New Books in Anthropology
This podcast is a channel on the New Books Network. The New Books Network is an academic audio library dedicated to public education. In each episode you will hear scholars discuss their recently published research with another expert in their field.
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2376
Nader Hashimi and Danny Postel, eds. “Sectarian...
The term ‘sectarianism’ has dominated much of the discourse on the Middle East and dictates that much of the unrest in the region is due to religious and cultural differences stemming back centuries. However,
26 min
2377
Pooyan Tamimi Arab, “Amplifying Islam in the Eu...
In mid-March, Europeans observed the Dutch national elections with intense interest. Onlookers believed that a victory of the Party for Freedom led by Geert Wilders will influence the results of coming elections in France, the UK, and Germany.
38 min
2378
Jon Dean, “Doing Reflexivity: An Introduction” ...
Doing Reflexivity: An Introduction (Policy Press, 2017) by Jon Dean, a senior lecturer in politics and sociology at Sheffield Hallam University, explores and explains reflexivity as one of the essential concepts in modern social research.
33 min
2379
Michael Youngblood, “Cultivating Community: Int...
Cultivating Community: Interest, Identity, and Ambiguity in an Indian Social Mobilization by Michael Youngblood, a cultural anthropologist based in San Francisco, was published in November, 2016 by the South Asian Studies Association Press.
35 min
2380
Sverre Molland, “The Perfect Business? Anti-Tra...
Now and then we feature a book on New Books in Southeast Asian Studies whose author we ought to have had on the show some time ago. The Perfect Business? Anti-Trafficking and the Sex Trade Along the Mekong (University of Hawaii Press,
40 min
2381
Susanna Forrest, “The Age of the Horse: An Equi...
The history of humanity is intertwined with that of the horse to such a degree that it is no exaggeration to say that the existence of either species as we know it today is a product of its relationship with the other.
47 min
2382
Michael Muhammad Knight, “Tripping with Allah: ...
Michael Muhammed Knight writes this book from a first-person perspective, as a piece of creative non-fiction. The book includes a liberal amount of swearing and sexual references, and Knight’s writing style is raw, sometimes jarring,
62 min
2383
Jessie Daniels and Arlene Stein, “Going Public:...
Jessie Daniels and Arlene Stein have written Going Public: A Guide for Social Scientists (University of Chicago Press, 2017). How can political scientists and other social scientists speak beyond campus walls? Through blogs, social media,
16 min
2384
Megha Amrith, “Caring for Strangers: Filipino M...
If you’ve been hospitalized in Europe, North America, Australia or the Middle East in recent years, chances are that at some point a nurse from the Philippines has had some part in your treatment. As Megha Amrith writes in the introduction to Caring fo...
40 min
2385
Melissa L. Cooper, “Making Gullah: A History of...
Making Gullah: A History of Sapelo Islanders, Race, and the American Imagination (University of North Carolina Press, 2017) is a wide-ranging history that upends a long tradition of scrutinizing the Low Country blacks of Sapelo Island by outsiders.
53 min
2386
Jeanette Jouili, “Pious Practice and Secular Co...
Jeanette Jouili‘s fascinating new book Pious Practice and Secular Constraints: Women in the Islamic Revival in Europe (Stanford University Press, 2015) navigates practices and challenges of living pious ethical lives in inhospitable conditions.
34 min
2387
Sophia Roosth, “Synthetic: How Life Got Made” (...
Sophia Roosth‘s wonderful new book follows researchers clustered around MIT beginning in 2003 who named themselves synthetic biologists. A historically informed anthropological analysis based on many years of ethnographic work,
70 min
2388
Lisa Messeri, “Placing Outer Space: An Earthly ...
What kind of object is a planet? Lisa Messeri‘s new book asks and addressed this question in a fascinating ethnography that explores how scientific practices transform planets into places and helps us understand why that matters not just for how we und...
62 min
2389
Lotta Bjorklund Larsen,”Shaping Taxpayers: Valu...
How do you make taxpayers comply? Lotta Bjorklund Larsen‘s ethnography, Shaping Taxpayers: Values in Action at the Swedish Tax Agency (Berghahn Books, 2017) offers a vivid, yet nuanced account of knowledge making at one of Sweden’s most esteemed bureau...
27 min
2390
Maya Barzilai, “Golem: Modern Wars and Their Mo...
This episode of New Books in Jewish Studies features Maya Barzilai, Assistant Professor of Hebrew Literature and Jewish Culture at the University of Michigan and the author of Golem: Modern Wars and Their Monsters (New York University Press, 2016).
27 min
2391
Rebe Taylor, “Into the Heart of Tasmania: A Sea...
In her book, Into the Heart of Tasmania: A Search For Human Antiquity (Melbourne University Press, 2017), Rebe Taylor, the Coral Thomas Fellow at the State Library of New South Wales, explores the life of Ernest Westlake,
16 min
2392
Carrie Jenkins, “What Love is: And What it Coul...
Carrie Jenkins‘ new book is a model for what public philosophy can be. Beautifully written, thoughtful, and compellingly and carefully argued, What Love Is: And What it Could Be (Basic Books, 2017) invites us to think openly and critically about romant...
66 min
2393
S. Brent Plate ed., “Key Terms in Material Reli...
In recent years, several scholars of religion have moved away from the examination of discursive textual domains or the meaning of ritual practices towards analyzing the material worlds in which these practices and beliefs exists. S. Brent Plate,
48 min
2394
Eugene Raikhel, “Governing Habits: Treating Alc...
Alcoholism is a strange thing. That it exists, no one seriously doubts. But it’s not entirely clear (diagnostically speaking) what it is, who has it, how they get it, or how to treat it. The answers to these questions depend, apparently,
57 min
2395
Lisa Wade, “American Hookup: The New Culture of...
“Hookup” has become a buzzword, a misleading concept for students, parents and educators alike–one that confuses more than explains the nuances of this complex and pervasive trend. In American Hookup: The New Culture of Sex on Campus (W. W. Norton,
44 min
2396
Cristina Bicchieri, “Norms in the Wild: How to ...
Humans engage in a wide variety of collective behaviors, ranging from simple customs like wearing a heavy coat in winter to more complex group actions, as when an audience gives applause at the close of a musical performance.
56 min
2397
Richard Baxstrom and Todd Meyers, “Realizing th...
One of the most interesting, but largely overlooked silent films, is Haxan, written and directed by Benjamin Christensen. Using documentary methods as well as reenactments, he presented a study of witchcraft hysteria,
69 min
2398
Andrew Causey, “Drawn to See: Drawing as Ethnog...
In his new book Drawn to See: Drawing as an Ethnographic Method (University of Toronto Press, 2016) Andrew Causey argues that social science practitioners can cultivate new ways of experiencing the world through drawing.
54 min
2399
Yuval Harari, “Jewish Magic before the Rise of ...
Jewish Magic Before the Rise of Kabbalah (Wayne State University Press, 2017) opens new vistas not only on the history of the practice of magic throughout Jewish history, but on the variety and syncretistic depth of such practices.
35 min
2400
Melissa Chakars, “The Socialist Way of Life in ...
In The Socialist Way of Life in Siberia: Transformation in Buryatia (Central European University Press, 2014), Melissa Chakars reveals not only how Soviet policies disrupted traditional Buryat ways of life,
44 min