Boosting a New West: Pacific Coast Expositions 1905–1916

John C. Putnam 

WSU Press: 2020

Inspired by Chicago’s successful 1893 Columbian Exposition, promoters in Portland, Seattle, San Diego, and San Francisco held fairs between 1905 and 1916 that drew in millions of people. Embracing new consumer marketing techniques, fair publicity directors sought to shape a new western identity. Putnam, associate professor of history at San Diego State University, explores the fairs’ cultural and social meaning in his book, and shows how organizers articulated the significance of the expositions to national and regional audiences.

Purchase Boosting a New West at WSU Press

 

Architecture and Sacrament: A Critical Theory 

David Wang 

Routledge: 2020

WSU architecture professor David Wang considers architectural theory from a Christian theological perspective. The book argues that retrieval of the sacramental outlook, which informed centuries of art and architecture in the West, can shed light on current architectural issues such as “big box stores,” the environmental crisis, and the loss of sense of community.

 

Negotiating Abolition: The Antislavery Project in the British Strait Settlements, 1786–1843

Shawna Herzog 

Bloomsbury: 2020

Sex and gender complicated the enforcement of colonial anti-slavery policies in the nineteenth-century British Straits Settlements of Southeast Asia. Local officials faced difficulty in identifying slave populations because reclassification of slave labor to systems of indenture or “free” labor created a new illicit trade for women and girls. Shawna Herzog, a history instructor at WSU, provides new perspectives on this often overlooked region in British imperial history and its challenges with slavery and abolition.

 

Cougs Talk Stock

WSU Extension

Podcast: 2021

WSU experts from Extension and the College of Agricultural, Human, and Natural Resource Sciences focus on science-based, relevant animal science topics in this new podcast for those who are interested in livestock production, raise livestock, and want to learn more⁠—such as 4-H and FFA members. Each episode, an industry expert is interviewed by Cougs Talk Stock hosts Don Llewellyn, Hannah Brause, Natasha Moffitt-Hemmer, and Sarah Dreger. Listeners can find the podcast at soundcloud.com/cougstalkstock.