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Book of the Day/ Chinese Studies

Reproductive Realities in Modern China

Birth Control and Abortion, 1911-2021

Sarah Mellors Rodriguez

Hosted by Laurie Dickmeyer
In Reproductive Realities in Modern China: Birth Control and Abortion, 1911-2021 (Cambridge UP, 2022), assistant professor of history at Missouri State University, Sarah Mellors Rodriguez explores the longue durée history of birth control and abortion in China from the Republican period to the present day. Drawing from a rich array of archival materials, oral histories, posters, films, novels, and other media, she delves into the diverse attitudes, policies, and practices …
Library Science

For the Encouragement of Learning

The Origins of Canadian Copyright Law

Myra Tawfik

Hosted by Jen Hoyer
Myra Tawfik's book For the Encouragement of Learning: The Origins of Canadian Copyright Law (U Toronto Press, 2023) addresses the contested history of copyright law in Canada, where the economic and …
Early Modern History

Intelligence and Espionage in the English Republic C. 1600-60

Alan Marshall

Hosted by Crawford Gribben
Alan Marshall's book Intelligence and Espionage in the English Republic C. 1600-60 (Manchester UP, 2023) is a richly detailed account of the ideas and activities in the early-modern 'secret state' and its …
Sociology

Decolonize Self-Care

Alyson K. Spurgas and Zoe Meleo Erwin

Hosted by Michael Johnston
For twentieth-century feminists, it was a rallying cry for bodily autonomy and political power. For influencers and lifestyle brands, it’s buying fancy nutrition and body products at a premium. And …
MIT Press Podcast

The Place Is Here

The Work of Black Artists in 1980s Britain

Nick Aikens and Elizabeth Robles

Hosted by MIT Press
Nick Aikens and Elizabeth Robles discuss The Place Is Here (Sternberg Press, 2019) and the range of perspectives on black art in Thatcherite Britain offered by the collection of artworks …
Madison's Notes

Economic Freedom from Kennedy to Reagan to Trump

A Conversation with Larry Kudlow

Larry Kudlow

Hosted by Annika Nordquist
With contentious midterm elections coming up fast, Annika sits down with one of the best-known commentators and participants in the American political economy over the past four decades: Larry Kudlow …
Science, Technology, and Society

Stroller

Amanda Parrish Morgan

Hosted by Frances Sacks
Among the many things expectant parents are told to buy, none is a more visible symbol of status and parenting philosophy than a stroller. Although its association with wealth …
Ukrainian Studies

In the Hour of War

Poetry from Ukraine

Carolyn Forché and Ilya Kaminsky

Hosted by Nataliya Shpylova-Saeed
Ukraine may be the only country on earth that owes its existence, at least in part, to a poet. Ever since the appearance of Taras Shevchenko's Kobzar in 1840, poetry …
Performing Arts

Why Do Actors Train?

Embodiment for Theatre Makers and Thinkers

Brad Krumholz

Hosted by Andy Boyd
Why Do Actors Train?: Embodiment for Theatre Makers and Thinkers (Bloomsbury, 2023) powerfully demystifies the actor-training process by focusing on acting as embodied cognition. In this framework, thought is action …
Education

Teachers as Policy Advocates

Strategies for Collaboration and Change

May Hara and Annalee G. Good

Hosted by Alex Tabor
May Hara and Annalee G. Good's Teachers as Policy Advocates: Strategies for Collaboration and Change (Teachers College Press, 2023) argues that teachers’ active participation in policy advocacy is crucial to …
Economics

The Global Architecture of Multilateral Development Banks

A System of Debt or Development?

Adrian R. Bazbauers and Susan Engel

Hosted by Sidney Michelini
Adrian Bazbauers and Susan Engel’s 2021 book The Global Architecture of Multilateral Development Banks: A System of Debt or Development? (Routledge, 2023) explores the evolution of the 30 functioning multilateral development …
Geography

Over Researched Places

Towards a Critical and Reflexive Approach

Cat Button and Gerald Taylor Aiken

Hosted by Stentor Danielson
Cat Button and Gerald Taylor Aiken's Over Researched Places: Towards a Critical and Reflexive Approach (Routledge, 2022) explores the implications that research-density has on the people and places researched, on …
Book of the Day/ Women's History

The Suffragist Peace

How Women's Votes Lead to Fewer Wars

Robert F. Trager and Joslyn N. Barnhart

Hosted by Miranda Melcher
In the modern age, some parts of the world are experiencing a long peace. Nuclear weapons, capitalism and the widespread adoption of democratic institutions have been credited with fostering this relatively peaceful period. Yet, these accounts overlook one of the most dramatic transformations of the 20th century: the massive redistribution of political power as millions of women around the world won the right to vote. The Suffragist Peace: How Women …
Academic Life

Navigating the Community College Job Market

A Discussion with Rob Jenkins

Rob Jenkins

Hosted by Christina Gessler
What makes a community college job interview different than one at a four-year college or a university? Do you need a PhD to get hired? What are they looking for …
Jewish Studies

A Brilliant Commodity

Diamonds and Jews in a Modern Setting

Saskia Coenen Snyder

Hosted by Miranda Melcher
During the late nineteenth century, tens of thousands of diggers, prospectors, merchants, and dealers extracted and shipped over 50 million carats of diamonds from South Africa to London. The primary …
Asian Review of Books

Yamuna's Journey

Translated by Deepra Dandekar

Baba Padmanji

Hosted by Nicholas Gordon
In 1856, the East India Company imposed the Hindu Widow Remarriage Act, allowing widows to remarry after their husband’s death. The Act was controversial at the time: Hindu traditionalists, particularly …
Indian Religions

The Making of Contemporary Indian Philosophy

Krishnachandra Bhattacharyya

Elise Coquereau-Saouma and Daniel Raveh

Hosted by Raj Balkaran
This book engages in a dialogue with Krishnachandra Bhattacharyya (K.C. Bhattacharyya, KCB, 1875-1949) and opens a vista to contemporary Indian philosophy. KCB is one of the founding fathers of …
Almost Good Catholics

Down to Earth: In Pursuit of Humility

A Discussion with Richard Foster and Brenda Quinn

Richard J. Foster and Brenda Quinn

Hosted by Krzysztof Odyniec
Quaker theologian Richard J. Foster and charismatic pastor Brenda Quinn talk with me about Foster’s new book (which Quinn worked on with him), Learning Humility: A Year of Searching for …
MIT Press Podcast

Black Film, British Cinema II

Clive Nwonka and Anamik Saha

Hosted by MIT Press
Clive Nwonka and Anamik Saha discuss their forthcoming book Black Film, British Cinema II (publishing in March with Goldsmiths Press), a book which brings together scholars, thinkers and practitioners to …
Madison's Notes

The Hundred Year War for the American Right

A Conversation with Matthew Continetti

Matthew Continetti

Hosted by Annika Nordquist
What is the American Right, where does it come from, and how has it changed over time? Journalist and author Matthew Continetti discusses his recent book: The Right: The Hundred …
Sociology

The Political Economy of Fortune and Misfortune

Prospects for Prosperity in Our Times

Scott Timcke

Hosted by Michael Johnston
Luck greatly influences a person's quality of life. Yet little of our politics looks at how institutions can amplify good or bad luck that widens social inequality. But societies can …
Popular Culture

Rude Girls

Women in 2 Tone and One Step Beyond

Heather Augustyn

Hosted by Rebekah Buchanan
In her latest book, Rude Girls: Women in 2 Tone and One Step Beyond (Sally Brown Publishing, 2023), Heather Augustyn explores the ska revival in the UK during the lates 1970s and 1980s …
Literary Studies

Fighting Over There

U.S. War Making and Contemporary Refugee Literature

Alaina Kaus

Hosted by Deidre Tyler
U.S. foreign policy has long been built on a dichotomy of an irreplaceable "here" and an expendable "there." In his 2003 announcement of the military campaign in Iraq, George W …
Book of the Day/ Islamic Studies

Broken

The Failed Promise of Muslim Inclusion

Evelyn Alsultany

Hosted by Kristian Petersen
In Broken: The Failed Promise of Muslim Inclusion (NYU Press, 2022), Evelyn Alsultany, Professor at the University of Southern California, argues that, even amid challenges to institutionalized Islamophobia, diversity initiatives fail on their promise by only focusing on crisis moments.  Muslims get included through “crisis diversity,” where high-profile Islamophobic incidents are urgently responded to and then ignored until the next crisis. In the popular cultural arena of television, this means …
Biblical Studies

Before There Was a Bible

Authorities in Early Christianity

Lee Martin McDonald

Hosted by Rob Heaton
Before There Was a Bible: Authorities in Early Christianity (T&T Clark, 2023) is a natural outgrowth from McDonald’s significant and ongoing work in the field of canon studies, which traces the …
Secularism

Empire and Progress in the Victorian Secularist Movement

Imagining a Secular World

Patrick J. Corbeil

Hosted by Carrie Lynn Evans
Empire and Progress in the Victorian Secularist Movement: Imagining a Secular World (Palgrave Macmillan, 2022) by Dr. Patrick Corbeil is the first extensive historical analysis of the relationship between empire …
General History

On Time

A History of Western Timekeeping

Kenneth Mondschein

Hosted by Boris Karpa
Western culture has been obsessed with regulating society by the precise, accurate measurement of time since the Middle Ages. In On Time: A History of Western Timekeeping (Johns Hopkins UP …
Food

Ed Mitchell's Barbeque

Ed Mitchell, Ryan Mitchell, and Zella Palmer

Hosted by Laura Goldberg
Ed Mitchell’s journey in the barbeque business began in 1991 with a lunch for his mama, who was grieving the loss of Ed’s father. Ed drove to the nearby Piggly …
Psychoanalysis

"Don't Be Sad When I'm Gone"

A Memoir of Loss and Healing in Buenos Aires

Beatriz Dujovne

Hosted by Lexa Rosean
The monumental sense of dislocation we experience after losing a loved one can be life-altering. There is no script for grieving–each individual passes through their own phases of mourning. In …
Burned by Books

The Society of Shame

Jane Roper

Hosted by Chris Holmes
In this timely and witty combination of So You've Been Publicly Shamed and Where'd You Go, Bernadette? a viral photo of a politician's wife's "feminine hygiene malfunction" catapults her to …
Madison's Notes

Missing: Men at Work

A Conversation with Nick Eberstadt

Nick Eberstadt

Hosted by Annika Nordquist
Over six million prime-age men are neither working nor looking for work; America's low unemployment rate hides the fact that many men have dropped out of the workforce altogether. Our …
MIT Press Podcast

Publishing in Art, Architecture and Visual Culture

A Discussion with Thomas Weaver and Victoria Hindley

Thomas Weaver and Victoria Hindley

Hosted by MIT Press
This episode features discussions with Thomas Weaver (Senior Acquisitions Editor for Art and Architecture) and Victoria Hindley (Acquisitions Editor in Visual Culture and Design) about publishing in the fields of …
The Common Magazine

Reading the Ashes

The Common Magazine (Fall, 2022)

Robin Lee Carlson

Hosted by Emily Everett
Robin Lee Carlson speaks to managing editor Emily Everett about her essay “Reading the Ashes,” which appears in The Common’s fall 2022 issue. Robin talks about the many-year process of …
Japanese Studies

This Overflowing Light

Selected Poems. Translated by Janine Beichman.

Rin Ishigaki

Hosted by Takeshi Morisato
Born in central Tokyo in 1920, Rin Ishigaki was one of the most daring and gifted poets of Japan’s postwar cultural renaissance. She knew Japan before the war, during it …
Early Modern History

In Fortune's Theater

Financial Risk and the Future in Renaissance Italy

Nicholas Scott Baker

Hosted by Michael Martoccio
In this episode, I was joined by Nicholas Scott Baker to discuss his book, In Fortune’s Theater: Financial Risk and the Future in Renaissance Italy (Cambridge University Press, 2021). Professor …
Jewish Studies

Undesirables

A Holocaust Journey to North Africa

Aomar Boum

Hosted by Ari Barbalat
In the lead-up to World War II, the rising tide of fascism and antisemitism in Europe foreshadowed Hitler's genocidal campaign against Jews. But the horrors of the Holocaust were not …
Nordic Asia Podcast

Sweden-North Korea Relations

Neither Friend nor Enemy

Benjamin Katzeff Silberstein

Hosted by Myunghee Lee
Welcome to the fourth NIAS-Korea episode. We invite Dr. Benjamin Katzeff Silberstein to discuss Sweden-North Korea relations. It may seem odd that among the Western countries, Sweden is the one …
Book of the Day/ General History

The West

A New History of an Old Idea

Naoíse Mac Sweeney

Hosted by Miranda Melcher
Dr. Naoíse Mac Sweeney presents a radical new account of how the idea of the West has shaped our history, told through the stories of fourteen fascinating lives in her book The West: A New History of an Old Idea (Dutton, 2023). We tend to imagine Western Civilisation as a golden thread, leading through the centuries from classical antiquity to the countries of the modern West - a cultural genealogy …
Jewish Studies

The Shamama Case

Contesting Citizenship Across the Modern Mediterranean

Jessica M. Marglin

Hosted by Geraldine Gudefin
In the winter of 1873, Nissim Shamama, a wealthy Jew from Tunisia, died suddenly in his palazzo in Livorno, Italy. His passing initiated a fierce lawsuit over his large estate …
Christian Studies

A Revolutionary Faith

Liberation Theology Between Public Religion and Public Reason

Raúl E. Zegarra Medina

Hosted by Adrian Guiu
Religious commitments can be a powerful engine for progressive social change. In A Revolutionary Faith: Liberation Theology Between Public Religion and Public Reason (Stanford UP, 2023), Raúl E. Zegarra examines the …
Indian Ocean World

Cargoes in Motion

Materiality and Connectivity Across the Indian Ocean

Burkhard Schnepel and Julia Verne

Hosted by Ahmed Almaazmi
Cargoes in Motion: Materiality and Connectivity Across the Indian Ocean (Ohio University Press, 2022) is an innovative collection of essays that foregrounds specific cargoes as a means to understand connectivity and …
Ukrainian Studies

A Crash Course in Molotov Cocktails

Translated by Amelia Glaser and Yulia Ilchuk

Halyna Kruk

Hosted by Nataliya Shpylova-Saeed
"We act like children with our dead," Halyna Kruk writes as she struggles to come to terms with the horror unfolding around her: "confused, / as if none of us …
Medieval History

Stories Between Christianity and Islam

Saints, Memory, and Cultural Exchange in Late Antiquity and Beyond

Reyhan Durmaz

Hosted by Zalman Newfield
In Stories between Christianity and Islam: Saints, Memory, and Cultural Exchange in Late Antiquity and Beyond (University of California Press, 2022), Reyhan Durmaz offers an original and nuanced understanding of …
MIT Press Podcast

The Gentrification of Queer Desire

Huw Lemmey and Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore

Hosted by MIT Press
Writer Huw Lemmey (Chubz, Red Tory, Unknown Language) speaks with Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore about her most recent book The Freezer Door and searching for connection in a world that enforces …
Psychoanalysis

Misogyny in Psychoanalysis

Michaela Chamberlain

Hosted by Christopher Russell
Today I talked to Michaela Chamberlain, author of Misogyny in Psychoanalysis (Phoenix Publishing House, 2022) Chamberlain’s book is a product of “cumulative trauma” whose original starting point was an interest …
Madison's Notes

Strategy and Saratoga

A Conversation with Kevin Weddle

Kevin Weddle

Hosted by Annika Nordquist
At the Battle of Saratoga, the tide of the Revolutionary War turned in favor of unlikely victors: the American patriots. What were the major strategy elements at play in the …
Southeast Asian Studies

Tragic Nation

Burma--Why and How Democracy Failed

Amitav Acharya

Hosted by Duncan McCargo
What went wrong with Burma’s democratic experiment? How are we to understand the country’s turbulent politics in the wake of the 2021 coup? In this conversation with Duncan McCargo, Amitav …
Children's Literature

A History of Toilet Paper (and Other Potty Tools)

Sophia Gholz

Hosted by Mel Rosenberg
Since Sophia Gholz’s highly successful debut book, The Boy Who Grew a Forest: The True Story of Jadav Payeng, appeared four years ago, she has published with several exceptional picture …
Book of the Day/ Biblical Studies

Armageddon

What the Bible Really Says about the End

Bart D. Ehrman

Hosted by Frances Sacks
A New York Times bestselling Biblical scholar, reveals why our popular understanding of the Apocalypse is all wrong—and why that matters.You’ll find nearly everything the Bible has to say about the end in the Book of Revelation: a mystifying prophecy filled with bizarre symbolism, violent imagery, mangled syntax, confounding contradictions, and very firm ideas about the horrors that await us all. But whether you understand the book as a literal description …
Media

Say the Right Thing

How to Talk About Identity, Diversity, and Justice

Kenji Yoshino and David Glasgow

Hosted by Deidre Tyler
In the current period of social and political unrest, conversations about identity are becoming more frequent and more difficult. On subjects like critical race theory, gender equity in the workplace …
Middle Eastern Studies

Revolutions Aesthetic

A Cultural History of Ba'thist Syria

Max Weiss

Hosted by Reuben Silverman
The November 1970 coup that brought Hafiz al-Asad to power fundamentally transformed cultural production in Syria. A comprehensive intellectual, ideological, and political project—a Ba'thist cultural revolution—sought to align artistic endeavors …
Economic and Business History

Better Money

Gold, Fiat, or Bitcoin?

Lawrence H. White

Hosted by Bernardo Batiz-Lazo
The recent rise of dollar, pound, and euro inflation rates has rekindled the debate over potential alternative monies, particularly gold and Bitcoin. Though Bitcoin has been much discussed in recent …
Religion

The Women’s Mosque of America

Authority and Community in US Islam

Tazeen M. Ali

Hosted by Joseph Stuart
The Women’s Mosque of America (WMA), a multiracial, women-only mosque in Los Angeles, is the first of its kind in the United States. Since 2015, the WMA has provided a …
Critical Theory

The Cultural Sociology of Art and Music

New Directions and New Discoveries

Lisa McCormick

Hosted by Dave O'Brien
How can sociology help us understand art and music? In The Cultural Sociology of Art and Music: New Directions and New Discoveries (Palgrave MacMillan, 2022), the editor Lisa McCormick, a …
MIT Press Podcast

Appendix N

The Eldritch Roots of Dungeons and Dragons

Peter Bebergal

Hosted by MIT Press
Dungeons and Dragons expert Jon Peterson (The Elusive Shift, Game Wizards) speaks with Peter Bebergal (Season of the Witch, Too Much to Dream) about his new book Appendix N, an anthology …
Military History

Brotherhood of the Flying Coffin

The Glider Pilots of World War II

Scott McGaugh

Hosted by AJ Woodhams
This book distills war down to individual young men climbing into defenseless gliders made of plywood, ready to trust the towing aircraft that would pull them into enemy territory by …
LGBTQ+ Studies

With Hawks and Angels

Episodes from a Southern Life

Joel Lafayette Fletcher, III

Hosted by Morris Ardoin
In this episode of Queer Voices I talk to Joel Lafayette Fletcher III about his book With Hawks and Angels: Episodes from a Southern Life (UP of Mississippi, 2023) About the …
Madison's Notes

Martyrs in Mosul

A Conversation on Christian Persecution with Father Benedict Kiely

Father Benedict Kiely

Hosted by Annika Nordquist
With Christmas approaching, in this episode we reflect on Christian persecution in the Middle East, the historic cradle of Christianity and the birthplace of Jesus, and the very different challenges …
Literature

Martha Moody

A Novel

Susan Stinson

Hosted by Kendall Dinniene
Winner of the Benjamin Franklin Award in Fiction, Susan Stinson's Martha Moody (Small Beer Press, 2020) is a speculative western that follows Amanda, a woman with a vibrant, sensuous imagination, as …
American Studies

The War is Here

Newark 1967

Chris Campion and Bud Lee

Hosted by Deidre Tyler
July 1967. After the arrest, beating, and imprisonment of cab driver John Smith by local police, the city of Newark--already a tinderbox, became a hotbed of protest and retaliation. Over …
Book of the Day/ Science, Technology, and Society

The Possibility of Life

Science, Imagination and Our Vision of the Cosmos

Jaime Green

Hosted by John Traphagan
Listen:
In this episode we talk to Jaime Green about her superb cultural and scientific exploration of alien life and the cosmos. It examines how the possibility of life on other planets shapes our understanding of humanity. Fans of Leslie Jamison, Carl Zimmer and Carlo Rovelli will find a lot to think about. One of the most powerful questions humans ask about the cosmos is: Are we alone? Yet this very question is inevitably reduced …
Environmental Studies

Less Heat, More Light

A Guided Tour of Weather, Climate, and Climate Change

John D. Aber

Hosted by Melek Firat Altay
Climate change is one of the most hotly contested environmental topics of our day. To answer criticisms and synthesize available information, scientists have been driven to devise increasingly complex models …
Indian Ocean World

Histories of Health and Materiality in the Indian Ocean World

Medicine, Material Culture and Trade, 1600-2000

Anne Gerritsen and Burton Cleetus

Hosted by Ahmed Almaazmi
Histories of Health and Materiality in the Indian Ocean World: Medicine, Material Culture and Trade, 1600-2000 (Bloomsbury, 2023): Introducing materiality into the study of the history of medicine, this volume hones …
Indian Religions

How Do We Know What We Know?

A Day School from Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies

Gavin Flood

Hosted by Raj Balkaran
The Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies is holding a Day School on "How Do We Know What We Know?" Today I talked to Gavin Flood bout the day school, discusses how he began …
Shakespeare For All

Shakespeare's "Julius Caesar" Part 2: Characters and Questions

A Discussion with Michael Dobson

Michael Dobson

Hosted by Zachary Davis
Part 2 focuses on the play’s key interpretive questions: how we are invited to judge the central characters. Is Caesar, in Shakespeare’s story, really a tyrant who needed to be …
The Imperfect Buddha Podcast

Buddhism and Transcendence

A Conversation with Curtis White

Curtis White

Hosted by Matthew O'Connell
Acclaimed cultural critic Curtis White examines current fissures in Western Buddhism and argues against the growth of scientific and corporate dharma, particularly in the Secular Buddhist movement. Most of his …
MIT Press Podcast

A Slow Burning Fire

The Rise of the New Art Practice in Yugoslavia

Marko Ilić

Hosted by MIT Press
Writer and academic Anthony Gardner (NSK from Kapital to Capital, Politically Unbecoming) interviews Marko Ilić about his new book A Slow Burning Fire, which documents Yugoslavia's cultural output throughout the …
Madison's Notes

Assessing Affirmative Action

A Conversation with Jason Riley

Jason Riley

Hosted by Annika Nordquist
With the Supreme Court poised to potentially outlaw race-conscious admissions, Affirmative Action may soon be on the chopping block. What will be the legacy of this half-century-old policy? Jason Riley …
The Future of . . . with Owen Bennett-Jones

The Future of Wales

A Discussion with Will Hayward

Will Hayward

Hosted by Owen Bennett-Jones
Will Wales ever become an independent country? The UK’s other constituent parts – Scotland and Northern Ireland - seem more likely to breakaway: the Scots voted no to independence in …
Military History

How Britain Broke the World

War, Greed and Blunders from Kosovo to Afghanistan (1997-2021)

Arthur Snell

Hosted by Philip Blood
Arthur Snell's book How Britain Broke the World: War, Greed and Blunders from Kosovo to Afghanistan (1997-2021) (Canbury Press, 2022) critically assesses UK foreign policy over the past 25 years, from …
Darts & Letters

Learning for Liberation: The Life and Legacy of Paulo Freire

The Life and Legacy of Paulo Freire

Paulo Freire

Hosted by Ren Bangert
Paulo Freire offers activists and academics everywhere a lesson in what it means to be a radical intellectual. He is known as the founder of critical pedagogy, which asks teachers …
Business, Management, and Marketing

Extreme Productivity

Boost Your Results, Reduce Your Hours

Robert C. Pozen

Hosted by Gregory LaBlanc
No matter what industry we all work in, productivity is key. Not only is managing our time properly good for getting all of our tasks done but also spending time …
Book of the Day/ South Asian Studies

A Part Apart

The Life and Thought of B. R. Ambedkar

Ashok Gopal

Hosted by Rituparna Patgiri
Listen:
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 be human. How and why did Ambedkar, who revered and cited the Gita till the 1930s, turn against Hinduism? What were his quarrels with Gandhi and Savarkar? Why did he come to see himself as Moses? How did the lessons …
Princeton UP Ideas Podcast

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 …
MIT Press Podcast

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 …
British Studies

Friends of Israel

The Backlash Against Palestine Solidarity

Hilary Frances Aked

Hosted by Roberto Mazza
Is there such a thing as “the Israel lobby,” and how powerful is it really? Hilary Frances Aked's book Friends of Israel: The Backlash Against Palestine Solidarity (Verso, 2023) provides a forensically researched …
Madison's Notes

Educating for Solitude

A Conversation with William Deresiewicz

William Deresiewicz

Hosted by Annika Nordquist
What kind of person is our education system designed to create? Best-selling author and award-winning essayist William Deresiewicz discusses the failures of our higher education system, how it mis-conditions our …
Caribbean Studies

Channeling Knowledges

Water and Afro-Diasporic Spirits in Latinx and Caribbean Worlds

Rebeca L. Hey-Colón

Hosted by Elena Igartuburu
Water is often tasked with upholding division through the imposition of geopolitical borders. We see this in the construction of the Rio Grande/Río Bravo on the US-Mexico border, as well …
Higher Education

Unequal Choices

How Social Class Shapes Where High-Achieving Students Apply to College

Yang Va Lor

Hosted by Miranda Melcher
High-achieving students from socioeconomically disadvantaged backgrounds are more likely to end up at less selective institutions compared to their socioeconomically advantaged peers with similar academic qualifications. A key reason for …
Jewish Studies

The White Terror

Antisemitic and Political Violence in Hungary, 1919-1921

Béla Bodó

Hosted by Ari Barbalat
The White Terror was a movement of right-wing militias that for two years actively tracked down, tortured, and murdered members of the Jewish community, as well as former supporters …
Children's Literature

Dream Big, Laugh Often

And More Great Advice from the Bible

Hanoch Piven and Shira Hecht-Koller

Hosted by Mel Rosenberg
Hanoch Piven is an Israeli collage artist whose colorful and witty portraits have appeared over the last 30 years on both sides of the Atlantic: in most major American magazines …
Literature

Our Lying Kin

Claudia Hagadus Long

Hosted by G. P. Gottlieb
The story of middle-aged sisters Zara and Lilly begins in Long’s fast-paced, first novel in this witty series, Nine Tenths of the Law, when Zara recognizes a family menorah in …
Scholarly Communication

What Is a Human?

Language, Mind, and Culture

James Paul Gee

Hosted by Daniel Shea
Listen to this interview of James Gee, Regents' Professor and Mary Lou Fulton Presidential Professor of Literacy Studies at Arizona State University. We talk about too much communication, about too …
International Horizons

Negotiating Decolonization

The Limits of a Fairy Tale

Valerie Rosoux

Hosted by International Horizons
In this episode of International Horizons, Valerie Rosoux, Research Director at the Belgian Fund for Scientific Research (FNRS) discusses the disagreements in the historiography of Belgium's human rights violations during …
Business, Management, and Marketing

Get Your Startup Story Straight

The Definitive Storytelling Framework for Innovators and Entrepreneurs

David Riemer

Hosted by Gregory LaBlanc
Everyone loves a good story, but more than that, we as humans are programmed on a genetic level to share and learn all kinds of information through stories. When you …
Book of the Day/ Critical Theory

Anarchism

A Very Short Introduction

Alex Prichard

Hosted by Morteza Hajizadeh
Listen:
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 exactly is anarchism? Anarchism: a Very Short Introduction (Oxford UP, 2022) provides a new point of departure for our understanding of anarchism. Prichard describes anarchism as a lived set of practices, with a rich historical legacy, and shows how anarchists …
MIT Press Podcast

Neighbor George

Victoria Nelson

Hosted by MIT Press
Listen:
Tariq Goddard (author, publisher and co-founder of Repeater Books) speaks with Victoria Nelson about her book Neighbor George. Do you know the language of the birds? Summer, 1979: A lonely …
Economic and Business History

International Business in Australia before World War One

Shaping a Multinational Economy

Simon Ville and David Merrett

Hosted by Paula De La Cruz-Fernández
Listen:
This episode features Professor Simon Ville talking about his latest book with David Merrett International Business in Australia Before World War One: Shaping a Multinational Economy (Palgrave MacMillan, 2022). This …
Anthropology

Friendship

Michael Jackson

Hosted by Latoya Johnson
Listen:
In Friendship (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2023), renowned anthropologist Michael Jackson draws on philosophy, biography, ethnography, and literature to explore the meanings and affordances of friendship—a relationship just as significant …
Madison's Notes

Defining Man and Woman

A Conversation with Abigail Favale

Abigail Favale

Hosted by Annika Nordquist
Listen:
Amidst fraught debates about what gender is, and how it fits into feminism, Annika sits down with Dr. Abigail Favale, an English professor specializing in gender studies and feminist literary …
Technology

The Equality Machine

Harnessing Digital Technology for a Brighter, More Inclusive Future

Orly Lobel

Hosted by Gregory LaBlanc
Listen:
The fear of algorithmic decision-making and surveillance capitalism dominate today's tech policy discussions. But instead of simply criticizing big data and automation, we can harness technology to correct discrimination, historical …
Political Science

The "Third" United Nations

How a Knowledge Ecology Helps the UN Think

Tatiana Carayannis and Thomas G. Weiss

Hosted by Sally Sharif
Listen:
Tatiana Carayannis and Thomas G. Weiss' book The "Third" United Nations: How a Knowledge Ecology Helps the UN Think (Oxford UP, 2021) is about the Third UN: the ecology of supportive …
South Asian Studies

World Literature for the Wretched of the Earth

Anticolonial Aesthetics, Postcolonial Politics

J. Daniel Elam

Hosted by Gargi Binju
Listen:
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 …
Scholarly Communication

Efficient Academic Writing

A Discussion with Mushtaq Bilal

Mushtaq Bilal

Hosted by Avi Staiman
Listen:
Mushtaq Bilal is an academic, content creator, thought leader, and public intellectual. Mushtaq discusses how he built an audience of more than 185,000 followers on Twitter and more than 30,00 …
Children's Literature

The Miracle Seed

Martin Lemelman

Hosted by Mel Rosenberg
Listen:
In our animated discussion, Martin Lemelman and I discuss his latest graphic novel, The Miracle Seed (Eerdmans Young Readers, 2023), which was published only two months ago. It is the …
Book of the Day/ Disability Studies

Prenatal Genetic Testing, Abortion, and Disability Justice

Amber Knight and Joshua Miller

Hosted by Shu Wan
The routinization of non-invasive prenatal genetic testing (NIPT) raises urgent questions about disability rights and reproductive justice. Supporters defend NIPT on the grounds that genetic information about the fetus helps would-be parents make better family planning choices. Prenatal Genetic Testing, Abortion, and Disability Justice (Oxford UP, 2023) challenges that assessment by exploring how NIPT can actually constrain pregnant women's options. Prospective parents must balance a complicated array of factors, including …
Academic Life

My What If Year

A Discussion with Alisha Fernandez Miranda

Alisha Fernandez Miranda

Hosted by Christina Gessler
Did we miss a fork in the road somewhere? What if our lives are going just fine, but we still want to hunt for the pieces of ourselves we’ve dropped …
Indian Religions

Pathways to Hindu-Christian Dialogue

Anantanand Rambachan

Hosted by Raj Balkaran
Hindus and Christians have a long history of interaction on the Indian subcontinent. Since the latter half of the twentieth century, with the increased possibilities for immigration, Hindus and Christians …
Dan Hill's EQ Spotlight

Sparking Success

Why Every Leader Needs to Develop a Creative Mindset

Adam Kingl

Hosted by Dan Hill
Today I talked to Adam Kingl about his new book Sparking Success: Why Every Leader Needs to Develop a Creative Mindset (Kogan Page, 2023). Most or, indeed, basically all of us start …
MIT Press Podcast

Teklife, Ghettoville, Eski

The Sonic Ecologies of Black Music in the Early 21st Century

Dhanveer Singh Brar

Hosted by MIT Press
Joy White, author of Terraformed, speaks with Dhanveer Singh Brar about his forthcoming book Teklife, Ghettoville, Eski, Teklife, Ghettoville, Eski argues that Black electronic dance music produces sonic ecologies of …
Madison's Notes

Beauty is Truth, Truth Beauty

A Conversation with Margarita Mooney Clayton

Margarita Mooney Clayton

Hosted by Annika Nordquist
Is beauty objective, or merely a personal experience? Do we need beauty in our daily lives, or is it just icing on the cake? Is the sole purpose of art …
Sociology

The Delusions of Crowds

Why People Go Mad in Groups

William J. Bernstein

Hosted by Gregory LaBlanc
What do financial bubbles and religious millenarianism have in common? They both involve collective delusion. When Charles Mackey wrote a book on the Madness of Crowds in the 19th century …
Almost Good Catholics

You Set a Table Before Me

The Teenage Witch Who Became a Dominican Sister

Sr. Maria Catherine, OP

Hosted by Krzysztof Odyniec
Sr Maria Catherine was looking for Truth in the wrong places when she started practicing witchcraft as girl. But she found her way out of the darkness and into the …
Scholarly Communication

Nick Enfield on Language, Influence, and Science Communications

Nick Enfield

Hosted by Daniel Shea
Listen to this interview of Nick Enfield, Professor of Linguistics at the University of Sydney for Language Research and the Sydney Initiative for Truth. We talk about communication as you …
Novel Dialogue

They’re Not Metaphorical Demons

A Discussion with Mariana Enriquez and Magalí Armillas-Tisyera

Mariana Enriquez and Magalí Armillas-Tisyera

Hosted by Chris Holmes
Booker Prize shortlister Mariana Enriquez, author of Things We Lost in the Fire and The Dangers of Smoking in Bed, joins Penn State professor Magalí Armillas-Tisyera and host Chris Holmes …
Asian Review of Books

Black Girl from Pyongyang

In Search of My Identity

Monica Macias

Hosted by Nicholas Gordon
Monica Macias, the youngest daughter of Equatorial Guinea’s first president at just seven years old, lands in Pyongyang, North Korea in 1979. Her father had sent her to the country …
Recall This Book

Musical Collaboration

A Chat with Composer Francisco del Pino

Francisco del Pino

Hosted by Elizabeth Ferry and John Plotz
Francisco del Pino is a widely celebrated composer from Buenos Aires, and currently a Ph.D. candidate in Music Composition at Princeton University. John fell in love with Francisco's music (during …