Podcasts about oxford up

Democratic backsliding, culture wars and partisan politics in the past two decades has seen the regression of human rights protections in the courts and across societies. However, having made incremental gains in constitutional courts, LGBTQ+ rights operate as somewhat of a paradox. In this pivotal work, Professor Rehan Abeyratne makes an argument that the progress made in LGBTQ+ rights protection obscures an increased shift towards authoritarian legality in the courts and beyond. Case studies of three apex courts - the U.S. Supreme Court, the Supreme Court of India, and the Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal - provide insight into the erosion of democracy and the rule of law across these jurisdictions. Courts and  LGBTQ+ Rights in an Age of Judicial Retrenchment (Oxford UP, 2025) is an important work and should serve as a warning sign to constitutional lawyers, human rights scholars and anybody interested in the values that underpin liberal democracy as to the the limited ability of constitutional courts to protect rights in the current climate.   Professor Rehan Abeyratne is is Professor and Associate Dean (Higher Degree Research) at Western Sydney University School of Law, where he teaches Government and Public Law, Legal Research and Methodology, and Comparative Law: Legal Systems of the World. He also coordinates the School of Law's Honours Program. Professor Abeyratne holds a PhD from Monash University, a JD from Harvard Law School, and a BA (Hons.) in Political Science from Brown University. He researches comparative constitutional law and has published several books and articles in world leading journals. Most of Prof. Abeyratne's research can be freely accessed on SSRN, Academia, and Google Scholar. 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

Democratic backsliding, culture wars and partisan politics in the past two decades has seen the regression of human rights protections in the courts and across societies. However, having made incremental gains in constitutional courts, LGBTQ+ rights operate as somewhat of a paradox. In this pivotal work, Professor Rehan Abeyratne makes an argument that the progress made in LGBTQ+ rights protection obscures an increased shift towards authoritarian legality in the courts and beyond. Case studies of three apex courts - the U.S. Supreme Court, the Supreme Court of India, and the Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal - provide insight into the erosion of democracy and the rule of law across these jurisdictions. Courts and  LGBTQ+ Rights in an Age of Judicial Retrenchment (Oxford UP, 2025) is an important work and should serve as a warning sign to constitutional lawyers, human rights scholars and anybody interested in the values that underpin liberal democracy as to the the limited ability of constitutional courts to protect rights in the current climate.   Professor Rehan Abeyratne is is Professor and Associate Dean (Higher Degree Research) at Western Sydney University School of Law, where he teaches Government and Public Law, Legal Research and Methodology, and Comparative Law: Legal Systems of the World. He also coordinates the School of Law's Honours Program. Professor Abeyratne holds a PhD from Monash University, a JD from Harvard Law School, and a BA (Hons.) in Political Science from Brown University. He researches comparative constitutional law and has published several books and articles in world leading journals. Most of Prof. Abeyratne's research can be freely accessed on SSRN, Academia, and Google Scholar. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/east-asian-studies

Does good democratic government require intelligent, moral, and productive citizens? Can our political institutions educate the kind of citizens we wish or need to have? With recent arguments "against democracy" and fears about the rise of populism, there is growing scepticism about whether liberalism and democracy can continue to survive together. Some even question whether democracy is worth saving. In Democracy Tamed: French Liberalism and the Politics of Suffrage (Oxford UP, 2024), Gianna Englert argues that the dilemmas facing liberal democracy are not unique to our present moment, but have existed since the birth of liberal political thought in nineteenth-century France. Combining political theory and intellectual history, Englert shows how nineteenth-century French liberals championed the idea of "political capacity" as an alternative to democratic political rights and argued that voting rights should be limited to capable citizens who would preserve free, stable institutions against revolutionary passions and democratic demands. Liberals also redefined democracy itself, from its ancient meaning as political rule by the people to something that, counterintuitively, demanded the guidance of a capable few rather than the rule of all.Understandably, scholarly treatments of political capacity have criticized the idea as exclusionary and potentially dangerous. Englert argues instead that political capacity was a flexible standard that developed alongside a changing society and economy, allowing liberals to embrace democracy without abandoning their first principles. She reveals a forgotten, uncharted path of liberalism in France that remained open to political democracy while aiming to foster citizen capacity. Overall, Democracy Tamed tells the story of how the earliest liberals deployed their notion of the "new democracy" to resist universal suffrage. But it also reveals how later liberals would appropriate their predecessors' antidemocratic arguments to safeguard liberal democracies as we have come to know them. Gianna Englert is Associate Professor of Humanities in The Hamilton School for Classical and Civic Education at the University of Florida. Morteza Hajizadeh is a Ph.D. graduate in English from the University of Auckland in New Zealand. His research interests are Cultural Studies; Critical Theory; Environmental History; Medieval (Intellectual) History; Gothic Studies; 18th and 19th Century British Literature. YouTube Channel: here 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

Does good democratic government require intelligent, moral, and productive citizens? Can our political institutions educate the kind of citizens we wish or need to have? With recent arguments "against democracy" and fears about the rise of populism, there is growing scepticism about whether liberalism and democracy can continue to survive together. Some even question whether democracy is worth saving. In Democracy Tamed: French Liberalism and the Politics of Suffrage (Oxford UP, 2024), Gianna Englert argues that the dilemmas facing liberal democracy are not unique to our present moment, but have existed since the birth of liberal political thought in nineteenth-century France. Combining political theory and intellectual history, Englert shows how nineteenth-century French liberals championed the idea of "political capacity" as an alternative to democratic political rights and argued that voting rights should be limited to capable citizens who would preserve free, stable institutions against revolutionary passions and democratic demands. Liberals also redefined democracy itself, from its ancient meaning as political rule by the people to something that, counterintuitively, demanded the guidance of a capable few rather than the rule of all.Understandably, scholarly treatments of political capacity have criticized the idea as exclusionary and potentially dangerous. Englert argues instead that political capacity was a flexible standard that developed alongside a changing society and economy, allowing liberals to embrace democracy without abandoning their first principles. She reveals a forgotten, uncharted path of liberalism in France that remained open to political democracy while aiming to foster citizen capacity. Overall, Democracy Tamed tells the story of how the earliest liberals deployed their notion of the "new democracy" to resist universal suffrage. But it also reveals how later liberals would appropriate their predecessors' antidemocratic arguments to safeguard liberal democracies as we have come to know them. Gianna Englert is Associate Professor of Humanities in The Hamilton School for Classical and Civic Education at the University of Florida. Morteza Hajizadeh is a Ph.D. graduate in English from the University of Auckland in New Zealand. His research interests are Cultural Studies; Critical Theory; Environmental History; Medieval (Intellectual) History; Gothic Studies; 18th and 19th Century British Literature. YouTube Channel: here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/political-science

Does good democratic government require intelligent, moral, and productive citizens? Can our political institutions educate the kind of citizens we wish or need to have? With recent arguments "against democracy" and fears about the rise of populism, there is growing scepticism about whether liberalism and democracy can continue to survive together. Some even question whether democracy is worth saving. In Democracy Tamed: French Liberalism and the Politics of Suffrage (Oxford UP, 2024), Gianna Englert argues that the dilemmas facing liberal democracy are not unique to our present moment, but have existed since the birth of liberal political thought in nineteenth-century France. Combining political theory and intellectual history, Englert shows how nineteenth-century French liberals championed the idea of "political capacity" as an alternative to democratic political rights and argued that voting rights should be limited to capable citizens who would preserve free, stable institutions against revolutionary passions and democratic demands. Liberals also redefined democracy itself, from its ancient meaning as political rule by the people to something that, counterintuitively, demanded the guidance of a capable few rather than the rule of all.Understandably, scholarly treatments of political capacity have criticized the idea as exclusionary and potentially dangerous. Englert argues instead that political capacity was a flexible standard that developed alongside a changing society and economy, allowing liberals to embrace democracy without abandoning their first principles. She reveals a forgotten, uncharted path of liberalism in France that remained open to political democracy while aiming to foster citizen capacity. Overall, Democracy Tamed tells the story of how the earliest liberals deployed their notion of the "new democracy" to resist universal suffrage. But it also reveals how later liberals would appropriate their predecessors' antidemocratic arguments to safeguard liberal democracies as we have come to know them. Gianna Englert is Associate Professor of Humanities in The Hamilton School for Classical and Civic Education at the University of Florida. Morteza Hajizadeh is a Ph.D. graduate in English from the University of Auckland in New Zealand. His research interests are Cultural Studies; Critical Theory; Environmental History; Medieval (Intellectual) History; Gothic Studies; 18th and 19th Century British Literature. YouTube Channel: here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/critical-theory

Does good democratic government require intelligent, moral, and productive citizens? Can our political institutions educate the kind of citizens we wish or need to have? With recent arguments "against democracy" and fears about the rise of populism, there is growing scepticism about whether liberalism and democracy can continue to survive together. Some even question whether democracy is worth saving. In Democracy Tamed: French Liberalism and the Politics of Suffrage (Oxford UP, 2024), Gianna Englert argues that the dilemmas facing liberal democracy are not unique to our present moment, but have existed since the birth of liberal political thought in nineteenth-century France. Combining political theory and intellectual history, Englert shows how nineteenth-century French liberals championed the idea of "political capacity" as an alternative to democratic political rights and argued that voting rights should be limited to capable citizens who would preserve free, stable institutions against revolutionary passions and democratic demands. Liberals also redefined democracy itself, from its ancient meaning as political rule by the people to something that, counterintuitively, demanded the guidance of a capable few rather than the rule of all.Understandably, scholarly treatments of political capacity have criticized the idea as exclusionary and potentially dangerous. Englert argues instead that political capacity was a flexible standard that developed alongside a changing society and economy, allowing liberals to embrace democracy without abandoning their first principles. She reveals a forgotten, uncharted path of liberalism in France that remained open to political democracy while aiming to foster citizen capacity. Overall, Democracy Tamed tells the story of how the earliest liberals deployed their notion of the "new democracy" to resist universal suffrage. But it also reveals how later liberals would appropriate their predecessors' antidemocratic arguments to safeguard liberal democracies as we have come to know them. Gianna Englert is Associate Professor of Humanities in The Hamilton School for Classical and Civic Education at the University of Florida. Morteza Hajizadeh is a Ph.D. graduate in English from the University of Auckland in New Zealand. His research interests are Cultural Studies; Critical Theory; Environmental History; Medieval (Intellectual) History; Gothic Studies; 18th and 19th Century British Literature. YouTube Channel: here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/intellectual-history

Beginning in the late nineteenth century, British companies used the resources of empire to create an imperial oil industry that controlled 20% of global oil reserves by 1939 and allowed for the movement of capital and labor between regions and companies. The imperial oil complex encompassed colonies—Burma and Trinidad—and dependent states-Iraq and Iraq. In both, the imperial state used its political and military power to support British oil interests. The oil complex drew on the resources of empire but also bolstered it with profits and tax revenues while a global set of oil sites supplied the British military and civilian consumers. British companies built an infrastructure of oil production that gave them quasi-state power in oil regions while connecting these areas to global and imperial networks of communication and transportation.Fuelling Empire: The British Imperial Oil Complex, 1886-1945 (Oxford UP, 2025) highlights the significance of Britain to the development of the global oil industry. It demonstrates the ways in which the global histories of oil and empire are inextricably interlinked. The imperial oil complex relied on a racially stratified hierarchy of labor where white supervisors managed indigenous and migrant workers. The harsh conditions of work and low pay fueled labor conflicts that resonated with emerging colonial nationalist movements that sought to limit the power of oil companies. Despite robust private and state security operations, the imperial oil complex faced greater insecurity before World War II. While the imperial oil complex survived the war, in the postwar era decolonization and Britain's financial weakness led to its decline. 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

Beginning in the late nineteenth century, British companies used the resources of empire to create an imperial oil industry that controlled 20% of global oil reserves by 1939 and allowed for the movement of capital and labor between regions and companies. The imperial oil complex encompassed colonies—Burma and Trinidad—and dependent states-Iraq and Iraq. In both, the imperial state used its political and military power to support British oil interests. The oil complex drew on the resources of empire but also bolstered it with profits and tax revenues while a global set of oil sites supplied the British military and civilian consumers. British companies built an infrastructure of oil production that gave them quasi-state power in oil regions while connecting these areas to global and imperial networks of communication and transportation.Fuelling Empire: The British Imperial Oil Complex, 1886-1945 (Oxford UP, 2025) highlights the significance of Britain to the development of the global oil industry. It demonstrates the ways in which the global histories of oil and empire are inextricably interlinked. The imperial oil complex relied on a racially stratified hierarchy of labor where white supervisors managed indigenous and migrant workers. The harsh conditions of work and low pay fueled labor conflicts that resonated with emerging colonial nationalist movements that sought to limit the power of oil companies. Despite robust private and state security operations, the imperial oil complex faced greater insecurity before World War II. While the imperial oil complex survived the war, in the postwar era decolonization and Britain's financial weakness led to its decline. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/history

Beginning in the late nineteenth century, British companies used the resources of empire to create an imperial oil industry that controlled 20% of global oil reserves by 1939 and allowed for the movement of capital and labor between regions and companies. The imperial oil complex encompassed colonies—Burma and Trinidad—and dependent states-Iraq and Iraq. In both, the imperial state used its political and military power to support British oil interests. The oil complex drew on the resources of empire but also bolstered it with profits and tax revenues while a global set of oil sites supplied the British military and civilian consumers. British companies built an infrastructure of oil production that gave them quasi-state power in oil regions while connecting these areas to global and imperial networks of communication and transportation.Fuelling Empire: The British Imperial Oil Complex, 1886-1945 (Oxford UP, 2025) highlights the significance of Britain to the development of the global oil industry. It demonstrates the ways in which the global histories of oil and empire are inextricably interlinked. The imperial oil complex relied on a racially stratified hierarchy of labor where white supervisors managed indigenous and migrant workers. The harsh conditions of work and low pay fueled labor conflicts that resonated with emerging colonial nationalist movements that sought to limit the power of oil companies. Despite robust private and state security operations, the imperial oil complex faced greater insecurity before World War II. While the imperial oil complex survived the war, in the postwar era decolonization and Britain's financial weakness led to its decline. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/middle-eastern-studies

To seek asylum, people often have to cross borders undocumented, embarking on perilous trajectories. Due to the war in Afghanistan, the rule of the Taliban, and severe human rights violations, over the past decades thousands of people have risked their lives to seek safety. By what means do they make these journeys, especially when they lack money and passports?Over the course of three years, Hannah Pool accompanied a group of Afghan friends and families as they attempted "The Game" - Game zadan: the route to Europe to seek asylum. The resulting ethnography follows them across their entire trajectories: through Iran, Turkey, Greece, and along the so-called Balkan route. In each place, Pool details the economic interactions and social relationships essential for acquiring, saving, borrowing, spending, and exchanging money to facilitate their undocumented migration routes.The Game: The Economy of Undocumented Migration from Afghanistan to Europe (Oxford UP, 2025) bridges economic sociology and migration studies to illustrate how migrants decide to trust people to facilitate their movement along these routes, focusing particularly on debt, special monies, bribes, donations, and gift-giving. Throughout the migration trajectory, relationships with family, fellow migrants, smugglers, humanitarian actors, and border control officials shape and are shaped by access to financial resources.Ultimately, the book highlights the dangers in undocumented border-crossing and delves into the core of what it means to flee: Who has the means to escape dangerous conditions to seek asylum? Hannah Pool is a Senior Researcher at the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies. 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

Today Cathleen interviews Elizabeth Garner Masarik, about her book, The Sentimental State: How Women-Led Reform Created the American Welfare State (University of Georgia Press, 2024), which is the 2025 winner of SHGAPE's H. Wayne Morgan Book Prize. For more information about the Society's three book awards (deadlines in October) see https://www.shgape.org/prizes-awards/Books mentioned by Dr. Masarik in today's interview:Katherine G. Aiken, Harnessing the Power of Motherhood: The National Florence Crittenton Mission, 1883-1925 (University of Tennessee Press, 1998)Brian Balogh, The Associational State: American Governance in the Twentieth Century (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2015)Regina Kunzel, Fallen Women, Problem Girls: Unmarried Mothers and the Professionalization of Social Work, 1890-1945 (Yale UP, 1993)Rickie Solinger, Wake up Little Susie: Single Pregnancy and Race Before Roe v. Wade (Routledge, 1992)Molly Ladd Taylor, Raising a Baby the Government Way: Mothers' Letters to the Children's Bureau, 1915-1932 (Rutgers University Press, 1986)Jane Tomkins, Sensational Designs: The Cultural Work of American Fiction, 1790-1860 (Oxford UP, 1985) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

To seek asylum, people often have to cross borders undocumented, embarking on perilous trajectories. Due to the war in Afghanistan, the rule of the Taliban, and severe human rights violations, over the past decades thousands of people have risked their lives to seek safety. By what means do they make these journeys, especially when they lack money and passports?Over the course of three years, Hannah Pool accompanied a group of Afghan friends and families as they attempted "The Game" - Game zadan: the route to Europe to seek asylum. The resulting ethnography follows them across their entire trajectories: through Iran, Turkey, Greece, and along the so-called Balkan route. In each place, Pool details the economic interactions and social relationships essential for acquiring, saving, borrowing, spending, and exchanging money to facilitate their undocumented migration routes.The Game: The Economy of Undocumented Migration from Afghanistan to Europe (Oxford UP, 2025) bridges economic sociology and migration studies to illustrate how migrants decide to trust people to facilitate their movement along these routes, focusing particularly on debt, special monies, bribes, donations, and gift-giving. Throughout the migration trajectory, relationships with family, fellow migrants, smugglers, humanitarian actors, and border control officials shape and are shaped by access to financial resources.Ultimately, the book highlights the dangers in undocumented border-crossing and delves into the core of what it means to flee: Who has the means to escape dangerous conditions to seek asylum? Hannah Pool is a Senior Researcher at the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/middle-eastern-studies

To seek asylum, people often have to cross borders undocumented, embarking on perilous trajectories. Due to the war in Afghanistan, the rule of the Taliban, and severe human rights violations, over the past decades thousands of people have risked their lives to seek safety. By what means do they make these journeys, especially when they lack money and passports?Over the course of three years, Hannah Pool accompanied a group of Afghan friends and families as they attempted "The Game" - Game zadan: the route to Europe to seek asylum. The resulting ethnography follows them across their entire trajectories: through Iran, Turkey, Greece, and along the so-called Balkan route. In each place, Pool details the economic interactions and social relationships essential for acquiring, saving, borrowing, spending, and exchanging money to facilitate their undocumented migration routes.The Game: The Economy of Undocumented Migration from Afghanistan to Europe (Oxford UP, 2025) bridges economic sociology and migration studies to illustrate how migrants decide to trust people to facilitate their movement along these routes, focusing particularly on debt, special monies, bribes, donations, and gift-giving. Throughout the migration trajectory, relationships with family, fellow migrants, smugglers, humanitarian actors, and border control officials shape and are shaped by access to financial resources.Ultimately, the book highlights the dangers in undocumented border-crossing and delves into the core of what it means to flee: Who has the means to escape dangerous conditions to seek asylum? Hannah Pool is a Senior Researcher at the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/sociology

In a nation whose Constitution purports to speak for "We the People", too many of the stories that powerful Americans tell about law and society include only We the Men. A long line of judges, politicians, and other influential voices have ignored women's struggles for equality or distorted them beyond recognition by wildly exaggerating American progress. Even as sexism continues to warp constitutional law, political decision making, and everyday life, prominent Americans have spent more than a century proclaiming that the United States has already left sex discrimination behind.Professor Jill Elaine Hasday's We the Men: How Forgetting Women's Struggles for Equality Perpetuates Inequality (Oxford University Press, 2025) is the first book to explore how forgetting women's struggles for equality—and forgetting the work America still has to do—perpetuates injustice, promotes complacency, and denies how generations of women have had to come together to fight for reform and against regression. Professor Hasday argues that remembering women's stories more often and more accurately can help the nation advance toward sex equality. These stories highlight the persistence of women's inequality and make clear that real progress has always required women to disrupt the status quo, demand change, and duel with determined opponents.America needs more conflict over women's status rather than less. Conflict has the power to generate forward momentum. Patiently awaiting men's spontaneous enlightenment does not. Transforming America's dominant stories about itself can reorient our understanding of how women's progress takes place, focus our attention on the battles that are still unwon, and fortify our determination to push for a more equal future. 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

In a nation whose Constitution purports to speak for "We the People", too many of the stories that powerful Americans tell about law and society include only We the Men. A long line of judges, politicians, and other influential voices have ignored women's struggles for equality or distorted them beyond recognition by wildly exaggerating American progress. Even as sexism continues to warp constitutional law, political decision making, and everyday life, prominent Americans have spent more than a century proclaiming that the United States has already left sex discrimination behind.Professor Jill Elaine Hasday's We the Men: How Forgetting Women's Struggles for Equality Perpetuates Inequality (Oxford University Press, 2025) is the first book to explore how forgetting women's struggles for equality—and forgetting the work America still has to do—perpetuates injustice, promotes complacency, and denies how generations of women have had to come together to fight for reform and against regression. Professor Hasday argues that remembering women's stories more often and more accurately can help the nation advance toward sex equality. These stories highlight the persistence of women's inequality and make clear that real progress has always required women to disrupt the status quo, demand change, and duel with determined opponents.America needs more conflict over women's status rather than less. Conflict has the power to generate forward momentum. Patiently awaiting men's spontaneous enlightenment does not. Transforming America's dominant stories about itself can reorient our understanding of how women's progress takes place, focus our attention on the battles that are still unwon, and fortify our determination to push for a more equal future. 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

Over the course of the last century, there has been an outsized incidence of conflict between democracies and personalist regimes—political systems where a single individual has undisputed executive power and prominence. In most cases, it has been the democratic side that has chosen to employ military force.  Why Democracies Fight Dictators (Oxford UP, 2025) takes up the question of why liberal democracies are so inclined to engage in conflict with personalist dictators. Building on research in political science, history, sociology, and psychology and marshalling evidence from statistical analysis of conflict, multi-archival research of American and British perceptions during the Suez Crisis and Gulf War, and non-democracies' understanding of the threat from Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait, Madison V. Schramm offers a novel and nuanced explanation for patterns in escalation and hostility between liberal democracies and personalist regimes. When conflicts of interest arise between the two types of states, Schramm argues, cognitive biases and social narratives predispose leaders in liberal democracies to perceive personalist dictators as particularly threatening and to respond with anger—an emotional response that elicits more risk acceptance and aggressive behavior. She also locates this tendency in the escalatory dynamics that precede open military conflict: coercion, covert action, and crisis bargaining. At all of these stages, the tendency toward anger and risk acceptance contributes to explosive outcomes between democratic and personalist regimes. Madison Schramm, Assistant Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Toronto Morteza Hajizadeh is a Ph.D. graduate in English from the University of Auckland in New Zealand. His research interests are Cultural Studies; Critical Theory; Environmental History; Medieval (Intellectual) History; Gothic Studies; 18th and 19th Century British Literature. YouTube Channel: here 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

About two hundred kilometers west of the city of Karachi, in the desert of Baluchistan, Pakistan, sits the shrine of the Hindu Goddess Hinglaj. Despite the temple's ancient Hindu and Muslim history, an annual festival at Hinglaj has only been established within the last three decades, in part because of the construction of the Makran Coastal Highway, which connects the distant rural shrine with urban Pakistan. Now, an increasingly confident minority Hindu community has claimed Hinglaj as their main religious center, a site for undisturbed religious performance and expression. In Hinglaj Devi: Identity, Change, and Solidification at a Hindu Temple in Pakistan (Oxford UP, 2018) Jürgen Schaflechner studies literary sources in Hindi, Sanskrit, Sindhi, and Urdu alongside extensive ethnographical research at the shrine, examining the political and cultural influences at work at the temple and tracking the remote desert shrine's rapid ascent to its current status as the most influential Hindu pilgrimage site in Pakistan. Schaflechner introduces the unique character of this place of pilgrimage and shows its modern importance not only for Hindus, but also for Muslims and Sindhi nationalists. Ultimately, this is an investigation of the Pakistani Hindu community's beliefs and practices at their largest place of worship in the Islamic Republic today--a topic of increasing importance to Pakistan's contemporary society. 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

Over the course of the last century, there has been an outsized incidence of conflict between democracies and personalist regimes—political systems where a single individual has undisputed executive power and prominence. In most cases, it has been the democratic side that has chosen to employ military force.  Why Democracies Fight Dictators (Oxford UP, 2025) takes up the question of why liberal democracies are so inclined to engage in conflict with personalist dictators. Building on research in political science, history, sociology, and psychology and marshalling evidence from statistical analysis of conflict, multi-archival research of American and British perceptions during the Suez Crisis and Gulf War, and non-democracies' understanding of the threat from Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait, Madison V. Schramm offers a novel and nuanced explanation for patterns in escalation and hostility between liberal democracies and personalist regimes. When conflicts of interest arise between the two types of states, Schramm argues, cognitive biases and social narratives predispose leaders in liberal democracies to perceive personalist dictators as particularly threatening and to respond with anger—an emotional response that elicits more risk acceptance and aggressive behavior. She also locates this tendency in the escalatory dynamics that precede open military conflict: coercion, covert action, and crisis bargaining. At all of these stages, the tendency toward anger and risk acceptance contributes to explosive outcomes between democratic and personalist regimes. Madison Schramm, Assistant Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Toronto Morteza Hajizadeh is a Ph.D. graduate in English from the University of Auckland in New Zealand. His research interests are Cultural Studies; Critical Theory; Environmental History; Medieval (Intellectual) History; Gothic Studies; 18th and 19th Century British Literature. YouTube Channel: here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history

Over the course of the last century, there has been an outsized incidence of conflict between democracies and personalist regimes—political systems where a single individual has undisputed executive power and prominence. In most cases, it has been the democratic side that has chosen to employ military force.  Why Democracies Fight Dictators (Oxford UP, 2025) takes up the question of why liberal democracies are so inclined to engage in conflict with personalist dictators. Building on research in political science, history, sociology, and psychology and marshalling evidence from statistical analysis of conflict, multi-archival research of American and British perceptions during the Suez Crisis and Gulf War, and non-democracies' understanding of the threat from Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait, Madison V. Schramm offers a novel and nuanced explanation for patterns in escalation and hostility between liberal democracies and personalist regimes. When conflicts of interest arise between the two types of states, Schramm argues, cognitive biases and social narratives predispose leaders in liberal democracies to perceive personalist dictators as particularly threatening and to respond with anger—an emotional response that elicits more risk acceptance and aggressive behavior. She also locates this tendency in the escalatory dynamics that precede open military conflict: coercion, covert action, and crisis bargaining. At all of these stages, the tendency toward anger and risk acceptance contributes to explosive outcomes between democratic and personalist regimes. Madison Schramm, Assistant Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Toronto Morteza Hajizadeh is a Ph.D. graduate in English from the University of Auckland in New Zealand. His research interests are Cultural Studies; Critical Theory; Environmental History; Medieval (Intellectual) History; Gothic Studies; 18th and 19th Century British Literature. YouTube Channel: here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/political-science

Over the course of the last century, there has been an outsized incidence of conflict between democracies and personalist regimes—political systems where a single individual has undisputed executive power and prominence. In most cases, it has been the democratic side that has chosen to employ military force.  Why Democracies Fight Dictators (Oxford UP, 2025) takes up the question of why liberal democracies are so inclined to engage in conflict with personalist dictators. Building on research in political science, history, sociology, and psychology and marshalling evidence from statistical analysis of conflict, multi-archival research of American and British perceptions during the Suez Crisis and Gulf War, and non-democracies' understanding of the threat from Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait, Madison V. Schramm offers a novel and nuanced explanation for patterns in escalation and hostility between liberal democracies and personalist regimes. When conflicts of interest arise between the two types of states, Schramm argues, cognitive biases and social narratives predispose leaders in liberal democracies to perceive personalist dictators as particularly threatening and to respond with anger—an emotional response that elicits more risk acceptance and aggressive behavior. She also locates this tendency in the escalatory dynamics that precede open military conflict: coercion, covert action, and crisis bargaining. At all of these stages, the tendency toward anger and risk acceptance contributes to explosive outcomes between democratic and personalist regimes. Madison Schramm, Assistant Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Toronto Morteza Hajizadeh is a Ph.D. graduate in English from the University of Auckland in New Zealand. His research interests are Cultural Studies; Critical Theory; Environmental History; Medieval (Intellectual) History; Gothic Studies; 18th and 19th Century British Literature. YouTube Channel: here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/critical-theory

About two hundred kilometers west of the city of Karachi, in the desert of Baluchistan, Pakistan, sits the shrine of the Hindu Goddess Hinglaj. Despite the temple's ancient Hindu and Muslim history, an annual festival at Hinglaj has only been established within the last three decades, in part because of the construction of the Makran Coastal Highway, which connects the distant rural shrine with urban Pakistan. Now, an increasingly confident minority Hindu community has claimed Hinglaj as their main religious center, a site for undisturbed religious performance and expression. In Hinglaj Devi: Identity, Change, and Solidification at a Hindu Temple in Pakistan (Oxford UP, 2018) Jürgen Schaflechner studies literary sources in Hindi, Sanskrit, Sindhi, and Urdu alongside extensive ethnographical research at the shrine, examining the political and cultural influences at work at the temple and tracking the remote desert shrine's rapid ascent to its current status as the most influential Hindu pilgrimage site in Pakistan. Schaflechner introduces the unique character of this place of pilgrimage and shows its modern importance not only for Hindus, but also for Muslims and Sindhi nationalists. Ultimately, this is an investigation of the Pakistani Hindu community's beliefs and practices at their largest place of worship in the Islamic Republic today--a topic of increasing importance to Pakistan's contemporary society. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/anthropology

Kathleen Casey joins Jana Byars to talk about The Things She Carried: A Cultural History of the Purse in America (Oxford UP, 2025). Purses and bags have always been much more than a fashion accessory. For generations of Americans, the purse has been an essential and highly adaptable object, used to achieve a host of social, cultural, and political objectives. In the early 1800s, when the slim fit of neoclassical dresses made interior pockets impractical, upper-class women began to carry small purses called reticules, which provided them with a private place in a world where they did not have equal access to public space. Although many items of apparel have long expressed their wearer's aspirations, only the purse has offered carriers privacy, pride, and pleasure. This privacy has been particularly important for those who have faced discrimination because of their gender, class, race, citizenship, or sexuality. The Things She Carried reveals how bags, sacks, and purses provided the methods and materials for Americans' activism, allowing carriers to transgress critical boundaries at key moments. It explores how enslaved people used purses and bags when attempting to escape and immigrant factory workers fought to protect their purses in the workplace. It also probes the purse's nuanced functions for Black women in the civil rights movement and explores how LGBTQ people used purses to defend their bodies and make declarations about their sexuality. Kathleen Casey closely examines a variety of sources--from vintage purses found in abandoned buildings and museum collections to advertisements, photograph albums, trade journals, newspaper columns, and trial transcripts. She finds purses in use at fraught historical moments, where they served strategic and symbolic functions for their users. The result is a thorough and surprising examination of an object that both ordinary and extraordinary Americans used to influence social, cultural, economic, and political change. 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

Kathleen Casey joins Jana Byars to talk about The Things She Carried: A Cultural History of the Purse in America (Oxford UP, 2025). Purses and bags have always been much more than a fashion accessory. For generations of Americans, the purse has been an essential and highly adaptable object, used to achieve a host of social, cultural, and political objectives. In the early 1800s, when the slim fit of neoclassical dresses made interior pockets impractical, upper-class women began to carry small purses called reticules, which provided them with a private place in a world where they did not have equal access to public space. Although many items of apparel have long expressed their wearer's aspirations, only the purse has offered carriers privacy, pride, and pleasure. This privacy has been particularly important for those who have faced discrimination because of their gender, class, race, citizenship, or sexuality. The Things She Carried reveals how bags, sacks, and purses provided the methods and materials for Americans' activism, allowing carriers to transgress critical boundaries at key moments. It explores how enslaved people used purses and bags when attempting to escape and immigrant factory workers fought to protect their purses in the workplace. It also probes the purse's nuanced functions for Black women in the civil rights movement and explores how LGBTQ people used purses to defend their bodies and make declarations about their sexuality. Kathleen Casey closely examines a variety of sources--from vintage purses found in abandoned buildings and museum collections to advertisements, photograph albums, trade journals, newspaper columns, and trial transcripts. She finds purses in use at fraught historical moments, where they served strategic and symbolic functions for their users. The result is a thorough and surprising examination of an object that both ordinary and extraordinary Americans used to influence social, cultural, economic, and political change. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/history

Kathleen Casey joins Jana Byars to talk about The Things She Carried: A Cultural History of the Purse in America (Oxford UP, 2025). Purses and bags have always been much more than a fashion accessory. For generations of Americans, the purse has been an essential and highly adaptable object, used to achieve a host of social, cultural, and political objectives. In the early 1800s, when the slim fit of neoclassical dresses made interior pockets impractical, upper-class women began to carry small purses called reticules, which provided them with a private place in a world where they did not have equal access to public space. Although many items of apparel have long expressed their wearer's aspirations, only the purse has offered carriers privacy, pride, and pleasure. This privacy has been particularly important for those who have faced discrimination because of their gender, class, race, citizenship, or sexuality. The Things She Carried reveals how bags, sacks, and purses provided the methods and materials for Americans' activism, allowing carriers to transgress critical boundaries at key moments. It explores how enslaved people used purses and bags when attempting to escape and immigrant factory workers fought to protect their purses in the workplace. It also probes the purse's nuanced functions for Black women in the civil rights movement and explores how LGBTQ people used purses to defend their bodies and make declarations about their sexuality. Kathleen Casey closely examines a variety of sources--from vintage purses found in abandoned buildings and museum collections to advertisements, photograph albums, trade journals, newspaper columns, and trial transcripts. She finds purses in use at fraught historical moments, where they served strategic and symbolic functions for their users. The result is a thorough and surprising examination of an object that both ordinary and extraordinary Americans used to influence social, cultural, economic, and political change. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/gender-studies

Kathleen Casey joins Jana Byars to talk about The Things She Carried: A Cultural History of the Purse in America (Oxford UP, 2025). Purses and bags have always been much more than a fashion accessory. For generations of Americans, the purse has been an essential and highly adaptable object, used to achieve a host of social, cultural, and political objectives. In the early 1800s, when the slim fit of neoclassical dresses made interior pockets impractical, upper-class women began to carry small purses called reticules, which provided them with a private place in a world where they did not have equal access to public space. Although many items of apparel have long expressed their wearer's aspirations, only the purse has offered carriers privacy, pride, and pleasure. This privacy has been particularly important for those who have faced discrimination because of their gender, class, race, citizenship, or sexuality. The Things She Carried reveals how bags, sacks, and purses provided the methods and materials for Americans' activism, allowing carriers to transgress critical boundaries at key moments. It explores how enslaved people used purses and bags when attempting to escape and immigrant factory workers fought to protect their purses in the workplace. It also probes the purse's nuanced functions for Black women in the civil rights movement and explores how LGBTQ people used purses to defend their bodies and make declarations about their sexuality. Kathleen Casey closely examines a variety of sources--from vintage purses found in abandoned buildings and museum collections to advertisements, photograph albums, trade journals, newspaper columns, and trial transcripts. She finds purses in use at fraught historical moments, where they served strategic and symbolic functions for their users. The result is a thorough and surprising examination of an object that both ordinary and extraordinary Americans used to influence social, cultural, economic, and political change. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/american-studies

Katharine Jenkins offers an introduction to feminist philosophy, giving the reader an idea of what it is, why it is important, and how to think about it. She explores key topics such as gender oppression, beauty, objectification, and sexuality. Moreover, she considers questions about the relation between the personal and the political, what it is to be a woman, whether there is a distinctive kind of women's knowledge, and what feminist philosophy can bring to our understanding of such aspects of our world as justice, work, and the environment. Feminist Philosophy: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford UP, 2025) takes a richly intersectional approach, recognizing the combined impact of such factors as race and class as well as gender. Katharine Jenkins is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Glasgow, and was previously Assistant Professor at the University of Nottingham. She specialises in social philosophy, especially feminist philosophy and social ontology. She is the author of Ontology and Oppression: Race, Gender, and Social Reality (OUP, 2023). Morteza Hajizadeh is a Ph.D. graduate in English from the University of Auckland in New Zealand. His research interests are Cultural Studies; Critical Theory; Environmental History; Medieval (Intellectual) History; Gothic Studies; 18th and 19th Century British Literature. YouTube Channel here 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

Katharine Jenkins offers an introduction to feminist philosophy, giving the reader an idea of what it is, why it is important, and how to think about it. She explores key topics such as gender oppression, beauty, objectification, and sexuality. Moreover, she considers questions about the relation between the personal and the political, what it is to be a woman, whether there is a distinctive kind of women's knowledge, and what feminist philosophy can bring to our understanding of such aspects of our world as justice, work, and the environment. Feminist Philosophy: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford UP, 2025) takes a richly intersectional approach, recognizing the combined impact of such factors as race and class as well as gender. Katharine Jenkins is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Glasgow, and was previously Assistant Professor at the University of Nottingham. She specialises in social philosophy, especially feminist philosophy and social ontology. She is the author of Ontology and Oppression: Race, Gender, and Social Reality (OUP, 2023). Morteza Hajizadeh is a Ph.D. graduate in English from the University of Auckland in New Zealand. His research interests are Cultural Studies; Critical Theory; Environmental History; Medieval (Intellectual) History; Gothic Studies; 18th and 19th Century British Literature. YouTube Channel here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/gender-studies

Katharine Jenkins offers an introduction to feminist philosophy, giving the reader an idea of what it is, why it is important, and how to think about it. She explores key topics such as gender oppression, beauty, objectification, and sexuality. Moreover, she considers questions about the relation between the personal and the political, what it is to be a woman, whether there is a distinctive kind of women's knowledge, and what feminist philosophy can bring to our understanding of such aspects of our world as justice, work, and the environment. Feminist Philosophy: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford UP, 2025) takes a richly intersectional approach, recognizing the combined impact of such factors as race and class as well as gender. Katharine Jenkins is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Glasgow, and was previously Assistant Professor at the University of Nottingham. She specialises in social philosophy, especially feminist philosophy and social ontology. She is the author of Ontology and Oppression: Race, Gender, and Social Reality (OUP, 2023). Morteza Hajizadeh is a Ph.D. graduate in English from the University of Auckland in New Zealand. His research interests are Cultural Studies; Critical Theory; Environmental History; Medieval (Intellectual) History; Gothic Studies; 18th and 19th Century British Literature. YouTube Channel here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/critical-theory

Katharine Jenkins offers an introduction to feminist philosophy, giving the reader an idea of what it is, why it is important, and how to think about it. She explores key topics such as gender oppression, beauty, objectification, and sexuality. Moreover, she considers questions about the relation between the personal and the political, what it is to be a woman, whether there is a distinctive kind of women's knowledge, and what feminist philosophy can bring to our understanding of such aspects of our world as justice, work, and the environment. Feminist Philosophy: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford UP, 2025) takes a richly intersectional approach, recognizing the combined impact of such factors as race and class as well as gender. Katharine Jenkins is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Glasgow, and was previously Assistant Professor at the University of Nottingham. She specialises in social philosophy, especially feminist philosophy and social ontology. She is the author of Ontology and Oppression: Race, Gender, and Social Reality (OUP, 2023). Morteza Hajizadeh is a Ph.D. graduate in English from the University of Auckland in New Zealand. His research interests are Cultural Studies; Critical Theory; Environmental History; Medieval (Intellectual) History; Gothic Studies; 18th and 19th Century British Literature. YouTube Channel here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/intellectual-history

The European left seemed to be in rude health during the 1970s. Never had so many political parties committed to representing the working class been in power simultaneously across the continent. New forms of mobilisation led by female, immigrant, and young wage-earners seemed to reflect the growing strength of the workers' movement rather than its pending obsolescence. Parties and trade unions grew rapidly as a diverse new generation entered the ranks. Why did the left's forward march halt so abruptly?  The Halted March of the European Left: The Working Class in Britain, France, and Italy, 1968-1989 (Oxford UP, 2025)shows how the left's defeats after the mid-1970s were not the inevitable result of de-industrialisation or, more precisely, the transition to a globalised and post-Fordist world that abolished the working class as a great historical actor. Choices that were made during a concentrated but decisive moment contributed to the left's lost battles. The British, French, and Italian left managed the shift to a new era by marginalising those groups of workers who had invested it with hopes of social and political transformation. Communist, socialist, and social democratic parties helped disempower the new components of the working class in workplaces, in society, in the political system, and successfully disciplined their traditional working-class supporters. The left encountered a crisis of purpose and identity, a sense of both defeat and lost opportunities, and the dissolution of the idea of a community of fate amongst workers. This book provides a comparative analysis of the left's fragmenting relationship with the working class and a 'feel' for the culture of three leading industrial countries during a traumatic transition of late twentieth-century history. It concludes that decisions taken by the left during the 1970s contributed to the tragic inversion of the expected outcome of that hopeful decade. Matt Myers is a Lecturer in Modern European History at the University of Oxford Morteza Hajizadeh is a Ph.D. graduate in English from the University of Auckland in New Zealand. His research interests are Cultural Studies; Critical Theory; Environmental History; Medieval (Intellectual) History; Gothic Studies; 18th and 19th Century British Literature. YouTube Channel here 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 European left seemed to be in rude health during the 1970s. Never had so many political parties committed to representing the working class been in power simultaneously across the continent. New forms of mobilisation led by female, immigrant, and young wage-earners seemed to reflect the growing strength of the workers' movement rather than its pending obsolescence. Parties and trade unions grew rapidly as a diverse new generation entered the ranks. Why did the left's forward march halt so abruptly?  The Halted March of the European Left: The Working Class in Britain, France, and Italy, 1968-1989 (Oxford UP, 2025)shows how the left's defeats after the mid-1970s were not the inevitable result of de-industrialisation or, more precisely, the transition to a globalised and post-Fordist world that abolished the working class as a great historical actor. Choices that were made during a concentrated but decisive moment contributed to the left's lost battles. The British, French, and Italian left managed the shift to a new era by marginalising those groups of workers who had invested it with hopes of social and political transformation. Communist, socialist, and social democratic parties helped disempower the new components of the working class in workplaces, in society, in the political system, and successfully disciplined their traditional working-class supporters. The left encountered a crisis of purpose and identity, a sense of both defeat and lost opportunities, and the dissolution of the idea of a community of fate amongst workers. This book provides a comparative analysis of the left's fragmenting relationship with the working class and a 'feel' for the culture of three leading industrial countries during a traumatic transition of late twentieth-century history. It concludes that decisions taken by the left during the 1970s contributed to the tragic inversion of the expected outcome of that hopeful decade. Matt Myers is a Lecturer in Modern European History at the University of Oxford Morteza Hajizadeh is a Ph.D. graduate in English from the University of Auckland in New Zealand. His research interests are Cultural Studies; Critical Theory; Environmental History; Medieval (Intellectual) History; Gothic Studies; 18th and 19th Century British Literature. YouTube Channel here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/critical-theory

The European left seemed to be in rude health during the 1970s. Never had so many political parties committed to representing the working class been in power simultaneously across the continent. New forms of mobilisation led by female, immigrant, and young wage-earners seemed to reflect the growing strength of the workers' movement rather than its pending obsolescence. Parties and trade unions grew rapidly as a diverse new generation entered the ranks. Why did the left's forward march halt so abruptly?  The Halted March of the European Left: The Working Class in Britain, France, and Italy, 1968-1989 (Oxford UP, 2025)shows how the left's defeats after the mid-1970s were not the inevitable result of de-industrialisation or, more precisely, the transition to a globalised and post-Fordist world that abolished the working class as a great historical actor. Choices that were made during a concentrated but decisive moment contributed to the left's lost battles. The British, French, and Italian left managed the shift to a new era by marginalising those groups of workers who had invested it with hopes of social and political transformation. Communist, socialist, and social democratic parties helped disempower the new components of the working class in workplaces, in society, in the political system, and successfully disciplined their traditional working-class supporters. The left encountered a crisis of purpose and identity, a sense of both defeat and lost opportunities, and the dissolution of the idea of a community of fate amongst workers. This book provides a comparative analysis of the left's fragmenting relationship with the working class and a 'feel' for the culture of three leading industrial countries during a traumatic transition of late twentieth-century history. It concludes that decisions taken by the left during the 1970s contributed to the tragic inversion of the expected outcome of that hopeful decade. Matt Myers is a Lecturer in Modern European History at the University of Oxford Morteza Hajizadeh is a Ph.D. graduate in English from the University of Auckland in New Zealand. His research interests are Cultural Studies; Critical Theory; Environmental History; Medieval (Intellectual) History; Gothic Studies; 18th and 19th Century British Literature. YouTube Channel here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/intellectual-history

The European left seemed to be in rude health during the 1970s. Never had so many political parties committed to representing the working class been in power simultaneously across the continent. New forms of mobilisation led by female, immigrant, and young wage-earners seemed to reflect the growing strength of the workers' movement rather than its pending obsolescence. Parties and trade unions grew rapidly as a diverse new generation entered the ranks. Why did the left's forward march halt so abruptly?  The Halted March of the European Left: The Working Class in Britain, France, and Italy, 1968-1989 (Oxford UP, 2025)shows how the left's defeats after the mid-1970s were not the inevitable result of de-industrialisation or, more precisely, the transition to a globalised and post-Fordist world that abolished the working class as a great historical actor. Choices that were made during a concentrated but decisive moment contributed to the left's lost battles. The British, French, and Italian left managed the shift to a new era by marginalising those groups of workers who had invested it with hopes of social and political transformation. Communist, socialist, and social democratic parties helped disempower the new components of the working class in workplaces, in society, in the political system, and successfully disciplined their traditional working-class supporters. The left encountered a crisis of purpose and identity, a sense of both defeat and lost opportunities, and the dissolution of the idea of a community of fate amongst workers. This book provides a comparative analysis of the left's fragmenting relationship with the working class and a 'feel' for the culture of three leading industrial countries during a traumatic transition of late twentieth-century history. It concludes that decisions taken by the left during the 1970s contributed to the tragic inversion of the expected outcome of that hopeful decade. Matt Myers is a Lecturer in Modern European History at the University of Oxford Morteza Hajizadeh is a Ph.D. graduate in English from the University of Auckland in New Zealand. His research interests are Cultural Studies; Critical Theory; Environmental History; Medieval (Intellectual) History; Gothic Studies; 18th and 19th Century British Literature. YouTube Channel here Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/italian-studies

The Unforgotten Women of the Islamic State (Oxford University Press, 2024) by Dr. Gina Vale explores the governance of the Islamic State (IS) terrorist organization through the lives and words of local Iraqi, Syrian, and Kurdish women. While the roles and activities of foreign (predominantly Western), pro-IS women have garnered significant attention, the experiences and insights of local civilian populations have been largely overlooked. Drawing on the testimonies of 63 local Sunni Muslim and Yazidi women, Dr. Vale exposes the group's intra-gender stratified system of governance. Eligibility for the group's protection, security, 'citizenship', and entrance into the (semi-)public sphere were not universal, but required convergence with the gender norms of IS, through permanent erasure or at least temporary disguise of certain markers of difference. In some cases, this was directed by a pre-meditated 'divide and conquer' strategy, while in others, it manifested as unregulated violences at the hands of individual group members, including women. The structure follows the trajectory of IS's increasing control over its 'citizens' and captive populations: its militarization of society; imposition of law and order; provision of goods and services; and intervention in civilians' private lives. Analysis of diverse first-hand accounts and the group's documentation reveals that the presence, exclusion, and victimization of local civilian women were necessary to the functioning and legitimation of IS's 'caliphate' project, and the supremacy of affiliated men - and women. As a fledgling proto-state, IS needed local Iraqi, Syrian, and Kurdish women. Though far from represented or protected, they were by no means forgotten. 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 Unforgotten Women of the Islamic State (Oxford University Press, 2024) by Dr. Gina Vale explores the governance of the Islamic State (IS) terrorist organization through the lives and words of local Iraqi, Syrian, and Kurdish women. While the roles and activities of foreign (predominantly Western), pro-IS women have garnered significant attention, the experiences and insights of local civilian populations have been largely overlooked. Drawing on the testimonies of 63 local Sunni Muslim and Yazidi women, Dr. Vale exposes the group's intra-gender stratified system of governance. Eligibility for the group's protection, security, 'citizenship', and entrance into the (semi-)public sphere were not universal, but required convergence with the gender norms of IS, through permanent erasure or at least temporary disguise of certain markers of difference. In some cases, this was directed by a pre-meditated 'divide and conquer' strategy, while in others, it manifested as unregulated violences at the hands of individual group members, including women. The structure follows the trajectory of IS's increasing control over its 'citizens' and captive populations: its militarization of society; imposition of law and order; provision of goods and services; and intervention in civilians' private lives. Analysis of diverse first-hand accounts and the group's documentation reveals that the presence, exclusion, and victimization of local civilian women were necessary to the functioning and legitimation of IS's 'caliphate' project, and the supremacy of affiliated men - and women. As a fledgling proto-state, IS needed local Iraqi, Syrian, and Kurdish women. Though far from represented or protected, they were by no means forgotten. 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

The Unforgotten Women of the Islamic State (Oxford University Press, 2024) by Dr. Gina Vale explores the governance of the Islamic State (IS) terrorist organization through the lives and words of local Iraqi, Syrian, and Kurdish women. While the roles and activities of foreign (predominantly Western), pro-IS women have garnered significant attention, the experiences and insights of local civilian populations have been largely overlooked. Drawing on the testimonies of 63 local Sunni Muslim and Yazidi women, Dr. Vale exposes the group's intra-gender stratified system of governance. Eligibility for the group's protection, security, 'citizenship', and entrance into the (semi-)public sphere were not universal, but required convergence with the gender norms of IS, through permanent erasure or at least temporary disguise of certain markers of difference. In some cases, this was directed by a pre-meditated 'divide and conquer' strategy, while in others, it manifested as unregulated violences at the hands of individual group members, including women. The structure follows the trajectory of IS's increasing control over its 'citizens' and captive populations: its militarization of society; imposition of law and order; provision of goods and services; and intervention in civilians' private lives. Analysis of diverse first-hand accounts and the group's documentation reveals that the presence, exclusion, and victimization of local civilian women were necessary to the functioning and legitimation of IS's 'caliphate' project, and the supremacy of affiliated men - and women. As a fledgling proto-state, IS needed local Iraqi, Syrian, and Kurdish women. Though far from represented or protected, they were by no means forgotten. 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/islamic-studies

In Ordinary Rebels: Rank-And-File Militants Between War and Peace (Oxford University Press, 2025), Kolby Hanson argues that these periods of state toleration do not simply change armed groups' behavior, but fundamentally transform the organizations themselves by shaping who takes up arms and which leaders they follow. This book draws on a set of innovative experimental surveys and 75 in-depth interviews tracing four armed movements over time in Northeast India and Sri Lanka. A powerful new theory of how conditions shape the trajectory of non-state armed groups, this book reshapes our understanding of why such organizations become more moderate over time. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/political-science

The Unforgotten Women of the Islamic State (Oxford University Press, 2024) by Dr. Gina Vale explores the governance of the Islamic State (IS) terrorist organization through the lives and words of local Iraqi, Syrian, and Kurdish women. While the roles and activities of foreign (predominantly Western), pro-IS women have garnered significant attention, the experiences and insights of local civilian populations have been largely overlooked. Drawing on the testimonies of 63 local Sunni Muslim and Yazidi women, Dr. Vale exposes the group's intra-gender stratified system of governance. Eligibility for the group's protection, security, 'citizenship', and entrance into the (semi-)public sphere were not universal, but required convergence with the gender norms of IS, through permanent erasure or at least temporary disguise of certain markers of difference. In some cases, this was directed by a pre-meditated 'divide and conquer' strategy, while in others, it manifested as unregulated violences at the hands of individual group members, including women. The structure follows the trajectory of IS's increasing control over its 'citizens' and captive populations: its militarization of society; imposition of law and order; provision of goods and services; and intervention in civilians' private lives. Analysis of diverse first-hand accounts and the group's documentation reveals that the presence, exclusion, and victimization of local civilian women were necessary to the functioning and legitimation of IS's 'caliphate' project, and the supremacy of affiliated men - and women. As a fledgling proto-state, IS needed local Iraqi, Syrian, and Kurdish women. Though far from represented or protected, they were by no means forgotten. 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/middle-eastern-studies

The Unforgotten Women of the Islamic State (Oxford University Press, 2024) by Dr. Gina Vale explores the governance of the Islamic State (IS) terrorist organization through the lives and words of local Iraqi, Syrian, and Kurdish women. While the roles and activities of foreign (predominantly Western), pro-IS women have garnered significant attention, the experiences and insights of local civilian populations have been largely overlooked. Drawing on the testimonies of 63 local Sunni Muslim and Yazidi women, Dr. Vale exposes the group's intra-gender stratified system of governance. Eligibility for the group's protection, security, 'citizenship', and entrance into the (semi-)public sphere were not universal, but required convergence with the gender norms of IS, through permanent erasure or at least temporary disguise of certain markers of difference. In some cases, this was directed by a pre-meditated 'divide and conquer' strategy, while in others, it manifested as unregulated violences at the hands of individual group members, including women. The structure follows the trajectory of IS's increasing control over its 'citizens' and captive populations: its militarization of society; imposition of law and order; provision of goods and services; and intervention in civilians' private lives. Analysis of diverse first-hand accounts and the group's documentation reveals that the presence, exclusion, and victimization of local civilian women were necessary to the functioning and legitimation of IS's 'caliphate' project, and the supremacy of affiliated men - and women. As a fledgling proto-state, IS needed local Iraqi, Syrian, and Kurdish women. Though far from represented or protected, they were by no means forgotten. 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/anthropology

The Unforgotten Women of the Islamic State (Oxford University Press, 2024) by Dr. Gina Vale explores the governance of the Islamic State (IS) terrorist organization through the lives and words of local Iraqi, Syrian, and Kurdish women. While the roles and activities of foreign (predominantly Western), pro-IS women have garnered significant attention, the experiences and insights of local civilian populations have been largely overlooked. Drawing on the testimonies of 63 local Sunni Muslim and Yazidi women, Dr. Vale exposes the group's intra-gender stratified system of governance. Eligibility for the group's protection, security, 'citizenship', and entrance into the (semi-)public sphere were not universal, but required convergence with the gender norms of IS, through permanent erasure or at least temporary disguise of certain markers of difference. In some cases, this was directed by a pre-meditated 'divide and conquer' strategy, while in others, it manifested as unregulated violences at the hands of individual group members, including women. The structure follows the trajectory of IS's increasing control over its 'citizens' and captive populations: its militarization of society; imposition of law and order; provision of goods and services; and intervention in civilians' private lives. Analysis of diverse first-hand accounts and the group's documentation reveals that the presence, exclusion, and victimization of local civilian women were necessary to the functioning and legitimation of IS's 'caliphate' project, and the supremacy of affiliated men - and women. As a fledgling proto-state, IS needed local Iraqi, Syrian, and Kurdish women. Though far from represented or protected, they were by no means forgotten. 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

The Unforgotten Women of the Islamic State (Oxford University Press, 2024) by Dr. Gina Vale explores the governance of the Islamic State (IS) terrorist organization through the lives and words of local Iraqi, Syrian, and Kurdish women. While the roles and activities of foreign (predominantly Western), pro-IS women have garnered significant attention, the experiences and insights of local civilian populations have been largely overlooked. Drawing on the testimonies of 63 local Sunni Muslim and Yazidi women, Dr. Vale exposes the group's intra-gender stratified system of governance. Eligibility for the group's protection, security, 'citizenship', and entrance into the (semi-)public sphere were not universal, but required convergence with the gender norms of IS, through permanent erasure or at least temporary disguise of certain markers of difference. In some cases, this was directed by a pre-meditated 'divide and conquer' strategy, while in others, it manifested as unregulated violences at the hands of individual group members, including women. The structure follows the trajectory of IS's increasing control over its 'citizens' and captive populations: its militarization of society; imposition of law and order; provision of goods and services; and intervention in civilians' private lives. Analysis of diverse first-hand accounts and the group's documentation reveals that the presence, exclusion, and victimization of local civilian women were necessary to the functioning and legitimation of IS's 'caliphate' project, and the supremacy of affiliated men - and women. As a fledgling proto-state, IS needed local Iraqi, Syrian, and Kurdish women. Though far from represented or protected, they were by no means forgotten. 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

In Ordinary Rebels: Rank-And-File Militants Between War and Peace (Oxford University Press, 2025), Kolby Hanson argues that these periods of state toleration do not simply change armed groups' behavior, but fundamentally transform the organizations themselves by shaping who takes up arms and which leaders they follow. This book draws on a set of innovative experimental surveys and 75 in-depth interviews tracing four armed movements over time in Northeast India and Sri Lanka. A powerful new theory of how conditions shape the trajectory of non-state armed groups, this book reshapes our understanding of why such organizations become more moderate over time. 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 Ordinary Rebels: Rank-And-File Militants Between War and Peace (Oxford University Press, 2025), Kolby Hanson argues that these periods of state toleration do not simply change armed groups' behavior, but fundamentally transform the organizations themselves by shaping who takes up arms and which leaders they follow. This book draws on a set of innovative experimental surveys and 75 in-depth interviews tracing four armed movements over time in Northeast India and Sri Lanka. A powerful new theory of how conditions shape the trajectory of non-state armed groups, this book reshapes our understanding of why such organizations become more moderate over time. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history

In Ordinary Rebels: Rank-And-File Militants Between War and Peace (Oxford University Press, 2025), Kolby Hanson argues that these periods of state toleration do not simply change armed groups' behavior, but fundamentally transform the organizations themselves by shaping who takes up arms and which leaders they follow. This book draws on a set of innovative experimental surveys and 75 in-depth interviews tracing four armed movements over time in Northeast India and Sri Lanka. A powerful new theory of how conditions shape the trajectory of non-state armed groups, this book reshapes our understanding of why such organizations become more moderate over time. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/anthropology

In Ordinary Rebels: Rank-And-File Militants Between War and Peace (Oxford University Press, 2025), Kolby Hanson argues that these periods of state toleration do not simply change armed groups' behavior, but fundamentally transform the organizations themselves by shaping who takes up arms and which leaders they follow. This book draws on a set of innovative experimental surveys and 75 in-depth interviews tracing four armed movements over time in Northeast India and Sri Lanka. A powerful new theory of how conditions shape the trajectory of non-state armed groups, this book reshapes our understanding of why such organizations become more moderate over time. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/sociology

In Ordinary Rebels: Rank-And-File Militants Between War and Peace (Oxford University Press, 2025), Kolby Hanson argues that these periods of state toleration do not simply change armed groups' behavior, but fundamentally transform the organizations themselves by shaping who takes up arms and which leaders they follow. This book draws on a set of innovative experimental surveys and 75 in-depth interviews tracing four armed movements over time in Northeast India and Sri Lanka. A powerful new theory of how conditions shape the trajectory of non-state armed groups, this book reshapes our understanding of why such organizations become more moderate over time. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/south-asian-studies

Nick Bromell is the author of By the Sweat of the Brow: Labor and Literature in Antebellum American Culture and Tomorrow Never Knows: Rock and Psychedelics in the Sixties, both published by the University of Chicago Press. His articles and essays on African American literature and political thought have appeared in American Literature, American Literary History, Political Theory, Raritan, and The Sewanee Review. He teaches at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and he blogs at thetimeisalwaysnow.org. Nick Bromell's book is a work of intellectual history and political theory that places Black thinkers—writers, activists, and artists—at the center of American democratic thought. He argues that African American intellectual traditions have continually reshaped the meaning of democracy in the U.S., offering critiques and visions that go beyond the frameworks typically emphasized in mainstream political philosophy. The title, taken from James Baldwin's writings, reflectsthe idea that democracy is never finished—it is always urgent and ongoing.The Time is Always Now: Black Political Thought and the Transformation of U.S. Democracy (Oxford UP, 2013) posits that Black thought epitomizes the crucible of American Democratic theory Bromell contends that African American thinkers are not simply responding to oppression but actively producing political theory—ideasabout freedom, justice, equality, and collective life. Their insights emerge from lived experiences of slavery, segregation,and racial inequality, which provide a unique vantage point for critiquing American democracy.Secondly, Democracy is an ongoing and incomplete project of reconstruction, renewal, and revival. Building on Baldwin's phrase “the time is always now,” Bromell argues that democracy must be constantly reimagined and fought for. Black intellectual traditions highlight democracy's fragility and incompleteness, challenging myths of American exceptionalism.Third, American Democracy exists beyond what are known to be traditional American institutions. While mainstream American political theory often places focus on constitutions, governments, or laws, Black thinkers and citizens emphasize affective, relational, and cultural dimensions of democracy—dimensions that exhibit and feature American virtues and values of community, solidarity, and recognition.Fourth, Professor Bromell calls for a vibrant relational empathy and mutual recognition. In this sense, Bromell highlights Black thought's insistence on recognition of shared humanity and mutual vulnerability as the foundation for democraticpractice. Thinkers as varied as James Baldwin, Frederick Douglass, Martin Luther King Jr, Toni Morrison, and Ralph Ellison stress the necessity of empathy as a civic virtue. Bromell reframes African American intellectual history as politicaltheory, not just cultural or social commentary. He challenges readers to recognize that the deepest resources fordemocratic renewal in America come from traditions forged under conditions of racial oppression.  Ultimately The Time is Always Now insists that democracy is less about stable American institutions and more about the practice of bettering and refining incipient features of American institutions-facing each other honestly, acknowledging and shouldering of collective pain, and being committed to a shared mutual recognition of the totality of our collective experience. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/african-american-studies

Nick Bromell is the author of By the Sweat of the Brow: Labor and Literature in Antebellum American Culture and Tomorrow Never Knows: Rock and Psychedelics in the Sixties, both published by the University of Chicago Press. His articles and essays on African American literature and political thought have appeared in American Literature, American Literary History, Political Theory, Raritan, and The Sewanee Review. He teaches at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and he blogs at thetimeisalwaysnow.org. Nick Bromell's book is a work of intellectual history and political theory that places Black thinkers—writers, activists, and artists—at the center of American democratic thought. He argues that African American intellectual traditions have continually reshaped the meaning of democracy in the U.S., offering critiques and visions that go beyond the frameworks typically emphasized in mainstream political philosophy. The title, taken from James Baldwin's writings, reflectsthe idea that democracy is never finished—it is always urgent and ongoing.The Time is Always Now: Black Political Thought and the Transformation of U.S. Democracy (Oxford UP, 2013) posits that Black thought epitomizes the crucible of American Democratic theory Bromell contends that African American thinkers are not simply responding to oppression but actively producing political theory—ideasabout freedom, justice, equality, and collective life. Their insights emerge from lived experiences of slavery, segregation,and racial inequality, which provide a unique vantage point for critiquing American democracy.Secondly, Democracy is an ongoing and incomplete project of reconstruction, renewal, and revival. Building on Baldwin's phrase “the time is always now,” Bromell argues that democracy must be constantly reimagined and fought for. Black intellectual traditions highlight democracy's fragility and incompleteness, challenging myths of American exceptionalism.Third, American Democracy exists beyond what are known to be traditional American institutions. While mainstream American political theory often places focus on constitutions, governments, or laws, Black thinkers and citizens emphasize affective, relational, and cultural dimensions of democracy—dimensions that exhibit and feature American virtues and values of community, solidarity, and recognition.Fourth, Professor Bromell calls for a vibrant relational empathy and mutual recognition. In this sense, Bromell highlights Black thought's insistence on recognition of shared humanity and mutual vulnerability as the foundation for democraticpractice. Thinkers as varied as James Baldwin, Frederick Douglass, Martin Luther King Jr, Toni Morrison, and Ralph Ellison stress the necessity of empathy as a civic virtue. Bromell reframes African American intellectual history as politicaltheory, not just cultural or social commentary. He challenges readers to recognize that the deepest resources fordemocratic renewal in America come from traditions forged under conditions of racial oppression.  Ultimately The Time is Always Now insists that democracy is less about stable American institutions and more about the practice of bettering and refining incipient features of American institutions-facing each other honestly, acknowledging and shouldering of collective pain, and being committed to a shared mutual recognition of the totality of our collective experience. 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 May 1894, President Grover Cleveland gave a speech thanking those who gathered “to worship at this national shrine.” He was not referring to the battlefields at Gettysburg or Antietam, nor to Mount Vernon, but to the gravesite of Mary Ball Washington, mother of George. While dedicating the new monument that marked it in Fredericksburg, Virginia, Cleveland honored “the woman who gave our Nation its greatest and best citizen.” There could be no clearer valorization of eighteenth-century republican motherhood and its centrality to the nation's origin story.The Mother of Washington in Nineteenth-Century America (Oxford UP, 2025) by Dr. Kate Haulman examines the role of motherhood in the commemoration of the American Revolution by tracing the creation and evolution of the Mother of Washington figure. Dr. Haulman explores the nineteenth-century memory of an eighteenth-century woman known for and through her famous son, the nation's first president. Underpinned by a canon of stories about Mary that often involved George, the monument and the figure it memorialized overlapped, sometimes in surprising and even paradoxical ways. In print, in images, and on the landscape, memorializing Mary foregrounded maternal ideals based in traditional gender roles and ancestry in the public memory of the nation's founding. As some women framed their engagement with the state in maternal terms, other men and women used the Mother of Washington to link the virtues she represented to the nation's origins. Women memorialists finally took up the cause to complete the monument, finishing what elite men had begun decades earlier.Then as now, groups used the past to construct American motherhood, as well as using motherhood to engage with the founding past. The Mother of Washington in Nineteenth-Century America offers fresh arguments about gender, race, and the politics of Revolutionary history and memory still contested 250 years later. 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

All over the world, for all of human history – and probably going back to our earliest hominid ancestors – people have found ways to try to keep themselves clean. But how did soap come about? Research: “Soap, N. (1), Etymology.” Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford UP, June 2025, https://doi.org/10.1093/OED/1115187665. American Cleaning Institute. “Soaps & Detergents History.” https://www.cleaninginstitute.org/understanding-products/why-clean/soaps-detergents-history Beckmann, John. “History of Inventions, Discoveries and Origins.” William Johnston, translator. Bosart, L.W. “The Early History of the Soap Industry.” The American Oil Chemists' Society. Journal of Oil & Fat Industries 1924-10: Vol 1 Iss 2. Cassidy, Cody. “Who Discovered Soap? What to Know About the Origins of the Life-Saving Substance.” Time. 5/5/2020. https://time.com/5831828/soap-origins/ Ciftyurek, Muge, and Kasim Ince. "Selahattin Okten Soap Factory in Antakya and an Evaluation on Soap Factory Plan Typology/Antakya'da Bulunan Selahattin Okten Sabunhanesi ve Sabunhane Plan Tipolojisi Uzerine Bir Degerlendirme." Art-Sanat, no. 19, Jan. 2023, pp. 133+. Gale Academic OneFile, dx.doi.org/10.26650/artsanat.2023.19.1106544. Accessed 18 Aug. 2025. Costa, Albert B. “Michel-Eugène Chevreul.” Encyclopedia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Michel-Eugene-Chevreul Curtis, Valerie A. “Dirt, disgust and disease: a natural history of hygiene.” Journal of epidemiology and community health vol. 61,8 (2007): 660-4. doi:10.1136/jech.2007.062380 Dijkstra, Albert J. “How Chevreul (1786-1889) based his conclusions on his analytical results.” OCL. Vol. 16, No. 1. January-February 2009. Gibbs, F.W. “The History and Manufacture of Soap.” Annals of Science. 1939. Koeppel, Dan. “The History of Soap.” 4/15/2020. https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/blog/history-of-soap/ List, Gary, and Michael Jackson. “Giants of the Past: The Battle Over Hydrogenation (1903-1920).” https://www.ars.usda.gov/research/publications/publication/?seqNo115=210614 Maniatis, George C. “Guild Organized Soap Manufacturing Industry in Constantinople: Tenth-Twelfth Centuries.” Byzantion, 2010, Vol. 80 (2010). https://www.jstor.org/stable/44173107 National Museum of American History. “Bathing (Body Soaps and Cleansers).” https://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/object-groups/health-hygiene-and-beauty/bathing-body-soaps-and-cleansers New Mexico Historic Sites. “Making Soap from the Leaves of the Soaptree Yucca.” https://nmhistoricsites.org/assets/files/selden/Virtual%20Classroom_Soaptree%20Yucca%20Soap%20Making.pdf “The history of soapmaking.” 8/30/2019. https://www.open.edu/openlearn/history-the-arts/history/history-science-technology-and-medicine/history-science/the-history-soapmaking Pliny the Elder. “The Natural History of Pliny. Translated, With Copious Notes and Illustrations.” Vol. 5. John Bostock, translator. https://www.gutenberg.org/files/60688/60688-h/60688-h.htm Pointer, Sally. “An Experimental Exploration of the Earliest Soapmaking.” EXARC Journal. 2024/3. 8/22/2024. https://exarc.net/issue-2024-3/at/experimental-exploration-earliest-soapmaking Ridner, Judith. “The dirty history of soap.” The Conversation. 5/12/2020. https://theconversation.com/the-dirty-history-of-soap-136434 Routh, Hirak Behari et al. “Soaps: From the Phoenicians to the 20th Century - A Historical Review.” Clinics in Dermatology. Vol. No. 3. 1996. Smith, Cyril Stanley, and John G. Hawthorne. “Mappae Clavicula: A Little Key to the World of Medieval Techniques.” Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, vol. 64, no. 4, 1974, pp. 1–128. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/1006317. Accessed 18 Aug. 2025. Timilsena, Yakindra Prasad et al. “Perspectives on Saponins: Food Functionality and Applications.” International journal of molecular sciences vol. 24,17 13538. 31 Aug. 2023, doi:10.3390/ijms241713538 “Craftsmanship of Aleppo Ghar soap.” https://ich.unesco.org/en/RL/craftsmanship-of-aleppo-ghar-soap-02132 “Tradition of Nabulsi soap making in Palestine.” https://ich.unesco.org/en/RL/tradition-of-nabulsi-soap-making-in-palestine-02112 “Soaps.” https://www.fs.usda.gov/wildflowers/ethnobotany/soaps.shtml van Dijk, Kees. “Soap is the onset of civilization.” From Cleanliness and Culture. Kees van Dijk and Jean Gelman Taylor, eds. Brill. 2011. https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1163/j.ctvbnm4n9.4 Wei, Huang. “The Sordid, Sudsy Rise of Soap in China.” Sixth Tone. 8/11/2020. https://www.sixthtone.com/news/1006041 See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.