Potent Writings from a Powerful Year: Great Non-Fiction Titles from The New School Community
Here are some of 2020’s impressive non-fiction books from New School faculty and graduates. Next week: Our fiction picks.
Compiled and edited by Sierra Lewandowski and Bruce Cory
by Stephanie Kelton, PhD., Economics (2001). Public Affairs Books.
The nation’s leading exponent of “modern monetary theory” – the most talked-about new idea in economics – argues that the conventional wisdom about the harmfulness of government deficits is just plain wrong, and inhibits job creation, climate change action, expanding health care coverage, and investing in long-term growth.
Main Street: How a City’s Heart Connects Us All
by Mindy Thompson Fullilove; Faculty, School of Public Engagement. NYU Press.
A leading scholar of urban renewal and its discontents shows how disinvestment has weakened Main Streets across the nation, and also how revitalized downtowns can help solve the toughest problems that cities face.
From Enforcers to Guardians: A Public Health Primer on Ending Police Violence
by Mindy Thompson Fullilove and Sarah L.F. Cooper. Johns Hopkins University Press.
Arguing that excessive police violence has been deliberately used throughout US history to marginalize working class and minority communities, the authors propose a multilevel strategy to transform policing.
by Claire Bond Potter; Professor of History, New School for Social Research. Basic Books.
With fake news on Facebook, trolls on Twitter, and viral outrage everywhere, it’s easy to believe that the internet changed politics entirely. Potter shows otherwise, revealing the roots of today’s dysfunction in a longer history of alternative political media Political Junkies is essential, entertaining reading for understanding how we got where we are.
The Elements of a Home: Curious Histories Behind Everyday Household Objects, from Pillows to Forks
by Amy Azzarito, MA, History of Decorative Arts & Design (2009). Chronicle Books.
Ranging from chopsticks to alarm clocks, napkins to picnic baskets, Azzarito explores the origins of 63 household items and how they have evolved into staples in our homes and lives.
Designing in Dark Times: An Arendtian Lexicon
Edited by Eduardo Staszowski, Associate Professor of Design Strategies, Parsons, and by Virginia Tassinari. Bloomsbury.
Assembling contributions from designers and scholars worldwide to reflect on the ideas of Hannah Arendt during her time at The New School and their relevance to contemporary design, and political action, in our own times.
Mill Town: Reckoning with What Remains
by Kerri Arsenault, MFA, Creative Writing (2015). St. Martin’s Press.
A personal investigation using archives, reports, and interviews about the paper mill that was the hub of life in Arsenault’s Maine hometown, examining the environmental, economic, social, and emotional price the community paid for its century-long operation.
by Aaron Jakes; Assistant Professor of History. Stanford University Press.
Hailed as “a definite study of the British occupation of Egypt,” this book uses fresh access to Egyptian archives and press accounts to tell a story of pre-World War I imperialism and its destructive consequences for the Egyptian economy and people.
by Kathy Gunst, Liberal Arts (1980). Simon & Schuster.
Has there ever been a bigger year for baking? Timely, funny, and creative, this is a collection of essays, thoughtful quotes, and more than 50 recipes from women passionate about social and political change, and also about their kitchens. Knead! Read! Heed!
by Hugh Raffles, Professor of Anthropology. Penguin Random House.
Taking off from the experience of being shaken awake in his hotel bed by a Tokyo earthquake, Raffles has written what The New York Times described as a “dense dark star” of a book about the instability of life and the impermanence even of geology. “What intuition the book requires,” the Times reviewer wrote, “what detective work — and what magic tricks it performs.”
by Stephanie Danler, MFA, Creative Writing (2014). Penguin Random House.
After selling her first novel, the author expected she should be happy. Instead, she was driven to face problems she thought she’d left behind: A mother disabled by years of alcoholism and now disabled by a brain aneurism; a long-absent father in and out of treatment for meth addiction. Stray is a memoir examining what we inherit, and what we don’t have to.
Gender Trouble in the U.S. Military
by Stephanie Szitanyi, Assistant Dean, School of Public Engagement. Palgrave Macmillan.
Despite recent policies appearing to increase gender inclusivity, the author finds that officials have simultaneously reinforced a “regime of hetero-male privilege” in the Armed Forces.
The Climate Crisis and the Global Green New Deal
by Robert Pollin, PhD., Economics (1982), and Noam Chomsky, with C.J. Polychroniou. Penguin Random House.
A conversation about climate change, its relationship to capitalism, what a global Green New Deal might look like, and how it might affect politics.
by Mikaela Kiner; MS, HR Management (1997). Greenleaf.
Drawing on her HR experience with Amazon, Starbucks, Microsoft and her own consulting firm, Kiner uses career profiles of 13 successful women to offers insight into overcoming workplace sexism, harassment, and bias.