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Hot Type
New releases by Swarthmoreans
Submit your publication for consideration: books@swarthmore.edu
Charles A. Platt: A Guide to His Graphic Art
Barbara Jones Design
This 340-page guide is a catalogue raisonné of Charles A. Platt’s complete graphic oeuvre. The documentary basis includes Rice’s catalogue (1887), and entries in the Chase Gallery exhibition (1887) and the Grolier Club (1925). The correspondence section highlights relevant personal material for each year in his career. These letters, particularly those to his family, afford the reader a perspective on his personality, character, mindset, and formative experiences.
Entanglements in World Politics: The Power of Uncertainty
Cambridge University Press
Entanglements in World Politics calls for humility and eclectic pragmatism, emphasizing the unity of knowledge of the natural and humanistic sciences and the complementarities of science and religion. Katzenstein’s engaging writing and innovative approach make this a must-read for anyone interested in the complexities of global politics. This book is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.
Entangled Tongues: A Short History of the English Language or The Influence of French on English
Althof Press
“Where does the English that is currently spoken come from? Why does it function the way that it does? These are the questions that the author addresses in this examination of the many different pieces that have come together to form modern English. An edifying account of the evolution of a complex language.” — Kirkus Reviews
Bristol Budd Sampson: Patriot of the American Revolution
Keystone College Press
Bristol Budd Sampson, an African American man from Connecticut, enlisted in the Continental Army in March 1777, when he was still a teenager. He served in the 2nd Regiment of the Connecticut Line until the end of the war, in 1783. Written for juvenile (middle grade) readers, the book is a rhyming, 31-verse, narrative poem of four lines per verse with 15 full-color illustrations.
A Flood of Pictures: The Formation of a Picture Culture in the United States
University of Pennsylvania Press
In this full-color, heavily illustrated book, Leja traces the beginnings of a transformation in cultural life in the United States: when the widespread circulation of pictures reshaped a culture accustomed to printed and spoken words. A Flood of Pictures recovers a time before successful pictorial formulas for mass appeal were established, before an audience habituated to consumption of pictures existed, and before pictures had become thoroughly commodified.
Out of the Cuckoo’s Nest
Windermere Press
In this unforgettable story, Saada Saar traces his journey from a childhood stolen by displacement and abuse to a life of wisdom, leadership, and unshakable resilience. Saada Saar’s memories, vivid and cinematic, carry readers from the sunlit shores of Benghazi to the shadows of a childhood marked by prejudice and loss. What unfolds is not just a personal history, but a testament to the strength of the human spirit.
The Island of Hermaphrodites
ACMRS Press
Published anonymously in 1605, The Island of Hermaphrodites created an uproar for its irreverent portrayal of the French court, critique of absolute monarchy, and radical questioning of gender and power. In its first full English translation, Kathleen P. Long offers new audiences a satirical romp through a world of absurdist power — one that feels politically salient today.
Harsh Medicine: Why Women Can’t Get Ahead in Science and Health Care
Johns Hopkins University Press
Grandis, a physician scientist, interviewed more than 100 people in academic medicine at over a dozen institutions, focusing on the leaking pipeline of women in her profession. She interviewed experts in their fields about what they experienced and how they successfully navigated tough work environments. Harsh Medicine offers resources and solutions and gives readers hope.
Women in Power: Fighting for Democracy in an Age of Authoritarianism
Columbia University Press
Award-winning journalist and foreign policy expert Robinson tells the powerful stories of the women on the front lines of the battle between democracy and authoritarianism. Despite age-old obstacles and virulent new dangers, these remarkable leaders have strengthened their countries, expanded gender equality, and promoted policies that benefit all. Robinson distills their hard-won lessons, providing a roadmap for countries facing existential threats.
The Codex of Christian Surname
Lockweed Press/Independent
In an alternate late Middle Ages, an intriguing stranger arrives in 13-year-old Ḥavah’s village in the Iverian mountains. Is the visitor who she seems? Sometimes in male and other guises, Ḥavah will cross the region, explore the pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela, and, in the intersections between her own Xudish culture, Cristianismo, Islama, and Budism, discover a world vaster than she could have imagined.
The Latina Survival Guide: A Memoir of Drama, Trauma, and Telenovela Logic
Rosales Mavericks Publishing
Born in a hurricane and raised inside a telenovela, Toledo survived a childhood of privilege, chaos, ghosts, and chancletas. In this sharp, funny, and deeply heartfelt memoir, she turns her Puerto Rican girlhood into a series of binge-worthy episodes filled with family drama, superstition, Catholic guilt, and resilience. The result is a wildly entertaining coming-of-age story about identity, inheritance, and rewriting the scripts we were given.
Aging Well with Cannabis: Feel Better, Sleep Better and Live Better with Marijuana and CBD
Sterling Ethos
This is the essential guide for the “canna-curious” senior, family member, or caregiver, providing practical instructions, case studies, and a balanced view of the benefits and risks of cannabis and CBD. Grinspoon, a primary care physician and cannabis specialist, addresses the “why” and “how” of cannabis use — from health benefits to potential risks, types and forms of cannabis, consumption methods, and appropriate dosages.
Everybody’s Fly: A Life of Art, Music, and Changing the Culture
Penguin Random House
Everybody’s Fly is a fast-moving, all-access pass to Fred’s extraordinary life — one that begins in a book- and jazz-filled Brooklyn home and takes us deep into New York’s creative explosions from the 1970s into the 1990s. He didn’t just shape culture, he synthesized it — from highbrow to street, the Bronx to the East Village, punk to rap, Warhol to Wild Style.
Banning Books in America: Not a How-To
Bloomsbury Academic
Banning Books in America features novelists on banning and being banned, arguments about the history and politics of book banning, readings of banned books in national and international contexts, and responses to new legislation by anti-censorship advocates, teachers, and librarians. Together, these writers and educators provide a view from the trenches of the wars on reading.
Motherhood Discounted: Care Work in America Before and After Roe
She Writes Press
After becoming a mother, McConnell was forced to face the myth of autonomy that American individualism breeds: the idea that independence is always good and dependence always bad. Why does America have such a problem offering social support for care work, she wondered, when mothering is the essential work of reproducing society?
Criminalizing Disobedience
Oxford University Press
Many laws penalize conduct not because it is inherently wrongful but because the government has prohibited it. Lee addresses the important normative and conceptual questions these laws raise: How should disobedience be understood? Is it blameworthy to disobey the state? In what ways does the state criminalize and punish disobedience? What should be the limits to the state’s power to demand obedience and punish disobedience?
Walks & Weathers
Beauty School Editions
After reading William Wordsworth’s poem “The Prelude,” poet and publisher MC Hyland became fascinated with the importance of walking with friends in Wordsworth’s poetry. She set out on a poetic research project, walking and writing with friends and strangers from the banks of the Mississippi River to the streets of Manhattan, Cambridge University, and a fjord in western Norway.
The Remembering
The Energetic Well
This album is frequency medicine for the spirit, and a gentle reminder that you are nature, that you are supported in multidimensional ways, and that all that you need is already within you. Suriel’s work includes seven original songs about the elements of nature, the resilience of humanity, the magic of witches, and the gifts of being in communion with oneself and with all that is.
Therapeutic Inequalities: Mood Disorder Self-Management in Chicago
NYU Press
Weiner shows how the logic of self-management aligns with neoliberal ideals of personal responsibility, while obscuring the broader conditions that shape mental health outcomes. Therapeutic Inequalities asks what a more humane, interconnected model of care might look like. It calls for a radical reimagining of both mental health and personhood — one that values empathy, community, and the recognition of our shared vulnerabilities.
Bittersweet Lane: Creating Home(s) in the American Affordable Housing Crisis
Simon & Schuster
Housing dominates headlines, yet few truly understand how affordable housing works — or why it’s failing. Written by a community development professional with expertise in housing development and public policy, Bittersweet Lane blends gripping memoir with sharp policy insights to expose the brutal history of housing in the U.S. — and the tools we already have to fix it.
English Sociosyntax: Theory, Evidence, Approaches
De Gruyter Brill
This volume contributes cutting-edge research that illustrates the current methods and theory of sociosyntax. It captures the full range of the field, including work by variationist sociolinguists who incorporate formal theory into their work, researchers whose work is situated within both sides of sociosyntax, and researchers who embody up-to-date methodologies.
Interweaving Equitable Participation and Deep Mathematics: Building Community in the Elementary Classroom
Corwin
With practical strategies and real-life examples, the authors offer a design for building community organized around four key aspects: every voice matters; collaboration supports student agency; student-created representations offer anchors, openings, and depth; and students become initiators and advocates for their own learning. Each chapter examines how teachers implement these ideas through video examples from six public elementary school classrooms.
The Bulletin receives numerous submissions of new publications from the talented Swarthmore community and can feature only a fraction of those submissions here. Please note that work represented in Hot Type does not necessarily reflect the views of the College.