Intellectual History

Intellectual History

episodes

Interviews with intellectual historians about their new books.

Inhuman

May 14, 2024

Inhuman

Rasheed Tazudeen

In this episode of High Theory, Rasheed Tazudeen tells us about the inhuman. The inhuman offers a way of moving beyond the legacies of humanism and ac…

Liliana Doganova, "Discounting the Future: The Ascendancy of a Political Technology" (Princeton UP, 2024)

May 14, 2024

Discounting the Future

Liliana Doganova
Hosted by Miranda Melcher

Forest fires, droughts, and rising sea levels beg a nagging question: have we lost our capacity to act on the future? Dr. Liliana Doganova’s book Disc…

Lauren Horn Griffin, "Fabricating Founders in Early Modern England: History, Rhetoric, and the Origins of Christianity" (Brill, 2023)

May 14, 2024

Fabricating Founders in Early Modern England

Lauren Horn Griffin
Hosted by Allison Isidore

Fabricating Founders in Early Modern England: History, Rhetoric, and the Origins of Christianity (Brill, 2023) argues that in order to understand nati…

Sony Coráñez Bolton, "Crip Colony: Mestizaje, US Imperialism, and the Queer Politics of Disability in the Philippines" (Duke UP, 2023)

May 14, 2024

Crip Colony

Sony Coráñez Bolton
Hosted by Michele Ford

In Crip Colony: Mestizaje, US Imperialism, and the Queer Politics of Disability in the Philippines (Duke UP, 2023), Sony Coráñez Bolton examines the r…

Siân E. Grønlie, "The Old Testament in Medieval Icelandic Texts: Translation, Exegesis and Storytelling" (Boydell & Brewer, 2024)

May 13, 2024

The Old Testament in Medieval Icelandic Texts

Siân E. Grønlie
Hosted by Miranda Melcher

The historical narratives of the Old Testament/Hebrew Bible have much in common with Icelandic saga literature: both are invested in origins and genea…

Yasmine Ramadan, "Space in Modern Egyptian Fiction" (Edinburgh UP, 2021)

May 12, 2024

Space in Modern Egyptian Fiction

Yasmine Ramadan
Hosted by Ibrahim Fawzy

In 1960s Egypt, a group of writers exploded onto the literary scene, transforming the aesthetic landscape. Yasmine Ramadan’s Space in Modern Egyptian …

Cecily N. Zander, "The Army under Fire: The Politics of Antimilitarism in the Civil War Era" (LSU Press, 2024)

May 12, 2024

The Army under Fire

Cecily N. Zander
Hosted by Andrew Graybill

Cecily N. Zander’s The Army under Fire: The Politics of Antimilitarism in the Civil War Era (LSU Press, 2024) is a pathbreaking study focusing on the …

Y. Tzvi Langermann, "Before Maimonides: A New Philosophical Dialogue in Hebrew" (Brill, 2023)

May 11, 2024

Before Maimonides

Y. Tzvi Langermann
Hosted by Caleb Zakarin

All can agree that the achievement of Moses Maimonides (d. 1204) set the standard for subsequent works of "Jewish philosophy". But just what were the …

Mark Dooley, "Roger Scruton: The Philosopher on Dover Beach" (Bloomsbury, 2024)

May 9, 2024

Roger Scruton: The Philosopher on Dover Beach

Mark Dooley
Hosted by Crawford Gribben

Roger Scruton was one of the outstanding British philosophers of the post-war years. Why then was he at best ignored and at worst reviled? In Roger Sc…

Sean Griffin, "The Liturgical Past in Byzantium and Early Rus" (Cambridge UP, 2019)

May 7, 2024

The Liturgical Past in Byzantium and Early Rus

Sean Griffin
Hosted by Aaron Weinacht

Dr. Sean Griffin's book, The Liturgical Past in Byzantium and Early Rus (Cambridge UP, 2019), takes on the question of the source materials for the Pr…

Rustam Alexander, "Gay Lives and ‘Aversion Therapy’ in Brezhnev’s Russia, 1964–1982" (Palgrave MacMillan, 2023)

May 6, 2024

Gay Lives and ‘Aversion Therapy’ in Brezhnev’s Russia, 1964–1982

Rustam Alexander

Rustam Alexander's Gay Lives and 'Aversion Therapy' in Brezhnev's Russia, 1964-1982 (Palgrave Macmillan, 2023) examines the autobiographies and diarie…

Francesca Trivellato, "The Promise and Peril of Credit" (Princeton UP, 2019)

May 5, 2024

Promise and Peril of Credit

Francesca Trivellato
Hosted by Mark Klobas

In 1647, the French author Étienne Cleirac asserted in his book Les us, et coustumes de la mer that the credit instruments known as bills of exchange …

Richard M. Jaffe, "Seeking Sakyamuni: South Asia in the Formation of Modern Japanese Buddhism" (U Chicago Press, 2019)

May 5, 2024

Seeking Sakyamuni

Richard M. Jaffe
Hosted by Samee Siddiqui

Though fascinated with the land of their tradition’s birth, virtually no Japanese Buddhists visited the Indian subcontinent before the nineteenth cent…

Zahra Ayubi, "Gendered Morality: Classical Islamic Ethics of the Self, Family, and Society" (Columbia UP, 2019)

May 4, 2024

Gendered Morality

Zahra Ayubi
Hosted by Shobhana Xavier

How are notions of justice and equality constructed in Islamic virtue ethics (akhlaq)? How are Islamic virtue ethics gendered, despite their venture i…

Shu Yang, "Untamed Shrews: Negotiating New Womanhood in Modern China" (Cornell UP, 2023)

May 2, 2024

Untamed Shrews

Shu Yang

If you are familiar with traditional Chinese literature, you have likely come across the figure of the “shrew,” a morally threatening woman who is eit…

Nietzsche Now! with Glenn Wallis

May 1, 2024

Nietzsche Now!

Glenn Wallis
Hosted by Uli Baer

What would Nietzsche say… about today’s divisive issues and debates? I spoke with Glenn Wallis, author of the new book, Nietzsche Now!, on how the Gre…

Renée Bergland, "Natural Magic: Emily Dickinson, Charles Darwin, and the Dawn of Modern Science" (Princeton UP, 2024)

May 1, 2024

Natural Magic

Renée Bergland
Hosted by Mark Klobas

Emily Dickinson and Charles Darwin were born at a time when the science of studying the natural world was known as natural philosophy, a pastime for p…

Jaume Aurell, "What Is a Classic in History?: The Making of a Historical Canon" (Cambridge UP, 2024)

April 30, 2024

What Is a Classic in History?

Jaume Aurell
Hosted by Miranda Melcher

What is a classic in historical writing? How do we explain the continued interest in certain historical texts, even when their accounts and interpreta…

Christopher Cameron, "Black Freethinkers: A History of African American Secularism" (Northwestern UP, 2019)

April 29, 2024

Black Freethinkers

Christopher Cameron

Black Freethinkers: A History of African American Secularism (Northwestern University Press, 2019) by Christopher Cameron, an Associate Professor of h…

Ariella Aisha Azoulay, "Potential History: Unlearning Imperialism" (Verso, 2019)

April 28, 2024

Potential History

Ariella Aisha Azoulay

Ariella Aisha Azoulay argues that the institutions that make our world, from archives and museums to ideas of sovereignty and human rights to history …