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New Books in Architecture

Marshall Poe

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.

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  • 34 episodes
  • Avg 48 min
  • English
Counted on this page — what you have heard stays on this device, so it is not something the list can be paged by.
  • #35
    September 20 · 31 min

    Damian White and Nicholas Pevzner, "Designing the Just Transition: Design-Politics, Labor, and the Battle for Post-Carbon Futures" (Bloomsbury, 2026)

    Environmental politics is clearly at an impasse, increasingly foreclosed by a fragmenting elite consensus on climate change, an escalating populist backlash on the right, and a pervasive sense of climate doom on the left. This book considers what new openings might be offered by a labor-centered transition focused on our creative agency and our collective capacities to design new worlds. Whilst political mobilizations and smart policy are vital for making progress on decarbonization, Designing

  • September 12 · 1 hr 24 min

    Billy Fleming, "Building Postcarbon Futures: Land, Justice, and Energy Transitions" (Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, 2026)

    What would a postcarbon future look like? What would it take to build and maintain a more just, regenerative world? How would it feel to live—and to thrive—in that world? In Building Postcarbon Futures: Land, Justice, and Energy Transitions (Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, 2026), Billy Fleming and a wide set of contributors critically engage with the above questions and more. Around the globe, people are transforming their social, ecological, and economic systems in response to the climate crisis. This book guides readers through 29 of these exemplary works, which span 43 nations and 6 continents. From Cuba to Kiribati, Iceland to the Andes, the prairies of North America to the expanding Gobi Desert, these case studies foreground the tactics and modes of practice being employed, often by marginalized peoples, to create more humane, hospitable places. With dispatches from more than a dozen leading scholars working on the front lines of the climate justice movement, Building Postcarbon Futures is both a celebration of action underway and a clarion call to the planners, designers, policymakers, and activists who are pushing this planet toward a future of collective flourishing. Billy Fleming is a leading voice on the role of design in responding to the climate crisis in our cities, communities, and landscapes. He is founding codirector of the Climate and Community Institute, a progressive think tank focused on climate and political economy, and assistant professor of landscape architecture at Temple University’s Tyler School of Art and Architecture in Philadelphia. This interview was conducted by Timi Koyejo. He is an urbanist and housing policy researcher at the Climate and Community Institute. Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/architecture

  • September 11 · 39 min

    Stefan Al, "Dwelling on Earth: The Past and Future of the Places We Call Home" (Norton, 2026)

    In Dwelling on Earth: The Past and Future of the Places We Call Home (Norton, 2026), the architect and urban planner Stefan Al asks–– where is a good place to live? His answer In this succinct and eminently readable survey­­­––almost everywhere and nowhere. He begins by showing homo sapiens and their hominid predecessors on the move, spreading across the globe looking for something to eat and a place to sit down. But only in the past ten thousand years after they learned to domesticate animals, cultivate the soil and store grain, could human beings abandon their migratory ways and settle into what we call villages, towns and cities. The author celebrates the ingenuity which made such settlements possible–– the humble brick of mud and straw, sewer and water systems and in the end, electricity and the engines that allow us to live in towers, suburbia or the great beyond. And thanks to powerful heating and cooling systems we can live comfortably (if we have the money) just about anywhere. But Professor Al also points out that “permanent settlement,” ancient or modern, has often so degraded the necessary resources of field and forest and life-sustaining water and air, that even the comfortably settled sometimes have been forced to move to higher, better or safer ground. In truth, wherever you live, you are likely to some degree degrading the environment. But Professor Al, neither a scold nor doomsayer, concludes that if we attend to the useful lessons of past building practices and town planning while drawing on new technology, we should be able to muddle through–– constructing sustainable communities and places where we may live permanently–– more or less! This episode is hosted by James Wunsch Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/architecture

  • #426
    September 6 · 28 min

    Marita Sturken, "Terrorism in American Memory: Memorials, Museums, and Architecture in the Post-9/11 Era" (NYU Press, 2022)

    Terrorism in American Memory argues that the terrorist attacks of 9/11 and all that followed in its wake were the primary force shaping United States politics and culture in the post-9/11 era. Marita Sturken maintains that during the past two decades, when the country was subjected to terrorist attacks and promulgated ongoing wars of aggression, we have veered into increasingly polarized factions and been extraordinarily preoccupied with memorialization and the politics of memory. The post-9/11

  • #425
    September 1 · 48 min

    Aonghus MacKechnie, "Edinburgh: City of Romanticism" (Lund Humphries, 2026)

    Romanticism made Scotland famous. It critically shaped the course of Scottish culture, while impacting on cultures elsewhere and inaugurating the country’s still-flourishing and lucrative tourist industry. This book is about Edinburgh’s most emblematic architecture over the long 19th century: the castellated and stone built cityscape of national revivalist architecture. It reveals why Scotland had by the 1820s become one of Europe’s great centres of Romanticism, due both to the majestic

  • #424
    August 22 · 51 min

    Beth Weinstein, "Architecture and Choreography: Collaborations in Dance, Space and Time" (Routledge, 2024)

    Architecture and Choreography: Collaborations in Dance, Space and Time (Routledge, 2024) examines the field of archi-choreographic experiments: unique interdisciplinary encounters and performed events generated through collaborations between architects and choreographers. Forty case studies spanning four decades give evidence of the range of motivations for embarking on these creative endeavors and diverse conceptual underpinnings, generative methods, objects of inquiry, and outcomes. Architectu

  • #423
    August 17 · 40 min

    Amihai Mazar and Nava Panitz-Cohen, "Tel Rehov: A Bronze and Iron Age City in the Beth-Shean Valle" (The Institute of Archaeology, The Hebrew University, 2020)

    This interview with Professor Amihai Mazar was conducted by Željko Stanojević for the New Books Network. The conversation focuses on Tel Reḥov: A Bronze and Iron Age City in the Beth-Shean Valley, especially Volume V, where the report turns from architecture and pottery to smaller objects and scientific evidence that help reconstruct life at the site. Amihai Mazar is a leading archaeologist of ancient Israel. His research examines the Bronze and Iron Ages, archaeology and biblical history, anci

  • #421
    August 16 · 43 min

    Gregorio Astengo and Davide Spina eds.,"Real Estate: Histories of Architecture and Capital" (gta Verlag, 2026)

    Real Estate: Histories of Architecture and Capital (gta Verlag, 2026)challenges the conventional assumption that architects and planners are the principal authors of urban form. It instead foregrounds the developers, builders, financiers, and media strategists whose pursuit of profit has shaped cities, particularly under global capitalism. Bringing together studies spanning the eighteenth century to the present, the editors, Gregorio Astengo and Davide Spina, and the contributors establi

  • #422
    August 16 · 48 min

    Karen M'Closkey and Keith VanDerSys eds., "Media Matters in Landscape Architecture" (Applied Research & Design, 2025)

    Media Matters in Landscape Architecture (Applied Research & Design, 2025) goes behind the scenes to consider how media technologies that have emerged in recent decades are shaping the practices of artists, designers, engineers, and scientists. The media infrastructure of climate science and Earth remote sensing, coupled with the increased availability of spatial information and modeling software, provides the context for many of the chapters in that the media and methods employed are desig

  • #420
    August 12 · 52 min

    Lauren Stara, "Planning Library Spaces: A Practical Guide for Library Building Projects" (Bloomsbury, 2025)

    Planning Library Spaces: A Practical Guide for Library Building Projects (Bloomsbury, 2025) is a book designed for librarians, trustees, local government officials, architects, and interior designers who are designing or planning to build, renovate, or reconfigure library spaces. Most librarians embark upon a library building project with little experience in space planning, architecture, or construction. Written by a registered architect and professional librarian, this is a guidebook for

  • #419
    August 11 · 38 min

    William Whyte, "The University: A History in Stone, Silk, and Blood" (Harvard UP, 2026)

    We often idealize the university as a sanctuary for disinterested reason, where material concerns are set aside in favor of higher principles. Yet when we remember our own college experiences, what springs to mind are not just lofty concepts but also material realities: cramped dorm rooms and musty library stacks, gothic towers and freshly mowed quads. The University: A History in Stone, Silk, and Blood (Harvard University Press, 2026) puts such seemingly inconsequential details at the

  • #418
    August 10 · 52 min

    Marco Pompili, "Public Housing in Japan: The Dōjunkai Apartments One Hundred Years On" (Brill, 2026)

    Public Housing in Japan: The Dōjunkai Apartments One Hundred Years On (Brill, 2026) is the first comprehensive English-language examination of the Dōjunkai Foundation (1924-2024). Compiled and edited by Dr. Marco Pompili through interviews and studies, it is a must-read for anyone interested in modern Japanese architecture. The Dōjunkai Apartments (1924-1934), the Foundation's best-known work, introduced apartment living to Japan in response to crucial historical and social challenges suc

  • #417
    August 9 · 29 min

    Stefan Al, "Dwelling on Earth: The Past and Future of the Places We Call Home" (Norton, 2026)

    A sweeping history of humanity’s most fundamental creation―the home―and its effects on the land, cities, and people themselves. Americans spend, on average, 90 percent of their lives indoors, with two-thirds of that time spent in their homes. Globally, the construction and maintenance of residential buildings account for a staggering portion of carbon emissions. In this timely and fascinating work, architect and urban-planning scholar Stefan Al deftly weaves together archaeology, engineer

  • #415
    August 3 · 36 min

    Brent Elliott and Roger Bowdler, "The British Cemetery: Architecture, Landscape, Sculpture" (Historic England, 2026)

    Roger Bowdler and Brent Elliott’s The British Cemetery: Architecture, Landscape, Sculpture, published by Historic England (2026), traces the history of the cemetery from the 17th century to the present day. The cemetery emerged as a new landscape form in the 19th century in Britain but had deep roots in earlier churchyard practices and in fashionable garden landscape design. Cemeteries very quickly became a locus for the monumental expression of loss, family identity and social standing. The

  • #416
    August 3 · 53 min

    Elizabeth Darling, "Palace of the Ether: Broadcasting House and the Architecture of the BBC, 1922–32" (Lund Humphries, 2026)

    Palace of the Ether: Broadcasting House and the Architecture of the BBC, 1922–1932 (Lund Humphries, 2026) by Dr. Elizabeth Darling is about the architecture and design of broadcasting in the 1920s and 1930s, examining the buildings which the BBC occupied in its founding decades, with a particular focus on Broadcasting House in London. It argues that these environments were as constitutive of the Corporation’s identity as the programmes and people that they housed. Borrowing from the archi

  • #414
    August 1 · 42 min

    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 empire. Empire and liberty have been part of the American story since the founding, but they are often at odds, sometimes irreconcilably so. Cook examines their changing relationship and meaning using these two iconic bui

  • #413
    July 22 · 1 hr 10 min

    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 Heathrow airport, it traces how the area has been formed and reformed by overlapping systems of architecture, infrastructure and enclosure, from the common land of Hounslow Heath in the eighteenth century to the global transp

  • #412
    July 3 · 49 min

    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, neglect, as well as the ongoing threat of destruction from both unscrupulous developers and war. Photographer Dmytro Soloviov has crossed Ukraine documenting them to form the most comprehensive publication availab

  • #411
    July 1 · 58 min

    Aditi Chandra, "Unruly Monuments: Disrupting the State at Delhi's Islamic Architecture" (Cambridge UP, 2025)

    Unruly Monuments: Disrupting the State at Delhi's Islamic Architecture (Cambridge University Press, 2025) examines how Delhi's Sultanate and Mughal architecture, dating from the twelfth to the seventeenth centuries, became modern monuments and were assimilated and ordered into public consciousness as spaces for tourism, leisure, and intellectual contemplation during the colonial and early postcolonial eras (1828-1963). It examines the resistance that challenges this ordering, rendering mon

Showing 1–20 of 34 episodes