Becoming American (Alumni Books Podcast)

07/02/14 • 12 min

Fariborz Ghadar '68, SM '70 discusses his new book, Becoming American: Why Immigration Is Good for Our Nation's Future. “Like many other immigrants before and after me, I had become aerodynamic,” Ghadar writes. “Shaped by the stronger than normal forces I had encountered in my lifetime as an immigrant. I worked hard not to be knocked over by these forces, which often led to sacrifices.” Read more: http://bit.ly/2vMf0cU Transcipt: https://bit.ly/2EeKhp5

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Do Fathers Matter? (Alumni Books Podcast)

Emperor penguin fathers nest on an egg for two months while the mothers journey to the sea to feed. The mimic poison frog nurtures its tadpole young through adolescence. Are human fathers this important? Paul Raeburn, MIT class of 1972, examines that question in his new book Do Fathers Matter? What Science Is Telling Us About the Parent We’ve Overlooked. Raeburn is a regular contributor to the New York Times, Science, Discover, and The Huffington Post, and he is chief media critic for the Knight Science Journalism Tracker at MIT. Like his first three books, which explored genetic engineering, the secrets on the planet mars, and depression in children, Raeburn’s non-fiction emerges from his own basic questions about science and his yearning to fact-check closely-held beliefs and presumptions about science in everyday living. Read more: http://bit.ly/2fyPr8B Transcipt: https://bit.ly/2GQ507P

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The Social Machine (Alumni Books Podcast)

A conversation with Judith Donath SM '86, PhD '97, whose book The Social Machine was published by MIT Press in May 2014. The book is a chronicle of Donath's projects in social media dating from the late 1980s, long before the term was in vogue. Read more: http://bit.ly/1TjtJwr Donath also traces the rise of social media to its roots in Usenet groups and discussion boards to the conquests of Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Donath explores why these media thrived while others failed, and the book serves as both a guide for researchers studying social media and a cautionary tale for casual users who don’t always question them critically enough. Learn more about Judith Donath: http://vivatropolis.org/judith/ Book homepage: http://vivatropolis.org/SocialMachine/ Podcast transcript: https://bit.ly/2Gz80lL