Imperfect world Christopher Hobson

In this episode, Chris and Pete welcome Joseph Vogl, who is a Regular Visiting Professor at Princeton University, and until last year, he was Professor of Modern German Literature, Cultural and Media Studies at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. Our conversation focuses on Vogl's most recent book: Capital and Ressentiment: A Brief Theory of the Present (2022), while also connecting it to his previous works, The Ascendancy of Finance (2017) and The Specter of Capital (2014).
 
For more information, visit imperfectnotes.substack.com 

In this episode, Chris and Pete welcome Guillaume Pitron, an investigative journalist who has been uncovering and examining the material realities of the unceasing advance of digital technologies, most notably through a pair of books: The Rare Metals War (La Guerre des métaux rares) and The Dark Cloud (L’Enfer numérique). 
For more information, visit imperfectnotes.substack.com 

Continuing the conversation with Pete Chambers, this time recorded in-person during a trip to Australia in February 2024.
Central to our conversation is the issue of scale, together we think through logics of consumption, transport, travel as they get scaled up and expanded, conditions in which ‘quantity has a quality all its own’.
For more information, visit imperfectnotes.substack.com and christopherhobson.net.

In this episode, Christopher Hobson continues his dialogue with Pete Chambers. 
The starting point for this conversation is Naomi Klein’s thought-provoking new book, Doppelganger. Using frames of mirrors, shadows and others, Klein manages to capture something about the deeply weird and warped relations that now prevail between online and the real / ‘real’ world. This serves as a prompt for a wide ranging discussion about how to understand and act in a world in which what is real and what is not blur and bend together, with many of our frames for understanding and seeing being rendered impotent. 
For more information, visit imperfectnotes.substack.com and christopherhobson.net.

In this episode, Chris and Pete welcome Laleh Khalili, the Al-Qasimi Professor of Gulf Studies at the University of Exeter, for a conversation about her work on the considering the forgotten space of the sea. She has explored these themes most fully in her 2021 book, Sinews of War and Trade: Shipping and Capitalism in the Arabian Peninsula. 
The structure of the episode is the first 30 minutes is a discussion between Peter Chambers and myself around Khalili’s work, followed by a conversation between Chambers and Khalili.
For more information, visit imperfectnotes.substack.com 

In this episode, Christopher Hobson continues his dialogue with Pete Chambers. 
The starting point for this conversation is the extreme summer the Northern Hemisphere has been experiencing. From there, the discussion moves from how we are individually and collectively (mis)understanding climate change, some of the consequences that come from the responses we are pursuing - notably the emphasis on electric vehicles - as well as the enduring challenge of individual agency in the context of massive systemic forces.
For more information, visit imperfectnotes.substack.com and christopherhobson.net.