The Feminist Present

Latest Episodes:

Episode 57: Queer & Trans Oral Histories with Caro De Robertis Jul 02, 2025

Show notes

In this episode, Caro De Robertis joins Laura to discuss their new book, So Many Stars: an Oral History of Trans, Nonbinary, Genderqueer, and Two-Spirit People of Color. Caro and Laura take a deep look into the queer medicine found within the stories of Queer and Trans elders who fought to create space for their full selves in the world.

Caro De Robertis is an Uruguayan–American author and professor of creative writing at San Francisco State University. They are the author of six novels and a nonfiction book, and the editor of an award-winning anthology. De Robertis' work has won the Stonewall Book Award, a New York Times Editors' Choice, and the Golden Poppy Octavia E. Butler Award. Their books have been translated into seventeen languages and have received numerous other honors, including a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts and the John Dos Passos Prize for Literature, which they were the first openly nonbinary person to receive.

Episode 50 - Jessica Calarco: Other countries have social safety nets. The U.S. has women. Jun 05, 2024

Show notes

Jessica Calarco joins Laura and Adrian to unpack her newly released book, Holding It Together: How Women Became America’s Social Safety Net. They discuss the histories and the sociological interviews central to Calarco's book, painting a picture of the women who are tasked with holding society together with their labor.

Dr. Jessica Calarco is an Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and an expert on education, families, and health decision-making. Her award-winning research reveals how structures power and privilege maintain socioeconomic, racial/ethnic, and gender inequalities in these settings. She is the author of Negotiating Opportunities, A Field Guide to Grad School, and most recently Holding It Together: How Women Became America’s Social Safety Net.

Episode 46 - Aliens Aug 29, 2023

Show notes

Laura and Adrian embark on their new series: feminism and the horror genre. We dedicate the first episode of this series to two favorites of ours: Hollywood treasure Sigourney Weaver and slimy aliens with acid for blood. A discussion of 1986’s Aliens, horror and motherhood, and dueling queens.

Episode 45 - Deadloch with Moira Donegan Aug 15, 2023

Show notes

This episode is basically a PSA: if you’re not watching the Australian feminist crime show Deadloch, then Laura, Adrian and guest Moira Donegan have one question for you: why not? Depressed industrial towns, toxic masculinity, lesbians, a four-hour movie called ‘Poseidon’s Uterus’: this show has everything, and we’re here for all of it.

In Bed With The Right: Midge Decter with Matt Sitman and Sam Adler-Bell Jul 10, 2023

Show notes

Midge Decter (1927-2022) has often been called the "grandmother of neoconservatism" -- hers was in some ways a pretty classic trajectory, from New Deal liberalism to profound unease with the social movements of the 1960s, to the center of the conservative movement and Republican politics. But unlike most of her fellow neocons, Midge Decter always framed her trajectory quite openly in terms of gender: repulsion from a certain kind of women's liberation, and attraction to a certain kind of masculinity. In this episode, Moira and Adrian delve into the weird, cantankerous world of Midge Decter with the co-hosts of Know Your Enemy, Matt Sitman and Sam Adler-Bell.

In Bed With The Right: Gay Marriage with Moira and Adrian Jul 10, 2023

Show notes

Join us for the first episode of the all-new show In Bed With The Right. For their inaugural episode, Moira and Adrian delve into right-wing (ahem) contributions to the gay marriage debate. Ten years ago the Supreme Court decided Windsor v. US and Hollingsworth v. Perry, which together spelled the beginning of the end of the gay marriage debate (gay marriage would be established nationwide in Obergefell v. Hodges two years later). But did the issue really go away? How did the terms of the debate back then on the right influence today's moral panics, how do they motivate a far-right Supreme Court? Follow the show to hear more!

In Bed With The Right - Trailer Jul 07, 2023

Show notes

Get a sneak peek at the upcoming, all-new show In Bed With the Right hosted by Moira Donegan and TFP's very own Adrian Daub.

Trailer - Get a Sneak Peek Jun 07, 2020

Show notes

Listen for a first look of what is to come this season on The Feminist Present. First full episode will be released on June 10th.