Best Simon Jacobson Podcasts (2024)

1
Why Are Our Leaders Failing Us 30:01

1d ago30:01

30:01

Let's talk about the state of leadership today. Our modern world is blessed in many ways. Unprecedented success and prosperity, breathtaking breakthroughs in science and medicine, revolutionary technology that is dramatically raising our standard of living. The list goes on. Yet we also face many profound challenges. Our society is deeply polarized…

1
The Last Generation, 30 Years Later | Rabbi Simon Jacobson | The Alef in Conversation 2 38:32

6d ago38:32

38:32

Join Rabbi Simon Jacobson on an insightful and emotional exploration on the contents of 'The Last Stand', what it means to live in the last generation of golus. The discussion touches upon contemporary question in connection to 30 years since Gimmel Tammuz and the relevance of the Rebbe's mission today. No question was off limits; no idea taboo. Ge…

1
Orientalism in Representations of Muslims: A Discussion with Laury Silvers 1:14:30

27m ago1:14:30

1:14:30

In this episode of Radio ReOrient we return to the literary theme of this season, to explore the work of Laury Silvers. Laury is the author of many successful book series set in the past and present of the Islamicate, including her Sufi Mysteries Quartet set in 10th Century Baghdad. In this interview she tells Saeed Khan and Salman Sayyid about her…

1
Helen Freear-Papio and Candyce Crew Leonard, "The Theatre of Twenty-First Century Spain" (Vernon Press, 2022) 54:17

1h ago54:17

54:17

The interview featured an in-depth dialogue about The Theatre of Twenty-First Century Spain (Vernon Press, 2022), a bilingual collection that examines contemporary Spanish theater and its exploration of identity, anxieties and social urgencies. The editors, Helen Freear-Papio and Candyce Crew Leonard, shared their backgrounds, interests in Spanish …

1
Yosefa Raz, "The Poetics of Prophecy: Modern Afterlives of a Biblical Tradition" (Cambridge UP, 2023) 1:15:56

1h ago1:15:56

1:15:56

Since the mid-1700s, poets and scholars have been deeply entangled in the project of reinventing prophecy. Moving between literary and biblical studies, Yosefa Raz's book The Poetics of Prophecy: Modern Afterlives of a Biblical Tradition (Cambridge UP, 2023) reveals how Romantic poetry is linked to modern biblical scholarship's development. On the …

1
Ep. 504: How Should We React to the Assassination Attempt on Former President Trump? 1:07:12

4h ago1:07:12

1:07:12

Rabbi Jacobson will discuss the following topics: Why is there so much upheaval and instability in the world today? Is it a result of us being in transition from golus to geulah? How did the Rebbe respond to the attempt against President Reagan in 1981? What does it teach us about the state of today’s society and education? Did the Rebbe embrace th…

1
Kristin J. Jacobson, "The American Adrenaline Narrative" (U Georgia Press, 2020) 57:56

1h ago57:56

57:56

By New Books Network

1
Huan Jin, "The Collapse of Heaven: The Taiping Civil War and Chinese Literature and Culture, 1850-1880" (Harvard UP, 2024) 1:08:36

5d ago1:08:36

1:08:36

The Collapse of Heaven: The Taiping Civil War and Chinese Literature and Culture, 1850-1880 (Harvard UP, 2024) investigates a long-neglected century in Chinese literature through the lens of the Taiping War (1851–1864), one of the most devastating civil wars in human history. With the war as the pivot, Huan Jin examines the manifold literary and cu…

1
Anri Yasuda, "Beauty Matters: Modern Japanese Literature and the Question of Aesthetics, 1890-1930" (Columbia UP, 2024) 39:44

6d ago39:44

39:44

The notion of beauty is inherently elusive: aesthetic judgments are at once subjective and felt to be universally valid. In Beauty Matters: Modern Japanese Literature and the Question of Aesthetics, 1890-1930 (Columbia UP, 2024), Anri Yasuda demonstrates that by exploring the often conflicting yet powerful pull of aesthetic sentiments, major author…

1
Joanne Leow, "Counter-Cartographies: Reading Singapore Otherwise" (Liverpool UP, 2024) 1:12:26

8d ago1:12:26

1:12:26

Counter-Cartographies: Reading Singapore Otherwise (Liverpool UP, 2024) draws from a body of Anglophone and multilingual cultural texts created in contemporary Singapore and in its diasporic communities. From banned documentaries to award-winning graphic novels, flash fiction collections to conceptual art, there is a vibrant, growing body of transm…

1
Ed Simon, "Devil's Contract: A History of the Faustian Bargain" (Melville House, 2024) 50:31

4d ago50:31

50:31

From ancient times to the modern world, the idea of the Faustian bargain—the exchange of one’s soul in return for untold riches and power—has exerted a magnetic pull upon our collective imaginations. In Devil's Contract: A History of the Faustian Bargain (Melville House, 2024), Dr. Ed Simon takes us on a historical tour of the Faustian bargain, fro…

1
Paige Reynolds, "Modernism in Irish Women's Contemporary Writing: The Stubborn Mode" (Oxford UP, 2023) 58:12

4d ago58:12

58:12

Paige Reynolds's book Modernism in Irish Women's Contemporary Writing: The Stubborn Mode (Oxford UP, 2023) examines the tangled relationship between contemporary Irish women writers and literary modernism. In the early decades of the twenty-first century, Irish women's fiction has drawn widespread critical acclaim and commercial success, with a sur…

1
Ep. 503: How Should We Approach the 30th Anniversary of Gimmel Tammuz? 1:06:07

5d ago1:06:07

1:06:07

MyLife Chassidus Applied: Where YOUR questions are answeredDonate now: https://mylife500.comFor recording visit the archive page or your favorite podcast carrier.Rabbi Jacobson will discuss the following topics: • What does Gimmel Tammuz teach us today? 0:55 • How should we approach the 30th anniversary of Gimmel Tammuz? 06:30 • What can we learn a…

1
Andrew S. Jacobs, "Gospel Thrillers: Conspiracy, Fiction, and the Vulnerable Bible" (Cambridge UP, 2023) 1:06:49

5d ago1:06:49

1:06:49

What if the original teachings of Jesus were different from the Bible's sanitized 'orthodox' version? What covert motivations might inspire those who decide what the text of the Bible 'says' or what it 'means'? For some who ask conspiratorial questions like these, the Bible is the vulnerable victim of secular forces seeking to divest the USA of its…

1
Russell Sandberg and Daniel Newman, "Law and Humanities" (Anthem Press, 2024) 1:40:15

6d ago1:40:15

1:40:15

In Law and Humanities (Anthem Press, 2024), Professor Russell Sandberg and Dr Daniel Newman provide an accessible introduction to the law and humanities. Each chapter explores the nature, development and possible further trajectory of a disciplinary ‘law and’ field, tackling a wide ranging series of topics as law and geography, law and history, law…

1
Ep. 502: How Should We React to the Israeli Court Ruling Forcing Haredim to Join the Army? 1:13:54

8d ago1:13:54

1:13:54

MyLife Chassidus Applied: Where YOUR questions are answeredDonate now: https://mylife500.comFor recording visit the archive page or your favorite podcast carrier.Rabbi Jacobson will discuss the following topics:What does this time period and Torah portion teach us today? • What do we learn from Chof Ches Sivan? 04:40 • Why does this day signify the…

1
Jeremy Black, "Defoe's Britain" (St. Augustine's Press, 2023) 24:15

8d ago24:15

24:15

The Weight of Words Series continues with Defoe's Britain (St. Augustine's Press, 2023), as historian Jeremy Black uses this writer to interpret Britain in the late 1600s, and likewise looks to the times to interpret the fiction. As seen in previous studies on Christie, Smollett, Fielding, and the Gothic novelists, Black tells the story of the stor…

1
Marsha Gordon, "Becoming the Ex-Wife: The Unconventional Life and Forgotten Writings of Ursula Parrott" (U California Press, 2024) 1:07:33

8d ago1:07:33

1:07:33

Credited with popularizing the label "ex-wife" in 1929, Ursula Parrott wrote provocatively about divorcées, career women, single mothers, work-life balance, and a host of new challenges facing modern women. Her best sellers, Hollywood film deals, marriages and divorces, and run-ins with the law made her a household name. Part biography, part cultur…

1
Aaron Sherraden, "Śambūka's Death Toll: A History of Motives and Motifs in an Evolving Rāmāyaṇa Narrative" (Anthem Press, 2023) 35:03

9d ago35:03

35:03

According to Vālmīki's Sanskrit Rāmāyaṇa (early centuries CE), Śambūka was practicing severe acts of austerity to enter heaven. In engaging in these acts as a Śūdra, Śambūka was in violation of class- and caste-based societal norms prescribed exclusively by the ruling and religious elite. Rāma, the hero of the Rāmāyaṇa epic, is dispatched to kill Ś…

1
Iris Mwanza, "The Lions' Den" (Graydon House, 2024) 40:21

9d ago40:21

40:21

A missing boy. A corrupt system. A case that could change everything... When young queer dancer Wilbess "Bessy" Mulenga is arrested by corrupt police, fresh-from-the-village rookie lawyer Grace Zulu takes up his cause in her first pro bono case. Presented with a freshly beaten client, Grace protests to the police and gets barred from accessing Bess…

1
What Does Independence and Freedom Mean to You 28:26

11d ago28:26

28:26

With July 4th, Independence Day, upon us, it's a good time to ask: What exactly is freedom and independence? What does it really mean? When the American Founding Fathers declared independence 248 years ago, it was straightforward. They felt the overbearing control of King George of Great Britain and that compelled them to throw off the shackles and…

1
Sonja Mejcher-Atassi, "An Impossible Friendship: Group Portrait, Jerusalem Before and After 1948" (Columbia UP, 2024) 53:34

14d ago53:34

53:34

In Jerusalem, as World War II was coming to an end, an extraordinary circle of friends began to meet at the bar of the King David Hotel. This group of aspiring artists, writers, and intellectuals—among them Wolfgang Hildesheimer, Jabra Ibrahim Jabra, Sally Kassab, Walid Khalidi, and Rasha Salam, some of whom would go on to become acclaimed authors,…

1
Christina M. García, "Corporeal Readings of Cuban Literature and Art: The Body, the Inhuman, and Ecological Thinking" (U Florida Press, 2024) 1:06:34

15d ago1:06:34

1:06:34

Christina M. García’s book, Corporeal Readings of Cuban Literature and Art: The Body, the Inhuman, and Ecological Thinking (University Press of Florida, 2024), looks at Cuban literature and art that challenge traditional assumptions about the body. García examines how writers and artists have depicted racial, gender, and species differences through…

1
Matthew Goldmark, "Forms of Relation: Composing Kinship in Colonial Spanish America" (U Virginia Press, 2023) 39:32

15d ago39:32

39:32

Drawing on literary texts, conversion manuals, and colonial correspondence from sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Spain and Peru, Forms of Relation: Composing Kinship in Colonial Spanish America (University of Virginia, 2023) shows the importance of textual, religious, and bureaucratic ties to struggles over colonial governance and identities. Dr.…

1
Joshua Schuster, "What Is Extinction?: A Natural and Cultural History of Last Animals" (Fordham UP, 2023) 57:11

15d ago57:11

57:11

Life on Earth is facing a mass extinction event of our own making. Human activity is changing the biology and the meaning of extinction. What Is Extinction?: A Natural and Cultural History of Last Animals (Fordham UP, 2023) examines several key moments that have come to define the terms of extinction over the past two centuries, exploring instances…

1
Reactive vs Proactive How to Train Yourself to Act, Not React 25:27

18d ago25:27

25:27

Are you reactive or proactive? Most of us tend to be more reactive, and there are several reasons for this. Firstly, we start our lives as children reacting to our parents—their attitudes, smiles, approval, and disapproval and we mirror their behavior. Secondly, as we grow older, we seek acceptance from our peers, friends, and society. This often l…

1
Jin Feng, "The Transpacific Flow: Creative Writing Programs in China" (Association for Asian Studies, 2024) 39:42

21d ago39:42

39:42

In 2009, Fudan University launched China’s first MFA program in creative writing, spurring a wave of such programs in Chinese universities. Many of these programs’ founding members point to the Iowa Writers Workshop and, specifically, its International Writers Program, which invited dozens of Mainland Chinese writers to take part between 1979 and 2…

1
Jerry Rafiki Jenkins, "Anti-Blackness and Human Monstrosity in Black American Horror Fiction" (Ohio State UP, 2024) 47:08

18d ago47:08

47:08

In Anti-Blackness and Human Monstrosity in Black American Horror Fiction (Ohio State UP, 2024), Jerry Rafiki Jenkins examines four types of human monsters that frequently appear in Black American horror fiction--the monsters of White rage, respectability, not-ness, and serial killing. Arguing that such monsters represent specific ideologies of Amer…

1
Ricardo Quintana-Vallejo, "Growing Up in the Gutter: Diaspora and Comics" (U Arizona Press, 2024) 52:31

18d ago52:31

52:31

Growing Up in the Gutter: Diaspora and Comics (U Arizona Press, 2024) by Dr. Ricardo Quintana-Vallejo offers new understandings of contemporary graphic coming-of-age narratives by looking at the genre’s growth in stories by and for young BIPOC, LGBTQ+, and diasporic readers. Through a careful examination of the genre, Dr. Quintana-Vallejo analyses …

1
Ep. 501: Are Our Prayers Helping Free the Hostages and Win the War in Gaza? 56:57

19d ago56:57

56:57

Rabbi Jacobson will discuss the following topics: What does this time period and Torah portion teach us today? How do we apply the journey of the Jewish people in the wilderness toward the Promised Land to our life journey? What do we learn from the sin of the scouts about facing the challenges in our life’s journeys? What can we do during today's …

1
Keja L. Valens, "Culinary Colonialism, Caribbean Cookbooks, and Recipes for National Independence" (Rutgers UP, 2024) 1:04:40

21d ago1:04:40

1:04:40

Women across the Caribbean have been writing, reading, and exchanging cookbooks since at least the turn of the nineteenth century. These cookbooks are about much more than cooking. Through cookbooks, Caribbean women, and a few men, have shaped, embedded, and contested colonial and domestic orders, delineated the contours of independent national cul…

1
Stephanie DeGooyer, "Before Borders: A Legal and Literary History of Naturalization" (Johns Hopkins UP, 2022) 49:26

21d ago49:26

49:26

How can the novel be a way to understand the development of nation-state borders? An important work in the intersections of law, literature, history, and migration, Stephanie DeGooyer's Before Borders: A Legal and Literary History of Naturalization (Johns Hopkins UP, 2022) offers fascinating insight into understanding naturalization. Tracing the id…

1
Christianity and the Transformation of the Book: A Lecture by Anthony Grafton 42:27

21d ago42:27

42:27

Anthony Grafton is the Henry Putnam University Professor of History at Princeton, where he has taught since 1975. He is an historian of early modern Europe, and the author and co-author of over a dozen books, including The Footnote: A Curious History (Harvard University Press, 1997), and Inky Fingers: The Making of Books in Early Modern Europe (Har…

1
Malcolm Schofield, "How Plato Writes: Perspectives and Problems" (Cambridge UP, 2023) 1:03:26

22d ago1:03:26

1:03:26

Plato is a philosophical writer of unusual and ingenious versatility. His works engage in argument but are also full of allegory, imagery, myth, paradox and intertextuality. He astutely characterises the participants whom he portrays in conversation. Sometimes he composes fictive dialogues in dramatic form while at other times he does so as narrati…

1
Escape Velocity: Sarah Manguso in Conversation with Tess McNulty (EH) 50:01

23d ago50:01

50:01

What’s the truth and what’s a lie? What’s a memoir, what’s a novel, and what if both are just a series of “prose blocks”? This conversation between Sarah Manguso and Tess McNulty takes up questions of writing and veracity, trauma and memory. Sarah Manguso is the author of nine books, including three memoirs. Her first novel, Very Cold People, was n…

1
Suganya Anandakichenin, "For My Blemishless Lord: Commentaries on Tiruppāṇāḻvār's Amalaṉ Āti Pirāṉ" (de Gruyter, 2023) 35:03

27d ago35:03

35:03

For My Blemishless Lord (de Gruyter, 2023) presents the text and translation of the exquisite poem Amalaṉ Āti Pirāṉ by Tiruppāṇ Āḻvār, which is part of the Śrīvaiṣṇava canon, the Nālāyira Divya Prabandham (6th- 9thcenturies CE), as well as of the three Śrīvaiṣṇava commentaries in Tamil-Sanskrit Manipravala (13th- 14th centuries) by key figures in t…

1
Real Men Do Cry 30:46

29d ago30:46

30:46

Do Real Men Cry? There's a pervasive myth that real men don't cry, implying that tears are reserved for women. This notion is not only demeaning, suggesting women are emotional and weak while men are tough and stoic, but it's also untrue. Is vulnerability a weakness? Is expressing emotions wrong? Where did this stereotype originate, and why does ou…

1
Ep. 500: How Should We React to the Rescue of the Four Hostages? 1:02:16

27d ago1:02:16

1:02:16

Rabbi Jacobson will discuss the following topics: MyLife: Chassidus Applied Episode 500 Tribute to Rabbi Moshe Kotlarsky a”h How should we react to the rescue of the four hostages? What happened on this day 3336 years ago? Why is it important for us to honor it? What is Torah? What is Torah from G-d's perspective? Why was the Torah not given at the…

1
Chloe Wigston Smith, "Novels, Needleworks, and Empire: Material Entanglements in the Eighteenth-Century Atlantic World" (Yale UP, 2024) 51:22

1M ago51:22

51:22

In the eighteenth century, women’s contributions to empire took fewer official forms than those collected in state archives. Their traces were recorded in material ways, through the ink they applied to paper or the artefacts they created with muslin, silk threads, feathers, and shells. Handiwork, such as sewing, knitting, embroidery, and other craf…

1
Kimberly King Parsons, "We Were the Universe" (Knopf, 2024) 37:33

1M ago37:33

37:33

The trip was supposed to be fun. When Kit's best friend gets dumped by his boyfriend, he begs her to ditch her family responsibilities for an idyllic weekend in the Montana mountains. They'll soak in hot springs, then sneak a vape into a dive bar and drink too much, like old times. Instead, their getaway only reminds Kit of everything she's lost la…

1
Shakespeare Through Islamic Worlds 1:03:52

1M ago1:03:52

1:03:52

Radio ReOrient is back for another season, and this time Hizer Mir is joined by a new team of hosts: Claudia Radiven, Saeed Khan and Chella Ward. In this first episode Hizer and Chella interview Ambereen Dadabhoy, associate professor of literature at Harvey Mudd College, about her brand new book Shakespeare through Islamic Worlds (Routledge, 2024).…

1
Adrienne Brown, "The Residential Is Racial: A Perceptual History of Mass Homeownership" (Stanford UP, 2024) 1:01:52

1M ago1:01:52

1:01:52

Housing experts and activists have long described the foundational role race has played in the creation of mass homeownership. This book insistently tracks the inverse: the role of mass homeownership in changing the definition, perception, and value of race. In The Residential Is Racial: A Perceptual History of Mass Homeownership (Stanford Universi…

1
Machine, System, Code: Masande Ntshanga and Magalí Armillas-Tiseyra (EH) 50:15

1M ago50:15

50:15

Building parallels between technology and the human imagination, Masande Ntshanga’s conversation with Magalí Armillas-Tiseyra explains how cities are like machines and how South African history resembles some of the most sinister versions of techno-futurism. Masande is the author of two novels: The Reactive, winner of a Betty Trask Award in 2018, a…

1
Sinai’s Message to Jews, Christians and Muslims. 3336 Years Later 40:39

1M ago40:39

40:39

With war continuing to rage in the Middle East, it would be wise to go back and trace the roots of this war and the long-standing antipathy and confrontation between the Muslims, Arabs, Jews and even Christians. We all know this isn't the first time that fighting has broken out in the region; there is unfortunately an ongoing history of deep tensio…

1
Mattan Torah Through the Lens of Chassidus 48:09

1M ago48:09

48:09

Mattan Torah Through the Lens of ChassidusWatch on YouTube: youtu.be/yF2x2JN4y0IBrought to you by: Shiurim.netContact us for all your podcast needs: podcast@shiurim.netBy Rabbi Simon Jacobson

1
Ep. 499: Should We Be Concerned That America Will Turn Against Jews? 1:03:17

1M ago1:03:17

1:03:17

Rabbi Jacobson will discuss the following topics: MyLife 500 campaign What assets and resources do we have to face life’s challenges? The power of Torah and Chassidus Transition from Iyar to Sivan Rosh Chodesh Sivan: Like one man, with one heart Bamidbar Bechukosei Omer Should we be concerned that America will turn against Jews, and begin planning …

1
Amrita Ghosh, "Kashmir's Necropolis: Literary, Cultural, and Visual Texts" (Lexington Books, 2023) 52:23

1M ago52:23

52:23

Amrita Ghosh's book Kashmir's Necropolis: Literary, Cultural, and Visual Texts (Lexington Books, 2023) is an interdisciplinary book that studies literary texts, film, photography, and art to understand the different forms of violence represented in the cultural productions from and on Kashmir. The author argues that selected texts present how the l…

1
Benjamin Balint, "Kafka's Last Trial: The Case of a Literary Legacy" (Norton, 2019) 41:00

1M ago41:00

41:00

When Franz Kafka died in 1924, his loyal friend Max Brod could not bring himself to fulfill Kafka’s last instruction: to burn his remaining manuscripts. Instead, Brod devoted his life to championing Kafka’s work, rescuing his legacy from both obscurity and physical destruction. Nearly a century later, an international legal battle erupted to determ…

1
Robert Cochran, "Haunted Man's Report: Reading Charles Portis" (U Arkansas Press, 2024) 1:14:45

1M ago1:14:45

1:14:45

Robert Cochran’s Haunted Man's Report: Reading Charles Portis (U Arkansas Press, 2024) is a pioneering study of the novels and other writings of Arkansan Charles Portis (1933–2020), best known for the novel True Grit and its film adaptations. Hailed by one critic as “the author of classics on the order of a twentieth-century Mark Twain” and as Amer…

1
Thersa Matsuura, "The Book of Japanese Folklore: An Encyclopedia of the Spirits, Monsters, and Yokai of Japanese Myth" (Adams Media, 2024) 30:36

1M ago30:36

30:36

Discover everything you’ve ever wondered about the legendary spirits, creatures, and figures of Japanese folklore including how they have found their way into every corner of our pop culture from the creator of the podcast Uncanny Japan. Welcome to The Book of Japanese Folklore: An Encyclopedia of the Spirits, Monsters, and Yokai of Japanese Myth (…

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