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From Public Books and Type Media Center, this is Primary Sources, the show where writers and intellectuals talk about some of the greatest influences on their work. Primary Sources is hosted by Eyal Press.
Ta-Nehisi Coates is best known for his writing about racism in America – in particular, his 2014 essay “The Case for Reparations,” and his 2015 book, Between the World and Me. Ta-Nehisi's readers know that the toll racism has inflicted on the bodies of Black people, and the enduring power of white supremacy, have long preoccupied him. On this show, however, he’ll be talking about a subject—or rather an influence—that few people associate with his work.
That influence is the late Tony Judt, a British historian. In 2005, Judt published his magnum opus, Postwar, a sweeping, 933-page history of modern Europe.
In this conversation, which was recorded last fall, Ta-Nehisi talks about why Postwar had such a profound impact on him. He explores the preface he wrote to Ill Fares the Land, another of Judt's books, which has just been reissued by Penguin. He also talks about the power of language to help us imagine a better world, whether he identifies as an Afro-pessimist, and what it’s like to grow up in a nationalist household.
Primary Sources is a co-production of Public Books and Type Media Center. Our show’s executive producer is Caitlin Zaloom, the founding editor of Public Books. Our producer is DJ Cashmere. Our engineer is Jess Engebretson. Special thanks to Kelley Deane McKinney, the publisher and managing editor of Public Books and Taya Grobow, executive director of Type Media Center. Our theme music is “Kitty in the Window,” composed by Podington Bear (Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 International License).
View full episode notes and a transcript here.

This season, Public Books is partnering with Novel Dialogue, a podcast where a novelist and a literary critic talk about novels from every angle: how we read them, write them, publish them, and remember them. 
Originally founded and hosted by Aarthi Vadde and John Plotz, Novel Dialogue is introducing some fresh new voices into the mix. This season, John and Aarthi welcome Chris Holmes, Emily Hyde, Tara Menon, and Sarah Wasserman as guest hosts. And they have brought a series of scintillating conversations with them!
In our series premiere, Sarah sits down with acclaimed novelist Chang-rae Lee and Anne Anlin Cheng, renowned scholar of American literature and visual culture at Princeton. The conversation goes small and goes big: from the shortest short story to the totalizing effects of capitalism.
To listen to the rest of the season, subscribe to Novel Dialogue on Apple, Spotify, or Stitcher. 

In the final episode of our season, "Becoming Data," scholars Sareeta Amrute and Emiliano Treré join our host, Natalie Kerby, to discuss the concept and lived reality of racial capitalism. The episode explores how data-centric systems perpetuate racial capitalism, and how different communities, particularly in the Global South, have resisted this datafication.
 
This season, "Becoming Data," is a partnership between the magazine Public Books and the research institution Data & Society. Follow us on Twitter @PublicBooks and @DataSociety.
 
View full episode notes and a transcript here.

Scholars Laura Forlano and Ranjit Singh join our host, Natalie Kerby, to explore the different infrastructures that data interacts with and flows through. Whose values get embedded into the algorithms that increasingly govern our lives? How are these data infrastructures complicating what it means to be human? 
 
This season, "Becoming Data," is a partnership between the magazine Public Books and the research institution Data & Society. Follow us on Twitter @PublicBooks and @DataSociety.
 
View full episode notes and a transcript here.

Researchers Arthur Gwagwa and Deb Raji join our host, Natalie Kerby, to discuss data, AI, and automation, and the different ways they operate across geopolitical contexts such as the US and Africa. The episode covers not only the harms that can result from these systems, but also how we might address and prevent those harms.
 
This season, "Becoming Data," is a partnership between the magazine Public Books and the research institution Data & Society. Follow us on Twitter @PublicBooks and @DataSociety.
 
View full episode notes and a transcript here.

Interdisciplinary researcher Shaka McGlotten and scholar/activist Chris Ramsaroop join our host, Natalie Kerby, to discuss data in the context of labor. The episode addresses the historical ways that data has been used to organize labor and the different ways that people, and more specifically workers, are resisting datafication.
 
This season, "Becoming Data," is a partnership between the magazine Public Books and the research institution Data & Society. Follow us on Twitter @PublicBooks and @DataSociety.
 
View full episode notes and a transcript here.