Nostalgia Trap

Latest Episodes:

Nostalgia Trap - Episode 202: No Place Like Home w/ Yasmin Nair Jul 08, 2020

Show notes

How does the way we live reflect all the traps of American ideology? This week, one of our favorites, writer and activist Yasmin Nair, joins us for a wide-ranging conversation on the historical, social, and economic dimensions of U.S. housing policy. From current debates around gentrification and rent strikes to the romanticized image of suburban nuclear families in pop culture, we explore how ideas of home ownership are at the core of the national-imperial project.

Nostalgia Trap - Episode 201: Educating the Ruling Class w/ Nathan Tankus Jul 02, 2020

Show notes

Since his first appearance on the Nostalgia Trap in 2016, Nathan Tankus has gained a devoted following for his ideas on politics, economics, and global finance. His newsletter, Notes on the Crises, is closely watched by journalists, politicians, and economists, particularly after publishing a remarkable set of pieces on COVID-19 and the Federal Reserve in early 2020. In this conversation, he discusses the strangeness of his newfound celebrity, and offers his takes on this chaotic historical moment, from Bernie's flame-out to the Black Lives Matter uprising . For a special subscription discount to Nathan's Substack, go here: https://nathantankus.substack.com/subscribe?coupon=1a0be4be

Nostalgia Trap - Episode 200: Wild Card w/ Justin Rogers-Cooper Jun 24, 2020

Show notes

This week Justin Rogers-Cooper joins us to celebrate our 200th episode with a deep dive into the political, economic, and cultural significance of the "Joker" character. What are the origins of the Joker image and mythology? How has the character evolved over time? And what does this archetype's ubiquitous presence tell us about our historical moment? This episode is dedicated in loving, living memory of Laszlo Scott Kehoe.

Nostalgia Trap - Episode 199: We Cannot Live Without Our Lives w/ Asad Haider Jun 18, 2020

Show notes

Asad Haider is a founding editor at Viewpoint Magazine and the author of Mistaken Identity: Race and Class in the Age of Trump. In this conversation he explains how the history of anti-racist struggle in the United States provides a compelling set of ideas for a dynamic, anti-capitalist emancipatory practice. Along the way, we discuss the value of reading Marx in 2020, our distorted view of 1960s and 1970s radicalism, the significance of the Black Lives Matter moment, and much more.

Nostalgia Trap - Episode 198: Most Wanted w/ Paul Renfro May 28, 2020

Show notes

Paul Renfro is a professor of history at Florida State University and the author of Stranger Danger: Family Values, Childhood, and the American Carceral State. In this conversation he explains how fears of child abduction fueled a hysterical campaign in the 1970s and 1980s that produced a wave of new laws, structures of punishment, and ideas about family, security, and sexuality that continue to haunt American life.

Nostalgia Trap - Episode 197: Where the Wave Broke w/ Ken Layne May 27, 2020

Show notes

Ken Layne is the creator of Desert Oracle, a magazine and radio show/podcast all about the strange inhabitants and culture of the Mojave Desert. Layne's trajectory through the world of alternative media winds through the 1990s and 2000s, when he was present at the creation of the Gawker media empire and subsequently took the reins of their influential politics outlet Wonkette. In this conversation, we talk about the evolution of underground culture through layers of toxic capitalism, as we trace Layne's path from the fast lane of LA/New York/DC digital media to the burgeoning psychedelic scene in the California desert.

Nostalgia Trap - Episode 195: Or Does It Explode? w/ Justin Rogers-Cooper May 20, 2020

Show notes

Our series on the rapidly evolving politics of COVID-19 continues this week, with Justin Rogers-Cooper warning that the logic of finance capital may force a premature "re-opening" on the American public in the summer of 2020. In this conversation we talk about recent armed anti-lockdown protests, the movie Parasite as a window into the cultural zeitgeist around class inequality, and the potential for social violence as America plunges into an unprecedented depression.

Nostalgia Trap - Episode 193: Toward a Global Left w/ Arash Azizi May 06, 2020

Show notes

Arash Azizi is a writer and scholar currently completing a Ph.D. in History and Middle Eastern Studies at NYU; his work focuses on the left in Iran and in the wider Islamic world. In this conversation, making frequent reference to cinema and pop culture, he discusses the global dimensions of anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist movements, tracing a narrative from the Cold War to the 21st century.

Nostalgia Trap - Episode 192: Cinema in Transition w/ Drew Morton Apr 28, 2020

Show notes

Drew Morton is an Assistant Professor of Mass Communication at Texas A&M University-Texarkana. He is the co-editor and co-founder of [in]Transition: Journal of Videographic Film and Moving Image Studies, the first peer-reviewed academic journal focused on the visual essay, drawn from a wide range of scholars (including Drew himself). In this conversation he describes his education in film, both as a casual viewer and fan and later as a graduate student in Cinema and Media Studies at UCLA, as we explore how the central questions, ideas, and methodologies of the discipline are evolving in a hyper-accelerated media landscape.

Nostalgia Trap - Episode 191: Aping Revolution w/ Yasmin Nair Apr 23, 2020

Show notes

Yasmin Nair returns to the Trap for a deep dive into the film Rise of the Planet of the Apes (2011), a conversation that helps us frame ideas about prison abolition, animal rights, environmentalism, pandemics, and the tactical elements of a grassroots revolution.

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