New Books in British Studies

By Marshall PoeSociety & Culture History

New Books in British Studies episodes

July 22 Mark Crinson, "Aviationland: Heathrow and the Making of an Airport Landscape" (Paul Mellon Centre, 2026)
Aviationland: Heathrow and the Making of an Airport Landscape (Paul Mellon Centre, 2026) by Professor Mark Crinson is the first critical study to examine how a major international airport takes shape on the ground, and what that means for the landscape around it. Focused on Heathrow airport, it traces how the area has been formed and reformed by overlapping systems of architecture, infrastructure and enclosure, from the common land of Hounslow Heath in the eighteenth century to the global transport hub of the present day. 
The book explores the different forces that have shaped the airport’s environment: the remaking of landforms, the design of terminal buildings, and the surrounding sprawl of hotels, schools, factories, and business parks. At the same time, it shows how the Heathrow area has been moulded by wider shifts in energy, mobility, and the economy, and how the airport has in turn left a lasting mark on its surroundings, both materially and ecologically.
Drawing on previously unpublished material, Aviationland includes close studies of key sites, as well as figures who shaped how we see the airport today, including Richard Rogers, Patrick Abercrombie, and J. G. Ballard. Bringing together architectural, landscape, and infrastructural histories that are seldom read in tandem, this volume makes the case for Heathrow as a distinctively modern landscape. The result is a nuanced account of how local places become entangled within global systems, and what happens when they do.
This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda’s interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts.
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1 hr 21 min
July 22 Martin Shaw, "The New Age of Genocide: Intellectual and Political Challenges After Gaza" (Agenda Publishing, 2025)
The Israeli destruction of Gaza has returned the idea of genocide
to the center of world politics, with sharp conflicts between the
protesters and lawyers who invoke it and the governments and media that
deny it. The New Age of Genocide: Intellectual and Political Challenges After Gaza (Agenda Publishing, 2025), by the foremost sociological theorist of genocide, Martin Shaw, defends
the idea against thinkers who have questioned it, and argues that it is
essential to the understanding of mass atrocities. It maintains that
Gaza has opened a new age in which the West not only fails to prevent,
but also participates in genocide.
As well as discussing the
genocide idea, the book analyses the Gaza genocide in the context of the
longer histories of the problem, both globally and in Palestine.
Further chapters deal with "forgotten genocides," the attempted Russian
elimination of Ukraine, and the history of British complicity.
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1 hr 21 min
July 20 Lucy D. Curzon, "Art and Citizenship in Conflict: British Women War Artists, 1939–45" (Manchester UP, 2025)
Art and Citizenship in Conflict: British Women War Artists, 1939-45 (Manchester UP, 2026) by Dr. Lucy Curzon examines the work of women war artists in order to highlight the complexity of citizenship and gender in Britain during the Second World War.
Evelyn Dunbar, Mary Kessell, Ethel Gabain, Stella Schmolle, and Laura Knight, among others, were commissioned by the War Artists' Advisory Committee (WAAC) to document the millions of women who took up sometimes unconventional roles-in agriculture, the auxiliary services, and manufacturing, among others-to support the British war effort. Indeed, their prints, drawings, and paintings were part of a broader scheme to uphold morale and promote much-needed citizen involvement on the home front. While there is growing interest, the importance of their remit in the history of the Second World War and the quality of their artistry have nonetheless not yet secured them a significant place in scholarship. Art and Citizenship in Conflict seeks to amend this gap.
This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda’s interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts.
Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/british-studies

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1 hr 6 min
July 17 Renisa Mawani, "Across Oceans of Law: The Komagata Maru and Jurisdiction in the Time of Empire" (Duke UP, 2018)
In 1914 the British-built and Japanese-owned steamship Komagata Maru
left Hong Kong for Vancouver carrying 376 Punjabi migrants. Chartered
by railway contractor and purported rubber planter Gurdit Singh, the
ship and its passengers were denied entry into Canada and two months
later were deported to Calcutta.
In Across Oceans of Law: The Komagata Maru and Jurisdiction in the Time of Empire (Duke University Press, 2018) Renisa Mawani retells this well-known story of the Komagata Maru.
Drawing on "oceans as method"—a mode of thinking and writing that
repositions land and sea—Mawani examines the historical and conceptual
stakes of situating histories of Indian migration within maritime
worlds.
Through close readings of the ship, the manifest, the trial, and the
anticolonial writings of Singh and others, Mawani argues that the Komagata Maru's
landing raised urgent questions regarding the jurisdictional tensions
between the common law and admiralty law, and, ultimately, the legal
status of the sea. By following the movements of a single ship and
bringing oceans into sharper view, Mawani traces British imperial power
through racial, temporal, and legal contests and offers a novel method
of writing colonial legal history.
The conversation also covers how the book, published in 2018, has
shaped the author’s more recent work as well as how historical methods
and approaches have evolved in the years since publication.
Helen Dewar is an historian of the Atlantic World and French
colonization in North America in the 17th and 18th centuries. She is a
professor of history at the Université de Montréal (Québec, Canada) and
the author of Disputing New France: Companies, Sovereignty and Law in the French Atlantic, 1598-1663 (McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2022).
Helen’s institutional website
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51 min
July 17 Rory Cormac, "Fakers: A Top-Secret Tale of Phantoms and Forgeries on the Disinformation Front Line" (Oxford UP, 2026)
Fakers: A Top-Secret Tale of Phantoms and Forgeries on the Disinformation Front Line (Oxford UP, 2026) reveals the rise and fall of the mavericks running Britain's Cold War forgery empire. Their secret mission was audacious: to disrupt and discredit adversaries across the world using phantom groups, fake sources, and counterfeit documents.
The leader was a remarkable character, wrestling with personal and professional dilemmas: Hans Welser. An Austrian refugee and one-time MI5 suspect interned behind barbed wire, Welser was a great survivor who rose to become special operations adviser to the Foreign Office, working hand in glove with MI6. His second in command was an eccentric, hard drinking, and high-flying journalist-turned-propagandist called John Rayner. Brought out of semi-retirement, for one final posting. Their team of bowler-hatted refugees, voluble ex-journalists, trailblazing women, and licentious literary sorts navigated loyalty and betrayal — both professionally and romantically — from the diplomats' attic, in the most sensitive part of the Foreign Office's secret propaganda department.
The newly declassified files expose an array of plots, some comically absurd and others dangerously controversial. The forgery empire impersonated everything from hippies and ghosts to Islamists and ballet composers in their campaign to smear hostile politicians, stir tensions among adversaries, and even stymie the career of a contentious British historian. All took place against a high stakes backdrop — both overseas as states competed beneath the looming threat of nuclear war and in the corridors of power at home where grey-suited bureaucrats circled, keen to shut down the team for good.
With timely insight into how propaganda works and how to respond to disinformation, Fakers is a thrilling journey into a secret world where nothing was as it seemed.
Rory Cormac is a Professor of International Relations at the University of Nottingham and a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.
Caleb Zakarin is CEO and Publisher of the New Books Network.
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1 hr
July 11 Amélie Junqua and Geoffrey Day, "Too Good to Waste: Recycling Paper in the Eighteenth Century" (Bodleian Library, 2026)
Paper
was a precious commodity in the eighteenth century: every sheet was
made by hand. There was therefore a significant market in recycling
substandard paper from paper mills and discarded proofs and sheets from
printers and booksellers for secondary use, alongside a black market in
which stealing and receiving stolen paper took place on a vast scale. A
single piece of paper could be termed ‘waste’ and yet sold for cash
three times in succession, on each occasion performing a useful
function. The end user would keep the newly purchased
‘waste’ or paper wrapping in a special drawer from which it would be
taken for a myriad household purposes, including cooking, needlework, decoration
and hygiene. Popular satirical prints depicted explicit paper uses,
while creators of flamboyant papier mâché ceilings concealed the
material by gilding it.
With over 100 illustrations, and
drawing on letters from a range of people from farmers to notable
authors and members of the aristocracy, together with meticulous
archival research, Too Good to Waste: Recycling Paper in the Eighteenth Century
(Bodleian Library, 2026) by Dr. Amélie Junqua and Dr. Geoffrey Day
traces the extraordinary history of ingenious paper recycling in
eighteenth century England.
This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book
focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty
negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative
analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find
Miranda’s interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts.
Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/british-studies

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41 min
July 09 A. G. Hopkins, "The Land Where Nothing Works: How Britain Lost the Plot" (Princeton UP, 2026)
What has happened to Britain? As drivers on its roads can attest, it
is the pothole capital of Europe. Once-beautiful towns now feature
peeling paint, weeds, and broken railings. Public services are no longer
fit for purpose. A malaise seems to infect every aspect of British
life: its economy, polity, social order, sense of well-being, domestic
regional relationships, and place in the world. In The Land Where Nothing Works: How Britain Lost the Plot (Princeton
University Press, 2026), the distinguished historian A. G. Hopkins
offers an explanation, tracing Britain’s current problems to decisions
made in the 1980s that abandoned its postwar experiment in social
democracy and mimicked policies of deregulation and privatisation
promoted by the United States.
In 1945, the new Labour
government’s development programme aimed at creating a social democracy
that would benefit all members of society. The counterrevolution
launched by Margaret Thatcher’s government in 1979, which remains in
force today, promoted individualism and deregulation. The transition
from one programme to another was a response to the growth of finance
and services centred on the City of London, and to decolonisation, which
redirected trade to Europe. The expansion of credit led to the
financial crisis of 2008 and the years of austerity that followed, and
fuelled the populist movement that culminated in Brexit. Hopkins argues
that, instead of following the free-market policies of its mentor, the
United States, Britain should draw on its own history of social
democracy and borrow from its neighbours in Europe, where communitarian
principles continue to be upheld.
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50 min
July 09 Brad Tolinski and Chris Gill, "Blow by Blow: The Jeff Beck Story" (Da Capo, 2026)
With his shag haircut and white Stratocaster guitar, Jeff Beck was an
icon known and loved by millions. Yet somehow, he maintained the
ineffable low profile cool of a cult hero as he glided through six
decades of musical trends with nary a lapse in taste. Not to say he ever
played it safe. What other guitarist can lay claim to performing with
opera star Luciano Pavarotti, mainstream television personality Kelly
Clarkson, and professional degenerates like Guns N’ Roses with equal
grace and wit? Or as Beck himself once quipped, “I’m an awkward son of a
bitch when it comes to doing the expected.”
In Blow by Blow: The Jeff Beck Story (Da
Capo, 2026), Brad Tolinski and Chris Gill return to chart the
unexplored life of rock’s greatest and perhaps most enigmatic
instrumentalist. Culled from approximately 30 hours of interviews with
the late guitarist himself, numerous conversations with those closest to
him, and extensive research, the book sheds new light on the genius
that Jimmy Page once said, “shifted the whole sound and face of electric
guitar music.”
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57 min
July 08 Roberta J. Magnusson, "Urban Infrastructure in Medieval England: Sustainability and Resilience" (Johns Hopkins UP, 2026)
In
the bustling market towns and growing cities of medieval England
between 1200 and 1600, public works were the lifelines of urban society.
In Urban Infrastructure in Medieval England: Sustainability and Resilience (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2026), Dr. Roberta J. Magnusson offers
the first comprehensive study of how medieval towns built, financed,
and sustained their defenses, bridges, streets, water systems, and harbors.
Dr.
Magnusson reveals how even modest communities, like the Warwickshire
town of Atherstone, boldly pursued projects that reshaped their futures.
Grants of tolls and taxes funded paving initiatives, bridge repairs,
and fortified walls, while enterprising lords and abbots sponsored
sluices, conduits, and quays. These efforts were not confined to
England's great cities; small towns with limited means also sought
to enhance their competitive edge, even when such investments strained
their resources. Drawing on royal records, municipal archives, and
archaeological evidence, Dr. Magnusson situates these civic undertakings
in their broader social and environmental contexts. She shows how
townsmen adapted traditional obligations of labor
and charity alongside innovative fiscal tools to sustain projects that
could span generations. Yet the balance was fragile. The crises of the
fourteenth century—famine, plague, and the harsher climate of the Little
Ice Age—undermined local resources, leaving many communities to
struggle with maintenance or watch their infrastructures decline.
At
once a history of engineering, economy, and community, this study
illuminates how medieval people conceived of security, health, and
prosperity through the material fabric of their towns. By tracing the
rise, transformation, and survival of these infrastructures, Dr.
Magnusson demonstrates how urban communities navigated centuries of
change while shaping the very landscapes in which they lived.
This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book
focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty
negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative
analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find
Miranda’s interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts.
Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/british-studies

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.
1 hr 7 min
July 06 Ted Powell, "Churchill and the Crown" (Oxford UP, 2026)
Winston Churchill was born in a palace and was given a funeral worthy
of a king. His family had enjoyed an intimate association with the
British monarchy stretching back centuries. As King Edward VIII said of
him, 'I have never met anyone of royal blood who exemplified in such
high degree the ideal of the 'good king.'
Churchill and the Crown (Oxford University Press, 2026) tells the story of Churchill's relationship with the various kings and
queens he served during his long political career, from young journalist
under Edward VII, through his dramatic fall from grace in the First
World War under George V, the frustrations of appeasement during the
interwar period and his relationship with Edward VIII during the
abdication crisis of 1936, culminating in his Finest Hour in the Second
World War under George VI and the coda of Churchill's public service to
his final monarch: Queen Elizabeth II.
Ted Powell analyses
Churchill's writings on monarchy and his role in preserving and
establishing monarchies outside Britain. At the core of the book is a
series of studies of Churchill's relationships with the monarchs he
served. These studies offer a two-way perspective, examining both
Churchill's view of individual monarchs and their attitudes towards him.
They shed light not only on Churchill's career but also on the changing
role of the monarchy in 20th century Britain.
Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/british-studies

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38 min

About New Books in British Studies

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This podcast is a channel on the New Books Network. The New Books Network is an academic audio library dedicated to public education. In each episode you will hear scholars discuss their recently published research with another expert in their field.