Along with football and religion, housing is a fundamental cornerstone of Egyptian life: it can make or break marriage proposals, invigorate or slow down the economy, and popularize or embarrass a ruler. Housing is political. Almost every Egyptian ruler over the last eighty years has directly associated himself with at least one large-scale housing project. ... Show More
Aug 1
Vaneesa Cook, "Empire and Liberty: The Tied Histories of Two American Landmarks" (Beacon Press, 2026)
In Empire and Liberty: The Tied Histories of Two American Landmarks (Beacon Press, 2026), historian Dr. Vaneesa Cook examines the history of the Empire State Building and the Statue of Liberty in order to consider, more broadly, the United States' relationship with liberty and e ... Show More
46m 16s
Jul 22
Mark Crinson, "Aviationland: Heathrow and the Making of an Airport Landscape" (Paul Mellon Centre, 2026)
Aviationland: Heathrow and the Making of an Airport Landscape (Paul Mellon Centre, 2026) by Professor Mark Crinson is the first critical study to examine how a major international airport takes shape on the ground, and what that means for the landscape around it. Focused on Heath ... Show More
1h 16m
Jul 3
Dmytro Soloviov, "Ukrainian Modernism: Modernist Architecture of Ukraine" (Fuel, 2025)
Ukraine’s modernist buildings are an extraordinary blend of function, avant-garde aesthetics and ingenious design, but despite these qualities, they remain largely unrecognized. This is a result of several factors, including the stigma of belonging to the Soviet era, corruption, ... Show More
52m 51s
Jun 2021
Caroline Seymour-Jorn, "Creating Spaces of Hope: Young Artists and the New Imagination in Egypt" (AU in Cairo Press, 2021)
It is now just over a decade since protests in Cairo's Tahrir Square started Egypt's chapter in the events of the Arab Spring. Much has been made in western criticism of art and culture's role in the revolution, but the everyday cultural production of studio artists, graffiti art ... Show More
59m 29s
Aug 2024
Arif Hasan, "The Search for Shelter: Writings on Land and Housing" (Oxford UP, 2022)
The Search for Shelter: Writings on Land and Housing (Oxford UP, 2022) sheds light on the global population living in slums, which has increased from 1 billion in 2014 to 1.6 billion in 2018. The book also looks at the impact of neoliberalism on urban planning, the manner of orga ... Show More
50m 33s
Jun 2025
Confronting the affordable-housing crisis
The US housing crunch is bad—and it’s getting worse. Wider access to safe, affordable homes is vital to enabling economic mobility for all Americans—and to harnessing what McKinsey Partner JP Julien, a leader of the McKinsey Institute for Economic Mobility, calls a “massive” unta ... Show More
25m 28s
Jan 2025
Alva Gotby, "Feeling at Home: Transforming the Politics of Housing" (Verso, 2025)
Housing is more than bricks and mortar. The home is where our hopes and dreams play out, and it lies at the heart of our lives. This is where we rest, eat, and relax. The home we enjoy can determine our health, life expectancy, and day-to-day well-being. In contrast, the lack of ... Show More
52 m
May 2024
Harry Pettit, "The Labor of Hope:: Meritocracy and Precarity in Egypt" (Stanford UP, 2023)
Capitalism is not only an economic system but also a system of production and allocation of hope. In Egypt, a generation of young men desire fulfilling employment, meaningful relationships, and secure family life, yet find few paths to achieve this.
In The Labor of Hope:: Merito ... Show More
56m 20s