I recently put Will Bardenwerper’s book Homestand: Small Town Baseball and the Fight for the Soul of America on my reading list. After reading Timothy Carney’s review of the book at the Washington Free Beacon I moved it to the […]
capitalism
The Author’s Corner with Ellen Hartigan-O’Connor
Ellen Hartigan-O’Connor is Professor of History and Associate Dean for Graduate Students and Postdoctoral Scholars at the University of California, Davis. This interview is based on her new book, America Under the Hammer: Auctions and the Emergence of Market Values (University […]
The Author’s Corner with Justene Hill Edwards
Justene Hill Edwards is Associate Professor of History at the University of Virginia. This interview is based on her new book, Savings and Trust: The Rise and Betrayal of the Freedman’s Bank (W. W. Norton & Company, 2024). JF: What led […]
The Author’s Corner with David M. Emmons
David M. Emmons is Professor Emeritus of History at the University of Montana. This interview is based on his new book, History’s Erratics: Irish Catholic Dissidents and the Transformation of American Capitalism, 1870-1930 (University of Illinois Press, 2024). JF: What […]
The Author’s Corner with Mary Bridges
Mary Bridges is an Ernest May Fellow in History and Policy at Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs. This interview is based on her new book, Dollars and Dominion: US Bankers and the Making of a […]
Cornerstone University president Gerson Moreno-Riaño says the quiet parts out loud
I was going to take some time off from the blog this weekend to get some work done on a book manuscript, but this story pulled me back, Michael Corleone-style. (Not familiar with what is going on these days at […]
Is for-profit journalism sustainable?
The editors of Current talk about this all the time and we hope to make some of our own news on this front soon. In the meantime, Stephen Prager makes some good points in his recent piece at Current Affairs […]
What is “progressive capitalism”?
Nobel prize-winning Columbia University economist Joseph Stiglitz lays it out in today’s Washington Post. Here is a taste: Champions of the neoliberal order, moreover, too often fail to recognize that one person’s freedom is another’s unfreedom — or, as Isaiah […]
The Author’s Corner with Shaun S. Nichols
Shaun S. Nichols is Assistant Professor of History at Boise State University. This interview is based on his new book, Manufacturing Catastrophe: Massachusetts and the Making of Global Capitalism, 1813 to the Present (Oxford University Press, 2024). JF: What led […]
The Author’s Corner with Scott Gac
Scott Gac is Professor of History and American Studies at Trinity College. This interview is based on his new book, Born in Blood: Violence and the Making of America (Cambridge University Press, 2024). JF: What led you to write Born […]
The Author’s Corner with Brian M. Ingrassia
Brian M. Ingrassia is Associate Professor of History at West Texas A&M University. This interview is based on his new book, Speed Capital: Indianapolis Auto Racing and the Making of Modern America (University of Illinois Press, 2024). JF: What led […]
The Author’s Corner with Caleb Wellum
Caleb Wellum is Assistant Professor of U.S. History at the University of Toronto, Mississauga. This interview is based on his new book, Energizing Neoliberalism: The 1970s Energy Crisis and the Making of Modern America (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2023). JF: […]
Episode 124: “Christian Capitalism in Early America”
In this episode we talk with Wesleyan University historian Joseph Slaughter, author of Faith in Markets: Christian Capitalism in Early America. He offers a new account of the interplay between religion and capitalism in early American history by focusing on 19th-century […]
The Author’s Corner with Adam R. Nelson
Adam R. Nelson is Vilas Distinguished Achievement Professor of Educational Policy Studies and History at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. This interview is based on his new book, Exchange of Ideas: The Economy of Higher Education in Early America (University of Chicago […]
The Author’s Corner with Michael A. Blaakman
Michael A. Blaakman is Assistant Professor of History at Princeton University. This interview is based on his new book, Speculation Nation: Land Mania in the Revolutionary American Republic (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2023). JF: What led you to write Speculation […]
Can one oppose abortion and still be a democratic socialist?
Check out Matt McManus‘s review of Sohrab Ahmari’s Tryanny , Inc.: How Private Power Crushed American Liberty–and What to Do About It at Jacobin. As I noted in an earlier post, socialists really like this book despite Ahmari’s social conservatism. […]
A right-wing intellectual takes on capitalism. Some socialists are fine with it.
Some of you may know the name Sohrab Ahmari from his 2019 argument with David French over the meaning of conservatism. Since that debate, Amari has co-founded Compact, a journal critical of liberalism of both the left and the right […]
A socialist take on the Barbie movie
This week Current ran two great pieces on the Barbie movie. Check out Christina Bieber Lake’s “Barbie. . . and Ken” and Beatruce Scudeler’s “Material Girls.” Over at Current Affairs, Nathan Robinson interprets the movie through the lens of consumer […]
Has the GOP rejected Reaganomics?
Check out David Leonardt’s interesting piece at The New York Times: The Wall Street Journal’s editorial board has spent the last few months trying to boost Gov. Ron DeSantis’s presidential campaign. It has called his legislative record “as impressive as […]
When Gucci and Judith Butler meet
What happens when Gucci uses a book by philosopher Judith Butler to sell high-priced wallets? Here is Umut Özkırımlı at The Critic: Books as objects of attraction? Is that what brought Butler and Gucci together? I don’t mean the commodification […]