New Books Network
Critical Theory
Critical Theory July 29, 2021

Eating in Theory

Annemarie Mol

Hosted by Kai Wortmann
As we taste, chew, swallow, digest, and excrete, our foods transform us, while our eating, in its turn, affects the wider earthly environment. In Eating in Theory (Duke UP, 2021) …

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Critical Theory July 28, 2021

There Is No Unhappy Revolution

The Communism of Destitution

Marcello Tarì

Hosted by Stephen Dozeman
The Marxist philosopher Theodor Adorno once quipped that much of his work was written without practical applications in mind, and that the constant demand for immediate practical relevance felt like …
Sociology July 27, 2021

Against White Feminism

Notes on Disruption

Rafia Zakaria

Hosted by Deidre Tyler
Elite white women have branded feminism, promising an apolitical individual empowerment along with sexual liberation and satisfaction, LGBTQ inclusion, and racial solidarity. As Rafia Zakaria expertly argues in Against White Feminism …
Intellectual History July 26, 2021

Speculation

A Cultural History from Aristotle to AI

Gayle Rogers

Hosted by Pierre d'Alancaisez
In a world that purports to know more about the future than any before it, why do we still need speculation? Insubstantial speculations – from utopian thinking to high-risk stock …
Critical Theory July 26, 2021

Crises and Hegemonic Transitions

From Gramsci's Quaderni to the Contemporary World Economy

Lorenzo Fusaro

Hosted by Stephen Dozeman
Gramsci’s concept of hegemony is often invoked, but usually as a means of cultural critique and analysis. However, my guest Lorenzo Fusaro argues in his recent book Crises and Hegemonic …
Gender Studies July 23, 2021

Beauvoir in Time

Meryl Altman

Hosted by Lilian Calles Barger
Meryl Altman's new book Beauvoir in Time, published by Brill Rodopi Press (2020), situates Simone de Beauvoir's The Second Sex (1949) in its historical context and responds to criticism that …
Film July 23, 2021

Beyond Bias

Conservative Media, Documentary Form, and the Politics of Hysteria

Scott Krzych

Hosted by Joel Tscherne
Scott Krzych's book Beyond Bias: Conservative Media, Documentary Form, and the Politics of Hysteria (Oxford University Press, 2021) offers the first scholarly study of contemporary right-wing documentary film and video. Drawing from …
Medicine July 22, 2021

Epidemic Illusions

On the Coloniality of Global Public Health

Eugene T. Richardson

Hosted by Catriona Gold
In Epidemic Illusions: On the Coloniality of Global Public Health (MIT Press, 2020), physician-anthropologist Eugene T. Richardson explores how public health practices—from epidemiological modeling to outbreak containment—help perpetuate global inequities. This book questions …
Psychology July 21, 2021

Psychoanalysis in the Barrios

Race, Class, and the Unconscious

Patricia Gherovici and Christopher Christian

Hosted by Eugenio Duarte
Psychoanalysis began as a politicized form of treatment for people from all walks of life. Yet in the United States, it has become divorced from these roots and transformed into …
Education July 21, 2021

Neurodiversity Studies

A New Critical Paradigm

Anna Stenning, Hanna Bertilsdotter Rosqvist and Nick Chown

Hosted by Christina Bosch
Since the term was popularized in the 1960s, a “paradigm shift” seems second in difficulty only to the primary task of identifying one to begin with. This is because a …
African American Studies July 21, 2021

Critical Black Futures

Speculative Theories and Explorations

Philip Butler

Hosted by Nicole Powell
Critical Black Futures: Speculative Theories and Explorations (Palgrave Macmillan, 2021),  edited by Dr. Philip Butler, imagines worlds, afrofutures, cities, bodies, art and eras that are simultaneously distant, parallel, present, counter …
Critical Theory July 20, 2021

For Abolition

Essays on Prisons and Socialist Ethics

David Scott

Hosted by Rachel Stuart
According to Jonathan Swift (1667-1745) 'Laws are like cobwebs, which may catch small flies, but let wasps and hornets break through.' Connecting the politics of abolition to wider emancipatory struggles …
Architecture July 14, 2021

Neoliberalism on the Ground

Architecture and Transformation from the 1960s to the Present

Kenny Cupers, Catharina Gabrielsson and Helena Mattsson

Hosted by Bryan Toepfer
Architecture and urbanism have contributed to one of the most sweeping transformations of our times. Over the past four decades, neoliberalism has been not only a dominant paradigm in politics …
French Studies July 13, 2021

Our Civilizing Mission

The Lessons of Colonial Education

Nicholas Harrison

Hosted by Roxanne Panchasi
Nicholas Harrison's Our Civilizing Mission: The Lessons of Colonial Education (Liverpool UP, 2019) is a fascinating examination of colonial education not just as a facet of colonialism, but as an "example" of education …
Critical Theory July 13, 2021

State Secrecy and Security

Refiguring the Covert Imaginary

William Walters

Hosted by Catriona Gold
In State Secrecy and Security: Refiguring the Covert Imaginary (Routledge, 2021), William Walters calls for secrecy to be given a more central place in critical security studies and elevated to become …
Intellectual History July 12, 2021

Workers' Inquiry and Global Class Struggle

Strategies, Tactics, Objectives

Robert Ovetz

Hosted by Keith Krueger
"The point of studying the world – including the past and other’s writings – is not just to understand it but to use that understanding to change it." – Harry …
Science, Technology, and Society July 9, 2021

Your Computer Is on Fire

Thomas D. Mullaney, Benjamin Peters, Mar Hicks, and Kavita Philip

Hosted by Matthew Jordan
This book sounds an alarm: after decades of being lulled into complacency by narratives of technological utopianism and neutrality, people are waking up to the large-scale consequences of Silicon Valley–led …
Political Science July 8, 2021

The Virtues of Vulnerability

Humility, Autonomy, and Citizen-Subjectivity

Sara Rushing

Hosted by Lilly Goren
Political Theorist Sara Rushing’s new book, The Virtues of Vulnerability: Humility, Autonomy, and Citizen-Subjectivity (Oxford UP, 2020), examines the very real experiences that individuals have in the context of healthcare, especially …
Geography July 7, 2021

Energy Islands

Metaphors of Power, Extractivism, and Justice in Puerto Rico

Catalina M. de Onís

Hosted by Stentor Danielson
Energy Islands: Metaphors of Power, Extractivism, and Justice in Puerto Rico (University of California Press, 2021) provides an urgent and nuanced portrait of collective action that resists racial capitalism, colonialism …
Gender Studies July 6, 2021

Out of Time

The Queer Politics of Postcoloniality

Rahul Rao

Hosted by Isabel Machado
Between 2009 and 2014, an anti-homosexuality law circulating in the Ugandan parliament came to be the focus of a global conversation about queer rights. The law attracted attention for the …