In such a challenging time, it seems important to make some space for gratitude. Here’s what the Threshold team is thinking about. If you enjoy this podcast, please support our independent nonprofit journalism at thresholdpodcast.org/donate All donations through the end of the year will be doubled by NewsMatch.
“Breathing is civil rights and breathing is environmental justice.” Dr. Robert Bullard, Distinguished Professor at Texas Southern University and a transformational figure in the environmental justice movement, says that the environment isn’t just out in the woods and wilderness; it’s everywhere. “It's where we live, work, play, worship, learn, as well as the physical and natural world,” he says. Robert has devoted much of his life to documenting how environmental racism puts Black people and oth...
The word crisis comes from the Greek krisis , meaning the turning point in a disease. Today on Threshold Conversations, we sit down with author, activist, and founder of 350.org Bill McKibben to talk about the dual crises of climate change and the coronavirus pandemic. If you enjoy this episode, please support our independent nonprofit journalism at thresholdpodcast.org/donate All donations through the end of the year will be doubled by NewsMatch. Mentioned in this episode: Subscribe to Amy's ne...
Award-winning photographer Ami Vitale has seen the best of humanity and the worst of humanity. She’s documented war and conflict, nature, wildlife, and conservation in places from Kashmir to Kenya. On this episode of Threshold Conversations, we hear the incredible stories behind some of Ami’s most iconic images — including her photo of a northern white rhino that was on the cover of National Geographic; what she sees as the importance of storytelling; and why she’s hopeful for our future. If you...
Become a Member Today! In-depth reporting on climate change, environmental justice, public lands, and so much more. This is what Threshold is about — bringing you important and thoughtful stories about human relationships with the natural world. And we need your help to continue doing this work. Our annual membership drive starts on November 1st. For the cost of a cup of coffee, a larger year-end gift, or anything in between, you can be a part of the Threshold story. Join us at thresholdpodcast....
How does your zip code affect your life expectancy? The impacts of climate change, toxic water, and dirty air aren’t evenly distributed. Low income and communities of color bear the brunt of these impacts. Today, we dive into conversation with Peggy Shepard, a pioneer of the environmental justice movement who has worked for more than three decades to shine a light on the ways damage to the natural world intersects with issues of race and class. She co-founded WE ACT for Environmental Justice, a ...
Join our host Amy Martin and National Geographic photographer Ami Vitale this Thursday, September 10 for a live recording of Threshold Conversations! Ami Vitale is an internationally-renowned photographer whose work invites us into extraordinary, intimate interactions between humans and wild creatures, and shines a light on the complicated relationships we have with our fellow beings. She’s received some of the biggest honors in the photography world, including a National Geographic photo of the...
Last week, the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge made headlines all over the world: the Trump administration finalized plans to open up this piece of remote, Alaskan wilderness to oil and gas development. But what does this latest move in the decades-long battle over the future of ANWR really mean? To find out, and to understand what might be next in this saga, we sat down with Heather Richards, who covers drilling on federal lands for E&E News, a journalism outlet focused on energy and the en...
If a whale sings in the ocean, and Michelle Fournet is there to record it, how does it sound? Find out in this episode of Threshold Conversations. Michelle Fournet is an acoustic ecologist with the Cornell Bioacoustics Research Program. She studies how marine animals—including humpback whales and other creatures—use sound to communicate, detect predators and prey, and engage with their environments in an increasingly noisy world. From Glacier Bay National Park in Southeast Alaska to Florida’s Ev...
IMPORTANT: DATE CHANGE This event was originally planned for August 27. Due to unforeseen changes in Ami Vitale's travel schedule, it's now happening Thursday, September 10 at 7 pm eastern time. Being a National Geographic photographer may seem glamorous, but sometimes the work just plain stinks—literally! Ami Vitale is an internationally-renowned photographer whose work invites us into extraordinary, intimate interactions between humans and wild creatures, and shines a light on the complicated ...
J. Drew Lanham is a Distinguished Professor at Clemson University, and an author, orator and Poet Laureate from Edgefield, SC. As a Black American, he’s intrigued by how ethnic prisms shape perceptions of nature and its care. His writing focuses on his passion for the natural world, and the personal and societal conflicts that sometimes put conservation and culture at odds. His award-winning book, The Home Place: Memoirs of a Colored Man's Love Affair with Nature , came out in 2016. In this epis...
In the second episode of Threshold Conversations, Amy talks with award-winning journalist Alfredo Corchado. As Mexico Border correspondent for the Dallas Morning News, Alfredo is one of the nation’s leading reporters covering the complicated issues playing out at the U.S./Mexico border. We all depend on the food we eat, and on the people who raise, grow, and harvest that food for us. In the United States, a huge number of the people who do that work are undocumented immigrants. Today, Alfredo di...
Threshold Wins a Peabody Award! Threshold was selected as one of 30 Peabody Award winners from a pool of nearly 1,300 submissions. This one of the most prestigious awards in media. We're thrilled! The board of jurors awarded the Peabody to Threshold’s most recent season, “The Refuge,” which examined the controversy over drilling for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. The jurors wrote, “This five-part series examines the battle for the future of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, and o...
Each week, we’re inviting you to help us document this crazy time, when we’re confronting a national crisis together — from alone in our homes. This week, we’re asking: Is this the end of the lockdown for you? Or are you still in quarantine mode? Send us some audio that captures the sound of this weird, nebulous moment. Record up to one minute of audio and send it our way. To participate, go to www.thresholdpodcast.org . We’ve posted everything you need to know on how to record and how to submit...
Hey! We’re starting a new thing! Welcome to Threshold Conversations, a new series featuring interviews with environmental thought leaders. We're still doing our main show—our documentary work, where we take you on a journey deep into one pressing issue. But between seasons of Threshold, we're going to start sharing interviews with people who have interesting things to say on important issues impacting cultures, creatures, and ecosystems around the world. For our inaugural episode, Amy talks with...
Each week, we’re inviting you to help us document this crazy time, when we’re confronting a national crisis together — from alone in our homes. This week, we’re asking: Tell us about a song or a piece of music that’s especially meaningful to you right now. Or — sing it to us. Record up to one minute of audio and send it our way. To participate, go to www.thresholdpodcast.org . We’ve posted everything you need to know on how to record and how to submit. Just a couple days ago, we also found out t...
Tomorrow is Giving Tuesday Now, a new global day of giving to address the immense need created by the COVID-19 pandemic. We’re participating in this campaign all week long. Nonprofit, independent journalism is more important than ever. If you can, we hope you'll help Threshold stay afloat during these uncertain times. You'll be joining the millions of people around the world who are contributing to causes they care about. Every donation, whether $5 or $500, helps us to hit our goal of raising $3...
Each week, we’re inviting you to help us document this crazy time, when we’re confronting a national crisis together — from alone in our homes. This week, we’re asking: What is breaking your heart right now? Does your sadness have a sound, or do you just want to tell us about it? How are you handling your grief? What are you doing with it, especially when you can’t go be with the people you love? Record up to one minute of audio and send it our way. To participate, go to www.thresholdpodcast.org...
Each week, we’re inviting you to help us document this crazy time, when we’re confronting a national crisis together — from alone in our homes. This week, we’re asking: How is the natural world helping you to get through this? And if you can’t access nature at all right now, what are you missing the most? How are you quarangreening? Or, how are you longing to? Record up to one minute of audio and send it our way. To participate, go to www.thresholdpodcast.org . We’ve posted everything you need t...
We’re launching a new project for this weird time we’re living in. It’s a time when we’re confronting a national crisis together. But we’re doing it from our homes, isolated and often alone. So we’re inviting you to help us document this crazy moment. Every week, starting today, we’ll give you a prompt. Your mission - if you choose to accept it - is to record up to one minute of sound in response to that prompt, and send it our way. This week’s prompt: Sunrise in Lockdown. What does waking up du...
To get us through this trying time, we’re inviting you around a virtual bonfire to share an Arctic story from our vault. In the 1920s, Ada Blackjack, an Iñupiaq woman from Nome, Alaska, was recruited to tag along on an expedition to a remote chunk of land north of Siberia called Wrangel Island. Along with four men, seven sled dogs, and a cat, she set off in September of 1921. The trip was anticipated to last a year. But just about nothing on that trip went according to plan. In this Threshold ex...
When the debate over drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge first emerged, most people had never heard of global warming. So over the last four decades, the controversies over oil in the Refuge and climate change evolved on different tracks. Now, those tracks are intersecting. We dive into the resulting tensions and contradictions around oil and climate in this final episode of our series on the Refuge. Learn more about Threshold on our website . Our reporting is made possible by listen...
The Gwich’in have lived and hunted in the Refuge long before it was carved out as federal, protected land. Their territory spans a huge swath of northeastern Alaska and northwestern Canada, and their health and culture depends on the Porcupine caribou herd - a group of animals 200,000 strong that calve on the area of the coastal plain slated for drilling. In this two-part episode, spend time in Arctic Village, a community just over the southern border of the Refuge, and hear from the Gwich’in ab...
The Gwich’in have lived and hunted in the Refuge long before it was carved out as federal, protected land. Their territory spans a huge swath of northeastern Alaska and northwestern Canada, and their health and culture depends on the Porcupine caribou herd - a group of animals 200,000 strong that calve on the area of the coastal plain slated for drilling. In this two-part episode, spend time in Arctic Village, a community just over the southern border of the Refuge, and hear from the Gwich’in ab...
We're moving from the coast to the interior of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, to help you get a sense of what it feels like to travel through this vast area. Last summer, writer William deBuys took a raft trip from the Brooks Range in the middle of the Refuge all the way out to the Arctic Ocean. During his two weeks on the water, he got to travel alongside the Porcupine caribou herd, animals crucial to the debate playing out the fate of the coastal plain. You’ll hear lots more about these ...
We continue our reporting from Kaktovik, Alaska—the only town within the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge—to find out how the conflict over drilling for oil in the refuge feels to the people who live there. The more we listened, the more we realized: the heart of the issue isn’t just over oil extraction and development, wilderness and wildlife. Whatever side people took, their focus is on their community, sovereignty, and survival. Learn more about Threshold on our website . This series was produ...
We continue our reporting from Kaktovik, Alaska—the only town within the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge—to find out how the conflict over drilling for oil in the refuge feels to the people who live there. The more we listened, the more we realized: the heart of the issue isn’t just over oil extraction and development, wilderness and wildlife. Whatever side people took, their focus is on their community, sovereignty, and survival. Learn more about Threshold on our website . Our reporting is made...
For 40 years, the fight over drilling for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge has been waged mostly from afar, in Washington, D.C. But what would oil development mean to the people who live closest to the proposed drilling area? Kaktovik, Alaska is the only town within the boundaries of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Now that drilling has been approved by Congress, it could mean people here someday have oil rigs right next door. But it could also mean this small town is suddenly awa...
The question of whether or not we should drill for oil in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is one of the most contentious public lands debates in the United States. Even though most Americans would have a hard time finding it on a map, the topic seems to ignite intense feelings in just about everyone. After 40 years of fighting, Congress voted in December 2017 to allow drilling in the refuge. As we release this, the Trump Administration says they’ll start auctioning off development right...
We’re closing out two years of Arctic reporting with a new series about one of the oldest, most contentious, and most complex environmental issues in the United States—the future of Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. In 2017, Congress opened part of the refuge for oil and gas development, and the Trump administration says they aim to start selling the drilling rights this winter. But opponents to drilling are saying: not so fast. The Refuge began as a bold vision to preserve enough land t...
