the story of Jean Carroll, the first Jewish woman to become a star in the field we now call stand-up comedy. Though rarely mentioned among the pantheon of early stand-up comics such as Henny Youngman and Lenny Bruce, Jean Carroll rivaled or even outshone the male counterparts of her heyday, playing more major theaters than any other comedian of her period. In addition to releasing a hit comedy album, Girl in a Hot Steam Bath, and briefly starring in her own sitcom on ABC, she also made twenty-nine appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show.Carroll made enduring changes to the genre of stand-up comedy, carving space for women and modeling a new form of Jewish femininity with her glamorous, acculturated, but still recognizably Jewish persona. She innovated a newly conversational, intimate style of stand-up, which is now recognized in comics like Joan Rivers, Sarah Silverman, and Tiffany Haddish. When Carroll was ninety-five she was honored at the Friars Club in New York City, where celebrities like Joy Behar and Lily Tomlin praised her influence on their craft. But her celebrated career began as an impoverished immigrant child, scrounging for talent show prize money to support her family.Drawing on archival footage, press clippings, and Jean Carroll's personal scrapbook, First Lady of Laughs restores Jean Carroll's remarkable story to its rightful place in the lineage of comedy history and Jewish American performance. Jane Scimeca, Professor of History at Brookdale Community College Website here @janescimeca.bsky.social Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/performing-arts

Before Hacks and The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, there was the comedienne who started it all. First Lady of Laughs: The Forgotten Story of Jean Carroll (NYU Press, 2024) tells the story of Jean Carroll, the first Jewish woman to become a star in the field we now call stand-up comedy. Though rarely mentioned among the pantheon of early stand-up comics such as Henny Youngman and Lenny Bruce, Jean Carroll rivaled or even outshone the male counterparts of her heyday, playing more major theaters than any other comedian of her period. In addition to releasing a hit comedy album, Girl in a Hot Steam Bath, and briefly starring in her own sitcom on ABC, she also made twenty-nine appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show.Carroll made enduring changes to the genre of stand-up comedy, carving space for women and modeling a new form of Jewish femininity with her glamorous, acculturated, but still recognizably Jewish persona. She innovated a newly conversational, intimate style of stand-up, which is now recognized in comics like Joan Rivers, Sarah Silverman, and Tiffany Haddish. When Carroll was ninety-five she was honored at the Friars Club in New York City, where celebrities like Joy Behar and Lily Tomlin praised her influence on their craft. But her celebrated career began as an impoverished immigrant child, scrounging for talent show prize money to support her family.Drawing on archival footage, press clippings, and Jean Carroll's personal scrapbook, First Lady of Laughs restores Jean Carroll's remarkable story to its rightful place in the lineage of comedy history and Jewish American performance. Jane Scimeca, Professor of History at Brookdale Community College Website here @janescimeca.bsky.social Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this powerful episode, Inclusion Catalyst sits down with Professor Corinna Lain, legal scholar and author of the forthcoming book Secrets of the Killing State, to examine the realities behind lethal injection in the United States. Lain's work exposes a system shrouded in secrecy, built on medical misconception, and sustained by public misunderstanding. Corinna Lain's research confronts the core question: Why are states so bad at lethal injection?What emerges is a disturbing truth: the method widely perceived as humane is structurally designed to hide pain, avoid accountability, and preserve the political palatability of the death penalty. Key Themes & Insights Lethal Injection as Hidden Torture The standard three-drug protocol uses a paralytic that freezes the face and body, masking the agony inflicted by potassium chloride. Autopsies routinely show multiple puncture wounds, evidence of repeated failed IV attempts by unqualified staff. Some executions have lasted hours, including the three-hour execution of Joe Nathan James. State Secrecy and Systemic Malpractice Many executions are carried out by non-medical prison staff, not trained clinicians States source drugs from unqualified vendors, including individuals running non-pharmaceutical businesses. Protocols are frequently violated: Curtains raised too early. Media witnesses banned. IV insertions hidden from public view. Prisoners' fingers are often taped down to prevent signaling pain. The Making of the Book Lain felt spiritually called to document these abuses and persisted through a year of publisher rejections. A fortuitous meeting led to a contract with NYU Press, which will release the book Easter 2025. The manuscript is extensively documented, with 1,000+ endnotes drawn from depositions, investigative journalism, and insider accounts. The 80-Day National Book Tour Lain traveled 12,000 miles across 23 states, taking unpaid leave to bring public attention to the issue. Reception has been overwhelmingly positive — and notably, no state official has challenged her findings. Why Lethal Injection Persists Lain argues its primary function is aesthetic: to make state killing appear peaceful, preserving public support. The book reframes the death penalty debate from “Does the prisoner deserve to die?” to “Does the state deserve the power to kill?” Many people on death row undergo profound personal transformation; the state may be, in Lain's words, “killing its Pauls.” This episode is produced in partnership with the Georgia Interfaith Public Policy Center.

Like any set of star-crossed lovers, Elaine and Charles came from different worlds. Elaine, an acclaimed childhood poet from a remote corner of the Massachusetts Berkshires, traveled to the Dakota Territories to teach Native American students, undaunted by society's admonitions. Charles, a Dakota Sioux from Minnesota, educated at Dartmouth and Boston University Medical School, was considered by his Euro-American mentors the epitome of an assimilated Indian. But when they met just ahead of the Wounded Knee Massacre in 1890, the magnetic pull of love brought them together despite the tremendous odds stacked against them.Love and Loss After Wounded Knee: A Biography of an Extraordinary Interracial Marriage (NYU Press, 2025) by Dr. Julie Dobrow offers a dual biography of Elaine Goodale and Ohíye'Sa, (Dr. Charles Alexander Eastman), exploring their individual lives as well as their highly publicized interracial marriage. Both well-known in their own time– Elaine as a poet, journalist, and advocate for Indian education and Charles as writer, public speaker, and ardent activist for Indian rights– their marriage started with a shared vision to work on behalf of Indians. In the face of extreme prejudice, financial burden, and personal tragedy however, the marriage began to unravel.Dr. Dobrow paints an intimate, emotional portrait of the Eastmans' lives drawn from Elaine and Charles's letters, papers, and hundreds of accounts of the Eastmans' lives from newspapers. Along the way, she skillfully illuminates the shifting late 19th and early 20th century definitions of Indigenous identity, and reveals how the Eastmans' legacies reflect changing American attitudes toward gender, interracial relationships and biracial children. The result is a compelling new history that weds the private and the political, and Native America and the United States of America– entwined yet separated, inextricable yet never fully joined, just like Elaine and Charles themselves. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda's interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

Like any set of star-crossed lovers, Elaine and Charles came from different worlds. Elaine, an acclaimed childhood poet from a remote corner of the Massachusetts Berkshires, traveled to the Dakota Territories to teach Native American students, undaunted by society's admonitions. Charles, a Dakota Sioux from Minnesota, educated at Dartmouth and Boston University Medical School, was considered by his Euro-American mentors the epitome of an assimilated Indian. But when they met just ahead of the Wounded Knee Massacre in 1890, the magnetic pull of love brought them together despite the tremendous odds stacked against them.Love and Loss After Wounded Knee: A Biography of an Extraordinary Interracial Marriage (NYU Press, 2025) by Dr. Julie Dobrow offers a dual biography of Elaine Goodale and Ohíye'Sa, (Dr. Charles Alexander Eastman), exploring their individual lives as well as their highly publicized interracial marriage. Both well-known in their own time– Elaine as a poet, journalist, and advocate for Indian education and Charles as writer, public speaker, and ardent activist for Indian rights– their marriage started with a shared vision to work on behalf of Indians. In the face of extreme prejudice, financial burden, and personal tragedy however, the marriage began to unravel.Dr. Dobrow paints an intimate, emotional portrait of the Eastmans' lives drawn from Elaine and Charles's letters, papers, and hundreds of accounts of the Eastmans' lives from newspapers. Along the way, she skillfully illuminates the shifting late 19th and early 20th century definitions of Indigenous identity, and reveals how the Eastmans' legacies reflect changing American attitudes toward gender, interracial relationships and biracial children. The result is a compelling new history that weds the private and the political, and Native America and the United States of America– entwined yet separated, inextricable yet never fully joined, just like Elaine and Charles themselves. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda's interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/native-american-studies

Like any set of star-crossed lovers, Elaine and Charles came from different worlds. Elaine, an acclaimed childhood poet from a remote corner of the Massachusetts Berkshires, traveled to the Dakota Territories to teach Native American students, undaunted by society's admonitions. Charles, a Dakota Sioux from Minnesota, educated at Dartmouth and Boston University Medical School, was considered by his Euro-American mentors the epitome of an assimilated Indian. But when they met just ahead of the Wounded Knee Massacre in 1890, the magnetic pull of love brought them together despite the tremendous odds stacked against them.Love and Loss After Wounded Knee: A Biography of an Extraordinary Interracial Marriage (NYU Press, 2025) by Dr. Julie Dobrow offers a dual biography of Elaine Goodale and Ohíye'Sa, (Dr. Charles Alexander Eastman), exploring their individual lives as well as their highly publicized interracial marriage. Both well-known in their own time– Elaine as a poet, journalist, and advocate for Indian education and Charles as writer, public speaker, and ardent activist for Indian rights– their marriage started with a shared vision to work on behalf of Indians. In the face of extreme prejudice, financial burden, and personal tragedy however, the marriage began to unravel.Dr. Dobrow paints an intimate, emotional portrait of the Eastmans' lives drawn from Elaine and Charles's letters, papers, and hundreds of accounts of the Eastmans' lives from newspapers. Along the way, she skillfully illuminates the shifting late 19th and early 20th century definitions of Indigenous identity, and reveals how the Eastmans' legacies reflect changing American attitudes toward gender, interracial relationships and biracial children. The result is a compelling new history that weds the private and the political, and Native America and the United States of America– entwined yet separated, inextricable yet never fully joined, just like Elaine and Charles themselves. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda's interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/biography

Like any set of star-crossed lovers, Elaine and Charles came from different worlds. Elaine, an acclaimed childhood poet from a remote corner of the Massachusetts Berkshires, traveled to the Dakota Territories to teach Native American students, undaunted by society's admonitions. Charles, a Dakota Sioux from Minnesota, educated at Dartmouth and Boston University Medical School, was considered by his Euro-American mentors the epitome of an assimilated Indian. But when they met just ahead of the Wounded Knee Massacre in 1890, the magnetic pull of love brought them together despite the tremendous odds stacked against them.Love and Loss After Wounded Knee: A Biography of an Extraordinary Interracial Marriage (NYU Press, 2025) by Dr. Julie Dobrow offers a dual biography of Elaine Goodale and Ohíye'Sa, (Dr. Charles Alexander Eastman), exploring their individual lives as well as their highly publicized interracial marriage. Both well-known in their own time– Elaine as a poet, journalist, and advocate for Indian education and Charles as writer, public speaker, and ardent activist for Indian rights– their marriage started with a shared vision to work on behalf of Indians. In the face of extreme prejudice, financial burden, and personal tragedy however, the marriage began to unravel.Dr. Dobrow paints an intimate, emotional portrait of the Eastmans' lives drawn from Elaine and Charles's letters, papers, and hundreds of accounts of the Eastmans' lives from newspapers. Along the way, she skillfully illuminates the shifting late 19th and early 20th century definitions of Indigenous identity, and reveals how the Eastmans' legacies reflect changing American attitudes toward gender, interracial relationships and biracial children. The result is a compelling new history that weds the private and the political, and Native America and the United States of America– entwined yet separated, inextricable yet never fully joined, just like Elaine and Charles themselves. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda's interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/american-studies

The surprising story of the Army's efforts to combat PTSD and traumatic brain injury The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have taken a tremendous toll on the mental health of our troops. In 2005, then-Senator Barack Obama took to the Senate floor to tell his colleagues that "many of our injured soldiers are returning from Iraq with traumatic brain injury," which doctors were calling the "signature wound" of the Iraq War. Alarming stories of veterans taking their own lives raised a host of vital questions: Why hadn't the military been better prepared to treat post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and traumatic brain injury (TBI)? Why were troops being denied care and sent back to Iraq? Why weren't the Army and the VA doing more to address these issues? Drawing on previously unreleased documents and oral histories, David Kieran tells the broad and nuanced story of the Army's efforts to understand and address these issues, challenging the popular media view that the Iraq War was mismanaged by a callous military unwilling to address the human toll of the wars. The story of mental health during this war is the story of how different groups--soldiers, veterans and their families, anti-war politicians, researchers and clinicians, and military leaders--approached these issues from different perspectives and with different agendas. It is the story of how the advancement of medical knowledge moves at a different pace than the needs of an Army at war, and it is the story of how medical conditions intersect with larger political questions about militarism and foreign policy. Signature Wounds: The Untold Story of the Military's Mental Health Crisis (NYU Press, 2019) shows how PTSD, TBI, and suicide became the signature wounds of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, how they prompted change within the Army itself, and how mental health became a factor in the debates about the impact of these conflicts on US culture. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

The surprising story of the Army's efforts to combat PTSD and traumatic brain injury The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have taken a tremendous toll on the mental health of our troops. In 2005, then-Senator Barack Obama took to the Senate floor to tell his colleagues that "many of our injured soldiers are returning from Iraq with traumatic brain injury," which doctors were calling the "signature wound" of the Iraq War. Alarming stories of veterans taking their own lives raised a host of vital questions: Why hadn't the military been better prepared to treat post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and traumatic brain injury (TBI)? Why were troops being denied care and sent back to Iraq? Why weren't the Army and the VA doing more to address these issues? Drawing on previously unreleased documents and oral histories, David Kieran tells the broad and nuanced story of the Army's efforts to understand and address these issues, challenging the popular media view that the Iraq War was mismanaged by a callous military unwilling to address the human toll of the wars. The story of mental health during this war is the story of how different groups--soldiers, veterans and their families, anti-war politicians, researchers and clinicians, and military leaders--approached these issues from different perspectives and with different agendas. It is the story of how the advancement of medical knowledge moves at a different pace than the needs of an Army at war, and it is the story of how medical conditions intersect with larger political questions about militarism and foreign policy. Signature Wounds: The Untold Story of the Military's Mental Health Crisis (NYU Press, 2019) shows how PTSD, TBI, and suicide became the signature wounds of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, how they prompted change within the Army itself, and how mental health became a factor in the debates about the impact of these conflicts on US culture. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history