New Books Network
Mobilities and Methods
Mobilities and Methods November 18, 2020

Beyond Exception

New Interpretations of the Arabian Peninsula

Ahmed Kanna, Amélie Le Renard, and Neha Vora

Hosted by Alize Arıcan
Over the nearly two decades that they have each been conducting fieldwork in the Arabian Peninsula, Ahmed Kanna, Amélie Le Renard, and Neha Vora have regularly encountered exoticizing and exceptionalist …

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Middle Eastern Studies November 6, 2020

Return to Ruin

Iraqi Narratives of Exile and Nostalgia

Zainab Saleh

Hosted by Alize Arıcan
With the U.S. invasion of Iraq, Iraqis abroad, hoping to return one day to a better Iraq, became uncertain exiles. Return to Ruin: Iraqi Narratives of Exile and Nostalgia (Stanford …
American Studies October 23, 2020

Love in the Drug War

Selling Sex and Finding Jesus on the Mexico-US Border

Sara Luna

Hosted by Alize Arıcan
Sex, drugs, religion, and love are potent combinations in la zona, a regulated prostitution zone in the city of Reynosa, across the border from Hidalgo, Texas. During the years 200 …
Middle Eastern Studies September 28, 2020

Street Sounds

Listening to Everyday Life in Modern Egypt

Ziad Fahmy

Hosted by Alize Arıcan
As the twentieth century roared on, transformative technologies—from trains, trams, and automobiles to radios and loudspeakers—fundamentally changed the sounds of the Egyptian streets. The cacophony of everyday life grew louder …
South Asian Studies September 21, 2020

Indian Sex Life

Sexuality and the Colonial Origins of Modern Social Thought

Durba Mitra

Hosted by Lakshita Malik
During the colonial period in India, European scholars, British officials, and elite Indian intellectuals—philologists, administrators, doctors, ethnologists, sociologists, and social critics—deployed ideas about sexuality to understand modern Indian society. In …
Art September 3, 2020

Insurgent Aesthetics

Security and the Queer Life of the Forever War

Ronak K. Kapadia

Hosted by Lakshita Malik
In Insurgent Aesthetics: Security and the Queer Life of the Forever War (Duke University Press), Ronak K. Kapadia theorizes the world-making power of contemporary art responses to US militarism in …
Film August 20, 2020

Arab Americans in Film

From Hollywood and Egyptian Stereotypes to Self-representation

Waleed Mahdi

Hosted by Josephine Chaet
Dr. Waleed Mahdi’s book, Arab Americans in Film: From Hollywood and Egyptian Stereotypes to Self-Representation (Syracuse University Press) offers a comparative analysis of the portrayals of Arab Americans in film …
Performing Arts August 20, 2020

Work! A Queer History of Modeling

A Queer History of Modeling

Elspeth H. Brown

Hosted by Lakshita Malik
From the haute couture runways of Paris and New York and editorial photo shoots for glossy fashion magazines to reality television, models have been a ubiquitous staple of twentieth- and …
Middle Eastern Studies August 17, 2020

Disruptive Situations

Fractal Orientalism and Queer Strategies in Beirut

Ghassan Moussawi

Hosted by Alize Arıcan
Disruptive Situations: Fractal Orientalism and Queer Strategies in Beirut (Temple UP, 2020) challenges representations of contemporary Beirut as an exceptional space for LGBTQ people by highlighting everyday life in a …
African Studies August 10, 2020

The Fixer

Visa Lottery Chronicles

Charles Piot

Hosted by Alize Arıcan
In the West African nation of Togo, applying for the U.S. Diversity Visa Lottery is a national obsession, with hundreds of thousands of Togolese entering each year. From the street …
Music August 3, 2020

The Globally Familiar

Digital Hip-Hop, Masculinity, and Urban Space in Delhi

Gabriel Dattatreyan

Hosted by Lakshita Malik
In his book The Globally Familiar: Digital Hip-Hop, Masculinity, and Urban Space in Delhi (Duke University Press, 2020), Gabriel Dattatreyan departs from the existing literature on masculinity in India, which …
Literary Studies July 30, 2020

Fashioning Diaspora

Beauty, Femininity and South Asian American Culture

Vanita Reddy

Hosted by Lakshita Malik
Vanita Reddy, in her book Fashioning Diaspora: Beauty, Femininity and South Asian American Culture (Temple University Press, 2016), locates diasporic transnationality, affiliations and intimacies through the analytic of beauty. Through …
Middle Eastern Studies July 17, 2020

Love, Sex, and Desire in Modern Egypt

Navigating the Margins of Respectability

L .L. Wynn

Hosted by Lakshita Malik
L.L. Wynn’s book Love, Sex, and Desire in Modern Egypt: Navigating the Margins of Respectability (University of Texas Press) is an interrogation of urban life and gendered mobilities in Cairo …
Latino Studies June 17, 2020

Marriage after Migration

An Ethnography of Money, Romance, and Gender in Globalizing Mexico

Nora Haenn

Hosted by Pamela Fuentes
Marriage after Migration: An Ethnography of Money, Romance, and Gender in Globalizing Mexico (Oxford University Press, 2019) tells the stories of five women in rural Mexico, each navigating the tricky …
African American Studies June 16, 2020

In Pursuit of Knowledge

Black Women and Educational Activism in Antebellum America

Kabria Baumgartner

Hosted by Hettie V. Williams
In Pursuit of Knowledge: Black Women and Educational Activism in Antebellum America (NYU Press, 2019) is an intellectual and cultural history of the educational activism of African American women and …
American Studies June 15, 2020

Borderline Citizens

The United States, Puerto Rico, and the Politics of Colonial Migration

Robert C. McGreevey

Hosted by Steven Rodriguez
In Borderline Citizens: The United States, Puerto Rico, and the Politics of Colonial Migration (Cornell University Press 2018), Robert C. McGreevey explores the contested meaning and limits of citizenship for …
Caribbean Studies June 10, 2020

Tides of Revolution

Information, Insurgencies, and the Crisis of Colonial Rule in Venezuela

Cristina Soriano

Hosted by Sharika Crawford
In Tides of Revolution: Information, Insurgencies, and the Crisis of Colonial Rule in Venezuela (University of New Mexico Press, 2018), Cristina Soriano examines the links between the spread of radical …
Italian Studies June 9, 2020

Soviet Signoras

Personal and Collective Transformations in Eastern European Migration

Martina Cvajner

Hosted by Jana Byars
Jana Byars talks with Martina Cvajner, Assistant Professor of Sociology in the Department of Psychology and Cognitive Sciences at the University of Trento, about her new book, Soviet Signoras: Personal …
American Studies June 8, 2020

Hotels and Highways

The Construction of Modernization Theory in Cold War Turkey

Begüm Adalet

Hosted by Geoffrey Gordon
During the opening decades of the Cold War, US policymakers and academics used modernization theory to provide an alternative model to communism for improving living standards. As Begüm Adalet demonstrates …
Music June 2, 2020

Everybody’s Doin’ It

Sex, Music, and Dance in New York, 1840-1917

Dale Cockrell

Hosted by Kristen Turner
Most books about American music ask how it sounded, who wrote it, or who performed it. In his new book, Everybody’s Doin’ It: Sex, Music, and Dance in New York …