books

• 
• SOURCE: Car and Driver
  4/25/2021
  

  Author Mia Bay Talks About Traveling Black: A Story of Race and Resistance

  Mia Bay's new book examines how the forces of Black freedom and White supremacy collided over freedom of movement. 

• SOURCE: Majority Report with Sam Seder
  4/19/2021
  

  How Domestic Slave Traders Shaped America w/ Joshua D. Rothman

  Historian Joshua D. Rothman discusses "The Ledger and the Chain: How Domestic Slave Traders Shaped America," a new book linking the internal slave trade to the development of American capitalism. 

• 
• SOURCE: Arkansas Democrat & Gazette
  4/11/2021
  

  Unsung and Unknown — Graphic Biography Details Life of First Black Lieutenant Governor, Oscar Dunn

  Professor Brian Mitchell's path into history began with a teacher's disbelief that one of his relatives had been the Lieutenant Governor of Louisiana. He now tells the story of Oscar Dunn in a graphic form to make it as widely accessible as possible. 

• 
• SOURCE: Oxford (OH) Observer
  4/9/2021
  

  Miami Professor Writes Book for Young Readers about Roosevelt’s Fight with Polio

  Journalism professor and FDR biographer James Tobin describes the work of making the story of Roosevelt's battle with polio and its effect on his political life accessible to young readers.

• 
• SOURCE: Black Perspectives
  4/8/2021
  

  Black Soldiers and the Civil War

  by Aston Gonzalez

  Deborah Willis's book "The Black Civil War Soldier" utilizes visual imagery other historians have often passed over to describe how Black soldiers understood military service in relation to their hopes for future economic, political, and familial security. 

• 
• SOURCE: New Statesman
  4/6/2021
  

  Can Joe Biden Replicate FDR’s Success in Rebuilding the Democrats’ Coalition?

  Eric Rauchway's latest book on the FDR era shows that the New Deal was a complex undertaking, administered often through local channels, which meant it sometimes enabled democracy and sometimes suppressed it. The Biden administration can win allegiance from voters by expanding the safety net and strategic spending, but it won't be simple. 

• 
• SOURCE: OU Daily
  4/6/2021
  

  'This is still being suppressed': OU professor's book of recovered photos preserves history of Tulsa Race Massacre

  by Ari Fife

  Oklahoma University historian Karlos Hill has published a photographic history of the 1921 Tulsa race massacre, working to bridge images often created by hostile whites to the experiences of Black survivors. 

• 
• SOURCE: The New Republic
  3/24/2021
  

  Paleo Con

  by Daniel Immerwahr

  Why do the lifestyles of paleolithic hunter-gatherers repeatedly pop up as foils for western capitalist modernity? 

• 
• SOURCE: Wall Street Journal
  3/26/2021
  

  Lindsay Chervinsky's Five Best Books on Presidential Cabinets

  The author of an acclaimed book about George Washington's creation of the cabinet recommends five books about presidential cabinets, including those of Lincoln, Eisenhower and JFK, the unofficial team of African American advisors to FDR, and the consequential relationship between George W. Bush and Dick Cheney. 

• 
• SOURCE: Public Books
  3/25/2021
  

  The Spy Who Came in from the Carrel

  Two new books by Kathy Peiss and Richard Ovenden deal with the question of acquiring or destroying knowledege as an act of war, including the work of archivists in the OSS's "Chairborne Division" and the forced labor of Jewish scholars to identify major works of Judaica for Nazi Germany to purge. 

• 
• 3/21/2021
  

  The Same Mistakes Twice? Teaching Dr. Seuss

  by Walter Kamphoefner

  Step back from the current media controversy and consider how Theodor Geisel's cartooning illustrate the contradictory nature of America's posture toward foreign and domestic racism in the World War II era, a pivotal moment for the nation that must be understood in all its complication. 

• 
• SOURCE: The New Republic
  3/11/2021
  

  The Underground Activists Who Fought for Freedom Across Asia

  by Jeffrey Wasserstrom

  A new book on the movements against colonial rule in Asia looks to grassroots movements and multiple ideological and political groups and challenges "great man" ideas of national liberation. 

• 
• SOURCE: Chronicle of Higher Education
  3/9/2021
  

  Dr. Philip Nel on the Legacy of Dr. Seuss

  "A lot of people have a hard time wrapping their heads around the idea that an artist and a writer can be both a genius and a racist, can do brilliant work and be profoundly damaging. Those are not mutually exclusive categories."

• 
• SOURCE: Slate
  3/3/2021
  

  How Dr. Seuss Responded to Critics Who Called Out His Racism

  by Rebecca Onion

  If anyone wants to examine the particulars of Dr. Seuss Enterprises' decision to discontinue the publication of six of the late author's books before jumping in to culture war combat, writer Rebecca Onion's interview with children's literature scholar Philip Nel is a good place to start. 

• 
• SOURCE: New York Times
  2/25/2021
  

  Searching for Our Urban Future in the Ruins of the Past

  Annalee Newitz's book on lost cities debunks the idea of sudden, catastrophic collapse. But the death of cities does show that humanity is vulnerable to change that makes centuries-old ways of life untenable. 

• 
• SOURCE: Washington Post
  3/2/2021
  

  (Opinion) If Curtailing Racist Imagery in Dr. Seuss is ‘Cancel Culture,’ What, Exactly, is Your Culture?

  by Philip Bump

  Washington Post columnist suggests that accusations of "cancel culture" following the Dr. Seuss estate's decision to remove six books from print tell more about the accusers than about the subject.

• 
• SOURCE: WHYY
  2/23/2021
  

  Camden’s ‘Hoodbrarian’ Brings Love of Books to Community

  One citizen's efforts are carrying on the community functions of a public library system decimated by budget cuts in Camden, New Jersey. 

• 
• SOURCE: Washington Post
  3/2/2021
  

  Some Dr. Seuss Books with Racist Imagery will Go out of Print

  The decision, which was made by Dr. Seuss Enterprises and is neither an instance of "cancellation" nor a fatal blow to the revenue generated by the late author's works, reflects growing awareness of the impact on children of ethnic stereotypes. 

• 
• SOURCE: Public Books
  2/24/2021
  

  What Counts, These Days, In Baseball?

  by David Henkin

  A cultural historian considers recent baseball controversies in light of new books on the sport, and concludes that ideas of fair competition have much more to do with our social context than fans acknowledge. 

• 
• SOURCE: Public Books
  2/16/2021
  

  The Arch of Injustice

  Historian Steven Hahn reviews Walter Johnson's "The Broken Heart of America," finding that Johnson makes a compelling case that St. Louis is the archetypal American city but is less effective at showing concepts like white supremacy and racial capitalism as dynamic historical processes.