Censorship History

Through compelling narrative, historian Eric Berkowitz reveals how drastically censorship has shaped our modern society. More than just a history of censorship, Dangerous Ideas illuminates the power of restricting speech; how it has defined states, ideas, and culture; and (despite how each of us would like to believe otherwise) how it is something we all participate in.

Two defense experts explore the collision of war, politics, and social media, where the most important battles are now only a click away. Through the weaponization of social media, the Internet is changing war and politics, just as war and politics are changing the Internet. Terrorists livestream their attacks, “Twitter wars” produce real world casualties, and viral misinformation alters not just the result of battles, but the very fate of nations. The result is that war, tech, and politics have blurred into a new kind of battlespace that plays out on our smartphones.

In Burning the Books, Richard Ovenden describes the deliberate destruction of knowledge held in libraries and archives from ancient Alexandria to contemporary Sarajevo, from smashed Assyrian tablets in Iraq to the destroyed immigration documents of the UK Windrush generation.

There is a common belief that we live in unprecedented times, that people are too sensitive today, that nobody objected to the actions of actors, comedians, and filmmakers in the past. Modern pundits would have us believe that Americans of a previous generation had tougher skin and seldom complained. But does this argument hold up to scrutiny? In Outrageous, celebrated cultural historian Kliph Nesteroff demonstrates that Americans have been objecting to entertainment for nearly two hundred years, sometimes rationally, often irrationally.

Facts are and must be the coin of the realm in a democracy. Unfortunately, for citizens in the United States and throughout the world, distinguishing between fact and fiction - always a formidable challenge - is now more difficult than ever, as a constant stream of questionable information pours into media outlets. Lewis argues forcefully that while data points and factoids abound, it is much harder to get to the whole truth of complex issues in time for that truth to guide citizens, voters, and decision makers.

The basis for the film The Post, The Pentagon Papers are a series of articles, documents, and studies examining the Johnson Administration's lies to the public about the extent of US involvement in the Vietnam War, bringing to light shocking conclusions about America's true role in the conflict. With a brand-new foreword by James L. Greenfield, this edition of the Pulitzer Prize-winning story is sure to provoke discussion about free press and government deception.

Hailed as the “first freedom”, free speech is the bedrock of democracy. But it is a challenging principle, subject to erosion in times of upheaval. Today, in democracies and authoritarian states around the world, it is on the retreat. In Free Speech, Jacob Mchangama traces the riveting legal, political, and cultural history of this idea.

One of the least understood countries in the world, North Korea has long been known for its repressive regime. Yet it is far from being an impenetrable black box. Media flows covertly into the country, and fault lines are appearing in the government's sealed informational borders. Drawing on deeply personal interviews with North Korean defectors from all walks of life, ranging from propaganda artists to diplomats, Jieun Baek tells the story of North Korea's information underground.

Jewell uncovers how battles to control college radio were about more than music—they were an influential, if unexpected, front in the nation's culture wars. These battles created unintended consequences and overlooked contributions to popular culture that students, DJs, and listeners never anticipated. More than an ode to beloved stations, this book will resonate with both music fans and observers of the politics of culture.

At a time when civilian periodicals faced strict censorship, the army’s chief of staff George Marshall won the support of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt to create an expansive troop-newspaper program. Both Marshall and FDR recognized that there was a second struggle taking place outside the battlefields of World War II—the war of words. While Hitler inundated the globe with propaganda, morale across the US Army dwindled. As the Axis blurred the lines between truth and fiction, the best defense was for American troops to bring the truth into focus by writing it down.

In Indelible Ink, acclaimed social historian Richard Kluger recreates in rich detail this dramatic clash of powerful antagonists that marked the beginning of press freedom in America and its role in vanquishing colonial tyranny. Here is an enduring lesson that resounds to this day on the vital importance of free public expression as the underpinning of democracy.

Every liberal democracy has laws or codes against hate speech - except the United States. For constitutionalists, regulation of hate speech violates the First Amendment and damages a free society. Against this absolutist view, Jeremy Waldron argues powerfully that hate speech should be regulated as part of our commitment to human dignity and to inclusion and respect for members of vulnerable minorities.

Google Archipelago: The Digital Gulag and the Simulation of Freedom explores the reach, penetration, power, and impact of Big Digital or the mega-information managers, social media platforms, Artificial Intelligence developers, providers of other web applications and functionalities, and the architects and proponents of the promised Internet of Things.

In Losing the News, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Alex S. Jones offers a probing look at the epochal changes sweeping the media, changes which are eroding the core news that has been the essential food supply of our democracy. Losing the News depicts an unsettling situation in which the American birthright of fact-based, reported news is in danger. But it is also a call to arms to fight to keep the core of news intact.

On June 13, 1971, the New York Times published on its front page a series of confidential documents outlining U.S. government policy on the war in Vietnam. These documents had been secretly leaked from the Department of Defense to reporters at the New York Times. There followed a period of intense debate, carried out in the board rooms of the newspaper, the offices of its legal counsel, and ultimately the courts of the nation...

A lively history of the Watch and Ward Society - New England's notorious literary censor for over eighty years. Banned in Boston is the first-ever history of the Watch and Ward Society - once Boston's unofficial moral guardian. An influential watchdog organization, bankrolled by society's upper crust, it actively suppressed vices like gambling and prostitution, and oversaw the mass censorship of books and plays.

Bradley Manning perpetrated the biggest breach of military security in American history. While serving as an Army intelligence analyst, he leaked an astounding amount of classified information to WikiLeaks: classified combat videos, plus hundreds of thousands of documents from the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and from embassies around the globe. Nearly all of WikiLeaks' headline-making releases of information have come from a single source: Bradley Manning.

Truth examines Bush's political roots as governor of Texas, delves into what is known about his National Guard duty - or lack of service - and sheds light on the solidity of the documents that backed up the National Guard story, even including images of the actual documents in an appendix to the book. It is peopled with a colorful cast of characters - from Karl Rove to Sumner Redstone - and moves from small-town Texas to Black Rock - CBS corporate headquarters - in New York City.

In Fearless Speech, Dr. Mary Anne Franks emphasizes the distinction between what speech a democratic society should protect and what speech a democratic society should promote. While the First Amendment in theory is politically neutral, in practice it has been legally deployed most visibly and effectively to promote powerful antidemocratic interests: misogyny, racism, religious zealotry, and corporate self-interest--in other words, reckless speech. Instead, Franks argues, we need to focus on fearless speech.

In this book, veteran constitutional lawyer Jonathan W. Emord explains the intellectual origins of freedom of speech from the Age of Enlightenment to the founding of the American republic. Today, government censorship of health information worldwide relies on the same mechanisms of prior restraint that were used in Europe from the 16th to the 18th centuries.