Podcast Episodes
Back to SearchJohn Trafton, "Movie-Made Los Angeles" (Wayne State UP, 2023)
Los Angeles was a cinematic city long before the rise of Hollywood. By the dawn of the twentieth century, photography, painting, and tourist promotio…
1 year ago
Speaking Philosophically: Communication at the Limits of Discursive Reason
Tom joins us to discuss his book Speaking Philosophically: Communication at the Limits of Discursive Reason (Bloomsbury, 2023). Western philosophy ha…
1 year ago
Pooja Rangan, Akshya Saxena, Ragini Tharoor Srinivasan, Pavitra Sundar eds., "Thinking with an Accent: Toward a New Object, Method, and Practice" (UC Press, 2023)
Everyone speaks with an accent, but what is an accent? Thinking with an Accent: Toward a New Object, Method, and Practice (UC Press, 2023) introduces…
1 year ago
Nao Tomabechi, "Supervillains: The Significance of Evil in Superhero Comics" (Rutgers UP, 2025)
Alongside superheroes, supervillains, too, have become one of today’s most popular and globally recognizable figures. However, it is not merely their…
1 year ago
Live from the Underground: A History of College Radio
Bands like R.E.M., U2, Public Enemy, and Nirvana found success as darlings of college radio, but the extraordinary influence of these stations and th…
1 year, 1 month ago
Laura Otis, "Banned Emotions: How Metaphors Can Shape What People Feel" (Oxford UP, 2019)
Who benefits and who loses when emotions are described in particular ways? How do metaphors such as "hold on" and "let go" affect people's emotional …
1 year, 1 month ago
Claire Knight, "Stalin's Final Films: Cinema, Socialist Realism, and Soviet Postwar Reality, 1945-1953" (Cornell UP, 2024)
Episode 304
Stalin's Final Films: Cinema, Socialist Realism, and Soviet Postwar Reality, 1945-1953 (Cornell UP, 2024) explores a neglected period in the history …
1 year, 1 month ago
Who Owns These Tools? Vauhini Vara and Aarthi Vadde (SW)
Episode 61
In an essay about her recent book Searches (Pantheon, 2025), a genre-bending chronicle of the deeply personal ways we use the internet and the uncann…
1 year, 1 month ago
Sara E. Wolf, "Teaching Copyright: Practical Lesson Ideas and Instructional Resources" (Bloomsbury, 2025)
Episode 91
The teaching of copyright and related concepts can easily be overwhelming to instructors who are experts in their field but may have little to no det…
1 year, 1 month ago
Lucia Soriano, "Embodying Normalcy: Women's Work in Neoliberal Times" (Lexington Books, 2024)
Episode 251
Embodying Normalcy: Women’s Work in Neoliberal Times (Lexington Books, 2024) calls attention to how women in the United States do a type of unpaid wo…
1 year, 1 month ago