Bill Connolly’s new book proposes a way to think about the world as a gathering of self-organizing systems or ecologies, and from there explores the ramifications and possibilities of this notion for how we think about and practice work with markets, politics, daily life, and beyond. It is wonderfully inspiring, and you can listen to us talking about it here. Continue reading The Fragility of Things: An Interview
David Livingstone’s new book traces the processes by which communities of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries that shared the same Scottish Calvinist heritage engaged with Darwin and Darwinians in different local contexts. This wonderful book locates evolutionary debates in particular sites and situations as a way of understanding the history of science in terms of “geographies of reading” and “speech spaces,” and you can listen to our … Continue reading Dealing with Darwin: An Interview
Tine Gammeltoft’s new book explores the process of reproductive decision making in contemporary Hanoi. Haunting Images develops an anthropology of belonging, paying special attention to the ways that women and their communities understand and make decisions based on ultrasound imaging technologies. You can listen to our conversation about the book here. Continue reading Haunting Images: An Interview
Steve Platt’s recent book is a beautifully written and intricately textured account of the Taiping Civil War, the bloodiest civil war of all time. Autumn in the Heavenly Kingdom situates the story of modern China within a broader, global history of civil war in the US and beyond, and you can listen to our conversation about it here. Continue reading Autumn in the Heavenly Kingdom: An Interview
Jay Carter’s new book follows the life of one man as a way of opening a window into the lived history of twentieth-century China, yet it is less a traditional biography than a life of an emergent modern nation as told through the experiences of a single individual whose relationships embodied the history of that nation in flesh, bones, and blood. You can listen to our … Continue reading Heart of Buddha, Heart of China: An Interview
Wensheng Wang’s new book takes us into a key turning point in the history of the Qing empire, the Qianlong-Jiaqing reign periods. Wang’s book aims to transform how we understand this crucial period in light of the eruption of major social and political crises and the consequences of imperial response to those crises for Qing and world history, and you can listen to our conversation about it here. Continue reading White Lotus Rebels and South China Pirates: An Interview
Jane Maienschein’s great new book traces the history of transformations in the observation and observability of the earliest stages of developing life. Embryos Under the Microscope is equally suited to both academic historians and a broader interested public, carefully curating the elements of the narrative such that they collectively inform broader debates over embryo-related policy in the contemporary United States. You can find our conversation about it here. Continue reading Embryos Under the Microscope: An Interview
Elizabeth Lunbeck’s wonderful new book offers a fascinating account of the entwined histories of narcissism, psychoanalysis, and modernity in 20th and 21st century America. You can find our conversation about it here. Continue reading The Americanization of Narcissism: An Interview
Craig Clunas’s new book is a wonderfully and productively revisionist account of Ming history and its artifacts. Screen of Kings emphasizes the importance of members of the Ming imperial clan (i.e., those who were NOT emperors) and their courts as sites of cultural innovation, production, and reproduction, and of Ming kings as producers, collectors, and patrons of the arts. You can listen to our conversation about it here. Continue reading Screen of Kings: An Interview
Fabio Lanza and I recently spoke about his thoughtful and inspiring new book on space, politics, and the emergence of “students” as a category in twentieth-century China. You can listen to our conversation here. Continue reading Behind the Gate: An Interview
Carla Nappi 