Getting Better with Jonathan Van Ness

Latest Episodes:

What's Haitian Vodou? (Part Two) with Professor Eziaku Nwokocha Jun 15, 2023

Show notes

What’s it like to enter a religious or spiritual space as a queer person? In Haitian Vodou, the divinities are ready to accept LGBTQIA+ practitioners—and are arguably queer themselves. In part two of our Pride Beyond Borders episode about this African diasporic religion, Professor Eziaku Nwokocha takes us into one of Manbo Maude’s temples to better understand this spiritual practice, and how its practitioners navigate questions of race, gender, and sexuality.

Curious for more?

Check out part one of our conversation with Professor Nwokocha, where we get down to basics on Haitian Vodou and Haitian history.

Revisit the first episode from our Pride Beyond Borders series, all about global drag cultures, with Professor Kareem Khubchandani.

And learn all about New Orleans history in parts one and two of our episode with Dr. Kathryn Olivarius!

Eziaku Nwokocha is an Assistant Professor at the University of Miami. She is a scholar of Africana religions with expertise in the ethnographic study of Vodou in Haiti and the Haitian diaspora. Her research is grounded in a thorough understanding of religions in Africa, the Caribbean, and the United States, in gender and sexuality studies, visual and material culture and Africana Studies generally.

She is the author of Vodou en Vogue: Fashioning Black Divinities in Haiti and the United States(University of North Carolina Press, 2023), which is an ethnographic study of fashion, spirit possession, and gender and sexuality in contemporary Haitian Vodou, exploring Black religious communities through their innovative ceremonial practices. This book is featured within the series Where Religion Lives.

You can follow Professor Nwokocha on Twitter and Instagram at @dr_zaku, and at eziakunwokocha.com.

Transcripts for each episode are available at JonathanVanNess.com.

Find books from past Getting Curious guests at bookshop.org/shop/curiouswithjvn.

Our executive producer is Erica Getto. Our producer is Chris McClure. Our editor is Andrew Carson. Production support from Julie Carrillo and Emily Bossak.

Curious about bringing your brand to life on the show? Email podcastadsales@sonymusic.com.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What's Haitian Vodou? (Part One) with Professor Eziaku Nwokocha Jun 14, 2023

Show notes

A spiritual practice that has a divinity dedicated to the protection of lesbians?! Tell us more! This week, for our Pride Beyond Borders series, we’re exploring the world of Haitian Vodou in a special two-part episode. In this first half, Professor Eziaku Nwokocha introduces us to this African diasporic religion, and Haitian history. In part two, out tomorrow, we’ll step into the world of Manbo Maude’s temples in Haiti and the US to learn about Haitian Vodou rituals and fashions, and what this practice has to do with queerness.

Curious for more? Check out the first episode from our Pride Beyond Borders series, all about global drag cultures, with Professor Kareem Khubchandani.

You can follow Professor Nwokocha on Twitter and Instagram at @dr_zaku, and at eziakunwokocha.com.

Transcripts for each episode are available at JonathanVanNess.com.

Find books from past Getting Curious guests at bookshop.org/shop/curiouswithjvn.

Our executive producer is Erica Getto. Our producer is Chris McClure. Our editor is Andrew Carson. Production support from Julie Carrillo and Emily Bossak.

Our theme music is “Freak” by QUIÑ; for more, head to TheQuinCat.com.

Curious about bringing your brand to life on the show? Email podcastadsales@sonymusic.com.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What Are The Global Politics Of Drag? with Professor Kareem Khubchandani Jun 07, 2023

Show notes

This June, we’re celebrating Pride Beyond Borders! And to kick off our series, we’re exploring global drag culture with Professor Kareem Khubchandani aka Dr. LaWhore Vagistan. We’re learning how drag artists around the world stage political dialogues with their audiences, how queer nightlife can connect diasporic communities, and how this art form can be used to challenge—rather than reinforce—the legacies of colonialism and white supremacy. The world of drag is so much bigger than the world of Drag Race, and we’re here for all of it.

Kareem Khubchandani is Associate Professor of Theatre, Dance, and Performance Studies at Tufts University. He is the author of Ishtyle: Accenting Gay Indian Nightlife and Decolonize Drag, co-editor of Queer Nightlife, and curator of criticalauntystudies.com. Kareem also performs as LaWhore Vagistan, everyone’s favorite overdressed, overeducated, oversaturated desi drag aunty.

You can follow Professor Khubchandani on Instagram and Twitter @kareempuff, and at KareemKhubchandani.com. They’re also on Instagram and Twitter @lawhorevagistan.

Get to know Dr. LaWhore Vagistan through their lecture “How to be an auntie” and their hit song “Sari”.

Curious for more? Here are some people Professor Khubchandani recommends following: Shaka McGlotten, M. Leslie Santana, Emi Great, Chanel Mercedes Benz, Odidiva, Papi Churro, Alisha Boti Kabab, Willow Pill, Crystal Methyd, and BeBe Zahara Benet. And here are some events to check out: Jai Ho, Rangeela, Behsaram, Kulture Kulcha, Sholay, and Yuva. All of these resources are linked in the episode entry on jonathanvanness.com.

Transcripts for each episode are available at JonathanVanNess.com.

Find books from Getting Curious guests at bookshop.org/shop/curiouswithjvn.

Our executive producer is Erica Getto. Our producer is Chris McClure. Our editor is Andrew Carson. Production support from Julie Carrillo and Emily Bossak.

Our theme music is “Freak” by QUIÑ; for more, head to TheQuinCat.com.

Curious about bringing your brand to life on the show? Email podcastadsales@sonymusic.com.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

How Many Hard Rights Can One Supreme Court Take? with Professor Melissa Murray May 31, 2023

Show notes

In the coming weeks, the Supreme Court of the United States will hand down decisions that could have major implications for LGBTQIA+ rights, racial justice, tribal sovereignty, and beyond. Melissa Murray and Jonathan discuss what’s on the docket, why the Supreme Court seems more powerful (and conservative) than ever, and how we can get through this hot mess SCOTUS summer.

Melissa Murray is a Professor of Law at NYU School of Law, where she teaches constitutional law, family law, criminal law, and reproductive rights and justice and writes about the legal regulation of intimate life. Melissa clerked for Judge Stefan Underhill on the District of Connecticut and for Justice Sotomayor when she served on the Second Circuit. When she’s not reading the SCOTUS tea leaves, she’s practicing the violin, reading People magazine, and keeping up with Meghan Markle, the Duchess of Sussex.

You can follow Professor Murray on Twitter and Instagram @ProfMMurray. You can keep up with Strict Scrutiny on Twitter @StrictScrutiny_ and Instagram @strictscrutinypodcast. Crooked Media is on Twitter and Instagram @crookedmedia.

Curious for more? Check out these episodes from the Getting Curious archive:

Can State Legislatures Save Us?

Whose Land Is This Land?

What Happened To Separation Of Church And State?

Transcripts for each episode are available at JonathanVanNess.com.

Find books from past Getting Curious guests at bookshop.org/shop/curiouswithjvn.

Our executive producer is Erica Getto. Our producer is Chris McClure. Our editor is Andrew Carson. Production support from Julie Carrillo and Emily Bossak.

Our theme music is “Freak” by QUIÑ; for more, head to TheQuinCat.com.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What Makes Gems So Precious? with Dr. Gabriela Farfan May 24, 2023

Show notes

We’re dripping in jewels this week on Getting Curious! What does it mean for a diamond to be “hard”? Are lab-grown gems made to perfection? What’s the difference between rubies and pink sapphires? Dr. Gabriela Farfan joins Jonathan to discuss the science and art behind the dazzling, multifaceted world of gems and minerals.

Dr. Gabriela Farfan is the Coralyn Whitney Curator of Gems and Minerals at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History. She began collecting minerals at a young age and turned her hobby into a career as a mineralogist, geochemist, and the first woman and Latina to become Curator-in-Charge of the National Gem Collection.

You can follow Dr. Farfan on Twitter @gabriela_farfan and on Instagram @the.mineralogist. The Smithsonian National Museum of American History is on Twitter @nmnh and Instagram @smithsoniannmnh.

Curious for more? Check out these resources from Dr. Farfan:

What is a Mineral?

The AMNH’s “GeoGallery”

Lion of Merelani Tsavorite Garnet

And check out these episodes from the Getting Curious archive:

Does Groundwater Go With The Flow?

How Does Dust Impact Earth’s Climate?

How Major Are Volcanoes?

Transcripts for each episode are available at JonathanVanNess.com.

Find books from past Getting Curious guests at bookshop.org/shop/curiouswithjvn.

Our executive producer is Erica Getto. Our producer is Chris McClure. Our editor is Andrew Carson. Production support from Julie Carrillo and Emily Bossak.

Our theme music is “Freak” by QUIÑ; for more, head to TheQuinCat.com.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

How Did New Orleans Become New Orleans? (Part Two) with Dr. Kathryn Olivarius May 18, 2023

Show notes

New Orleans was one of America’s most important cities in the early 1800s. It was also one of the most deadly. This week, to mark the new season of Queer Eye, we’re exploring New Orleans history with Dr. Kathryn Olivarius in a special two-part episode. Today, we’re learning about yellow fever’s grip on the city—and what this illness revealed about power and politics in New Orleans.

Haven’t listened to part one yet? Check it out here to learn more about New Orleans history.

A note from the team: this episode discusses enslavement and graphic descriptions of illness.

Kathryn Olivarius is a prizewinning historian of slavery, medicine, and disease. She is Assistant Professor of History at Stanford University. Her book Necropolis: Disease, Power, and Capitalism in the Cotton Kingdom, published by Harvard University Press, was recently awarded the Frederick Jackson Turner Prize.

You can follow Dr. Olivarius on Twitter @katolivarius. Harvard University Press is on Twitter @Harvard_Press.

If you’re new to Getting Curious, here are some episodes that are relevant to today’s discussion:

When Viruses Spread, Who’s Most Vulnerable?

What’s The Sordid History Of U.S. Trash Collection?

Who Does America’s “Child Welfare System” Serve?

Who Built The Panama Canal?

How F$^*#d Up Is Fatphobia?

Transcripts for each episode are available at JonathanVanNess.com.

Find books from past Getting Curious guests at bookshop.org/shop/curiouswithjvn; we’ll be updating it soon with more releases!

Our executive producer is Erica Getto. Our editor is Andrew Carson. Production support from Julie Carrillo, Chris McClure, and Emily Bossak.

Our theme music is “Freak” by QUIÑ; for more, head to TheQuinCat.com.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

How Did New Orleans Become New Orleans? (Part One) with Dr. Kathryn Olivarius May 17, 2023

Show notes

New Orleans is a city in a swamp—a city, some argue, that should have never been built. So how did it become one of America’s most important sites in the 1800s, and a critical battleground in the American Civil War? This week, to mark the new season of Queer Eye, we’re exploring New Orleans history with Dr. Kathryn Olivarius in a special two-part episode. Today, we’re breaking down the basics on antebellum New Orleans. Tomorrow, we’ll learn all about New Orleans’ rampant history of yellow fever.

A note from the team: this episode discusses enslavement and references to bodily harm.

Kathryn Olivarius is a prizewinning historian of slavery, medicine, and disease. She is Assistant Professor of History at Stanford University. Her book Necropolis: Disease, Power, and Capitalism in the Cotton Kingdom, published by Harvard University Press, was recently awarded the Frederick Jackson Turner Prize.

You can follow Dr. Olivarius on Twitter @katolivarius. Harvard University Press is on Twitter @Harvard_Press.

If you’re new to Getting Curious, here are some episodes that are relevant to today’s discussion:

When Viruses Spread, Who’s Most Vulnerable?

What’s The Sordid History Of U.S. Trash Collection?

Who Does America’s “Child Welfare System” Serve?

Who Built The Panama Canal?

How F$^*#d Up Is Fatphobia?

Transcripts for each episode are available at JonathanVanNess.com.

Find books from past Getting Curious guests at bookshop.org/shop/curiouswithjvn; we’ll be updating it soon with more releases!

Our executive producer is Erica Getto. Our editor is Andrew Carson. Production support from Julie Carrillo, Chris McClure, and Emily Bossak.

Our theme music is “Freak” by QUIÑ; for more, head to TheQuinCat.com.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Why Do We Gossip? with Dr. Meltem Yucel May 10, 2023

Show notes

You didn’t hear it from us, but this week’s episode is so juicy that you’ll want to tell everyone about it. Dr. Meltem Yucel joins Jonathan to dish on gossip: why it’s irresistible, what it reveals about our moral and social codes, and how we can use it to our benefit. Come for the drama, stay for the drama. (Are we the drama?)

Dr. Meltem Yucel is a Postdoctoral Associate at Duke University’s Department of Psychology and Neuroscience. She researches the development of social cognition and morality, specifically focusing on how and when children become moral beings. She is also the founder of www.PsychResearchList.com with the goal of making Psychology more accessible to students from all backgrounds by making the hidden curriculum of higher education more visible.

You can follow Dr. Yucel on Twitter @DrMeltemYucel, on Instagram @drmeltemyucel, and on LinkedIn @nazlimeltemyucel. Her website is meltemyucel.com.

Transcripts for each episode are available at JonathanVanNess.com.

Find books from past Getting Curious guests at bookshop.org/shop/curiouswithjvn; we’ll be updating it soon with more releases!

Our executive producer is Erica Getto. Our editor is Andrew Carson. Production support from Julie Carrillo and Chris McClure.

Our theme music is “Freak” by QUIÑ; for more, head to TheQuinCat.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

How Do Great Apes Go Wild? with Dr. Laura Simone Lewis May 03, 2023

Show notes

Chimpanzees and bonobos know how to live it up. They hang out with their friends, they take self-care breaks, they eat fresh fruit, and when it’s raining they fashion umbrellas out of leaves. Dr. Laura Simone Lewis is back on the show this week to tell us all about the social lives of these dynamic individuals, who happen to share 98% of our DNA. From their favorite juice flavors to their equivalent of Netflix and chill—this episode’s got it all.

Missed Dr. Lewis’s first episode on the show, all about our great ape family tree? Check it out here.

Dr. Laura Simone Lewis is a UC President’s Postdoctoral Fellow in the Psychology department at UC Berkeley. She received her PhD from Harvard through the department of Human Evolutionary Biology last year. She studies how social cognition has evolved in our closest living primate cousins, chimpanzees and bonobos!

You can follow Dr. Lewis on Twitter @LauraSimoneLew.

Want to support our chimpanzee and bonobo cousins? Here are some groups to follow:

Lola Ya Bonobo in DRC

Ngamba Island Chimpanzee Sanctuary in Uganda

Sweetwaters Chimpanzee Sanctuary in Kenya

Jane Goodall Institute

World Wildlife Fund

Jonathan is on Instagram @JVN and @Jonathan.Vanness on Facebook.

Transcripts for each episode are available at JonathanVanNess.com.

Find books from Getting Curious guests at bookshop.org/shop/curiouswithjvn; we’ll be updating it soon with more releases!

Our executive producer is Erica Getto. Our editor is Andrew Carson. Production support from Julie Carrillo, Chris McClure, and Erin McKeon.

Our theme music is “Freak” by QUIÑ; for more, head to TheQuinCat.com.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

How F$^*#d Up Is Fatphobia? (ICYMI) with Dr. Sabrina Strings Apr 26, 2023

Show notes

What do Enlightenment-era paintings, 19th-century American fashion magazines, and Sir Mix-A-Lot’s “Baby Got Back” have in common? They’re all examples of what fatphobia has to do with race, class, and gender discrimination. This week, we’re re-releasing one of our favorite episodes from the archives, with Dr. Sabrina Strings. Learn all about the origins of anti-fat bias, and how it persists today.

Listened to this one last year? We promise—it’s worth revisiting!

Sabrina Strings, Ph.D. is a Chancellor's Fellow and Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of California, Irvine. Sabrina has been featured in dozens of venues, including BBC News, NPR, Huffington Post, Vox, Los Angeles Times, Essence, Vogue, and goop. Her writing has appeared in diverse venues including, The New York Times, Scientific American, Ethnic and Racial Studies, and Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society. Her book, Fearing the Black Body: The Racial Origins of Fat Phobia (2019), was awarded the 2020 Best Publication Prize by the Body & Embodiment Section of the American Sociological Association.

You can follow Dr. Strings on Twitter @SaStrings and check out her website, sabrinastrings.com. Want to learn more? Here are some books and resources Dr. Strings recommends:

Da’Shaun Harrison's Belly of the Beast

Sonya Renee Taylor’s The Body Is Not An Apology

Dr. Joy Cox’s Fat Girls In Black Bodies

Roxane Gay’s Hunger

Tressie McMillan Cottom’s THICK

Dr. Jill Andrew’s work

NAAFA

Jonathan is on Instagram @JVN and @Jonathan.Vanness on Facebook.

Transcripts for each episode are available at JonathanVanNess.com.

Find books from past Getting Curious guests at bookshop.org/shop/curiouswithjvn; we’ll be updating it soon with more releases!

Our executive producer is Erica Getto. Our editor is Andrew Carson. Production support from Julie Carrillo, Chris McClure, and Erin McKeon.

Our theme music is “Freak” by QUIÑ; for more, head to TheQuinCat.com.