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    Steven Roby and Brad SchreiberBecoming Jimi Hendrix: From Southern Crossroads to Psychedelic London, the Untold Story of a Musical Genius

    May 3, 2013

    [Cross-posted from New Books in Pop Music] After his incendiary performance at the 1967 Monterey International Pop Festival, Jimi Hendrix almost immediately went from obscure musician to pop superstar in America. But as Steven Roby and Brad Schreiber reveal in Becoming Jimi Hendrix: From Southern Crossroads to Psychedelic London, the Untold Story of a Musical Genius, Hendrix was far from an overnight [...]

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    Steven J. HarperThe Lawyer Bubble: A Profession in Crisis

    May 1, 2013

    [Cross-posted from New Books in Big Ideas] A friend of mine who had just graduated from law school said “Law school is great. The trouble is that when you are done you’re a lawyer.” Steven J. Harper would, after a fashion, agree (though he would probably add that law schools are not that great). Harper’s book, The Lawyer Bubble: [...]

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    Jennifer Keishin ArmstrongMary and Lou and Rhoda and Ted: And all the Brilliant Minds Who Made The Mary Tyler Moore Show a Classic

    April 30, 2013

    [Cross-posted from New Books in Biography] Forty years after its debut, The Mary Tyler Moore Show remains one of the most beloved and successful television sitcoms of all time. But Jennifer Keishin Armstrong‘s Mary and Lou and Rhoda and Ted: And all the Brilliant Minds Who Made The Mary Tyler Moore Show a Classic (Simon & Schuster, 2013) isn’t a simple episode [...]

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    Laina DawesWhat are You Doing Here?: A Black Woman’s Life and Liberation in Heavy Metal

    April 25, 2013

    [Cross-posted from New Books in Pop Music] Extreme metal, punk, and hardcore. Slayer. Sick of it All. Cro-Mags. Decapitated. Behemoth. Musically aggressive rock bands with growling vocals and lyrics about annihilation, death, and dismemberment. A genre of music that, even more than more mainstream music genres, seems to be the province of (straight) white males. But [...]

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    Andrew KoppelmanThe Tough Luck Constitution and the Assault on Health Care Reform

    April 24, 2013

    [Cross-posted from New Books in Law] Every hundred years or so, the Supreme Court decides a question with truly vast economic implications. In 2012 such a decision was handed down, in a case that had the potential to affect the economy in the near term more than any court case ever had. The substance of [...]

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    Cyril GhoshThe Politics of the American Dream: Democratic Inclusion in Contemporary American Political Culture

    April 19, 2013

    [Cross-posted from New Books in Political Science] Cyril Ghosh is Visiting Assistant Professor at Wagner College where he teaches courses in American government, political theory, and immigration. His new book, The Politics of the American Dream: Democratic Inclusion in Contemporary American Political Culture (Palgrave-MacMillan 2013), explores the development and meaning of this powerful national myth. Ghosh tracks the historical [...]

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    Richard RashkeUseful Enemies: John Demjanjuk and America’s Open-Door Policy for Nazi War Criminals

    April 19, 2013

    [Cross-posted from New Books in History] You may have heard of a fellow named Ivan or John Demjanuik. He made the news–repeatedly over a 30 year period– because he was, as many people probably remember, a Nazi war criminal nick-named “Ivan the Terrible” for his brutal treatment of Jews (and others) in the Sobibor death camp. [...]

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    Joshua Bloom and Waldo MartinBlack Against Empire: The History and Politics of the Black Panther Party

    April 17, 2013

    [Cross-posted from New Books in African American Studies] German military theorist Carl Von Clausewitz observed that many of the important variables in war exist in ‘clouds of great uncertainty’ which create disconnects and confusion that persist even after the fighting has ended. The conflict between the Black Panther Party and the United States government is in [...]

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    Neil GrossWhy are Professors Liberal and Why do Conservatives Care?

    April 8, 2013

    [Cross-posted from New Books in Big Ideas] Most people think that professors are more liberal, and some much more liberal, than ordinary folk. As Neil Gross shows in his eye-opening Why are Professors Liberal and Why do Conservatives Care? (Harvard UP, 2013), “most people” are right: academia is much more left-leaning than any other major profession in the U.S . [...]

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    Catherine TackleyBenny Goodman’s Famous 1939 Carnegie Hall Jazz Concert

    March 19, 2013

    [Cross-posted from New Books in Jazz] Feed: “How do I get to Carnegie Hall?” Comic:  “Practice!” When I first began to build a jazz record library back in the early 1960s, one particular album stood out.  A rare “double-album,” Benny Goodman’s Famous 1938 Carnegie Hall Jazz Concert was more akin in appearance to the records in my [...]

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