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Punishment: Behind Japanese Military Brutality with Danny Orbach (Hurst, 2026)
Why was the Japanese Army so brutal before and during World War Two? This haunting question anchors a sweeping investigation into the moral universe of Imperial Japan’s soldiers, tracing their path from the twilight of the samurai age to the ashes of Manila in 1945.
Punishment: Behind Japanese Military Brutality (Hurst, 2026) by Professor Danny Orbach uncovers a world in which war was conceived not merely as combat, but also as justice. Officers and soldiers learned to navigate two rival visions of war: one restrained by the ‘foreign gaze’ of the Western world, the other rooted in older traditions that cast adversaries as ‘rebels’ and ‘bandits’ deserving exemplary punishment. However, these competing strategies were intertwined, in an interplay of mutual mitigation and brutalisation. Drawing on archival material in six languages and fieldwork conducted across Asia—from Taiwan’s indigenous highlands to Manchuria’s sorghum fields and the streets of Nanjing—Professor Orbach reveals how ambiguity, obedience, fear and ideology converged on the battlefield. Vague orders could become massacres, and the boundary between necessity and cruelty became perilously thin.
Part detective story, part moral history, Punishment illuminates how a modern state slid into devastating violence—and why that descent was neither inevitable nor easily explained.
This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda’s interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts.
16 Oct 2026
Tyrell Haberkorn In Conversation with Duncan McCargo
In this episode of Talking Thai Politics, Professor Tyrell Haberkorn discusses her new book, Dictatorship on Trial: Coups and the Future of Justice in Thailand (Stanford UP, 2024). This book examines five court cases brought during the regime of the National Council for Peace and order, involving protests and human rights. It features alternative judgments by the “Court of the People” which are offered alongside critical discussions of the actual case outcomes.
Tyrell Haberkorn is a prominent scholar of Thailand, with interests in state violence and dissident cultural politics from the end of absolute monarchy in 1932 to the present. She is currently Plaenert-Bascom Professor of Southeast Asian Studies at the University of Wisconsin, Madison
Her previous books are In Plain Sight: Impunity and Human Rights in Thailand (University of Wisconsin Press, 2018) and Revolution Interrupted: Farmers, Students, Law and Violence in Northern Thailand. (University of Wisconsin Press, 2011).
Duncan McCargo is President’s Chair in Global Affairs at Nanyang Technological University.
Talking Thai Politics brings crafted conversations about the politics of Thailand to a global audience. Created by the Generation Thailand project at Nanyang Technological University, the podcast is hosted by Duncan McCargo. Our production assistant is Shermaine Lau.
Website: here
You might also enjoy these related podcasts:
A 2021 conversation with Tyrell Haberkorn discussing this book as a work in progress: here
Duncan McCargo talking about his book Fighting for Virtue: Politics and Justice in Thailand (Cornell 2019). here
15 Oct 2026
Living Resistance: An Indigenous Vision for Seeking Wholeness Every Day
Feeling worn out by the work of resistance? How do you persevere?
Today’s book is: Living Resistance: An Indigenous Vision for Seeking Wholeness Every Day, by Kaitlin B. Curtice. In an era in which "resistance" has become tokenized, Kaitlin Curtice reclaims it as a basic human calling. Kaitlin Curtice shows that we can learn to practice embodied ways of belonging and connection to ourselves and one another through everyday practices, such as getting more in touch with our bodies, resting, and remembering our ancestors. She explores four "realms of resistance"—the personal, the communal, the ancestral, and the integral—and shows how these realms overlap and why all are needed for our liberation. Readers will be empowered to seek wholeness in whatever spheres of influence they inhabit.
Guest: Kaitlin B. Curtice is an award-winning author, poet-storyteller, and public speaker. As an enrolled citizen of the Potawatomi nation, she writes on the intersections of spirituality and identity and how that shifts throughout our lives. She writes online for On Being, SELF Magazine, and more. Her work has been featured on CBS and in USA Today. Her books include Native, Living Resistance, and Everything Is A Story. She writes The Liminality Journal.
Host: Dr. Christina Gessler is an academic writing coach and editor. She is the producer of the Academic Life podcast and newsletter.
Listeners to this episode may also be interested in:
How We Show Up
Indigenous D.C.
We Refuse: A Forceful History of Black Resistance
What Might Be
The Diné Reader
Night of the Living Rez
A Calm and Normal Heart
Becoming the Writer You Already Are
The Lost Journal of Sacajewea
How can mindfulness help?
Welcome to Academic Life, the podcast for your academic journey—and beyond! Please join us again to learn from more experts inside and outside the academy, and around the world. Missed any of the 300+ Academic Life episodes? Find them here. And thank you for listening!
This episode was originally published on May 11, 2023
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