Rephonic
Artwork for New Books in Science, Technology, and Society

New Books in Science, Technology, and Society

New Books Network
Artificial Intelligence
World War II
Climate Change
Social Media
Technology
Memory
Silicon Valley
Medical Progress
Environmental Justice
Geoai
Social Justice
Capitalism
Plastic Pollution
Drone Warfare
Cultural History
Neuroscience
Cultural Studies
Telecommunications
History Of Technology
Data Literacy

This podcast is a channel on the New Books Network. The New Books Network is an academic audio library dedicated to public education. In each episode you will hear scholars discuss their recently published research with another expert in their field. Discover our 150+ channels and browse our 28,000+ episodes on our website: ⁠newbooksnetwork.com⁠ Subscribe to our free weekly Substack newsletter to ... more

PublishesDailyEpisodes2915Founded14 years ago
Number of ListenersCategories
Social SciencesScience

Listen to this Podcast

Artwork for New Books in Science, Technology, and Society

Latest Episodes

In this episode of International Horizons, RBI Acting Director Eli Karetny sits down with Alexis Cruz, founder of Enough Consulting and former strategic advisor for governance at Meta. Cruz explores how the proliferation of AI and digital platforms h... more

Since the 1990s, technologists have promoted a vision of the “cloud” as a shapeless and intangible entity. Grounding the Cloud: Urbanism in the Shadow of Data

(University of Minnesota Press, 2026) by Dr. Ali Fard peers through

this hazy façade to r... more

The first chemists were Sri Lankan forgers who crafted

unimaginably strong steel millennia before it should have been

possible. They were alchemists in Roman Egypt, who designed apparatus

still in use today. They were Stone Age leatherworkers, ... more

Stove

improvers have been designing and promoting “clean” or “efficient”

biomass cookstoves in India since the 1940s and have been frustrated to

find their carefully engineered stoves abandoned in trash heaps or

repurposed as storage bins, while ... more

Key Facts

Accepts Guests
Accepts Sponsors
Contact Information
Podcast Host
Number of Listeners
Find out how many people listen to this podcast per episode and each month.

Similar Podcasts

People also subscribe to these shows.

Acid Horizon
Acid HorizonAcid Horizon
The LRB Podcast
The LRB PodcastThe London Review of Books
Overthink
OverthinkEllie Anderson, Ph.D. and David Peña-Guzmán, Ph.D.

Recent Guests

Elizabeth Cotton
Author of UberTherapy, The New Business of Mental Health
Policy Press
Episode: Elizabeth Cotton, "UberTherapy: The New Business of Mental Health" (Policy Press, 2025)
Cleo Nisse
Author, Venetian Canvas and the Transformation of Painting
Princeton University Press (publisher)
Episode: Cleo Nisse, "Venetian Canvas and the Transformation of Painting" (Princeton UP, 2026)
Jon Penney
Legal scholar and social scientist; associate professor and research chair at Osgoode Hall Law School; faculty associate at Harvard's Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society
Osgoode Hall Law School; Harvard Berkman Klein Center
Episode: Jonathon W. Penney, "Chilling Effects: Repression, Conformity, and Power in the Digital Age" (Cambridge UP, 2025)
Gareth Doherty
Author of Landscape Fieldwork: How Engaging the World Can Change Design
National University of Singapore and University of Johannesburg (associate/visiting)
Episode: Gareth Doherty, "Landscape Fieldwork: How Engaging the World Can Change Design" (U Virginia Press, 2025)
Ayala Fader
Professor of Anthropology at Fordham University
Fordham University
Episode: Hidden Heretics: Jewish Doubt in the Digital Age
Josh Lambert
Sophia Moses Robeson Associate Professor of Jewish Studies and English; Director of the Jewish Studies Program at Wellesley College
Wellesley College
Episode: Hidden Heretics: Jewish Doubt in the Digital Age
Emily Doucet
Writer, editor, and researcher focused on photography and the cultural life of technology
Framing Devices (founder) / Duke University Press book author
Episode: Emily Doucet, "Inventing Nadar: A History of Photographic Firsts" (Duke UP, 2026)
John Longhurst
Award-winning journalist and author
Winnipeg Free Press
Episode: John Longhurst, "Can Robots Love God and Be Saved? A Journalist Reports on Faith" (CMU Press, 2024)
Andrew Sorota
Head of Research for the Office of Eric Schmidt
Office of Eric Schmidt
Episode: AI, Algocracy, and Democracy's Challenging Road Ahead with Andrew Sorota

Host

Miranda Melcher
Host of The New Books Network; focus on history and science/technology topics; affiliated with New Books Network.

Reviews

4.3 out of 5 stars from 77 ratings
  • Excellent, but please fix the audio

    Excellent content, but the audio of the introductory part is disturbed by static noise. Thankfully the introduction is pretty short. The audio of the interview is much better. I think it would be wise to get a new microphone.

    Apple Podcasts
    3
    Em1975
    United States5 years ago

Listeners Say

Key themes from listener reviews, highlighting what works and what could be improved about the show.

Guests are clearly experts and bring depth to debates.
Thoughtful, rigorous conversations with top scholars.
Occasional audio quality issues during intros.
The show combines archival insight with contemporary relevance.
Great for background reading and understanding complex topics.

Chart Rankings

How this podcast ranks in the Apple Podcasts, Spotify and YouTube charts.

Talking Points

Recent interactions between the hosts and their guests.

Eivind Røssaak, "The Cory Arcangel Hack: Digital Culture and Aesthetic Practice" (MIT Press, 2025)
Q: How did your questions evolve as you studied Arcangel's work?
The interviewee explains that over time he traced Arcangel's works through two planes—the immediate hacks that alter a system and the larger social, political, and aesthetic implications of those hacks—leading to a two-tier reading of his practice across early 2000s net art and later post-internet contexts.
Eivind Røssaak, "The Cory Arcangel Hack: Digital Culture and Aesthetic Practice" (MIT Press, 2025)
Q: What were your initial questions?
I started from the shift from analog regimes in cinema and media to the digital regime, asking how digital life shapes social subjects and what the artist can intervene in to critique that regime.
Isabelle Held, "Atomic Bombshells: How Plastics Shaped Postwar Bodies" (Duke UP, 2026)
Q: How did the public exhibitions influence the reception of these new materials like nylon?
The fairs provided a testing ground where audiences could experience nylons firsthand, with attendants and 'Miss Chemistry' figures illustrating how the material could be marketed through performances, shape-shifting demonstrations, and curated narratives that tied science to style and modern femininity.
Isabelle Held, "Atomic Bombshells: How Plastics Shaped Postwar Bodies" (Duke UP, 2026)
Q: What makes nylon such a pivotal material in this history beyond its use in stockings?
Nylon was framed as the world's first fully synthetic fiber and, through wartime and postwar campaigns, it connected military research with consumer markets, transforming perceptions of what synthetic materials could do for daily life and how women's bodies were imagined in relation to technology.
Isabelle Held, "Atomic Bombshells: How Plastics Shaped Postwar Bodies" (Duke UP, 2026)
Q: Could you start us off by introducing yourself and telling us why you decided to write this book?
I am the Mellon Foundation Gender and LGBTQ Plus History Fellow at the New York Historical Center for Women's History, and my research centered on the body, fashion, and the material culture of postwar consumer products, which led me to explore how a seemingly innocent object like the bullet bra interacted with larger design projects and military materials to reshape women's bodies.

Audience Metrics

Listeners, social reach, demographics and more for this podcast.

Listeners per Episode
Gender Skew
Location
Interests
Professions
Age Range
Household Income
Social Media Reach

Frequently Asked Questions About This Podcast

What is This Podcast about and what kind of topics does it cover?

This program features in-depth conversations with scholars who discuss recently published books and research across science, technology, and society. Episodes cover topics like psywar history, language and AI, urban self-provisioning, environmental disasters, peace infrastructures, phrenology's historical impact, AI leadership in GLAM institutions, reparative media, race and genomics, internet history, space policy, and data capitalism in rural contexts. Guests are primarily academics and policy thinkers who illuminate historical debates, technological change, and social implications, often tying scholarly work to contemporary public conversations. The show is notable for integrating archival research with contemporary issues, offering rigo... more

Where can I find podcast stats for this podcast?

Rephonic provides a wide range of podcast stats for this podcast. We scanned the web and collated all of the information that we could find in our comprehensive podcast database. See how many people listen to this podcast and access YouTube viewership numbers, download stats, audience demographics, chart rankings, ratings, reviews and more.

How many listeners does this podcast get?

Rephonic provides a full set of podcast information for three million podcasts, including the number of listeners. View further listenership figures for this podcast, including podcast download numbers and subscriber numbers, so you can make better decisions about which podcasts to sponsor or be a guest on. You will need to upgrade your account to access this premium data.

What are the audience demographics for this podcast?

Rephonic provides comprehensive predictive audience data for this podcast, including gender skew, age, country, political leaning, income, professions, education level, and interests. You can access these listener demographics by upgrading your account.

How many subscribers and views does this podcast have?

To see how many followers or subscribers this podcast has on Spotify and other platforms such as Castbox and Podcast Addict, simply upgrade your account. You'll also find viewership figures for their YouTube channel if they have one.

Which podcasts are similar to this podcast?

These podcasts share a similar audience with this podcast:

1. New Books in Critical Theory
2. Jacobin Radio
3. Acid Horizon
4. The LRB Podcast
5. Overthink

How many episodes of this podcast are there?

this podcast launched 14 years ago and published 2915 episodes to date. You can find more information about this podcast including rankings, audience demographics and engagement in our podcast database.

How do I contact this podcast?

Our systems regularly scour the web to find email addresses and social media links for this podcast. We scanned the web and collated all of the contact information that we could find in our podcast database. But in the unlikely event that you can't find what you're looking for, our concierge service lets you request our research team to source better contacts for you.

Where can I see ratings and reviews for this podcast?

Rephonic pulls ratings and reviews for this podcast from multiple sources, including Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Castbox, and Podcast Addict.

View all the reviews in one place instead of visiting each platform individually and use this information to decide if a show is worth pitching or not.

How do I access podcast episode transcripts for this podcast?

Rephonic provides full transcripts for episodes of this podcast. Search within each transcript for your keywords, whether they be topics, brands or people, and figure out if it's worth pitching as a guest or sponsor. You can even set-up alerts to get notified when your keywords are mentioned.

What guests have appeared on this podcast?

Recent guests on this podcast include:

1. Elizabeth Cotton
2. Cleo Nisse
3. Jon Penney
4. Gareth Doherty
5. Ayala Fader
6. Josh Lambert
7. Emily Doucet
8. John Longhurst

To view more recent guests and their details, simply upgrade your Rephonic account. You'll also get access to a typical guest profile to help you decide if the show is worth pitching.

Find and pitch the right podcasts

We help savvy brands, marketers and PR professionals to find the right podcasts for any topic or niche. Get the data and contacts you need to pitch podcasts at scale and turn listeners into customers.
Try it free for 7 days