New Books in History

Marshall Poe

Episodes

Mentioned books

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Feb 1, 2026 • 1h

Peter H. Wilson, "Iron and Blood: A Military History of the German-Speaking Peoples Since 1500" (Harvard UP, 2023)

Peter H. Wilson, Professor of the history of war at Oxford and author of Iron and Blood, rethinks five centuries of German-speaking military history. He questions myths of innate German militarism. He traces shifting power from Habsburgs to Prussia, explores soldier life, mercenaries, and militia, and repositions the world wars within long-term military and political change.
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Feb 1, 2026 • 1h 20min

Michael Casiano, "Let Us Alone: The Origins of Baltimore's Police State" (U Illinois Press, 2025)

Michael Casiano, Assistant Professor of American Studies at UMBC and author of Let Us Alone, traces how Baltimore’s police grew into a racialized municipal power. He discusses the book’s organization by policing sites, the chilling cover photo of masked detectives, vagrancy laws and jails, reformers' roles, courtroom cases like Henry Brown’s, and the Black press as a record of policing.
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Jan 31, 2026 • 51min

Nicole Wegner, "Martialling Peace: How the Peacekeeper Myth Legitimises Warfare" (Edinburgh UP, 2023)

Nicole Wegner, a lecturer who studies militarism and peace, explores how the peacekeeper myth emotionally legitimizes military force. She discusses the concept of martial peace, how myths form and sustain militarism, Canada's peacekeeping narrative, Afghanistan's role, and links between militarized policing and Indigenous suppression. Short, provocative, and focused on storytelling and political narratives.
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Jan 30, 2026 • 46min

Jovana Babović, "The Youngest Yugoslavs: An Oral History of Post-Socialist Memory" (Indiana UP, 2025)

Jovana Babović, Associate Professor of modern European history at SUNY Geneseo, studies Yugoslav and Eastern European urban culture. She shares oral histories from those born 1971–1991. Listeners hear memories of childhood in late socialism. Conversations cover multilingual everyday life, mobility across the region, who claims Yugoslavia, and unexpected post-Yugoslav diasporas.
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Jan 28, 2026 • 57min

Saundra Weddle, "The Brothel and Beyond: An Urban History of the Sex Trade in Early Modern Venice" (Penn State UP, 2026)

Saundra Weddle, professor of architecture who studies how buildings shape social life, discusses her book on Venice’s sex trade. She traces how sex work spread beyond municipal brothels into alleys, gondola landings, taverns, and bathhouses. Conversations cover mapping and archival methods, neighborhood patterns, networks of workers and intermediaries, and how urban space shaped mobility and everyday practices.
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10 snips
Jan 28, 2026 • 54min

Anna Reid, "A Nasty Little War: The West's Fight to Reverse the Russian Revolution" (Basic Books, 2024)

Anna Reid, journalist-turned-historian known for her work on Russia and Ukraine, examines the Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War. She recounts sprawling campaigns from Siberia to the Arctic. The conversation highlights shifting Allied aims, soldiers’ harsh daily realities, complicity in pogroms, and how this forgotten adventure was later remembered or erased.
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Jan 27, 2026 • 1h 10min

Damon Scott, "The City Aroused: Queer Places and Urban Redevelopment in Postwar San Francisco" (U Texas Press, 2024)

Damon Scott, urban historical geographer and author of The City Aroused, traces postwar San Francisco’s queer places and the redevelopment that erased them. He maps unrecorded waterfront sites. He discusses racial mixed maritime communities, policing and raids, legal blight and eminent domain, and how displaced drinking venues sparked collective political organizing.
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Jan 26, 2026 • 53min

Gerald F. Goodwin, "Race in the Crucible of War: African American Servicemen and the War in Vietnam" (U Massachusetts Press, 2023)

Gerald F. Goodwin, historian and author who documents Black servicemen in Vietnam through oral histories. He explores how racial conflict followed soldiers into war. He discusses research methods, veterans' perspectives on Vietnamese civilians, motivations to serve, and the difficult realities returning home.
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23 snips
Jan 25, 2026 • 1h 12min

Jorge Marco and Gutmaro Gomez Bravo, "The Fabric of Fear: Building Franco's New Society in Spain, 1936-1950" (Liverpool UP, 2023)

Jorge Marco, historian of Francoist repression, explains state building through mass violence and institutional tools. He discusses improvised military trials, prison systems, Catholic framing, denunciations and social fear. Short scenes show how repression was organized, adapted, and normalized across war and postwar Spain.
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Jan 25, 2026 • 1h 27min

Bradley R. Simpson, "The First Right: Self-Determination and the Transformation of International Order, 1941-2000" (Oxford UP, 2025)

Bradley R. Simpson, Associate Professor of History and Asian Studies, explores the contested meanings of self-determination across the twentieth century. He traces how decolonization, indigenous and regional movements, the UN, and Cold War power politics shaped competing visions. The conversation spans Pacific islands, economic sovereignty, transnational activism, and modern parallels like Palestine and Greenland.

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