Tag: Podcast

Podcasts

The Art of Being Governed: An Interview

At the heart of Michael Szonyi’s new book are two questions: 1) How did ordinary people in the Ming deal with their obligations to provide manpower to the army?, and 2) What were the broader consequences of their behavior?” The Art of Being Governed: Everyday Politics in Late Imperial China (Princeton University Press, 2017) considers how military institutions shaped the lives of ordinary people on China’s southeast coast … Continue reading The Art of Being Governed: An Interview

Carla Nappi
Podcasts

Curating Revolution: An Interview

“In Mao’s China, to curate revolution was to make it material.” Denise Y. Ho’s new book explores this premise in a masterful account of exhibitionary culture in the Mao period (1949-1976) and beyond. Curating Revolution: Politics on Display in Mao’s China (Cambridge University Press, 2017) argues that “curating revolution taught people how to take part in revolution,” and it develops that argument in a series of case studies … Continue reading Curating Revolution: An Interview

Carla Nappi
Podcasts

The Pidgin Warrior: An Interview

“Big boys, the story in this little book is told for you.” Thus begins the preface to Zhang Tianyi’s The Pidgin Warrior (Balestier Press, 2017), as translated by the wonderful David Hull. Not just for boys (big or small), The Pidgin Warrior is a moving, hilarious novel set in 1930s Shanghai during wartime. Hull’s translation is a sensitive and humane rendering of characters that are by turns laughable and … Continue reading The Pidgin Warrior: An Interview

Carla Nappi
Podcasts

Textures of Mourning: An Interview

Reginald Jackson’s inspiring new book takes a transdisciplinary approach to rethinking how we read, how we pay attention, and why that matters deeply in shaping how we understand the past, live in the present, and imagine possible futures. Textures of Mourning: Calligraphy, Mortality, and The Tale of Genji Scrolls (University of Michigan Press, 2018) explores the relationship between reading, dying, and mourning across three central texts: the Heian … Continue reading Textures of Mourning: An Interview

Carla Nappi
Podcasts

Face/On: An Interview

Sharrona Pearl’s new book is an absolute pleasure to read. Face/On: Face Transplants and the Ethics of the Other (The University of Chicago Press, 2017) looks closely at facial allotransplantations, commonly known as face transplants, in order to offer a careful and fascinating study of the stakes for changing the face, and the changing stakes for the face. Troubling the indexical relationship between the face and … Continue reading Face/On: An Interview

Carla Nappi
Podcasts

A World Trimmed with Fur: An Interview

Jonathan Schlesinger’s new book makes a compelling case for the significance of Manchu and Mongolian sources and archival sources in particular in telling the story of the Qing empire and the invention of nature in its borderlands. A World Trimmed with Fur: Wild Things, Pristine Places, and the Natural Fringes of Qing Rule (Stanford University Press, 2017) traces the history of Qing nature and its environments … Continue reading A World Trimmed with Fur: An Interview

Carla Nappi
Podcasts

The Edge of Knowing: An Interview

Roy Bing Chan’s new book explores twentieth-century Chinese literature that emphasizes sleeping and dreaming as a way to reckon with the trauma of modernity, from the early May Fourth period through the end of the Cultural Revolution in the late 1970s. Informed by theoretical engagements with Russian Formalism, semiotics, psychoanalysis, Marxism, affect studies, and more, The Edge of Knowing: Dreams, History, and Realism in Modern Chinese … Continue reading The Edge of Knowing: An Interview

Carla Nappi
Podcasts

Placing Outer Space: An Interview

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 understand outer space, but also for how we understand the Earth and ourselves. Based on 15 months of participant observation in 2009 and 2010 … Continue reading Placing Outer Space: An Interview

Carla Nappi
Podcasts

The Intellectual in Modern Chinese History: An Interview

In The Intellectual in Modern Chinese History (Cambridge University Press, 2015), Timothy Cheek offers a magisterial intellectual history of modern China that maps the changing terrain of intellectual life over a century so that the reader can place a particular figure, idea, or debate sensibly, helping the reader track different times, social worlds, and key concepts. It’s a wonderful book for readers of all sorts, and you … Continue reading The Intellectual in Modern Chinese History: An Interview

Carla Nappi