Over the course of the Almoravid (1040–1147) and Almohad (1121–1269) dynasties, mediaeval Marrakesh evolved from an informal military encampment into a thriving metropolis that attempted to translate a local and distinctly rural past into a broad, imperial architectural vernacular. In Marrakesh and the Mountains: Landscape, Urban Planning, and Iden…

Women, Agency, and the State in Guinea: Silent Politics (Routledge, 2020) examines how women in Guinea articulate themselves politically within and outside institutional politics. It documents the everyday practices that local female actors adopt to deal with the continuous economic, political, and social insecurities that emerge in times of politi…

Well into the early nineteenth century, Luanda, the administrative capital of Portuguese Angola, was one of the most influential ports for the transatlantic slave trade. Between 1801 and 1850, it served as the point of embarkation for more than 535,000 enslaved Africans. In the history of this diverse, wealthy city, the gendered dynamics of the mer…

Each year, thousands of youth endure harrowing unaccompanied and undocumented migrations across Central America and Mexico to the United States in pursuit of a better future. Drawing on the firsthand narratives of migrant youth in Los Angeles, California to produce Sin Padres, Ni Papeles: Unaccompanied Migrant Youth Coming of Age in the United Stat…

Women, Agency, and the State in Guinea: Silent Politics (Routledge, 2020) examines how women in Guinea articulate themselves politically within and outside institutional politics. It documents the everyday practices that local female actors adopt to deal with the continuous economic, political, and social insecurities that emerge in times of politi…

Each year, thousands of youth endure harrowing unaccompanied and undocumented migrations across Central America and Mexico to the United States in pursuit of a better future. Drawing on the firsthand narratives of migrant youth in Los Angeles, California to produce Sin Padres, Ni Papeles: Unaccompanied Migrant Youth Coming of Age in the United Stat…

In Litigating the Environment: Process and Procedure Before International Courts and Tribunals (Edward Elgar, 2023), Dr Justine Bendel scrutinises how international courts and tribunals may respond procedurally to an ever-growing list of environmental disputes. In a time of environmental crisis, she lays crucial groundwork for strengthening the app…

In the lead-up to every election cycle, pundits predict that Latino Americans will overwhelmingly vote in favor of the Democratic candidate. And it’s true—Latino voters do tilt Democratic. Hillary Clinton won the Latino vote in a “landslide,” Barack Obama “crushed” Mitt Romney among Latino voters in his reelection, and, four years earlier, the Demo…

Well into the early nineteenth century, Luanda, the administrative capital of Portuguese Angola, was one of the most influential ports for the transatlantic slave trade. Between 1801 and 1850, it served as the point of embarkation for more than 535,000 enslaved Africans. In the history of this diverse, wealthy city, the gendered dynamics of the mer…

Women, Agency, and the State in Guinea: Silent Politics (Routledge, 2020) examines how women in Guinea articulate themselves politically within and outside institutional politics. It documents the everyday practices that local female actors adopt to deal with the continuous economic, political, and social insecurities that emerge in times of politi…

The specter of the “Godless” Soviet Union haunted the United States and continental Western Europe throughout the Cold War, but what did atheism mean in the Soviet Union? What was its relationship with religion? In her new book, A Sacred Space Is Never Empty: A History of Soviet Atheism, Dr. Victoria Smolkin explores how the Soviet state defined an…

Over two million Americans are currently in prison or jail. Another 4.5 million are on probation or parole. And nearly one in two Americans have a family member who is or has been incarcerated. Writing for those new to activism as well as seasoned organizers, celebrated criminal justice activist Raj Jayadev introduces readers to the groundbreaking …

In Normporn: Queer Viewers and the TV That Soothes Us (NYU Press, 2023), Karen Tongson presents an irreverent look at the love-hate relationship between queer viewers and mainstream family TV shows like Gilmore Girls and This Is Us. After personal loss, political upheaval, and the devastation of the COVID-19 pandemic, many of us craved a return to …

In The Countercultural Victory of 1 John in Greco-Roman Context: Conquering the World (T&T Clark, 2023), Ahreum Kim re-examines conquering language in 1 John, arguing that when the letter is read with the context of Greco-Roman culture in mind, the conflict extends beyond in-fighting within the Johannine community. She suggests that the letter's au…

The Tiwi people have more than their fair share of stories that turn ideas of Australian history upside down. The Tiwi claim the honour of defeating a global superpower. When the world’s most powerful navy invaded and attempted to settle the Tiwi Islands in 1824, Tiwi warriors fought the British and won. The Tiwi remember the fight, and oral histor…

Russian Orientalism in a Global Context: Hybridity, Encounter, and Representation, 1740-1940 (Manchester UP, 2023) features new research on Russia's historic relationship with Asia and the ways it was mediated and represented in the fine, decorative and performing arts and architecture from the mid-eighteenth century to the first two decades of Sov…

A vibrant urban settlement from mediaeval times and the royal seat of the Safavid dynasty, the city of Isfahan emerged as a great metropolis during the seventeenth century. Using key sources, Isfahan: Architecture and Urban Experience in Early Modern Iran (Penn State University Press, 2024) reconstructs the spaces and senses of this dynamic city. F…

A vibrant urban settlement from mediaeval times and the royal seat of the Safavid dynasty, the city of Isfahan emerged as a great metropolis during the seventeenth century. Using key sources, Isfahan: Architecture and Urban Experience in Early Modern Iran (Penn State University Press, 2024) reconstructs the spaces and senses of this dynamic city. F…

A vibrant urban settlement from mediaeval times and the royal seat of the Safavid dynasty, the city of Isfahan emerged as a great metropolis during the seventeenth century. Using key sources, Isfahan: Architecture and Urban Experience in Early Modern Iran (Penn State University Press, 2024) reconstructs the spaces and senses of this dynamic city. F…

A vibrant urban settlement from mediaeval times and the royal seat of the Safavid dynasty, the city of Isfahan emerged as a great metropolis during the seventeenth century. Using key sources, Isfahan: Architecture and Urban Experience in Early Modern Iran (Penn State University Press, 2024) reconstructs the spaces and senses of this dynamic city. F…

Amid the bloody Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2021 and the escalating tensions across the Taiwan Strait, the geopolitical balance of power has changed significantly in a very short period. If current trends continue, we may be witnessing a tectonic realignment unseen in more than a century. In 1904, Halford Mackinder delivered a seminal lecture en…

In this podcast, Ashis Roy (Psychoanalyst (IPA) and author of the recently published book Intimacy in Alienation: A Psychoanalytic Study of Hindu-Muslim Relationships (Yoda Press, 2024) is in conversation with Dhwani Shah, MD. Shah is a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst currently practicing in Princeton, NJ. He is a clinical associate faculty member i…

In our pursuit of efficiency in the lower criminal courts, have we lost sight of quality justice? Through the critical examination of original stenographic data, Over-Efficiency in the Lower Criminal Courts: Understanding a Key Problem and How to Fix it (Policy Press, 2024) by Dr. Shaun Yates demonstrates how an English Magistrates' courthouse ofte…

Christie Hodgen is the author of four books of fiction, most recently the novel Boy Meets Girl, which won the 2020 AWP Award for the Novel. Her short fiction and essays have been included in dozens of literary journals and have won two Pushcart Prizes. She teaches in the MFA program at the University of Missouri-Kansas City and is the editor of New…

Territory is one of the central political concepts of the modern world and, indeed, functions as the primary way the world is divided and controlled politically. Yet territory has not received the critical attention afforded to other crucial concepts such as sovereignty, rights, and justice. While territory continues to matter politically, and terr…

How do micro-interactions of resistance, fighting and dialogue shape larger patterns of peace and conflict? How can nonviolent resistance, conflict transformation and diplomacy be analysed in micro-detail? Exploring these questions in The Micro-Sociology of Peace and Conflict (Cambridge University Press, 2023), Dr. Isabel Bramsen introduces micro-s…

Despite Haiti's proximity to the United States, and its considerable importance to our own history, Haiti barely registered in the historic consciousness of most Americans until recently. Those who struggled to understand Haiti's suffering in the earthquake of 2010 often spoke of it as the poorest country in the Western hemisphere, but could not ex…

Territory is one of the central political concepts of the modern world and, indeed, functions as the primary way the world is divided and controlled politically. Yet territory has not received the critical attention afforded to other crucial concepts such as sovereignty, rights, and justice. While territory continues to matter politically, and terr…

What does it take to become a teacher today and how does one become a teacher? Theodore G. Zervas's book With Grit and a Big Heart: A Beginners Guide to Teaching (Rowman and Littlefield, 2022) covers the ins and outs on becoming a teacher from receiving a teaching license, working with students, colleagues, and parents, and confronting some of the …

Amid the bloody Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2021 and the escalating tensions across the Taiwan Strait, the geopolitical balance of power has changed significantly in a very short period. If current trends continue, we may be witnessing a tectonic realignment unseen in more than a century. In 1904, Halford Mackinder delivered a seminal lecture en…

Often assumed to be a self-evident good, Open Access has been subject to growing criticism for perpetuating global inequities and epistemic injustices. it has been seen as imposing exploitative business and publishing models and as exacerbating exclusionary research evaluation culture and practices. Achieving Global Open Access: The Need for Scient…

In recent years, companies have felt the pressure to be transparent about their environmental impact. Large documents containing summaries of yearly emissions rates, carbon output, and utilized resources are shared on companies’ social media pages, websites, and employee briefings in a bid for public confidence in corporate responsibility. And yet,…

Over the course of the Almoravid (1040–1147) and Almohad (1121–1269) dynasties, mediaeval Marrakesh evolved from an informal military encampment into a thriving metropolis that attempted to translate a local and distinctly rural past into a broad, imperial architectural vernacular. In Marrakesh and the Mountains: Landscape, Urban Planning, and Iden…

Non-profit organizations play an indispensable role in the world today, and are consistently rated higher than governments, the media or businesses in term of public trust. Yet many non-profit organizations suffer from dysfunction. New non-profit leaders find themselves unprepared for the challenges ahead, and even seasoned leaders often struggle t…

Political Scientist Heath Brown’s new book, Roadblocked: Joe Biden's Rocky Transition to the Presidency (UP of Kansas, 2024), examines the presidential transition between the Trump Administration and the Biden Administration in late 2020 and into 2021. Presidential transitions are not all that frequent, since presidents who are re-elected do not ne…

This is part #2 of a the (ir)Rational Alaskans, a Cited Podcast series that re-examines the legacy of the Exxon Valdez oil spill. Last episode, the spill devastates Cordova, Alaska. In this second part, 12 Angry Alaskans, a jury of ordinary Alaskans picks up our story. They muddle through the most devastating, and most complicated, environmental di…

Over the course of the Almoravid (1040–1147) and Almohad (1121–1269) dynasties, mediaeval Marrakesh evolved from an informal military encampment into a thriving metropolis that attempted to translate a local and distinctly rural past into a broad, imperial architectural vernacular. In Marrakesh and the Mountains: Landscape, Urban Planning, and Iden…

A sweeping account of how small wars shaped global order in the age of empires. Imperial conquest and colonization depended on pervasive raiding, slaving, and plunder. European empires amassed global power by asserting a right to use unilateral force at their discretion. They Called It Peace: Worlds of Imperial Violence (Princeton UP, 2024) is a pa…

Over the course of the Almoravid (1040–1147) and Almohad (1121–1269) dynasties, mediaeval Marrakesh evolved from an informal military encampment into a thriving metropolis that attempted to translate a local and distinctly rural past into a broad, imperial architectural vernacular. In Marrakesh and the Mountains: Landscape, Urban Planning, and Iden…

Lesley Smith of Oxford University joins Jana Byars to talk about her new book, Fragments of a World: William of Auvergne and His Medieval Life (University of Chicago Press, 2023). It has been 140 years since a full biography of William of Auvergne (1180?-1249), which may come as a surprise, given that William was an important gateway of Greek and A…

Queer Obscenity: Erotic Archives in Dictatorial Spain (Stanford University Press, 2024) takes us inside the archive to demonstrate how the incongruities of the Primo de Rivera (1923–1930) and Franco (1939–1975) regimes were manifested in the regulation of erotic material cultures. Focusing on amateur pornographers and their confiscated and censored…

Over the course of the Almoravid (1040–1147) and Almohad (1121–1269) dynasties, mediaeval Marrakesh evolved from an informal military encampment into a thriving metropolis that attempted to translate a local and distinctly rural past into a broad, imperial architectural vernacular. In Marrakesh and the Mountains: Landscape, Urban Planning, and Iden…

It's November 3, 1957. As Sputnik 2 launches into space, carrying Laika, the doomed Soviet dog, a couple begin their day. Virgil Beckett, an insurance salesman, isn't particularly happy in his job but he fulfills the role. Kathleen Beckett, once a promising tennis champion with a key shot up her sleeve, is now a mother and homemaker. On this unseas…