In this episode we challenge the ideas about invisibility of Asian Americans in the urban Midwest by discussing Rebecca Jo Kinney’s Mapping AsiaTown Cleveland: Race and Redevelopment in the Rust Belt (Temple University Press, 2025).
Mapping AsiaTown Cleveland links the contemporary development of Cleveland’s “AsiaTown” to the multiple and fragmented histori ... Show More
Jul 6
Michael Amoruso, "Moved by the Dead: Haunting and Devotion in São Paulo, Brazil" (UNC Press, 2025)
In the sprawling city of São Paulo, a weekly practice known as devotion to souls (devoção às almas) draws devotees to Catholic churches, cemeteries, and other sites associated with tragic or unjust deaths. The living pray and light candles for the souls of the dead, remembering e ... Show More
1h 13m
Jul 5
John Bardes, "The Carceral City: Slavery and the Making of Mass Incarceration in New Orleans, 1803-1930" (UNC Press, 2024)
The Carceral City: Slavery and the Making of Mass Incarceration in New Orleans, 1803-1930 (UNC Press, 2024) reveals that Americans often assume that slave societies had little use for prisons and police because slaveholders only ever inflicted violence directly or through oversee ... Show More
48m 57s
Jul 3
Bridging History, Policy and Place with Bruce Harvey
Bruce Harvey is a historian and photographer based in Syracuse, NY, who works at the intersection of memory, place, and public history. As an independent consultant, he helps both public and private clients document historic sites--shaping how we remember, preserve, and sometimes ... Show More
1h 15m
Feb 2025
Yuval Ben-Bassat and Johann Büssow, "Late Ottoman Gaza: An Eastern Mediterranean Hub in Transformation" (Cambridge UP, 2024)
Today, when we think about Gaza we think about the war, the destruction of the city and the constant movement of its population. In contemporary public discourse, Gaza tends to be characterized solely as a theatre of the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinians. Howev ... Show More
1 h
Feb 2025
Palestinian Writing From the Diaspora | Sahar Mustafah Interviews Susan Muaddi Darraj
In this episode of Ehkili, Sahar Mustafah welcomes author and editor Susan Muaddi Darraj to discuss her recent anthology, "Ask the Night for a Dream: Palestinian Writing From the Diaspora." The conversation highlights the significance of amplifying Palestinian literary voices, th ... Show More
50m 4s
Aug 2024
Iman Mersal, "Traces of Enayat" (Transit Books, 2023)
Traces of Enayat (Transit Books, 2023) is a work of creative nonfiction tracing the mysterious life and erasure of Egyptian literature’s tragic heroine. It begins in Cairo, 1963. Four years before her lone novel is finally published, the writer Enayat al-Zayyat takes her own life ... Show More
1h 3m
Oct 2024
Mahmoud Muna and Matthew Teller, "Daybreak in Gaza: Stories of Palestinian Lives and Culture" (Saqi Books, 2024)
This is Gaza – a place of humanity and creativity, rich in culture and industry. A place now utterly devastated, its entire population displaced by a seemingly endless onslaught, its heritage destroyed.Daybreak in Gaza: Stories of Palestinian Lives and Culture (Saqi Books, 2024) ... Show More
1h 21m
Jan 2025
Nadia Maftouni on the Legacy of Ibn al-Haytham in Camera Obscura | With Fujifilm & Gulf Photo Plus
The afikra podcast is back with a new season hosted by Mikey Muhanna. We kick off with an episode in partnership with Fujifilm and Gulf Photo Plus with Iranian academic, philosophical author, and artist Nadia Maftouni, who delves into the groundbreaking contributions of Ibn al-Ha ... Show More
33m 6s
Jan 2025
Deyo, Le Flem, de Leon: 2024 The Year in Review
In this program, we look at the discoveries that made 2024 unique, Join us as we uncover, new temples, geoglyphs, the Yugas, a ancient Maya City, Cleopatra tomb and much more.
Panelist include:
Jenn Deyo has spent decades out in the field unearthing artifacts and researching anci ... Show More
2h 14m
Jul 2023
Ep 4: The Fatimids: Founders of Cairo, with Dr Shainool Jiwa
The Fatimids were an Ismaili dynasty that reigned over a diverse religious and ethnic population for about 200 years, emerging from the vibrant 10th century world of the Mediterranean. At its height, the Fatimid Empire stretched across the length of the southern Mediterranean and ... Show More
38m 11s
Oct 2024
Boris Adjemian, "The Brass Band of the King: Armenians in Ethiopia" (Bloomsbury, 2024)
In 1924, the crown prince and future emperor of Ethiopia, Ras Täfäri, on a visit to Jerusalem, called on forty Armenian orphans who had survived the genocide of 1915-1916 to form his empire's royal brass band. The conductor, who was also Armenian, composed the first official anth ... Show More
1h 10m