On this episode of SEPADPod Simon speaks with Maya Mikdashi, an interdisciplinary scholar of the state at Rutgers University. Maya is the author of the wonderful Sectarianism: Sovereignty, Secularism, and the State in Lebanon, published by Stanford University Press. She is the co-founder of Jadaliyya and the director of About Baghdad (2004) and Notes on the War (2006) , a feature length documentary film on the 2006 Israel-Lebanon War, and others. You can find her on twitter @mayamikdashi. On this episode, Simon and Maya talk about becoming interested in the state and the politics of difference, travelling to Baghdad, filming documentaries, the importance of human experience, anthropology and political science, sectarianism and sex, sectarianism and the state, the process of ‘un-seeing’, Jadaliyya, trust, and much more!