Podcasts by Bedrosian Bookclub Podcast
An audio book club. Our geeks read and discuss new and classic works in the policy field – fictional and non. Social justice, tech, politics, policy … we cover it all and more. Let's think about what is at the heart of being a citizen in America. This book club helps us get at the heart of what it means to be a citizen in a democracy.
Sponsored by the USC Bedrosian Center
http://bedrosian.usc.edu/
Recorded at the USC Sol Price School of Public Policy
http://priceschool.usc.edu
Further podcasts by USC Bedrosian Center
Podcast on the topic Gesellschaft und Kultur
All episodes
The 1619 Project from 2022-01-26T14:00
This is the last episode of the Bedrosian Bookclub in this incarnation, it's been a blast.
We discuss the importance of The 1619 ...
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Eat the Mouth That Feeds You from 2021-12-16T14:00
Three votes for Carribean Fragoza’s Eat the Mouth that Feeds You to be something every high school senior is exposed to. This d...
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Covered With Night from 2021-11-22T14:00
Now, in the tail end of 2021, discourse about restorative justice and public safety lack imagination. We tend to “do what we’ve always done.”
NYU Historian Listen
House of Leaves from 2021-10-22T13:00
Ostensibly, House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski, is about a young man who finds a manuscript in a dead man’s apartment. This experimental novel, released in 2000, takes a cinematic approach t...
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Not a Nation of Immigrants from 2021-10-08T13:00
In Not a Nation of Immigrants, Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz strives to look at the ever morphing ...
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Unconventional Combat (Author Interview) from 2021-09-06T13:00
The Atmospherians from 2021-08-30T13:00
A "canceled" influencer. A lonely man looking for attention. White men adrift in hoards, no memory of the violence or good they've done. Enter The Atmosphere, a new retreat where men can detox f...
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The Brutish Museums from 2021-07-19T13:00
The Brutish Museums by Dan Hicks is a necrography wherein each stolen item from Benin City is an ongoing event: each event a sto...
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The Shadow of the Wind from 2021-07-11T13:00
This month we're thinking about history, collections, and stories. How do stories evolve over time, how do stories shape history, how do they make their way through time and space?
Carlos...
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The Fact of a Body from 2021-07-08T01:36:55
The Fact of a Body by *Alexandria Marzano-Lesnevich is a true crime memoir. After encountering the child murderer Ricky Langle...
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Emergent Stategy from 2021-06-29T13:00
Polarization is at a high point, political violence surrounds us, joblessness, homelessness, the country's need to face the great wrongs of the past, and th...
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All We Can Save from 2021-06-25T13:00
Activists, scientists, most of us ... we know that the truth of the climate crisis is monumental. It's overwhelming the size, scope, interconnectedness of the problem.
The Nature of Desert Nature from 2021-05-31T16:00
Ostensibly, editor Gary Paul Nabhan's collection of friends' essays, The Nature of Desert Nature is about the desert.
Rather ... it's human nature that we encounter delving into ...
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Twilight of Democracy from 2021-04-05T12:30
Twilight of Democracy is a memoir. It is also a condemnation of the many intellectuals and opportunists who have not only given up on democracy, but given up on truth.
Anne Apple...
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Solutions and Other Problems from 2021-02-22T16:30
"The first time I can remember feeling truly powerless, I was three, and I was trapped sideways in a bucket in the garage."
The first line of Allie Brosh's latest illustrated memoir, ...
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A Promised Land from 2021-02-03T14:00
Accelerating Fair Chance Hiring from 2021-02-01T18:38:28
In our new series on Community Impact we speak with Victoria Ciudad-Real, John Roberson III, Gary Painter, and Jeffery Wallace about findings from their collaborative project Accelerating Fair C...
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Parable of the Sower from 2021-01-27T14:30
Octavia Butler's 1993 novel, Parable of the Sower, was listed as a New York Times bestseller for the first time in September 2020.
Parable is the story of a 15-...
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Economic Roundtable’s Locked Out Report from 2021-01-22T19:15:22
For this bonus episode, we’re talking with Daniel Flaming & Anthony Orlando on the new report on homelessness in the time of COVID (and after). The Economic Roundtable report uses past pandemic ...
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The Book Truck&Teen Literacy from 2021-01-14T13:00
In today's bonus episode, we speak with Elizabeth Dragga (Founder of The Book Truck) and Julie Sandor ab...
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A Libertarian Walks Into a Bear from 2020-12-21T16:00
What better way to end a hard year than to visit Grafton, New Hampshire as author Matthew Hongoltz-Hetling as he reports on the people who lived there during the Free Town Project? In the new bo...
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How Do Renters Cope with Unaffordability? from 2020-12-15T17:00
This episode is a bit different but we decided this was too good to pass up. We aren’t discussing a book today, rather we’re going to cover another important report out of the USC Price School o...
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Just Us: An American Conversation from 2020-11-25T14:00
The Auctioneer from 2020-10-26T12:00
The Auctioneer was released in 1976 with a campaign that likened it to "The Lottery.” That the novel reflects ...
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NDSC Criminal Justice Data Report from 2020-10-14T12:30
This episode is a bit different but we decided this was too good to pass up. We aren't discussing a book today, rather we're going to cover an important Listen
The Ghost Map from 2020-09-28T12:00
The Affordable City (Author Interview) from 2020-09-14T22:01:56
An interview with author of The Affordable City by Shane Phillips. (Follow Phillips on Twitte...
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The Address Book (author interview) from 2020-09-09T18:18:08
An interview with author of The Address Book, Deirdre Mas...
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The Address Book from 2020-08-28T20:56:41
The Address Book is a dive into the deep waters of the meaning of addresses, often with tangents into the weird and interesting lives of people throughout history.
Beginning with...
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The City We Became from 2020-07-29T18:08:22
Care (author interview) from 2020-07-14T13:00
An interview with author of Care: Stories, Christopher Records...
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The Murmur of Bees from 2020-06-26T21:58:39
Our host, Dr. Lisa Schweitzer, chose Sofía Segovia's The Murmur of Bees (translated by Simon Bruni) in August of 2019. It seemed like it would be a good sprawling family saga to read th...
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No Turning Back from 2020-05-28T22:07:43
An 18 year old Mohammad Darwish cries out, "We want freedom!"
A revolution begins in the city of Rastan, Syria. April 1st, 2011.
For many years, journalist Rania Abouzeid spends ti...
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Republican Party Politics and the American South, 1865-1968 from 2020-05-19T23:56:48
Another bonus episode!
Environmental Justice in a Moment of Danger from 2020-04-27T21:40:46
We spent #EarthDay2020 talking about environmental justice.
We spoke about an intriguing new book by UCDavis Prof...
Betraying Big Brother from 2020-03-30T13:00
Can a groundswell of feminist activism threaten an authoritarian patriarchal regime?
Author, Leta Hong Fincher looks at this question through the study of women in China. In Betraying...
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Destiny Disrupted from 2020-03-04T21:03:38
Tamim Ansary brings 1500 years of history to life in Destiny Disrupted: A History of the World Through Islamic Eyes. Destiny Disrupted gives readers a broad overview of history of the m...
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A Lot of People Are Saying from 2020-02-24T13:00
Does your favorite conspiracy come with evidence and theory of governance, or is it just a meme?
Russell Muirhead and Nancy L. Rosenblum, authors of A Lot of People Are Saying: The Ne...
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On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous from 2020-01-28T00:56:22
In today’s episode we're briefly gorgeous, or possibly briefly monstrous. We're pretty sure both are true.
What we are sure of is that Ocean Vuong's magnificent ...
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Trailblazer from 2020-01-16T14:00
In today’s episode we’re thinking about racism, sexism, misogynoir, and the journalism. We're reading Trailblazer, a memoir by journalist giant Dorothy Butler Gilliam.
Gilliam sh...
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Children of the Dream from 2019-12-09T14:00
An interview with author of Children of the Dream: Why School Integration Works...
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The Seven Necessary Sins for Women and Girls from 2019-11-25T19:54:09
In today’s episode we’re thinking about the patriarchy, and Mona Eltahawy’s tools for women and girls. Tools to take down the premise by which prevents so many women from living full human lives...
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5 Year Retrospective from 2019-11-06T20:28:28
For today's episode, we're thinking about the many books we've discussed over the years.
After 70+ book discussions, we thought it was about time we did a look back at our favorite discus...
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The Devil in Silver from 2019-10-28T20:44:45
Host Lisa Schweitzer is joined by Aubrey L. Hicks, Listen
By-Right, By-Design from 2019-09-30T21:00
Another bonus episode!
Host Lisa discusses Professor Liz Falletta's b...
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The Undercommons from 2019-09-30T12:30
The Undercommons is a series of essays exploring contemporary political thought from an inside/outside the commons perspective. Our guest today contends that under all the theory, the book is ab...
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Why Cities Lose from 2019-09-23T20:37:59
You've heard that gerrymandering can be bad for representation.
Jonathan A. Rodden wants to take you further back in time to the beginnings of what has become a problem of representation,...
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The Line Becomes a River from 2019-08-26T18:50:44
Today's book: The Line Becomes a River by Francisco Cantú.
The southern border between Mexico and the U.S. can be a violent place. Yet isn't as easily defined as it seems.There a...
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Career of Evil from 2019-07-29T13:00
What is a summer book club without a good detective novel?
Our conversation today dives into Robert Galbraith's third installment of the Cormoran Strike novels, Career of Evil. T...
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The Model Thinker from 2019-07-17T21:37:41
If models of the world are all wrong, why are they critical to understanding our complex world?
Today, host Pamela Clouser McCann discusses the book The Model Thinker with guests...
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Commander in Cheat from 2019-06-27T16:37:49
Can the way a person plays golf really explain their whole personality? Famed golf writer Rick Reilly aims to make the case in Commander in Cheat. Detailing with excruciating detail and...
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Who Fears Death from 2019-05-24T13:00
In today's episode, we discuss Nnedi Okorafor's Afrofuturist novel Who Fears Death. A young woman, named Onyesonwu meaning Who Fears Death learns she is a child of rape, deals with bein...
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White Fragility from 2019-04-26T16:50:20
Host Aubrey Hicks is joined by professors Chris Redfearn and Liz Falletta in a discussion of the New York Times bestselling book White Fragility by Robin DiAngelo.
On to...
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An Unkindness of Ghosts from 2019-03-21T23:43:51
An Unkindness of Ghosts by Rivers Solomon
This month, host Listen
Body Horror from 2019-02-21T00:18:50
Body Horror: Capitalism, Fear, Misogyny, Jokes by Anne Elizabeth Moore
This month, Listen
The Real Fake: Authenticity and the Production of Space from 2019-01-18T17:11:03
Using the case of Thames Town, an English-like village in Shanghai, The Real Fake looks at Chinese ideas of spac...
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Fear: Trump in the White House from 2018-12-19T14:00
This month, Lisa is joined by Anthony Orlando, Jeff Jenkins, and Christian Grose to discuss Bob Woodward's latest reportage on the Presidency: Listen
Payment by Results and Social Impact Bonds from 2018-12-14T21:26:18
One of the larger problems for government, is that taking risks is difficult. Risks are expensive, and can lead to a host of problems when those risks don't give desired results.
Here's ...
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American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin from 2018-11-26T14:00
This month, Lisa, Richard, and Aubrey discuss the new book of sonnets from Terrance Hayes, American Sonnets for my Past and Future Assassin. Hayes' sonnets a...
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The Death of Truth from 2018-11-20T23:14:38
This month, Aubrey, Ange-Marie, Jeff, and David discuss the new book from renowned literary critic Michiko Kakutani, The Death of Truth : Notes on Falsehood in th...
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Bless Me, Ultima from 2018-10-26T00:23:36
Our new tradition, on the Bedrosian Bookclub, is to read a witchy book for the month of October. This year ...
We're taking a look at the coming of age novel, Listen
Planning for AuthentiCITIES from 2018-10-01T20:14
What is authenticity in a community? What is an authentic community? In a world which never stops changing, growing, evolving ... how can planners take up the challenge of authenticit...
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Women&Power from 2018-08-27T22:26:08
In 2017 two lectures presented in the London Review of Books’ Winter Lecture series were published together in Mary Beard’s Women & Power. The first lecture put into context the idea ...
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This Is How It Ends from 2018-07-30T16:18:58
Eva Dolan's This Is How It Ends is a thriller set in an anti-gentrifi...
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Draft No. 4 from 2018-06-25T13:00
Anyone who reads or watches the news might feel like we are in a news assault. The news happens so fast, technology helps us disseminate and consume with speed, and m...
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The Myth of Independence from 2018-05-29T13:00
Congressional historian Sarah Binder joins neighbor and investment manager, Mark Spindel in a look at the history of the relationship between the Federal Reserve and ...
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Bonus - Interview with E. Glen Weyl from 2018-05-08T22:19:12
Special bonus track!
An interview with one of the co-authors of Radical Markets: Uprooting Capitalism and Democracy for ...
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Radical Markets from 2018-05-08T22:17:32
In Radical Markets, Eric A. Posner and E. Glen Weyl envision new rules for markets in order to limit the tyranny of monopolies and majority rule. Their aim, ...
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Ender's Game from 2018-03-23T19:04:58
In Ender's Game, by Orson Scott Card is a dystopian novel lookin...
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Killers of the Flower Moon from 2018-02-27T00:01:35
In Killers of the Flower Moon, David Grann br...
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Ursula K. Le Guin and the Walk Away from Omelas from 2018-02-06T18:36:59
The world lost one of the greats on Monday, January 22nd. Ursula K. Le Guin passed away at the age of 88 and left a hole in many hearts around the world.
<... Listen
Coriolanus from 2018-01-30T19:28:27
In Coriolanus, Shakespeare brings us to a Rome in a time of transitional government, leadership, citizenship. Patrician Menenius tries to calm a mutiny among...
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Democracy in Chains from 2017-12-19T00:26:11
Democracy in Chains begins as the story of James Buchanan, the Nobel Prize winning economist who popularized public choice economist. MacLean argues that Buchanan joi...
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All the President’s Men (40th Anniversary Edition) from 2017-11-28T00:38:33
Bernstein and Woodward published All the President's Men a mere three months before Nixon's resignation. We're revisiting (or visiting for the first time) th...
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City of Inmates from 2017-10-30T22:16:33
Historian Kelly Lytle Hernández brings us the lengthy history of how authorities in Los Angeles have used imprisonment as a tool to control both labor and migration.<...
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BONUS – Lolly Willowes: Or the Loving Huntsman from 2017-10-13T00:00:58
Lolly Willowes: Or the Loving Huntsman is the deceptively simple novel by Sylvia Townsend Warner, about a woman who after 40 years spent in devotion to takin...
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White Tears from 2017-08-28T14:00
For our discussion of Hari Kunzru's White Tears, we return t...
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Tears We Cannot Stop from 2017-07-28T17:12:01
Can America overcome its sin of racism? If redemption of sin comes through repentance, can White America meet the demands necessary? Michael Eric Dyson's latest is a ...
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American Swastika from 2017-06-26T20:18:32
In American Swastika: Inside the White Power Movement's Hidden Spaces of Hate (2nd edition), Pete Simi and Robert Futrell look at the white power movement. O...
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Slow Philosophy and The Slow Professor from 2017-06-22T19:57:22
Looking at academia as microcosm of society at large, we find many Americans can get something from this conversation on the difference between love of wisdom and the...
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The Reluctant Fundamentalist from 2017-05-30T22:38:52
The narrator of Mohsin Hamid's The Reluctant Fundamentalist may be unreliable as he tells his American experience before and after 9/11 with an unknown American dinner guest, but we wonder if he...
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Cop in the Hood (Part 2) from 2017-04-24T20:22:09
In part 2 of our discussion of Cop in the Hood by Peter Moskos, we discuss the notion of discretion in the legal system - by police all the way to prosecutors & parole/probation boards. We think...
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Cop in the Hood (Part 1) from 2017-04-24T20:19:26
We ask how to define "good" policing, as we discuss sociologist Peter Moskos' Cop in the Hood: My Year Policing Baltimore's Eastern District. What expectations do we put on police officers? How ...
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The Underground Railroad from 2017-03-27T21:47:16
In Colson Whitehead's award-winning novel The Underground Railroad, Cora, daughter and granddaughter...
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Hillbilly Elegy from 2017-02-24T23:50:21
Hillbilly Elegy is a memoir by J. D. Vance about family; about Appalachia, hillbillies, and the American white underclass in the rural and semi-rural interior of the United States. Vance relates...
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Bonus - White Trash from 2016-12-21T20:06:02
In White Trash: The 400-year Untold History of Class in America, historian Nancy Isenberg traces white poverty and class from the earliest British settlements through to the 21st century. What s...
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The City & the City from 2016-12-21T19:30:20
The City and The City by China Miéville is a noir detective murder mystery set in an urban fantasy landscape where the cities of Beszel and Ul Qoma are not just neighboring, but enmeshed in over...
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Sidewalking: Coming to Terms with Los Angeles from 2016-10-26T19:51:01
This episode features a discussion of David Ulin’s Sidewalking: Coming to Terms with Los Angeles. A transplant to Los Angeles from New York, Ulin’s long essay/memoir is a meditation on moving th...
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BONUS – Interview with Viet Thanh Nguyen from 2016-09-29T20:55:07
Special bonus track! An interview with The Sympathizer author Viet Thanh Nguyen.
On April 18, 2016, The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen won the ...
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The Sympathizer from 2016-09-26T23:33:52
This edition of the book club features the astounding Pulitzer Prize winning novel, The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen. The narrator, a communist double agent, is a “man of two minds,” whom we...
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The Sympathizer from 2016-09-26T23:33:52
This edition of the book club features the astounding Pulitzer Prize winning novel, The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen. The narrator, a communist double agent, is a “man of two minds,” whom we...
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The Sympathizer from 2016-09-26T23:33:52
This edition of the book club features the astounding Pulitzer Prize winning novel, The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen. The narrator, a communist double agent, is a “man of two minds,” whom we...
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Dream Cities from 2016-08-28T00:00
Wade Graham's latest book Dream Cities: Seven Urban Ideas That Shape the World is ostensibly about the architects and the seven big ideas that have shaped contemporary cities across the world. O...
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Citizen: An American Lyric from 2016-07-22T00:00
This month's book is both poetry and criticism, Citizen: An American Lyric. Rankine's piece is a revolution. A political, a poetic, complex revolution in 169 pages. We look at it through an unus...
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The Rise And Fall Of Urban Economies from 2016-05-23T00:00
Audio book club discussion of THE RISE AND FALL OF URBAN ECONOMIES: LESSONS FROM SAN FRANCISCO AND LOS ANGELES for links to some of the things we talk about, see the show page: https://bedrosian...
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The Water Knife from 2016-04-13T00:00
This podcast features *spoilers – so, please listen after you’ve read the book unless you are okay with hearing about major plot details and the ending of this amazing novel. Listen on iTunes: <...
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Your Heart Is A Muscle The Size Of A Fist from 2016-02-18T00:00
Sunil Yapa's debut novel, Your Heart is a Muscle the Size of a Fist, returns us to 1999 during the WTO protests in Seattle. Taking on multiple perspectives during the first day of the meeting/pr...
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Richard II from 2016-01-21T00:00
Richard II, the first of four Shakespeare plays known as the "Henriad," is the tale of strife between Richard II, the rightful but terrible king, and his cousin Henry Bolingbroke. Followed by He...
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The Great Inversion from 2015-12-21T00:00
Alan Ehrenhalt begins THE GREAT INVERSION by taking a tour of 19th century European cities - 5-story Paris and Vienna. He argues that the demographics of the urban and suburban landscape are in ...
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Bonus: Interview With Rez Life author David Treuer from 2015-12-13T00:00
Special bonus track! An interview with Rez Life author David Treuer. To participate in Native American History Month, we read Rez Life: An Indian's Journey Through Reservation Life by USC Profes...
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What I Saw At The Revolution from 2015-10-25T00:00
In this edition of the Bedrosian Book Club Podcast, we’re taking a look to the past. We read Peggy Noonan's 1990 memoir, What I Saw at the Revolution. This is a political memoir for those who do...
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Between The World And Me from 2015-09-25T02:00
In this edition of the Bedrosian Book Club Podcast, we’re continuing our conversation about race in America, with the book Toni Morrison calls “required reading.” Between the World and Me by Ta-...
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The Last Days Of Ptolemy Grey from 2015-08-31T02:00
In this edition of the Bedrosian Book Club Podcast, we're continuing our conversation about race in America, from a slightly different angle. Walter Mosley, most known for his LA crime fiction, ...
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