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Feminista Jones | Reclaiming Our Space: How Black Feminists Are Changing the World from the Tweets to the Streets with DaMaris B. Hill | A Bound Woman is a Dangerous Thing Feb 06, 2019

Show notes

Social worker, public speaker, community activist, and blogger Feminista Jones is the author of the novel Push the Button and the poetry collection The Secret of Sugar Water. She was named one of the 100 Most Influential People in Philadelphia (Philadelphia Magazine) and one of The Root's Top 100 Black Social Influencers. Her articles have appeared in a variety of periodicals, including the New York Times, Ebony, Time, and Essence. In Reclaiming Our Space, Jones examines the ways black women are using digital spaces to change the conventional dialogues of culture and social movements. DaMaris B. Hill is the author of The Fluid Boundaries of Suffrage, Jim Crow: Staking Claims, and the poetry collection Vi-ze-bel\Teks-chers. A double PhD in English and women and gender studies, she teaches creative writing and African American and Africana studies at the University of Kentucky. In A Bound Woman is a Dangerous Thing: The Incarceration of African American Women from Harriet Tubman to Sandra Bland, Hill evokes some of the most powerful incarcerated American women of color-from Assata Shakur to Zora Neale Hurston-to present an unflinching, unbridled celebration of struggle and transcendence. (recorded 2/5/2019)

Jane Brox | Silence: A Social History of One of the Least Understood Elements of Our Lives Feb 01, 2019

Show notes

Penning ''nonfiction literature of a high and lasting order'' (Chicago Tribune), Jane Brox is the author of, among other books, Five Thousand Days Like This One, a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award; Brilliant: The Evolution of Artificial Light, named one of 2010's best books by Time magazine; and Here and Nowhere Else, winner of the L.L. Winship/PEN New England Award. Told through the intrinsically linked histories of the monastery and penitentiary (including a section on Eastern State), Silence traces the complex culturally transformative power of the concept of complete quiet. (recorded 1/31/2019)

Bridgett M. Davis | The World According to Fannie Davis: My Mother's Life in the Detroit Numbers Jan 30, 2019

Show notes

Bridgett M. Davis is the author of Into the Go-Slow, the acclaimed story of a young woman traveling from Detroit to Nigeria as she mourns the death of her sister, and Shifting Through Neutral, a finalist for the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award. She is a professor of journalism and the writing professions at Baruch College and Director of the Sidney Harman Writer-in-Residence Program at CUNY. Davis's newest book is a tribute to her mother, a jill-of-all-trades bookie, banker, wife, and parent who bucked the ‘60s and ‘70s decay of Detroit to lead her family into prosperity. (recorded 1/29/2019)

Dani Shapiro | Inheritance: A Memoir of Genealogy, Paternity, and Love Jan 28, 2019

Show notes

In conversation with Beth Kephart, the award-winning author of twenty-four books, including Going Over, Handling the Truth: On the Writing of Memoir, and Flow: The Life and Times of Philadelphia's Schuylkill River. Delivering ''an eviscerating, raw honesty'' (New York Times Book Review), writer's writer Dani Shapiro is the author of the memoirs Devotion, Still Writing, and Hourglass. Her five novels include Black & White and Family History. She is a cofounder of the Sirenland Writers Conference and a former writing teacher at Columbia University, NYU, and Wesleyan University. A story of identity, family secrets, and love, Inheritance charts the staggering implications of Shapiro's discovery that her father wasn't her biological parent. (recorded 1/22/2019)

Kristen Roupenian | You Know You Want This: Cat Person and Other Stories Jan 18, 2019

Show notes

Kristen Roupenian holds a PhD in English from Harvard and an MFA from the University of Michigan. Originally published in The New Yorker in 2017, her story ''Cat Person'' garnered national attention for its frank depiction of dating in the digital age. Included in The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2018, it is now the cornerstone of Roupenian's debut story collection. Genre-leaping and theme-bouncing from the supernatural to the super mundane, You Know You Want This explores sexuality, Schadenfreude, and gender power struggles. (recorded 1/15/2019)

Ha Jin | The Banished Immortal: A Life of Li Bai (Li Po) Jan 18, 2019

Show notes

In conversation with Carlin Romano, Critic-at-Large, The Chronicle of Higher Education, former literary critic The Philadelphia Inquirer and author of America the Philosophical. Celebrated internationally for a prolific, ''achingly beautiful'' (Los Angeles Times Book Review) body of work across a variety of genres, Chinese émigré Ha Jin is the author of a score of novels, volumes of poetry, story collections, and a book of essays. His many honors include the National Book Award, two PEN/Faulkner Awards, the Flannery O'Connor Award for Short Fiction, and election to the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Jin's books include Waiting, Under the Red Flag, and War Trash. The Banished Immortal is a biography of the 8th-century, Tang Dynasty poet whose verses remain an intrinsic element of Chinese language and culture. (recorded 1/17/2019)

One Book, One Philadelphia Kickoff Event | Featuring Jesmyn Ward Jan 17, 2019

Show notes

One Book, One Philadelphia 2019 kicks off with a reading and conversation between Jesmyn Ward, author of the One Book featured selection Sing, Unburied, Sing, and WURD President/CEO Sara Lomax-Reese. Their talk will be followed by a performance of an original work from Curtis Institute of Music composer Elizabeth Younan. (recorded 1/16/2019)

In Conversation With The Rosenbach: The Legacy of the Thirteenth Amendment with Michele Norris Jan 17, 2019

Show notes

Michele Norris is a Peabody Award-winning journalist, founder of The Race Card Project and Executive Director of The Bridge, The Aspen Institute's new program on race, identity, connectivity and inclusion. For more than a decade Norris served as a host of NPR's ''All Things Considered'' where she interviewed world leaders, American presidents, Nobel laureates, leading thinkers and groundbreaking artists. She has also produced in-depth profiles, interviews and series for NPR News programs as well as special reports for National Geographic, Time Magazine, ABC News and Lifetime Television. Norris created The Race Card Project, an initiative to foster a wider conversation about race in America, after the publication of her family memoir, The Grace of Silence. About the Legacy of the Thirteenth Amendment Mini-Series The Rosenbach collection includes an 1865 commemorative copy - signed by members of both houses of the United States Congress - of the proposal for Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which abolished slavery. This series of programs will examine the historical circumstances of the amendment's passage and the complicated legacy of the amendment, from Jim Crow to mass incarceration. (recorded 1/9/2019)

Gregory B. Jaczko | Confessions of a Rogue Nuclear Regulator Jan 15, 2019

Show notes

The Chairman of the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission from 2009-2012, Dr. Gregory Jaczko oversaw the U.S. government's response to Japan's Fukushima nuclear disaster. An NRC commissioner from 2005-2009 and former science policy advisor to Senator Harry Reid, he is now an adjunct professor at Princeton University and Georgetown University, and has created a clean energy development company. In Confessions of a Rogue Nuclear Regulator, Jaczko blows the lid off the public and private controversies surrounding nuclear energy and explains how the U.S. government has allowed it to endanger our lives. (recorded 1/14/2019)

Mary Schmidt Campbell | An American Odyssey: The Life and Work of Romare Bearden Jan 02, 2019

Show notes

President of Spelman College since 2015, and dean emerita of the Tisch School of the Arts, Mary Schmidt Campbell served as the vice chair of the President's Committee on the Arts and Humanities during the Obama administration. She has contributed to an array of scholarly and popular publications, is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and was the commissioner of the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs. Her new book delves into the life of artist Romare Bearden, a muralist and collagist whose large-scale public works came to symbolize the black experience during the Civil Rights era. Watch the video here. (recorded 12/6/2018)

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