On June 15, the Supreme Court ruled that Title VII of the Civil Rights Act protects Gay and Transgender individuals from workplace discrimination. ACLU National Legal Director David Cole, who spearheaded the victorious lawsuit, joins Then & Now to discuss this surprise ruling, how the ACLU and its allies framed the argument, what the decision's legal implications are for today, and how the Supreme Court’s approach to discrimination has evolved over time....
Jul 27, 2020•39 min•Season 1Ep. 18
The seemingly intractable Israel-Palestine conflict may well be moving into a new phase, one in which the long-dominant two-state solution is no longer viable or desirable to the parties involved. How did this occur? And what would replace it? Peter Beinart, noted journalist and editor-at-large of Jewish Currents magazine, recently published two pieces in the Jewish Currents and The New York Times about abandoning his own faith in the long-sought two-state solution. Beinart now proposes a vision...
Jul 20, 2020•55 min•Season 1Ep. 17
What is work? Who is a worker? How have women been perceived and treated as workers? Who is deemed “deserving” of benefits, welfare, and pensions, and who gets excluded? Answers to these questions have enormous implications on the the structure of society and policy and how we live our lives. Professor Eileen Boris, Hull Professor and Distinguished Professor of Feminist Studies and Professor of History, Black Studies, and Global Studies at the University of California at Santa Barbara, joins Kat...
Jul 13, 2020•53 min•Season 1Ep. 16
From Jack Johnson to Muhammed Ali, from Tommie Smith to Colin Kaepernick, Black athletes have played a huge role in the social and cultural history of the 20th and 21st centuries. Ben Carrington, sociologist at the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism, joins Then & Now to discuss the "racial project" of the Black Athlete. He observes how Black athletes have been fetishized, commodified, controlled, and celebrated, sometimes all at once. He compares the long history of this p...
Jul 06, 2020•58 min•Season 1Ep. 15
This year marks the 50th anniversary of the first LGBTQ Pride Parade and Festival in West Hollywood. Activist, speaker, and founder of the TransLatin@ Coalition Bamby Salcedo joins Then & Now in conversation with LCHP’s Maia Ferdman to discuss Pride's origins as a protest movement spurred by transgender women of color. She discusses the historic exclusion of the transgender community from the gay liberation movement, some of the persistent challenges facing the transgender community today as...
Jun 29, 2020•43 min•Season 1Ep. 14
“Battling Bella” Abzug was a Congresswoman, lawyer, and ardent feminist leader — during the 1970s she was one of the most recognizable women in U.S. politics. Abzug biographer and historian Leandra Zarnow joins Then & Now for a conversation with UCLA History Professor Katherine Marino about Abzug’s legacy that touches on an array of pivotal women’s rights policies, the founding of the National Women’s Political Caucus, and an intersectional approach to progressivism. Now, in the era of #MeTo...
Jun 22, 2020•36 min•Season 1Ep. 13
The coronavirus is like rain — it falls on everyone, but some communities are better able to protect themselves. In this week’s episode, Dr. David Hayes-Bautista talks with the LCHP's Maia Ferdman about the historical origins of these health inequities and their consequences today. A Distinguished Professor of Medicine and the Director of the Center for the Study of Latino Health and Culture (CESLAC) at the UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine, Dr. Hayes-Bautista shares his data-driven journey i...
Jun 16, 2020•36 min•Season 1Ep. 12
"We cannot be the nation we want to be if we wrap ourselves in a flag of mythology, and refuse to look at what lies underneath that flag." As part of our special coverage on the aftermath of the murder of George Floyd and the ensuing debate over policing and structural racism, we welcome scholar Brenda Stevenson to the program. A leading historian on slavery and the legacy of America's race problems, Dr. Stevenson ranges widely, from the Civil War to the Civil Rights Movement of the 60s, from th...
Jun 11, 2020•49 min•Season 1Ep. 11
Historians have the responsibility not only to unearth facts, but to uncover and lift up stories that have been traditionally ignored or excluded. This calling is all the more important in the midst of global pandemic -- and after the murder of George Floyd exposed anew the burdens of oppression against the Black community in the United States. Tyree Boyd-Pates, associate curator at the Autry Museum of the American West, sees his role as a public historian as "combatting the historical amnesia a...
Jun 09, 2020•54 min•Season 1Ep. 10
Political philosopher Hannah Arendt famously argued - in the case of SS officer Adolf Eichmann - that ordinary people can easily become complicit in evil acts as part of a larger system of injustice and inequality. In this special episode, we discuss the concept of "the banality of evil" with Robin Kelley, prominent scholar and professor of U.S. and African American History. As protests spread across the country over the murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, and so many more, P...
Jun 04, 2020•48 min•Season 1Ep. 9
This week the UCLA Luskin Center for History and Policy releases its report on White Nationalism in Southern California, titled " All is Not Well in the Golden State ." We are joined by the authors, Grace Johnston-Glick, James Nee, and Gavin Quan, a team of dedicated UCLA undergraduates who delve into the history, ideology, and present-day implications of white nationalism. As streets across the country are filled with protests over the killing of George Floyd and so many others, we must continu...
Jun 02, 2020•35 min•Season 1Ep. 8
Please join for an inspiring conversation on Then & Now with Tendayi Achiume, UCLA Law Professor, the Faculty Director of the UCLA Law Promise Institute for Human Rights , and the UN Special Rapporteur on Contemporary Forms of Racism . Prof. Achiume shares her personal history, the historical development of the global human rights movement, the state of racism during the COVID-19 era, and the importance of maintaining hope about making meaningful change in the world....
May 26, 2020•49 min•Season 1Ep. 7
Dr. Linda Rosenstock, Professor and Dean Emeritus of the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health, joins Then & Now to share her rich experience in the public health field and helps us make sense of the current response to the unprecedented COVID-19 crisis. She describes the development of local, national, and global public health infrastructures, and describes what has worked in the past and what isn't working today.
May 18, 2020•43 min•Season 1Ep. 6
This week we are joined by Professor Michael Meranze, UCLA History Professor and Chair of UCLA’s Academic Senate. The Academic Senate is a body of faculty members who share in the governance of the UCLA. Professor Meranze discusses the history of shared governance, the university’s past and current responses to crises, and the lessons that can be learned from the Great Depression and New Deal.
May 11, 2020•34 min•Season 1Ep. 5
To conclude Then & Now’s three-part mini-series on the relationship between the LA County Supervisors and Sheriff’s Department, we sat down with Connie Rice, Esq. and Dr. Raphael Sonenshein, two prominent civic leaders with deep knowledge of Los Angeles political history. They skillfully frame the divergent narratives we heard in our last two episodes on the topic, offering much needed historical context and a keen analysis of the present-day conflict. Essential listening for all those inter...
May 04, 2020•50 min•Season 1Ep. 4
In this special episode of Then & Now, we sit down with LA County Sheriff Alex Villanueva as he responds to our inaugural episode and gives his take on the current tensions between his office and the Board of Supervisors, and on how the past informs his perspectives and decisions.
Apr 27, 2020•57 min•Season 1Ep. 3
Join a team of researchers from the UCLA Luskin Center for History and Policy as they discuss their timely new report examining California's responses to pandemics over the last 100 years. They discuss the division of power among local, state, and federal government in responding to these outbreaks, the tendency to stigmatize groups and places by naming a disease, and the divergent economic effects of pandemics “then” and “now.”
Apr 22, 2020•34 min•Season 1Ep. 2
Los Angeles County, one of the largest municipal governments in the world, is overseen by a board of five elected supervisors and three countywide elected officials, including the sheriff. In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Supervisors voted to remove LA County Sheriff Alex Villanueva from his post as head of the County's Emergency Operations Center, and tensions have only risen since. How can we make sense of the ongoing conflict between the L.A. County leaders in this moment of public ...
Apr 13, 2020•45 min•Season 1Ep. 1
Subscribe today to be the first to hear The UCLA Luskin Center for History & Policy's brand new podcast, Then & Now. This podcast is dedicated to uncovering the wisdom and guidance that history has to offer us today.
Apr 07, 2020•47 sec
