The World in the Curl: An Unconventional History of Surfing (Dibner Lecture)

Peter Westwick discusses his new book, “The World in the Curl: An Unconventional History of Surfing” (2013, Random House), co-authored with Peter Neushul. His Dibner Lecture covers the high-tech aspects of the history of surfing, including how surfboards and wetsuits derive from military technology and how coastlines and even waves are increasingly engineered. In 2013–14 Westwick was the Searle Visiting Professor in the History of Science at Caltech and The Huntington. He is an assistant professor of history at the University of Southern California.