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UnTextbooked | A history podcast for the future — History
UnTextbooked | A history podcast for the future

UnTextbooked is brought to you by teen change-makers who are looking for answers to big questions. Have you ever wondered if protests really can save lives, why assimilation required Native American kids to attend boarding schools, how Black-led organizations for mutual aid began, how the fear of communism led the United States to plan the overthrows of many leaders in Latin America, or why Brazilian cars run on sugar? Or maybe you’ve questioned when Asian Americans will stop being seen as “perpetual foreigners,” how African heritage influences Black activism, or what resilience looks like for Iranian women?

Your textbooks probably didn’t teach you how American Jews were an integral part of the Civil Rights Movement, if history’s greatest leaders were generalists or specialists, how a Black teenager and his young lawyer changed America’s criminal justice system, or if either the US or the USSR won the Cold War. Did you know some of the forgotten BIPOC women of history were spying in aid of the French Resistance, that there’s more to being a leader than going down with your battleship, or that there is a long history of gender expression in Native American cultures that goes beyond the male/female binary? Listen in as we interview famous authors and historians who have the answers.

Context is the key to understanding topics like British imperialism, segregation, racism, criminal justice, identifying as non-binary and so much more. These intergenerational conversations bring the full power of history to you with the depth and vividness that most textbooks lack. Real history, to help you find answers to your big questions. UnTextbooked makes history unboring forever.

Copyright: © Copyright 2020-2023 The History Co:Lab. All Rights Reserved.

Latest Episodes:

Why do we forget the cruelty of the British Empire? Nov 23, 2020

Show notes

On April 13, 1919, thousands of Indians gathered in Amritsar, Punjab to celebrate Baisakhi - a religious holiday. Such gatherings had been banned by the British colonial government, but the people gathered anyway to celebrate and to protest British imperialism.

What followed was the Jallianwala Bagh Massacre; British General Reginald Dyer ordered his troops to open fire without warning on the crowd of unarmed protesters. They fired until they ran out of ammunition, killing 379 and wounding more than a thousand people (though the final death toll has been disputed over the years.) The massacre is considered a turning point that sparked anti-British resistance for many Indians, including Gandhi. It was one of the deadliest acts of colonial aggression in Britain’s history, but for many historians, it exemplifies the kind of violence Britain relied on to maintain its colonial power.

UnTextbooked producer Hassan Javed grew up hearing stories from his grandparents about what it was like growing up in British India. They told him about how humiliation and degradation were a part of daily life for many Indians in British India. But when Hassan learned about British imperialism in school, he was shocked that his curriculum portrayed Britain as a “modernizing” force for good. He wanted more context, and his research brought him to The Blood Never Dried: A People’s History of the British Empire by historian John Newsinger. The book contends that all empires are inherently criminal, and that Britain’s was one of the worst.

Book: The Blood Never Dried: A People’s History of the British Empire

Guest: John Newsinger

Producer: Hassan Javed

Music: Silas Bohen and Coleman Hamilton

Editors: Bethany Denton and Jeff Emtman

How America’s fear of communism paved the way for a Chilean dictator. Nov 19, 2020

Show notes

During the Cold War, the United States feared the rise of Communism across the world. But in Latin America, the United States took action.

In 1970, Salvador Allende won the Chilean presidency with just a third of the vote. He was a socialist who started shaking things up across the country.

Within just a couple years, a military coup removed him from power, and Augusto Pinochet, the American-backed strongman, replaced him. The ensuing Pinochet regime left thousands of Chileans dead and missing. The government actively persecuted alleged dissonants both domestically and abroad, leading to the eventual assassinations of Orlando Letelier and Ronni Karpen Moffitt, who were killed with a car bomb in Washington D.C.

The story of the United States’ involvement in South American upheaval is still unfolding. But declassified documents show that then National Security Advisor Henry Kissenger was fairly un-bothered about the upheaval of South American democracy, so long as the Communists lost influence.

Historian Alan McPherson says that the United States’ relation with democracies in Latin America is incredibly complex and nuanced. In this episode of UnTextbooked, producer Jessica Chiriboga asks why stories about foreign intervention are never simple.

Book: Intimate Ties, Bitter Struggles: the United States and Latin America since 1945

Guest: Alan McPherson

Producer: Jessica Chiriboga

Music: Silas Bohen and Coleman Hamilton

Editors: Bethany Denton and Jeff Emtman

Damnation to the governor and confusion to the colony. Nov 16, 2020

Show notes

Pop culture misremembers the Golden Age of piracy, and usually portrays pirates as apolitical agents of chaos. But historians now believe that many pirates followed a democratic and egalitarian structure that put them directly at odds with the world’s biggest governments.

In the 1700’s, life as a European sailor left a lot to be desired. Wages were low, conditions were dangerous, and captains could be cruel. A lot of sailors wanted out.

Pirates, on the other hand, were recruiting disenchanted sailors from captured ships and escaped slaves, offering them better living conditions.

Life under the Jolly Roger was still rough though, and as such, pirate codes of conduct emerged, like the one issued by Captain Bartholomew Roberts, which stated that each pirate should receive equal shares of loot, that gambling shouldn’t take place on the ship, that pirates should receive compensation for injuries sustained in battle, that arguments should be settled by duels, but only on land, and more (see page 231).

“A merry life and a short one, shall be my motto,” said Captain Roberts. This sounds a lot like a more modern phrase: “I’m here for a good time, not a long time”, which wound up in music by Trooper, George Strait and Drake.

Historian Marcus Rediker thinks it’s no surprise that these ideals still persist. Despite the eventual decline of piracy in the Atlantic, Rediker believes that pirates may have won the longer war of influence; most of us can name pirates, but few remember the names of those who hanged them.

On this episode of UnTextbooked, producer Ming-Wei Cyprien Fasquelle interviews Marcus Rediker on what the pirates of the Atlantic can teach us about resisting corrupt authority.

Book: Villains of All Nations: Atlantic Pirates in The Golden Age

Guest: Marcus Rediker

Producer: Ming-Wei Cyprien Fasquelle

Music: Silas Bohen and Coleman Hamilton

Editors: Bethany Denton and Jeff Emtman

How much influence does America still have? Nov 12, 2020

Show notes

In 1987, the historian Paul Kennedy published a massive, nearly 700 page book called The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers. In normal circumstances, the book might have been lumped in with the rest of academic writing that’s seen only by scholars…if it weren’t for the book’s conclusion, which flew in the face of American exceptionalism and certainly upset some people.

In that final section of the book, Kennedy suggests that the United States had begun a period of relative decline that began in the 1960’s. Kennedy focussed on two major elements in his claim of the US’s decline: military strength and economic power.

The United States’ military was (and still is) largely unmatched. Kennedy worried about overreach though, having observed the United States’ dramatic and failed attempt to fight communism in Vietnam.

And economically, Kennedy saw the United States weakening due to domestic policy and the rising economies in nations like India and China.

At the time of the book’s publishing, he received criticism from the political scientist Joseph Nye, who argued that Kennedy had undervalued the significance of so-called “soft power.” Nye coined this phrase. He uses “soft power” to describe the forms of persuasion that countries hold, ie. all the ways to coerce on the world stage that don’t involve guns or dollars. Soft powers include social values like culture, charisma, values, politics, NGOs, reputation, etc. This all provides an avenue for countries to maintain relevance even when their “hard powers” (military and economics) decline. Kennedy recognized Nye’s criticism and now sees his conclusion with more nuance.

On this episode of UnTextbooked, producer Will Bourell interviews Paul Kennedy on the recent erosions in the United States’ soft power and the ways in which the country can manage its relative decline and reverse its most harmful effects.

Book: The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers

Guest: Paul Kennedy

Producer: Will Bourell

Music: Silas Bohen and Coleman Hamilton

Editors: Bethany Denton and Jeff Emtman

The forgotten mothers of American gynecology. Nov 09, 2020

Show notes

James Marion Sims has a complicated legacy. He was a surgeon in the 19th century who, for decades, was heralded as the ‘Father of American Gynecology’ for his contributions to the field, including inventing the speculum. But those innovations came at the expense of the poor and enslaved women that he performed experimental surgeries on. Not much is known about the Black enslaved women and poor Irish immigrants he experimented on, but without their contributions, gynecology would not be what it is today.

On this episode of UnTextbooked, producer Ruba Memon interviews Deirdre Cooper Owens, author of the book Medical Bondage: Race, Gender, and the Origins of American Gynecology. They talk about how America’s history of slavery and racism continues to influence medicine in ways that harm Black people at disproportionate rates.

Book: Medical Bondage: Race, Gender, and the Origins of American Gynecology

Guest: Deirdre Cooper Owens

Producer: Ruba Memon

Music: Silas Bohen and Coleman Hamilton

Editors: Bethany Denton and Jeff Emtman

When did Americans become so dependent on processed foods? Nov 06, 2020

Show notes

For decades, experts have warned that the average American diet is potentially harmful. Americans tend to eat food that is laden with too much sodium, fat, and added sugars, and it's making people sick.

What’s insidious about this is that a lot of Americans don’t even know that the food they’re eating is unhealthy. A lot of foods are deceptively sweeter, saliter, and fattier than one would assume. And those added ingredients make processed foods addictive.

UnTextbooked producer and host, Gabe Hostin, wanted to understand how the American food industry got this way. He found the work of journalist Michael Moss, who’s the author of Salt, Sugar, Fat: How the Food Giants Hooked Us. In it, Michael Moss writes about “food giants”, enormous companies that produce the vast majority of processed food products in America. He contends that these companies became so powerful because they figured out how to make their products irresistible, and that these innovations coincided with other societal shifts that were changing American eating habits.

Book: Salt, Sugar, Fat: How the Food Giants Hooked Us

Guest: Michael Moss

Producer: Gabe Hostin

Music: Silas Bohen and Coleman Hamilton

Editors: Bethany Denton and Jeff Emtman

A historical argument against the gender binary. Nov 02, 2020

Show notes

As a kid, UnTextbooked producer Gavin Scott loved listening to his grandfather tell stories about their people. He used to like to imagine what his home was like back before white settlers came. As much as Gavin enjoyed learning about his culture, he sometimes felt out of place as the only gay person he knew of in his small hometown. So when he had the opportunity to work on this podcast, he decided to research LGBT Native Americans to learn more about people who were like him.

He learned about “Two Spirit”, a term that was adopted in 1990 at a gathering of gay and lesbian Native Americans. “Two Spirit” is an umbrella term that encompasses many understandings of queer and gender variant identities for Native Americans. The term alludes to traditional third and fourth gender people; as in, people who were both/neither male and/or female. Many Native American cultures accepted and celebrated these people before white settlers forced assimilation.

Gavin’s research eventually brought him to an unlikely source: Sabine Lang, a German anthropologist who has studied Native American cultures for decades. In her book Men as Women, Women as Men, Sabine Lang writes about the traditional roles of “men-women” and “women-men”, as she calls them. She uses those terms in order to avoid using “Two Spirit”, a contemporary term, when discussing historical identities.

Guest: Sabine Lang

Book: Men as Women, Women as Men: Changing Gender in Native American Cultures

Producer: Gavin Scott

Music: Silas Bohen and Coleman Hamilton

Editors: Bethany Denton and Jeff Emtman

How a Black teenager and his young lawyer changed America’s criminal justice system. Oct 29, 2020

Show notes

Picture this: You’re nineteen years old, it’s a summer afternoon, and you’re driving around your hometown. You notice a group of other teenagers on the side of the road. As you get closer you realize that two of them are your cousin and nephew. You can tell by body language that things are getting heated, tempers are flaring. So you pull over. You get out of your car. You step in between your family and the other teenagers that are trying to fight them, and in the process you put your hand on the other kid’s arm.

One more thing: you are Black, and the kid who just touched on the arm is white. Also, it’s 1966 and you live in Louisiana.

So you get arrested and charged with simple battery, a misdemeanor. In 1960’s Louisiana, it means you won’t get a jury trial, you won’t get that chance to tell your side of the story to a jury of your peers. Instead, your case is going to be decided by just one man. And that man just happens to be Leander Perez, one of the most virulent white supremacists in the American South. For the crime of simple battery you could go to prison for two years.

This is the story of Gary Duncan. Instead of accepting his fate, Gary found a lawyer named Richard Sobol and they appealed. The case made its way to the Supreme Court in Duncan v. Louisiana.

Matthew Van Meter, author of Deep Delta Justice, explains how Gary Duncan’s case changed the criminal justice system. While most Americans assume that criminal cases are decided by a jury, Louisiana and many other states did not require a jury. This is because even though the Constitution guaranteed citizens the right to a jury trial, that only applied to federal crimes at the time. This essentially gave judges, who were predominantly white and beholden to racist laws, the ability to decide the future of people like Gary Duncan. According to Matthew Van Meter, this is just one example of how the criminal justice system has been used to uphold white supremacy. Thanks to Gary Duncan’s case, the Supreme Court ruled that jury trials are fundamental to American justice, and that all states were obligated to provide them. Despite this victory, jury trials have all but disappeared in the United States.

Guest: Matthew Van Meter

Book: Deep Delta Justice: A Black Teen, His Lawyer, and Their Groundbreaking Battle for Civil Rights in the South

Producer: Elliot Smith

Music: Silas Bohen and Coleman Hamilton

Editors: Bethany Denton and Jeff Emtman

The false mythology of good leadership. Oct 26, 2020

Show notes

There’s a certain mythos around the founders of the United States. George Washington gets this treatment to the extreme. He’s painted riding brilliant white horses, standing up in boats, and puffing out his chest as he presides over the signing of the Constitution. He’s essentially an American folk hero.

What’s odd is that this mythical understanding of a real person conceals the truth of what real leadership looks like. At least, that’s the perspective of General Stanley McChrystal, who rose through the ranks of the military and had to learn a lot about leadership along the way.

General McChrystal thinks that too many people view our leaders as if they’re cut from a different cloth, when in fact, leaders are fallible, and reliant on the people around them to succeed.

He co-wrote the book Leaders: Myth and Reality, wherein he profiles many influential leaders, both moral and corrupt. The book is loosely structured on Plutarch’s Parallel Lives biographies. In the book, he profiles the leadership strategies of Martin Luther, Coco Chanel, Walt Disney, William “Boss” Tweed and others. He also gives one chapter to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, an Al Qaeda leader that he fought for years.

General McChrystal is quick to separate his respect for a leader’s style from that leader’s actions. While that’s certainly true of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, McChrystal also attempts to clarify his complicated relationship with General Robert E Lee, a man who he grew up nearly worshipping as a leader. In his years since childhood, McChrystal’s tried to balance his respect for Lee’s leadership with a moral obligation to fight bigotry and symbols of hate.

After his military career ended, General McChrystal became the Board Chair of the Service Year Alliance, which helps youth to do a paid year of civil service.

Guest: General Stanley McChrystal

Book: Leaders: Myth and Reality

Producer: Victor Ye

Music: Silas Bohen and Coleman Hamilton

Editors: Bethany Denton and Jeff Emtman

Does America live up to its own ideals? Oct 19, 2020

Show notes

Democracy: a small word and a big concept foundational to the United States. Ideally, we’re a country of pluralism and self determination, but the reality is often different.

Many dark chapters exist in our history: Slavery and the extermination of Native Americans, Disenfranchisement and voter suppression. Japanese internment and white supremacy. And yet, many of the ideals that surround the founding of our country do slowly bend us towards justice. So how is it that one nation could be founded on principles of equality while also oppressing so many people throughout its history?

UnTextbooked producer Anya Dua wanted to better understand these contradictions. Anya is herself an amalgamation of many different American experiences: Her mom’s side of the family were European settlers who came to the United States before it was even a country. Her dad is Indian and immigrated to America by way of Australia. Both of these are fundamentally American experiences, and gave Anya very different perspectives on American history.

In her research, Anya found the work of historian Jill Lepore, and read her book These Truths: A History of the United States.

The “truths” in the book’s title—political equality, natural rights, and the sovereignty of the people—are gleaned from the Declaration of Independence. In her introduction, Jill Lepore asks one question essential to a better understanding of our nation: “Does American history prove these truths, or does it belie them?”

Guest: Jill Lepore

Book: These Truths: A History of the Uniited States

Producer: Anya Dua

Music: Silas Bohen and Coleman Hamilton

Editors: Bethany Denton and Jeff Emtman

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