Cambridge American History Seminar Podcast: Recent Episodes
Cambridge American History Seminar Podcast
A weekly (term-time) podcast featuring brief interviews with the presenters at the Cambridge American History Seminar. We talk about presenters' current research and paper, their broader academic interests as well as a few more general questions. If you have any feedback, suggestions or questions, contact us via Twitter @camericanist or via email ltd27@cam.ac.uk . Thanks for listening!
Daniel Widener is a Professor of History at the University of California, San Diego. He is the author of Black Arts West and the book under discussion today: Third Worlds Within: multiethnic movements and transnational solidarity, available through Duke University Press. Taking their cues from the book’s introduction, titled “The Dream of a Common Language: Afterlives of U.S. Thirdworldism,” Fergus Selsdon Games and Kris Dekatris—PhD candidates here at Cambridge—join Daniel to discuss Thirdworldism, racial capitalism, neoliberalism, settler colonialism, Daniel’s scholarly influences, and solidarity.
Erika Lee, this year’s Pitt Professor of American History and Institutions at Cambridge University, Bae Family Professor of History, and Radcliffe Alumnae Professor at Harvard University, joins Fergus Selsdon Games and Sam Lanevi—both PhD candidates here at Cambridge—to discuss her upcoming work Reclaiming Lost Histories of Asian America. Topics include toppling statues, the problems surrounding contemporary memorialisation, and overcoming research hurdles.
Arianne Sedef Urus, Assistant Professor of Early American History and Fellow at Christ's College, Cambridge, joins Megan Renoir and Hugh Wood to discuss cod fisheries, early modern empires, and Indigenous expropriation through the commons.
Prof. Manfred Berg, Curt Engelhorn Chair in American History at the University of Heidelberg, joins Megan Renoir and Hugh Wood to discuss the 2nd Amendment, mass shootings, the militia movement, and the possibility of another American civil war.
Dr. Erik Mathisen joins Hugh Wood and Rob O'Sullivan to discuss his paper "The Problem of Free Labor and the Origins of the Republican Party." Dr. Mathisen places the idea of Free Labor within a global context and attempts to understand how the flaws of Free Labor were glossed over by proponents and later historians.
This week, Elizabeth Varon, Harold Vyvyan Harmsworth Professor of American History, University of Oxford, and Langbourne M. Williams Professor of American History, University of Virginia, examines the political discourse of the Reconstruction era, and particularly the origins of the phrase "white supremacy."
NB this episode contains reference to outdated and offensive language.
Dr. Noam Maggor, Senior Lecturer in American History at Queen Mary, joins the podcast to discuss the transformation of American capitalism in the late-C19th. We focus on railroad regulation as a tool of the American 'developmental state'.
We discuss the complex history of ‘freedom’ in American history with 2023 Pulitzer Prize winner Jefferson Cowie (Vanderbilt University).
Prof. Andrew Preston is joined by two of his supervisees, Sam and Caleb. They discuss his next book project, which is about the invention of national security in the New Deal period.
Tune in for Latinx visual culture, New York's alternative 'artworlds' of the 1970s, Black Atlantic women artists and the nature of canonisation.
Prof. Stephanie Lewthwaite is Associate Professor in American History (Faculty of Arts) at the University of Nottingham
Dr. Joanna Cohen, Reader in American History at Queen Mary University of London, invites Fergus and Rob to consider some major problems in nineteenth century legal history and the history of capitalism. A lot of our discussion turns on the meaning of 'sympathy' in historical analysis.
Dr. Lewis Defrates discusses his paper "Neutrality by Absence: The Selective Repatriation of Americans at the Beginning of the First World War." The paper describes how the U.S. government rushed to extract its citizens, ordered by social category, from the crisis rapidly unfolding across Europe. The paper promises to reshape our understanding of the relationship between geopolitics, citizenship, and crisis management.
Prof. Nick Guyatt, Caleb Woodall, and Hugh Wood discuss Nick's role as editor of the upcoming Oxford Illustrated History of the United States. We discuss the history and culture wars, the narratives that surround the American past, and the difficult political terrain the contemporary historian must navigate.
Richard J. M. Blackett, Andrew Jackson Professor of History at Vanderbilt University, joins Fergus and Shea to discuss the largely forgotten abolitionist Samuel Ringgold Ward.
Dr. Grace Mallon - Kinder Junior Research Fellow in Atlantic History, and fellow of University College, Oxford - joins Jasmin Bath and Hugh Wood to discuss the peculiarities and practicalities of federalism in the Early Republic period.
Prof. Andrew Preston discusses the causes and implications of the American invasion and occupation of Iraq with Fergus and Hugh.
Prof. Daddis joins Caleb Woodall and Fergus Selsdon Games, both PhD candidates here at Cambridge, to discuss his forthcoming work Faith and Fear: America's Relationship with War in the Modern Era. We discuss power, gender, and America's faith in the transformative capacity of conflict.
For the final episode before Easter break, Dr. Meg Jacobs and Caleb Woodall join Hugh Wood to discuss the New Deal's Agricultural Adjustment Agency. We cover topics such as collectivism, coercion, and the saving of American capitalism. As noted in the introduction, there won't be any new episodes until mid-May. Until then, stay well, and thanks for tuning in this term!
This week, Prof. Emily West, from Reading University, and Meg Roberts, a PhD candidate at the University of Cambridge, join Hugh Wood to discuss Prof. West's paper, "Enslaved Women and the Duality of Feeding in the Antebellum South." Here's a link to Prof. West's article on wet-nursing: https://www.jstor.org/stable/44783893, and here's a link to BRANCH: https://branchuk.wordpress.com/ We hope you enjoy this week's episode, and thanks to both Prof. West and Meg for joining!
This week, Prof. Sophie White and Will Johnson, an MPhil here at Cambridge, join Hugh Wood to discuss Prof. White's paper, "His Master's Grace": Extra-Judicial Violence in Atlantic Slave Societies." Here are the links to the project and works mentioned in the introduction: the digital humanities project, https://oieahc.wm.edu/digital-projects/oi-reader/; an edited collection, Hearing Enslaved Voices: African And Indian Slave Testimony In British And French America, 1700–1848, https://www.routledge.com/Hearing-Enslaved-Voices-African-and-Indian-Slave-Testimony-in-British-and/White-Burnard/p/book/9780367541866; and Voices of the Enslaved https://uncpress.org/book/9781469666266/voices-of-the-enslaved/. Thanks for tuning in, and we hope you enjoy this week's episode.
This week, Dr. Robert Lee and Megan Renoir join Hugh Wood to discuss indigenous dispossession, institution building, and the complexities of post-revolutionary governing. Here's a link to Dr. Lee's prizewinning work on Land Grab Universities: https://www.landgrabu.org/. Thanks for tuning in and we hope you enjoy!
Dr. Emily Brady - the Broadbent Junior Research Fellow at Christ Church College, Oxford - joins Marie Puysségur and Hugh Wood to discuss her work on African American Women photographers in the long civil rights movement. Here's a link to an article containing some of the photographs we discuss today: (https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2020/feb/01/civil-rights-photographer-doris-derby-we-will-walk-turner-contemporary). The photo Dr. Brady mentions at the end is found here: (https://www.icp.org/browse/archive/objects/coretta-scott-king). We hope you enjoy this week's episode!
This week, Prof. Bruce J. Schulman, discusses some research drawn from his current book project, a monumental volume of the Oxford History of the United States, covering the period 1896-1929. We're joined by Eric Wycoff-Rogers, who's just submitted their PhD on gender and sex relations in the first decades of the 20th century.
For the first episode of 2023 (re-uploaded due to a technical error!), we're joined by Dr. Caitlin Harvey, an early career research fellow at Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge. Alongside Caitlin, we're joined by Rob O'Sullivan, a PhD candidate at Sidney Sussex and historian of Irish identity in the nineteenth century United States. Be on the lookout for Caitlin's upcoming book, Bricks and Mortar Boards: University-Building in the Settlement Empire, 1840-1920, which will be released in late 2024. Thanks for listening!
For the first episode of 2023, we're joined by Dr. Caitlin Harvey, an early career research fellow at Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge. Alongside Caitlin, we're joined by Rob O'Sullivan, a PhD candidate at Sidney Sussex and historian of Irish identity in the nineteenth century United States. Be on the lookout for Caitlin's upcoming book, Bricks and Mortar Boards: University-Building in the Settlement Empire, 1840-1920, which will be released in late 2024. Thanks for listening!
In this episode, Dr. Erin Trahey, Assistant Professor of Early American History at Cambridge, discusses a chapter from her upcoming book project, Free Women of Jamaica: Property, Race and Power in Jamaican Slave Society 1760-1834, entitled: "Power Ever Follows Property: Sugar Heiresses and the Devises Act of 1761." Take a dive into the racial, gender, and class hierarchies of colonial Jamaica with Dr. Trahey, and PhD students Shea Hendry and Hugh Wood.
In this episode, Professor Fredrik Logevall discusses a chapter from the upcoming second volume of his biography of President John F. Kennedy. Theo Zenou - a PhD candidate at Hughes Hall - joins Hugh Wood to talk through JFK's character, contemporary resonance, and the debates surrounding the relationship between biography and history.
This week, Professor Angus Burgin discusses his paper, "From the New Economy to Neoliberalism" with PhD students Sam Pallis and Hugh Wood.
Professor Mario Del Pero, Professor of International History, Institut d’études politiques at Sciences Po, Paris, speaks about his paper 'In the Shadow of the Vatican' with PhD student Christopher Schaefer.
The pair discuss the missionary efforts of a small group of evangelical Christians, members of the 'Church of Christ', who moved from Lubbock, Texas to Castelli Romani, Italy, in 1948. They explore the history of Pentecostalism and the Waldensian movement in Italy, concerns about the pressures of the Vatican on the Italian state, and the constant spectre of communism that loomed over debates regarding religious practice and the growing American presence in Europe in the years following the Second World War. They also discuss the promises and perils of microhistory for historians of modern Europe.
As mentioned during the introduction, after this week all seminars until the end of term have been cancelled on account of scheduled industrial action. That means that unless something drastically changes, you won't hear from us again until the end of April. If you have any questions, suggestions or feedback, get in touch via @camericanist on Twitter or ltd27@cam.ac.uk. Spread the word, and thanks for listening!
Back to our normal format this week. Emma Teitelman, Mellon Research Fellow in American History at the University of Cambridge, talks to Lewis Defrates about her paper ‘Class and State in America’s Greater Reconstruction’
Dr Teitelman’s paper discusses the efforts of groups of north-eastern capitalists in the years following the Civil War to work with the federal government to engender new forms of social organization based around free labour capitalism in the ‘peripheries’, i.e. the American south and west. The project looks at the developing relationship between the state and private capital in transforming the United States in the decades following the rupture of the Civil War
Here, Dr Teitelman talks largely about the work of two public-private groups, the Southern Famine Relief Commission and the Board of Indian Commissioners, in the years between 1865-1874. We also discuss the broader project, what these new ‘social relations’ looked like, and perhaps the most anticipated ‘favourite album’ answer yet.
If you have any questions, suggestions or feedback, get in touch via @camericanist on Twitter or ltd27@cam.ac.uk. Spread the word, and thanks for listening!
(NB: there’s one moment in this interview where I ‘punch in’ a rerecording of a question I asked, as the original recording was unusable due to the flow of conversation. This might be noticeable to listeners - it certainly is to me - but the wording is almost identical to what was asked at the time, promise!)
This is a special episode of the CAHS podcast, as Pitt Professor of American History and Institutions Heather Ann Thompson delivers her inaugural lecture on 'American Prison Uprisings and Why They Matter Today', with introductory comments from Professor Gary Gerstle.
Apologies for the quasi-'field recording' style of the audio here. Video of the lecture will be uploaded to the Cambridge History YouTube channel in the coming days.
If you have any questions, suggestions or feedback, get in touch via @camericanist on Twitter or ltd27@cam.ac.uk. Spread the word, and thanks for listening!