Why We Can't (and Shouldn't) Move On From Jan. 6. Fordham University political science professor, Christina Greer, joins to takes our politics questions on the hearings and more. Plus, the story of 91-year-old artist Faith Ringgold, as told by her daughter. Companion listening for this episode : A Conservative View of the Vigilante Right (1/24/2022) Mona Charen discusses the true meaning of conservative and the radical shift in the GOP. Then, a listener mailbag begs us to explore how "normal peo...
Jun 13, 2022•52 min•Ep 183•Transcript available on Metacast The John Jay Educational Campus, a large brick building in Park Slope, Brooklyn, houses four high schools: Cyberarts Studio Academy, the Secondary School for Law, Millennium Brooklyn, and Park Slope Collegiate. Each school is its own separate universe, but the students yearn to connect. When the administration announces that the athletics programs will merge, they ask what it will take for the building to live up to its new motto: “We Are One.” “Keeping Score” is a co-production of WNYC Studios ...
Jun 09, 2022•30 min•Transcript available on Metacast Schools Had a Tough Year. What’d We Learn? Plus, follow the season of a girl’s varsity volleyball team, and find one Brooklyn school building’s effort to bridge its stark racial divide. From WNYC’s new miniseries, Keeping Score. The past year has forced public classrooms into the center of our country’s intense culture wars and political debates, from Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” bill, to Critical Race Theory, to the ever-present threat of gun violence. What do these fights mean about the future ov...
Jun 06, 2022•48 min•Ep 181•Transcript available on Metacast After publishing 34 books, Alice Walker talks through her latest release, a collection of personal journals spanning four decades. Read more in Gathering Blossoms Under Fire: The Journals of Alice Walker, 1965–2000 , out now. Companion listening for this episode : Lynn Nottage: Unexpected Optimist (1/3/2022) Playwright Lynn Nottage breaks down her remarkable career and shares how, as an optimist at heart, she finds the light and resilience in unexpected stories. “The United States of Anxiety” ai...
May 30, 2022•50 min•Ep 180•Transcript available on Metacast There are no “lone wolves” in the terrorist violence of white identity politics. So what’s that mean for white people who want to confront it? First, assistant secretary for homeland security under President Obama and current professor at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, Juliette Kayyem, joins host Kai Wright to help us make sense of the moment with tools from her new book, The Devil Never Sleeps: Learning to Live in an Age of Disasters . Read her article for The Atlantic in response to t...
May 23, 2022•50 min•Transcript available on Metacast An intergenerational meditation on Ntozake Shange’s iconic Broadway play, For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/When the Rainbow Is Enuf . First, host Kai Wright and producer speak with the director and choreographer of the current Broadway Revival, Camille A. Brown. Then, performers Trazana Beverley, Aku Kadogo, and Carol Maillard reminisce on the original production and with the show's legendary creator, Ntozake Shange . Companion listening for this episode : Lynn Nottage: Unexpected O...
May 16, 2022•50 min•Transcript available on Metacast His leaked opinion tells us more about a powerful minority’s view of the U.S. than it does about the Constitution or the history of abortion. Kai Wright talks to Susan Matthews, news director at Slate and host of the upcoming season of Slow Burn: Roe v. Wade , “The Constitution Wasn't Written for Women.” And Michele Goodwin, a Chancellor's Professor at the University of California, Irvine, joins Kai to open the phones to your questions and emotional reactions to this frightening but galvanizing ...
May 09, 2022•50 min•Transcript available on Metacast In 2018, host Kai Wright visited the Alabama Women’s Center in Huntsville, to learn how abortion providers were dealing with the state’s new law that sought to make their practice a felony crime. The law was one of several that Republican controlled states passed in an effort to provoke a Supreme Court ruling on Roe. A leak of Justice Samuel Alito’s draft opinion in a separate case suggests the Court is now poised to overturn the constitutional right to an abortion. So we revisit this 2018 story...
May 05, 2022•18 min•Transcript available on Metacast Michigan State Senator Mallory McMorrow and The Nation Magazine’s John Nichols explain how the Democrats can fight – and win – the culture wars. Plus, listeners weigh in with how they would like the party to proceed. Watch State Senator McMorrow’s speech here . Then, read John’s article in reaction to the speech here . Companion listening for this episode : How the Right’s Anti-Trans Hate Machine Works (5/28/2021) Last year, guest More than 100 anti-Trans bills have been introduced across 30 sta...
May 02, 2022•51 min•Transcript available on Metacast Kai Wright talks with WNYC colleague Nancy Solomon about her new podcast: Dead End: A New Jersey Political Murder Mystery New Jersey politics is not for the faint of heart. But the brutal killing of John and Joyce Sheridan, a prominent couple with personal ties to three governors, shocks even the most cynical operatives. The mystery surrounding the crime sends their son on a quest for truth. Dead End is a story of crime and corruption at the highest levels of society in the Garden State. “The Un...
Apr 29, 2022•3 min•Transcript available on Metacast Voters who switched from Trump to Biden in 2020 are headed to the polls again, and former GOP strategist Sarah Longwell wants to know what they’re thinking. Longwell is executive director of the Republican Accountability Project and publisher of The Bulwark, where she hosts The Focus Group podcast. She’s convening an ongoing series of focus groups with voters, including “flippers” who ditched Trump in 2020. What are they thinking as they head into primary elections for this year’s midterms? Then...
Apr 25, 2022•50 min•Ep 173•Transcript available on Metacast As the country confronts racial tensions and class conflicts, it begs the question: How did we get here? We look back to a moment in history when our country was struggling to become a true, multiracial democracy -- meeting a lot of roadblocks, many of which persist today. Historian Eric Foner gives us a primer on the Reconstruction Era amendments that we explored in season four, as producer Veralyn Williams rides along to help us make sense of what it means today and how we can move forward as ...
Apr 18, 2022•52 min•Transcript available on Metacast Host Kai Wright attends a free self defense class hosted in partnership between The Alicia and Jason Lee Foundation and University Settlement, and meets the instructor. Read more about the effort’s mission here . Then, he speaks with Jo-Ann Yoo, Executive Director of the Asian American Federation, which works with nonprofits to support the pan-Asian community. What’s the economic and social cost of hate crime on Asian American communities? What are the uncomfortable – yet crucial – tensions betw...
Apr 11, 2022•51 min•Transcript available on Metacast A slap at the Oscars tarnished Will Smith’s legacy. What about him did Hollywood treasure? Is this institution just a screen for projecting our own social anxieties and cultural debate? Culture critic Soraya McDonald joins to take a deeper look at the roles Hollywood allows us to play, on screen and off. Plus, breaking down the exhausting reaction to Pixar’s defiantly Asian film, Turning Red, with Jeff Yang, the co-author of Rise: A Pop History of Asian America from the Nineties to Now. Read Jef...
Apr 04, 2022•52 min•Transcript available on Metacast The Senate’s questioning of Ketanji Brown Jackson revealed where she might fit in the history, and future, of the Supreme Court. Host Kai Wright is joined by Frederick I. and Grace Stokes Professor of Law at New York University, Melissa Murray, to discuss. Plus, a National Geographic explorer’s story of diving for sunken slave ships. Companion listening for this episode : Can America Be Redeemed? (7/5/2021) Eddie Glaude and Imani Perry consider the question through the work of James Baldwin and ...
Mar 28, 2022•52 min•Transcript available on Metacast What’s in a name? A lot. A listener's voicemail inspired us to explore the sometimes complicated relationship between our names and our racial and ethnic identities. Host Kai Wright is joined by novelist Beth Nguyen to discuss her personal journey when it comes to her name, and invited callers to share their own stories. Check out Beth’s article for The New Yorker: America Ruined My Name For Me . Companion listening for this episode : Why So Many Are Stuck in the “Other” Box (2/21/2022) The epis...
Mar 21, 2022•49 min•Transcript available on Metacast The social fabric is torn. People nationwide are scared, some going so far as to arm themselves. What can we learn from our history as we react to this fear? Scholar James Forman Jr., author of the book Locking Up Our Own: Crime and Punishment in Black America , helps break down what’s real, vs perception, about the rise in violent crime. Plus, a conversation with Nina Jankowicz , author of How to be a Woman Online: Surviving Abuse and Harassment, and How to Fight Back , about how to make the in...
Mar 14, 2022•50 min•Ep 167•Transcript available on Metacast Presidencies are rarely transformational, and neither Biden nor Trump have lived up to their supporters’ dreams. So what does it take to really change our politics? Host Kai Wright is joined by political theorist Corey Robin to confront that question, and take your calls about Biden’s first year in office. Companion listening for this episode : Government: A Love-Hate Story (4/12/2021) How did Americans come to think so poorly of the government? And how did Joe Biden come to be the first modern ...
Mar 07, 2022•31 min•Transcript available on Metacast Democracy won’t work if we can’t talk to each other. So how do we do it across the cultural and political divides? WNYC’s own Brian Lehrer has hosted his syndicated show for over 30 years. Find out how a Raegan-era repeal changed the course of his career. Companion listening for this episode : The Method to Tucker Carlson’s Madness (5/3/2021) History suggests we shouldn’t laugh off what’s happening in right wing media right now. Plus, profiting off of racism is a business model as old as the new...
Feb 28, 2022•49 min•Transcript available on Metacast U.S. Census data found that more people are choosing "some other race" when asked to self-identify. It reveals just how complicated identity is, especially when it comes to race. Data journalist Mona Chalabi talks us through the data, and the stakes, of that statistic. Plus we hear from people around New York City who live outside of the Black-white binary, as they share their stories. Companion listening for this episode : This Land Is My Land, That Land Is Your Land (10/6/2016) One thing polit...
Feb 21, 2022•52 min•Transcript available on Metacast Afrofuturism is an old idea that’s reaching new people. This Black History Month, we travel from Seneca Village to Wakanda, from Sun Ra to Lil Nas X as we learn this cosmic vision of Black freedom, directly from the culture makers propelling the movement. Academy Award winning production designer and lead curator of the Before Yesterday We Could Fly: An Afrofuturist Period Room at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Hannah Beachler (Creed, Moonlight, Beyoncé's Lemonade, Black Panther, and more), tel...
Feb 14, 2022•53 min•Ep 163•Transcript available on Metacast The former Talking Heads frontman explores the various challenges – and beauties – of human connection while breaking down his hit Broadway show, American Utopia. David Byrne's American Utopia is running at Broadway's St. James Theater through early April. You can also stream the filmed version, directed by Spike Lee, on HBO Max. Companion listening for this episode : Lynn Nottage: Unexpected Optimist (1/3/2022) Playwright Lynn Nottage breaks down her remarkable career and shares how, as an opti...
Feb 10, 2022•19 min•Transcript available on Metacast Biden’s vow to finally appoint a Black woman to the Supreme Court has ignited a debate before a nomination has even materialized. How do you fight for representation, without getting stuck in the tired old debate over “affirmative action?” Hear reactions from President and CEO of the National Women's Law Center Fatima Goss Graves, Court scholar Elie Mystal, and listeners. Companion listening for this episode : A Court On The Edge (9/21/2020) After the passing of the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsb...
Feb 07, 2022•48 min•Transcript available on Metacast New science finds we’ve got less than a decade to avoid climate catastrophe. Activist and author Bill McKibben says the only solutions that can beat that deadline are collective. Host Kai Wright invites listeners to ask McKibben their own climate questions, on the heels of a United Nations report that declared the damage from carbon and methane emissions at our current rate will be irreversible by 2030. What can we do that will make enough change, quickly enough? Companion listening for this epi...
Jan 31, 2022•51 min•Transcript available on Metacast Mona Charen discusses the true meaning of conservative and the radical shift in the GOP. Plus, she helps take your calls. Then, a listener mailbag begs us to explore how "normal people" became part of the Jan 6. attack. Host Kai Wright and senior digital producer Kousha Navidar spoke with Seamus Hughes, Deputy Director of the Program on Extremism at George Washington University, to learn more. Companion listening for this episode : Episode 1: How Did We Get Here and Where Are We Going? (9/22/201...
Jan 24, 2022•51 min•Transcript available on Metacast As recent voting rights legislation struggles to even get a vote in the Senate, we revisit a conversation with historian Dr. Carol Anderson about how American voters, particularly Black Americans, had fought and continue to fight for their right to participate in the democratic process - safely and with certainty that their votes will count. Dr. Anderson is a Charles Howard Candler Professor of African American Studies at Emory University and author of several books including “White Rage: The Un...
Jan 20, 2022•24 min•Transcript available on Metacast This MLK Weekend, Rev. Dr. Jacqueline Lewis helps us understand the potential of love in our politics. Then, hear from a student participating in a hunger strike for voting rights. What is it like putting your body on the line when your own Senator is the person standing in the way? Arizona State University sophomore, Michaela Schillinger, takes us through the process of organizing a strike while balancing school, meeting with legislators like Senator Kyrsten Sinema, and a surprising update as t...
Jan 18, 2022•51 min•Transcript available on Metacast On a scale of 1-10, how anxious are you about the state of our democracy? Kai considers when democracy is past its tipping point with New York Times columnist Thomas Edsall. Plus callers tell us how anxious they are about the state of our democracy. Then is the right better at the internet than the left? Senior producer Kousha Navidar reports back. Companion listening for this episode : The Supreme Court v. Our Rights (12/6/2021) Another year of the SCOTUS is coming to a close. But can we still ...
Jan 10, 2022•51 min•Transcript available on Metacast Two-time Pulitzer Prize winning playwright Lynn Nottage (Ruined, Sweat, Clyde’s) breaks down her remarkable career and shares how, as an optimist at heart, she finds the light and resilience in unexpected stories. Plus, she tells host Kai Wright about her hopes for the future of theater and her interest in making the medium accessible and meeting people where they are. Companion listening for this episode : Can America Be Redeemed? (7/5/2021) Eddie Glaude and Imani Perry consider the question th...
Jan 03, 2022•51 min•Transcript available on Metacast James Reese Europe was already famous when he enlisted to fight in World War I. But the band he took to the frontlines — as part of the famous 369th Infantry Regiment, also known as the Harlem Hellfighters — thurst him, and Black American music, onto the global stage. Moran sits down at the piano to show Kai how Europe’s band changed music, and how jazz carries the resilient sound of Black history and ambition in America. Companion listening for this episode : The ‘Beautiful Experiments’ Left Ou...
Dec 27, 2021•51 min•Transcript available on Metacast 
