Category: Media

Miriam Davidson’s New Op-Ed in Progressive Calls for Protections of Mexican Journalists

Posted on by Mari Herreras

February 15, 2022

The Progressive Magazine recently published a new op-ed by University of Arizona Press author Miriam Davidson, calling for the Mexican government to protect Mexican journalists. Mexico continues to rank as one of the most dangerous countries in the world for the press.

Davidson’s new book, The Beloved Border: Humanity and Hope in a Contested Land, shares the history of sanctuary and argues that this social movement and others that have originated on the border are vanguards of larger global movements against the mistreatment of migrant workers and refugees, police brutality, and other abuses of human and natural rights. She gives concrete examples of positive ways in which border people are promoting local culture and cross-border solidarity through health care, commerce, food, art, and music.

From the op-ed:

Not only is the Mexican government failing to protect journalists, it has been using spyware to monitor their activities, watchdog groups have determined. Some of the surveilled reporters have later turned up dead.

In response to this situation, some Mexican reporters have gone into exile in other countries. A few have applied for asylum in the U.S., though most are denied, even after receiving death threats. 

But there’s only so much they can do. In Mexico, as in the United States, politicians enjoy fomenting public distrust of the press. The media are a suspect class. Yet reporters in both countries perform an essential service in keeping the public informed.

AMLO needs to do more. He must stand up for a free press by putting attention and resources toward actually protecting people, preventing attacks and combatting official corruption. With those words and deeds, he can help end the scourge of journalist murders.

Read the entire op-ed here.

Abalone Mountain Press Podcast on ‘Diné Reader’

Posted on by Mari Herreras

February 3, 2022

Abalone Mountain Press Podcast interviewed Esther Belin, co-editor of The Diné Reader: An Anthology of Navajo Literature, published by the University of Arizona Press. Also interviewed were Byron Aspaas, Nia Francisco and Laura Tohe. Together they discussed what it is like growing up on the Navajo Reservation, writing poems in Navajo, and hopes for The Diné Reader.

Listen to the podcast here.

Author Esther G. Belin talks ‘Diné Reader’ on Native America Calling Radio Program

Posted on by Mari Herreras

December 22, 2022

Tara Gatewood, producer and host of Native America Calling, recently interviewed Diné multimedia artist and writer Esther G. Belin about The Diné Reader: An Anthology of Navajo Literature.

Belin is one of four editors of this powerful new anthology of Navajo literature with a range of contributors including Shonto Begay, Sherwin Bitsui, Luci Tapahonso, Laura Tohe, and many others.

Listen to the interview here.

Watch: Tsim Schneider Introduces the Archaeology of Refuge and Recourse

Posted on by Savannah Hicks

October 8, 2021

The Archaeology of Refuge and Recourse explores the dual practices of refuge and recourse among Indigenous peoples of California. From the eighteenth to the twentieth century, Indigenous Coast Miwok communities in California persisted throughout multiple waves of colonial intrusion. But to what ends?

Applying theories of place and landscape, social memory, and mobility to the analysis of six archaeological sites, Tsim D. Schneider argues for a new direction in the archaeology of colonialism. This book offers insight about the critical and ongoing relationships Indigenous people maintained to their homelands despite colonization and systematic destruction of their cultural sites.

Watch Tsim Schneider introduce his new book below.

Tsim D. Schneider is a citizen of the Federated Indians of Graton Rancheria and an assistant professor of anthropology at the University of California, Santa Cruz. His archaeological and historical research investigates the lives and decision making of Indigenous peoples contending with colonialism. Schneider is co-editor of Indigenous Landscapes and Spanish Missions: New Perspectives from Archaeology and Ethnohistory, and his research appears in such high-caliber journals as American Anthropologist, American Antiquity, and American Indian Quarterly.

Podcast Features Sara Sue Hoklotubbe on ‘Betrayal at the Buffalo Ranch’

Posted on by Mari Herreras

September 3, 2021

On The Joys of Binge Reading podcast, Jenny Wheeler recently interviewed University of Arizona Press author Sara Sue Hoklotubbe on writing and her book, Betrayal at the Buffalo Ranch, the fourth in Hoklotubbe’s Sadie Walela mystery series.

“She recounts how a book that started out being about how women got a bad rap in banking turned into a bank robbery mystery. And she recalls the day she got stopped at Heathrow for having an American Indian name, believe it or not.”

Listen to the podcast here.

Stephen Pyne on Arizona’s Fire Problem in Az Republic

Posted on by Abby Mogollon

July 12, 2021

In a special opinion piece for the Arizona Republic Stephen Pyne writes that Fires in the West–and the world, for that matter, is not a problem solved with a once-and-done project:

“Places that historically had fire are having more and nastier outbreaks. Places without routine fire are experiencing it. An equal reality is that we need more landscape fire to dampen fuels and enhance ecological integrity. All in all, too much bad fire, too little good.”

Read the Op Ed

***

Stephen J. Pyne is an emeritus professor at Arizona State University. Best known for his research into the history of fire, he is the author of Between Two Fires and To The Last Smoke, along with several other works on fire. He has also written a suite of studies that orbit around the concept of three ages of discovery: The Ice: A Journey to Antarctica; How the Canyon Became Grand; Voyager: Exploration, Space, and the Third Great Age of Discovery; and The Great Ages of Discovery.

Listen: Carwil Bjork-James Featured on Media Indigena Podcast

Posted on by Savannah Hicks

April 20, 2021

University of Arizona Press author Carwil Bjork-James was recently featured on a Media Indigena podcast episode entitled “Bolivia for Beginners.”

Imagine what it would be like to live in a country where roughly half the population is Indigenous, said to be the highest such proportion in all of South America. Imagine too that, for over a decade, your president was himself Indigenous. Well, in Bolivia, that’s been the reality—and a fascinating one at that. A reality we delve into further with a special guest who’s written extensively about the ways in which Indigenous-led social movements have dramatically and fundamentally altered the mainstream political landscape.

Joining host/producer Rick Harp are roundtable regular Brock Pitawanakwat, Associate Professor of Indigenous Studies at York University, and Carwil Bjork-James, author of The Sovereign Street: Making Revolution in Urban Bolivia.

Listen to the podcast here.

Watch: Spatialities of Andean Extractivism with Carwil Bjork-James

Posted on by Savannah Hicks

April 20, 2021

Recently, University of Arizona Press author Carwil Bjork-James presented a talk on Andean extraction at the American Association of Geographers meeting. Taking the streets of Cochabamba, Sucre, and La Paz as its vantage point, Carwil’s new book The Sovereign Street offers a rare look at political revolution as it happens. It documents a critical period in Latin American history, when protests made headlines worldwide, where a generation of pro-globalization policies were called into question, and where the indigenous majority stepped into government power for the first time in five centuries

“As part of an extended panel on the Corporation on at the American Association of Geographers meeting, I presented the following talk on Concession blocks, spiraling pits, and wily start-ups: Spatialities of Andean extractivism (AAG members only). The talk is a deep dive in the technologies and policies that connect open-pit mining w/ speculative capital, built around Sumitomo Corporation’s San Cristobal mine in Potosí, Bolivia and Bear Creek Mining’s failed Santa Ana silver mine project in Puno, Peru.”— Carwil Bjork-James

Carwil Bjork-James is an assistant professor of anthropology at Vanderbilt University. His research, both ethnographic and historical, concerns disruptive protest, grassroots autonomy, state violence, and indigenous collective rights in Bolivia.

Steve Pyne on Persevering to Mars

Posted on by Abby Mogollon

March 25, 2021

In a new essay published this week on the History News Network, Steve Pyne explains the link between last months Mars landing by Perseverance and the Great Ages of Discovery, which he details in his new book. Here’s a brief excerpt from the essay:

“There is a lot to marvel at Perseverance’s February 18 landing on Mars, beyond robotic exploration as an extreme sport.  Only half of attempted missions to Mars have succeeded, and the sheer technical audacity that stuck Perseverance’s landing is guaranteed to dazzle. But America’s latest endeavor joins two other missions from civilizations re-emerging as global actors after centuries of exploring quietude. Perhaps more deeply, Perseverance’s first-contact photo, a shadow selfie, raises questions about the very nature of discovery and the character of an explorer.”

Read more

Cuba, Hot and Cold Featured in The Wall Street Journal

Posted on by Savannah Hicks

March 12, 2021

Tom Miller’s University of Arizona Press book, Cuba, Hot and Cold, was featured in a recent article from The Wall Street Journal: Dreaming of Cuba? Here’s How to Feel Like You’re in Havana Anytime You’d Like.

Jon Lee Anderson, author of Che: A Revolutionary Life, offers four books that reveal a Havana beyond the clichés. One of the books he chose is Miller’s Cuba, Hot and Cold, about which Anderson writes, “If you had to pick one great introduction to Havana, it’d be this slender, readable work. It hits all the touchstones of history, art and literature with a healthy sense of humor—and you can finish it in an hour and a half.”

Read the rest of the article here.

Since his first visit to the island thirty years ago, Miller has shown us the real people of Havana and the countryside, the Castros and their government, and the protesters and their rigor. His first book on Cuba, Trading with the Enemy, brought readers into the “Special Period,” Fidel’s name for the country’s period of economic free fall. Cuba, Hot and Cold brings us up to date, providing intimate and authentic glimpses of day-to-day life.

Tom Miller has been writing about Latin America and the American Southwest for more than four decades. His articles have appeared in outlets including the New York Times, Smithsonian, LIFE, Rolling Stone, and Natural History. He is affiliated with the University of Arizona’s Center for Latin American Studies, and at a 2008 ceremony, the City of Quito proclaimed Miller Un Huésped Ilustre (An Illustrious Guest).

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