Who's Black and Why?

A Hidden Chapter from the Eighteenth-Century Invention of Race

Henry Louis Gates, Jr. and Andrew S. Curran

Hosted by Caleb Zakarin

Who's Black and Why?: A Hidden Chapter from the Eighteenth-Century Invention of Race (Harvard University Press, 2022) is the first translation and publication of sixteen submissions to the notorious eighteenth-century Bordeaux essay contest on the cause of black skin. In 1739 Bordeaux's Royal Academy of Sciences announced a contest for the best essay on the sources of "blackness." The authors ranged from naturalists to physicians, theologians to amateur savants. Documented on each …

Ministry of Ideas

Divine Technology--or, Religion, Technology, and Magic

Illuminations Episode 3

Tulasi Srinivas

Hosted by Zachary Davis

It’s common to feel that technology removes the magic of the world, but Hindu worshippers in Bangalore have shown that it's all in the approach. Guest: Tulasi Srinivas, associate professor of …

Political Science

Strategies for Navigating Graduate School and Beyond

Kevin G. Lorentz, Daniel J. Mallinson, and Julia Marin Hellwege

Hosted by Lilly Goren

This new compendium, Strategies for Navigating Graduate School and Beyond, is a true asset to the discipline of Political Science (and other graduate programs as well) in the myriad ways …

French Studies

Sacred Rivals

Catholic Missions and the Making of Islam in Nineteenth-Century France and Algeria

Joseph W. Peterson

Hosted by Sarah Miles

Upon the French invasion of Algeria in 1830, the territory quickly became a placeholder for French dreams, debates, and experiments in social engineering, economic development and even religious culture. Missionaries …

Early Modern History

Fictions of Credit in the Age of Shakespeare

Laura Kolb

Hosted by Zalman Newfield

In Fictions of Credit in the Age of Shakespeare (Oxford University Press, 2021), Laura Kolb examines how Shakespeare and his contemporaries represented credit-driven artifice and interpretation on the early modern …

On Religion

God, the Bestseller

How One Editor Transformed American Religion a Book at a Time

Stephen Prothero

Hosted by Gregory Soden

New York Times bestselling author and acclaimed religion scholar, Stephen Prothero, captures the compelling and unique saga of twentieth-century America on an identity quest through the eyes and books of …

Law

Reckoning with Empire

Self-Determination in International Law

Miriam Bak Mckenna

Hosted by Vladislav Lilic

Miriam Bak McKenna is an Associate Professor at the Department of Social Sciences and Business at Roskilde University (Denmark). Her first monograph, Reckoning with Empire: Self-Determination in International Law (Brill, 2023), adopts a …

Literature

Take What You Need

A Novel

Idra Novey

Hosted by G. P. Gottlieb

Today I talked to Idra Novey about her new novel Take What You Need (Viking, 2023). Leah, her husband, and their little son are driving back to where she grew up …

MIT Press Podcast

The Deception Dividend

FDR's Undeclared War

John Schuessler

Hosted by MIT Press

Sean Lynn-Jones, editor of International Security, interviews author John Schuessler, whose article "The Deception Dividend: FDR's Undeclared War" appears in the Spring 2010 issue of the journal. Their conversation tackles …

Diplomatic History

Euromissiles

The Nuclear Weapons That Nearly Destroyed NATO

Susan Colbourn

Hosted by Grant Golub

In Euromissiles: The Nuclear Weapons That Nearly Destroyed NATO (Cornell UP, 2022), Susan Colbourn tells the story of the height of nuclear crisis and the remarkable waning of the fear …

Taiwan on Air

Vietnamese Refugee Camps in Penghu

A Discussion with Asio Liu

Asio Liu

Hosted by Taiwan on Air

In this podcast, the host, Lara Momesso, interviews the Taiwanese movie director Asio Liu on his most recent movie project on the Vietnamese refugee camps in Penghu. Many of us …

Literature

You Must Believe in Spring

Mohamed Tonsy

Hosted by Takeshi Morisato

You Must Believe in Spring (Hajar Press, 2022) is Mohamed Tonsy's "speculative fiction." It is about the future of Egypt when people's memory of the recent revolution is beginning to fade away …

Literature

You Were Watching from the Sand

Juliana Lamy

Hosted by Kendall Dinniene

Playful, kinetic, and devastating in turn, You Were Watching from the Sand (Red Hen Press, 2023) is a collection in which Haitian men, women, and children who find their lives …

Darts & Letters

The Hippie High-Rise

Rochdale College, Toronto’s Communal Living High Rise Free Education Experiment

Marc Apollonio

Hosted by Marc Apollonio

From 1968 to 1975 one high-rise was the heart of Canada’s counterculture. Rochdale College in Toronto was jammed full with leftist organizers, hippies, draft dodgers, students, artists, and others just …

Book of the Day/ Education

Campus Misinformation

The Real Threat to Free Speech in American Higher Education

Bradford Vivian

Hosted by Thomas Discenna

If we listen to the politicians and pundits, college campuses have become fiercely ideological spaces where students unthinkingly endorse a liberal orthodoxy and forcibly silence anyone who dares to disagree. These commentators lament the demise of free speech and academic freedom. But what is really happening on college campuses? Campus Misinformation: The Real Threat to Free Speech in American Higher Education (Oxford UP, 2022) shows how misinformation about colleges and …

Global Media & Communication

The Ethics of Engagement

Media, Conflict and Democracy in Africa

Herman Wasserman

Hosted by Aswin Punathambekar and Jing Wang

Hello, world! This is the Global Media & Communication podcast series. In this episode, our host Yuval Katz discusses the book The Ethics of Engagement: Media, Conflict and Democracy in …

Middle Eastern Studies

Teachers as State-Builders

Education and the Making of the Modern Middle East

Hilary Falb Kalisman

Hosted by Reuben Silverman

Today, it is hard to imagine a time and place when public school teachers were considered among the elite strata of society. But in the lands controlled by the Ottomans …

Religion

Religion and US Empire

Critical New Histories

Tisa Wenger and Sylvester A. Johnson

Hosted by Jacob Barrett

The United States has been an empire since the time of its founding, and this empire is inextricably intertwined with American religion. Religion and US Empire: Critical New Histories (NYU …

Van Leer Institute Series on Ideas with Renee Garfinkel

Wild Problems

A Guide to the Decisions That Define Us

Russ Roberts

Hosted by Renee Garfinkel

Algorithms and apps analyze data and tell you how to beat the traffic, what books to buy, what music to listen to, and even who to date—often with great results …

African American Studies

Samuel Ringgold Ward

A Life of Struggle

R. J. M. Blackett

Hosted by Omari Averette-Phillips

Born on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, Samuel Ringgold Ward (1817–c. 1869) escaped enslavement and would become a leading figure in the struggle for Black freedom, citizenship, and equality. He …

Economics

Lives Amid Violence

Transforming Development in the Wake of Conflict

Mareike Schomerus

Hosted by Miranda Melcher

Violent conflict and its aftermath are pressing problems, particularly for international development initiatives. However, the results of development in conflict contexts have generally been disappointing and their preventative potential thus …

Southeast Asian Studies

Unsettled Frontiers

Market Formation in the Cambodia-Vietnam Borderlands

Sango Mahanty

Hosted by Michele Ford

Like other global frontiers, the Cambodia-Vietnam borderlands are a hotspot for migration, land claims, and markets for newly introduced commodities. These topics and more are the focus of Sango Mahanty’s …

Genocide Studies

Survivors Uncensored

100+ Testimonies from Survivors of the Rwandan Genocide

Ribara Uwariraye et al.

Hosted by Christopher Davey

Authentic, harrowing, and inspirational, Survivors Uncensored contains more than 100 recollections of events narrated by those who lived through the tragic events when Rwanda turned to darkness. The diversity of …

Anthropology

Nested Ecologies

A Multilayered Ethnography of Functional Medicine

Rosalynn A. Vega

Hosted by Joan Matamoros

Each body is a system within a system—an ecology within the larger context of social, political, economic, cultural, and environmental factors. This is one of the lessons of epigenetics, whereby …

MIT Press Podcast

Computer Music and Human Computer Interaction

A Discussion with Michael Gurevich

Michael Gurevich

Hosted by MIT Press

Michael Gurevich, lecturer at the Sonic Arts Research Centre at the Queen’s University, Belfast School of Music and Sonic Arts, serves as guest editor of the Winter 2010 issue of …

Sociology

A Good Place to Do Business

The Politics of Downtown Renewal Since 1945

Roger Biles and Mark H. Rose

Hosted by Nicole Trujillo-Pagan

The “Pittsburgh Renaissance,” an urban renewal effort launched in the late 1940s, transformed the smoky rust belt city’s downtown. Working-class residents and people of color saw their neighborhoods cleared and …

Princeton UP Ideas Podcast

Gods and Mortals

Ancient Greek Myths for Modern Readers

Sarah Iles Johnston

Hosted by Mark Klobas

Gripping tales that abound with fantastic characters and astonishing twists and turns, Greek myths confront what it means to be mortal in a world of powerful forces beyond human control …

Taiwan on Air

Taiwan’s Green Parties

Alternative Politics in Taiwan

Dafydd Fell

Hosted by Taiwan on Air

In this podcast, the host, Lara Momesso, interviews Prof Dafydd Fell, Director of the Centre of Taiwan Studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London. The two …

Book of the Day/ Critical Theory

Playing Oppression

The Legacy of Conquest and Empire in Colonialist Board Games

Mary Flanagan and Mikael Jakobsson

Hosted by Miranda Melcher

Playing Oppression: The Legacy of Conquest and Empire in Colonialist Board Games (MIT Press, 2023) by Dr. Mary Flanagan & Dr. Mikael Jakobsson is a striking analysis of popular board games' roots in imperialist reasoning—and why the future of play depends on reckoning with it. Board games conjure up images of innocuously enriching entertainment: family game nights, childhood pastimes, cooperative board games centered around resource management and strategic play. Yet …

Academic Life

Overcoming the Anxiety of Giving a Presentation

A Discussion with James M. Lang

James M. Lang

Hosted by Christina Gessler

Why is giving a presentation so stressful? Is your heart supposed to race? And how do you gain more confidence? This episode explores: How to feel more connected to your …

Intellectual History

Women Philosophers in the Long Nineteenth Century

The German Tradition

Dalia Nassar and Kristin Gjesdal

Hosted by Morteza Hajizadeh

The long nineteenth-century--the period beginning with the French Revolution and ending with World War I--was a transformative period for women philosophers in German-speaking countries and contexts. The period spans romanticism …

Political Science

The Informal Regulation of Criminal Markets in Latin America

Hernán Flom

Hosted by Lilly Goren

Political Scientist Hernán Flom has written a fascinating and nuanced analysis of how the criminal drug markets operate in Argentina and Brazil. Instead of tracking the path that illegal drugs …

Music

The Fascist Groove Thing

A History of Thatcher's Britain in 21 Mixtapes

Hugh Hodges

Hosted by Bradley Morgan

This is the late 1970s and '80s as explained through the urgent and still-relevant songs of the Clash, the Specials, the Au Pairs, the Style Council, the Pet Shop Boys …

Psychoanalysis

Plato's Ghost

Liminality and Psychoanalysis

Nilofer Kaul

Hosted by Ashis Roy

Psychoanalytic encounters are filled with the unknowability of two unconscious minds meeting. Here one may forge a link that enables the process of meaning-making, or else it can become the …

American West

A People's History of SFO

The Making of the Bay Area and an Airport

Eric Porter

Hosted by Stephen Hausmann

What can an airport tell us about a city? Quite a bit, according to UC-Santa Cruz history professor Eric Porter in A People's History of SFO: The Making of the Bay Area and …

MIT Press Podcast

American Restaurants and Cuisine in the Mid–Nineteenth Century

Paul Freedman

Hosted by MIT Press

Paul Freedman, Chester D. Tripp Professor of History and Acting Chair, Department of History at Yale University, chats with Rebecca Federman, Culinary Collections Librarian at the New York Public Library …

Asian Review of Books

On Java Road

A Novel

Lawrence Osborne

Hosted by Nicholas Gordon

The star of On Java Road (Hogarth: 2022), the latest novel from Lawrence Osborne, is Adrian Gyle, a down-on-his-luck correspondent in Hong Kong, in the midst of its 2019 protests …

Human Rights

Taking Sides

A Memoir about Love, War, and Changing the World

Sherine Tadros

Hosted by Nicholas Bequelin

Taking Sides: A Memoir about Love, War, and Changing the World (Scribe, 2023) is a personal memoir by Sherine Tadros, the United Nations Representative and Deputy Director of Advocacy for …

Taiwan on Air

Human Glitches

A Discussion with Lin Hsin-hui

Lin Hsin-hui

Hosted by Taiwan on Air

In this episode, our podcast host, Ti-han Chang, invited Ms Lin Hsin-hui, a bourgeoning Taiwanese Sci-fi writer to talk about her award-winning short story collection, Human Glitches. Lin comments on …

Almost Good Catholics

Saint Patrick the Forgiver

The History and Legends of Ireland's Bishop

Ned Bustard

Hosted by Krzysztof Odyniec

Ned Bustard is the author of a new children’s book, Saint Patrick the Forgiver: The History and Legends of Ireland's Bishop (InterVarsity, 2023). We talked about the book, the life …

Indian Religions

The Nature of Endangerment in India

Tigers, 'Tribes', Extermination and Conservation, 1818-2020

Ezra Rashkow

Hosted by Raj Balkaran

Perhaps no category of people on earth has been perceived as more endangered, nor subjected to more preservation efforts, than indigenous peoples. And in India, calls for the conservation of …

Book of the Day/ National Security

Original Sin

Power, Technology and War in Outer Space

Bleddyn E. Bowen

Hosted by Samuel Canter

Space technology was developed to enhance the killing power of the state. The Moon landings and the launch of the Space Shuttle were mere sideshows, drawing public attention away from the real goal: military and economic control of space as a source of power on Earth. Today, as Bleddyn E. Bowen vividly recounts in Original Sin: Power, Technology and War in Outer Space (Oxford UP, 2022), thousands of satellites work silently …

Islamic Studies

In the Shade of the Sunna

Salafi Piety in the Twentieth-Century Middle East

Aaron Rock-Singer

Hosted by Shehnaz Haqqani

Who are the Salafis, and what are the roots of Salafism? What does it even mean to be Salafi? Why is Salafism concerned with ethics of visibility and bodily regulation …

Scholarly Communication

To the Collector Belong the Spoils

Modernism and the Art of Appropriation

Annie Pfeifer

Hosted by Jen Hoyer

To the Collector Belong the Spoils: Modernism and the Art of Appropriation (Cornell UP, 2023) rethinks collecting as an artistic, revolutionary, and appropriative modernist practice, which flourishes beyond institutions like …

African American Studies

It's Always Been Ours

Rewriting the Story of Black Women's Bodies

Jessica Wilson

Hosted by Ari Barbalat

In It's Always Been Ours: Rewriting the Story of Black Women's Bodies (Hachette Go, 2023) eating disorder specialist and storyteller Jessica Wilson challenges us to rethink what having a "good" …

Gender Studies

Between Banat

Queer Arab Critique and Transnational Arab Archives

Mejdulene Bernard Shomali

Hosted by Fulya Pinar

In Between Banat: Queer Arab Critique and Transnational Arab Archives (Duke UP, 2023), Mejdulene Bernard Shomali examines homoeroticism and non-normative sexualities between Arab women in transnational Arab literature, art, and …

Anthropology

The Philosophy of Tattoos

John Miller

Hosted by Miranda Melcher

‘History, it seems, is seldom written by the tattooed.’ The Philosophy of Tattoos (British Library, 2021) by Dr. John Miller presents an impressively broad yet personal account, exploring tattooing as …

MIT Press Podcast

Nicolas Collins on Leonardo Music Journal’s 20th Anniversary

Nicolas Collins

Hosted by MIT Press

Nicolas Collins, editor of Leonardo Music Journal and Chair of Sound at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, answered our questions about the 20th anniversary issue of LMJ …

East Asian Studies

One China, Many Taiwans

The Geopolitics of Cross-Strait Tourism

Ian Rowen

Hosted by Li-Ping Chen

One China, Many Taiwans: The Geopolitics of Cross-Strait Tourism (Cornell UP, 2023) shows how tourism performs and transforms territory. In 2008, as the People’s Republic of China pointed over a …

Politics & Polemics

In Praise of Civility

James W. Heisig

Hosted by Takeshi Morisato

Through telling stories in this little book, In Praise of Civility (Resource Publications, 2021), James Heisig aims to provoke second thoughts about the effects of incivility on our lives and the …

Taiwan on Air

Reflecting on Hu Tai-li’s Indigenous Ethnographic Work in Taiwan

A Discussion with Scott Simon

Scott Simon

Hosted by Taiwan on Air

In this episode, our host, Niki Alsford, invites Prof Scott Simon, the Chair of Taiwan Studies at the University of Ottawa, to share his thoughts and reflections on Prof Hu Tai-li …

Literary Studies

Eliot and Beckett's Low Modernism

Humility and Humiliation

Rick de Villiers

Hosted by Morteza Hajizadeh

Humility and humiliation have an awkward, often unacknowledged intimacy. Humility may be a queenly, cardinal or monkish virtue, while humiliation points to an affective state at the extreme end of …

Military History

Conquer We Must

A Military History of Britain, 1914-1945

Robin Prior

Hosted by Philip Blood

The First and Second World Wars were separated by a mere two decades, making the period 1914-1945 an unprecedentedly intense and violent era of history. But how did Britain develop …

Think About It

Vivian Gornick on Emma Goldman

Book Talk 58

Vivian Gornick

Hosted by Uli Baer

What Is to Be Done? In her luminous biography Emma Goldman: Revolution as a Way of Life (Yale UP, 2011), Vivian Gornick brings us back to this question, originally made …

Nordic Asia Podcast

Rethinking Community in Myanmar

Practices of We-Formation Among Muslims and Hindus in Urban Yangon

Judith Beyer

Hosted by Nordic Asia Podcast

Where does the concept of “community” come from? How does it shape the lives of Hindus and Muslims in metropolitan Yangon? And how do these people navigate between their ethno-religious …

Book of the Day/ Politics & Polemics

The Struggle for a Decent Politics

On "Liberal" as an Adjective

Michael Walzer

Hosted by Keith Krueger

The national purpose of the American state is to realize and then sustain the democracy and the equality that was the promise of our founding. I believe that requires perennial struggle and … groups like Black Lives Matter are an essential part of that struggle … Those are the social movements I hope to join, support, and that I hope will always be qualified by the adjective ‘liberal’. – Michael …

Urban Studies

Tensions in Diversity

Spaces for Collective Life in Los Angeles

Felicity Hwee-Hwa Chan

Hosted by Anna Zhelnina

Urban landscapes are complex spaces of sociocultural diversity, characterized by narratives of both conviviality and conflict. As people with multiple ethnicities and nationalities find their common destinies in thriving globalizing …

Economic and Business History

Pioneers of Capitalism

The Netherlands 1000–1800

Maarten Prak and Jan Luiten van Zanden

Hosted by Javier Mejia

During the Middle Ages, the Netherlands played a significant role in the emergence of capitalism, which led to the impressive Dutch Golden Age and paved the way for long-term economic …

Military History

The Island of Extraordinary Captives

A Painter, a Poet, an Heiress, and a Spy in a World War II British Internment Camp

Simon Parkin

Hosted by AJ Woodhams

The Island of Extraordinary Captives: A Painter, a Poet, an Heiress, and a Spy in a World War II British Internment Camp (Scribner, 2022 is the “riveting…truly shocking” (The New York …

Literature

Traces

Patricia L. Hudson

Hosted by Deidre Tyler

An early American adage proclaimed, "The frontier was heaven for men and dogs―hell for women and mules." Since the 1700s, when his name first appeared in print, Daniel Boone has …

Literary Studies

James Baldwin’s Turkish Decade

Erotics of Exile

Magdalena J. Zaborowska

Hosted by Morteza Hajizadeh

Between 1961 and 1971 James Baldwin spent extended periods of time in Turkey, where he worked on some of his most important books. In this first in-depth exploration of Baldwin’s …

Japanese Studies

Women and Martial Art in Japan

Kate Sylvester

Hosted by Nathan Hopson

Kate Sylvester’s Women and Martial Art in Japan (Routledge 2023) examines sport, gender, and society in Japan through the author’s extensive experience and ethnographic research as a kendo practitioner both …

Women's History

Women, Empires, and Body Politics at the United Nations, 1946-1975

Giusi Russo

Hosted by Rebecca Turkington

In Women, Empires, and Body Politics at the United Nations, 1946–1975 (University of Nebraska Press, 2023), Giusi Russo focuses on the first decades of the United Nations Commission on the …

MIT Press Podcast

The Sharing of Sound Art

A Discussion with Claire MacDonald and Sarah Parry

Claire MacDonald and Sarah Parry

Hosted by MIT Press

In this podcast, Claire MacDonald and Sarah Parry discuss the history of recording, the sharing of sound art between artists, how recording has shaped communities, the impact of technology on …

Canadian Studies

Double Threat

Canadian Jews, the Military, and World War II

Ellin Bessner

Hosted by Mel Rosenberg

Today I talked to Ellin Bessner about her book Double Threat: Canadian Jews, the Military, and World War II (New Jewish Press, 2018). "He died so Jewry should suffer no more." …

Jewish Studies

Is Superman Circumcised?

The Complete Jewish History of the World’s Greatest Hero

Roy Schwartz

Hosted by Ari Barbalat

Superman is the original superhero, an American icon, and arguably the most famous character in the world--and he's Jewish! Introduced in June 1938, the Man of Steel was created by …

Scholarly Communication

The Challenge of AI to Publishing

A Discussion with Sally Wilson of Emerald Publishing

Sally Wilson

Hosted by Avi Staiman

Sally Wilson, VP of Publishing at Emerald opens up about the challenges publishers are facing in contending with the onset of the mass adoption of AI tools including ChatGPT, and …

Book of the Day/ Anthropology

Harvard's Quixotic Pursuit of a New Science

The Rise and Fall of the Department of Social Relations

Patrick L. Schmidt

Hosted by Alex Golub

Harvard's Department of Social Relations made history in the 1950s and 1960s as the most ambitious program in social science in the United States. Dedicated to a synthesis of sociology, anthropology, psychology, and other disciplines, the scope of its ambitions were matched only by the scope of its failures. Patrick Schmidt's new volume Harvard's Quixotic Pursuit of a New Science: The Rise and Fall of the Department of Social Relations (Rowman and …

Children's Literature

Publishing Jewish Children's Books

A Chat with Joni Sussman

Joni Sussman

Hosted by Mel Rosenberg

Joni Sussman talks about her love for children's books and for everything Jewish and how she found her life's mission combining these passions as publisher of Kar-Ben, (part of Lerner …

Chinese Studies

China and Latin America

Development, Agency and Geopolitics

Chris Alden and Alvaro Mendez

Hosted by Miranda Melcher

China's role as an economic powerhouse in Latin America is reshaping a region on the cusp of development and change. Since the turn of the century, bilateral trade between China …

Economics

From China's Lost Generation to American Private Equity Professor

A Discussion with Weijian Shan

Weijian Shan

Hosted by Keith Krueger

Having lived through both China’s Great Leap Forward during primary school, then the Cultural Revolution and the closing of schools for ten years, Beijing-born Weijian Shan, instead of a secondary …

Military History

White Knights in the Black Orchestra

The Extraordinary Story of the Germans Who Resisted Hitler

Tom Dunkel

Hosted by AJ Woodhams

They were a small group of conspirators who risked their lives by plotting relentlessly to obstruct and destroy the Third Reich from within. The Gestapo nicknamed this shadowy confederation of …

Literary Studies

Medieval English Manuscripts and Literary Forms

Jessica Brantley

Hosted by John Yargo

Today’s guest is Jessica Brantley, Professor of English at Yale University. Professor Rosenberg is the author of the previous monograph, Reading in the Wilderness, published by the University of Chicago …

Japanese Studies

The God Susanoo and Korea in Japan’s Cultural Memory

Ancient Myths and Modern Empire

David Weiss

Hosted by Raditya Nuradi

The God Susanoo and Korea in Japan’s Cultural Memory: Ancient Myths and Modern Empire (Bloomsbury, 2022) traces reiterations and reinterpretations of the deity Susanoo regarding his relationship with Korea vis-a-vis Japan. Through …

Literary Studies

The Postmodern Representation of Reality in Peter Ackroyd's Chatterton

Arya Aryan

Hosted by Morteza Hajizadeh

Arya Aryan's book The Postmodern Representation of Reality in Peter Ackroyd's Chatterton (Cambridge Scholars, 2022) explores the postmodernist representation of reality and argues that historiographic metafictional texts, such as Peter Ackroyd’s …

Art

Autonomy

The Social Ontology of Art under Capitalism

Nicholas Brown

Hosted by Kaveh Rafie

In Autonomy: The Social Ontology of Art under Capitalism (Duke University Press, 2019), Nicholas Brown offers a fresh perspective on aesthetic autonomy and its political value, one of the great debates of the twentieth century …

MIT Press Podcast

Anti-Irish Prejudice in the Trial of Dominic Daley and James Halligan (Northampton, Massachusetts, 1806)

A Discussion with Bill Fowler, Michael Dukakis and Dick Brown

Bill Fowler, Michael Dukakis, and Dick Brown

Hosted by MIT Press

Bill Fowler, member of the editorial board of The New England Quarterly, Professor Dick Brown, and Governor Michael Dukakis discuss Brown's recent NEQ article, “'Tried, Convicted, and Condemned, in Almost …

Military History

Mercy

Humanity in War

Cathal J. Nolan

Hosted by Caleb Zakarin

Mercy: Humanity in War (Oxford University Press, 2022) gathers and explores acts of singular mercy, giving them form and substance across wars, causes, and opposing uniforms. These acts demand our attention …

Christian Studies

White Lilies

Letters, Conversations, & Poems from Prison

Valeriu Gafencu. Translated by Octavian Gabor.

Hosted by Adrian Guiu

Valeriu Gafencu was born in 1921 in the Bessarabia region of Romania. In 1941, he was arrested and imprisoned, remaining so until his death in 1952. Two years into his incarceration …

Book of the Day/ Sports

Unsung

Not All Heroes Wear Kits

Alexis James

Hosted by Miranda Melcher

Unsung: Not all Heroes Wear Kits (Pitch Publishing, 2022) by Alexis James introduces the sports stars you don't know, telling the stories you can't miss. It shines a rare spotlight behind the scenes of professional sport, with overlooked heroes such as F1 mechanics, athletics starters, football chaplains, rugby medics and cycling moto pilots revealing previously untold tales of intrigue, ambition and dedication. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher …

Genocide Studies

From Discrimination to Death

Genocide Process Through a Human Rights Lens

Melanie 0'Brien

Hosted by Kelly McFall

Melanie 0'Brien's book From Discrimination to Death: Genocide Process Through a Human Rights Lens (Routledge, 2022) studies the process of genocide through the human rights violations that occur during genocide. Using …

Law

Better Law for a Better World

New Approaches to Law Practice and Education

Liz Curran

Hosted by Jane Richards

In Better Law for a Better World: New Approaches to Law Practice and Education (Routledge, 2021) I spoke with Dr Liz Curran about the urgent need for innovation in law, legal practice, and legal …

Journalism

Borderland

Decolonizing the Words of War

Chrisanthi Giotis

Hosted by Miranda Melcher

Every two seconds a person is displaced, caught in one of the more than 40 active conflicts around the world that show no sign of ending. Since 1994, there has …

Irish Studies

Land and Liberalism

Henry George and the Irish Land War

Andrew Phemister

Hosted by Aidan Beatty

Andrew Phemister is Research Associate at Newcastle University. He has previously held postdoctoral positions in History at NUI Galway, the University of Oxford, and Edinburgh’s Institute for Advanced Studies in …

Native American Studies

Allotment Stories

Indigenous Land Relations Under Settler Siege

Daniel Heath Justice and Jean M. O'Brien

Hosted by John Cable

Daniel Heath Justice and Jean M. O'Brien's book Allotment Stories: Indigenous Land Relations Under Settler Siege (U Minnesota Press, 2021) collects more than two dozen chronicles of white imperialism and Indigenous …

Architecture

Climate Justice and Community Renewal

Resistance and Grassroots Solutions

Brian Tokar and Tamra Gilbertson

Hosted by Bryan Toepfer

Brian Tokar and Tamra Gilbertson's book Climate Justice and Community Renewal: Resistance and Grassroots Solutions (Routledge, 2020) brings together the voices of people from five continents who live, work, and research …

Entrepreneurship and Leadership

Running a Cutting Edge Family Office

A Conversation with Sameer Narula

Hosted by Richard Lucas and Kimon Fountoukidis

In this episode, Kimon and Richard speak with Sameer Narula, Managing Partner of August One, a private investment firm. Despite self-identifying as an engineer, Sameer has an entrepreneurial mind. Prior …

Shakespeare For All

Shakespeare's "Macbeth" Part 1: the Story

A Discussion with Emma Smith

Emma Smith

Hosted by Zachary Davis

Macbeth is one of Shakespeare’s most concentrated and thrilling tragedies. Macbeth is a warrior lord living in medieval Scotland who starts the play by saving his king — only to …

Russian and Eurasian Studies

Picturing the Page

Illustrated Children’s Literature and Reading under Lenin and Stalin

Megan Swift

Hosted by Polina Popova

Based on sources from rare book libraries in Russia and around the world, Picturing the Page: Illustrated Children’s Literature and Reading under Lenin and Stalin (U Toronto Press, 2020) offers …

MIT Press Podcast

China's Century?

Why America's Edge Will Endure

Michael Beckley

Hosted by MIT Press

Much has been made of the rise of China's economy, and some fear that China will surpass the United States as the world's largest economy in the coming years. Michael …

Exchanges: A Cambridge UP Podcast

Just as Deadly

The Psychology of Female Serial Killers

Marissa A. Harrison

Hosted by Mark Klobas

You've heard of Ted Bundy and John Wayne Gacy. But have you heard of Amy Archer-Gilligan? Or Belle Gunness? Or Nannie Doss? Women have committed some of the most disturbing …

Popular Culture

Play Like a Man

My Life in Poster Children

Rose Marshack

Hosted by Rebekah Buchanan

In Play Like a Man: My Life in Poster Children (University of Illinois Press, 2023), Poster Children bassist Rose Marshack details her life in the 80s and 90s as part of a …

Peoples & Things

Left to Our Own Devices

A Conversation with Julia Ticona

Julia Ticona

Hosted by Lee Vinsel

Over the past three decades, digital technologies like smartphones and laptops have transformed the way we work in the US. At the same time, workers at both ends of the …

Book of the Day/ Critical Theory

Combat Trauma

Imaginaries of War and Citizenship in Post-9/11 America

Nadia Abu El-Haj

Hosted by Stephen Dozeman

One of the most recognizable tropes in American society in the past few decades is the scarred war veteran, returning from foreign lands with wounds both visible and invisible. His experiences are incomprehensible to those who’ve not served, but we owe him everything, and it is our duty as American citizens to honor him with nonjudgmental empathy so that he might eventually heal and reintegrate into the national community …

Catholic Studies

Bede the Theologian

History, Rhetoric, and Spirituality

John P. Bequette

Hosted by Jackson Reinhardt

Revered by contemporaries and posterity for both his sanctity and his scholarship, Bede (672-735) is a pivotal figure in the history of the Church. Known primarily as an historian for …

Historical Fiction

The White Lady

Jacqueline Winspear

Hosted by C. P. Lesley

It’s just after World War II, and Elinor White (born Elinor de Witt, which also means “white”), a single woman in her mid-forties, lives as a recluse in a village …

Military History

Liberty Is Sweet

The Hidden History of the American Revolution

Woody Holton

Hosted by AJ Woodhams

A “deeply researched and bracing retelling” (Annette Gordon-Reed, Pulitzer Prize–winning historian) of the American Revolution, showing how the Founders were influenced by overlooked Americans—women, Native Americans, African Americans, and religious …

African American Studies

Driving the Green Book

A Road Trip Through the Living History of Black Resistance

Alvin Hall

Hosted by Nicole Trujillo-Pagan

For countless Americans, the open road has long been a place where dangers lurk. In the era of Jim Crow, Black travelers encountered locked doors, hostile police, and potentially violent …

Sociology

Forbidden Intimacies

Polygamies at the Limits of Western Tolerance

Melanie Heath

Hosted by Rituparna Patgiri

In the past thirty years, polygamy has become a flashpoint of conflict as Western governments attempt to regulate certain cultural and religious practices that challenge seemingly central principles of family …

Critical Theory

The Politics of Precarity

Spaces of Extractivism, Violence, and Suffering

Gediminas Lesutis

Hosted by Shraddha Chatterjee

Based on critical theory and ethnographic research, Gediminas Lesutis' book The Politics of Precarity: Spaces of Extractivism, Violence, and Suffering (Routledge, 2021) explores how intensifying geographies of extractive capitalism shape human …

General History

Christendom

The Triumph of a Religion, AD 300-1300

Peter Heather

Hosted by Charles Coutinho

In the fourth century AD, a new faith grew out of Palestine, overwhelming the paganism of Rome and resoundingly defeating a host of other rival belief systems. Almost a thousand …

Burned by Books

American Mermaid

A Novel

Julia Langbein

Hosted by Chris Holmes

Broke English teacher Penelope Schleeman is as surprised as anyone when her feminist novel American Mermaid becomes a best-seller. Lured by the promise of a big payday, she quits teaching …

Disability Studies

Families We Need

Disability, Abandonment, and Foster Care's Resistance in Contemporary China

Erin Raffety

Hosted by Shu Wan

Set in the remote, mountainous Guangxi Autonomous Region and based on ethnographic fieldwork, Families We Need: Disability, Abandonment, and Foster Care's Resistance in Contemporary China (Rutgers UP, 2022) traces the …

Policing, Incarceration, and Reform

Injustice, Inc.

How America's Justice System Commodifies Children and the Poor

Daniel L. Hatcher

Hosted by Deidre Tyler

Injustice, Inc.: How America's Justice System Commodifies Children and the Poor (U California Press, 2023) exposes the ways in which justice systems exploit America's history of racial and economic inequality to …

Jewish Studies

Jewish Antifascism and the False Promise of Settler Colonialism

Max Kaiser

Hosted by Miriam Schulz

Max Kaiser's book Jewish Antifascism and the False Promise of Settler Colonialism (Palgrave MacMillan, 2022) takes a timely look at histories of radical Jewish movements, their modes of Holocaust memorialisation, and …

Literature

The Field

Victoria Garza

Hosted by G. P. Gottlieb

Victoria Garza begins her poetic memoir with her ten-year-old self learning that her little sister and cousin have died in a car accident. She painstakingly recalls lovely moments with her …

Book of the Day/ Critical Theory

Imperfect Victims

Criminalized Survivors and the Promise of Abolition Feminism

Leigh Goodmark

Hosted by Kendall Dinniene

Leigh Goodmark’s new book, Imperfect Victims: Criminalized Survivors and the Promise of Abolition Feminism (U California Press, 2023), uses the stories of individual criminalized survivors of gender based violence to illuminate the ways that the criminal legal system perpetuates violence against the very women, transgender people, and gender non-conforming people it claims to protect. Leigh argues that reform is not the answer to this problem, and that instead of limiting …

Art

Visual Culture and the Forensic

Culture, Memory, Ethics

David Houston Jones

Hosted by Pierre d'Alancaisez

The relationship between images and truth has a complicated history. In the Western tradition, the Kantian settlement on aesthetic judgment as detached from external interests gave rise to artistic production …

Christian Studies

Corporeal Theology

The Nature of Theological Understanding in Light of Embodied Cognition

Tobias Tanton

Hosted by Frazer MacDiarmid

Appropriating insights from empirical findings and theoretical constructs of 'embodied cognition', Corporeal Theology: The Nature of Theological Understanding in Light of Embodied Cognition (Oxford UP, 2023) explores how theological understanding is …

Ukrainian Studies

How Patronal Networks Shape Opportunities for Local Citizen Participation in a Hybrid Regime

A Comparative Analysis of Five Cities in Ukraine

Oleksandra Keudel

Hosted by John Vsetecka

In How Patronal Networks Shape Opportunities for Local Citizen Participation in a Hybrid Regime: A Comparative Analysis of Five Cities in Ukraine (Ibidem, 2022), Oleksandra Keudel proposes a novel explanation for why some …

Buddhist Studies

Until Nirvana's Time

Buddhist Songs from Cambodia

Trent Walker

Hosted by Jessica Zu

A unique Buddhist tradition, accessible in English for the first time—translations of forty-five Cambodian Dharma songs, with contextualizing essays and a link to audio of stunning vocal performances. Trent Walker's …

American West

Rim to River

Looking Into the Heart of Arizona

Tom Zoellner

Hosted by Daniel Moran

Tom Zoellner walked across the length of Arizona to come to terms with his home state. But the trip revealed more mountains behind the mountains. Rim to River: Looking …

Sociology

Counseling Women

Kinship Against Violence in India

Julia Kowalski

Hosted by Rituparna Patgiri

Women’s rights activists around the world have commonly understood gendered violence as the product of so-called traditional family structures, from which women must be liberated. Counseling Women: Kinship Against Violence …

Food

Italy on a Plate

Travels, Memories, Menus

Susan Gravely

Hosted by Laura Goldberg

In her debut memoir and cookbook, Susan Gravely celebrates 40 years as Founder and Creative Director of VIETRI. In Italy on a Plate: Travels, Memories, Menus (Vietri Publishing, 2023), she …

MIT Press Podcast

Present at the Creation

Edward Mead Earle and the Depression-Era Origins of Security Studies

Sean Lynn-Jones and David Ekbladh

Hosted by MIT Press

Edward Mead Earle was a historian, scholar, professor, and international relations expert; he was also a founding father of the field we know as Security Studies. Listen as David Ekbladh …

Folklore

Oral Traditions in Contemporary China

Healing a Nation

Juwen Zhang

Hosted by Timothy Thurston

Oral Traditions in Contemporary China: Healing a Nation (Lexington Books, 2022) is the newest monograph from Professor Juwen Zhang of Willamette College. Through a historical survey and analyses of oral traditions like …

African Studies

Five Hundred African Voices

A Catalog of Published Accounts by Africans Enslaved in the Transatlantic Slave Trade, 1586-1936

Aaron Spencer Fogleman and Robert Hanserd

Hosted by Caleb Zakarin

The importance of published accounts by African slave ship survivors is well-known but not their existence in large numbers. Fogleman and Hanserd catalog nearly five hundred discrete accounts and more …

Big Ideas

Time Patterns in Big History

Cycles, Fractals, Waves, Transitions, and Singularities

David LePoire

Hosted by Stephen Satkiewicz

There is the common saying, “history doesn't repeat itself, but it often rhymes.” Are there any discernible patterns in history, and if so, what are these patterns? These are the …

The Future of . . . with Owen Bennett-Jones

The Future of Genes and Equality

A Discussion with Kathryn Paige Harden

Kathryn Paige Harden

Hosted by Owen Bennett-Jones

If your genes make you better suited to succeed, is that fair? And if not, can anything be done about it? Kathryn Paige Harden – professor psychology at University of …