Best Alan Berg Podcasts (2024)

1
Anthony P. Stone, "Hindu Astrology: Myths, Symbols, and Realities" (Pippa Rann Books, 2023) 37:16

7m ago37:16

37:16

Does Hindu astrology work? If so, why? When does it not work? Why? Where and how did Hindu astrology arise and develop? What are its similarities with other astrological systems? These are among the unusual and fascinating questions tackled by an Oxford mathematician, Dr. A. P. Stone, who learned Sanskrit specifically for the purpose. Analyzing var…

1
A Hidden Life (with Brian Zahnd) 1:07:35

7m ago1:07:35

1:07:35

What would you do in the place of Austrian farmer Franz Jägerstätter in 1943? Mumble your loyalty oath to Hitler like everyone else—or refuse and pay with your life? This martyr is a blessed in the Catholic Church and on the way to being canonized. He is also the subject of a transcendentally beautiful movie A Hidden life by Terrence Mallick in 201…

1
Claudio Lomnitz, "Sovereignty and Extortion: A New State Form in Mexico" (Duke UP, 2024) 1:53:14

7m ago1:53:14

1:53:14

Over the past fifteen years in Mexico, more than 450,000 people have been murdered and 110,000 more have been disappeared. In Sovereignty and Extortion: A New State Form in Mexico (Duke UP, 2024), Claudio Lomnitz examines the Mexican state in relation to this extreme violence, uncovering a reality that challenges the familiar narratives of “a war o…

1
Anthony Abraham Jack, "Class Dismissed: When Colleges Ignore Inequality and Students Pay the Price" (Princeton UP, 2024) 32:46

7m ago32:46

32:46

Elite colleges are boasting unprecedented numbers with respect to diversity, with some schools admitting their first majority-minority classes. But when the twin pandemics of COVID-19 and racial unrest gripped the world, schools scrambled to figure out what to do with the diversity they so fervently recruited. And disadvantaged students suffered. C…

1
Justine Chambers, "Pursuing Morality: Buddhism and Everyday Ethics in Southeastern Myanmar" (NUS Press, 2024) 48:07

7m ago48:07

48:07

What is the right way to live? This is an old question in Western moral philosophy, but in recent years anthropologists have turned their attention to this question in what has been called, a “moral turn”. In this original ethnographic study, Pursuing Morality: Buddhism and Everyday Ethics in Southeastern Myanmar (NUS Press, 2024), Justine Chambers…

1
Decoloniality 41:16

7m ago41:16

41:16

This episode is the third one this series where we look back over the first principles of the ReOrient project. In previous episodes we have discussed post-orientalism and post-positivism, here we turn to decoloniality. Discussions of decoloniality have become increasingly mainstream since the ‘Decolonise the Curriculum’ and ‘Rhodes Must Fall’ move…

1
Zvi Schreiber, "Money, Going Out of Style: The Story of Money and the Mystery of Its Decline" (2021) 29:21

7m ago29:21

29:21

What is money? Why are trillions of dollars, euros, pounds, and yen being printed, but not spent, and what does this reveal about the state of our society? Money, as we know it, was born in 1971 when currencies unlinked from gold. During its adolescence, money was hyperactive, causing rampant inflation. Three decades of mature growth followed. But …

1
"Grace" and "Calmness" in Va'etchanan 41:56

7m ago41:56

41:56

Modya and David are joined this week by Ruth Schapira (about whose work you can learn more at innerjudaism.com) to look at the role of grace and calmness within this week's Torah portion. Together, they focus on the value of gentle words in Moses' plea to be allowed to enter the land, and how a calm orientation is necessary to navigate difficult co…

1
He/She/They: How We Talk About Gender and Why It Matters 55:32

8h ago55:32

55:32

Schuyler Bailar didn’t set out to be an activist, but his very public transition to the Harvard men’s swim team put him in the spotlight. His choice to be open about his journey and share his experience has evolved into tireless advocacy for inclusion and collective liberation. Today’s book is: He/She/They: How We Talk About Gender and Why it Matte…

1
Policing and White Power with Daniel Kryder and David Cunningham (JP, EF) 39:35

7m ago39:35

39:35

This June 2020 episode, originally part of a Global Policing series, was Recall this Book's first exploration of police brutality, systemic and personal racism and Black Lives Matter. Elizabeth and John were lucky to be joined by Daniel Kryder and David Cunningham, two scholars who have worked on these questions for decades. Many of the mechanisms …

1
Shaul Magid, "Meir Kahane: The Public Life and Political Thought of an American Jewish Radical" (Princeton UP, 2021) 1:04:11

7m ago1:04:11

1:04:11

Rabbi Meir Kahane came of age amid the radical politics of the counterculture, becoming a militant voice of protest against Jewish liberalism. Kahane founded the Jewish Defense League in 1968, declaring that Jews must protect themselves by any means necessary. He immigrated to Israel in 1971, where he founded KACH, an ultranationalist and racist po…

1
#846 The Secrets to Restoring Your Metabolism & Increasing Longevity with Ben Azadi 1:09:36

2h ago1:09:36

1:09:36

In this episode, host Ben Azadi, bestselling author of "Keto Flex," shares insights from his lecture at the Keto Orlando Summit 2024. He emphasizes the importance of restoring metabolism and addressing metabolic diseases by understanding the root causes, such as high insulin and blood sugar levels. Ben discusses solutions like ketosis, the negative…

1
Get Team Science Working for Your Publication Outcomes 1:07:19

9m ago1:07:19

1:07:19

Listen to this interview of Anthony Anjorin, a lead software architect at Zühlke Engineering, Germany; and also, Hsiang-Shang Ko, assistant research fellow, Institute of Information Science, Academia Sinica, Taiwan. We talk about their paper Benchmarking bidirectional transformations: Theory, implementation, application, and assessment (Software an…

1
James Madison and the Spirit of Self-Government: A Conversation with Colleen Sheehan 55:44

6h ago55:44

55:44

Who was James Madison? Why were his Notes on Government so valuable to the American founding? Did James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, and George Washington all achieve what Sheehan calls “Civic Friendship”? Colleen Sheehan joins Madison’s Notes to discuss her seminal works on James Madison: The Mind of James Madison: The Legacy of Classical Republic…

1
Alonso Duralde, "Hollywood Pride: A Celebration of LGBTQ+ Representation and Perseverance in Film" (Running Press Adult, 2024) 59:40

9m ago59:40

59:40

Film critic Alonso Duralde and I talk his new book, Hollywood Pride: A Celebration of LGBTQ+ Representation and Perseverance in Film (Running Press, 2024), including some fascinating anecdotes, case studies, and watershed moments in queer cinematic history, not to mention its creators, its stars, its detractors, and its various ebbs and flows -- fr…

1
Tehila Sasson, "The Solidarity Economy: Nonprofits and the Making of Neoliberalism after Empire" (Princeton UP, 2024) 56:52

19h ago56:52

56:52

After India gained independence in 1947, Britain reinvented its role in the global economy through nongovernmental aid organisations. Utilising existing imperial networks and colonial bureaucracy, the nonprofit sector sought an ethical capitalism, one that would equalise relationships between British consumers and Third World producers as the age o…

1
Mark Sweetnam, "Paul's Last Letter: A Commentary on the Second Epistle to Timothy" (Wipf and Stock, 2024) 33:22

9m ago33:22

33:22

The Second Epistle to Timothy is, by any standard, a remarkable document. Even as the apostle urges his friend and coworker hasten to Rome for a final meeting, the intimacy and urgency of Paul's words make clear his awareness that Timothy might not arrive in time to say goodbye. This makes the epistle deeply personal. But Paul has a much larger pur…

1
Juli Min, "Shanghailanders" (Spiegel & Grau, 2024) 41:00

7h ago41:00

41:00

Shanghailanders (Spiegel & Grau: 2024), the debut novel from Juli Min, starts at the end: Leo, a wealthy Shanghai businessman, sees his wife and daughters off at the airport as they travel to Boston. Everyone, it seems, is unhappy. The novel then travels backwards through time, giving answers to questions revealed in later chapters, jumping from pe…

1
Crystal Wilkinson, "Praisesong for the Kitchen Ghosts: Stories and Recipes from Five Generations of Black Country Cooks" (Clarkson Potter, 2023) 55:36

9m ago55:36

55:36

Poet Laureate of Kentucky Crystal Wilkinson’s food memoir, Praisesong for the Kitchen Ghosts: Stories and Recipes from Five Generations of Black Country Cooks (Clarkson Potter, 2023), honors her kitchen ghosts, five generations of Black Appalachian women. She contends, “The concept of the kitchen ghost came to me years ago, when I realized that my …

1
Noah Heringman, "Deep Time: A Literary History" (Princeton UP, 2023) 53:04

9m ago53:04

53:04

In Deep Time: A Literary History (Princeton UP, 2023), Noah Heringman, Curators’ Professor of English at the University of Missouri, presents a “counter-history” of deep time. This counter-history acknowledges and investigates the literary and imaginary origins of the idea of deep time, from eighteen-century narratives of voyages around the world t…

1
Operations + Performance with Dylan Weisman 34:32

11h ago34:32

34:32

Summary In this episode, David Osborne interviews Dylan Weisman, a partner at Xplosive Entertainment, a boutique event group specializing in high-end bar and bat mitzvahs, weddings, and corporate functions. They discuss the dynamics of their partnership and the importance of communication and aligned vision. Dylan shares his journey from working wi…

1
Jaclyn Sumner, "Indigenous Autocracy: Power, Race, and Resources in Porfirian Tlaxcala, Mexico" (Stanford UP, 2023) 1:20:00

9m ago1:20:00

1:20:00

When General Porfirio Díaz assumed power in 1876, he ushered in Mexico's first prolonged period of political stability and national economic growth--though "progress" came at the cost of democracy. Indigenous Autocracy presents a new story about how regional actors negotiated between national authoritarian rule and local circumstances by explaining…

1
Is Islamophobia Racism? 25:43

9m ago25:43

25:43

An interview with Salman Sayyid in which he addresses some of the criticisms of the recent definition of Islamophobia as “a type of racism that targets Muslimness or perceived Muslimness.” To read more about the incident of Islamophobia mentioned in this podcast, please visit this link. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices…

1
Miguel Montalva Barba, "White Supremacy and Racism in Progressive America: Race, Place, and Space" (Policy Press, 2024) 53:27

9m ago53:27

53:27

White Supremacy and Racism in Progressive America: Race, Place, and Space (Policy Press, 2024) examines the connections between race, place, and space, and sheds light on how they contribute and maintain racial hierarchies. Dr. Miguel Montalva Barba focuses on the White residents of Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts, which, according to the Cooks Politi…

1
Should you have a "frequently asked questions" section on your website? 7:52

4h ago7:52

7:52

Should you have a "frequently asked questions" section on your website? How can you address the questions your clients are asking before they even contact you? What’s the best way to present FAQs without overwhelming potential customers? In this episode, I dive into the benefits of having an FAQ section on your website and share practical tips on h…

1
Marc Ambinder, “The Brink: President Reagan and the Nuclear War Scare of 1983” (Simon & Schuster, 2018) 1:00:09

3h ago1:00:09

1:00:09

The Brink: President Reagan and the Nuclear War Scare of 1983 (Simon & Schuster, 2018), by Marc Ambinder, is a history of US-Soviet Relations under Ronald Reagan and an exploration of nuclear command and control operations. Ambender weaves together accounts of military exercises, false alarms, and espionage to tell the story of how close the U.S. a…

1
Dianne Elise, "Creativity and the Erotic Dimensions of the Analytic Field" (Routledge, 2019) 1:06:51

3h ago1:06:51

1:06:51

Today I talked to Dianne Elise about her book Creativity and the Erotic Dimensions of the Analytic Field (Routledge, 2019). To be in the presence of a person—a woman in fact, and Dianne Elise in particular—who follows her instincts, someone who builds theory from the ground up, and whose theories keep evolving, enlivens the interlocutor. I almost h…

1
Teresa Morgan, "The New Testament and the Theology of Trust" (Oxford UP, 2022) 35:15

3h ago35:15

35:15

The New Testament and the Theology of Trust (Oxford UP, 2022) argues for the recovery of trust as a central theme in Christian theology, and offers the first theology of trust in the New Testament. 'Trust' is the root meaning of Christian 'faith' (pistis, fides), and trusting in God and Christ is still fundamental to Christians. But unlike faith, a…

1
Andrew R. Basso, "Destroy Them Gradually: Displacement as Atrocity" (Rutgers UP, 2024) 1:13:07

3h ago1:13:07

1:13:07

Perpetrators of mass atrocities have used displacement to transport victims to killing sites or extermination camps to transfer victims to sites of forced labor and attrition, to ethnically homogenize regions by moving victims out of their homes and lands, and to destroy populations by depriving them of vital daily needs. Displacement has been trea…

1
Jocelyn Szczepaniak-Gillece, "Movies Under the Influence" (U Minnesota Press, 2024) 55:48

3h ago55:48

55:48

Movies under the Influence (University of Minnesota Press, 2024) by Dr. Jocelyn Szczepaniak-Gillece charts the entangled histories of moviegoing and mind-altering substances from early cinema through the psychedelic 1970s. Dr. Szczepaniak-Gillece examines how the parallel trajectories of these two enduring aspects of American culture, linked by the…

1
Zoe Knox, “Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Secular World: From the 1870s to the Present” (Palgrave, 2018) 34:01

3h ago34:01

34:01

Jehovah’s Witnesses are one of the most successful “new religious movements” to have emerged from the prophetic ferment within later nineteenth-century Protestantism. Always controversial, often persecuted, and well-known for their proselytising efforts, they have made a substantial contribution in terms of human rights, and they count numerous fam…

1
Heather Murray, "Asylum Ways of Seeing: Psychiatric Patients, American Thought and Culture" (U Pennsylvania Press, 2022) 43:53

3h ago43:53

43:53

Asylum Ways of Seeing: Psychiatric Patients, American Thought and Culture (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2021) by Dr. Heather Murray is a cultural and intellectual history of people with mental illnesses in the twentieth-century United States. While acknowledging the fraught, and often violent, histories of American psychiatric hospitals, Heath…

1
Ana Raquel Minian, “Undocumented Lives: The Untold Story of Mexican Migration” (Harvard UP, 2018) 1:05:35

3h ago1:05:35

1:05:35

In the 1970s, the Mexican government acted to alleviate rural unemployment by supporting the migration of able-bodied men. Millions crossed into the United States to find work that would help them survive as well as sustain their families in Mexico. They took low-level positions that few Americans wanted and sent money back to communities that depe…

1
#845 "It's Hiding In Your Food!" #1 Most Harmful Food Causing Obesity, Diabetes, Disease with Chris Knobbe 1:25:51

1d ago1:25:51

1:25:51

It's a pleasure to welcome Dr. Chris Knobbe back to the show. He is a physician, ophthalmologist, nutrition researcher, author, speaker, public health advocate, and the founder of two nonprofit organizations: Ancestral Health Foundation and Cure AMD Foundation. Since 2015, Dr. Knobbe has given scores of presentations and achieved international acad…

1
Training Day 29:09

1d ago29:09

29:09

Do you need to be a wolf to protect the sheep? That’s the question at the heart of Training Day (2001), in which Ethan Hawke plays the lead and Denzel Washington plays himself–at least for the first hour. What happens in the film once the sun goes down gets Mike and Dan arguing as they haven’t in a while: does the movie become yet another one where…

1
Peter Charles Hoffer, "The Supreme Court Footnote: A Surprising History" (NYU Press, 2024) 1:04:33

1d ago1:04:33

1:04:33

When the draft majority decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health was leaked, the media, public officials, and scholars focused on the overturning of Roe v. Wade. They noted Justice Alito’s strident tone and radical use of originalism to eliminate constitutional protection for reproductive rights. My guest today has written a book that asks us to…

1
Nancy E. Berg and Naomi B. Sokoloff, "Since 1948: Israeli Literature in the Making" (SUNY Press, 2020) 1:10:56

1d ago1:10:56

1:10:56

Toward the end of the twentieth century, an unprecedented surge of writing altered the Israeli literary scene in profound ways. As fresh creative voices and multiple languages vied for recognition, diversity replaced consensus. Genres once accorded lower status—such as the graphic novel and science fiction—gained readership and positive critical no…

1
Benjamin C. Waterhouse on "One Day I'll Work for Myself: The Dream and Delusion That Conquered America" 1:25:35

1d ago1:25:35

1:25:35

Peoples & Things host, Lee Vinsel, talks to Benjamin Waterhouse, full-as-full-can- be Professor of History at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, about his book, One Day I’ll Work for Myself: The Dream and Delusion that Conquered America (Norton, 2024). The book examines how the ideal of self-employment became so prominent in the United St…

1
Soar and Chill 1:04:34

1d ago1:04:34

1:04:34

Why do certain musical sounds move us while others leave us cold? Are musical trends simply that—or do they contain insights into the culture at large? Our guest is a musicologist who studies pop and electronic dance music. She’s fascinated by the way EDM privileges timbral and rhythmic complexity over the chord changes and harmonic complexities of…

1
Sara J. Charles, "The Medieval Scriptorium: Making Books in the Middle Ages" (Reaktion Books, 2024) 50:05

1d ago50:05

50:05

The Medieval Scriptorium: Making Books in the Middle Ages (Reaktion, 2024) by Sara J. Charles takes the reader on an immersive journey through mediaeval manuscript production in the Latin Christian world. Each chapter opens with a lively vignette by a mediaeval narrator – including a parchment-maker, scribe and illuminator – introducing various asp…

1
Zoë Bossiere, "Cactus Country: A Boyhood Memoir" (Abrams Press, 2024) 53:29

1d ago53:29

53:29

Today, I interview Zoë Bossiere about Cactus Country: A Boyhood Memoir (Abrams Press, 2024). Bossiere is writer from Tucson, Arizona. They are the managing editor of Brevity: A Journal of Concise Literary Nonfiction, as well as the coeditor of two anthologies: The Best of Brevity and The Lyric Essay as Resistance. Today, we talk about their debut m…

1
Aimee Louise Middlemiss, "Invisible Labours: The Reproductive Politics of Second Trimester Pregnancy Loss in England" (Berghahn Books, 2024) 45:16

1d ago45:16

45:16

Tracing women’s experiences of miscarriage and termination for foetal anomaly in the second trimester, before legal viability, shows how such events are positioned as less ‘real’ or significant when the foetal being does not, or will not, survive. Invisible Labour: The Reproductive Politics of Second Trimester Pregnancy Loss in England (Berghahn, 2…

1
Gold, Silver, and Bronze with Yuri Cath 34:29

1d ago34:29

34:29

In this episode Pat speaks with Dr Yuri Cath. Dr Yuri Cath's work explores epistemological questions about the nature and sources of different kinds of knowledge, and the importance of these issues for other areas of philosophy including the philosophy of mind and moral philosophy. He is interested in the philosophical distinction between "knowing-…

1
Spencer Piston, “Class Attitudes in American Politics: Sympathy for the Poor, Resentment of the Rich, and Political Implications” (Cambridge UP, 2018) 33:41

4d ago33:41

33:41

It has long been a truism that Americans’ disdain for poor people–our collective sense that if they only worked harder or behaved more responsibly they would do well in this land of opportunity–explains, at least in part, why it is we have such a weak and limited public welfare state. But what if that very premise is false? What if, to the contrary…

1
Kirsten Fermaglich, "A Rosenberg by Any Other Name: A History of Jewish Name Changing in America" (NYU Press, 2018) 1:01:40

3d ago1:01:40

1:01:40

Throughout the 20th century, especially during and immediately after WWII, New York Jews changed their names at rates considerably higher than any other ethnic group. Representative of the insidious nature of American anti-Semitism, recognizably Jewish names were often barriers for entry into college, employment, and professional advancement. Colle…

1
Iris Berent, "The Blind Storyteller: How We Reason about Human Nature" (Oxford UP, 2020) 56:28

2d ago56:28

56:28

Do newborns think-do they know that 'three' is greater than 'two'? Do they prefer 'right' to 'wrong'? What about emotions--do newborns recognize happiness or anger? If they do, then how are our inborn thoughts and feelings encoded in our bodies? Could they persist after we die? Going all the way back to ancient Greece, human nature and the mind-bod…

1
Yoga, Disability, and Animism, with Theo Wildcroft 1:04:35

2d ago1:04:35

1:04:35

In this episode, Dr Pierce Salguero sits down with Dr Theodora Wildcroft, a researcher, anthropologist, and long-time teacher of what she calls “post-lineage yoga.” We discuss Theo's ethnographic research on yoga in the UK, focusing on its connections with animism, paganism, and other somatic practices. We also dive into Theo’s personal approach to…

1
Casey Plett, "On Community" (Biblioasis, 2023) 53:53

2d ago53:53

53:53

Today I interview Casey Plett. Plett is the author of multiple works of fiction, including the story collection A Dream of a Woman, the novel Little Fish, which was a winner of a Lambda Literary Award and the Amazon First Novel Award in Canada, and and the story-collection A Safe Girl to Love, also a winner of a Lambda Literary Award. Today, we tal…

1
Marissa Nicosia, "Imagining Time in the English Chronicle Play: Historical Futures, 1590-1660" (Oxford UP, 2023) 46:09

2d ago46:09

46:09

Imagining Time in the English Chronicle Play: Historical Futures, 1590-1660 (Oxford University Press, 2023) argues that dramatic narratives about monarchy and succession codified speculative futures in the early modern English cultural imaginary. This book considers chronicle plays—plays written for the public stage and play pamphlets composed when…

1
Eric Hoyt, "Ink-Stained Hollywood: The Triumph of American Cinema’s Trade Press" (U California Press, 2022) 1:11:29

2d ago1:11:29

1:11:29

For the first half of the twentieth century, no American industry boasted a more motley and prolific trade press than the movie business—a cutthroat landscape that set the stage for battle by ink. In 1930, Martin Quigley, publisher of Exhibitors Herald, conspired with Hollywood studios to eliminate all competing trade papers, yet this attempt and e…

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