Water Politics

This audio study guide for Saltwater Slavery by Stephanie E. Smallwood includes detailed summary and analysis of each chapter and an in-depth exploration of the book’s multiple symbols, motifs, and themes such as the commodification of African captives, diaspora, and social death, and the Middle Passage. Featured content also includes commentary on major characters, 25 important quotes, essay questions, and discussion topics.

Only once did David Foster Wallace give a public talk on his views on life, during a commencement address given in 2005 at Kenyon College. The speech is presented for the first time in audiobook form in This Is Water. How does one keep from going through their comfortable, prosperous adult life unconsciously? How do we get ourselves out of the foreground of our thoughts and achieve compassion? The speech captures Wallace's electric intellect as well as his grace in attention to others.