University of Minnesota Press

Society has yet to fully grapple with the administrative chaos that has ensued from the growth of the urban. One such city allows tremendous insight into the process of urbanization in the new millennium: Bengaluru. During the past two decades, Bengaluru’s real estate sector and infrastructure investments have exploded in a massive transformation that stimulated rapid urbanization and unbounded growth. The coedited collection of writings Chronicles of a Global City: Speculative Lives and Unsettled Futures in Bengaluru explores how people caught up in the whirlwinds of change—construction laborers, street vendors, gig workers—experience, struggle, strive, and speculate to make a livable city for themselves.Several contributors to this book are gathered here in conversation:Vinay Gidwani is professor of geography and global studies at the University of Minnesota and author of Capital Interrupted: Agrarian Development and the Politics of Work in India.Hemangini Gupta is lecturer in gender and global politics and associate director of GENDER.ED at the University of Edinburgh. She is author of Experimental Times: Startup Capitalism and Feminist Futures in India and coeditor of Feminist Studies: An Introductory Reader.Kaveri Medappa is a postdoctoral researcher in human geography at the University of Oxford. Swathi Shivanand is assistant professor at the Department of Liberal Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences in Manipal Academy of Higher Education, Manipal, India.Michael Goldman is associate professor of sociology and global studies at the University of Minnesota and author of Imperial Nature: The World Bank and Struggles for Social Justice in the Age of Globalization.Praise for Chronicles of a Global City:“A nuanced investigation into the precise nature in which Bengaluru (and the global sphere) has embraced what the authors have dubbed 'speculative urbanism', a capital-led paradigm that has monopolised the imagination over public spaces and city-building.”—Frontline MagazineChronicles of a Global City: Speculative Lives and Unsettled Futures in Bengaluru is available from University of Minnesota Press.

Tamara Dean's quest to live lightly on the planet in the midst of the environmental crises of our time led her to a landscape unlike any other: the Driftless area of Wisconsin, a region untouched by glaciers, marked by steep hills and deeply carved valleys, capped with forests and laced with cold, spring-fed streams. There she confronted, in ways large and small, the challenges of meeting basic needs while facing the ravages of climate change. Here, Dean is joined in conversation with Curt Meine.Tamara Dean is an educator and writer, author of Shelter and Storm: At Home in the Driftless and The Human-Powered Home: Choosing Muscles over Motors. Her essays and stories have been published in The American Scholar, The Georgia Review, the Guardian, One Story, Orion, and The Progressive.Curt Meine is a conservation biologist, environmental historian, and writer. Meine is the award-winning author of the first biography of Aldo Leopold and has written and edited many books on conservation, including The Driftless Reader.REFERENCES:The Land Remembers / Ben LoganOrder Upon the Land / Hildegard Binder JohnsonAldo LeopoldPRAISE FOR THE BOOK: "Dean writes with a clarity and wisdom that illuminates the past, the present, and the future. Shelter and Storm is an essential book for our time." —Jane Hamilton, award-winning author of The Book of Ruth and A Map of the World"In this remarkable collection of essays, Tamara Dean conveys the depth of our connection to the natural world with careful research and gentle words." —Joan Maloof, author of Teaching the Trees"There is so much to admire in these beautifully written essays, but foremost are Tamara Dean’s sense of awe in the natural world, her citizen science undertakings, and her deep research into both history and biology." —Nancy Lord, former Alaska State Writer Laureate and author of Early WarmingShelter and Storm: At Home in the Driftless by Tamara Dean is available from University of Minnesota Press. Thank you for listening.

Cities across the US are rethinking streets, going beyond sidewalks and bike lanes to welcome nonmotorists to share the roadway. David L. Prytherch, author of Reclaiming the Road: Mobility Justice beyond Complete Streets, traces the historical evolution of America’s streets and explores contemporary movements to retake them from cars for diverse forms of mobility and community life. Can we design more just streets? Here, Prytherch is joined in conversation with Mimi Sheller and Peter Norton.David Prytherch is professor of geography at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. He is author of Reclaiming the Road: Mobility Justice beyond Complete Streets; Law, Engineering, and the American Right-of-Way: Imagining a More Just Street; and coeditor of Transport, Mobility, and the Production of Urban Space. Mimi Sheller is Dean of The Global School at Worcester Polytechnic Institute. Sheller is founding co-editor of the journal Mobilities, founding co-director of the Centre for Mobilities at Lancaster University, England, and past president of the International Association for the History of Transport, Traffic and Mobility. Sheller is author of Mobility Justice: The Politics of Movement in an Age of Extremes.Peter Norton is associate professor of history in the Department of Engineering and Society at the University of Virginia. He is author of Fighting Traffic: The Dawn of the Motor Age in the American City and Autonorama: The Illustory Promise of High-Tech Driving.REFERENCES:John UrryThe Death and Life of Great American Cities / Jane JacobsPeople for Mobility JusticeRobert MosesComplete StreetsThe UntokeningKimberlé CrenshawPraise for the book:"Reporting from the front lines of recent post-pandemic physical and cultural transformations of public space in nine major American cities, David L. Prytherch raises profound questions about what streets are for and how they might be equitably shared. The result is a fresh, hopeful vision for intersectional mobility justice and public placemaking."—Mimi Sheller, author of Mobility Justice: The Politics of Movement in an Age of Extremes"David L. Prytherch gives a crisp, clear, and accessible narrative of the movement to reclaim public streets after one hundred years of domination by private automobile interests. Steering us through the politics of streets during the Covid-19 pandemic and recovery, this is a refreshingly innovative and optimistic book for anyone concerned about our urban mobility future."—Jason Henderson, coauthor of Street Fights in Copenhagen: Bicycle and Car Politics in a Green Mobility CityReclaiming the Road: Mobility Justice beyond Complete Streets by David L. Prytherch is available from University of Minnesota Press.

Cinema can be furtive and intensely beautiful—and it can leave a viewer craving more. Cinemal is Tessa Laird’s passionate inquiry into the desire to write about animals and to write about art, juxtaposing the two and burrowing into the ways that films mimic the majesty, mystery, and movements of animals. Here, Laird is joined in conversation with Giovanni Aloi and Caroline Picard, editors of the Art after Nature series with University of Minnesota Press.Tessa Laird is an artist, writer, and senior lecturer at the Victorian College of the Arts, University of Melbourne. Her books include a fictocritical exploration of color, A Rainbow Reader, and a cultural history of bats, Bat, in Reaktion Books’ celebrated Animal series.Giovanni Aloi teaches art history, theory, and criticism at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. He is author or editor of many books on the nonhuman and art.Caroline Picard is a writer, cartoonist, curator, and founder of the Green Lantern Press.EPISODE REFERENCES:The Animal That Therefore I Am / Jacques DerridaDonna HarawayArthur and Corinne CantrillMichael TaussigMonocultures of the Mind / Vandana ShivaWhat Animals Teach Us about Politics / Brian MassumiLen Lye, New Zealand modernist artistSergei EisensteinElectric Animal / Akira LippitBaptiste MarizotUndrowned / Alexis Pauline GumbsSriwhana SpongPraise for the book:“Original, erudite, and playful all in one, Cinemal is not only a joy to read but estranges the very idea of cinema, and therefore of life, in ways wondrous and wise.”—Michael Taussig, Columbia University“A sparkling, engaging book, a virtuosic and thrilling interleaving of experimental cinema, philosophies of the more-than-human, and stories of animal encounters. Celebrating the variety and inventiveness of cinematic experimentation, Tessa Laird calls for us to remake our human senses in order to align better with the needs of the planet.”—Laura U. Marks, author of The Fold: From Your Body to the CosmosArt after Nature is a series edited by Giovanni Aloi and Caroline Picard that explores epistemological questions that emerge from the expanding, environmental consciousness of the humanities.Cinemal: The Becoming-Animal of Experimental Film by Tessa Laird is available from University of Minnesota Press.

“There is no such thing as a raw, natural, aggressive urge that underlies human violence. While we inherit defense mechanisms, they work only when triggered culturally.” So opens John Protevi’s Regimes of Violence: Toward a Political Anthropology, which takes as its biocultural basis that social practices shape our bodies and minds, and analyzes human aggression throughout history: early nomadic foragers, organized sports, berserkers and blackout rages, maroons escaping slavery, the January 6th invasion of the US Capitol, and responses to the Covid-19 pandemic. Protevi entwines the philosophical with the anthropological and considers why humans’ capacity for cooperation and sharing is persistently overlooked by stories of aggression and warfare. This book is an important contribution to the studies of Deleuze and Guattari, and here, Andrew Culp (Dark Deleuze) and Protevi (“joyous Deleuze”) dig into myriad shades of human expression from philosophical and cultural perspectives.John Protevi is professor of French studies and philosophy at Louisiana State University and author of Regimes of Violence: Toward a Political Anthropology; Political Affect: Connecting the Social and the Somatic; Life, War, Earth: Deleuze and the Sciences; and Edges of the State.Andrew Culp is director of the MA Aesthetics and Politics program at California Institute of the Arts and author of Dark Deleuze and A Guerrilla Guide to Refusal. Episode references:Francisco VarelaEvan ThompsonEsequiel Di PaoloHanne De JaegherFrancisco Varela, Eleanor Rosch, Evan Thompson / The Embodied MindWilhelm ReichBaruch SpinozaSigmund Freud Gustave Le BonJeremy Gilbert / Common GroundRodrigo Nunes / Neither Vertical nor HorizontalManuel DeLanda / War in the Age of Intelligent MachinesManuel DeLanda / A Thousand Years of Nonlinear HistoryDeleuze and Guattari / Anti-OedipusBatailleNietzscheMarxFreudDeleuze and Guattari / A Thousand PlateausClaude Lévi-Strauss / Wild ThoughtLisa Adkins / The Time of MoneyArline T. Geronimus / Weathering: The Extraordinary Stress of Ordinary Life in an Unjust SocietyAndrew Culp / Dark DeleuzeDeleuze and Guattari / What Is Philosophy?Suzanne de Brunhoff / Marx on MoneyQuentin BadaireQuentin Badaire’s book review of Against the Grain: A Deep History of the Earliest States by James C. ScottLewis Henry MorganHobbesLockeDaniel Luban / Hobbesian Slavery (essay in Political Theory)RousseauCase studies discussed in this episode:BerserkersEsprit de CorpsRobert BalesShenetta White-BallardPraise for the book:"A brilliant and novel political anthropology that updates our most entrenched philosophical biases and looks to a politics of joy beyond the relations of command."—Davide PanagiaRegimes of Violence: Toward a Political Anthropology by John Protevi is available from University of Minnesota Press.

Scholars have long challenged the common assumption of midwestern isolationism. In Global Heartland, historian Peter Simons reorients the way we look at the critical period in US history from the 1930s through 1950s, showing how farmers across the Midwest understood their work as contributing to an era of international upheaval, geographical reimagination, and global ecological thinking. Here, Simons is joined in conversation with Michael Lansing about the rural heartland, US foreign policy, and the changing and multidisciplinary ways that scholars approach history.Peter Simons is a historian in upstate New York and author of Global Heartland: Cultivating the American Century on the Midwestern Farm.Michael Lansing is a professor of history at Augsburg University and author of Insurgent Democracy: The Nonpartisan League in North American Politics. EPISODE REFERENCES:Arthur Vandenberg: The Man in the Middle of the American Century / Hendrik MeijerThe Heartland: An American History / Kristin HogansonGrasslands Grown: Creating Place on the US Northern Plains and Canadian Prairies / Molly P. RozumBack East: How Westerners Invented a Region / Flannery BurkeSupermarket USA: Food and Power in the Cold War Farms Race / Shane HamiltonNuclear Country: The Origins of the Rural New Right / Catherine McNicol StockLester E. Helland Papers, Wisconsin Veterans Museum, MadisonPraise for the book:“From Lend-Lease to Food for Peace, Global Heartland reveals how rural Midwesterners came to see their farms as being at the heart of the world.”—Kristin Hoganson“This rich and revealing book transforms the way we think about the rural heartland.”—Michael LansingGlobal Heartland: Cultivating the American Century on the Midwestern Farm by Peter Simons is available from University of Minnesota Press.

Join Talia Mae Bettcher, a philosophy professor and author of "Beyond Personhood", in conversation with Judith Butler, a leading voice in feminist and gender studies. They delve into the complexities of trans identity, discussing the damaging political narratives surrounding trans rights and the need for an evolved understanding of personhood. Bettcher introduces groundbreaking ideas like interpersonal spatiality and critiques traditional identity constructs. Their dialogue highlights philosophy as a form of resistance and offers profound insights into navigating contemporary challenges faced by trans individuals.

​"Infrastructure is invisible until it breaks." How do we visualize something that cannot be physically seen? What limitations do existing knowledge structures impose that reverberate through planetary problem-solving processes, including public health and environmental crises? This episode brings together two scholars who think elementally: Lisa Yin Han, who operates in the blue humanities or ocean humanities, who studies mediation and the deep seafloor; and Gloria Chan-Sook Kim, who focuses on scientific problems of knowledge and visualization and more specifically, microbes. Their astounding conversation goes from emerging microbes to the seabed to places where their research intersects, including catastrophic deferral, scalar mediation, the figure of the plume, and the concept of resolution.Lisa Yin Han is assistant professor of media studies at Pitzer College and author of Deepwater Alchemy: Extractive Mediation and the Taming of the Seafloor.Gloria Chan-Sook Kim is a scholar of visual culture, media studies, and science and technology studies, assistant professor at the University of California, Riverside, and author of Microbial Resolution: Visualization and the Security in the War on Microbes. Episode references:Melody JueCelina Osuna, desert humanitiesNicole StarosielskiChristopher P. Heuer / Into the WhiteAndrea BallesteroAdriana Petryna / Life ExposedCelia LoweStefan Helmreich / Alien OceanJames Hamilton-Paterson / Seven-TenthsDeepwater Alchemy and Microbial Resolution are available from University of Minnesota Press.

There's living coral, and then there's Coral—the iconicity and imaginary of living coral. As Melody Jue writes in Coralations, coral alternates between signifying an organism and signifying an environment, all too often imagined as a tourist destination. In rethinking the limitations of Coral, Jue opens up possibilities for a more expansive sense of environmental media, more inclusive goals for multispecies justice, and more nuanced forms of oceanic care work. Here, Jue is joined in conversation with Ann Elias. Melody Jue is associate professor of English at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Jue is author of Coralations and Wild Blue Media: Thinking through Seawater and coeditor of Saturation: An Elemental Politics with Rafico Ruiz.Ann Elias is professor emerita of visual culture at the University of Sydney. Elias is author of many books including Coral Empire: Underwater Oceans, Colonial Tropics, Visual Modernity.REFERENCES:Coral Whisperers (Irus Braverman)Situated Knowledges (Donna Haraway, in the journal Feminist Studies)Her Seal Skin Coat (Lauren Beukes, short story)Sylvia EarleJacques CousteauCalifornia Against the Sea (Rosanna Xia)Jean PainlevéZoological Surrealism (James Leo Cahill)Alien Ocean (Stefan Helmreich)Chasing Coral documentaryCoralations by Melody Jue is available from University of Minnesota Press. This book is part of the Forerunners series, and an open-access edition is available to read free online at manifold.umn.edu.

University of Minnesota Press, est. 1925, turns 100 this year. Yes, we are twice as old as Saturday Night Live. And just as old as The New Yorker and The Great Gatsby. The Press has had only five directors in its history, and many current staff have been on for more than a few decades.How about another serendipitous milestone: this podcast, est. 2020, is releasing its 100th episode right here, right now. The past 99 episodes have focused on our authors. Between authorship and publication, a book passes through more than a few hands, and today we are getting into it with people who have dedicated their days, years, and decades in service of books and research. About half of our staff are represented here. Without further adieu, come meet (half of) the Press!People appearing in this episode include:Douglas Armato, director of University of Minnesota PressSusan Doerr, associate directorEmily Hamilton, associate director for book publishingLaura Westlund, managing editor and development officerJason Weidemann, editorial directorPieter Martin, senior editorMichael Stoffel, managing editor–scholarly booksHeather Skinner, publicity director and assistant marketing managerRachel Moeller, assistant production manager and art directorErik Anderson, senior acquisitions editorMaggie Sattler, digital marketing managerEric Lundgren, development and outreach managerEliza Edwards, production assistantEmma Saks, editorial assistantCarina Bolaños Lewen, exhibits and marketing assistantAnthony Silvestri, journals managerZack Stewart, journals production specialistAlena Rivas, publicity associateKeep up with our centennial at z.umn.edu/ump100.Thank you for listening.