Beyond the Margins: The University of California Press Podcast
Episodes
Sabine Frühstück, "Playing War: Children and the Paradoxes of Modern Militarism in Japan" (U California Press, 2017)
14 Aug 2019
Contributed by Lukas
In Playing War: Children and the Paradoxes of Modern Militarism in Japan (University of California Press, 2017), Sabine Frühstück shows how children...
Harshita M. Kamath, "The Artifice of Brahmin Masculinity in South Indian Dance" (U California Press, 2019)
08 Aug 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Harshita M. Kamath's new book The Artifice of Brahmin Masculinity in South Indian Dance (University of California Press, 2019) features an investigati...
Celeste Watkins-Hayes, "Remaking a Life: How Women Living with HIV/AIDS Confront Inequality" (U California Press, 2019)
26 Jul 2019
Contributed by Lukas
How do women -- especially poor and low-income women with histories of childhood sexual trauma and drug addiction -- respond to and deal with an HIV/A...
Laura Alice Watt, "The Paradox of Preservation: Wilderness and Working Landscapes at Point Reyes National Seashore" (U California Press, 2016)
16 Jul 2019
Contributed by Lukas
“Wilderness,” “nature,” and their “preservation” are concepts basic to how the National Park Service organizes our relationship to America...
Genevieve Carpio, "Collisions at the Crossroads: How Place and Mobility Make Race" (U California Press, 2019)
08 Jul 2019
Contributed by Lukas
In her new book, Collisions at the Crossroads: How Place and Mobility Make Race (University of California Press, 2019), Professor Genevieve Carpio con...
Laura R. Barraclough, "Charros: How Mexican Cowboys Are Remapping Race and American Identity" (U California Press, 2019)
01 Jul 2019
Contributed by Lukas
In Charros: How Mexican Cowboys Are Remapping Race and American Identity (University of California Press, 2019), Dr. Laura R. Barraclough tells a surp...
Emily Wilcox, "Revolutionary Bodies: Chinese Dance and the Socialist Legacy" (U California Press, 2018)
18 Jun 2019
Contributed by Lukas
What is “Chinese dance,” how did it take shape in during China’s socialist period, and how has this socialist form continued to influence Post-M...
Manu Karuka, "Empire’s Tracks: Indigenous Nations, Chinese Workers, and the Transcontinental Railroad" (U California Press, 2019)
05 Jun 2019
Contributed by Lukas
What does anti-imperialism look like from the vantage point of North America? In Empire’s Tracks: Indigenous Nations, Chinese Workers, and the Trans...
Kris Lane, "Potosí: The Silver City That Changed the World" (U California Press, 2019)
20 May 2019
Contributed by Lukas
In 1545, a native Andean prospector hit pay dirt on a desolate red mountain in highland Bolivia. There followed the world's greatest silver bonanza, m...
Houri Berberian, "Roving Revolutionaries: Armenians and the Connected Revolutions in the Russian, Iranian and Ottoman Worlds" (U California Press, 2019)
07 May 2019
Contributed by Lukas
In her newest book, Roving Revolutionaries: Armenians and the Connected Revolutions in the Russian, Iranian and Ottoman Worlds (University of Californ...
Alex Colas et al., "Food, Politics, and Society Social Theory and the Modern Food System" (U California Press, 2018)
20 Mar 2019
Contributed by Lukas
The consumption of food and drink is much more than what we put in our mouth. Food and drink have been a focal point of modern social theory since the...
Leigh Goodmark, "Decriminalizing Domestic Violence: A Balanced Policy Approach to Intimate Partner Violence" (U California Press, 2018)
04 Feb 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Thanks to the efforts of activists concerned that the problem of “battered women” was being ignored -- and treated as a private, family matter rat...
Brannon D. Ingram, "Revival from Below: The Deoband Movement and Global Islam" (U California Press, 2018)
30 Jan 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Revival from Below: The Deoband Movement and Global Islam (University of California Press, 2018) by Brannon D. Ingram is a timely study of the Deoband...
Jamal Elias, "Alef is for Allah: Childhood, Emotion, and Visual Culture in Islamic Societies" (U California Press, 2018)
23 Jan 2019
Contributed by Lukas
In his groundbreaking new book, Alef is for Allah: Childhood, Emotion, and Visual Culture in Islamic Societies (University of California Press, 2018),...
Alexander S. Dawson, "The Peyote Effect: From the Inquisition to the War on Drugs" (U California Press, 2018)
17 Jan 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Peyote occupies a curious place in the United States and Mexico: though prohibited by law, its use remains permissible in both countries for ceremonia...
Nicholas Bauch, "Geography of Digestion: Biotechnology and the Kellogg Enterprise" (U California Press, 2017)
11 Jan 2019
Contributed by Lukas
While most people in the US are familiar with the ubiquitous Kellogg cereal brand, few know how it relates to US geography, science and technology aro...
Patrick Eisenlohr, "Sounding Islam: Voice, Media, and Sonic Atmospheres in an Indian Ocean World" (U California Press, 2018)
02 Jan 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Sounding Islam: Voice, Media, and Sonic Atmospheres in an Indian Ocean World(University of California Press, 2018) by Patrick Eisenlohr is an exciting...
Randy Shaw, “Generation Priced Out: Who Gets to Live in the New Urban America?” (U California Press, 2018)
21 Nov 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Why is housing so expensive in so many cities, and what can be done about it? Join us as we speak with long-time San Francisco housing activist Randy ...
Ronald Rael, “Borderwall as Architecture: A Manifesto for the U.S.-Mexico Boundary” (U California Press, 2017)
16 Nov 2018
Contributed by Lukas
With the passage of the Secure Fence Act in 2006, the U.S. Congress authorized funding for what has become the largest domestic construction project i...
Shenila Khoja-Moolji, “Forging an Ideal Educated Girl: The Production of Desirable Subjects in Muslim South Asia” (U California Press, 2018)
12 Nov 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Shenila Khoja-Moolji’s Forging an Ideal Educated Girl: The Production of Desirable Subjects in Muslim South Asia (University of California Press, 20...
Kathryn Fuller-Seeley, “Jack Benny and the Golden Age of American Radio Comedy” (U California Press, 2017)
19 Oct 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Jack Benny was one of the first crossover stars in broadcast comedy, rising from the vaudeville circuit to star in radio, film, and television. Kathry...
Michael Koncewicz, “They Said No to Nixon: Republicans Who Stood Up to the President’s Abuses of Power” (U California Press, 2018)
11 Oct 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Is it possible for a president’s political appointees to rein in a president with a penchant for abusing power? Yes. Michael Koncewicz, who listened...
Charlotte Greenhalgh, “Aging in Twentieth-Century Britain” (U California Press, 2018)
09 Oct 2018
Contributed by Lukas
What role did elderly Britons have in shaping the twentieth-century welfare state? In her new book, Aging in Twentieth-Century Britain (University of ...
Alyshia Gálvez, “Eating NAFTA: Trade, Food Policies, and the Destruction of Mexico” (U. California Press, 2018)
19 Sep 2018
Contributed by Lukas
The North American Free Trade Agreement—or NAFTA, as we Americans call it—is very much in the news of late, primarily because President Trump has ...
Gary Fields, “Enclosure: Palestinian Landscapes in a Historical Mirror” (U California Press, 2017)
16 Aug 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Inspired by the usage of the term ‘enclosure’ to describe the Separation Wall in Israel-Palestine on a visit he made to the West Bank, Gary Fields...
Andrew B. Kipnis, “From Village to City: Social Transformation in a Chinese County Seat” (U California Press, 2016)
08 Aug 2018
Contributed by Lukas
“When I first went to Zouping in 1988,” writes Andrew B. Kipnis in From Village to City: Social Transformation in a Chinese County Seat (Universit...
Casey Walsh, “Virtuous Waters: Mineral Springs, Bathing, and Infrastructure in Mexico” (U California Press, 2018).
02 Aug 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Water politics have long figured prominently in Mexico, and scholars have addressed such critical topics as irrigation, dam and canal building, and re...
Kate McDonald, “Placing Empire: Travel and the Social Imagination in Imperial Japan” (U California Press, 2017)
01 Aug 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Kate McDonald‘s Placing Empire: Travel and the Social Imagination in Imperial Japan (University of California Press, 2017) is a thoughtful and pro...
Kelsy Burke, “Christians Under Covers: Evangelicals and Sexual Pleasure on the Internet” (U California Press, 2016)
17 Jul 2018
Contributed by Lukas
How do we conceptualize religious conservatives and their relationship with sex? And how do Christians use digital media for sexual knowledge and plea...
Laura Robson, “States of Separation: Transfer, Partition, and the Making of the Modern Middle East” (U California Press, 2017)
12 Jul 2018
Contributed by Lukas
The First World War ended over four centuries of Middle East rule by the expansive, multiethnic, multireligious, and multilingual Ottoman Empire. In i...
Pamela Potter, “Art of Suppression: Confronting the Nazi Past in Histories of the Visual and Performing Arts” (U California Press, 2016)
27 Jun 2018
Contributed by Lukas
In her new book, Art of Suppression: Confronting the Nazi Past in Histories of the Visual and Performing Arts (University of California Press, 2016), ...
Nicole Von Germeten, “Profit and Passion: Transactional Sex in Colonial Mexico” (U California Press, 2018)
07 Jun 2018
Contributed by Lukas
In Profit and Passion: Transactional Sex in Colonial Mexico (University of California Press, 2018), Nicole Von Germeten explains the most important c...
Patrick Lopez-Aguado, “Stick Together and Come Back Home: Racial Sorting and the Spillover of Carceral Identity” (U California Press)
31 May 2018
Contributed by Lukas
How do systems of incarceration influence racial sorting inside and outside of prisons? And how do the social structures within prisons spill out into...
Rosina Lozano, “An American Language: The History of Spanish in the United States” (U California Press, 2018)
28 May 2018
Contributed by Lukas
In An American Language: The History of Spanish in the United States (University of California Press, 2018), Rosina Lozano details the entangled rela...
Simeon Man, “Soldiering through Empire: Race and the Making of the Decolonizing Pacific” (U California Press, 2018)
25 May 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Simeon Man‘s book Soldiering through Empire: Race and the Making of the Decolonizing Pacific (University of California Press, 2018) focuses on the ...
Elaine Fisher, “Hindu Pluralism: Religion and the Public Sphere in Early Modern South Asia” (U California Press, 2017)
21 May 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Elaine Fisher’s Hindu Pluralism: Religion and the Public Sphere in Early Modern South Asia (University of California Press, 2017) sheds light on t...
Pablo Piccato, “A History of Infamy: Crime, Truth, and Justice in Mexico” (U California Press, 2017)
27 Apr 2018
Contributed by Lukas
A History of Infamy: Crime, Truth, and Justice in Mexico (University of California Press, 2017) explores the definitive changes that the justice syst...
Aidan Forth, “Barbed-Wire Imperialism: Britain’s Empire of Camps, 1876-1903” (U California Press, 2017)
24 Apr 2018
Contributed by Lukas
In his new book, Barbed-Wire Imperialism: Britain’s Empire of Camps, 1876-1903 (University of California Press, 2017), Aidan Forth employs a compar...
Anna Zeide, “Canned: The Rise and Fall of Consumer Confidence in the American Food Industry” (U California Press, 2018)
16 Apr 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Most everything Americans eat today comes out of cans. Some of it emerges from the iconic steel cylinders and much of the rest from the mammoth proces...
Chad Montrie, “The Myth of Silent Spring: Rethinking the Origins of American Environmentalism” (U California Press, 2018)
05 Apr 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Uncle Tom’s Cabin didn’t start the Civil War and Silent Spring didn’t start the environmental movement. In The Myth of Silent Spring: Rethinking...
Mira Balberg, “Blood for Thought: The Reinvention of Sacrifice in Early Rabbinic Literature” (U California Press, 2017)
05 Apr 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Mira Balberg‘s Blood for Thought: The Reinvention of Sacrifice in Early Rabbinic Literature (University of California Press, 2017) delves into a rel...
Mara Buchbinder, “All in Your Head: Making Sense of Pediatric Pain” (U California Press, 2015)
04 Apr 2018
Contributed by Lukas
As physicians, we cannot image or measure it, we can only try to locate within the lives and (sometimes) bodies of our patients. In All in Your Head: ...
Peter A. Kopp, “Hoptopia: A World of Agriculture and Beer in Oregon’s Willamette Valley” (U California Press, 2016)
09 Mar 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Environmental historian Peter A. Kopp‘s book Hoptopia: A World of Agriculture and Beer in Oregon’s Willamette Valley (University of California Pre...
Claudio Sopranzetti, “Owners of the Map: Motorcycle Taxi Drivers, Mobility and Politics in Bangkok” (U California Press, 2017)
09 Mar 2018
Contributed by Lukas
When the army brutally dispersed Red Shirts protestors in Bangkok’s busy commercial district in May 2010, motorcycle taxi drivers emerged as a key f...
Jerry Flores, “Caught Up: Girls, Surveillance, and Wrap-Around Incarceration” (U California Press, 2016)
23 Feb 2018
Contributed by Lukas
What are the lives of young incarcerated Latinas like? And what were their lives like before and after their incarceration? In his new book, Caught Up...
Mark Padoongpatt, “Flavors of Empire: Food and the Making of Thai America” (U of California Press, 2017)
13 Feb 2018
Contributed by Lukas
In Flavors of Empire: Food and the Making of Thai America (University of California Press, 2017), Mark Padoongpatt weaves together histories of food, ...
Jean Beaman, “Citizen Outsider: Children of North African Immigrants in France” (U California Press, 2017)
08 Feb 2018
Contributed by Lukas
What does it mean to be a citizen? Every country has its own legal codes that confer a set of rights on official members. But full citizenship is ofte...
Joel Blecher, “Said the Prophet of God: Hadith Commentary Across a Millennium” (U. Cal Press, 2017)
24 Jan 2018
Contributed by Lukas
In his marvelous new book Said the Prophet of God: Hadith Commentary Across a Millennium (University of California Press, 2017), Joel Blecher, Assista...
Kathryn A. Sloan, “Death in the City: Suicide and the Social Imaginary in Modern Mexico” (U California Press, 2017)
22 Jan 2018
Contributed by Lukas
In her recent book Death in the City: Suicide and the Social Imaginary in Modern Mexico (University of California Press, 2017), Kathryn A. Sloan explo...
Corey D. Fields, “Black Elephants in the Room: The Unexpected Politics of African American Republicans” (UC Press, 2016)
24 Dec 2017
Contributed by Lukas
What is it about Black Republicans that makes them fodder for comedy? How do Black Republicans view their participation in their political group? Core...
Corey D. Fields, “Black Elephants in the Room: The Unexpected Politics of African American Republicans” (UC Press, 2016)
24 Dec 2017
Contributed by Lukas
What is it about Black Republicans that makes them fodder for comedy? How do Black Republicans view their participation in their political group? Core...
Kevan Harris, “A Social Revolution: Politics and the Welfare State in Iran” (U. Cal Press, 2017)
11 Dec 2017
Contributed by Lukas
Kevan Harris is the author of A Social Revolution: Politics and the Welfare State in Iran (University of California Press, 2017). Harris is assistant ...
Carolyn Sufrin, “Jailcare: Finding the Safety Net for Women behind Bars” (U. Cal Press, 2017)
01 Dec 2017
Contributed by Lukas
In 1976, the landmark supreme court case Estelle v. Gamble, established that under the Eighth Amendment “deliberate indifference” to the health ne...
Kathryn Lofton, “Consuming Religion” (U. Chicago Press, 2017)
20 Nov 2017
Contributed by Lukas
Kathryn Lofton is a professor of religious studies and history at Yale University. Her book Consuming Religion (University of Chicago Press, 2017) off...
Steve Viscelli, “The Big Rig: Trucking and the Decline of the American Dream” (U. Cal Press, 2016)
13 Nov 2017
Contributed by Lukas
There may not be a more ubiquitous presence on American highways than the truck. The images are iconic: eighteen-wheelers with muddy steel and chrome,...
Hugh Urban, “Zorba the Buddha: Sex, Spirituality, and Capitalism in the Global Osho Movement” (U. Cal Press, 2016)
09 Oct 2017
Contributed by Lukas
Many contemporary spiritual movements are characterized by denial of material pleasures, subjugation of the self, and focus on transcendence. A spirit...
Ruth Braunstein, “Prophets an Patriots: Faith in Democracy across the Political Divide” (U. California Press, 2017)
20 Sep 2017
Contributed by Lukas
Ruth Braunstein is the author of Prophets and Patriots: Faith in Democracy across the Political Divide (University of California Press, 2017). Braunst...
Victor Tan Chen, “Cut Loose: Jobless and Hopeless in an Unfair Economy” (U. California Press, 2015)
24 Jul 2017
Contributed by Lukas
We are nearly a decade removed from the start of the Great Recession, and many indicators show that the economy is doing relatively well. But during t...
Sarah Eltantawi, “Shari’ah on Trial: Northern Nigeria’s Islamic Revolution” (U. California Press, 2017)
12 Jul 2017
Contributed by Lukas
Few images attached to Islam and to the Islamic legal tradition (the Sharia) in particular are more often and more disturbingly sensationalized than t...
Tom Adam Davies, “Mainstreaming Black Power” (U. Cal Press, 2017)
14 Jun 2017
Contributed by Lukas
What is Black Power? Does it still exist in the so-called post-racial 21st Century? How does Black Power relate to similar movements, like Black Lives...
Marcia Yonemoto, “The Problem of Women in Early Modern Japan” (U of California Press, 2016)
25 Apr 2017
Contributed by Lukas
Were women a problem in early modern Japan? If they were, what was the nature of the problem they posed? For whom, and why? Marcia Yonemoto‘s new bo...
Emily K. Hobson, “Lavender and Red: Liberation and Solidarity in the Gay and Lesbian Left” (U. Cal Press, 2016)
16 Mar 2017
Contributed by Lukas
In Lavender and Red: Liberation and Solidarity in the Gay and Lesbian Left (University of California Press, 2016), Emily K. Hobson challenges concepti...
Tyina Steptoe, “Houston Bound: Culture and Color in a Jim Crow City” (U. California Press, 2015)
09 Mar 2017
Contributed by Lukas
What do you know about Houston, Texas? That Houston is the fourth largest city in the United States? That Houston was the home of the 2016 NCAA Final ...
Ruth Rogaski, “Hygienic Modernity: Meanings of Health and Disease in Treaty-Port China” (U. California Press, 2014 reprint)
07 Dec 2016
Contributed by Lukas
Since it was published in 2004, Ruth Rogaski’s Hygienic Modernity: Meanings of Health and Disease in Treaty-Port China (University of California Pre...
Charles Keith, “Catholic Vietnam: A Church from Empire to Nation” (U of California Press, 2012)
06 Jun 2016
Contributed by Lukas
The relationship between religion, imperialism, and national identity can be quite complex. At the same time, nationalist readings of history, particu...
Gabriel Thompson, “America’s Social Arsonist: Fred Ross and Grassroots Organizing in the Twentieth Century” (U of California Press, 2016)
16 May 2016
Contributed by Lukas
“A good organizer is a social arsonist who goes around setting people on fire.” This axiom encapsulates both the approach and dedication exhibited...
Garrett M. Broad, “More Than Just Food: Food Justice and Community Change” (U of California Press, 2016)
13 May 2016
Contributed by Lukas
Resistance to the industrial food system has, over the past decades, led to the rise of alternative food movements. Debate about genetically modified ...
Matthew H. Sommer, “Polyandry and Wife-Selling in Qing Dynasty China” (U of California Press, 2015)
04 May 2016
Contributed by Lukas
First things first: Matthew H. Sommer‘s new book is an absolute must-read for anyone interested in the history of China and/or the history of gender...
Birgit Meyer, “Sensational Movies: Video, Vision, and Christianity in Ghana” (U of California Press, 2015)
30 Apr 2016
Contributed by Lukas
Anthropologist Birgit Meyer‘s most recent book, Sensational Movies: Video, Vision, and Christianity in Ghana (University of California Press, 2015),...
Jason Mokhtarian, “Rabbis, Sorcerers, Kings, and Priests: The Culture of the Talmud in Ancient Iran” (U of California Press, 2015)
22 Feb 2016
Contributed by Lukas
In Rabbis, Sorcerers, Kings, and Priests: The Culture of the Talmud in Ancient Iran (University of California Press, 2015), Jason Mokhtarian, Assistan...
Sarah Bowen, “Divided Spirits: Tequila, Mezcal, and the Politics of Production” (U of California Press, 2015)
06 Feb 2016
Contributed by Lukas
In her new book, Divided Spirits: Tequila, Mezcal, and the Politics of Production (University of California Press, 2015), Sarah Bowen presents the cha...
Joan Judge, “Republican Lens: Gender, Visuality, and Experience in the Early Chinese Periodical Press” (U of California Press, 2015)
19 Jan 2016
Contributed by Lukas
Joan Judge‘s wonderful new book takes readers into the pages of the Funu shibao (the Women’s Eastern Times), a “Shanghai-based, nationally distr...
Christopher Rea, “The Age of Irreverence: A New History of Laughter in China” (University of California Press, 2015)
21 Dec 2015
Contributed by Lukas
Christopher Rea‘s new book explores five kinds of laughter that emerged from the tumultuous first decades of China’s twentieth century: jokes, pla...
Sarah Maza, “Violette Noziere: A Story of Murder in 1930s Paris” (U. of California Press, 2012)
18 Dec 2015
Contributed by Lukas
On August 21, 1933, the teenaged Violette Noziere attempted to kill both her parents. At first, seemingly so clearcut, the case ultimately came to be ...
Arlene Davila, “Latinos, Inc.: The Marketing and Making of a People” (U California Press, 2012)
11 Dec 2015
Contributed by Lukas
In Latinos Inc.: The Marketing and Making of a People (University of California Press, updated ed. 2012) Arlene Davila, Professor of Anthropology at N...
Mario T. Garcia, “The Chicano Generation: Testimonios of the Movement” (U of California Press, 2015)
12 Nov 2015
Contributed by Lukas
As multifaceted as it was multinucleated, the Chicana/o Movement of the late-1960s and 1970s was “the largest and most widespread civil rights and e...
Erika Robb Larkins, “The Spectacular Favela: Violence in Modern Brazil” (U of California Press, 2015)
09 Oct 2015
Contributed by Lukas
After the emancipation of slavery in the late nineteenth century, Afro-Brazilians moved to cities like Rio de Janeiro in search of employment. Because...
Amanda Lucia, “Reflections of Amma: Devotees in a Global Embrace” (University of California Press, 2014)
26 Sep 2015
Contributed by Lukas
Waiting several hours in line for a hug is well worth it for thousands of people, the devotees of the Guru, Amma, Mata Amritanandamayi. In Reflections...
Suzanna Reiss, “We Sell Drugs: The Alchemy of U.S. Empire” (University of California Press, 2014)
14 Sep 2015
Contributed by Lukas
Though the conventional history of the U.S.-led “War on Drugs” locates the origins of this conflict in a reaction to the domestic culture of exces...
Phil Tiermeyer, “Plane Queer: Labor, Sexuality, and AIDS in the History of Male Flight Attendants” (U of California Press, 2013)
14 Sep 2015
Contributed by Lukas
Today’s guest discusses the history of sexuality in the workplace through the lens of male flight attendants. We speak with Phil Tiemeyer about the ...
Natalia Molina, “How Race is Made in America: Immigration, Citizenship, and the Historical Power of Racial Scripts” (University of California Press, 2014)
02 Sep 2015
Contributed by Lukas
“America is a nation of immigrants.” Either this common refrain, or its cousin the “melting pot” metaphor is repeated daily in conversations a...
Alejandro Velasco, “Barrio Rising: Urban Popular Politics and the Making of Modern Venezuela” (U of California Press, 2015)
28 Jun 2015
Contributed by Lukas
In the mid-1950s, Venezuela’s military government razed a massive slum settlement in the heart of Caracas and replaced it with what was at the time ...
James Laine, “Meta-Religion: Religion and Power in World History” (U of California Press, 2015)
23 Jun 2015
Contributed by Lukas
Most world religions textbooks follow a structure and conceptual framework that mirrors the modern discourse of world religions as distinct entities r...
Ana Elizabeth Rosas, “Abrazando el Espiritu: Bracero Families Confront the U.S.-Mexico Border” (U of California Press, 2014)
20 Jun 2015
Contributed by Lukas
The Emergency Farm Labor Program (a.k.a. Bracero Program) was initiated in 1942 as a bilateral wartime agreement between the governments of the United...
Kevin O’Neill, “Secure the Soul: Christian Piety and Gang Prevention in Guatemala” (U of California Press, 2015)
02 Jun 2015
Contributed by Lukas
Kevin O’Neill‘s fascinating book Secure the Soul: Christian Piety and Gang Prevention in Guatemala (University of California Press, 2015) traces t...
Julie Sze, “Fantasy Islands: Chinese Dreams and Ecological Fears in an Age of Climate Crisis” (U of California Press, 2015)
19 May 2015
Contributed by Lukas
Julie Sze‘s new book opens by bringing readers into the wetlands of Dongtan, introducing us to an ambitious but unrealized project to create the “...
Lisa Stevenson, “Life Beside Itself: Imagining Care in the Canadian Arctic” (University of California Press, 2014)
05 Mar 2015
Contributed by Lukas
Lisa Stevenson‘s new book opens with two throat-singing women and one listening king. Whether we hear them sitting down to a normal night’s dinner...
Cabeiri Robinson, “Body of Victim, Body of Warrior: Refugee Families and the Making of Kashmiri Jihadists” (University of California Press, 2013)
19 Feb 2015
Contributed by Lukas
The idea of jihad is among the most keenly discussed yet one of the least understood concepts in Islam. In her brilliant new book Body of Victim, Body...
Charlotte Eubanks, “Miracles of Book and Body: Buddhist Textual Culture and Medieval Japan (U of California Press, 2011)
06 Feb 2015
Contributed by Lukas
In Miracles of Book and Body: Buddhist Textual Culture and Medieval Japan (University of California Press, 2011), Charlotte Eubanks examines the rel...
John Renard, “Islamic Theological Themes: A Primary Source Reader” (U of California Press, 2014)
06 Feb 2015
Contributed by Lukas
Islamic theology is generally understood or approached in terms of its systematic or speculative forms. In Islamic Theological Themes: A Primary Sourc...
S. Lochlann Jain, “Malignant: How Cancer Becomes Us” (U of California Press, 2013)
14 Jan 2015
Contributed by Lukas
Cancer pervades American bodies–and also habits of mind. Malignant: How Cancer Becomes Us (University of California Press, 2013) is a sharp, advent...
Joseph D. Hankins, “Working Skin: Making Leather, Making a Multicultural Japan” (U of California Press, 2014)
31 Dec 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Joseph D. Hankins‘s marvelous new ethnography of the contemporary Buraku people looks at the labor involved in “identifying, dismantling, and repr...
Alex Nading, “Mosquito Trails: Ecology, Health and the Politics of Entanglement” (University of California Press, 2014)
18 Dec 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Dengue fever is on the rise globally. Since it is transmitted by mosquitoes which reside and reproduce in human environments, eradication efforts invo...
Pamela Klassen, “Spirits of Protestantism: Medicine, Healing, and Liberal Christianity” (University of California Press, 2011)
21 Nov 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Liberal Protestants are often dismissed as reflecting nothing more than a therapeutic culture or viewed as a measuring rod for the decline of Christia...
Nadine Hubbs, “Rednecks, Queers, and Country Music” (University of California Press, 2014)
05 Nov 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Academics don’t pay enough attention to class. And when we do, too often we only magnify the tendency for working class subjects to be defined accor...
Anson Rabinbach and Sander Gilman, “The Third Reich Sourcebook” (U California Press, 2013)
26 Sep 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Primary source readers represent an unusual historical genre. Unlike editions, their aim is not to enable the reader to hear, as clearly as possible, ...
Todd A. Henry, “Assimilating Seoul: Japanese Rule and the Politics of Public Space in Colonial Korea, 1910-1945” (U of California Press, 2014)
21 Sep 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Todd Henry’s new book is a wonderful study of public space as a laboratory for producing the experiences and engines of colonial society. Assimilati...
Tine M. Gammeltoft, “Haunting Images: A Cultural Account of Selective Reproduction in Vietnam” (University of California Press, 2014)
22 Jul 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Tine Gammeltoft‘s new book explores the process of reproductive decision making in contemporary Hanoi. Haunting Images: A Cultural Account of Select...
Miriam Kingsberg, “Moral Nation: Modern Japan and Narcotics in Global History” (University of California Press, 2013)
08 Apr 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Miriam Kingsberg‘s fascinating new book offers both a political and social history of modern Japan and a global history of narcotics in the modern w...
Nathan Schneider. “God in Proof: The Story of a Search from the Ancients to the Internet” (University of California Press, 2013)
07 Apr 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Nathan Schneider‘s monograph, God in Proof: The Story of a Search from the Ancients to the Internet (University of California Press, 2013), explores...