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A discussion of the historical trajectory informing the current polycrisis reverberating from the Strait of Hormuz with two historians of Iranian Oil, authors of Nationalising Oil & Knowledge in Iran (Edinburgh UP, 2025) and Machineries of Oil (MIT Press, 2018).
Cast (in order of appearance): Matt Seybold, Katayoun Shafiee, Mattin Biglari
Date Recorded: June 1, 2026
Music: Danny Weiss Quartet, Moby
Featured Guests
Mattin Biglari is Lecturer in Asian & Middle Eastern Environmental History at University of Bristol and the author of Nationalizing Oil & Knowledge in Iran (Edinburgh UP, 2025).
Katayoun Shafiee is Associate Professor of History at University of Warwick and the author of Machineries of Oil: An Infrastructural History of BP in Iran (MIT Press, 2018).
Matt Seybold is Associate Professor of American Literature & Mark Twain Studies at Elmira College, as well as resident scholar at the Center For Mark Twain Studies and executive producer of The American Vandal Podcast.
Episode Bibliography
Mattin Biglari, Nationalizing Oil & Knowledge in Iran: Labour, Decolonization & Colonial Modernity, 1933-1951 (Edinburgh UP, 2025)
Adam Hanieh, Crude Capitalism: Oil, Corporate Power, & The Making of The World Market (Verso, 2025)
Laleh Khalili, Extractive Capitalism: How Commodities & Cronyism Drive the Global Economy (Verso, 2025)
Laleh Khalili, Sinews of War & Trade: Shipping & Capitalism in the Arabian Peninsula (Verso, 2020)
Laleh Khalili, Séamus Malekafzali, & Dylan Saba, “Strait Outta Hormuz” Turbulence Podcast (March 31, 2026)
Laleh Khalili & Matt Seybold, “The Suez Canal, #Stuckboat, & The Sinew of War & Trade” The American Vandal Podcast (April 8, 2021)
Katayoun Shafiee, Machineries of Oil: An Infrastructural History of BP in Iran (MIT Press, 2018)
