Episode Reviews

I knew Timbuktu was a real place, but I had no idea it had been a center of learning. This episode was fascinating but also underlined how very few aspects of African history I even know that I don't know about. This is also a good explanation + example of empires and how they work (and how, eventually, they don't). I really appreciate how this podcast generally tends to discuss human civilization almost as if it's an ecological process -- I don't mean in terms of how they interact with the environment, although there's definitely discussion of that! -- but about how human civilizations are interconnected and certain types of them (like empires) undergo predictable cycles, in ways that remind me a lot of how populations of animals and plants undergo cycles as they interact with each other.