New Books in Environmental Studies
Episodes
Daniel A. Barber, "Modern Architecture and Climate: Design Before Air Conditioning" (Princeton UP, 2020)
06 Jan 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Modern Architecture and Climate explores how leading architects of the twentieth century incorporated climate-mediating strategies into their designs,...
Jonathan C. Slaght, "Owls of the Eastern Ice: A Quest to Find and Save the World's Largest Owl" (FSG, 2020)
24 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The Blakiston’s fish owl is the world’s largest living species of owl, with larger females of the species weighing as much as ten pounds. It lives...
S. L. Lewis and M. A. Maslin, "The Human Planet: How We Created the Anthropocene" (Yale UP, 2018)
18 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Meteorites, mega-volcanoes, and plate tectonics--the old forces of nature--have transformed Earth for millions of years. They are now joined by a new ...
John Soluri and Claudia Leal, "A Living Past: Environmental Histories of Modern Latin America" (Berghahn, 2018)
17 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
A Living Past: Environmental Histories of Modern Latin America (Berghahn Books 2018) is a wonderful collection that seeks to provide a general overvi...
Louise M. Pryke, "Turtle" (Reaction Books, 2020)
16 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
As ancient creatures that once shared the Earth with dinosaurs, turtles have played a crucial role in maintaining healthy terrestrial and marine ecosy...
Nora Bateson. "Small Arcs of Larger Circles: Framing Through Other Patterns" (Triarchy Press, 2016)
16 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
“To be a participant in a complex system is to desire to be both lost and found in the interrelationships between people, nature and ideas.” Nora ...
Alex Alvarez, "Unstable Ground: Climate Change, Conflict, and Genocide" (Rowman and Littlefield, 2017)
15 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Unstable Ground: Climate Change, Conflict, and Genocide (Rowman and Littlefield, 2017) looks at the human impact of climate change and its potential ...
Anne Lawrence-Mathers, "Medieval Meteorology: Forecasting the Weather from Aristotle to the Almanac" (Cambridge UP, 2019)
15 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode we speak to Anne Lawrence-Mathers, Professor of History at the University of Reading about her new book Medieval Meteorology: Foreca...
Andrea Ballestero, "A Future History of Water" (Duke UP, 2019)
11 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
We are joined by Dr. Andrea Ballestero, associate Professor of Anthropology and Director Ethnography Studio, at Rice University. We will be talking ab...
Beating Plastic Pollution in Timor-Leste with Professor Thomas Maschmeyer
10 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
As environmental emergencies go, the explosion of plastic waste is right up there. With global plastic production exceeding 300 million tonnes each ye...
Quito J. Swan, "Pauulu's Diaspora: Black Internationalism and Environmental Justice" (UP of Florida, 2020)
04 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Pauulu’s Diaspora: Black Internationalism and Environmental Justice (University Press of Florida, 2020) by Quito Swan is an enchanting, magisteria...
Peter Singer, "Why Vegan?: Eating Ethically" (Liveright, 2020)
03 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Even before the publication of his seminal Animal Liberation in 1975, Peter Singer, one of the greatest moral philosophers of our time, unflinchingl...
Rosemary-Claire Collard, "Animal Traffic: Lively Capital in the Global Exotic Pet Trade" (Duke UP, 2020)
27 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Parrots and snakes, wild cats and monkeys---exotic pets can now be found everywhere from skyscraper apartments and fenced suburban backyards to roadsi...
Ray Ison, "Systems Practice: How to Act In Situations of Uncertainty and Complexity in a Climate-Change World" (Springer, 2017)
25 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
While various systems theories have received rigorous treatments across the literature of the field, reliable and robust advice for systems practic...
Amalia Leguizamón, "Seeds of Power: Environmental Injustice and Genetically Modified Soybeans in Argentina" (Duke UP, 2020)
24 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In 1996 Argentina adopted genetically modified (GM) soybeans as a central part of its national development strategy. Today, Argentina is the third lar...
Jim Mason, "An Unnatural Order: The Roots of Our Destruction of Nature" (Latern Books, 2002)
24 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
First published by Simon & Schuster in 1993 and then by Continuum in 1998, Jim Mason’s An Unnatural Order: The Roots of Our Destruction of Nature ...
Michael Mascarenhas, "Lessons in Environmental Justice: From Civil Rights to Black Lives Matter and Idle No More" (Sage, 2020)
23 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Michael Mascarenhas's book Lessons in Environmental Justice: From Civil Rights to Black Lives Matter and Idle No More (Sage, 2020) provides an entry...
Graciela Chichilnisky, "Reversing Climate Change: How Carbon Removals Can Resolve Climate Change and Fix the Economy" (World Scientific, 2020)
17 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Dr. Graciela Chichilnisky’s new book Reversing Climate Change: How Carbon Removals Can Resolve Climate Change and Fix the Economy is perhaps the s...
Douglas Kelbaugh, "The Urban Fix: Resilient Cities in the War Against Climate Change, Heat Islands and Overpopulation" (Routledge, 2019)
16 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Cities are one of the most significant contributors to global climate change. The rapid speed at which urban centers use large amounts of resources ad...
James Staples, "Sacred Cows and Chicken Manchurian: The Everyday Politics of Eating Meat in India" (U Washington Press, 2020)
09 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Bovine politics exposes fault lines within contemporary Indian society, where eating beef is simultaneously a violation of sacred taboos, an expressio...
Thomas Fleischman, "Communist Pigs: An Animal History of East Germany's Rise and Fall" (U Washington Press, 2020)
03 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The pig played a fundamental role in the German Democratic Republic's attempts to create and sustain a modern, industrial food system built on communi...
Micha Rahder, "An Ecology of Knowledges: Fear, Love, and Technoscience in Guatemalan Forest Conservation" (Duke UP, 2020)
30 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
We are joined today by Dr. Micha Rahder, writer, editor, and independent scholar based in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. We will be talking about her ...
S. Myers and H. Frumkin, "Planetary Health: Protecting Nature to Protect Ourselves" (Island Press, 2020)
30 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In Planetary Health: Protecting Nature to Protect Ourselves (Island Press, 2020), Dr. Samuel Myers and his co-authors illustrate the interconnecte...
Michael Stamm, "Dead Tree Media: Manufacturing the Newspaper in Twentieth-Century North America" (Johns Hopkins UP, 2018)
29 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Michael Stamm’s book Dead Tree Media: Manufacturing the Newspaper in Twentieth-Century North America (Johns Hopkins UP, 2018) begins with the simple...
Peter J. Thuesen, "Tornado God: American Religion and Violent Weather" (Oxford UP, 2020)
27 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In Tornado God: American Religion and Violent Weather (Oxford UP, 2020), Peter J. Thuesen links the “numinous” religious experiences of Americans ...
Precariously Positioned: How Africa Must Balance Development with a Climate-Friendly Outlook
26 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In addition to battling poverty, malnutrition, and disease, African countries today find themselves also having to fend off the numerous perils of cli...
Valerie Olson, "Into the Extreme: U.S. Environmental Systems and Politics Beyond Earth" (U Minnesota Press, 2018)
20 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
What if outer space is not outside the human environment but, rather, defines it? This is the unusual starting point of Valerie Olson’s Into the Ext...
Kristina M. Lyons, "Vital Decomposition: Soil Practitioners and Life Politics" (Duke UP, 2020)
19 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In Colombia, decades of social and armed conflict and the US-led war on drugs have created a seemingly untenable situation for scientists and rural co...
Kristin J. Jacobson, "The American Adrenaline Narrative" (U Georgia Press, 2020)
08 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Kristin J. Jacobson In her new book, The American Adrenaline Narrative (University of Georgia Press), Kristin Jacobson considers the nature of perilou...
Daniel Macfarlane, "Fixing Niagara Falls: Environment, Energy, and Engineers at the World’s Most Famous Waterfall" (UBC Press, 2020)
07 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Water and diplomatic historian Dan MacFarlane has written a fascinating book on a fundamental debate in environmental history: What is a natural lands...
Elizabeth Ferry and Stephen Ferry, "La Batea" (Red Hook, 2017)
30 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
La Batea is an unconventional book. A collaboration between anthropologist Elizabeth Ferry and her photographer brother Stephen, it combines text and ...
Thom van Dooren, "The Wake of Crows: Living and Dying in Shared Worlds" (Columbia UP, 2019)
30 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Crows can be found almost everywhere that people are, from tropical islands to deserts and arctic forests, from densely populated cities to suburbs an...
Andrew C. Isenberg, "The Destruction of the Bison: An Environmental History, 1750-1920" (Cambridge UP, 2000)
30 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In 1800, tens of millions of bison roamed the North American Great Plains. By 1900, fewer than 1,000 remained. In The Destruction of the Bison: An Env...
Noam Chomsky and Robert Pollin, "Climate Crisis and the Global Green New Deal: The Political Economy of Saving the Planet" (Verso Books, 2020)
24 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In Climate Crisis and the Global Green New Deal: The Political Economy of Saving the Planet (Verso Books, 2020), Noam Chomsky, the world’s leading p...
Debjani Bhattacharyya, "Empire and Ecology in the Bengal Delta: The Making of Calcutta" (Cambridge UP, 2019)
21 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Debjani Bhattacharyya’s Empire and Ecology in the Bengal Delta: The Making of Calcutta (Cambridge University Press) asks: What happens when a distan...
Brian Eyler, "Last Days of the Mighty Mekong" (Zed Book, 2019)
21 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The Mekong River is one of the world’s great rivers. From its source in the Qinghai-Tibetan plateau it snakes down through southern China and then b...
Sue Stuart-Smith, "The Well-Gardened Mind: The Restorative Power of Nature (Scribner, 2020)
18 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Sue Stuart-Smith, who is a distinguished psychiatrist and avid gardener, offers an inspiring and consoling work about the healing effects of gardening...
Carl Safina, "Becoming Wild: How Animal Cultures Raise Families, Create Beauty, and Achieve Peace" (Henry Holt, 2020)
17 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Some people insist that culture is strictly a human accomplishment. What are those people afraid of? Becoming Wild: How Animal Cultures Raise Families...
Karen Holl, "Primer of Ecological Restoration" (Island Press, 2020)
08 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The pace, intensity, and scale at which humans have altered our planet in recent decades is unprecedented. We have dramatically transformed landscapes...
Matthew Yglesias, "One Billion Americans: The Case for Thinking Bigger" (Portfolio, 2020)
08 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
What would actually make America great? More people. If the most challenging crisis in living memory has shown us anything, it’s that America has lo...
Chantal Bilodeau, "Forward" (Tanlonbooks 2018)
03 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Over the past ten years, Chantal Bilodeau has made a name for herself a playwright singularly dedicated to writing plays about the issue of climate ch...
Brad Walters, "The Greening of Saint Lucia: Economic Development and Environmental Change in the West Indies" (UWI Press, 2019)
02 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Saint Lucia’s rural landscape is more forested today than at any time in at least seventy-five years (probably much longer). This change is profound...
Jeff Schauer, "Wildlife between Empire and Nation in 20th-Century Africa" (Palgrave Macmillan, 2019)
02 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The protection of African wildlife enjoys the support of large numbers of individuals and institutions throughout the world. In Wildlife between Empir...
Nathalie Peutz, "Islands of Heritage Conservation and Transformation in Yemen" (Stanford UP, 2018)
31 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Soqotra, the largest island of Yemen's Soqotra Archipelago, is one of the most uniquely diverse places in the world. A UNESCO natural World Heritage S...
Bjorn Lomborg, "False Alarm: How Climate Change Panic Costs Us Trillions, Hurts the Poor, and Fails to Fix the Planet" (Basic Books, 2020)
25 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Should climate change policy be subject to a cost-benefit analysis leading to a variety of policy choices? Or is it so critical that the only "proper"...
David Moon, "The American Steppes: The Unexpected Russian Roots of Great Plains Agriculture, 1870s-1930s" (Cambridge UP, 2020)
21 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Beginning in the 1870s, migrant groups from Russia's steppes settled in the similar environment of the Great Plains. Many were Mennonites. They brough...
Amelia Moore, "Destination Anthropocene: Science and Tourism in The Bahamas" (U California Press, 2019)
21 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Despite being a minor contributor to global greenhouse gas emissions, like many other small island nations, The Bahamas’s ecology and society are es...
Kerri Arsenault, "Mill Town: Reckoning with What Remains" (Martin's Press, 2020)
20 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Kerri Arsenault grew up in the rural working-class town of Mexico, Maine. For over 100 years the community orbited around a paper mill that employs mo...
Emily Pawley, "The Nature of the Future: Agriculture, Science, and Capitalism in the Antebellum North" (U Chicago Press, 2020)
11 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The nostalgic mist surrounding farms can make it hard to write their history, encrusting them with stereotypical rural virtues and unrealistically sep...
Stuart Ritchie, "Science Fictions: Exposing Fraud, Bias, Negligence, and Hype in Science" (Penguin Books, 2020)
10 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
So much relies on science. But what if science itself can’t be relied on? In Science Fictions: Exposing Fraud, Bias, Negligence, and Hype in Science...
Richard Breitman, "The Journal of Holocaust and Genocide Studies"(Oxford Academic/USHMM)
07 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The Journal of Holocaust and Genocide Studies is turning twenty-five. One of the first academic journals focused on the study of the Holocaust and G...
J. Browning and T. Silver, "An Environmental History of the Civil War" (UNC Press, 2020)
06 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
This sweeping new history recognizes that the Civil War was not just a military conflict but also a moment of profound transformation in Americans' re...
Daniel P. Aldrich, "Black Wave: How Networks and Governance Shaped Japan’s 3/11 Disasters" (U Chicago Press, 2020)
05 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Despite the devastation caused by the magnitude 9.0 earthquake and 60-foot tsunami that struck Japan in 2011, some 96% of those living and working in ...
Solomon Goldstein-Rose, "The 100% Solution: A Plan for Solving Climate Change" (Melville House, 2020)
29 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
At age 26, Solomon Goldstein-Rose has already spent more time thinking about climate change than most of us will in our lifetimes. He’s been a clima...
JoAnna Poblete, "Balancing the Tides: Marine Practices in American Samoa" (U Hawai’i Press, 2020)
28 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In Balancing the Tides: Marine Practices in American Samoa (University of Hawai’i Press, 2020), JoAnna Poblete demonstrates how western-style econom...
Sandra Postel, "Replenish: The Virtuous Cycle of Water and Prosperity" (Island Press, 2020)
22 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In Replenish: The Virtuous Cycle of Water and Prosperity (Island Press), Sandra Postel acknowledges society’s past mishaps with managing water ...
R. Sroufe and S. Melnyk, "Developing Sustainable Supply Chains to Drive Value" (Business Expert Press, 2017)
17 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Robert Sroufe and Steven Melnyk's Developing Sustainable Supply Chains to Drive Value (Business Expert Press) provides a multi-perspective approach to...
Thaisa Way, "River Cities, City Rivers" (Dumbarton Oaks, 2018)
16 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Today I talked to Thaisa Way, editor of River Cities, City Rivers (Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, 2018). Cities have been built along...
Kregg Hetherington, "The Government of Beans: Regulating Life in the Age of Monocrops" (Duke UP, 2020)
14 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
By the time Bolivian President Evo Morales was deposed in December 2019, it had become increasingly clear that Latin America’s Pink Tide – the wav...
Matto Mildenberger, "Carbon Captured: How Business and Labor Control Climate Politics" (MIT Press, 2020)
13 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Why do some countries pass legislation regulating carbon or protecting the environment while others do not? In his new book Carbon Captured: How Busin...
Robert Sroufe, "Integrated Management: How Sustainability Creates Value for Any Business" (Emerald, 2018)
10 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Integration has been a key theme across the general management, organizational behavior, supply chain management, strategy, information systems and th...
Rachel Mundy, "Animal Musicalities: Birds, Beasts, and Evolutionary Listening" (Wesleyan UP, 2018)
07 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
“What makes song sparrows, Verdi, medieval monks, and minstrelsy part of the same taxonomy?” So asks—and answers—Rachel Mundy, who is Assistan...
Eric Holthaus, "The Future Earth: A Radical Vision for What’s Possible in the Age of Warming" (HarperOne, 2020)
30 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
We sit at the beginning of what could be “both a truly terrifying and a golden era in humanity.” In The Future Earth: A Radical Vision for What’...
Thomas C. Rust, "Watching over Yellowstone: The US Army's Experience in America's First National Park, 1886–1918" (UP of Kansas, 2020)
25 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
When, in 1883, Congress charged the US Army with managing Yellowstone National Park, soldiers encountered a new sort of hostility: work they were untr...
Lee McIntyre, "The Scientific Attitude: Defending Science from Denial, Fraud, and Pseudoscience" (MIT Press, 2019)
24 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
What can explain the success of science as an endeavor for getting closer to truth? Does science simply represent a successful methodology, or is it s...
Julia Obertreis, "Imperial Desert Dreams: Cotton Growing and Irrigation in Central Asia, 1860-1991" (V and R Unipress, 2017)
23 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In Imperial Desert Dreams: Cotton Growing and Irrigation in Central Asia, 1860-1991 (V & R Unipress, 2017), Julia Obertreis explores the infrastructur...
Brian Greene, "Until the End of Time: Mind, Matter, and Our Search for Meaning in an Evolving Universe" (Random House, 2020)
02 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Brian Greene is a Professor of Mathematics and Physics at Columbia University in the City of New York, where he is the Director of the Institute for S...
Jane Hutton, "Reciprocal Landscapes: Stories of Material Movements" (Routledge, 2020)
01 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
How are the far-away, invisible landscapes where materials come from related to the highly visible, urban landscapes where those same materials are in...
Ben Nobbs-Thiessen, "Landscape of Migration: Mobility and Environmental Change on Bolivia's Tropical Frontier, 1952 to the Present" (UNC Press, 2020)
28 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Landscape of Migration: Mobility and Environmental Change on Bolivia's Tropical Frontier, 1952 to the Present (UNC Press, 2020), traces the entwined h...
Adam M. Sowards, "An Open Pit Visible from the Moon" (U Oklahoma Press, 2020)
21 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Adam M. Sowards is professor of history at the University of Idaho and a leading environmental historian. His new book, An Open Pit Visible from the M...
Johan Elverskog, "The Buddha’s Footprint: An Environmental History of Asia" (U Penn Press, 2020)
21 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Challenging the popular image of Buddhism as a religion intrinsically concerned with the environment, Dr. John Elverskog’s new monograph, The Buddha...
Toshihiro Higuchi, "Political Fallout: Nuclear Weapons Testing and the Making of a Global Environmental Crisis" (Stanford UP, 2020)
20 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In Political Fallout: Nuclear Weapons Testing and the Making of a Global Environmental Crisis (Stanford University Press, 2020), Toshihiro Higuchi pre...
Betsy Gaines Quammen, "American Zion: Cliven Bundy, God and Public Lands in the West" (Torrey House, 2020)
18 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In 2014, the cattle rancher Cliven Bundy entered the national spotlight after a showdown against federal officials over grazing rights on public lands...
A. M. Barton and W. S. Keeton, "Ecology and Recovery of Eastern Old-Growth Forests" (Island Press, 2018)
14 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Old-growth forests captivate and inspire us. Walking through them can transport us to a time before human domination of the natural world. This is esp...
Robert Sroufe et al, "The Power of Existing Buildings" (Island Press, 2019)
12 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Your building has the potential to change the world. Existing buildings consume approximately 40 percent of the energy and emit nearly half of the car...
Christian Wright, "Carbon County, USA: Miners for Democracy in Utah and the West" (U Utah Press, 2020)
06 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
During the early 1970s, a movement of rank-and-file coal miners rose up in Appalachia to challenge mine bosses and stodgy union officials. They sought...
Patrick M. Condon, "Five Rules for Tomorrow’s Cities" (Island Press, 2020)
29 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
How we design our cities over the next four decades will be critical for our planet. If we continue to spill excessive greenhouse gas into the atmosph...
Leslie M. Harris, "Slavery and the University: Histories and Legacies" (U Georgia Press, 2019)
28 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Slavery and the University: Histories and Legacies (University of Georgia Press, 2019), edited by Leslie M. Harris, James T. Campbell, and Alfred L. B...
Chris Courtney, "The Nature of Disaster in China: The 1931 Yangzi River Flood" (Cambridge UP, 2018)
28 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
For somewhat unfortunate reasons, many more people in the world now know about the existence and location of a city called Wuhan than was the case at ...
A. B. Chastain and T. W. Lorek, "Itineraries of Expertise: Science, Technology, and the Environment in Latin America" (U Pittsburgh Press, 2020)
23 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Emerging out of a 2016 conference, Andra Chastain and Timothy Lorek have brought together Environmental History, Latin American Studies, and Science a...
Jacob Blanc, "Before the Flood: The Itaipu Dam and the Visibility of Rural Brazil" (Duke UP, 2019)
22 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Jacob Blanc’s Before the Flood: The Itaipu Dam and the Visibility of Rural Brazil (Duke University Press, 2019) tells the story of the the Itaipu da...
Phoebe Lickwar and Roxi Thoren, "Farmscape: The Design of Productive Landscapes" (Routledge, 2020)
21 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Phoebe Lickwar and Roxi Thoren's book Farmscape: The Design of Productive Landscapes (Routledge, 2020) situates agriculture as a design practice, usin...
Jodi Hilty, "Corridor Ecology: Linking Landscapes for Biodiversity Conservation and Climate Adaptation" (Island Press, 2019)
20 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In Corridor Ecology: Linking Landscapes for Biodiversity Conservation and Climate Adaptation, 2nd Edition (Island Press, 2019), Dr. Jodi Hilty and her...
Wenfei Tong, "Bird Love: The Family Life of Birds" (Princeton UP, 2020)
17 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Wenfei Tong's Bird Love: The Family Life of Birds (Princeton University Press, 2020) looks at the extraordinary range of mating systems in the avian w...
Maya K. Peterson, "Pipe Dreams: Water and Empire in Central Asia’s Aral Sea Basin" (Cambridge UP, 2019)
16 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The drying up of the Aral Sea - a major environmental catastrophe of the late twentieth century - is deeply rooted in the dreams of the irrigation age...
Carlo Caduff, "The Pandemic Perhaps: Dramatic Events in a Public Culture of Danger" (U California Press, 2015)
16 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Carlo Caduff’s The Pandemic Perhaps: Dramatic Events in a Public Culture of Danger (University of California Press, 2015) is an ethnographic inquiry...
K. Aronoff, et al., "A Planet to Win: Why We Need a Green New Deal" (Verso, 2019)
14 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In early 2019, freshman representative Alexandria Ocasio Cortez and Senator Ed Markey proposed a bold new piece of legislation, now very well known as...
Matt Cook, "Sleight of Mind: 75 Ingenious Paradoxes in Mathematics, Physics, and Philosophy" (MIT Press, 2020)
30 Mar 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Paradox is a sophisticated kind of magic trick. A magician's purpose is to create the appearance of impossibility, to pull a rabbit from an empty hat....
Joseph E. Taylor III, "Persistent Callings: Seasons of Work and Identity on the Oregon Coast" (Oregon State UP, 2019)
26 Mar 2020
Contributed by Lukas
George Perkins Marsh Prize winning environmental historian and geographer Joseph E. Taylor III's new book, Persistent Callings: Seasons of Work and Id...
Sara Hughes, "Repowering Cities: Governing Climate Change Mitigation in New York City, Los Angeles, and Toronto" (Cornell UP, 2019)
25 Mar 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Scholars like Ben Barber have suggested that cities provide the democratic culture to pragmatically problem-solve challenging policy issues – such a...
Sophia Stamatopoulou-Robbins, "Waste Siege: The Life of Infrastructure in Palestine" (Stanford UP, 2020)
09 Mar 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Waste Siege: The Life of Infrastructure in Palestine (Stanford University Press, 2019) is an ethnography of Palestinian life under occupation that tak...
Jerome Whitington, "Anthropogenic Rivers: The Production of Uncertainty in Lao Hydropower" (Cornell UP, 2018)
06 Mar 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Jerome Whitington's Anthropogenic Rivers: The Production of Uncertainty in Lao Hydropower (Cornell University Press, 2019) examines the dynamics and d...
Steven Higashide, "Better Buses, Better Cities : How to Plan, Run, and Win the Fight for Effective Transit" (Island Press, 2019)
02 Mar 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Buses can and should be the cornerstone of urban transportation. They offer affordable mobility and can connect citizens with every aspect of their li...
Ellen Griffith Spears, "Baptized in PCBs: Race, Pollution, and Justice in an All-American Town" (UNC Press, 2016)
28 Feb 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Professor Ellen Griffith Spears of the University of Alabama, author of Baptized in PCBs: Race, Pollution, and Justice in an All-American Town (Univer...
Phillipa Chong, “Inside the Critics’ Circle: Book Reviewing in Uncertain Times” (Princeton UP, 2020)
25 Feb 2020
Contributed by Lukas
How does the world of book reviews work? In Inside the Critics’ Circle: Book Reviewing in Uncertain Times (Princeton University Press, 2020), Philli...
Stephanie Kaza, "Green Buddhism: Practice and Compassionate Action in Uncertain Times" (Shambhala, 2019)
20 Feb 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Stephanie Kaza is Professor Emerita of Environmental Studies at the University of Vermont, and has written widely on Buddhism and the environment. She...
Robert Frank, "Under the Influence: Putting Peer Pressure to Work" (Princeton UP, 2020)
17 Feb 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Psychologists have long understood that social environments profoundly shape our behavior, sometimes for the better, often for the worse. But social i...
Kyle Devine, "Decomposed: The Political Ecology of Music" (MIT Press, 2019)
05 Feb 2020
Contributed by Lukas
What is the human and environmental cost of music? In Decomposed: The Political Ecology of Music (MIT Press, 2019),Kyle Devine, an Associate Professor...
K. Linder et al., "Going Alt-Ac: A Guide to Alternative Academic Careers" (Stylus Publishing, 2020)
30 Jan 2020
Contributed by Lukas
If you’re a grad student facing the ugly reality of finding a tenure-track job, you could easily be forgiven for thinking about a career change. How...
Salvador Salinas, "Land, Liberty, and Water: Morelos After Zapata, 1920-1940" (U Arizona Press, 2018)
29 Jan 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In Land, Liberty, and Water: Morelos After Zapata, 1920-1940 (University of Arizona Press, 2018), Salvador Salinas fills an important gap in the histo...