Long Form Podcast
(Episode 2)
Featuring:
Talal Asad
Genocide in Context
Hosts:
Bassam Haddad
Sinan Antoon
Thursday, 6 March, 2025 | 2:00PM EST
Watch Here:
Youtube.com/Jadaliyya
X.com/Jadaliyya
In this sit down conversation with Bassam Haddad and Sinan Antoon, Talal Asad takes a bird’s eye look at the political landscape since Israel’s genocidal war against Gaza and reflects on the state of our world. Candid and uncompromisingly critical, but with hints of hope. In this lengthy conversation, Asad also addresses colonialism, violence, media and Hamas, Gaza Genocide and Terminology, Liberalism, Aaron Bushnell, Western values, Universities and Academic Freedom, and collective liberation.
Long Form consists of a series of lengthy discussions and conversations with leading thinkers, scholars, and activists that explores the most pressing issues of our day, sheds light on their context and dynamics, and in so doing seeks to explore the broader theme of challenges to the global order and how these might affect it.
Featuring
Talal Asad (Guest) is a sociocultural anthropologist of international stature specializing in the anthropology of religion with a special interest in the Middle East and Islam. He earned his M.A. at Edinburgh University and B.Litt. and D.Phil. at Oxford. Before coming to the United States to teach at the New School, he taught at Oxford and the universities of Khartoum, Sudan, and Hull, England. He was a member of the New School graduate faculty from 1989 to 1995, then joined the faculty at Johns Hopkins University. In the spring of 1979, he served as visiting professor at the University of California at Berkeley. Asad specializes in studies of the Sudan, Arabs, and nomadism. Among other books, he is the author of On Suicide Bombing (The Wellek Library Lectures) (2007); Formations of the Secular: Christianity, Islam, Modernity (Cultural Memory in the Present) (2003); and Genealogies of Religion: Discipline and Reasons of Power in Christianity and Islam (1993). Asad has also edited or contributed to numerous volumes and has published in a wide variety of international journals. His works have been translated into many languages. The recipient of many awards and honors, Asad has served on the Economic and Social Research Council in England and the Social Science Research Council in the United States.
Bassam Haddad (Host) is Founding Director of the Middle East and Islamic Studies Program and Associate Professor at the Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University. He is the author of Business Networks in Syria: The Political Economy of Authoritarian Resilience (Stanford University Press, 2011) and co-editor of A Critical Political Economy of the Middle East (Stanford University Press, 2021). Bassam is Co-Founder/Editor of Jadaliyya Ezine and Executive Director of the Arab Studies Institute. He serves as Founding Editor of the Arab Studies Journal and the Knowledge Production Project. He is co-producer/director of the award-winning documentary film, About Baghdad, and director of the acclaimed series Arabs and Terrorism. Bassam serves on the Board of the Arab Council for the Social Sciences and is Executive Producer of Status Audio Magazine and Director of the Middle East Studies Pedagogy Initiative (MESPI). He received MESA's Jere L. Bacharach Service Award in 2017 for his service to the profession. Currently, Bassam is working on his second Syria book titled Understanding the Syrian Calamity: Regime, Opposition, Outsiders (forthcoming, Stanford University Press).
Sinan Antoon (Host) is a poet, novelist, scholar and translator. He has published five novels and two collections of poetry. A third collection of poetry in English, entitled Postcards from the Underworld, was published by Seagull Books this past October. He has been described as one of the most acclaimed Arab novelists. His most recent work in Arabic is a novel entitled, Khuzama. His scholarly works include the book, Ibn al-Hajjaj and Sukhf: The Poetics of the Obscene in Pre-Modern Arabic Poetry. He is associate professor at New York University. He is co-founder and co-editor of Jadaliyya. His scholarly works include the book, Ibn al-Hajjaj and Sukhf: The Poetics of the Obscene in Pre-Modern Arabic Poetry. He is associate professor at New York University. He is co-founder and co-editor of Jadaliyya."
“The old world is dying, and the new world struggles to be born: now is the time of monsters.” – Antonio Gramsci