As reports of mass killings in Bosnia spread in the middle of 1995, Germans faced a dilemma. Should the Federal Republic deploy its military to the Balkans to prevent a genocide, or would departing from postwar Germany’s pacifist tradition open the door to renewed militarism? In short, when Germans said “never again,” did they mean “never again Auschwitz” or ... Show More
Jan 13
Richard Fine, "The Price of Truth: The Journalist Who Defied Military Censors to Report the Fall of Nazi Germany" (Cornell, 2023)
In The Price of Truth: The Journalist Who Defied Military Censors to Report the Fall of Nazi Germany (Cornell, 2023), Richard Fine recounts the intense drama surrounding the German surrender at the end of World War II and the veteran Associated Press journalist Edward Kennedy’s c ... Show More
57m 43s
Jan 13
Dagmar Herzog, "The New Fascist Body" (Wirklichkeit Books, 2025)
The success of new far-right movements cannot be explained by fear or rage alone – the pleasures of aggression and violence are just as essential. As such, racism is particularly intense when it is erotically charged, migration presenting as a sexual threat to white women being o ... Show More
1h 4m
Jan 12
Matthijs Lok, "Europe Against Revolution: Conservatism, Enlightenment, and the Making of the Past" (Cambridge UP, 2023)
Contemporary Europe seems to be divided between progressive cosmopolitans sympathetic to the European Union and the ideals of the Enlightenment, and counter-enlightened conservative nationalists extolling the virtues of homelands threatened by globalised elites and mass migration ... Show More
56m 51s
Oct 2021
Robert Hellyer, "Green with Milk and Sugar: When Japan Filled America's Tea Cups" (Columbia UP, 2021)
Robert Hellyer’s Green with Milk and Sugar: When Japan Filled America's Tea Cups (Columbia UP, 2021) is a tale of American and Japanese teaways, skillfully weaving together stories of Midwesterners drinking green tea (with milk and sugar, to be sure), the recent and complex origi ... Show More
44m 25s
May 2022
Susan Westhafer Furukawa, "The Afterlife of Toyotomi Hideyoshi: Historical Fiction and Popular Culture in Japan" (Harvard UP, 2022)
Popular representations of the past are everywhere in Japan, from cell phone charms to manga, from television dramas to video games to young people dressed as their favorite historical figures hanging out in the hip Harajuku district. But how does this mass consumption of the pas ... Show More
40 m
Aug 2023
Wendy A. Woloson, "Crap: A History of Cheap Stuff in America" (U Chicago Press, 2020)
Why are our lives filled with so much stuff? In Crap: A History of Cheap Stuff in America (U Chicago Press, 2023), Wendy Woloson, Professor and Chair in the Department of History at Rutgers University, tells the history of these objects and things, from the early years of peddler ... Show More
44m 16s
Jan 2025
Discover the tales of history's great treasures
Swallowed by the sea, buried, hidden behind walls or concealed…True treasure troves have always known the best place to hide. And when to reappear and surprise us!
Harboring tales worthy of an adventure novel, they often contain fascinating secrets.
In this new season of The Voic ... Show More
57s
Nov 2021
Demet Güzey, "Mustard: A Global History" (Reaktion Books, 2019)
Whether grainy or smooth, spicy or sweet, Dijon, American, or English, mustard accompanies our food and flavors our life around the globe. It has been a source of pleasure, health, and myth from ancient times to the present day, its tiny seed a symbol of faith and its pungent fla ... Show More
22m 50s