March 31, 2025

S2 Ep1: Bharat Venkat (Colloquium Mini Episode) - on thermal inequality

17 minutes

In this mini episode, Richard and Mia talk to Bharat Venkat, a professor of anthropology at UCLA, about the research he presented at the Johns Hopkins Program in the History of Science, Medicine & Technology's colloquium series and his upcoming book project, "Swelter: A History of Our Bodies in a Warming World."

Related links for Bharat's work:

UCLA Heat Lab

"Carceral heat exposure as harmful design: An integrative model for understanding the health impacts of heat on incarcerated people in the United States" (Social Science & Medicine, 2025)

"Through a glass darkly: race, thermal sensation and the nervous body in late colonial India" (British Journal of the History of Science, 2022)

"What Not to Wear" (LA Review of Books, 2023)

"California will finally have indoor heat standards for workplaces — with a cruel exception" (LA Times, 2024)

“L.A. loves food trucks. With more heat waves, they can be dangerous for people working in them” (LA Times, 2023)

"How historic redlining led to extreme heat in the Watts community" (LA Times, 2022)

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For the Medical Record is a Podcast from Johns Hopkins University's Center for Medical Humanities and Social Medicine, hosted by Research Associated Richard Del Rio and Postdoctoral Fellow Mia Levenson. New episodes are released biweekly.

In these episodes, we talk to people affiliated with the Center to discuss their research within the history of medicine and the medical humanities. We ask them why their work matters, and how history and the humanities can help us to better understand debates and practices within medicine and care today.

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