New Books Network Podcast

High Theory April 1, 2022

Welcome to High Theory!

Kim Adams and Soronik Bosu

Welcome to High Theory! High Theory is a podcast in which we get high on the substance of theory. And we ask the three standard questions, to each other, and …

Archaeology June 10, 2023

Objects Untimely

Object-Oriented Philosophy and Archaeology

Graham Harman and Christopher Witmore

Hosted by Adam Bobeck

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Objects generate time; time does not generate or change objects. That is the central thesis of this book by the philosopher Graham Harman and the archaeologist Christopher Witmore, who defend …

Politics & Polemics June 9, 2023

Stalinism and the Dialectics of Saturn

Anticommunism, Marxism, and the Fate of the Soviet Union

Doug Enaa Greene

Hosted by Stephen Dozeman

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As capitalism’s popularity wanes and socialism’s popularity increases, there remains a massive shadow cast by the history of actually existing socialism, Stalin being the primary pillar. His violent rule …

MIT Press Podcast June 9, 2023

Turing’s Vision

The Birth of Computer Science

Chris Bernhardt

Hosted by MIT Press

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In 1936, when he was just twenty-four years old, Alan Turing wrote a remarkable paper in which he outlined the theory of computation, laying out the ideas that underlie all …

General History June 9, 2023

Orwell and Empire

Douglas Kerr

Hosted by Charles Coutinho

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George Orwell was born in India and served in the Imperial Police in Burma as a young man. Douglas Kerr's book Orwell and Empire (Oxford UP, 2022) is a study of …

Russian and Eurasian Studies June 8, 2023

Soviet Samizdat

Imagining a New Society

Ann Komaromi

Hosted by Iva Glisic

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Soviet Samizdat: Imagining a New Society (Cornell UP, 2022) traces the emergence and development of samizdat, a significant and distinctive phenomenon of the late Soviet era that provided an uncensored …

Indian Religions June 8, 2023

The Matter of Wonder

Abhinavagupta's Panentheism and the New Materialism

Loriliai Biernacki

Hosted by Raj Balkaran

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In the early 11th century, the Kashmiri philosopher Abhinavagupta proposed panentheism-seeing the divine as both immanent in the world and at the same time as transcendent--as a way to reclaim …

Chinese Studies June 7, 2023

World History and National Identity in China

The Twentieth Century

Xin Fan

Hosted by Shu Wan

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Nationalism is pervasive in China today. Yet nationalism is not entrenched in China's intellectual tradition. Over the course of the twentieth century, the combined forces of cultural, social, and political …

Madison's Notes June 6, 2023

Feminism against Progress

A Conversation with Mary Harrington

Mary Harrington

Hosted by Annika Nordquist

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Is feminism compatible with progress? Reactionary feminist Mary Harrington thinks not. In this interview, she discusses the history of feminism, her own journey from proponent to radical opponent of progress …

Critical Theory June 5, 2023

What's the Use of Philosophy?

Philip Kitcher

Hosted by Morteza Hajizadeh

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In What's the Use of Philosophy? (Oxford UP, 2023), Philip Kitcher here grapples with an essential philosophical question: what the point of philosophy is, and what it should and can be. Kitcher's …

Military History June 4, 2023

Guibert's General Essay on Tactics

Jonathan Abel

Hosted by Caleb Zakarin

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"'The God of War' is near to revealing himself, because we have heard his prophet." So wrote Jean Colin, naming Napoleon the God of War and Jacques-Antoine-Hippolyte, comte de Guibert …

Intellectual History June 3, 2023

The Evolution of Pragmatism in India

Ambedkar, Dewey, and the Rhetoric of Reconstruction

Scott R. Stroud

Hosted by Kalyani Kalyani

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Scott R. Stroud's The Evolution of Pragmatism in India: Ambedkar, Dewey, and the Rhetoric of Reconstruction (U Chicago Press, 2023) is a philosophical engagement with Dr. B. R. Ambedkar’s life and …

Asian American Studies June 3, 2023

The Allure of Empire

American Encounters with Asians in the Age of Transpacific Expansion and Exclusion

Chris Suh

Hosted by Byung Ho Choi

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The Allure of Empire: American Encounters with Asians in the Age of Transpacific Expansion and Exclusion (Oxford UP, 2023) traces how American ideas about race in the Pacific were made …

African American Studies June 3, 2023

Workers of All Colors Unite

Race and the Origins of American Socialism

Lorenzo Costaguta

Hosted by Omari Averette-Phillips

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As the United States transformed into an industrial superpower, American socialists faced the vexing question of how to approach race. Lorenzo Costaguta balances intellectual and institutional history to illuminate the …

Biography June 2, 2023

Money and Empire

Charles P. Kindleberger and the Dollar System

Perry Mehrling

Hosted by Caleb Zakarin

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Charles Kindleberger ranks as one of the twentieth century's best known and most influential international economists. This book traces the evolution of his thinking in the context of a 'key-currency' …

South Asian Studies May 31, 2023

World Literature for the Wretched of the Earth

Anticolonial Aesthetics, Postcolonial Politics

J. Daniel Elam

Hosted by Gargi Binju

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World Literature for the Wretched of the Earth: Anticolonial Aesthetics, Postcolonial Politics (Fordham UP, 2020) recovers a genealogy of anticolonial thought that advocated collective inexpertise, unknowing, and unrecognizability. Early-twentieth-century anticolonial …

Critical Theory May 31, 2023

Anarchism

A Very Short Introduction

Alex Prichard

Hosted by Morteza Hajizadeh

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If you asked a passerby on the street what anarchism is, they may answer that it is an ideology based on chaos, disorder, and violence. But is this true? What …

MIT Press Podcast May 30, 2023

X-Risk

How Humanity Discovered Its Own Extinction

Thomas Moynihan

Hosted by MIT Press

Matt Colquhoun (author/editor of Egress and Postcapitalist Desire) speaks to to Thomas Moynihan about his most recent book X-Risk: How Humanity Discovered Its Own Extinction. From forecasts of disastrous climate …

Princeton UP Ideas Podcast May 30, 2023

Night Vision

Seeing Ourselves Through Dark Moods

Mariana Alessandri

Hosted by Mark Klobas

Under the light of ancient Western philosophies, our darker moods like grief, anguish, and depression can seem irrational. When viewed through the lens of modern psychology, they can even look …

South Asian Studies May 30, 2023

A Part Apart

The Life and Thought of B. R. Ambedkar

Ashok Gopal

Hosted by Rituparna Patgiri

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Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar (1891–1956) is perhaps the most iconised historical figure in India. Born into a caste deemed ‘unfit for human association’, he came to define what it means to …