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THE REVOLUTIONARY ACTRESS Sahib Gizzatullina Apr 09, 2018

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A classic story of a young woman defying her parents to follow her heart, but with a fascinating Russian twist! Sahib Gizzatullina lived for the stage, introducing Russian audiences to theater for the first time in their lives. She and her penniless traveling theater troupe experienced all the passion, heartbreak, and drama that you’d expect from a roving band of actors. But they did it during Russia’s most turbulent time: through the reign–and murder–of Tzar Nicholas II, through both world wars, the Bolshevik revolution and the rise of the USSR.

Katie interviews guest Danielle Ross, Assistant Professor of Asian History at Utah State University where she teaches pre-modern and modern Islamic and world history. A native of California, Ross has published articles on Muslim participation in the First World War and Islamic law and education in the Russian empire. She is currently researching Muslim merchant-industrialist networks in the nineteenth and early twentieth-century Russia.

All music for this episode from field recordings provided by Dr. Ross.

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THE SISTERS Jane and Anna Maria Porter Apr 02, 2018

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Sisters Jane and Anna Maria Porter were wildly popular writers–among the most widely-read writers in Regency England. (Yes, more popular than Jane Austen!) Their novels were on every British bookshelf, their poetry was popular and acclaimed, and Jane Porter’s historical novel The Scottish Chiefs would retain its popularity for nearly 150 years. So how did these bestselling icons of British literature end up nearly penniless and living as “professional houseguests” without a home to call their own? And why did the eternal fame they expected elude them in the end?

Guest Devoney Looser is the author of the award-winning book The Making of Jane Austen (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2017). She was awarded the prestigious Guggenheim Fellowship in 2018 for her work on a book about the Porter Sisters. She is Professor of English at Arizona State University and the author or editor of six other books on literature by women. Her recent writing has appeared in The Atlantic, the New York Times, Salon, The TLS, and Entertainment Weekly, and she’s had the pleasure of talking about Austen on CNN. Looser has played roller derby as Stone Cold Jane Austen and is on Twitter @devoneylooser and @Making_Jane

Music featured in this episode by Amanda Setlik Wilson, Allison Kim, Peter Ryan, and Half Pelican.

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THE SAGE Gargi Vachaknavi Mar 26, 2018

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Are public debates like the feuds we see on Twitter and Facebook a product of modern society? Gargi Vachaknavi has long been remembered in India for her brilliant performance in a public debate 2,700 years ago. Her story offers a refreshing model for how to engage in heated ideological discussions: she didn’t just throw down an epic victory, humiliating her opponent. She did something much more clever!

Guest Ravi M. Gupta holds the Charles Redd Chair of Religious Studies and serves as Director of the Religious Studies Program at Utah State University. He is the author or editor of four books, including an abridged translation of the Bhagavata Purana (with Kenneth Valpey), published in 2017 by Columbia University Press. Gupta has received four teaching awards, a National Endowment for the Humanities summer fellowship, and two research fellowships at Oxford. He is a Permanent Research Fellow of the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies and a past president of the Society for Hindu Christian Studies. He received his PhD from the University of Oxford. His current research focuses on the Bhagavata Purana’s Sanskrit commentaries. He enjoys teaching World Religions, Hinduism, Sanskrit, and Religious Studies Theory and Method.

Music featured in this episode provided by Navatman Music Collective, Nimisha Shankar, Ashok Pathak, and Vinod Prasanna, Okey Szoke & Pompey.

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THE RADICAL Lola Ridge Mar 19, 2018

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Rose Emily Ridge was born in Dublin, Ireland in 1973. After spending her childhood in Australia and New Zealand, she fled an abusive husband for California in 1907. Arriving in America, she promptly changed her name, her age, her nationality and her marital status and launched her new life as Lola Ridge, radical poet, anarchist organizer, and editor of the influential avant-garde magazine Broom. Her unconventional life, radical activist work and influential writing should have placed her alongside literary giants (and friends) William Carlos Williams, Edna St. Vincent Millay and Jean Toomer, but the shifting political climate, and her first would-be biographer’s failure to produce any actual writing, meant that for decades she has been almost completely forgotten.

Our guest, Guggenheim-award-winning writer Terese Svoboda, is working to remedy this tragic erasure. Along with Anything That Burns You: A Portrait of Lola Ridge, A Radical Poet, Terese Svoboda has published 6 books of fiction, 7 books of poetry, a memoir, and a book of translation from the Sudanese.

Music featured in this episode by Half Pelican, Trialogo, The New Hot 5, and Killarney.

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THE VISIONARY Hildegard of Bingen Mar 12, 2018

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900 years ago, the young Hildegard of Bingen was given by her parents to the Catholic Church. She was literally “walled up” in a tiny convent, completely cut off from the outside world. But over the course of her long and varied life, she emerged from the walls to embrace the world. She founded her own convents and traveled across Europe on preaching tours. She spent decades caring for the sick and infirm, resulting in her seminal medical text that endured for centuries. She is also much celebrated today as a composer; she wrote hauntingly beautiful music that was rediscovered just 100 years ago. But she is perhaps most famous for her vivid and prophetic religious visions. She did what her visions told her to do, even if it meant defying the Pope himself.

Guest Alice Chapman is Associate Professor of Medieval History in the History Department at Grand Valley State University, in Grand Rapids, Michigan. She is the author of Sacred Authority and Temporal Power in the Writings of Bernard of Clairvaux, and she has published articles focusing on the role of the papacy in disputes between ecclesiastical and royal power including “Disentangling Potestas in the Works of Bernard of Clairvaux,” and “Ideal and Reality: Images of a Bishop in Bernard of Clairvaux’s Advice to Eugenius III (r. 1145-53). She is also working on a second book project focused on the role of Christ as Physician (Christus medicus) in the Middle Ages.

Music featured in this episode by Solis Camerata, Kira Zeeman Rugen, Makemi, and selections from “Hildegard of Bingen: Visions of the Trinity” at the St. Paul’s Forum

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THE DISAPPEARING WOMAN Adelaide Herrmann Mar 05, 2018

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Adelaide Herrmann ruled the stage for fifty years as one the brightest stars of the Golden Age of Magic. After the death of her husband, renowned magician Herrmann the Great, Adelaide took center stage, and toured for thirty years as one of the most famous magicians in the world. She was more famous than Houdini, and continued performing until her death at age seventy-nine - when she was inexplicably forgotten for nearly a century. Join our guest, anthropologist and mentalist/magician Paul Draper, as we discover how the Queen of Magic just... disappeared.

[correction: Paul Draper mistakenly names the librarian of the Magic Castle as Lisa Cummings. Her name is Lisa Cousins.]

Music for this episode provided by Jeremy Dittus, Peak Duo, Amanda Setlik Wilson, and Jeff Cuno.

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THE MUSICIAN Mary Lou Williams Feb 05, 2018

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Mary Lou Williams was one of the most innovative, creative, groundbreaking musicians in the history of jazz. She was a brilliant and prolific composer and uniquely gifted pianist whose influence spans nearly the entire timeline of jazz music, but her name is almost never listed among the “giants of jazz.” Although prejudice kept her from achieving the recognition and fame she deserved during her lifetime, her contributions cement her legacy as a true pioneer of American music.

Guest Carol Bash is an award winning filmmaker with over 15 years of experience in broadcast journalism and independent documentaries. She is the producer and director of the documentary film Mary Lou Williams: The Lady Who Swings the Band. Her production company Paradox Films is developing Clean Justice, a feature documentary on the environmental justice movement; and Blueprint For My People, a short film incorporating Margaret Walker’s poem, “For My People” and rare cyanotypes of African Americans in the late 19th/early 20th centuries. Most recently, she worked with the award winning Firelight Films as Archival Producer on Tell Them We Are Rising: The Story of Black Colleges and Universities, which premiered nationally on PBS’ Independent Lens series on February 19, 2018.

All music excerpted from the film Mary Lou Williams, the Lady Who Swings the Band: “Lotta Sax Appeal” with Andy Kirk and his Twelve Clouds of Joy, “The Land of Oobla Dee” with Dizzy Gillespie, “Nightlife” by Mary Lou Williams, “Roll ‘Em” with the Benny Goodman Orchestra, “Roll ‘Em” and “The Jeep is Jumpin” from Live at Keystone Corner, “Free Spirits” and “Ode to Saint Cecile” from Free Spirits, “Our Father” from Mary Lou’s Mass, “Capricorn” and “Scorpio” from Zodiac Suite, and “St. Martin de Porres” from The Black Christ of the Andes.

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THE PHILOSOPHER Margaret Cavendish Jan 29, 2018

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Four hundred years ago, Margaret Cavendish dared to contemplate the biggest philosophical questions of her day. Brilliant and bold, she wrote 21 books despite being dismissed or mocked by the almost entirely male intellectual community. A famously eccentric dresser, she and her husband hosted high-society parties at their fantastical castle, but she was also paralyzed by bashfulness and dreaded talking to people. She hoped that her intellectual works would lead to eternal fame, but she remained quite ignored until recent scholars dug her books out of the shadows.

Guest Dr. Rachel Robison-Greene earned her PhD from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. She works in metaethics, normative ethics, and applied ethics. She teaches philosophy at Weber State University. She has co-edited eleven books on pop-culture and philosophy and is currently working on a solo edited collection on philosophy in Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale.

Music featured in this episode by Solis Camerata, Mandy Clegg, Tommy Strawser, Sam Kreidenweis, Erik Gustafson, Kerry Ginger, Joel Wolcott, Carol Jennings, and Marc Nelson.

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THE UNSINKABLE Margaret “Molly” Brown Jan 22, 2018

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Margaret "Molly" Brown is often cited as the quintessential American rags-to-riches story. Born to poor Irish immigrants in Missouri, Margaret went on to become one of the wealthiest women in the country. She cemented her place in history through her heroism on the disastrous maiden voyage of the Titanic, but her life story is a compelling and unusual tale of character, compassion and just the right amount of bull-headedness. Her story is fully worthy of the many films, books and musicals which have born her name (even if that isn’t really her name, and most don’t in any way resemble her real story). Discover the remarkable woman behind the myth of the “Unsinkable Molly Brown.” Join us on-location at the Molly Brown House Museum in Denver, Colorado.

Guest Jamie Melissa Wilms was Director of Education at the Molly Brown House from 2013-2018, and is now the Executive Director of the Denver Firefighter’s Museum. She has a BA in American History/Public Administration from Northern Michigan University, an MA in Historical Administration/American History from Eastern Illinois University, and has worked in the museum field for over fifteen years in locations across the United States.

Musicfeatured in this episode by Killarney, Andy Reiner and Jon Sousa, Marc Nelson, and The Earth Stringband.

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THE PRINCESS Te Puea Herangi Jan 15, 2018

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Te Puea Herangi was one of the most important and influential Maori leaders of the 20th century. Born into the family of the Maori King, she was a tireless activist for her people. Her work to assure economic prosperity in the Waikato region, her fierce battles for justice for Maori communities harmed by illegal land seizures, and her passionate dedication to Maori cultural revival assure that she will long be remembered as a critical voice in New Zealand history. Olivia interviews Dr. Gina Colvin.

Guest Gina Colvin is New Zealand Māori of Ngāti Porou and Ngā Puhi descent. She is an adjunct research fellow at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch, New Zealand. Colvin is the co-editor of Decolonizing Mormononism [University of Utah Press] and writes about the intersections of race, gender, culture and religion. Colvin is also the host of A Thoughtful Faith Podcast and she blogs at Patheos.

Music provided by the talented students of Te Kura Kaupapa Māori o Hoani Waititi Marae:

“He Tatai Tangata” written by Metotagivale Schmidt-Peke and performed by Taniwha, and “Iwi Taketake” written and performed by Taniwha (Metotagivale Schmidt-Peke, Javan Rivers-Hall and Scarlett Manners Te Pania).

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