#AcademicRunPlaylist - 11/23/24

It was another weekend day of cleanup tasks, but at least I was able to take the dogs out for some walks while listening to books/talks for my #AcademicRunPlaylist!

First was an interesting talk by Maureen McNichols on the changing thinking around corporate purpose and what drives workforce diversity disclosure (tldr; it's because investors want it) at Mohamed Elsalkh's Egyptian Online Seminars in Business, Accounting and Economics https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ajIROW2cDiQ

Next was "Loving Our Own Bones" by Julia Watts Belser. This book is beautifully written, and since I'm Jewish it hit very close to home. The profound impact of Judeo-Christian philosophy on how we view disability is difficult to overstate, and Watts Belser methodically reviews the voluminous writings on this topic to illustrate how complex and varied interpretations can be of religious writings. Through it all, she demonstrates how central disability is to the human condition, even in these religious texts, how often it is swept away, and how important it is to re-examine our view of disability.

I think this book will still be great even if you're not Jewish, but if you are you're definitely going to get more from it. Highly recommend https://www.beacon.org/Loving-Our-Own-Bones-P1974.aspx

Last was "An Afro-Indigenous History of the United States" by Kyle Mays. Compared to other books examining Black or Native American history, this one is much more probing in the questions it asks, as well as in its refreshing, original prose. I wish the book was twice as long - there are some events that are strangely glossed over while others that receive much more detailed consideration and are better for it. Other historical accounts would disagree with some of the conclusions here, which are ideologically driven to a level that I'm not entirely comfortable with in an academic book. If you're looking for an entry point into US history, however, this is a good place to start https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/676294/an-afro-indigenous-history-of-the-united-states-by-kyle-t-mays/