Making Sense of the Elections of 2024
Matrix Podcast
The American election closed out a year of momentous elections. Almost two decades on from the financial crisis of 2007 that helped unleash a wave of authoritarian, populist, and nativist movements in global democracies, a range of social and political forces have reshaped elections around the world. What do the election results tell us about the health or fragility of global democracy, and how might we better understand the outcome of the American election as part of a broader global process? Recorded on November 21, 2024, this panel featured a group of UC Berkeley scholars discussing...
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Gendered Violence in Insurgencies: Interview with Tara Chandra
Matrix Podcast
This episode of the Matrix Podcast features an interview with , a consultant and independent researcher who received a PhD in in Political Science with a Designated Emphasis in Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies from UC Berkeley. Chandra's research focuses on the intersection of gender and international security. Prior to beginning her PhD, she worked in foreign policy in Washington, D.C. She holds a Master's degree in Global Affairs from Yale and a BA in Political Science from the University of Chicago. The interview was conducted by Julia Sizek, formerly a postdoctoral fellow at Social...
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New Directions in the Study of Labor
Matrix Podcast
In this "New Directions" panel, recorded on December 2, 2024, an interdisciplinary group of UC Berkeley graduate students explored the evolving dynamics of work, management, and labor organization. The panel featured research by three current Berkeley PhD students: William Darwell (Jurisprudence and Social Policy), Kristy Kim (Economics), and Vera Parra (Sociology). The panel was moderated by John Logan, Visiting Scholar at the UC Berkeley Labor Center. The presenters' studies focus on such topics as the impact of pension systems on workforce participation, labor union organizing in automotive...
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Sin Padres, Ni Papeles: Unaccompanied Migrant Youth Coming of Age in the United States
Matrix Podcast
Recorded on December 3, 2024, this podcast episode features an Authors Meet Critics panel on by , Assistant Professor of Sociology at UC Berkeley and Faculty Director of the Berkeley Interdisciplinary Migration Initiative. Professor Canizales was joined in conversation by , Assistant Professor of Social Welfare at UC Berkeley, and , Associate Professor of Public Policy at UC Berkeley. , Professor at Berkeley Law, moderated. This event was presented by Social Science Matrix as part of the book series, which features lively discussions about recently published books authored by social...
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Authors Meet Critics: "Authoritarian Absorption: The Transnational Remaking of Epidemic Politics in China"
Matrix Podcast
Recorded on November 13, 2024, this Authors Meet Critics" panel centered on the book , by , Assistant Professor in the UC Berkeley Department of Sociology. Professor Long was joined in conversation by Matthew Kohrman, Associate Professor in the Department of Anthropology at Stanford University; and Rachel E. Stern, Professor of Law and Political Science at Berkeley Law, and the Pamela P. Fong and Family Distinguished Chair in China Studies. The panel was moderated by Tom Gold, Professor of Sociology Emeritus at UC Berkeley. The panel was presented as part of the Social Science Matrix book...
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Emotion, Race, and Gender: Interview with Gold Okafor
Matrix Podcast
is a PhD candidate in social and personality psychology at UC Berkeley. She investigates racial and gender disparities through emotion research. Her research questions include, "how does the race and gender of an emotional person influence the judgments of the emotional person?" For example, how is an angry Black woman judged differently from an angry White woman, and what are the downstream consequences? And how do we accurately measure mindfulness, an emotion regulation strategy, within Black Americans? Okafor is Ford Predoctoral Fellow and a recipient of an American Psychological...
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Matrix on Point: Shifting Alignments in the 2024 Election
Matrix Podcast
Recorded on October 25, 2024, this panel examined the shifting demographic and political forces that are redefining the traditional bases of the Democratic and Republican parties and their efforts to build new electoral coalitions. Panelists analyzed voter trends and realignment along key dimensions, including gender, age, race and ethnicity, and explored how issues like the economy, abortion, immigration, and threats to democracy are motivating different segments of the electorate. The panel featured Ian Haney López, Chief Justice Earl Warren Professor of Public Law at UC Berkeley; David...
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The Imperiled Place of Universities and Democracy in the USA: Interview with Todd Wolfson
Matrix Podcast
Global Democracy Commons Podcast: Episode 2 In the run up to the American election we talked to , the new President of AAUP, about how public disinvestment from higher education and the culture wars have transformed colleges in ways that make them less democratic places — and imperil democracy across the country. A transcript of this episode is available at . About the Series One measure of the fragile state of many democracies is the way in which public universities have come under attack around the world. A new monthly podcast series, produced as part of the project,...
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Matrix on Point: Voices from the Heartland
Matrix Podcast
Over the past few years, Arlie Hochschild has been in conversation with citizens of Pikeville, Kentucky, in the heart of Appalachia; Jenny Reardon has been biking through her home state of Kansas, talking to farmers, ranchers and other denizens of the prairie; and Lisa Pruitt has straddled the rural-urban divide over the course of her life in Arkansas and California and as a scholar of rural legal access. As the nation braced for a decisive election, this conversation — recorded on October 21 — sought to illuminate the frequently overlooked yet politically potent voices emanating from...
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Partisan Nation: The Dangerous New Logic of American Politics in a Nationalized Era
Matrix Podcast
Recorded on October 9, 2024, this video features an Authors Meet Critics panel on the book , by , the John Gross Distinguished Professor of Political Science at UC Berkeley, and , the Jeffrey & Ashley McDermott Professor of Political Science and co-director of the Institute of Governmental Studies at UC Berkeley. The authors were joined in conversation by , the Olivier Nomellini Senior Fellow at Stanford University’s Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI) and a faculty member of FSI’s Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law (CDDRL), and Didi Kuo, a Center...
info_outlineContemporary writers and activists have described the climate crisis as, in part, a crisis of the imagination, of culture, and of storytelling. Recorded on March 11, 2024, this panel featured a group of authors and scholars of different genres — science fiction, journalism, history, literary fiction, and comedy — discussing how the climate crisis has impacted their craft and what practices of storytelling have to offer us at this pivotal moment in human history. This panel was co-sponsored by the UC Berkeley Department of English, the Department of History, and the Berkeley School of Journalism.
Panelists
Daniel Gumbiner is a novelist and editor based in Oakland. His first book, The Boatbuilder, was nominated for the National Book Award. His new novel, Fire in the Canyon, was published by Astra House in 2023. He is the Editor of The Believer.
Annalee Newitz is a science fiction writer and science journalist. They are the author of nine books including, most recently, the science fiction novel The Terraformers. They are a contributing opinion writer at the New York Times, a columnist in the The New Scientist, and the co-host of an award-winning podcast, Our Opinions Are Correct.
Aaron Sachs is a professor of History and American Studies at Cornell University. He is the author of several books, most recently, Stay Cool: Why Dark Comedy Matters in the Fight against Climate Change (NYU Press, 2023).
Rebecca Solnit is a writer, historian, and activist, and a graduate of the Berkeley School of Journalism. She has written more than twenty books, including Orwell’s Roses; Hope in the Dark; Men Explain Things to Me; A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities that Arise in Disaster; and A Field Guide to Getting Lost. Together with Thelma Young Lutunatabua, Solnit edited the 2023 collection Not too Late: Changing the Climate Story from Despair to Possibility.
Rebecca Herman (moderator) is associate professor in the History Department at UC Berkeley and author of Cooperating with the Colossus (Oxford University Press, 2022). She is currently working on a book about the unlikely ban on mining in Antarctica, told through the stories of the military wives and children, artists, writers, activists, soldiers, and scientists who traveled South in growing numbers during the 1970s and 80s.
A video and transcript of this event are available at https://matrix.berkeley.edu/research-article/storytelling-climate