Category: 3-BookTalkDaily

A richly imagined new view on the great human tradition of apocalypse, from the rise of Homo sapiens to the climate instability of our present, that defies conventional wisdom and long-held stories about our deep past to reveal how cataclysmic events are not irrevocable endings, but transformations.

A drought lasts for decades, a disease rips through a city, a civilization collapses. When we finally uncover the ruins, we ask: What happened? The good news is, we’ve been here before. History is long, and people have already confronted just about every apocalypse we’re facing today. But these days, archaeologists are getting better at seeing stories of survival, transformation, and even progress hidden within those histories of collapse and destruction. Perhaps, we begin to see, apocalypses do not destroy worlds, but create them anew.

Apocalypse offers a new way of understanding human history, reframing it as a series of crises and cataclysms that we survived, moments of choice in an evolution of humanity that has never been predetermined or even linear. Here Lizzie Wade asks us to reckon with our long-held narratives of these events, from the end of Old Kingdom Egypt, the collapse of the Classic Maya, to the Black Death, and shows us how people lived through and beyond them—and even considered what a new world could look like in their wake.

The more we learn about apocalypses past, the more hope we have that we will survive our own. It won’t be pleasant. It won’t be fair. The world will be different on the other side, and our cultures and communities—perhaps even our species—will be different too.

Lizzie Wade is an award-winning journalist and correspondent for Science, one of the world's most prestigious scientific journals. She covers archaeology, anthropology, and Latin America for the magazine's print and online news sections. Her work has also appeared in Wired, The Atlantic, Slate, The New York Times, Aeon, Smithsonian, Archaeology, and California Sunday, among other publications.

Gene-George Earle is currently a PhD candidate in Anthropology at East China Normal University in Shanghai.

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How do states advance their national security interests? Conventional wisdom holds that states must court the risk of catastrophic war by “tying their hands” to credibly protect their interests. Dan Reiter overturns this perspective with the compelling argument that states craft flexible foreign policies to avoid unwanted wars. Through a comprehensive analysis of key international crises, including the Berlin, Taiwan Straits, and Cuban Missile Crises, and the Korean and Vietnam Wars, Reiter provides new perspectives on the causes of wars, the role of international alliances, foreign troop deployments, leader madness, and the impact of AI on international relations. With critical insights into contemporary foreign policy challenges, such as America’s role in NATO, the risks of war with China, containing a resurgent Russia, and the dangers of nuclear war, Untied Hands: How States Avoid the Wrong Wars (Cambridge University Press, 2025) is essential reading for anyone interested in understanding how states can effectively manage international crises while avoiding the wrong wars.

Dan Reiter is Samuel Candler Dobbs Professor of Political Science at Emory University.

Leo Bader is a senior at Wesleyan University studying political theory and history.

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From his early albums with the Mothers of Invention, Frank Zappa established a reputation as a musical genius who pushed the limits of culture throughout the 1960s and 1970s, experimenting with a blend of genres in innovative and unheard-of ways. Not only did his exploratory styles challenge the expectations of what popular music could sound like, but his prolific creative endeavors also shaped how audiences thought about the freedom of artistic expression.

In Frank Zappa's America (LSU Press, 2025), Bradley Morgan casts the artist as an often-misunderstood figure who critiqued the actions of religious and political groups promoting a predominantly white, Christian vision of the United States. A controversial and provocative satirist, often criticized for the shocking subject matter of his songs, Zappa provided social commentary throughout his career that spoke truth to power about the nefarious institutions operating in the lives of everyday Americans. Beginning in the late 1970s, his music frequently addressed the rise of extremist religious influence in American politics, specifically white Christian nationalism.

Despite commercial and critical pressure, Zappa refused to waver in his support for free speech during the era of Reagan and MTV, including his pointed testimony before the U.S. Senate at the Parents Music Resource Center (PMRC) hearings. Throughout the 1980s, and until his death in 1993, Zappa crafted his art form to advocate for political engagement, the security of individual liberties, and the advancement of education. Music became his platform to convey progressive views promoting the rights of marginalized communities most at risk in a society governed by the principles of what he perceived as Christian radicalism.

Frank Zappa's Americexamines the musician's messaging through song, tracing the means by which Zappa created passionate, at times troubling, art that combats conservativism in its many manifestations. For readers in the twenty-first century, his music and public advocacy demonstrate the need to preserve democracy and the voices that uphold it.

Bradley Morgan, a media arts professional based in Chicago, is the author of U2's The Joshua Tree: Planting Roots in Mythic America. He manages partnerships for CHIRP Radio 107.1 FM and directs the station's music film festival. Morgan also interviews authors of music and pop culture books for the New Books Network podcast.

Caleb Zakarin is editor of the New Books Network.

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Why does critical theory matter today? In Critical Theory: The Basics (Routledge, 2024), Martin Shuster, a Professor of Philosophy and the Isaac Swift Distinguished Professor of Jewish Studies at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, explores the history, thought and legacy of the Frankfurt School to demonstrate the urgency of critical theory for explaining the world. Beginning with the idea of needless suffering as a concept animating the theory and practice of thinkers such as Adorno, Horkheimer, Marcuse and Benjamin, the book ranges widely across topics including subjectivity, the social world, art, culture and religion. An accessible introduction to complex, but urgent, thought, the book is essential reading for arts, humanities and social science scholars, as well as for anyone who would like to change the world.

Dave O'Brien is Professor of Cultural and Creative Industries, at the University of Manchester.

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Today we’re continuing our series on Harry Frankfurt’s seminal work, On Bullshit. I have the privilege to speak with Arvind Narayanan co-author of the book AI Snake Oil: What Artificial Intelligence Can Do, What it Can’t, and How to Tell the Difference (Princeton University Press, 2024). Arvind is the perfect guest to explore the subject of bullshit in AI as AI Snake Oil takes on the ridiculous hype ascribed to the promise of AI. AI chatbots often hallucinate and many of the promoters of AI engage in the art of bullshit when selling people on wild and crazy AI applications.

Arvind Narayanan is professor of computer science at Princeton University and director of its Center for Information Technology Policy.

Caleb Zakarin is editor of the New Books Network.

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At the turn of the twentieth century, the Black press provided a blueprint to help Black Americans transition from slavery and find opportunities to advance and define African American citizenship. Among the vanguard of the Black press was Jefferson Lewis Edmonds, founder and editor of The Liberator newspaper. His Los Angeles-based newspaper championed for women's rights, land and business ownership, education, and civic engagement, while condemning lynchings and other violent acts against African Americans. It encouraged readers to move westward and build new communities, and it printed stories about weddings and graduations as a testament to the lives and moments not chronicled in the White-owned press.

Edmonds took this fierce perspective in his career as a journalist, for he himself was born into slavery and dedicated his life to creating pathways of liberation for those who came after him. Across the pages of his newspaper, Edmonds painted a different perspective on Black life in America and championed for his community--from highlighting the important work of his contemporaries, including Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. Du Bois, to helping local readers find love in the personal ads section. The Liberator, along with a chorus of Black newspapers at the turn of the century, educated an entire generation on how to guard their rights and take claim of their new American citizenship.

Written by Jefferson Lewis Edmonds' great-great granddaughter, We Now Belong to Ourselves: J. L. Edmonds, the Black Press, and Black Citizenship in America (Oxford University Press, 2025) chronicles how Edmonds and other pioneering Black publishers documented the shifting tides in the advancement of Black liberation. Arianne Edmonds argues that the Black press was central in transforming Black Americans' communication patterns, constructing national resistance networks, and defining Black citizenship after Reconstruction--a vision, mission, and spirit that persists today through Black online social movements. Weaving together poetry, personal narrative, newspaper clips, and documents from the Edmonds family archive, We Now Belong to Ourselves illustrates how Edmonds used his platform to center Black joy, Black triumph, and radical Black acceptance.

Arianne Edmonds is a 5th generation Angeleno, archivist, civic leader, and founder of the J.L. Edmonds Project, an initiative dedicated to preserving the history and culture of the Black American West. She is currently a Senior Civic Media Fellow at the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism funded by the MacArthur Foundation and a Commissioner for the Los Angeles Public Library.

Caleb Zakarin is editor of the New Books Network.

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