New Books Network Podcast

Game Studies September 23, 2023

Time and Space in Video Games

A Cognitive-Formalist Approach

Federico Alvarez Igarzábal

Hosted by Rudolf Thomas Inderst

Video games are temporal artifacts: They change with time as players interact with them in accordance with rules. In Time and Space in Video Games: A Cognitive-Formalist Approach (Transcript …

Media September 23, 2023

The New True Crime

How the Rise of Serialized Storytelling Is Transforming Innocence

Diana Rickard

Hosted by Miranda Melcher

The New True Crime: How the Rise of Serialized Storytelling Is Transforming Innocence (NYU Press, 2023) by Dr. Diana Rickard examines how serialized crime shows became an American obsession. TV …

Van Leer Institute Series on Ideas with Renee Garfinkel September 23, 2023

The Engaged Scholar

Expanding the Impact of Academic Research in Today’s World

Andrew J. Hoffman

Hosted by Renee Garfinkel

Society and democracy are ever threatened by the fall of fact. Rigorous analysis of facts, the hard boundary between truth and opinion, and fidelity to reputable sources of factual information …

Nordic Asia Podcast September 22, 2023

The Political Life of Memory

Birsa Munda in Contemporary India

Rahul Ranjan

Hosted by Kenneth Bo Nielsen

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How do affective sites such as memorials and statues produce political visions, emotions, and opportunities? And how are they used strategically to further particular political projects? In this episode, we …

Geography September 22, 2023

Beyond Straw Men

Plastic Pollution and Networked Cultures of Care

Phaedra C. Pezzullo

Hosted by Stentor Danielson

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Addressing plastics can feel overwhelming. Guilt, shame, anger, hurt, fear, dismissiveness, and despair abound. Beyond Straw Men: Plastic Pollution and Networked Cultures of Care (U California Press, 2023) moves beyond …

Disability Studies September 21, 2023

Mediating Alzheimer's

Cognition and Personhood

Scott Selberg

Hosted by Shu Wan

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With no known cause or cure despite a century of research, Alzheimer's disease is a true medical mystery. In Mediating Alzheimer's: Cognition and Personhood (U Minnesota Press, 2022), Scott Selberg …

Asian American Studies September 19, 2023

Model Minority Masochism

Performing the Cultural Politics of Asian American Masculinity

Takeo Rivera

Hosted by Julia Lee

There are few grand narratives that loom over Asian Americans more than the “model minority.” While many Asian Americanist scholars and activists aim to disprove the model minority as “myth,” …

Literary Studies September 19, 2023

Engaging Violence

Civility and the Reach of Literature

David Simpson

Hosted by Morteza Hajizadeh

Recent thinking has resuscitated civility as an important paradigm for engaging with a violence that must be deemed endemic to our lives. But, while it is widely acknowledged that civility …

Library Science September 17, 2023

The Two Revolutions

A History of the Transgender Internet

Avery Dame-Griff

Hosted by Hallel Yadin

Avery Dame-Griff's The Two Revolutions: A History of the Transgender Internet (NYU Press, 2023) explores how the rise of the internet shaped transgender identity and activism from the 1980s to the present …

Library Science September 16, 2023

In Visible Archives

Queer and Feminist Visual Culture in the 1980s

Margaret Galvan

Hosted by Jen Hoyer

In In Visible Archives: Queer and Feminist Visual Culture in the 1980s (U Minnesota Press, 2023), Margaret Galvan explores a number of feminist and cultural touchstones—the feminist sex wars, the …

Academic Life September 14, 2023

The Other Side of the Desk

A Discussion with "The Conversation" Editor Emily Costello

Emily Costello

Hosted by Christina Gessler

How can writing for the general public help scholars to democratize education? Today, The Conversation editor Emily Costello takes us behind the scenes of a “typical” day at her editor’s …

Media September 12, 2023

A Better Way to Buy Books

A Conversation with Andy Hunter, Founder and CEO, Bookshop.org

Andy Hunter

Hosted by Caleb Zakarin

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Bookshop.org is an online book retailer that donates more than 80% of its profits to independent bookstores. Launched in 2020, Bookshop.org has already raised more than $27,000,000. In this interview …

Popular Culture September 11, 2023

The Disney Princess Phenomenon

A Feminist Analysis

Robyn Muir

Hosted by Miranda Melcher

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The Disney Princesses are a billion-dollar industry, known and loved by children across the globe. In The Disney Princess Phenomenon: A Feminist Analysis (Bristol University Press, 2023) Dr. Robyn Muir …

South Asian Studies September 9, 2023

Scripts of Power

Writing, Language Practices, and Cultural History in Western India

Prachi Deshpande

Hosted by Niharika Yadav

Scripts of Power: Writing, Language Practices, and Cultural History in Western India (Permanent Black, 2023) is a cultural history of western India from a fascinatingly new perspective: language use, writing practices …

Game Studies September 7, 2023

Open World Structures

Architecture, Urban and Natural Landscape in the Computer Game

Marc Bonner

Hosted by Rudolf Thomas Inderst

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What role do algorithms play in the construction of images and the representation of the world and weather in computer games? How does the design of rooms, levels and topographies …

Literary Studies September 6, 2023

Matter and Making in Early English Poetry

Literary Production from Chaucer to Sidney

Taylor Cowdery

Hosted by John Yargo

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Is the raw material of literature the paper, ink, vellum, paphyrus, and increasingly electronic data that it is inscribed on? Or is the stuff of literature the storehouse of tropes …

Library Science September 6, 2023

On the Digital Humanities

Essays and Provocations

Stephen Ramsay

Hosted by Hallel Yadin

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Stephen Ramsey's On the Digital Humanities: Essays and Provocations (University of Minnesota Press, 2023) is a witty and incisive exploration of the philosophical conundrums that animate the digital humanities. Since its inception …

Chinese Studies September 6, 2023

A Feminist Reading of China’s Digital Public Sphere

Altman Yuzhu Peng

Hosted by Shu Wan

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In A Feminist Reading of China’s Digital Public Sphere (Palgrave Pivot, 2020), Altman Yuzhu Peng articulates how feminism and pseudo-feminism become confused in contemporary Chinese society, and how this confusion is invoked by …

Japanese Studies September 5, 2023

Gas Mask Nation

Visualizing Civil Air Defense in Wartime Japan

Gennifer Weisenfeld

Hosted by Ran Zwigenberg

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Airplanes, gas masks, and bombs were common images in wartime Japan. Yet amid these emblems of anxiety, tasty caramels were offered to children with paper gas masks as promotional giveaways …

Science, Technology, and Society September 2, 2023

Industry Unbound

The Inside Story of Privacy, Data, and Corporate Power

Ari Ezra Waldman

Hosted by Jake Chanenson

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In Industry Unbound: The Inside Story of Privacy, Data, and Corporate Power (Cambridge UP, 2021), Ari Ezra Waldman exposes precisely how the tech industry conducts its ongoing crusade to undermine …