#AcademicRunPlaylist - 9/3/25

I've had a hectic few days but I fit in some talks and books for my #AcademicRunPlaylist!

First was an engaging panel on Meta's DMA non-compliance at the Digital Markets Research Hub with Simonetta Vezzoso, Marco Botta, and Mikołaj Barczentewicz https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bf-bEyd1j50

Next was an interesting talk by Anitha Pasupathy on visual scene understanding and object recognition in primate brains at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pTZStzqxqFo

Next was an intriguing talk by Philippe Aghion on the power of creative destruction at Sciences Po https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTcxT0VbXIY

Next was an excellent talk by Vukosi Marivate on natural language processing for low resource languages and the importance of Africans developing their own solutions at Data Science for Social Impact (DSFSI) https://youtu.be/hwefANMnSxo?si=T-wa0hE4y1deBG1P&t=858

Next was a great conversation between Ann Lipton and Michael Levin on constituency statues in Canada and the US and the bizarre US government/Intel situation on the Shareholder Primacy podcast https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KzeolRBLmo8

Next was "Pockets" by Hannah Carlson. This book is focused on the cultural forces that shaped the use of and impression of pockets, which is inextricably linked with its gendered norms. There's surprisingly little about the initial adoption of pockets by European royalty and how it was spread from the Ottoman empire, and in general I would've liked more on the diffusion pattern of different styles. Still, an interesting foray into fashion history https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/hannah-carlson/pockets/9781643751542/

Last was "Ebony & Ivy" by Craig Steven Wilder. This book systematically demonstrates how important capital from the slave trade was in building and supporting many prominent universities in the US. It also shows how attending these universities did nothing to alter the slaveholding practices of its graduates. What it doesn't do in most cases, however, is show the regular employment of institutional or academic resources in supporting slavery with the notable exception of eugenics. This isn't to absolve universities of responsibility, or the necessity of understanding this history for people in academia, but I was a bit surprised at how little institutional dirt was there https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/ebony-and-ivy-9781608193837/