#ScholarSunday Thread 236

August is here, and with it my 236^th #ScholarSunday thread of great public scholarly writing & work, podcast episodes, new & forthcoming books from the past week. Add more below, share widely, & enjoy, all!

Note: I know well Substack’s ongoing & deepening issues, & my wife & I are working to create an alternative, non-corporate public scholarly website that should launch this fall. For now, I hope these free collections of amazing work represent the best of this space & our communities.

Starting with a few favorites from the week as usual, including Meg Pillow for LitHub unpacking the archetype of the “promising young woman” with her own story & much more:

https://lithub.com/on-promising-young-women-and-the-nameless-men-who-get-in-their-way/

For his PGH City Paper column, David Rotenstein told the fascinating story of the building that once housed Pittsburgh’s most notorious madam:

https://www.pghcitypaper.com/news/the-bacchus-house-with-its-odd-facade-was-once-home-to-pittsburghs-most-notorious-madam-28422616

For History Workshop, Sabine Hanke highlighted histories of indigenous performance & resistance in the early 20^th century:

https://www.historyworkshop.org.uk/indigenous-history/performing-the-exotic-and-lakota-resistance/

While for Contingent magazine, A’liya Spinner wrote about an example of the vital scientific & archival work that is threatened by current cuts:

https://contingentmagazine.org/2025/07/28/the-losses-of-archives-and-arthropods/

& for a vital new archival resource, check out Miranda Spieler, Meredith Martin, & Hannah Williams’ Slaves in Paris Digital Mapping Project:

https://slavesinparis.org/

I really enjoyed this University of Vermont History in Action conversation with Felicia Kornbluh about her public scholarly work:

https://www.uvm.edu/cas/news/history-action-conversation-professor-felicia-kornbluh

Three pieces from the AHA’s Perspectives blog to share this week, including an update on the second month of the AHA Reads campaign:

https://www.historians.org/perspectives-article/aha-reads-2025-second-month-complete/

Also for Perspectives, NPS Park Ranger Ashley Whitehead Luskey contributed a moving & powerful piece on her work at the Richmond National Battlefield Park:

https://www.historians.org/perspectives-article/the-future-of-our-nations-past/

& check out Jessica Ramos for Perspectives on the power of counter-narratives in elementary social studies to teach girls that they belong:

https://www.historians.org/perspectives-article/teaching-girls-they-belong/

On a similar note, check out Selina Alipour Tabrizi for the Saturday Evening Post on some of the vital women behind famous male writers:

https://www.saturdayeveningpost.com/2025/07/behind-many-a-great-male-writer-is-a-woman-holding-a-pen/

That’s one of four columns from Saturday Evening Post colleagues to share this week, also including Nancy Rubin Stuart on silent film star Billie Burke’s relationship to Florenz Ziegfeld:

https://www.saturdayeveningpost.com/2025/07/missing-in-history-billie-burkes-tumultuous-relationship-with-florenz-ziegfeld/

Derek Mong wrote for the Post on how a small town in Texas & the 4^th of July saved his faith in the American road trip:

https://www.saturdayeveningpost.com/2025/07/saving-the-great-american-road-trip/

& I really enjoyed Post film reviewer Bill Newcott on Shoshana, a historical epic with a lot of complex present-day connections:

https://www.saturdayeveningpost.com/2025/07/review-shoshana-movies-for-the-rest-of-us-with-bill-newcott/

Turning to such current events, vital work from Julia Rose Kraut & Tyler McBrien for Lawfare on Trump’s embrace of ideological exclusion & deportation:

https://www.lawfaremedia.org/article/the-trump-admin-s-embrace-of-ideological-exclusion-and-deportation

For resistance to such policies, check out Jennifer Stavros for the Los Angeles Public Press on LA therapists’ “whisper networks” to help immigrants:

https://lapublicpress.org/2025/07/therapists-creating-whisper-networks-to-help-immigrants/

Brant Bingamon wrote for The Austin Chronicle on how right-wing crackdowns on higher ed are driving academics away from the University of Texas:

https://www.austinchronicle.com/news/2025-07-25/right-wing-crackdowns-drive-academics-away-from-ut-and-the-u-s/

Here’s Joseph Stieb for Liberal Currents on how the “restraint movement” in foreign policy lost its way through its attachment to Trump:

https://www.liberalcurrents.com/how-the-restraint-movement-lost-its-way/#/portal/signup

Great love letter to the lost pleasure of newspaper & magazine local music listings from Gabriel Kahane in The Atlantic (gift link below):

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2025/07/death-of-local-music-listings/683669/?gift=F2XcJGWxro5VL-sCQ2djtqlnrhkLI9I1OeHAIHOsj6s&utm_source=copy-link&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=share

& I really enjoyed Monique Welch-Rutherford in Capital B news on what Katrina survivors have contributed to a renaissance in Houston:

https://capitalbnews.org/houston-katrina-survivors-20-years-later/

Lots of great new podcast episodes this week, including the latest of Kelly Therese Pollock’s Unsung History featuring Susan Juster on Catholicism in the pre-Revolutionary colonies:

https://www.unsunghistorypodcast.com/Catholics/

Speaking of pre-Revolutionary religion, episode 417 of Liz Covart’s Ben Franklin’s World features the editors of Reading Roger Williams: Rogue Puritans, Indigenous Nations, & the Founding of America, Linford Fisher, Sheila McIntyre, & Julie Fisher:

https://benfranklinsworld.com/episode-417-roger-williams-rogue-puritan/

While for the new episode of Ian Saxine & Tiffany Link’s Mainely History, the organizers of the November 2024 Descendants Walk joined to talk about that event & the 1724 massacre at Norridgewock:

https://mainelyhistory.podbean.com/e/descendantswalk/

Episode 182 of Axelbank Reports History & Today features Evan’s interview with James Bradley about his book Martin Van Buren: America’s First Politician:

For the latest episode of the Shipwrecks & Seadogs podcast, John Noonan & John Bricker joined to talk about the rediscovered Civil War-era ship the Adriatic:

https://www.shipwrecksandseadogs.com/the-adriatic-a-civil-war-era-ship-uncovered/

The latest episode of Kamran Javadizadeh’s Close Readings features Siobhan Phillips on the great Marianne Moore:

For a fascinating new episode of the Oh What a Lovely podcast, the hosts turned the mic over to nine young readers to talk about the YA historical novel The Boy I Loved:

https://ohwhatalovelypodcast.co.uk/podcast/the-boy-i-loved/

Episode 60 of Waitman Beorn’s Holocaust History podcast features Alette Smeulers on studying perpetrators of mass violence:

Two new episodes of Liam Heffernan’s America: A History podcast this week, including linguist Valerie Fridland on American dialects & accents :

& for the latest in his In the Making current events series, Liam compared the Epstein Files to Nixon’s Watergate tapes:

Speaking of current events conversations, for SSN’s No Jargon podcast Taryn Morrissey joined to discus devastating cuts to our safety nets:

https://scholars.org/podcast/when-safety-net-shrinks

For the This Old Democracy podcast, host Micah Sifry was joined by journalist Perry Bacon to discuss the deepening crisis of American democracy:

While for the new episode of John Fugelsang & Corey Brettschneider’s The Oath & the Office podcast the hosts discussed South Park’s satirical resistance to Trump & Paramount:

& for the latest episode of Mark Anthony Neal’s Left of Black podcast, Sam C. Tenorio joined to talk Black anarchism’s resistance to anti-Blackness:

Finally, two special episodes to share this week, including possibly the final episode of the Reimagining the Internet podcast featuring the great Alondra Nelson:

https://publicinfrastructure.org/podcast/117-alondra-nelson/

& for the Civics & Coffee podcast, host Alycia Asai reflected on five years of podcasting & discussed the show’s rebranding & future:

https://www.civicsandcoffee.com/five-years-of-civics-coffee-welcome-to-the-new-era/

Three great pieces for Time’s Made By History blog this week, including Chipo Dendere & Kellie Carter-Jackson on what history tells us about the dangers of Trump’s brain drain:

https://time.com/7298847/history-dangers-trumps-brain-drain/

Here’s Sejal Patel-Tolksdorf for Made By History on how bureaucracy & budgets have always shaped American medical research:

https://time.com/7302294/bureaucracy-reshaped-american-medical-research/

& finally for Made By History, Kate L. Flach traced what the 1990s internet boom can tell us about the current AI craze:

https://time.com/7302216/internet-history-ai/

Over at the AAIHS’s Black Perspectives blog, Ashley Everson interviewed Crystal R. Sanders about her book A Forgotten Migration: Black Southerners, Segregated Scholarships, & the Debt Owed to Public HBCUs:

https://www.aaihs.org/a-forgotten-migration-an-interview-with-crystal-r-sanders/

Speaking of important scholarly books, out this week from UNC Press is Alaina M. Morgan’s Atlantic Crescent: Building Geographies of Black & Muslim Liberation in the African Diaspora:

https://uncpressblog.com/2025/07/29/new-this-week-july-29/

While now out in paperback from Routledge is Gregory Rupik’s Remapping Biology with Goethe, Schelling, & Herder: Romanticizing Evolution:

https://www.routledge.com/Remapping-Biology-with-Goethe-Schelling-and-Herder-Romanticizing-Evolution/Rupik/p/book/9781032582986?srsltid=AfmBOopF1AUtJViFgyLnNB0IcqPBQBIfpI3o1KUZkKgsBC6FUb1xs3MQ

Finally available for pre-order from Princeton University Press is Dan Sinykin & Johanna Winant’s much-anticipated collection Close Reading for the Twenty-First Century:

https://press.princeton.edu/books/paperback/9780691265704/close-reading-for-the-twenty-first-century?srsltid=AfmBOor7ed7W_d6blUJGHGg-RHlSXupV6cj8qWfp8OXqj_PLtqkCimL6

For an excerpt from an important recent publication, here’s Anders Stephanson in Jacobin from his American Imperatives: The Cold War & Other Matters:

https://jacobin.com/2025/07/cold-war-ussr-china-history/

For the latest USIH book review, Michelle Christian wrote about Alexander D. Barder’s Global Race War: International Politics & Racial Hierarchy:

https://s-usih.org/2025/07/michelle-christian-on-alexander-d-barders-global-race-war-international-politics-and-racial-hierarchy/

& behind a paywall but well worth if it you can track it down is David S. Reynolds’s New York Review of Books essay on Edward Larson’s American Inheritance: Liberty & Slavery in the Birth of a Nation, 1765-1795:

https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2025/08/21/the-contradictory-revolution-american-inheritance-larson/

Gonna end with a bunch of great newsletters & blog posts as ever, including the latest in the Ideas Roadshow America’s Descent series, this one on how the news became entertainment:

For his The Good Society newsletter, Michael Albertus interviewed senior January 6^th prosecutor Sonia Mittal on the gap between the law & democratic erosion:

Two interconnected pieces for Steve Vladeck’s One First newsletter, this one on the DOJ’s misconduct complaint against Judge Boasberg:

& this important follow-up piece responding to law professor Jonathan Adler’s defense of the DOJ:

For her Medium column, Allison Wiltz wrote about the frustrating current flirtation with a return to racial segregation:

https://allyfromnola.medium.com/whites-only-is-no-longer-a-past-problem-its-a-present-one-455852311fee

While Thomas Zimmer wrote for his Democracy Americana newsletter on white supremacy & the enduring debate over what & for whom is America:

Seth Masket wrote for the Tusk newsletter on the Trump administration’s multilayered assault on higher education:

Two parallel pieces for Kahlil Greene’s History Can’t Hide newsletter this week, including this one on a Massachusetts town’s resistance to an ICE arrest:

& Greene also wrote about the erased history of Grace Wisher, the free Black girl in early 19C Baltimore who helped stitch the flag that inspired “The Star-Spangled Banner”:

Speaking of flags, Liz Jackson & Rua M. Williams wrote for Thank You for Your Feedback Loop on the fraught Disability Pride Flag:

https://buttondown.com/TYFYFL/archive/unraveling-the-disability-pride-flag/

For his blog, William G. Pooley wrote about the term “glazing” & what it can tell us about AI in 2025:

https://williamgpooley.wordpress.com/2025/07/29/glazed-and-confused/

For bracing historical parallels to our current moment, check out Garret Graff for his Doomsday Scenario newsletter on the stories of people fleeing 1930s fascism:

https://www.doomsdayscenario.co/p/fleeing-one-step-ahead-of-fascism-fbcf5ac4661dca77

I really loved Kevin M. Levin for his Civil War Memory newsletter on what he’d argue was the most important moment during Reconstruction:

For a new installment of his Liberating Narratives blog, Bram Hubbell wrote about teaching East Africa in world history, c.1000 to the present:

https://www.liberatingnarratives.com/a-mixed-population-of-muslims-and-zanj/

For his A Necessitous Blog, Eric Rauchway highlighted the fascinating story & data behind New Deal-era relief to U.S. territories:

https://erauchway.github.io/posts/relief_pc/relief_st_terr.html

Two new posts at Pamela D. Toler’s History in the Margins blog this week, including this one on corsets’ contributions to the WWI home front:

https://www.historyinthemargins.com/2025/07/29/corsets-for-victory/

& Toler followed up a reader question with this post on the great journalist & creative writer Rebecca Harding Davis:

https://www.historyinthemargins.com/2025/08/01/rebecca-harding-davis-making-things-real/

For his Freedom Papers newsletter, Etienne Toussiant shared with Zora Neale Hurston can tell us about writing with curiosity & purpose:

For her Feminist Giant newsletter, Mona Eltahawy offered some birthday reflections on lifting, strength, & continued growth:

While for her Love Notes newsletter, Jenn M. Jackson penned an ode to platonic love between Black women:

Gonna end with great cultural studies pieces as I often do, including Liza Donnelly for her substack on groundbreaking New Yorker cartoonist Mary Petty:

For his Adventures in the Archive newsletter, Chris Yogerst reminded us of the first reactions to South Park back in 1997:

Another great essay for Bright Wall/Dark Room, this time Veronica Fitzpatrick on The Silence of the Lambs:

https://www.brightwalldarkroom.com/2025/07/29/where-to-look-silence-of-the-lambs/

& Vaughn Joy offered a wonderful installment of her Review Roulette newsletter, a formalist take on the original Naked Gun & the best of film comedy:

Also check out this introductory post for what should be a fascinating new material culture newsletter, Grave Concerns:

& if you can’t get enough public scholarly goodness (me neither!), check out Dion Georgiou’s 46^th Stop, Look, & Listen newsletter:

PS. I’m sure I missed plenty as ever, so please share more writing, podcasts, new & forthcoming books below. Thanks, & happy reading, listening, & learning, all!