New Books Network
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Political Science January 27, 2022

Decoding the Digital Church

Evangelical Storytelling and the Election of Donald J. Trump

Stephanie A. Martin

Hosted by Lilly Goren
Dr. Stephanie (Sam) A. Martin’s new book, Decoding the Digital Church: Evangelical Storytelling and the Election of Donald J. Trump (U Alabama Press, 2021), is a fascinating exploration of the way …

Media

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Interviews with scholars of media and communications about their new books.

Critical Theory January 21, 2022

Confidence Culture

Shani Orgad and Rosalind Gill

Hosted by Louisa Hann
In Confidence Culture (Duke UP, 2022), Shani Orgad and Rosalind Gill argue that imperatives directed at women to “love your body” and “believe in yourself” imply that psychological blocks rather …
Political Science January 20, 2022

Toxic Masculinity

Mapping the Monstrous in Our Heroes

Esther De Dauw and Daniel J. Connell

Hosted by Lilly Goren
Scholars Esther De Dauw and Daniel J. Connell have assembled an array of chapters that explore the idea of masculinity in the realm of contemporary heroes and superheroes. Toxic Masculinity: Mapping …
General History January 20, 2022

Degrees of Difficulty

How Women's Gymnastics Rose to Prominence and Fell from Grace

Georgia Cervin

Hosted by Miranda Melcher
Electrifying athletes like Olga Korbut and Nadia Comaneci helped make women’s artistic gymnastics one of the most popular events in the Olympic Games. But the transition of gymnastics from a …
Critical Theory January 18, 2022

On Living with Television

Amy Holdsworth

Hosted by Dave O'Brien
How should we understand the role of television in everyday life? In On Living with Television (Duke UP, 2021), Amy Holdsworth, a Senior Lecturer in Theatre, Film & Television Studies …
Critical Theory January 11, 2022

Reimagining the Creative Industries

Youth Creative Work, Communities of Care

Miranda Campbell

Hosted by Dave O'Brien
How can we make creative industries fair and inclusive? In Reimagining the Creative Industries: Youth Creative Work, Communities of Care (Routledge, 2021), Miranda Campbell, an associate professor in the School …
Art January 6, 2022

The Play in the System

The Art of Parasitical Resistance

Anna Watkins Fisher

Hosted by Pierre d'Alancaisez
What does artistic resistance look like in the twenty-first century, when disruption and dissent have been co-opted and commodified in ways that reinforce dominant systems? In The Play in the …
Scholarly Communication December 31, 2021

Exploring Science Literacy and Public Engagement with Science

Ayelet Baram-Tsabari

Hosted by Avi Staiman
Listen to this interview of Ayelet Baram-Tsabari. We talk about the accessibility of science using Google to scholars and students in languages beyond English and how scholars can de-jargonize their …
Digital Humanities December 22, 2021

Living Books

Experiments in the Posthumanities

Janneke Adema

Hosted by Sarah Kearns
In Living Books: Experiments in the Posthumanities (MIT Press, 2021), Janneke Adema proposes that we reimagine the scholarly book as a living and collaborative project -- not as linear, bound …
Science December 22, 2021

Joseph Reagle on H. G. Wells's "World Brain" (1937)

Joseph Reagle

Hosted by Galina Limorenko
In a series of talks and essays in 1937, H. G. Wells proselytized for what he called a World Brain, as manifested in a World Encyclopedia--a repository of scientifically established …
East Asian Studies December 15, 2021

Mediatized Taiwanese Mandarin

Popular Culture, Masculinity, and Social Perceptions

Chun-Yi Peng

Hosted by Li-Ping Chen
Mediatized Taiwanese Mandarin: Popular Culture, Masculinity, and Social Perceptions (Springer, 2021) explores how language ideologies have emerged for gangtaiqiang through a combination of indexical and ideological processes in televised media …
Nordic Asia Podcast December 10, 2021

The #MeToo Movement in China and the Case of Tennis Star Peng Shuai

Dusica Ristivojević

Hosted by Julie Yu-Wen Chen
Several high-profile cases of sexual harassment and assault have helped the #MeToo movement in China continue to make impacts on a society that is highly controlled and surveilled. Most recently …
Film December 9, 2021

Hollywood Shutdown

Production, Distribution, and Exhibition in the Time of COVID

Kate Fortmueller

Hosted by Joel Tscherne
By March 2020, the spread of COVID-19 had reached pandemic proportions, forcing widespread shutdowns across industries, including Hollywood. Studios, networks, production companies, and the thousands of workers who make film …
The Proust Questionnaire Podcast June 25, 2020

Proust Questionnaire 5

Susan Fales-Hill, Writer/ Producer

Susan Fales-Hill

Hosted by Uli Baer and Caroline Weber
Susan Fales-Hill is a writer and television producer, and the showrunner and an executive producer on Lena Waithe’s new BET sitcom, Twenties. Susan began her career in television working first …
Journalism January 19, 2022

News After Trump

Journalism's Crisis of Relevance in a Changed Media Culture

Matt Carlson, Sue Robinson, and Seth C. Lewis

Hosted by Jenna Spinelle
Political scientists have argued that Donald Trump exacerbated long-simmering changes in polarization, populism, and other aspects of politics. In their book News After Trump: Journalism's Crisis of Relevance in a Changed …
Political Science January 17, 2022

Batman Saves the Congo

How Celebrities Disrupt the Politics of Development

Alexandra Cosima Budabin and Lisa Ann Richey

Hosted by Lamis Abdelaaty
Are celebrities “disruptors” who revitalize the development field, or are they just charismatic ambassadors for big business? In Batman Saves the Congo: How Celebrities Disrupt the Politics of Development (University …
Entrepreneurship and Leadership January 17, 2022

Marshall Poe

The Founder and Editor of the New Books Network

Hosted by Richard Lucas and Kimon Fountoukidis
This interview was recorded and first published in early 2020 when the NBN had about a million downloads a month. Since then the downloads have increased more than four-fold to just below …
Film December 27, 2021

Inhospitable World

Cinema in the Time of the Anthropocene

Jennifer Fay

Hosted by Gustavo Gutiérrez Suárez
Inhospitable World: Cinema in the Time of the Anthropocene (Oxford UP, 2018) explores the connection between cinema and artificial weather, climates, and even planets in or on which hospitality and …
Anthropology December 24, 2021

Visions of Beirut

The Urban Life of Media Infrastructure

Hatim El-Hibri

Hosted by Mathew Gagné
In Visions of Beirut: The Urban Life of Media Infrastructure (Duke UP, 2021), Hatim El-Hibri explores how the creation and circulation of images has shaped the urban spaces and cultural imaginaries …
Popular Culture December 24, 2021

The Sisters Are Alright, 2nd Edition

Changing the Broken Narrative of Black Women in America

Tamara Winfrey Harris

Hosted by Rebekah Buchanan
In the second edition of her book, The Sisters Are Alright: Changing the Broken Narrative of Black Women in America (Berrett-Koehler, 2021), Tamara Winfrey Harris interviews over 100 diverse Black women …