New Books Network

Robert Hall, former British Army officer turned resilience consultant and author of Building Resilient Futures (2023). He explores personal, social, urban, and national resilience. Shortcase studies include COVID, the Winter War, and Ladbroke Grove. Topics include redundancy vs just-in-time systems, community bonds over stockpiles, teaching resilience to youth, and lessons from history like Shackleton and Finnish sisu.

Kristina Jonutytė, social anthropologist and author of Between the Buddha and the New Tsar, studies urban Buddhism and minority politics in Buryatia. She explores temple economies, how city life reshapes Buddhist practice, and the effects of war and conscription on Buryat identity. The conversation highlights russification, transnational ties, infrapolitical rituals, and migration reshaping belonging.

Lee Ann S. Wang, Assistant Professor of Asian American Studies and author of The Violence of Protection, blends ethnography and abolition feminist critique. She discusses how U.S. protection laws tie immigrant survivors to policing. Short segments cover fieldwork with advocates, critiques of VAWA/U/T visas, racialized survivor templates, and visions of abolitionist solidarity.

They pit Heat against Collateral and debate which film best captures Michael Mann’s signature traits. Conversation ranges from Heat’s ensemble depth, moral ambiguity, and tragic choices to Collateral’s nocturnal structure, Cruise and Foxx’s performances, and a transformative everyman journey. They close by ranking Mann’s top films and arguing which works feel most quintessentially his.

Philip Wingai-Orayo, a scholar of missiology and Methodist history, examines John Wesley’s surprising reluctance to send overseas missionaries. He highlights how ordinary laypeople—immigrants, sailors, enslaved and freed persons—carried Methodism globally. The discussion covers Wesley’s Georgia experience, Moravian influences, Thomas Coke’s missionary push, women’s roles, and transatlantic networks like Boston King’s story.

Robert Cribb, an Emeritus professor of Asian history specializing in Southeast Asia, and Sandra Wilson, a professor of Japanese history and expert in Japanese sources, discuss thirteen cases of wartime violence. They explore trials, military records, the limits of cultural explanations, wartime pressures and choices, and how individuals came to commit atrocities. The conversation highlights documentation, controversial verdicts, and legal complexities.

Thomas C. Schmidt, Associate Professor of Religious Studies and author of Josephus and Jesus, explores the life and world of the historian Josephus. He surveys Josephus’s aristocratic roots, Roman connections, and role in the Galilean revolt. The conversation highlights how Josephus illuminates New Testament context, contested references to Jesus, dating issues, and the political and religious turmoil of first‑century Judea.

Dr. Dagmar Wujastyk, Associate Professor at University of Alberta and organizer of Indology in Canada, specializes in premodern Indian studies. The conversation outlines the conference’s aim to build a Canadian Indological community. Topics include redefining Indology today, inclusivity across diasporic and vernacular work, conference format and networking, and themes like epics, medicine, alchemy, and translation.

Lindsay McMahon, founder of All Ears English and veteran ESL teacher, shares her approach to pronunciation teaching. She discusses prioritizing connection over perfection. Short, authentic conversations and shadowing shape clear speech and rhythm. She also explores preparing learners for diverse accents and the role of AI tools in pronunciation practice.

Allan Greer, a Canadian historian of early colonial life and author of Canada in the Age of Rum, traces how massive rum imports reshaped work and trade from the 1670s to the 1830s. He explores rum’s role in fisheries and the fur trade, its use to control labour and trade with Indigenous peoples, Indigenous responses and resistance, and why rum’s dominance faded by the 1830s.