Raiders Of The Lost Archive

Episode 28: Dana El Kurd

Fri, 05 Dec 2025 00:00:00 -0400

Dana El Kurd (University of Richmond) reflects on the personal and ethical dimensions of a research journey that is also a journey home — in her case, to Palestine. Her candid insights on foreign-assisted state-building, doing fieldwork with limited resources, and navigating data collection in authoritarian environments illuminate how differently the field can treat different researchers. She asks whether scholars trying to understand public opinion under these constraints can — or even should — strive for “neutrality.” An inspiring conversation for junior scholars who think they’re the only ones improvising methods as they go.

Episode 27: Michael Kofman

Fri, 17 Oct 2025 00:00:00 -0300

How does one study war up close without acquiring dangerous habits of mind? How is the professional path of a military analyst different from a ‘pure’ academic path - and what do cloistered academics who never work in the government miss? Michael Kofman (Carnegie) shares insight on his fieldwork experiences.

Episode 26: Rose McDermott

Fri, 03 Oct 2025 00:00:00 -0300

Our podcast’s first bona fide political psychologist! Rose McDermott (Brown) has expertise spanning subjects from pharmacology to polygyny. In this lively episode we cover everything from male club behavior in security studies to the challenges of navigating graduate school if statistics aren’t your thing. Even nuclear war is easier to handle if you can laugh at it a little.

Episode 25: Kirsten Weld

Fri, 26 Sep 2025 00:00:00 -0300

How do you describe the smell of a newly-opened secret police archive, accidentally discovered in Guatemala City near a salvage yard for junked police cars? Only a few rare researchers can speak themselves into the Raiders of the Lost Archive canon as vividly as Kirsten Weld (Harvard). A can’t miss episode for anyone interested in pushing the boundaries between critical scholarship and activism.

Episode 24: Mark Beissinger

Fri, 12 Sep 2025 00:00:00 -0300

Mark Beissinger (Princeton) recalls fieldwork in the Soviet Union, the transition to a “post-Soviet” experience, and speculates about the future of fieldwork in Russia as U.S.-Russia relations return to something resembling a new Cold War. A tireless mentor to dozens of comparativists, he reflects on his career and our shared ethical responsibility as archivists.

Episode 23 -- Roger Petersen

Thu, 02 May 2024 17:25:57 -0300

How many civil wars were there in Iraq after the U.S. invasion – and how did they really end? Roger Petersen of MIT describes a life of immersion, from road construction to honchoing a network of scholar-soldiers as they unspooled the complexity of a decade of war in Iraq. How does one get honest answers out of warlords in situations where they (and their entourage) have all the power? Is it possible to be a neutral observer in an ongoing war? Can ethnographicsensibility be taught -- and if not, as the profession incentivizes students to become technically-oriented in our training sequences, what is lost? Provocative, funny, blunt, and always thoughtful, Petersen's slow-rolled delivery is calibrated to get you wondering what you might learn if you got serious about active listening.

Episode 22 - Wendy Pearlman

Mon, 16 Oct 2023 00:00:00 -0300

Wendy Pearlman is Professor of Political Science at Northwestern University, where she is Crown Professor of Middle East Studies. She studies the comparative politics of the Middle East, social movements, and forced migration, and has conducted with more than 500 displaced Syrians since 2012. In this podcast we discuss how this data was curated ("midwife-ing") to create the award-winning We Crossed A Bridge and It Trembled: Voices from Syria (HarperCollins, 2017).

Episode 21 - Kristine Eck

Mon, 12 Jun 2023 14:37:40 -0300

Kristine Eck (Uppsala University) discusses the challenges of working with contemporary and historical police archives. For quantitative social scientists, how does "the data generation process" introduce measurement bias into the processes that we are actually describing when we employ data generated by the state for counterinsurgency? How do ongoing state efforts to digitize archives aid and hinder political scientists and data scientists trying to quantify human rights abuses? What are the citation norms for private correspondence by public figures who were in command decision roles during episodes of violence? A frank, eye-opening discussion on how scholars access and use state-generated datasets on repression, with comparative cases ranging from the Malayan Emergency to Israel and from contemporary OECD countries to Nepal.

Episode 20 - Ana Bracic

Fri, 19 May 2023 09:29:46 -0300

Ana Bracic (Michigan State University) discusses positionality, entree, and a variety of ethical considerations that informed her work with a highly-vulnerable population in Central Europe. The candid discussion of how her project on the Roma evolved from an idealized, perfect "magical dataset" ("something as ridiculous as a time-series cross-section dataset on some sort of dimension of Roma exclusion, and it didn't matter what it was, so long as it was the same one across all these observations...") to her actual project. How was her mother an asset? What happens if you come home from the field with data that, once analyzed, is shown to be completely unhelpful for your job market paper? A can't miss episode for an aspiring junior scholar.

Episode 19 - Margaret Levi

Fri, 05 May 2023 00:00:00 -0300

The author of Rule and Revenue, In the Interests of Others, Consent, Dissent, and Patriotism, and Analytic Narratives describes some of her lesser-known her early-career work: police ride-alongs in Detroit after the social upheavals of the 1960s, interviewing Jimmy Hoffa, and day-drinking with scary police officers (before they went on duty). A wide-ranging discussion of triangulating data to tell a compelling story, how and when to alter theories in the face of new data, and numerous inspiring examples of tenacity in the face of adversity dealing with hard-to-access archives. With generous answers, always more cogent and coherent than the questions, this is truly a can't miss episode.

Episode 18 - Sarah Parkinson

Fri, 21 Apr 2023 00:00:00 -0300

Sarah Parkinson's (Johns Hopkins) blunt and honest reflections on how her dissertation project evolved over more than a decade is a reminder that the field is supposed to change the scholar -- not always in ways that can be predicted in advance. Parkinson discusses her evolutions, both in terms of methods employed and her social identification in the discipline. There is something here that will be valuable to every young scholar, especially those considering work in areas adjacent to violence. What does it mean to study the state from the bottom-up? What do we, privileged observers, owe our most vulnerable subjects, really? The second guest in the ARC (Advancing Research on Conflict) Consortium.

Episode 17 - Christian Davenport (Part Two: ”Hi, My Name Is Christian, Don’t Mind The Vehicle...”)

Fri, 07 Apr 2023 05:00:00 -0300

In part two of our "What Did You Do In 2022?" series, Davenport reflects on new tools for archiving as he tests new research frontiers, from BLM to Syria to Colombia. How should we think about university liability -- and our own -- when handling very sensitive data? How should these archival materials pass from one generation to the next? A characteristically wide-ranging conversation on mortality, activism, and the scholarly enterprise.

Episode 16 - Jesse Driscoll (Part Two: ”True Tales from the Five-Sided Wind Tunnel”)

Fri, 24 Mar 2023 10:11:51 -0300

After taking a year off from podcasting, the first of a two-part "What Did You Do In 2022?" series. Driscoll discusses a year of participant observation on the Joint Staff, working in the Europe/NATO/Russia division as a Ukraine Desk Officer. A candid reflection on a disorienting year, as a micro-conflict scholar re-reads Thomas Schelling, signs NDAs, befriends both 'Russia Hawks' and 'Russia Understand-ists', and learns to write in the voice of the Pentagon. http://archiveraiders.weebly.com/

Episode 15 - David Laitin

Fri, 24 Dec 2021 00:00:00 -0400

David Laitin reflects on lessons learned from a lifetime of fieldwork -- and imagines the road ahead. How did watching the Sardana folk dance in Cataolonia reveal the limits of Gramscian hegemony as an explanatory framework? After one just decides, in middle life, to "learn Russian", how does one get started? How does one arrange to take a family, with two young children in tow, to Nigeria? True adventures on the social science frontier, as narrated by a uniquely experienced voice of authority.

Episode 14 - Sarah Cameron

Thu, 23 Dec 2021 00:00:00 -0400

Sarah Cameron (University of Maryland) shares practical advice for conducting archival research in non-English languages, based on her her experiences living in Kazakhstan conducting research for her award-winning HUNGRY STEPPE: FAMINE, VIOLENCE, AND THE MAKING OF SOVIET KAZAKHSTAN. Why start with children's elementary school textbooks to develop a research vocabulary? The podcast's first bona-fide historian!

Episode 13 - David Cunningham

Wed, 22 Dec 2021 00:00:00 -0400

David Cunningham (Wash U St. Louis), next in our "when the field is home" series, discusses the archival and interview research that yielded KLANSVILLE USA: THE RISE AND FALL OF THE CIVIL RIGHTS-ERA KU KLUX KLAN and THERE'S SOMETHING HAPPENING HERE: THE NEW LEFT, THE KLAN AND FBI COUNTERINTELLIGENCE. How do we mentor graduate students planning work on topics that will put them in close proximity to dangerous political actors? The podcast's first bona-fide sociologist!

Episode 12 - Cynthia Enloe

Mon, 01 Nov 2021 14:20:42 -0300

In this episode Cynthia Enloe -- prolific feminist writer, political theorist, inspiring teacher, and all-around badass -- discusses her early fieldwork experiences in Malaysia. How is it possible to write six books about war, violence, and ethnicity and never think seriously about gender performance? How can you be self-reflective on the page, and embrace the first-person voice, without making yourself the most interesting person in the book? An authentic social science heroine shares her reflections and prescriptions. A can't miss episode.

Episode 11 - Kanisha Bond

Wed, 13 Oct 2021 00:00:00 -0300

Kanisha Bond (SUNY Binghamton) on doing participant observation on the contemporary Antifa movement, the blurring of the line between researcher and activist roles, thinking about America as a comparative case, and thinking purposefully about the need to sometimes step back from research that can be repurposed by the state as op-sec. The third in our "when the field is home" series.

Episode 10 - Asfandyr Mir

Wed, 29 Sep 2021 00:00:00 -0300

Asfandyr Mir (Stanford - CISAC) shares his reflections on the challenges of presenting himself as a neutral scientist observer when researching the U.S. drone war in Pakistan. The second in a "when the field is home" series.

Episode 9 - Tariq Thachil

Thu, 23 Sep 2021 11:41:56 -0300

Tariq Thachil (UPenn) is the first in a "when the field is home" series. What are the advantages and disadvantages of being able to present as a local? Is being ambushed on social media part of what we should be preparing students for? Does it "count" as ethnographic observation if you are also looking for measurable indicators for quantitative tests as you go? How should we teach THEFT OF AN IDOL?

Episode 8 - Zachariah Mamphilly

Wed, 15 Sep 2021 11:36:26 -0300

Zachariah Mamphilly (CUNY) answers the big questions about agency and responsibility. What does it mean to be an oppositional intellectual in the field of political violence? Should we expect any accountability for the role that our field has played in legitimizing the war on terror as we chase grants and policy relevance? As we professionalize our students, who are we teaching them to write for?

Episode 7 - Leonard Wantchekon

Mon, 30 Aug 2021 00:00:00 -0300

Leonard Wantchekon (Princeton University), activist and scholar, reflects on his journey. Saddle wisdom, "The Tao of Leonard", and practical advice for early-career scholars.

Episode 6 - Jen Murtazashvili

Tue, 22 Jun 2021 13:43:37 -0300

Jen Murtazashvili (University of Pittsburgh) speaking candidly about Afghanistan, course correction while in the field, and the importance of publicly admitting mistakes.

Episode 5 - Bob Bates

Thu, 10 Jun 2021 00:00:00 -0300

The legendary Bob Bates describes his fieldwork experiences Zambian mining townships -- getting in, building trust, staying safe, and writing up. Can qualitative methods be taught?

Episode 4 - Jesse Driscoll (UCSD)

Fri, 21 May 2021 09:21:07 -0300

Meeting The Host #2: Jesse Driscoll recalls some memorable characters from his time in Tajikistan and Georgia.

Episode 3 - Christian Davenport

Tue, 18 May 2021 00:00:00 -0300

Meeting The Host #1: Christian Davenport (University of Michigan) shares some hard-won wisdom from his experiences in Rwanda.

Episode 2 - Lisa Wedeen

Sat, 15 May 2021 00:00:00 -0300

Our second podcast guest is Lisa Wedeen (University of Chicago), author of Ambiguities of Domination, Peripheral Visions, and Authoritarian Apprehensions.

Episode 1 - James Scott

Fri, 19 Mar 2021 16:48:01 -0300

We begin our podcast with none other than Prof. James Scott (Yale University). Yes, the James Scott of Weapons of the Weak, Seeing Like a State and Two Cheers for Anarchism.