writer and historian

Other work

INTERVIEWS

for Public Culture and Public Books

Siva Vaidhyanathan on Facebook and Other “Antisocial” Media,” Public Books (October 12, 2018)

"Jill Lepore on the Challenge of Explaining Things," Public Books (April 24, 2017)

Interview of Peter Galison,” Public Culture 26.1 (Winter 2014): 79-100

The Confidence Economy: An Interview with T.J. Jackson Lears,” Public Books (May 7, 2013)

for The Believer [contributor page]

Micro-interview of Peter Galison: Historian, Philosopher, Filmmaker,” The Believer 9 (June 2011): 20, 31, 48, 52, 55

Interview of Rebecca Solnit: Nature Writer, Environmental Activist, Art Historian,” The Believer 7  (September 2009): 43-49

Interview of Michael Pollan, Environmental Journalist and Agro-Food Writer,” The Believer 5 (April 2007): 63-71 [in full here]

Interview of Arnold Davidson: Conceptual Historian, Philosopher of Science, Scholar of Monsters, Sex, and Ontology,” The Believer 4 (May 2006): 66-73

Interview of Marjorie Grene, Living Philosophical Legend,” The Believer 3 (March 2005): 65-74

at The World’s Fair

Author-Meets-Blogger: a series of 17 interviews with authors in environmental history and STS

 

SCHOLARSHIP-RELATED PIECES

Three essays for the Lehigh Valley's Food in the Public Square NEH Project:

"Food Justice and Flood Zones" (October 24, 2016)

"Forests and Trees, Food Policies and Individuals" (May 14, 2016)

"Food as a Means Too, Not Just an End" (April 2, 2016)

Is environmentalism best pursued through technocratic means?" Aeon Conversations (June 10, 2015)

"Should the FDA Define ‘Natural’?New York Times (November 10, 2014)

All Praise the Civics of Food HubsCivil Eats (September 7, 2012)

What Bean-Counting ‘Contrarians’ Miss about the Local Food Movement,” Grist Magazine (April 14, 2011)

Why Blog the History of Science?” History of Science Newsletter (October 2008): 3-5

B.R. Cohen’s Days at the Museum”: a five-part series at McSweeney's in 2009 (and then the last was in 2013)

B.R. Cohen’s Annals of Science”: a 13-part series at McSweeney's from 2003-2007

I co-authored The World’s Fair at scienceblogs.com with David Ng (University of British Columbia) from 2006 through 2009. The site itself hosts the full catalog of posts from that time; here are two other areas in addition to that catalog and the author-meets-blogger link above:

Food and Agriculture Posts: a subset at the World’s Fair of 50+ posts on industrial agriculture & alternatives

Cannonball Epistemology: a 14-part series about the intersection of visual evidence, objectivity, and truth

 

NEITHER OF THE ABOVE

Various Breads and Butters, the podcast with Simon Tonev, Michelle Polton-Simon, and a slew of interns (iTunes; Twitter; Fb)

Here is my full author page at McSweeney’s, and here is a selection of some highlights at the site:

Muscle and Flow (for L. Weschler’s Convergences series)

On anti-environmentalists

World Historical Cheneys

“Bathtub Gin” Songbook Essay

On Tour with Bob Edwards

Summer Vacation (part II)

Hot Chocolate

Descartes

Important Dates in Machiavelli’s Life

I was the Lists page editor at the McSweeney’s site from 2004-2007 and helped put together Mountain Man Dance Moves (2006).

“Borges Was A Webelo” was not short-listed for the Pushcart Prize, but might have been. It appears in The McSweeney’s Joke Book of Book Jokes (2008).

I contributed to The Future Dictionary of America (2004) and Issues #35 (2010) and #39 (2011) of the Quarterly.




at The Science Creative Quarterly

Bisphenol-A: The One-Act Play

"Stratigraphical Analysis Of Friday-Sunday Identification In Relation To Sugar Consumption Preferences And Related Demographic Variables"

"Why Some People Make The Wrong Decision And Others Don’t: An Assessment Of Arithmetic And Geometric Projections Of The Friday-Sunday Divide Beyond The Mehspair Chasm With P-Values, Χ2, And Licorice"


at The Education of Oronte Churm

On ‘The Accident’

Too Much Culture But Not Enough to See

I CR8 ART