Episodes

  • Jane Vaynman, "Enemies in Agreement: Political Volatility and the Design of Arms Control" (Cambridge UP, 2026)

    Jane Vaynman, "Enemies in Agreement: Political Volatility and the Design of Arms Control" (Cambridge UP, 2026)
    Apr 18 2026
    Why do adversaries sometimes cooperate to restrain their military competition? Why do they design arms control agreements with intrusive verification in some cases but rely on minimal transparency in others? Amidst ongoing international competition, arms control remains rare despite potential mutual benefits, and agreements vary dramatically in their approaches to monitoring. Enemies in Agreement: Political Volatility and the Design of Arms Control (Cambridge UP, 2026) reveals how uncertainty from domestic political changes, such as leadership transitions or social unrest, can enable arms control. The book identifies two paths to agreement: during periods of uncertainty, states that previously relied on informal understandings hedge by establishing lightly monitored agreements, while those that anticipated deception take calculated risks through agreements with intensive verification. Through comprehensive data analysis and rich case studies, Jane Vaynman challenges conventional wisdom about uncertainty in international relations while offering policymakers insights. As states confront challenges from nuclear competition to emerging technologies, understanding when arms control becomes viable is more vital than ever.Our guest is Professor Jane Vaynman, an Assistant Professor of Strategic Studies at the School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) at Johns Hopkins University. Our host is Eleonora Mattiacci, an Associate Professor of Political Science at Amherst College. She is the author of "Volatile States in International Politics" (Oxford University Press, 2023).
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    39 mins
  • Penny Roberts, "Huguenot Networks: Truth and Secrecy in Sixteenth-Century Europe" (Cambridge UP, 2025)

    Penny Roberts, "Huguenot Networks: Truth and Secrecy in Sixteenth-Century Europe" (Cambridge UP, 2025)
    Apr 17 2026
    Huguenot Networks: Truth and Secrecy in Sixteenth-Century Europe (Cambridge UP, 2025), Penny Robert's latest book, takes us into the world of secret intelligence gathering during the French Wars of Religion. Robert's discovery of the interrogation record of a Huguenot merchant, Jean Tivinat, arrested in May 1570 for attempting to secretly carry letters to England, unspools into a broader story about the intersections between confessional affiliations, international affairs, knowledge, trust, and networking in a tumultuous time. As she argues, clandestine communication was crucial to maintaining ties amongst a widely dispersed and threatened religious community. Huguenot Networks is a lively read and sure to appeal to anyone interested in the history of espionage, Huguenots, international affairs in Elizabethan England, or the French Wars of Religion. Elspeth Currie is a PhD Candidate in the Department of History at Boston College where she studies women’s intellectual history in early modern Europe.
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    53 mins
  • Christian Henderson, "Monarchies of Extraction: The Gulf States in the Global Food System" (Cambridge UP, 2026)

    Christian Henderson, "Monarchies of Extraction: The Gulf States in the Global Food System" (Cambridge UP, 2026)
    Apr 12 2026
    In a region known for its export of oil, Monarchies of Extraction: The Gulf States in the Global Food System (Cambridge UP, 2026) explores how the Gulf states are simultaneously defined by the importation of food. Charting the economics and politics of the Gulf through an examination of its food system, Christian Henderson demonstrates how these states constitute a distinct social metabolism within the global food system. Starting with the pre-oil phase, this book examines the politics of agrarian change in the Gulf. In the contemporary period, Henderson considers the way that the Gulf states have evolved into 'inverted farms', where the import of prodigious quantities of agricultural commodities has enabled these economies to overcome their lack of arable land. As a result of this trade, states such as the UAE and Saudi Arabia have developed their own agribusiness sectors. Henderson further shows how food and consumption in the Gulf states constitute political questions of diet, sustainability, and boycott. Christian Henderson is a lecturer at the University of Leiden. His research focuses on the Arab region, with a particular focus on Gulf investment in the states of North Africa and the Levant, rural development and business politics. Alongside his academic work, he has worked as a journalist in Lebanon and with Al Jazeera in Qatar. Alec Fiorini is a PhD student at Queen Mary University London's Centre for Labour, Sustainability and Global Production (CLaSP) researching the political economy of nitrogen fertilizer supply chains.
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    1 hr and 3 mins
  • Christine Grandy, "Race on Screen: Audience Racism in Twentieth-Century Britain" (Cambridge UP, 2026)

    Christine Grandy, "Race on Screen: Audience Racism in Twentieth-Century Britain" (Cambridge UP, 2026)
    Apr 4 2026
    What is the role of television in the history of the UK? In Race on Screen: Audience Racism in Twentieth-Century Britain (Cambridge UP, 2026) Christine Grandy, an Associate Professor in History at the University of Lincoln, explores how producers, audiences, and television programmes themselves addressed race and racism in the Twentieth-Century. Drawing on a huge range of archival material, the book demonstrates the explicit racism associated with white audiences and TV programming, along with the critical resistance offered by audiences of colour. Thinking through how this history of audience and TV production racism has been forgotten, the analysis is a vital contribution to our own contemporary discussions about race and media, in the UK and beyond. The book is essential reading for arts, humanities and social science scholars, along with anyone interested in the past and future of television.
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    52 mins
  • Derek Krueger "Monastic Desires: Homoeroticism, Homophobia, and the Love of God in Medieval Constantinople" (Cambridge UP, 2026)

    Derek Krueger "Monastic Desires: Homoeroticism, Homophobia, and the Love of God in Medieval Constantinople" (Cambridge UP, 2026)
    Mar 30 2026
    Derek Krueger Monastic Desires: Homoeroticism, Homophobia, and Love of God in Medieval Constantinople (Cambridge UP, 2026) The Byzantine Abbot Symeon the New Theologian (949–1022) transgressed the homophobic norms of medieval Orthodox society. His longing for God was distinctly homoerotic, and he depicted union with the divine as a queer sort of marriage. His Orthodox theology of theosis, the deification of the entire person, meant that Symeon taught the salvation of all the parts of the body. But monks also desired the eradication of lust and the punishment of those who fell prey to it. Sermons and biblical commentary defined men who had sex with men as sodomites; and saints' lives warned of the consequences of same-sex desires. Those who renounced sex redirected their desire rather than eliminating it. Symeon's queer erotics shed light on other devotions distinctive to medieval Orthodoxy, including the veneration of saints and worship with icons. Monastic Desires makes a groundbreaking contribution to the history of sexuality and the history of Christianity. New Books in Late Antiquity is presented by Ancient Jew Review Derek Krueger is emeritus professor of religious studies at UNC Greensboro, the author of multiple books including Liturgical Subjects: Biblical Narratives and the Formation of the Self in Byzantium, the editor of far more, and former editor of the book series Divinations: Rereading Late Antiquity. Michael Motia teaches Classics and Religious Studies at UMass Boston
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    1 hr and 29 mins
  • Satya Shikha Chakraborty, "Colonial Caregivers: Ayahs and the Gendered History of Race and Caste in British India" (Cambridge UP, 2025)

    Satya Shikha Chakraborty, "Colonial Caregivers: Ayahs and the Gendered History of Race and Caste in British India" (Cambridge UP, 2025)
    Mar 25 2026
    Colonial Caregivers: Ayahs and the Gendered History of Race and Caste in British India (Cambridge UP, 2025) offers a compelling cultural and social history of ayahs (nannies/maids), by exploring domestic intimacy and exploitation in colonial South Asia. Working for British imperial families from the mid-1700s to the mid-1900s, South Asian ayahs, as Chakraborty shows, not only provided domestic labor, but also provided important moral labor for the British Empire. The desexualized racialized ayah archetype upheld British imperial whiteness and sexual purity, and later Indian elite 'upper' caste domestic modernity. Chakraborty argues that the pervasive cultural sentimentalization of the ayah morally legitimized British colonialism, while obscuring the vulnerabilities of caregivers in real-life. Using an archive of petitions and letters from ayahs, fairytales they told to British children, court cases, and vernacular sources, Chakraborty foregrounds the precarious lives, voices, and perspectives of these women. By placing care labor at the center of colonial history, the book decolonizes the history of South Asia and the British Empire.Satya Shikha Chakraborty is an Associate Professor of History at The College of New Jersey.Saumya Dadoo is a PhD Candidate at MESAAS, Columbia University
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    1 hr and 4 mins
  • Nana Osei-Opare, "Socialist De-Colony: Black and Soviet Entanglements in Ghana's Cold War" (Cambridge UP, 2025)

    Nana Osei-Opare, "Socialist De-Colony: Black and Soviet Entanglements in Ghana's Cold War" (Cambridge UP, 2025)
    Mar 24 2026
    Led by the charismatic Kwame Nkrumah, Ghana won its political independence from the United Kingdom in 1957. It precipitated both the dying spiral of colonialism across the African continent and the world's first Black socialist state. Utilising materials from Ghanaian, Russian, English, and American archives, Nana Osei-Opare offers a provocative and new reading of this defining moment in world history through the eyes of workers, writers, students, technical-experts, ministers, and diplomats. Osei-Opare shows how race and Ghana-Soviet spaces influenced, enabled, and disrupted Ghana's transformational socialist, Cold War, and decolonization projects to achieve Black freedom. This title is also available as open access on Cambridge Core. Elisa Prosperetti is an Assistant Professor of African and global history at NIE/NTU in Singapore.
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    48 mins
  • Lucia Motolinia, "Unity through Particularism: How Electoral Reforms Influence Parties and Legislative Behavior" (Cambridge UP, 2026)

    Lucia Motolinia, "Unity through Particularism: How Electoral Reforms Influence Parties and Legislative Behavior" (Cambridge UP, 2026)
    Mar 24 2026
    Why do supposedly accountability-enhancing electoral reforms often fail in young democracies? How can legislators serve their constituents when parties control the necessary resources? Unity through Particularism: How Electoral Reforms Influence Parties and Legislative Behavior (Cambridge University Press, 2026) by Dr. Lucia Motolinia sheds light on these questions and more by explaining how parties can use personal vote-seeking incentives in order to decrease intra-party dissent. Studying a unique electoral reform in Mexico, the book provides a detailed description of how institutional incentives can conflict. It draws on a variety of rich, original data sources on legislative behavior and organization in 20 Mexican states to develop a novel explanation of how electoral reforms can amplify competing institutional incentives. In settings where legislative rules and candidate selection procedures favor parties, legislators may lack the resources necessary to build voter support. If this is the case, party leaders can condition access to these resources on loyalty to the party's political agenda. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda’s interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts.
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    28 mins