#ScholarSunday Thread 250! (11/16/25)

Here it is, a very special–& especially supersized—250^th #ScholarSunday thread of great public scholarly writing & work, podcast episodes, new & forthcoming books from the last week. Please add more below, share as widely as possible, & enjoy, all!

First, a reminder that yesterday I shared a meta-thread featuring reflections on these first 250 #ScholarSunday threads & requests for y’all when it comes to them & our website as we move forward.

Articles:

Starting with a handful of excellent articles for Veterans’ Day, including Andy Demetra for ESPN on the late 19^th century Georgia Tech football star who became a military legend.

Important piece from the folks at the Equal Justice Institute on the need to remember Black veterans targeted for racial violence across our history.

Over at Meidas+, Ken Harbaugh shared a thoughtful post on how veterans can exemplify critical patriotism long after their service.

Nick Hurley wrote for Contingent magazine on takeaways from his year teaching History at the United States Military Academy.

For her Women’s Work column at the Saturday Evening Post, Tanya Roth honored all the women who have served across American history.

While for my own latest Considering History column for the Post, I highlighted the heroic, tragic, very American story of the iconic WWII veteran Ira Hayes.

Speaking of Hayes, check out this CPR News Veterans’ Day story on the Battle of Iwo Jima through the eyes of a U.S. Marine who lived it.

& for my AmericanStudier blog this week I analyzed veterans’ stories & texts from across the 250 years of American history & military conflicts.

Turning to other great public scholarly writing & work from the week, check out the important new Negro World Newspaper Collection, 1923-1925, from the folks at Digital Culture of Metropolitan New York.

For a similar project in progress, check out Ira Porter & Cameron Pugh reporting for the Christian Science Monitor on Howard University’s fight to preserve historic Black newspapers (featuring the perspective of Nicole Carr).

A trio of great essays on American fiction to share this week, including Eve Dunbar for LitHub on the life & work of mid-20^th century author Alice Childress.

For the Pittsburgh Review of Books, Geoff Peck offered a brief but rich history of the American protest novel. 

& I really enjoyed Daniel Yadin’s article for The Drift magazine on contemporary romantasy authors at the end of the world.

Also a handful of fascinating pieces on spatial histories to share this week, including Jeff Nichols for the Chicago Reader on the city’s history of defying kidnappings of its residents.

For the Urban History Association’s Metropole blog’s November series on Metropolitan Consumption, Matthew King contributed a post on how the Wisconsin Dells turned nature into the ultimate indoor destination.

Jonathan Burdick wrote for the Erie Reader on how the Erie Playhouse reflects the dramatic evolution of the community’s local theater scene.

Two new columns from David S. Rotenstein this week, including for Link Northern Kentucky on how changes in a historic sign mask gambling histories.

While Rotenstein wrote for his Pittsburgh City Paper column on that city’s history of controversial “black books.”

Two inspiring pieces for the AHA’s Perspectives blog this week, including the final of Ben Vinson III’s Presidential columns, a conversation with transnational historian Erika Pani.

While Sarah Jones Weicksel wrote for Perspectives on the organization’s partnership with the important new Doctoral Futures Initiative.

For the 50^th anniversary of the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald, Jerald Podair wrote for Clio and the Contemporary on lessons from that historic tragedy.

Speaking of that wreck, Jeff Nilsson wrote for the Saturday Evening Post on other significant shipwrecks from across Great Lakes history.

& the folks at the Post also shared David McCullough’s reflections on historical education & knowledge in our fraught 2020s moment. 

Current Events:

Turning to current events public scholarly writing, three thoughtful pieces this week on Mamdani’s historic win, including A.R. Moxon for The Reframe on the power of standing for something.

Over at The Farce, Jason Sattler argued that the Mamdani campaign must be the future of Democratic & American politics.

While Peter Coviello, Mamdani’s former Chair of Africana Studies at Bowdoin, wrote for LitHub on why it’s a mistake to talk to legacy media about Mamdani.

For a broader take on the 2025 elections, here’s Amanda Becker for 19^th News on how Democrats successfully responded to anti-trans attacks.

While Brandi Buchman wrote for HuffPost on how lower courts are playing their own long game to resist Trump.

Important column for The Atlantic (that’s a gift link) from Quinta Jurecic on how we’re in the midst of a third Red Scare.

While Zadie Smith wrote for The Guardian on the British Library’s striking workers & the role of culture in our fraught moment.

For a far more destructive role of culture, here’s Adam Serwer for The Atlantic (gift link) on why Elon Musk needs fantasy fiction to support his scientific racism.

Victor Ray wrote for Liberal Currents on the seeming conflicts but genuinely small differences between the Heritage Foundation & Nick Fuentes.

Important New York Times Guest Essay (gift link) from David Herzberg on all the things Trump gets wrong about Fentanyl.

For the latest installment of her NiCHE Canada #EnvHist Worth Reading column, Jessica DeWitt highlighted a handful of important recent pieces.

Vital piece from Calum Matheson for Tech Policy Press on the role of affect & emotion in our disinformation age.

Speaking of disinformation machines, for her Medium column Nina Begus shared her Slovenian Science Day remarks on science, humanities, & AI.

While Maggie Fernandes, Megan McIntyre, & Jennifer Sano-Franchini provided an update on their year of refusing generative AI in Writing Studies.

Also check out the new issue of my friend Robin E. Field’s Zeal magazine for David Buck’s arguments for GenAI refusal.

Two open-access academic articles on AI to share this week as well, including Kaspar Beelen, Jon Lawrence, Katherine McDonough, & Daniel C.S. Wilson for Computational Humanities Research on assessing bias in datasets.

Also open-access is Eva Cheuk-Yin Li & Ka-Wei Pang for Transformative Works & Cultures offering a critically speculative ethics of care for fandom research in the age of AI.

& for a delightful hand-written alternative to these AI trends, check out Matthew Hutson for Scientific American on discovering “eureka” moments in mathematicians’ chalkboard writings.

Podcasts:

Tons of new podcast episodes to share this week, including the latest for Christina Gessler’s Academic Life podcast featuring Marion Orr on the rise & fall of America’s most consequential Black Congressman, Charles C. Diggs Jr.

& thanks to Christina for also sharing an episode of Academic Life that I had missed, featuring John Elledge offering “a brief history of the world in 47 borders.”

For the latest episode of the History on Film podcast, Alan Siegel joined to discuss his book Stupid TV, Be More Funny: How the Golden Era of The Simpsons Changed Television—and America—Forever.

While for the newest episode of the CineHistorians podcast, they highlighted Victor Erice’s The Spirit of the Beehive (1973).

& for Sonny Bunch’s Bulwark Goes to Hollywood podcast, Chris Yogerst joined to talk about his new book on The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence.

Episode 425 of Liz Covart’s Ben Franklin’s World podcast focuses on a new cultural work, Ken Burns’s The American Revolution, with the documentary’s two co-directors Sarah Botstein & David Schmidt.

For her American Conversations series, Heather Cox Richardson likewise interviewed Botstein as well as Ken Burns himself.

While over at his Civil War Memory podcast Kevin M. Levin hosted a live chat on that new documentary.

Over at the Civil War Monitor podcast, David Hochfelder joined to discuss the vital & often unseen role of the telegraph during the Civil War.

The latest episode of Liam Heffernan’s America: A History podcast features Coll Thrush on the life & legacy of Chief Seattle.

While the newest episode of Alycia Asai’s Civics & Coffee podcast highlights the frustratingly enduring legacy of the Alien Enemies Act.

For his Axelbank Reports History & Today podcast, Evan Axelbank was joined by David Baron to discuss his book The Martians: The True Story of an Alien Craze that Captured Turn-of-the-Century America.

The latest episode of Kate Carpenter’s Drafting the Past podcast features Mary Frances Phillips talking about her first book, Black Panther Woman: The Political & Spiritual Life of Ericka Huggins.

While the folks at the This is Democracy podcast were joined by Renata Keller to discuss the history of U.S.-Latin American relations.

The new episode of the Shipwrecks & Sea Dogs podcast highlights the 60^th anniversary of the deadly disaster of the SS Yarmouth Castle.

Turning to more current events conversations, Lina-Maria Murillo joined the Immigrantly podcast to discuss how the myth of “too many people” drives eugenics arguments.

For a much more positive take on a growing population, Howard French joined Lydia Polgreen from the New York Times to discuss the need for world engagement with Africa.

For the 10^th episode of their This Ain’t It podcast, Melissa & Matthew Teutsch discussed a far more frustrating Times piece & whether women really “ruined the workplace.”

Episode 2 of Dana R. Fisher’s Apocalyptically Optimistic Climate Conversations podcast features Rod Schoonover & Lisa Schipper on (mal)adaptation & climate shocks.

Over at her Freedom Over Fascism podcast, Stephanie G. Wilson interviewed investigative journalist Zev Shalev about the Epstein files & financial crises.

For The New Republic’s Trump vs. History series, David W. Blight was joined by Geraldo Cadava, Edward Ayers, & Mollly Worthen to discuss the fights to preserve history & democracy.

Speaking of the fight for democracy, another recent episode of Heather Cox Richardson’s American Conversations featured Kate Compton Barr & Sam Wang on gerrymandering.

Finally, check out the debut episode of an exciting new podcast, Matt Gabriele’s American Medieval, featuring a conversation with Eleanor Janega about their respective medieval studies.

Made By History and Black Perspectives:

Two important new pieces for Time’s Made By History blog this week, including Philip Yaure on how the fight over birthright citizenship has always been political.

While Michael Bobelian wrote for Made By History on how the Warren Court’s frustrating retreat might foreshadow fraught trends in our own moment.

& over at AAIHS’s Black Perspectives blog, Ashley Everson interviewed Andrea Morales Loucil about her new article on abolition & performance in the 19^th-century Caribbean.

Books:

Lots of important new books published this week, including my personal favorite, my awesome wife Vaughn Joy’s Selling Out Santa: Hollywood Christmas Films in the Age of McCarthy from De Gruyter Brill.  

Out this week from UNC Press is Oscar Winberg’s Archie Bunker for President: How One Television Show Remade American Politics.

Out now from Rutgers University Press is Kathleen Tamalo Alves’s Body Language: Medicine & the Eighteenth-Century Comic Novel.

Likewise newly published from editors Durell M. Callier, Dominique C. Hill, Lauren Muller, & Becky Thompson’s This Unruly Witness: June Jordan’s Legacy from Haymarket Books.

Published this week by Hachette Book Group was Vanessa S. Williamson’s The Price of Democracy: The Revolutionary Power of Taxation in American History.

Also out this week from Simon & Schuster is John Lingan’s Backbeats: A History of Rock and Roll in Fifteen Drummers.

Now available for folks in the UK is Conor Heffernan’s When Fitness Went Global: The Rise of Physical Culture in the Nineteenth Century from Bloomsbury UK.

For those & other new releases from the past week, check out Kate Carpenter’s list on her Drafting the Past site.

Not newly published but newly shared with me (which I always appreciate & hope y’all will continue doing!) is Lauren Coodley’s Upton Sinclair: California Socialist, Celebrity Intellectual from the University of Nebraska Press. & thanks to Lauren for also sharing her latest article, for Napa Valley Marketplace magazine on the groundbreaking young county supervisor Sam Chapman.

Forthcoming next week from the University of South Carolina Press is Tim Galsworthy’s The Republican House Divided: Civil War Memory, Civil Rights, & the Transformation of the GOP.

Forthcoming 12/2 from UNC Press is Aaron G. Fountain Jr.’s High School Students Unite!: Teen Activism, Education Reform, & FBI Surveillance in Postwar America.

Also forthcoming on 12/2 from MIT Press is W. Patrick McCray’s README: A Bookish History of Computing from Electronic Brains to Everything Machines.

Forthcoming in January from UNC Press is Kylie M. Smith’s much-anticipated Jim Crow in the Asylum: Psychiatry & Civil Rights in the American South.

For the latest installment of John Fea’s The Way of Improvement Leads Home Author’s Corner, he interviewed Jonathan S. Jones about his new book Opium Slavery: Civil War Veterans & America’s First Opioid Crisis.

For the latest USIH book review, Marlén Ríos-Hernández wrote about Robert Fitzgerald’s Hardcore Punk in the Age of Reagan: The Lyrical Lashing of an American Presidency.

While for The New Republic, Scott W. Stern reviewed a pair of recent books from Katie Batza & René Esparza on how the American Heartland responded to AIDS & shaped queer politics.

Newsletters and Blog Posts:

Gonna end with a bunch of great newsletters & blog posts as ever, including the latest installment of Jennifer M. Jackson’s Black Feminist Book Club, featuring Brittney Cooper’s Eloquent Rage.

For Kevin M. Kruse’s Campaign Trails newsletter, he offered contextual analyses of the exciting 2025 election results.

While on a more down but equally important note, Sherrilyn Ifill offered real talk for voters, advocates, & Democratic leaders after the shutdown.

Over at her Feminist Giant newsletter, Mona Eltahawy wrote about the Mexican President’s #MeToo experience with public sexual harassment.

For her Degenerate Art newsletter, Andrea Pitzer used history to consider the Border Patrol, ICE, & when bad things get worse.

Two interconnected pieces for Kevin M. Levin’s Civil War Memory newsletter to share, including this one on Trump’s war on African American history & this one on two cemeteries bound together by the long history of American racism.

For London Centric, Jim Waterson offered a fascinating glimpse into the alternative history of the city’s unbuilt Ringways.

For her continued Boat Trip Through History series at her History in the Margins blog, Pamela D. Toler wrote about the Papyrus Institute.

For a Remembrance Day special installment of Matt’s Historical Ephemera, Matt Eaton wrote about the long history of civilian performers.

Over at his Looking Through the Past newsletter, George Dillard shared a story from the Gilded Age West as a representation of the new direction for his newsletter.

While at his Ehlers on Everything blog, Mark J. Ehlers traced the life & legacy of Frances Perkins.

For his latest A Word About… newsletter, Benjamin Dreyer offered some notes on notes, footnotes, endnotes, & more.

& for a commissioned newsletter, author Catherine Shannon offered a brief defense of cliché.

Gonna end with a handful of great cultural studies pieces as ever, including Matthew Teutsch for his Medium column on the Lost Cause in Flannery O’Connor’s “A Late Encounter with the Enemy.”

Vanessa Willoughby wrote for The Flytrap on the long & vital history of Black women in punk music.

For Pop Culture Maniacs, Burkely Hermann shared the first part of a series on the power of music in anime.

& I really enjoyed Grant Sharples for the LA Review of Books on Bruce Springsteen’s career & legacy in light of the new biopic film.

Vaughn Joy’s wonderful Christmas conference keynote yesterday meant she didn’t offer a Review Roulette newsletter this week, but on that note I’ll end with her review of her favorite holiday film, the animated classic Klaus (2019).

PS. I’m sure I missed plenty as ever, so please share more public scholarly writing & work, podcasts, new & forthcoming books from the past week & beyond. Thanks, thanks for all your contributions & support across these first 250 #ScholarSunday threads, & happy reading, listening, & learning, all!