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A Foreign Affairs Best Book of 2025
"In this provocative book, both witty and profoundly serious, Barak provides a human-scale history of the causes and consequences of rising temperatures in the Middle East. He brings the abstractions of carbon footprints and greenhouse gas emissions to vivid, tangible life"."—Foreign Affairs
Despite the flames of record-breaking temperatures licking at our feet, most people fail to fully grasp the gravity of environmental overheating. What acquired habits and conveniences allow us to turn a blind eye with an air of detachment? Using examples from the hottest places on earth, Heat, a History shows how scientific methods of accounting for heat and modern forms of acclimatization have desensitized us to climate change.
Ubiquitous air conditioning, shifts in urban planning, and changes in mobility have served as temporary remedies for escaping the heat in hotspots such as the twentieth-century Middle East. However, all of these measures have ultimately fueled not only greenhouse gas emissions but also a collective myopia regarding the impact of rising temperatures. Identifying the scientific, economic, and cultural forces that have numbed our responses, this book charts a way out of short-term thinking and towards meaningful action.
“On Barak brings a welcome humanistic, historical perspective to the challenges facing the region and its peoples, reflecting on those local traditions and ways of coping with heat that were systematically displaced by modern technologies and architectural practices sweeping through the Middle East during the twentieth century.”
List of Illustrations
Acknowledgments
Introduction
A Giant Leap from Man
From Global Warming to Local Heating
1. Under the Skin
Ottoman Sweat as Heaven on Earth
No Sweat
2. Heat Islands
The Building Blocks of a Coastal Thermal Sink
Beached: Libidinal Coastmopolitanism
3. Into the Bubble
Gone with the Wind
Arctic Comfort in Arabia
4. Internal Combustions
From Devout Closeness to Ungodly Congestion
From Licit Contact to Sexual Harassment 1
The Motorscape of Zahma
Postscript: Burning Bridges
The Bad COP
Bubbles Big and Small, Expanding Like Foam
Notes
Bibliography
Index