Podcast Episodes
Back to SearchFauzia Husain, "The Stigma Matrix: Gender, Globalization, and the Agency of Pakistan's Frontline Women" (Stanford UP, 2024)
Episode 354
As developing states adopt neoliberal policies, more and more working-class women find themselves pulled into the public sphere. They are pressed int…
2 years ago
Shu Yang, "Untamed Shrews: Negotiating New Womanhood in Modern China" (Cornell UP, 2023)
Episode 526
If you are familiar with traditional Chinese literature, you have likely come across the figure of the “shrew,” a morally threatening woman who is ei…
2 years ago
Harry Pettit, "The Labor of Hope:: Meritocracy and Precarity in Egypt" (Stanford UP, 2023)
Episode 298
Capitalism is not only an economic system but also a system of production and allocation of hope. In Egypt, a generation of young men desire fulfilli…
2 years ago
Nadine A. Sinno, "A War of Colors: Graffiti and Street Art in Postwar Beirut" (U Texas Press, 2024)
Episode 157
Over the last two decades in Beirut, graffiti makers have engaged in a fierce “war of colors,” seeking to disrupt and transform the city’s physical a…
2 years ago
Justin O’Connor, "Culture is Not an Industry: Reclaiming Art and Culture for the Common" (Manchester UP, 2024)
Episode 353
According to Dr. Justin O’Connor, culture is at the heart of what it means to be human. But twenty-five years ago, the British government rebranded a…
2 years ago
Mohamed Shafeeq Karinkurayil, "The Gulf Migrant Archives in Kerala: Reading Borders and Belonging" (Oxford UP, 2024)
Episode 227
The Indian state of Kerala is one of the largest blocs of migrants in the oil economies of the Arab Gulf.
Looking closely at the cultural archives pr…
2 years ago
Adia Harvey Wingfield, "Gray Areas: How the Way We Work Perpetuates Racism and What We Can Do to Fix It" (Amistad Press, 2023)
Episode 352
Labor and race have shared a complex, interconnected history in America. For decades, key aspects of work—from getting a job to workplace norms to ad…
2 years ago
Jaume Aurell, "What Is a Classic in History?: The Making of a Historical Canon" (Cambridge UP, 2024)
Episode 209
What is a classic in historical writing? How do we explain the continued interest in certain historical texts, even when their accounts and interpret…
2 years ago
John O'Brien, "States of Intoxication: The Place of Alcohol in Civilisation" (Routledge, 2018)
Episode 4
Is alcohol a universal feature of human society? Why is problematic in some countries and not others? How was alcohol helped build the modern state? …
2 years ago
Gary S. Cross, "Free Time: The History of an Elusive Ideal" (NYU Press, 2024)
Episode 98
Free time, one of life’s most precious things, often feels unfulfilling. But why? And how did leisure activities transition from strolling in the par…
2 years ago