New Books in Science, Technology, and Society

Today I talked to John L. Rudolph about his book Why We Teach Science (and Why We Should) (Oxford UP, 2023).
Few people question the importance of science education in American schooling. The public readily accepts that it is the key to economic growth through innovation, develops the ability to reason more effectively, and enables us to solve the everyday problems we encounter through knowing how the world works. Good science teaching results in all these benefits and more -- or so we think. But what if all this is simply wrong? What if the benefits we assume science education produces turn out to be an illusion, nothing more than wishful thinking?
John L. Rudolph is Vilas Distinguished Achievement professor in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He has affiliate appointments in the Department of Educational Policy Studies and the Robert and Jean Holtz Center for Science and Technology Studies and is the past editor-in-chief of the Wiley & Sons journal Science Education. Prior to his faculty appointment, he taught physics, chemistry, and biology in middle schools and high schools across Wisconsin.

Morteza Hajizadeh is a Ph.D. graduate in English from the University of Auckland in New Zealand. His research interests are Cultural Studies; Critical Theory; Environmental History; Medieval (Intellectual) History; Gothic Studies; 18th and 19th Century British Literature. YouTube channel.
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Delving into the complex interplay of race, kinship, and technology, Technologies of Kinship: Asian American Racialization and the Making of Family (NYU Press, 2025) challenges conventional notions of racial identity in an era of advanced genetic testing. As Author LiLi Johnson argues, kinship, far from being solely defined by biological ties, is a social construct shaped by "technologies of kinship"—systems like government bureaucracy, immigration policies, photography, online profiles, and ancestry tests. These technologies reveal the surprisingly fluid nature of racial categories in relation to kinship, a social formation that significantly affects how race is defined, understood, and experienced.

Johnson reexamines the technological systems that have shaped Asian American identity and kinship, exploring how the racialization of Asian Americans has evolved from exclusion to neoliberal multiculturalism over the last century, analyzing the political and interpersonal implications of these social and cultural changes for affected families.

LiLi Johnson is an Assistant Professor of English and Gender and Women’s Studies at Dalhousie University. Her research interests include Asian American family and kinship, racial formation and discourses of multiculturalism, cultural studies of science and technology, and digital and visual cultures.
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As World War II raged in North Africa, General Erwin Rommel was guided by an uncanny sense of his enemies' plans and weaknesses. In the summer of 1942, he led his Axis army swiftly and terrifyingly toward Alexandria, with the goal of overrunning the entire Middle East. Each step was informed by detailed updates on British positions. The Nazis, somehow, had a source for the Allies' greatest secrets.
Yet the Axis powers were not the only ones with intelligence. Brilliant Allied cryptographers worked relentlessly at Bletchley Park, breaking down the extraordinarily complex Nazi code Enigma. From decoded German messages, they discovered that the enemy had a wealth of inside information. On the brink of disaster, a fevered and high-stakes search for the source began.
In War of Shadows: Codebreakers, Spies, and the Secret Struggle to Drive the Nazis from the Middle East (Public Affairs, 2021), Gershom Gorenberg tells the cinematic story of the race for information in the North African theater of World War II, set against intrigues that spanned the Middle East. Years in the making, this book is a feat of historical research and storytelling, and a rethinking of the popular narrative of the war. It portrays the conflict not as an inevitable clash of heroes and villains but a spiraling series of failures, accidents, and desperate triumphs that decided the fate of the Middle East and quite possibly the outcome of the war.
Gershom Gorenberg is a columnist for the Washington Post and a senior correspondent for the American Prospect, as well as an Adjunct Faculty at Columbia Graduate School of Journalism.
Schneur Zalman Newfield is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at Borough of Manhattan Community College, City University of New York, and the author of Degrees of Separation: Identity Formation While Leaving Ultra-Orthodox Judaism (Temple University Press, 2020). Visit him online at ZalmanNewfield.com.
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In A Dirty History of Photography: Chemistry, Fog, and Empire (U Chicago Press, 2026), Professor Michelle Henning presents an environmental history of chemical photography through the lens of its deep connections to empire and industry.

Dependent on the extractive practices of fossil-fueled industrial capitalism, chemical photography’s emulsions and films were highly sensitive to polluted atmospheres, and photographic companies had to work hard to control this sensitivity. Drawing on histories of empire, coal, and chemistry and from the archives of British photographic manufacturer Ilford Limited, Professor Henning exposes the ways photography shaped how we see and understand the atmosphere while leaving its toxic residues in the air, soil, and water.

Structured as thirty-six short chapters and with over seventy illustrations, this innovative book begins in interwar London, follows the supply of Ilford products to photographers on the West African coast, and considers photography as a military technology linked to the development of chemical warfare. Combining close readings of photographs with discussions of low-light, tropical, and aerial photography, Professor Henning examines the extraction and development of photographic materials, their role in the current environmental crisis, and how they have shaped experiences of time and the environment.

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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Dropping the atomic bombs on Japan during World War II was, arguably, the most controversial decision of the 20th century. The responsibility for that “decision” has logically fallen on US President Harry S. Truman. But in The Most Awful Responsibility: Truman and the Secret Struggle for Control of the Atomic Age (Harper, 2025), Alex Wellerstein argues that Truman's actual decision wasn’t what everyone thinks it was.

The conventional narrative is that American leaders had a choice: Invade Japan, which would have cost millions of Allied and Japanese lives, or instead, use the atom bomb in the hope of convincing Japan to surrender. Truman, the story goes, carefully weighed the pros and cons before deciding that the atomic bomb would be used against Japanese cities, as the lesser of two evils.

But nuclear historian Alex Wellerstein argues that is not what happened.

Not only did Truman not take part in the decision to use the bomb, but the one major decision that he did make was a very different one — one that he himself did not fully understand until after the atomic bomb was used. The weight of that decision, and that misunderstanding, became the major reason that atomic bombs have not been used again since World War II.

Based on a close reading of the historical record, The Most Awful Responsibility shows that, despite his reputation as an ardent defender of the atomic bomb, Truman:

Wanted to avoid the “murder” and “slaughter” of innocent civilians

Believed that the atomic bomb should never be used again

Hoped that nuclear weapons would be outlawed in his lifetime

Wellerstein makes a startling case that Truman was possibly the most anti-nuclear American president of the twentieth century, but his ambitions were strongly constrained by the domestic and international politics of the postwar world and the early Cold War. This book is a must-read for all who want to truly understand not only why the bomb was dropped on Japan but also why it has not been used since.

Dr. Andrew O. Pace is a historian of the US in the world who specializes in the fog of war. He is currently a DPAA Research Partner Fellow at the University of Southern Mississippi and a co-host of the Diplomatic History Channel on the New Books Network. He is also working on his first book which examines why the United States pursued victory at practically all costs during World War II. He can be reached at [email protected] or here. Andrew is not an employee of DPAA, he supports DPAA through a partnership. The views presented are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of DPAA, DoD or its components. 
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