Hidden Histories: Use Value and Theories from the East

In this episode, Biao Xiang interviews two extraordinary
thinkers: Don Kalb, whose new book "Value and Worthlessness" has
been hailed as a landmark in Marxist anthropology, and Xenia
Cherkaev, a scholar whose work bridges Eastern European social
history with contemporary existential questions.


Together, they reimagine ethnographic research by centering
hidden histories, relational use values, and the emotional weight
of being “worthless” in a world obsessed with exchange and
performance. They further explore how Post-Socialism reveals the
limits of the left and why the right isn’t just “Xenophobia”, but
a response to abandonment.