Podcasts about national endowment

Nick Lantz's poem "Dolorimetry" appeared in issue 88 and won the 2026 Neil Postman Award for Metaphor. He's the author of five collections of poetry, most recently The End of Everything and Everything That Comes After That (University of Wisconsin Press, 2024). His poetry has received several awards, including the Larry Levis Reading Prize, the Great Lakes Colleges Association New Writer Award, and a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. He teaches in the MFA program at Sam Houston State University and lives in Huntsville, Texas, with his wife and cats. Find more info here: https://www.nick-lantz.com/ As always, we'll also include the live Prompt Lines for responses to our weekly prompt. Submit your poems through Submittable by midnight Sunday for a chance to be invited: https://rattle.submittable.com/submit/269309/rattlecast-prompt-poems-online For links to all the past episodes, visit: https://www.rattle.com/page/rattlecast/ This Week's Prompt: Write a poem about a time you couldn't keep the correct time straight. Include at least one temporal shift. Next Week's Prompt: Pick an obscure holiday that occurs during the next week, and write a poem that celebrates accordingly. Include which holiday/date in the notes of your submission. The Rattlecast livestreams on YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter, then becomes an audio podcast. Find it on iTunes, Spotify, or anywhere else you get your podcasts.

What makes a character so compelling that readers will forgive almost anything about the plot? How do you move beyond vague flaws and generic descriptions to create people who feel pulled from real life? In this solo episode, I share 15 actionable tips for writing deep characters, curated from past interviews on the podcast. In the intro, thoughts from London Book Fair [Instagram reel @jfpennauthor; Publishing Perspectives; Audible; Spotify]; Insights from a 7-figure author business [BookBub]. This show is supported by my Patrons. Join my Community and get articles, discounts, and extra audio and video tutorials on writing craft, author business, and AI tools, at Patreon.com/thecreativepenn This episode has been created from previous episodes of The Creative Penn Podcast, curated by Joanna Penn, as well as chapters from How to Write a Novel: From Idea to Book. Links to the individual episodes are included in the transcript below. In this episode: Master the ‘Believe, Care, Invest' trifecta, how to hook readers on the very first page Define the Dramatic Question: Who is your character when the chips are down? Absolute specificity. Why “she's controlling” isn't good enough Understand the Heroine's Journey, strength through connection, not solo action Use ‘Metaphor Families' to anchor dialogue and give every character a distinctive voice Find the Diagnostic Detail, the moments that prove a character is real Writing pain onto the page without writing memoir Write diverse characters as real people, not stereotypes or plot devices Give your protagonist a morally neutral ‘hero' status. Compelling beats likeable. Build vibrant side characters for series longevity and spin-off potential Use voice as a rhythmic tool Link character and plot until they're inseparable Why discovery writers can write out of order and still build deep character Find the sensory details that make characters live and breathe More help with how to write fiction here, or in my book, How to Write a Novel. Writing Characters: 15 Tips for Writing Deep Character in Your Fiction In today's episode, I'm sharing fifteen tips for writing deep characters, synthesised from some of the most insightful interviews on The Creative Penn Podcast over the past few years, combined with what I've learned across more than forty books of my own. I'll be referencing episodes with Matt Bird, Will Storr, Gail Carriger, Barbara Nickless, and Sarah Elisabeth Sawyer. I'll also draw on my own book, How to Write a Novel, which covers these fundamentals in detail. Whether you're writing your first novel or your fiftieth, whether you're a plotter or a discovery writer like me, these tips will help you create characters that readers believe in, care about, and invest in—and keep coming back for more. Let's get into it. 1. Master the ‘Believe, Care, Invest' Trifecta When I spoke with Matt Bird on episode 624, he laid out the three things you need to achieve on the very first page of your book or in the first ten minutes of a film. He calls it “Believe, Care, and Invest.” First, the reader must believe the character is a real person, somehow proving they are not a cardboard imitation of a human being, not just a generic type walking through a generic plot. Second, the reader must care about the character's circumstances. And third, the reader must invest in the character's ability to solve the story's central problem. Matt used The Hunger Games as his primary example, and it's brilliant. On the very first page, we believe Katniss's voice. Suzanne Collins writes in first person with a staccato rhythm—lots of periods, short declarative sentences—that immediately grounds us in a survivalist mentality. We care because Katniss is starving. She's protecting her little sister. And we invest because she is out there bow hunting, which Matt pointed out is one of the most badass things a character can do. She even kills a lynx two pages in and sells the pelt. We invest in her resourcefulness and grit before the plot has even begun. Matt was very clear that this has nothing to do with the character being “likable.” He said his subtitle, Writing a Hero Anyone Will Love, doesn't mean the character has to be a good person. He described “hero” as both gender-neutral and morally neutral. A hero can be totally evil or totally good. What matters is that we believe, care, and invest. He demonstrated this beautifully by breaking down the first ten minutes of WeCrashed, where the characters of Adam and Rebekah Neumann are absolutely not likable, but we are completely hooked. Adam steals his neighbour's Chinese food through a carefully orchestrated con involving an imaginary beer. It's not admirable behaviour, but the tradecraft involved, as Matt put it—using a term from spy movies—makes us invest in him. We see a character trying to solve the big problem of his life, which is that he's poor and wants to be rich, and we want to see if he can pull it off. Actionable step: Go to the first page of your current work in progress. Does it achieve all three? Does the reader believe this is a real person with a distinctive voice? Do they care about the character's circumstances? And do they invest in the character's ability to handle what's coming? If even one of those three is missing, that's your revision priority. 2. Define the Dramatic Question: Who Are They Really? Will Storr, author of The Science of Storytelling, came on episode 490 and gave one of the most powerful frameworks I've ever heard for character-driven fiction. He explained that the human brain evolved language primarily to swap social information—in other words, to gossip. We are wired to monitor other people, to ask the question: who is this person when the chips are down? That's what Will calls the Dramatic Question, and it's what he believes lies at the heart of all compelling storytelling. It's not a question about plot. It's a question about the character's soul. And every scene in your novel should force the character to answer it. His example of Lawrence of Arabia is unforgettable. The Dramatic Question for the entire film is: who are you, Lawrence? Are you ordinary or are you extraordinary? At the beginning, Lawrence is a cocky, rebellious young soldier who believes his rebelliousness makes him superior. Every iconic scene in that three-hour film tests that belief. Sometimes Lawrence acts as though he truly is extraordinary—leading the Arabs into battle, being hailed as a god—and sometimes the world strips him bare and he sees himself as ordinary. Because it's a tragedy, he never overcomes his flaw. He doubles down on his belief that he's extraordinary until he becomes monstrous, culminating in that iconic scene where he lifts a bloody dagger and sees his own reflection with horror. Will also used Jaws to demonstrate how this works in a pure action thriller. Brody's dramatic question is simple: are you going to be old Brody who is terrified of the water, or new Brody who can overcome that fear? Every scene where the shark appears is really asking that question. And the last moment of the film isn't the shark blowing up. It's Brody swimming back through the water, saying he used to be scared of the water and he can't imagine why. Actionable step: Write down the Dramatic Question for your protagonist in a single sentence. Is it “Are you ordinary or extraordinary?” or “Are you brave enough to love again?” or “Will you sacrifice your principles for survival?” If you can't answer this with specificity, your character might still be a sketch rather than a person. 3. Get rid of Vague Flaws, and use Absolute Specificity This was one of Will Storr's most important points. He said that vague thinking about characters is really the enemy. When he teaches workshops and asks writers to describe their character's flaw, most of them say something like “they're very controlling.” And Will's response is: that's not good enough. Everyone is controlling. How are they controlling? What's the specific mechanism? He gave the example of a profile he read of Theresa May during the UK's Brexit chaos. Someone who knew her said that Theresa May's problem was that she always thinks she's the only adult in every room she goes into. Will said that stopped him in his tracks because it's so precise. If you define a character with that level of specificity, you can take them and put them in any genre, any situation—a spaceship, a Victorian drawing room, a school playground—and you will know exactly how they're going to behave. The same applies to Arthur Miller's Willy Loman in Death of a Salesman, as Will described it: a man who believes absolutely in capitalistic success and the idea that when you die, you're going to be weighed on a scale, just as God weighs you for sin, but now you're weighed for success. That's not a vague flaw. That's a worldview you can drop into any story and watch it combust. Will made another counterintuitive point that I found really valuable: writers often think that piling on multiple traits will create a complex character, but the opposite is true. Starting with one highly specific flaw and running it through the demands of a relentless plot is what generates complexity. You end up with a far more nuanced, original character than if you'd started with a laundry list of vague attributes. Actionable step: Take your protagonist's flaw and pressure-test it. Is it specific enough that you could place this character in any situation and predict their behaviour? If you're stuck at “she's stubborn” or “he's insecure,” keep pushing. What kind of stubborn? What kind of insecure? Find the diagnostic sentence—the Theresa May level of precision. 4. Understand the Heroine's Journey: Strength Through Connection Gail Carriger came on episode 550 to discuss her nonfiction book, The Heroine's Journey, and it completely reframed how I think about some of my own fiction. Gail explained that the core difference between the Hero's Journey and the Heroine's Journey comes down to how strength and victory are defined. The Hero's Journey is about strength through solo action. The hero must be continually isolated to get stronger. He goes out of civilisation, faces strife alone, and achieves victory through physical prowess and self-actualisation. The Heroine's Journey is the opposite. The heroine achieves her goals by activating a network. She's a delegator, a general. She identifies where she can't do something alone, finds the people who can help, and portions out the work for mutual gain. Gail put it simply: the heroine is very good at asking for help, which our culture tends to devalue but which is actually a powerful form of strength. Crucially, Gail stressed that gender is irrelevant to which journey you're writing. Her go-to examples are striking: the recent Wonder Woman film is practically a beat-for-beat hero's journey—Gilgamesh on screen, as Gail described it. Meanwhile, Harry Potter, both the first book and the series as a whole, is a classic heroine's journey. Harry's power comes from his network—Dumbledore's Army, the Order of the Phoenix, his friendships with Ron and Hermione. He doesn't defeat Voldemort alone. He defeats Voldemort because of love and connection. This distinction has real practical consequences for writers. If you're writing a hero's journey and you hit writer's block, Gail said, the solution is usually to isolate your hero further and pile on more strife. But if you're writing a heroine's journey, the solution is probably to throw a new character into the scene—someone who has advice to offer or a skill the heroine lacks. The actual solutions to writer's block are different depending on which narrative you're writing. As I reflected on my own work, I realised that my ARKANE thriller protagonist, Morgan Sierra, follows a hero's journey—she's a solo operative, a lone wolf like Jack Reacher or James Bond. But my Mapwalker fantasy series follows a heroine's journey, with Sienna and her group of friends working together. I hadn't consciously chosen those paths; the stories led me there. But understanding the framework helps me write more intentionally now. Actionable step: Identify which journey your protagonist is on. Does your character gain strength by being alone (hero) or by building connections (heroine)? This will inform every plot decision you make, from how they face obstacles to how your story ends. 5. Use ‘Metaphor Families' to Anchor Dialogue and Voice One of the most practical techniques Matt Bird shared on episode 624 is the idea of assigning each character a “metaphor family”—a specific well of language that they draw from. This gives each character a distinctive voice that goes beyond accent or dialect. Matt explained how in The Wire, one of the most beloved TV shows of all time, every character has a different metaphor family. What struck him was that Omar, this iconic character, never utters a single curse word in the entire series. His metaphor family is pirate. He talks about parlays, uses language that feels like it belongs in Pirates of the Caribbean, and it creates this incredible ironic counterpoint against his urban setting. It tells us immediately that this is a character who sees himself in a tradition of people that doesn't match his immediate surroundings. Matt also referenced the UK version of The Office, where Gareth works at a paper company but aspires to the military. So all of his language is drawn from a military metaphor family. He doesn't talk about filing and photocopying; he talks about tactics and discipline and being on the front line. This tells us that the character has a life and dreams beyond the immediate scene—and it's the gap between aspiration and reality that makes him both funny and believable. He pointed out that a metaphor family sometimes comes from a character's background, but it's often more interesting when it comes from their aspirations. What does your character want to be? What world do they fantasise about inhabiting? That's where their language should come from. In Star Wars, Obi-Wan Kenobi is a spiritual hermit, but his metaphor family is military. He uses the language of generals and commanders, and that ironic counterpoint is part of what makes him feel so rich. Actionable step: Assign each of your main characters a metaphor family. It could be based on their job, their background, or—more interestingly—their secret aspirations. Then go through your dialogue and make sure each character is consistently drawing from that well of language. If two characters sound the same when you strip away the dialogue tags, this is the fix. 6. Find the Diagnostic Detail: The Diagonal Toast Avoid clichéd character tags—the random scar, the eye patch, the mysterious limp—unless they serve a deep narrative purpose. Matt Bird on episode 624 was very funny about this: he pointed out that Nick Fury, Odin, and eventually Thor all have eye patches in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Eye patches are done, he said. You cannot do eye patches anymore. Instead, look for what I'm calling the “diagonal toast” detail, after a scene Matt described from Captain Marvel. In the film, Captain Marvel is trying to determine whether Nick Fury is who he says he is. She asks him to prove he isn't a shapeshifting alien. Fury shares biographical details—his history, his mother—but then she pushes further and says, name one more thing you couldn't possibly have made up about yourself. And Fury says: if toast is cut diagonally, I can't eat it. Matt said that detail is gold for a writer because it feels pulled from a real life. You can pull it from your own life and gift it to your characters, and the reader can tell it's not manufactured. He gave another example from The Sopranos: Tony Soprano's mother won't answer the phone after dark. The show's creator, David Chase, confirmed on the DVD commentary that this came from his own mother, who genuinely would not answer the phone after dark and couldn't explain why. Matt's practical advice was to keep a journal. Write down the strange, specific things that people do or say. Mine your own life for those hyper-specific details. You just need one per book. In my own writing, I've used this approach. In my ARKANE thrillers, my character Morgan Sierra has always been Angelina Jolie in my mind—specifically Jolie in Lara Croft or Mr and Mrs Smith. And Blake Daniel in my crime thriller series was based on Jesse Williams from Grey's Anatomy. I paste pictures of actors into my Scrivener projects. It helps with visuals, but also with the sense of the character, their energy and physicality. But visual details only take you so far. It's the behavioural quirks—the diagonal toast moments—that make a character feel genuinely alive. That said, physical character tags can work brilliantly when they serve the story. As I discuss in How to Write a Novel, Robert Galbraith's Cormoran Strike is an amputee, and his pain and the physical challenges of his prosthesis are a key part of every story—it's not a cosmetic detail, it's woven into the action and the character's psychology. My character Blake Daniel always wears gloves to cover the scars on his hands, which provides an angle into his wounded past as well as a visual cue for the reader. And of course, Harry Potter's lightning-shaped scar isn't just a mark—it's a direct connection to his nemesis and the mythology of the entire series. The rule of thumb is: if the tag tells us something about the character's interior life or connects to the plot, it's earning its place. If it's just there to make the character visually distinctive, it's probably a crutch. Game of Thrones takes character tags further with the family houses, each with their own mottos and sigils. The Starks say “Winter is coming” and their sigil is a dire wolf. Those aren't just labels—they're worldview made visible. Actionable step: Start a “diagonal toast” notebook. Every time you notice something strange and specific about someone's behaviour—something that feels too real to be made up—write it down. Then gift it to a character who needs more texture. 7. Displace Your Own Trauma into the Work Barbara Nickless shared something deeply personal on episode 732 that fundamentally changed how I think about putting pain onto the page. While starting At First Light, the first book in her Dr. Evan Wilding series, she lost her son to epilepsy—something called SUDEP, Sudden Unexplained Death in Epilepsy. One day he was there, and the next day he was gone. Barbara said that writing helped her cope with the trauma, that doing a deep dive into Old English literature and the Viking Age for the book's research became a lifeline. But here's what's important: she didn't give Dr. Evan Wilding her exact trauma. Evan Wilding is four feet five inches, and Barbara described how he has to walk through a world that won't adjust to him. That's its own form of learning to cope when circumstances are beyond your control. She displaced her genuine grief into the character's different but parallel struggle. When I asked her about the difference between writing for therapy and writing for an audience, she drew on her experience teaching creative writing to veterans through a collaboration between the US Department of Defense and the National Endowment for the Arts. She said she's found that she can pour her heartache into her characters and process it through them, even when writing professionally, and that the genuine emotion is what touches readers. We've all been through our own losses and griefs, so seeing how a character copes can be deeply meaningful. I've always found that putting my own pain onto the page is the most direct way to connect with a reader's soul. My character Morgan Sierra's musings on religion and the supernatural are often my own. Her restlessness, her fascination with the darker edges of faith—those come from me. But her Krav Maga fighting skills and her ability to kill the bad guys are definitely her own. That gap between what's mine and what's hers is where the fiction lives. Barbara also said something on that episode that I wrote down and stuck on my wall. She said the act of producing itself is a balm to the soul. I've been thinking about that ever since. On my own wall, I have “Measure your life by what you create.” Different words, same truth. Actionable step: If you're carrying something heavy—grief, anger, fear, regret—consider how you might displace it into a character's different but emotionally parallel struggle. Don't copy your exact situation; transform it. The emotion will be genuine, and the reader will feel it. 8. Write Diverse Characters as Real People When I spoke with Sarah Elisabeth Sawyer on episode 673—Sarah is Choctaw and a historical fiction author honoured by the Smithsonian's National Museum of the American Indian—she offered a perspective that every fiction writer needs to hear. The key message was to move away from stereotypes. Don't write your American Indian character as the “Wise Guide” who exists solely to dispense mystic wisdom to the white protagonist. Don't limit diverse characters to historical settings, as though they only exist in the past. Place them in normal, contemporary roles. Your spaceship captain, your forensic scientist, your small-town baker—any of them can be American Indian, or Nigerian, or Japanese, and their heritage should be a lived-in part of their identity, not the sole reason they exist in the story. I write international thrillers and dark fantasy, and my fiction is populated with characters from all over the world. I have a multi-cultural family and I've lived in many places and travelled widely, so I've met, worked with, and had relationships with people from different cultures. I find story ideas through travel, and if I set my books in a certain place, then the story is naturally populated with the people who live there. As I discuss in my book, How to Write a Novel, the world is a diverse place, so your fiction needs to be populated with all kinds of people. If I only populated my fiction with characters like me, they would be boring novels. There are many dimensions of difference—race, nationality, sex, age, body type, ability, religion, gender, sexual orientation, socio-economic status, class, culture, education level—and even then, don't assume that similar types of people think the same way. Some authors worry they will make mistakes. We live in a time of outrage, and some authors have been criticised for writing outside their own experience. So is it too dangerous to try? Of course not. The media amplifies outliers, and most authors include diverse characters in every book without causing offence because they work hard to get it right. It's about awareness, research, and intent. Actionable step: Audit the cast of your current work in progress. Have you written a mono-cultural perspective for all of them? If so, consider who could bring a different background, perspective, or set of cultural specifics to the story. Not as a token addition, but as a real person with a real life. 9. Respect Tribal and Cultural Specificity Sarah Elisabeth Sawyer on episode 673 was emphatic about one thing: never treat diverse groups as monolithic. If you're writing a Native American character, you must research the specific nation. Choctaw is not Navajo, just as British is not French. Sarah described the distinct cultural markers of the Choctaw people—the diamond pattern you'll see on traditional shirts and dresses, which represents the diamondback rattlesnake. They have distinct dances and songs. She said that if she saw someone in traditional dress at a distance, she would know whether they were Choctaw based on what they were wearing. She encouraged writers who want to write specifically about a nation to get to know those people. Go to events, go to a powwow, learn about the individual culture. She noted that a big misconception is that American Indians exist only in the past—she stressed that they are still here, still living their cultures, and fiction should reflect that present reality. I took a similar approach when writing Destroyer of Worlds, which is set mostly in India. I read books about Hindu myth, watched documentaries about the sadhus, and had one of my Indian readers from Mumbai check my cultural references. For Risen Gods, set in New Zealand with a young Maori protagonist, I studied books about Maori mythology and fiction by Maori authors, and had a male Maori reader check for cultural issues. Research is simply an act of empathy. The practical takeaway is this: if you're going to include a character from a specific cultural background, do the work. Use specific cultural details rather than generic signifiers. Sarah talked about how even she fell into stereotypes when she was first writing, until her mother pointed them out. If someone from within a culture can fall into those traps, the rest of us certainly can. Do the research, try your best, ask for help, and apologise if you need to. Actionable step: If you're writing a character from a specific culture, identify three to five sensory or behavioural details that are particular to that culture—not the generic version, but the real, researched, lived-in version. Consider hiring a sensitivity reader from that community to check your work. 10. Give Your Protagonist a Morally Neutral ‘Hero' Status Matt Bird was clear about this on episode 624: the word “hero” simply means the protagonist, the person we follow through the story. It's a functional role, not a moral label. We don't have to like them. We don't even have to root for their goals in a moral sense. We just have to find them compelling enough to invest our attention in their problem-solving. Think of Succession, where every member of the Roy family is varying degrees of awful, and yet the show was utterly compelling. Or WeCrashed, where Adam Neumann is a narcissistic con artist, but we can't look away because he's trying to solve the enormous problem of building an empire from nothing, and the tradecraft he employs is fascinating. As I wrote in How to Write a Novel, readers must want to spend time with your characters. They don't have to be lovable or even likable—that will depend on your genre and story choices—but they have to be captivating enough that we want to spend time with them. A character who is trying to solve a massive problem will naturally draw investment from the audience, even if we wouldn't want to have tea with them. Will Storr extended this idea by pointing out that the audience will actually root for a character to solve their problem even if the audience doesn't actually want the character's goal to be achieved in the real world. We don't really want more billionaires, but we invested in Adam Neumann's rise because that was the problem the story posed, and our brains are wired to invest in problem-solving. This connects to something deeper: what does your character want, and why? As I explore in How to Write a Novel, desire operates on multiple levels. Take a character like Phil, who joins the military during wartime. On the surface, she wants to serve her country. But she also wants to escape her dead-end town and learn new skills. Deeper still, her father and grandfather served, and by joining up, she hopes to finally earn their respect. And perhaps deepest of all, her father died on a mission under mysterious circumstances, and she wants to find out what happened from the inside. That layering of motivation is what turns a flat character into a three-dimensional one. The audience doesn't need to be told all of this explicitly. It can emerge through action, dialogue, and the choices the character makes under pressure. But you, the writer, need to know it. You need to know what your character really wants deep down, because that desire—more than any external plot device—is what drives the story forward. And your antagonist needs the same depth. They also want something, often diametrically opposed to your protagonist, and they need a reason that makes sense to them. In my ARKANE thriller Tree of Life, my antagonist is the heiress of a Brazilian mining empire who wants to restore the Earth to its original state to atone for the destruction caused by her father's company. She's part of a radical ecological group who believe the only way to restore Nature is to end all human life. It's extreme, but in an era of climate change, it's a motivation readers can understand—even if they disagree with the solution. Actionable step: If you're struggling to make a morally grey character work, make sure their problem is big enough and their methods are specific and interesting enough that we invest in the how, even if we're ambivalent about the what. 11. Build Vibrant Side Characters Gail Carriger made a point on episode 550 that was equal parts craft advice and business strategy. In a Heroine's Journey model, side characters aren't just fodder to be killed off to motivate the hero. They form a network. And because you don't have to kill them—unlike in a hero's journey, where allies are often betrayed or removed so the hero can be further isolated—you can pick up those side characters and give them their own books. Gail said this creates a really voracious reader base. You write one series with vivid side characters, and then readers fall in love with those side characters and want their stories. So you write spin-offs. The romance genre does this brilliantly—think of the Bridgerton books, where each sibling gets their own novel. The side character in one book becomes the protagonist in the next. Barbara Nickless experienced this firsthand with her Dr. Evan Wilding series. She has River Wilding, Evan's adventurous brother, and Diana, the axe-throwing research assistant, and her editor has already expressed interest in a spin-off series with those characters. Barbara described creating characters she wants to spend time with, or characters who give her nightmares but also intrigue her. That's the dual test: are they interesting enough for you to write, and interesting enough for readers to demand more? As I wrote in How to Write a Novel, characters that span series can deepen the reader's relationship with them as you expand their backstory into new plots. Readers will remember the character more than the plot or the book title, and look forward to the next instalment because they want more time with those people. British crime author Angela Marsons described it as readers feeling like returning to her characters is like putting on a pair of old slippers. Actionable step: Look at your supporting cast. Is there a side character who is vivid enough to carry their own story? If not, what could you add—a specific hobby, a distinct voice, a compelling backstory—that would make readers want more of them? 12. Use Voice as a Rhythmic Tool Voice is one of the most important elements of novel writing, and Matt Bird helped me think about it in a technical, mechanical way that I found really useful. He pointed out that the ratio of periods to commas defines a character's internal reality. A staccato rhythm—lots of periods, short sentences—suggests a character who is certain, grounded, or perhaps survivalist and traumatised. Katniss in The Hunger Games has a period-heavy voice. She's in survival mode. She doesn't have time for complexity or qualification. A flowing, comma-heavy style suggests someone more academic, more nuanced, or possibly more scattered and manipulative. The character who qualifies everything, who adds sub-clauses and digressions, is a different kind of person from the character who speaks in declarations. This is something you can actually measure. Pull up a passage of your character's dialogue or internal monologue and count the periods versus the commas. If the rhythm doesn't match who the character is supposed to be, you've found a mismatch you can fix. Sentence length is the heartbeat of your character's persona. And voice extends beyond rhythm to the words themselves. As I discussed in the metaphor families tip, each character should draw from a distinctive well of language. But voice also encompasses their relationship to silence. Some characters talk around the thing they mean; others say it straight. Some are self-deprecating; others are blunt to the point of rudeness. All of these choices are character choices, not just style choices. I find it useful to read my dialogue aloud—and not just to check for naturalness, but to hear whether each character sounds distinct. If you could swap dialogue lines between two characters and nobody would notice, you have a voice problem. One practical test: cover the dialogue tags and see if you can tell who's speaking from the words alone. Actionable step: Choose a key passage from your protagonist's point of view and read it aloud. Does the rhythm match the character? A soldier under fire should not sound like a philosophy professor at a wine tasting. Adjust the ratio of periods to commas until the voice feels right. 13. Link Character and Plot Until They're Inseparable Will Storr made the case on episode 490 that the number one problem he sees in the writing he encounters—in workshops, in submissions, even in published books—is that the characters and the plots are unconnected. There's a story happening, and there are people in it, but the story isn't a product of who those people are. He said a story should be like life. In our lives, the plots are intimately connected to who we are as characters. The goals we pursue, the obstacles we face, the same problems that keep recurring—these are products of our personalities, our flaws, our specific ways of being in the world. His framework is that your plot should be designed specifically to plot against your character. You've got a character with a particular flaw; the plot exists to test that flaw over and over until the character either transforms or doubles down and explodes. Jaws is the perfect example. Brody is afraid of water. A shark shows up in the coastal town he's responsible for protecting. The entire plot is engineered to force him to confront the one thing he cannot face. Will pointed out that the whole plot of Jaws is structured around Brody's flaw. It begins with the shark arriving, the midpoint is when Brody finally gets the courage to go into the water, and the very final scene isn't the shark blowing up—it's Brody swimming back through the water. Even a film that's ninety-eight percent action is, at its core, structured around a character with a character flaw. This is the standard I aspire to in my own work, even in my action-heavy thrillers. The external plot should be a mirror of the internal struggle. When those two are aligned, the story becomes irresistible. Will also made an important point about series fiction, which is where most commercial authors live. I asked him how this works when your character can't be transformed at the end of every book because there has to be a next book. His answer was elegant: you don't cure them. Episodic TV characters like Fleabag or David Brent or Basil Fawlty never truly change—and the fact that they don't change is actually the source of the comedy. But every episode throws a new story event at them that tests and exposes their flaw. You just keep throwing story events at them again and again. That's a soap opera, a sitcom, and a book series. As I wrote in How to Write a Novel, character flaws are aspects of personality that affect the person so much that facing and overcoming them becomes central to the plot. In Jaws, the protagonist Brody is afraid of the water, but he has to overcome that flaw to destroy the killer shark and save the town. But remember, your characters should feel like real people, so never define them purely by their flaws. The character addicted to painkillers might also be a brilliant and successful female lawyer who gets up at four in the morning to work out at the gym, likes eighties music, and volunteers at the local dog shelter at weekends. Character wounds are different from flaws. They're formed from life experience and are part of your character's backstory—traumatic events that happened before the events of your novel but shape the character's reactions in the present. In my ARKANE thrillers, Morgan Sierra's husband Elian died in her arms during a military operation. This happened before the series begins, but her memories of it recur when she faces a firefight, and she struggles to find happiness again for fear of losing someone she loves once more. And then there's the perennial advice: show, don't tell. Most writers have heard this so many times that it's easy to nod and then promptly write scenes that tell rather than show. Basically, you need to reveal your character through action and dialogue, rather than explanation. In my thriller Day of the Vikings, Morgan Sierra fights a Neo-Viking in the halls of the British Museum and brings him down with Krav Maga. That fight scene isn't just about showing action. It opens up questions about her backstory, demonstrates character, and moves the plot forward. Telling would be something like: “Morgan was an expert in Krav Maga.” Showing is the reader discovering it through the scene itself. Actionable step: Look at the main plot events of your novel. For each major turning point, ask: does this scene specifically test my protagonist's flaw? If not, can you redesign the scene so that it does? The tighter the connection between character and plot, the more powerful the story. 14. The ‘Maestra' Approach: Write Out of Order If you're a discovery writer like me, you may feel like the deep character work I've been describing sounds more suited to plotters. But Barbara Nickless gave me a beautiful metaphor on episode 732 that reframes it entirely. Barbara described her evolving writing process as being like a maestra standing in front of an orchestra. Sometimes you bring in the horns—a certain theme—and sometimes you bring in the strings—a certain character—and sometimes you turn to the soloist. It's a more organic and jumping-around process than linear writing, and Barbara said she's only recently given herself permission to work this way. When I told her that I use Scrivener to write in scenes out of order and then drag and drop them into a structure later, she was genuinely intrigued. And this is how I've always worked. I'll see the story in my mind like a movie trailer—flashes of the big emotional scenes, the pivotal confrontations, the moments of revelation—and I write those first. I don't know how they hang together until quite late in the process. Then I'll move scenes around, print the whole thing out, and figure out the connective tissue. The point is that discovery writers can absolutely build deep characters. Sometimes writing the big emotional scenes first is how you discover who the character is before you fill in the rest. You don't need a twenty-page character worksheet or a 200-page outline like Jeffery Deaver. You need to be willing to follow the character into the unknown and trust that the structure will emerge. As Barbara said, she writes to know what she's thinking. That's the discovery writer's credo. And I would add: I write to know who my characters are. Actionable step: If you're stuck on your current chapter, skip it. Write the scene that's burning in your imagination, even if it's from the middle or the end. That scene might be the key to unlocking who your character really is. 15. Use Research to Help with Empathy Research shouldn't just be about factual accuracy—it's a tool for finding the sensory details that create empathy. Barbara Nickless described research as almost an excuse to explore things that fascinate her, and I feel exactly the same way. I would go so far as to say that writing is an excuse for me to explore the things that interest me. Barbara and I both travel for our stories. For her Dr. Evan Wilding books, she did deep research into Old English literature and the Viking Age. For my thriller End of Days, I transcribed hours of video from Appalachian snake-handling churches on YouTube to understand the worldview of the worshippers, because my antagonist was brought up in that tradition. I couldn't just make that up. I had to hear their language, feel their conviction, understand why they would hold venomous serpents as an act of faith. Barbara also mentioned getting to Israel and the West Bank for research, and I've been to both places too. Finding that one specific sensory detail—the smell of a particular location, the specific way an expert handles a tool, the sound of a particular kind of music—makes the character's life feel lived-in. It's the difference between a character who is described as living in a place and a character who inhabits it. As I wrote in How to Write a Novel, don't write what you know. Write what you want to learn about. I love research. It's part of why I'm an author in the first place. I take any excuse to dive into a world different from my own. Research using books, films, podcasts, and travel, and focus particularly on sources produced by people from the worldview you want to understand. Actionable step: For your next piece of character research, go beyond reading. Watch a documentary, visit a location, talk to someone who lives the experience. Find one sensory detail—a smell, a sound, a texture—that you couldn't have invented. That detail will make your character feel real. Bonus: Measure Your Life by What You Create In an age of AI and a tsunami of content, your ultimate brand protection is the quality of your human creation. Barbara Nickless said that the act of producing itself is a balm to the soul, and I believe that with every fibre of my being. Don't be afraid to take that step back, like I did with my deadlifting. Take the time to master these deeper craft skills. It might feel like you're slowing down or going backwards by not chasing the latest marketing trend, but it's the only way to step forward into a sustainable, high-quality career. Your characters are your signature. No AI can replicate the specificity of your lived experience, the emotional truth of your displaced trauma, or the sensory details you've gathered from a life of curiosity and travel. Those are yours. Pour them into your characters, and they will resonate for years to come. Actionable Takeaway: Identify the Dramatic Question for your current protagonist. Can you state it in a single sentence with the kind of specificity Will Storr described? Is it as clear as “Are you ordinary or extraordinary?” or “Are you the only adult in the room?” If you can't answer it with that kind of precision, your character might still be a sketch. Give them a diagonal toast moment today. Find the one hyper-specific detail that proves they are not an imitation of life. And then ask yourself: does your plot test your character's flaw in every major scene? If you can align those two things—a precisely defined character and a plot that exists to test them—you will have a story that readers cannot put down. References and Deep Dives The episodes I've referenced today are all available with full transcripts at TheCreativePenn.com: Episode 732 — Facing Fears, and Writing Unique Characters with Barbara Nickless Episode 673 — Writing Choctaw Characters and Diversity in Fiction with Sarah Elisabeth Sawyer Episode 624 — Writing Characters with Matt Bird Episode 550 — The Heroine's Journey with Gail Carriger Episode 490 — How Character Flaws Shape Story with Will Storr Books mentioned: The Secrets of Character: Writing a Hero Anyone Will Love by Matt Bird The Science of Storytelling by Will Storr The Heroine's Journey by Gail Carriger How to Write a Novel: From Idea to Book by Joanna Penn You can find all my books for authors at CreativePennBooks.com and my fiction and memoir at JFPennBooks.com Happy writing! How was this episode created? This episode was initiated created by NotebookLM based on YouTube videos of the episodes linked above from YouTube/TheCreativePenn, plus my text chapters on character from How to Write a Novel. NotebookLM created a blog post from the material and then I expanded it and fact checked it with Claude.ai 4.6 Opus, and then I used my voice clone at ElevenLabs to narrate it. The post Writing Characters: 15 Actionable Tips For Writing Deep Character first appeared on The Creative Penn.

A federal judge in Maryland issued a TRO blocking the construction of an ICE detention facility without first undertaking the legally required environmental impact assessment.The Trump administration filed an “emergency” petition to the Supreme Court demanding that it be allowed to immediately deport 350,000 Haitians who have enjoyed Temporary Protected Status for decades. It insists an earlier shadow docket ruling allowing it to deport Venezuelan TPS holders is precedential. An amicus brief from 175 former judges points out that shadow docket orders are definitionally non-precedential.The USDA is teaming up with Robert Kennedy and his team of freaks at Health and Human Services to Make America Healthy Again … by shaming poor people for their food choices. SNAP recipients sued in DC to block a “pilot” program to allow states to restrict food benefits to exclude sugary foods.MAIN SHOW:DOGE destroyed the National Endowment for the Humanities in three weeks last spring. We wrote about it on the blog, and discussed the ongoing litigation. Turns out, the DOGE dudes are pissed that the plaintiffs released video of them smirking their way through depositions.On Monday, in the middle of trial, the Trump administration tried to blow up the antitrust lawsuit against Live Nation, the parent company of Ticketmaster. This leaves the 40 states which joined the suit as co-plaintiffs in the lurch. Judge Arun Subramanian has ordered the parties to huddle up and see if they can't negotiate a settlement. Will the case go forward next week without the lead plaintiff?And Andrew has an extended exploration of Trump's plan to use a little known federal agency called the United States International Development Finance Corporation (DFC) to get oil tankers to cross the Strait of Hormuz. The DFC has released a plan (or at least, concepts of a plan) to reinsure insurance companies that issue war riders. Which might help if insurance companies were refusing to issue policies to ships at sea – except that insurance companies are still underwriting as many marine policies as ever. It's just that it costs more now, because of the war.Plus for subscribers, we'll break down the bar complaint against fan favorite Ed Martin.Kash Patel Confirms UFC Fighters Will Train FBI Agents This Week, Calling It A “Historic Opportunity”https://deadline.com/2026/03/kash-patel-ufc-fighters-train-fbi-agents-1236750897/State of Maryland v. Noem [ICE Detention Center in Hagerstown]https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/72313096/state-of-maryland-v-noemLesly Miot v. Trump [Haitian TPS, Trial Docket]https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70965949/lesly-miot-v-trump/Trump v. Miot [SCOTUS Docket]https://www.supremecourt.gov/search.aspx?filename=/docket/docketfiles/html/public/25a999.htmlDOGE Bros Had More Fun Burning Down Government Than Testifying About Ithttps://www.lawandchaospod.com/p/doge-bros-had-more-fun-burning-downAuthors Guild v. National Endowment for the Humanitieshttps://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70243086/the-authors-guild-v-national-endowment-for-the-humanitiesAmicus Brief of 175 Former Judges re Precedent of Shadow Docket Rulingshttps://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/25/25A952/400077/20260305142419318_Amicus%20Brief%20of%20Former%20Judges%20re%20Dahlia%20Doe_FINAL.pdfAragon v. Rollins [SNAP Benefits]https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/72419889/aragon-v-rollins/DOJ nopes out of Ticketmaster antitrust suithttps://www.publicnotice.co/p/ticketmaster-suit-dojUS v. Live Nationhttps://www.courtlistener.com/docket/68557723/united-states-of-america-v-live-nation-entertainment-incTrump's ‘free flow of energy' vow fails to restart shipping in strait of Hormuz [The Guardian]https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/mar/10/trump-free-flow-energy-fails-restart-shipping-strait-hormuzDFC Reinsurance announcement [US International Development Finance Corporation]https://www.dfc.gov/media/press-releases/dfc-announces-chubb-lead-insurance-partner-maritime-reinsurance-planGulf war risk premiums topping double-digit millions of dollars per trip [Lloyd's List]https://www.lloydslist.com/LL1156586/Gulf-war-risk-premiums-topping-double-digit-millions-of-dollars-per-tripNo, P&I clubs have not ‘cancelled war risk cover' [Lloyd's List]https://www.lloydslist.com/LL1156515/No-PI-clubs-have-not-cancelled-war-risk-coverShow Links:https://www.lawandchaospod.com/BlueSky: @LawAndChaosPodThreads: @LawAndChaosPodTwitter: @LawAndChaosPodSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Susan Stinsmuehlen-Amend is an artist for whom ideas have always been more important than media, and possibly more integral to her work. It's interesting then that her art has been consistently viewed through the lens of glass. In the creation of her early X series to more recent Calendar Notations, she has pioneered techniques such as non-traditional, unfired painting on glass, mixing glass with other media, and presenting painted, decorated glass on the wall in reflected light. Throughout her career, the artist distilled her own life experiences in the creation of progressive and experimental work.  While studying Fine Arts at the University of Texas, Austin, in 1973, Stinsmuehlen-Amend was serendipitously introduced to glass and went on to become partner with Rodney Smith and designer of Renaissance Glass, an architectural glass studio. Beyond teaching and employing 14 artists, she built a creative hub that included studio space, glass supplies, a hot glass studio, education and exhibitions. Understanding the cutting edge in the field, Stinsmuehlen-Amend invited luminaries in the Studio Glass movement such as Dale Chihuly, Paul Marioni, William Morris, and Narcissus Quagliata, among others, to lecture and teach in the early 1980s. The studio became the center for contemporary glass in Texas from 1973 to 1987. While balancing single motherhood, donating time to the arts, and running her business, she became the Glass Art Society's first woman president (1984 – '86).  Concurrent with designing stained glass commissions, Stinsmuehlen-Amend was determined to make the craft form a means for personal expression. Through experimentation and rebellion and influenced by the local punk scene, her radical fashion designer best friend, Pattern & Decoration and Neo-Expressionism in art, as well as innovations in the world of craft, her work became unrestrained, kinetic, glittery, and jarring—defiantly not "tasteful" or functional. Combining mixed media with glass was a new idea at the time. For Stinsmuehlen-Amend, the shifting qualities of glass itself—its capacity to reveal, obscure, reflect, and distort—became integral to how meaning unfolds. Rooted in stained glass's narrative tradition, her story emerged through her everyday stream of consciousness rooted in the surreal logic of dreams.  In 1987, Stinsmuehlen-Amend relocated to Los Angeles, where she became a full-time artist; solo exhibitions and dynamic public art commissions followed. She was the lead artist on the Hollywood Demonstration Project in Hollywood, completing a precast concrete crosswalk with inlaid glass and bronze and an adjunct wrought iron public space. In 1994, she completed leaded glass for the AT&T corporate headquarters and The Jewish Museum, both in in New York City. Throughout these decades, she maintained her commitment to teaching, returning to Pilchuck Glass School repeatedly (1980 to 2019) and serving as a visiting artist at RISD, RIT, Tyler School of Art, California College of the Arts, and numerous other institutions. Stinsmuehlen-Amend's work is included in major collections including the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Detroit Institute of the Arts, Oakland Museum of California, Corning Museum of Glass, Tacoma Museum of Glass, and Museum of Art and Design. She has received two National Endowment for the Arts Fellowships, two Pilchuck Hauberg Fellowships, and the 2007 Brychtová Libenský Award. The artist served 14 years on Pilchuck's Board of Directors and is a Trustee Emeritus of The American Craft Council and an Honorary Life Member of the Glass Art Society. She was recently awarded by the American Craft Council with the biennial College of Fellows honor for contributions to the craft ecosystem. Opening on May 16, 2026, at the Corning Museum of Glass, Tough Stuff: Women in the American Glass Studio will feature Stinsmuehlen-Amend's work. This new exhibition celebrates the female artists who revolutionized American Studio glass. The artist states: "Many artists found my loose and inclusive approach to working with glass inspirational because I was continually violating preconceived notions about craft and glass specifically."  

What if the tale of Genesis were reframed as a story of humanity's ascent into awareness of mortality and entropy? How are both connectedness and a “mattering project” key to flourishing as an individual? Rebecca Goldstein is the author of several fiction and non-fiction books, including The Mattering Instinct: How Our Deepest Longing Drives Us and Divides Us, 36 Arguments for the Existence of God: A Work of Fiction, Plato at the Googleplex: Why Philosophy Won't Go Away, and The Mind-Body Problem. Greg and Rebecca discuss how the ideas in her new book, The Mattering Instinct, trace back to her novel, The Mind-Body Problem. Rebecca details a long-developed theory of human motivation: beyond survival and pleasure, humans are “creatures of matter who long to matter,” driven to justify themselves in their own eyes (homo justificans). To Rebecca, this is linked to self-reflection, theory of mind, and existential “absurdity.” This episode will outline some mattering strategies and also discuss personality links, ethics, and concerns about AI. *unSILOed Podcast is produced by University FM.* Episode Quotes: We are creatures of matter who long to matter 08:21: What we are are creatures of matter who long to matter. I love that we can do that in English. You know, we can't do it; it can't be replicated in other languages. But thank goodness for English, two amazing words: the noun matter and the verb matter. Why everyone needs to feel like they matter 04:23: Look, everybody needs to feel like they matter. Then there's a great diversity of ways in which we might try to prove to ourselves that we matter. The human search for values 15:11: Entering into this world of entropy, where everything eventually runs out of energy and does die, the universe itself will run out of energy and thermal equilibrium that awaits the universe, with that stepping out of paradise. They took on the burden, but the dignity of being human, of trying to justify becoming Homo Justific, becoming creatures who are in search of values that will justify them in their own eyes. We come up with a whole bunch of values, and we disagree tremendously about these values, but there's something so grand about being creatures who need values in order to be able to  live with themselves, even if they're bad values, but that we bring values into the universe because we are creatures longing to matter. Show Links: Recommended Resources: Ludwig Wittgenstein Aristotle Book of Genesis Baruch Spinoza Eudaimonia Happiness Economics Sigmund Freud Entropy Second Law of Thermodynamics Theory of Mind Blaise Pascal “The unexamined life is not worth living.” Darwinism William James Guest Profile: RebeccaGoldstein.com Wikipedia Profile Profile on the National Endowment for the Humanities Guest Work: Amazon Author Page The Mattering Instinct: How Our Deepest Longing Drives Us and Divides Us Incompleteness: The Proof and Paradox of Kurt Gödel 36 Arguments for the Existence of God: A Work of Fiction Plato at the Googleplex: Why Philosophy Won't Go Away The Mind-Body Problem Betraying Spinoza: The Renegade Jew Who Gave Us Modernity Kurt Gödel The Dark Sister Mazel Properties Of Light Late Summer Passion of a Woman of Mind The Mattering Map | Substack Newsletter Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Funding dance programs has never been easy. And back in May the National Endowment for the Arts canceled at least $1 million in grants to San Francisco nonprofits alone. Leaders in the Bay Area dance community found themselves say they're now more strained than ever. Last summer, Renée Bartlett-Webber went to find out how Dance programs have had to pivot. 

Alex Voisine interviews today Amanda Sarasien. Born in Tennessee) she is a writer, literary translator, and visual artist. Her translation of Springtime in the Bones by Állex Leilla will be published in March 2026 by Foreshore Books. She translates from French and Portuguese into English and was a 2022 National Endowment for the Arts Translation Fellow. They speak about the role of the translator, to work in translation, art and literature with a disability and many other topics. Alex Voisine entrevista hoy a Amanda Sarasien. Nacida en Tennessee, es escritora, traductora literaria y artista visual. Su traducción de Springtime in the Bones de Állex Leilla se publicará en marzo de 2026 por Foreshore Books. Traduce del francés y del portugués al inglés y fue becaria de Traducción del National Endowment for the Arts en 2022. Conversan sobre el papel del traductor, el trabajo en la traducción, el arte y la literatura desde la experiencia de la discapacidad, y muchos otros temas.

Mitchell L. H. Douglas, a National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellow and Indiana University Indianapolis associate professor, released his fourth poetry collection, “Universal Corner,” on March 3. The collection explores the intersection of music, memory and humanity through the lens of punk and hip-hop cultures.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Dr. Jennifer Maritza McCauley is the acclaimed author of When Trying to Return Home (2023), which was a New York Times Editors' Choice, Best Fiction Book of the Year by Kirkus Reviews, and a Must-Read by Elle, Latinx in Publishing, Ms. Magazine, and Southern Review of Books. A former National Endowment for the Arts fellow, she is an assistant professor of English at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. Visit her website at https://jennifermaritzamccauley.com/ Spies, Lies and Private Eyes is copyrighted by Authors on the Air Global Radio Network #authorsofinstagram #authorinterview #writingcommunity #authorsontheair#suspensebooks#authorssupportingauthors #thrillerbooks #suspense #wip#writers#writersinspiration #books#bookrecommendations #bookaddict #bookaddicted#bookaddiction #bibliophile #read#amreading #lovetoread #terrencemccauley#terrencemccauleybooks #bookouture #thrillers#theuniversityseries #JenniferMaritzaMcCauley #NeonSteel

Dr. Jennifer Maritza McCauley is the acclaimed author of When Trying to Return Home (2023), which was a New York Times Editors' Choice, Best Fiction Book of the Year by Kirkus Reviews, and a Must-Read by Elle, Latinx in Publishing, Ms. Magazine, and Southern Review of Books. A former National Endowment for the Arts fellow, she is an assistant professor of English at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. Visit her website at https://jennifermaritzamccauley.com/ Spies, Lies and Private Eyes is copyrighted by Authors on the Air Global Radio Network #authorsofinstagram #authorinterview #writingcommunity #authorsontheair#suspensebooks#authorssupportingauthors #thrillerbooks #suspense #wip#writers#writersinspiration #books#bookrecommendations #bookaddict #bookaddicted#bookaddiction #bibliophile #read#amreading #lovetoread #terrencemccauley#terrencemccauleybooks #bookouture #thrillers#theuniversityseries #JenniferMaritzaMcCauley #NeonSteel

The Alliance for Civics in the Academy hosted "How Can Universities Strengthen Civic Education in K–12 Schools?" with Jennifer McNabb, Joshua Dunn, and Jenna Storey on March 4, 2026, from 9:00-10:00 a.m. PT. Universities are increasingly reexamining their role as incubators of effective citizenship. An essential yet often overlooked part of this work is strengthening K–12 civic education. This webinar explores how efforts within higher education can support civic learning in K–12 schools, with particular emphasis on the academy's role in training the next generation of educators. ABOUT THE SPEAKERS Meira Levinson is a political theorist/philosopher of education who is working to start a global field of educational ethics that is philosophically rigorous, disciplinarily and experientially inclusive, and both relevant to and informed by educational policy and practice. In doing so, she draws upon scholarship from multiple disciplines as well as her eight years of experience teaching middle school humanities, civics, history, and English in the Atlanta and Boston Public Schools.  Meira has written or co-edited nine books, including Civic Contestation in Global Education and Educational Equity in a Global Context (both 2024, with Ellis Reid, Tatiana Geron, and Sara O'Brien), Instructional Moves for Powerful Teaching in Higher Education (2023, co-authored with Jeremy Murphy), Democratic Discord in Schools (2019, with Jacob Fay), winner of the 2020 AERA Moral Development and Education SIG Outstanding Book Award, and Dilemmas of Educational Ethics (2016, with Jacob Fay). Her book No Citizen Left Behind (2012) won awards in political science, philosophy, social studies, and education and has been translated into Chinese and Japanese. Meira shares educational ethics resources on JusticeinSchools.org, materials to support K-12 educators working in politically charged environments at Educational Values in Action, and resources for youth activists and teacher allies at YouthinFront.org. Each of these projects reflects Levinson's commitment to achieving productive cross-fertilization — without loss of rigor — among scholarship, policy, and practice. Meira earned a B.A. in philosophy from Yale and a D.Phil. in politics from Nuffield College, Oxford University. Her work has been supported by fellowships from Guggenheim, the Edmond & Lily Safra Center for Ethics at Harvard, Harvard Radcliffe Institute, and the National Academy of Education. Prior to joining the Stanford faculty, Meira taught at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Jennifer McNabb is Professor and Head of the Department of History at the University of Northern Iowa, where she teaches courses on early modern European history and the history of England. She was Co-Chair of UNI's Civic Education Task Force, which created UNI's Center for Civic Education, and she was Co-PI for a National Endowment for the Humanities Connections Grant that developed UNI's first civic education curriculum: "Civic Literacy, Engagement and the Humanities." McNabb is also a Co-PI of a national grant that will establish the Iowa Civic Educators Institute, providing professional development opportunities for in-service and pre-service social studies and history teachers throughout the state. McNabb has received several awards for her teaching and has completed four courses for The Teaching Company's The Great Courses on the Renaissance, witchcraft, sex, and marriage. She currently serves as a Councilor in the Professional Division of the American Historical Association and as president of the Midwest Conference on British Studies. Joshua Dunn (PhD, University of Virginia) serves as Executive Director of the Institute of American Civics at the Howard H. Baker School of Public Policy and Public Affairs at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. His research and teaching focus on constitutional law and history, education policy, federalism, and freedom of speech and religion. His books include Complex Justice: The Case of Missouri v. Jenkins (University of North Carolina Press), From Schoolhouse to Courthouse: The Judiciary's Role in American Education (Brookings Institution Press) and Passing on the Right: Conservative Professors in the Progressive University (Oxford University Press).  Moderator Jenna Silber Storey is the Ravenel Curry Chair in Civic Thought in the Social, Cultural, and Constitutional Studies Division of the American Enterprise Institute, and Co-Director of AEI's Center for the Future of the American University.  She is also an SNF Agora Fellow at Johns Hopkins University and a Research Fellow at the Civitas Institute at the University of Texas at Austin.  She previously taught political philosophy at Furman University, where she was an Assistant Professor in the Department of Politics and International Affairs, and Executive Director of Furman's Tocqueville Program.  Her writing has appeared in outlets such as The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, The Boston Globe, The Chronicle of Higher Education, Inside Higher Ed, First Things, and The National Endowment for the Humanities flagship journal, Humanities.  Dr. Storey is the co-author, with her husband Ben, of Why We Are Restless:  On the Modern Quest for Contentment (Princeton University Press, 2021).  They are currently working on a book titled The Art of Choosing: How Liberal Education Should Prepare You for Life.

Arts On Prescription: What if your doctor prescribed an arts-based treatment for what ails you and your health insurance paid for it.YEAH RIGHT! Actually, Yeah, right, and REALLY! In this episode we learn all about it in Arts on Prescription: A Field Guide for U. S. CommunitiesBIO'sDr. Tasha Golden directs research for the International Arts + Mind Lab at Johns Hopkins Medicine. As a national leader in arts + public health, Dr. Golden studies the impacts of arts & culture, music, aesthetics, and social norms on well-being, health research, and professional practice. She has authored many publications related to arts and health, served as an advisor on several national health initiatives, and is adjunct faculty for the University of Florida's Center for Arts in Medicine.In addition to her research, Golden is a career artist and entrepreneur. As singer-songwriter for the critically acclaimed band Ellery, she toured full-time in the U.S. and abroad, and her songs appear in feature films and TV dramas (ABC, SHOWTIME, FOX, NETFLIX, etc). She is also a published poet and has taught university courses in public health as well as in writing, rhetoric, and literature. Holding a Ph.D. in Public Health Sciences, Dr. Golden draws on her diverse background to develop innovative, interdisciplinary presentations and partnerships that advance health, health equity, creativity, and well-being.Dr. Golden is also the founder of Project Uncaged: an arts-based health intervention for incarcerated teen women that amplifies their voices in community and policy discourses. These young folx are among her greatest teachers.Jill Sonke, PhD, is director of research initiatives in the Center for Arts in Medicine at the University of Florida (UF), director of national research and impact for the One Nation/One Project initiative, and co-director of the EpiArts Lab, a National Endowment for the Arts Research Lab. She is an affiliated faculty member in the UF School of Theatre & Dance, the Norman Fixel Institute for Neurological Diseases, the Center for African Studies, the STEM Translational Communication Center, and the One Health Center, and is an editorial board member for Health Promotion Practice journal. She served in the pandemic as a senior advisor to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Vaccine Confidence and Demand Team on the COVID-19 Vaccine Confidence Task Force and currently serves on the steering committee of the Jameel Arts & Health Lab, established by the World Health Organization (WHO), the Steinhardt School at New York University, Community Jameel, and CULTURUNNERS.With 28 years of experience and leadership in the field of arts in health and a PhD in arts in public health from Ulster University in Northern Ireland, Jill is active in research and policy advocacy nationally and internationally. She is an artist and a mixed methods researcher with a current focus on population-level health outcomes associated with arts and cultural participation, arts in public health, and the arts in health communication. Notable MentionsNotable MentionsArts On Prescription: A Field Guide for US Communities.: A roadmap for communities to develop programs that integrate arts, culture, and nature resources into local health and social care systems. prescription Anne Basting, Creative Care: Basting pioneers a radical change in how we interact with older loved ones, especially those experiencing dementia, as she introduces a proven method that uses the creative arts to bring light and joy to the lives of elders.Atlantic Fellowship:Through seven global, interconnected programs, Atlantic Fellows collaborate across borders and disciplines to address the root causes of inequity.Veronica Rojas is an Atlantic Fellow who works in different art programs in the San Francisco Bay Area that either serve adults with developmental disabilities or older adults, many with dementia. She is both a practicing and teaching artist.Center for Arts in Medicine at the University of Florida (UF): Using creativity to advance health, wellness, and equity as a trained arts in health professional. Promote health one creative moment at a time.International Arts + Mind Lab at Johns Hopkins Medicine,Tennessee Whiskey, Tasha Golden, from Over Land, Over SeaInterlochen Arts Academy: “A global community of like-minded artists, you'll discover a high school for the arts (grades 9-12) you may only have dreamed about.”Mass Cultural Council, CultureRX: Mission - To build a public infrastructure that supports the role of cultural experiences as a protective factor in the health and well-being of all people in the Commonwealth.United Kingdom, National Health Service, social prescribing infrastructure is an approach that connects people to activities, groups, and services in their community to meet the practical, social and emotional needs that affect their health and wellbeing.. Alan Siegel advocate for social prescribingHorizon Blue Cross Blue Shield in New Jersey/New Jersey Performing Arts Center: Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey has made a $3 million gift to NJPAC to support new arts and wellness programming both at the Arts Center and throughout Newark. Health Organization's definition of health, World Health Organization published a social prescribing toolkit.Federal Reserve Bank of New York/Social Prescribing: On Wednesday, October 4, 2023, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, in partnership with Social Prescribing USA, hosted an in-person event discussing how medical prescriptions for patients to participate in community activities such as walking in nature, creating and viewing art, joining social groups, and volunteering can improve public health.Quebec, Mediateur Culturel, For several years, the City of Quebec has been developing cultural mediation projects between professional artists and citizens. By bringing art into their living environment and involving them in the creative process, cultural mediation places citizens at the heart of the artistic process. Here are the works of art created so far in all the boroughs of Quebec.Dr. Daisy Fancourt, is a British researcher who is an Associate Professor of Psychobiology and Epidemiology at University College London.[3][4][5] Her research focuses on the effects of social factors on health, including loneliness, social isolation, community assets, arts and cultural engagement, and social prescribing.[6Social Prescribing USA: “Our mission is to make social...

Have a comment? Send us a text! (We read all of them but can't reply). Email us: Will@faithfulpoliticspodcast.comWhat does it mean to call America a “Christian nation”? And has it ever truly been one?In this episode, we sit down with Matt Avery Sutton, historian and author of Chosen Land, to unpack the long and complicated relationship between Christianity and American public life. From Christopher Columbus and biblical prophecy to premillennialism, evangelical political power, and the modern Supreme Court, Sutton traces the historical through line of Christian influence in the United States. We explore why America became more religious — not less — after disestablishment, how an unofficial Protestant establishment shaped public life, and why separation of church and state did not secularize the country. We also discuss the role of capitalism and corporate funding in shaping both the religious right and the religious left, the theological roots of political activism, and how beliefs about the end times influenced public engagement. Finally, we examine three emerging coalitions competing to define America's future: Christian nationalist conservatives, progressive pluralists who bring faith into the public square, and strict separationists who want religion kept out of politics. This conversation isn't just about what America was — it's about what kind of country we want to be moving forward.Buy - Chosen Land: How Christianity Made America and Americans Remade Christianity https://bookshop.org/a/112456/9781541646339Guest BioMatt Avery Sutton is a distinguished professor and chair of the Department of History at Washington State University. He earned his PhD from the University of California, Santa Barbara, and has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities.He is the author of multiple books, including:Chosen LandAmerican ApocalypseHis work focuses on the intersection of religion, politics, and American culture, with particular attention to evangelicalism and apocalyptic belief.Support the show

Every year, the Multnomah County Library chooses one book they hope the whole city will read. Between January and April, the Library, and their partner organizations, host events based around the themes of the book, and they distribute thousands of free copies—thanks to the Library Foundation—to readers of all ages from across the county. At Literary Arts, our role is to bring the author to town for a talk in the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall. The 2025 Everybody Reads book was the memoir Solito by Javier Zamora. Written from the perspective of his nine-year-old self, Solito is a gripping and beautiful account of Zamora's three-thousand-mile journey from a small village in El Salvador to his new home in United States. Epic in scope and intimate in detail, it's a book about the family one comes from, the family one longs for, and the family one makes. Zamora conjures all the wonder, fear and imaginative capacity of his young self; clear-eyed in his depictions of cruelty and danger, insistent on recognizing kindness. He also renders his journey with vivid detail with breathtaking lyricism, paying close attention to the power of language – this comes as no surprise, given that Zamora is also an award-winning poet. The writer Sandra Cisneros said, “I have waited decades for a memoir like Solito.” But, Solito isn't simply a story of a migrant's harrowing journey, it's the story of a writer becoming a writer. It is also one of the most important American stories of our time. “Poetry and history were the first tools I had to begin to explain my life so far away from the land that watched me be born and grow up for the first nine years of my life.” Javier Zamora was born in La Herradura, El Salvador in 1990. When he was a year old, his father fled El Salvador due to the US-funded Salvadoran Civil War (1980-1992). His mother followed her husband's footsteps in 1995 when Javier was about to turn five. Zamora was left at the care of his grandparents who helped raise him until he migrated to the US when he was nine. His first poetry collection, Unaccompanied, explores some of these themes. In his debut New York Times bestselling memoir, SOLITO, Javier retells his nine-week odyssey across Guatemala, Mexico, and eventually through the Sonoran Desert. He travelled unaccompanied by boat, bus, and foot. After a coyote abandoned his group in Oaxaca, Javier managed to make it to Arizona with the aid of other migrants. Zamora is the winner of a 2024 Whiting Fellowship and the 2022 LA Times-Christopher Isherwood Prize. He holds fellowships from CantoMundo, Colgate University (Olive B. O’Connor), MacDowell, Macondo, the National Endowment for the Arts, Poetry Foundation (Ruth Lilly), Stanford University (Stegner), and Yaddo. He is the recipient of a 2018-2019 Radcliffe Fellowship at Harvard University, a 2017 Lannan Literary Fellowship, the 2017 Narrative Prize, the 2016 Barnes & Noble Writer for Writers Award for his work in the Undocupoets Campaign.

Memoirist and filmmaker Curtis Chin on pitching for national press, booking venues through cold emails, and making a high-volume book events strategy financially sustainable.   You'll learn:Why Curtis booked readings before his memoir released to drive pre-orders, and what that early push unlocked. How he found venues by researching programs and series online, then sending cold outreach without overcomplicating it. A practical way to define your “audience” so your outreach targets the right communities and institutions. How to write a venue email that creates urgency (a “hook” and a reason to say yes now), without sounding gimmicky. A press pitching approach that starts local, builds credibility, and then moves toward national outlets. What his spreadsheets are (and aren't) for, and a lightweight way to track outreach and payments without building a complicated system. How he initially used a publisher budget, then supplemented it with community funding when the budget wasn't enough. Why momentum compounds (your growing “resume” of events and media makes the next invitations easier), and how to lean into that effect. How he structures his day to keep writing, business logistics, and book marketing moving at the same time. How getting paid for talks changed the economics of touring, and why nonfiction subject expertise can create more paid speaking opportunities.  Resources & Links:

Welcome to Mysteries to Die For and this Toe Tag.I am TG Wolff and am here with Jack, my piano player and producer. This is normally a podcast where we combine storytelling with original music to put you at the heart of mystery. Today is a bonus episode we call a Toe Tag. It is the first chapter from a fresh release in the mystery, crime, and thriller genre.Today's featured release is Zigzag Girl by Ruth Knafo SettonTG Wolff ReviewZigzag Girl is mystery suspense. It's opening night for Magician Lucy Moon and her partners Van and Stormie, who are as close as sisters. Amid the bright lights and sparkle of illusion, murder lurks. Performing the sawing a woman illusion, Lucy lifts the lid to enter, when she finds the space is already taken. Her best friend, a black rose, a prop that has killed before—no, Lucy is not going to leave this one to the cops.Bottom line: Zigzag Girl is for you if you like your illusions, suspense, mystery twisted together with a sprinkling of Irish magic.The Zigzag Girl was released from Black Spring Crim and is promoted by Partners In Crime Tours and is available from AMAZON LINK and other book retailers.https://www.amazon.com/ZigZag-Girl-Ruth-Knafo-Setton/dp/1917788037About Ruth Knafo SettonRuthSetton.comBorn in Morocco and raised in the Lehigh Valley, Ruth Knafo Setton is the author of the novel, The Road to Fez (Counterpoint Press). Her honors include awards and fellowships from the National Endowment of the Arts, PEN, CineStory, Nimrod, Cutthroat, Writer's Digest, and residencies at Hedgebrook, Yaddo, MacDowell, and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. She is a multi-genre author whose fiction, creative nonfiction, screenplays, and poetry have won many awards and appeared in journals and anthologies. A former Fiction Editor of Arts & Letters, she has taught Creative Writing and Multicultural Literature at Lehigh University and on Semester at Sea.Wondering what to read after you finish Zigzag Girl? Partners in Crime Tours is your ultimate destination for all things mystery, crime, thriller, and cozy! Since 2011, they've been working to fill bookshelves with gripping and heart-pounding reads. Discover new mystery series and connectwith other fans with Partners in Crime. Look up Partners in Crime Tours on the web or your favorite social media – partnersincrimevbt.com.And Authors, whether you're looking to promote your latest thriller, discover a new mystery series, or connect with fellow fans of the genre, PICT has you covered. Check out their promotion options that come with the personal attention of a dedicated coordinator.Join us next week for the next original story in Season 9 Stuff That Can Kill You. Robert J. Binney and hairstylist extraordinaire Henry Beauchamp are back in the morgue with FLAT, where gravity is the STCKY means of murder.

 Imagine tuning a radio time-machine dial between the past and present of the Zambezi River valley; birds weave a tapestry in and out of the soundscape as static, magnetic drift, crosstalk and interference rise and fall with the signals in the atmosphere. The foundation of this mix, an original recording in the Pitt Rivers Museum collection, is a radio broadcast of singing and drumming by an unidentified group circa 1965, in the first years of Zambia's independence and the period of transition from colonial broadcasting structures to a national network. The available information is minimal; a single scrap of paper tells us the recording is "starring Stephen & Pio". During the copying process one of the reels of tape was accidentally overprinted, so that one track runs backwards while another simultaneously runs forward. In my reimagined mix this glitch leads us through history and memory, the reversed rhythms of backwards magnetic tape conducting an aural transition back into the past.  In the 1970s the government and the people supported the Black majorities in neighbouring countries who were engaged in armed struggles against oppressive white settler regimes. Lusaka, the capital of Zambia, acted as the headquarters for clandestine shortwave radio broadcasts supporting these wars of African liberation. In transmissions of solidarity and strategy sent across borders, the sound of gunfire was a form of station identification, heard here among victory celebrations and swarming mosquitoes. Collectivities float across the airwaves: clouds of insects, armies and colonies and communities of people, soloist and chorus in call and response, the undercurrent of winds and rivers, flocks of birds. For the Tonga of Southern Province, birds are associated with spirits and the women who perform rainmaking rituals with them. Tuning into the Zambezi Valley in the 2020s, we catch voices of women's empowerment amidst fragments of an ongoing community radio revitalization movement. New volunteer-run stations are broadcasting on FM in areas where Internet and cell phone service are sketchy or nonexistent, but most households own at least one radio. Questions asked by Brooklyn College anthropology students are answered by students and radio producers in the Zambezi Valley in an exchange of audio letters, part of a co-production with Claudia Wegener (a.k.a. radio continental drift). In the coda we return to the early years of Zambian freedom and independence, as the tape plays backwards again and the individual voices of the original recording multiply to form a nation.Birds: Macaulay Library, Cornell University Ornithology LabClandestine shortwave recordings: Interval Signals OnlineClips: Radio Zambia, Radio Chikuni, Sinazongwe Community Radio Voices:Maseline Mureles (Narrator), Chisa Mwiinde, ManJun Luo, Anna Kowalski, Miriam Salama, Arilda Hyka, Galit Mamrout, Lucia Munenge, Megi Murati, Meggie Cheng, Mrs. Banda Ndeti, Nosiku Mundia, Margaret Munkuli, Monica Siabunkululu, Patience KabukuThanks: Claudia Wegener, Zongwe FM, Zubo Trust for Women, Brooklyn College, Stuart Fowkes, Anna Stereopolou, Wave Farm, Library of Congress Radio Preservation Task Force, National Endowment for the Humanities Radio & Decolonization workshop.Bantu songs from Zambia reimagined by Tom Miller.———Part of the project A Century of Sounds, reimagining 100 sounds covering 100 years from the collections of the Pitt Rivers Museum at the University of Oxford. Explore the full project at citiesandmemory.com/century-sounds

In this week's News Roundup, Bridget and Producer Mike cover the tech news stories you might have missed. The story behind Hallow, the Christian app hawked by Gwen Stefani: https://mashable.com/article/hallow-prayer-app-gewn-stefani-jd-vance-peter-thiel Elon Musk's Grok doxes adult performer on X: https://www.404media.co/grok-doxing-real-names-birthdates-siri-dahl/ Sleazy facial recognition app unmasks cam girls and sells their images: https://www.404media.co/underground-facial-recognition-tool-unmasks-camgirls/ New UK law requires platforms to remove deepfake nudes and revenge porn within 48 hours: https://www.theguardian.com/society/2026/feb/18/tech-firms-must-remove-revenge-porn-in-48-hours-or-risk-being-blocked-says-starmer The two DOGE bros in charge of cutting National Endowment for the Humanities grants literally just asked ChatGPT what to do: https://www.techdirt.com/2026/02/19/doge-bros-grant-review-process-was-literally-just-asking-chatgpt-is-this-dei/ US civil rights agency sues Coca-Cola distributor for excluding men from casino work trip: https://apnews.com/article/dei-coca-cola-eeoc-lawsuit-andrea-lucas-867fd98ec6d05ab52e7e0a3711e9d492 White Men Learn the Hidden Cost of Suing for Discrimination: https://news.bloomberglaw.com/social-justice/white-men-learn-the-hidden-cost-of-suing-for-discrimination A WIN FOR DEMOCRACY: Trump admin rescinds rule banning discussion of DEI in schools after losing court ruling. https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/department-of-education-backs-down-on-unlawful-directive-targeting-educational-equity Let us know what you think about these stories by emailing hello@tangoti.com or leaving a comment on Spotify! Follow Bridget and TANGOTI on social media! || instagram.com/bridgetmarieindc/ || tiktok.com/@bridgetmarieindc || youtube.com/@ThereAreNoGirlsOnTheInternet || bsky.app/profile/tangoti.bsky.socialSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Jose Torres, senior economist at Interactive Brokers, says the economy is strong and "not looking at a recession here," but  that hot economy benefits cyclical stocks rather than the Magnificent Seven stocks, and that limits just how much the market can gain ground. With technology "set for a down year," the other areas of the market can't generate enough gains — even in a robust economy — to make 2026 positive. He also notes the market has been running in a "three year on, one year off" cycle, and he thinks that will impact tech companies this year." Torres still expects rate cuts and thinks any downturn will be relatively short lived and not too deep, but enough for where investors should adjust their expectations. John Cole Scott, president of CEF Advisors, sizes up the prospects for the first new IPO the closed-end fund industry has seen in several years, and from a surprising source. Robinhood markets, the investment platform, will launch next week Robinhood Ventures Fund I, a concentrated portfolio of private companies. Scott, who also serves as chairman of the Active Investment Company Alliance, discusses the role private equities can play in a portfolio, as well as the challenges investors face in sizing up a fund with a net asset value entirely based on the "value" of illiquid shares that don't trade in public markets. Billy Hensley, president of the National Endowment for Financial Education discusses the group's recent poll on how American adults view their financial well-being, which found that seven of eight respondents were feeling some form of financial stress as they entered the year, with more than three-quarters of all respondents having suffered a financial setback in 2025.

My guest today is Carla Kaplan, the author of Troublemaker: The Fierce, Unruly Life of Jessica Mitford (Harper, 2025). In Troublemaker, Kaplan tells the wild and unlikely story of Jessica Mitford, fifth of the six famous Mitford Girls, a British aristocrat-turned-American Communist, famous for exposés like The American Way of Death. This biography brings her astonishing self-transformation to life with a riveting, often hilarious account of trading wealth and status for a life of radical activism. Jessica Mitford, always known as Decca, was brought up by an eccentric English family to marry well and reproduce her wealth and privilege, not to advocate for the rights of others. Decca ran away to America to forge a rebel's life. As this richly researched book details, Decca broke the Mitford mold. Instead of settling for life as a professional Beauty, she fought fascism in the Spanish Civil War, became an American Communist and pioneered witty, hugely popular journalism, including her 1963 blockbuster The American Way of Death. Decca dedicated her life to social justice and proved herself an immensely effective ally, but she also injected laughter into all her political work, annoying some activists with her relentless antics but encouraging many others to find joy in the struggle. Mining extensive, untapped sources, and with nearly fifty new interviews, Kaplan's passionate biography beautifully illuminates how Decca's hard-won and self-taught social empathy offers a powerful example of female freedom, the dramatic, novelistic story of an extraordinary woman of her time who is remarkably relevant and resonant today. Carla Kaplan is an award-winning professor and writer who holds the Stanton W. and Elisabeth K. Davis Distinguished Professorship in American Literature at Northeastern University. She has published seven books, including Zora Neale Hurston: A Life in Letters and Miss Anne in Harlem: The White Women of the Black Renaissance, both New York Times Notable Books. A recipient of Guggenheim and National Endowment for the Humanities “Public Scholar” fellowships, Kaplan has been a fellow in residence at the Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers, the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, and the W. E. B. Du Bois Research Institute; is a fellow of the Society of American Historians; and serves on the board of Biographers International. She divides her time between Boston and Cape Cod. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

My guest today is Carla Kaplan, the author of Troublemaker: The Fierce, Unruly Life of Jessica Mitford (Harper, 2025). In Troublemaker, Kaplan tells the wild and unlikely story of Jessica Mitford, fifth of the six famous Mitford Girls, a British aristocrat-turned-American Communist, famous for exposés like The American Way of Death. This biography brings her astonishing self-transformation to life with a riveting, often hilarious account of trading wealth and status for a life of radical activism. Jessica Mitford, always known as Decca, was brought up by an eccentric English family to marry well and reproduce her wealth and privilege, not to advocate for the rights of others. Decca ran away to America to forge a rebel's life. As this richly researched book details, Decca broke the Mitford mold. Instead of settling for life as a professional Beauty, she fought fascism in the Spanish Civil War, became an American Communist and pioneered witty, hugely popular journalism, including her 1963 blockbuster The American Way of Death. Decca dedicated her life to social justice and proved herself an immensely effective ally, but she also injected laughter into all her political work, annoying some activists with her relentless antics but encouraging many others to find joy in the struggle. Mining extensive, untapped sources, and with nearly fifty new interviews, Kaplan's passionate biography beautifully illuminates how Decca's hard-won and self-taught social empathy offers a powerful example of female freedom, the dramatic, novelistic story of an extraordinary woman of her time who is remarkably relevant and resonant today. Carla Kaplan is an award-winning professor and writer who holds the Stanton W. and Elisabeth K. Davis Distinguished Professorship in American Literature at Northeastern University. She has published seven books, including Zora Neale Hurston: A Life in Letters and Miss Anne in Harlem: The White Women of the Black Renaissance, both New York Times Notable Books. A recipient of Guggenheim and National Endowment for the Humanities “Public Scholar” fellowships, Kaplan has been a fellow in residence at the Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers, the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, and the W. E. B. Du Bois Research Institute; is a fellow of the Society of American Historians; and serves on the board of Biographers International. She divides her time between Boston and Cape Cod. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/biography

My guest today is Carla Kaplan, the author of Troublemaker: The Fierce, Unruly Life of Jessica Mitford (Harper, 2025). In Troublemaker, Kaplan tells the wild and unlikely story of Jessica Mitford, fifth of the six famous Mitford Girls, a British aristocrat-turned-American Communist, famous for exposés like The American Way of Death. This biography brings her astonishing self-transformation to life with a riveting, often hilarious account of trading wealth and status for a life of radical activism. Jessica Mitford, always known as Decca, was brought up by an eccentric English family to marry well and reproduce her wealth and privilege, not to advocate for the rights of others. Decca ran away to America to forge a rebel's life. As this richly researched book details, Decca broke the Mitford mold. Instead of settling for life as a professional Beauty, she fought fascism in the Spanish Civil War, became an American Communist and pioneered witty, hugely popular journalism, including her 1963 blockbuster The American Way of Death. Decca dedicated her life to social justice and proved herself an immensely effective ally, but she also injected laughter into all her political work, annoying some activists with her relentless antics but encouraging many others to find joy in the struggle. Mining extensive, untapped sources, and with nearly fifty new interviews, Kaplan's passionate biography beautifully illuminates how Decca's hard-won and self-taught social empathy offers a powerful example of female freedom, the dramatic, novelistic story of an extraordinary woman of her time who is remarkably relevant and resonant today. Carla Kaplan is an award-winning professor and writer who holds the Stanton W. and Elisabeth K. Davis Distinguished Professorship in American Literature at Northeastern University. She has published seven books, including Zora Neale Hurston: A Life in Letters and Miss Anne in Harlem: The White Women of the Black Renaissance, both New York Times Notable Books. A recipient of Guggenheim and National Endowment for the Humanities “Public Scholar” fellowships, Kaplan has been a fellow in residence at the Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers, the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, and the W. E. B. Du Bois Research Institute; is a fellow of the Society of American Historians; and serves on the board of Biographers International. She divides her time between Boston and Cape Cod. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Louis Jones is a keeper— working as a Field Archivist at the Reuther Library at Wayne State University in Detroit, he cares for the largest labor archive in North America. Home to numerous union and labor collections from around the country, the Reuther Library also actively collects material documenting Detroit's civil rights movement, women's struggles in the workplace, the LGBTQ Archive of Detroit and more.Born in New York City, the grandson of a Pullman porter, Jones takes us through the archives with stories of the United Auto Workers, Cesar Chavez, Utah Phillips, A. Philip Randolph, the Civil Rights Movement, the 1967 Detroit uprising, and how archivists are examining and re-imagining their roles in the midst of Covid-19 and the Black Lives Matter movement.Special thanks to the Reuther Library at Wayne State University, Detroit, Michigan; Nancy Beaumont and the Society of American Archivists (SAA); Paulina Hartono; The National Endowment for the Humanities; and supporters of The Kitchen Sisters Productions.Produced by The Kitchen Sisters (Nikki Silva & Davia Nelson) with Nathan Dalton and Brandi Howell. The Kitchen Sisters Present is part of Radiotopia from PRX.

In this week's episode, authors Kim Coleman Foote and Toni Ann Johnson talk about fictionalizing their families' difficult and messy history to create dark, heartfelt, and sometimes funny novels.Kim Coleman Foote is the author of the acclaimed novel, Coleman Hill, which blends fact and fiction about her family's Great Migration journey to suburban New Jersey, where Kim grew up. The novel was a finalist for the Carol Shields Prize and NAACP Image Award, among others, and was long-listed for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize. Additional honors include literature fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the New York Foundation for the Arts, and Kimbilio; residencies at Hedgebrook, Yaddo, and MacDowell; and a Fulbright Fellowship to Ghana, where Kim conducted fieldwork for her second novel, Salt Water Sister. Forthcoming from SJP Lit in 2027, the novel explores women's resistance to enslavement in the 1700s and a fight for reparations in the present day.Toni Ann Johnson is the winner of the Flannery O'Connor Award for short fiction for Light Skin Gone to Waste, which was selected for the prize and edited by Roxane Gay. The book, a work of autobiographical fiction based on Johnson's family, was also shortlisted for the Saroyan Prize and nominated for an NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work. Johnson's novella Homegoing (about the same family) won Accents Publishing's inaugural novella contest. Her novel Remedy for a Broken Angel earned an NAACP Image Award nomination for Outstanding Literary Work by a Debut Author. Her newest book, But Where's Home? is Johnson's third installment of the "Arrington Family" saga, and won the Screen Door Press Prize for fiction. Books:A full list of the books and authors mentioned in this episode is available here. Register for Upcoming Events.The Watchung Booksellers Podcast is produced by Kathryn Counsell and Marni Jessup and is recorded at Watchung Booksellers in Montclair, NJ. The show is edited by Kathryn Counsell. Original music is composed and performed by Violet Mujica. Research and show notes by Caroline Shurtleff. Thanks to all the staff at Watchung Booksellers and The Kids' Room! If you liked our episode please like, follow, and share! Stay in touch!Email: wbpodcast@watchungbooksellers.comSocial: @watchungbooksellersSign up for our newsletter to get the latest on our shows, events, and book recommendations!

Rick Beck's modern cast and carved figurative glass sculptures are inspired by industrial and architectural works as well as the human form, with an emphasis on formal aspects. Interested in playing the volumes of mass against the rhythm of the lines, Beck enjoys the interplay of the visual versus the verbal, creating art that challenges the eye as well as the mind. Beck states: "My wife, Valerie, got me a book about the competitive relationship between Picasso and Matisse. Their artistic dialogue about the figure has fired my imagination, especially the way they shared and borrowed images and ideas from one another, as well as from history and literature. Between this book and visits to the Art Institute of Chicago, I've been inspired by the use of shape, form, and mass to create something more universal than the literal subject." A studio artist who was based in Spruce Pine, North Carolina, for 30 years before moving to Hawaii in 2020, Beck began working in glass at Hastings College in Nebraska, where he received his BA. The artist received his MFA from Southern Illinois University, where he studied with Bill Boysen. He was awarded residencies at the Appalachian Center for Crafts 1989 to 1991, and in 1994 received a Visual Arts Fellowship from the North Carolina Arts Council, followed by a National Endowment for the Arts regional Visual Arts Fellowship from the Southern Arts Federation in 1995. A student of the Studio Glass movement, Beck has assisted at Pilchuck Glass School, assisting artists Curtiss Brock and Jan Mares, as well as at the Penland School of Craft.   Beck currently shares a studio with wife Valerie Thomas Beck in Hakalau, Hawaii. Valerie has been a designer and co-conspirator to Rick since 1984. Both artists have been artists-in-residence at Penland School of Crafts, North Carolina, (1991-94) and have also been instructors there. Their blown glass work consists mainly of vessels – canvasses for imagery based on dreams and experiences ranging from the sublime to the ridiculous. These vessels document their lives while providing beauty and pleasure. Since moving to the Big Island, Beck's challenge in making glass work is two-fold. First, to create work without using fossil fuels or adding to the demand for capacity on the electrical grid. Their new studio is powered by a solar/photo voltaic and battery system. Second, to create work that excites and challenges his concepts of art inside these new energy parameters. For him, formal aspects are crucial. Beck stretches and manipulates common shapes and objects, reducing the objects to pattern and geometry. Currently, he is producing work focusing on the geometry of life, plant, and human forms.  Beck's work will be on view in 2026 at Blue Print Gallery, Dallas, Texas, opening February 26; at Hidell Brooks Gallery, Charlotte, North Carolina, in May; at Blue Spiral 1 group show, Asheville, North Carolina; and at Ken Saunders, Chicago, Illinois. His work is also represented by Raven Gallery, Aspen, Colorado.    

When young people began disappearing in Argentina, their mothers searched for answers. Despite laws prohibiting protests and political gatherings, the women still met to walk the Plaza de Mayo, a central square in Buenos Aires near the president's residence. The government worked to deny their reports of the missing, to discredit the women, and to erode their standing among their peers. But the Madres de la Plaza de Mayo persisted. Dr. Laura Tedesco joins us to share about her own childhood in Argentina during the military junta of the 1970s, her expertise on the Madres de la Plaza de Mayo, and what authoritarianism then and now looks like, as we take a deep dive into her article “How Government Killings and Kidnappings in Argentina drove mothers to resist and revolt – and eventually win,” published in The Conversation on January 27, 2026. This episode explores: features of authoritarianism, liberation theology, the death flights, Nunca Mas, human rights, fear, mothers' activism, and how a society can react to state terrorism. Our guest is: Dr. Laura Tedesco, who is an Associate Professor of Political Science and International Relations. She specializes in Latin American Politics, Political Leadership, Political Corruption, and the dynamics of Authoritarianism and Democracy. From 2016 to 2024, she led a research grant funded by the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), focusing on the political role of the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias (FAR) in Cuba. Additionally, from 2009 to 2021, she directed a research project sponsored by the Open Society Institute, examining political leadership in Latin America. Since 2024, Dr. Tedesco has served as the Associate Dean for Humanities and Social Sciences at Saint Louis University's Madrid campus. Our host is: Dr. Christina Gessler, who is a writing coach and developmental editor for academics. She is the creator and producer of the Academic Life podcast. She holds a PhD in history, which she uses to explore what stories we tell and what happens to those we never tell. Playlist for listeners: The First and Last King of Haiti A Brief History of the World in 47 Borders Thanks To Life Dear Miss Perkins: A Story of Frances Perkins Efforts to Aid Refugees From Nazi Germany Secret Harvests Preparing for War Living Right The Library of Lost Maps Welcome to Academic Life, the podcast for your academic journey—and beyond! Join us again to learn from more experts inside and outside the academy, and around the world. Missed any of the 300+ Academic Life episodes? Find them here. And thank you for listening! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

When young people began disappearing in Argentina, their mothers searched for answers. Despite laws prohibiting protests and political gatherings, the women still met to walk the Plaza de Mayo, a central square in Buenos Aires near the president's residence. The government worked to deny their reports of the missing, to discredit the women, and to erode their standing among their peers. But the Madres de la Plaza de Mayo persisted. Dr. Laura Tedesco joins us to share about her own childhood in Argentina during the military junta of the 1970s, her expertise on the Madres de la Plaza de Mayo, and what authoritarianism then and now looks like, as we take a deep dive into her article “How Government Killings and Kidnappings in Argentina drove mothers to resist and revolt – and eventually win,” published in The Conversation on January 27, 2026. This episode explores: features of authoritarianism, liberation theology, the death flights, Nunca Mas, human rights, fear, mothers' activism, and how a society can react to state terrorism. Our guest is: Dr. Laura Tedesco, who is an Associate Professor of Political Science and International Relations. She specializes in Latin American Politics, Political Leadership, Political Corruption, and the dynamics of Authoritarianism and Democracy. From 2016 to 2024, she led a research grant funded by the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), focusing on the political role of the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias (FAR) in Cuba. Additionally, from 2009 to 2021, she directed a research project sponsored by the Open Society Institute, examining political leadership in Latin America. Since 2024, Dr. Tedesco has served as the Associate Dean for Humanities and Social Sciences at Saint Louis University's Madrid campus. Our host is: Dr. Christina Gessler, who is a writing coach and developmental editor for academics. She is the creator and producer of the Academic Life podcast. She holds a PhD in history, which she uses to explore what stories we tell and what happens to those we never tell. Playlist for listeners: The First and Last King of Haiti A Brief History of the World in 47 Borders Thanks To Life Dear Miss Perkins: A Story of Frances Perkins Efforts to Aid Refugees From Nazi Germany Secret Harvests Preparing for War Living Right The Library of Lost Maps Welcome to Academic Life, the podcast for your academic journey—and beyond! Join us again to learn from more experts inside and outside the academy, and around the world. Missed any of the 300+ Academic Life episodes? Find them here. And thank you for listening! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/latin-american-studies

When young people began disappearing in Argentina, their mothers searched for answers. Despite laws prohibiting protests and political gatherings, the women still met to walk the Plaza de Mayo, a central square in Buenos Aires near the president's residence. The government worked to deny their reports of the missing, to discredit the women, and to erode their standing among their peers. But the Madres de la Plaza de Mayo persisted. Dr. Laura Tedesco joins us to share about her own childhood in Argentina during the military junta of the 1970s, her expertise on the Madres de la Plaza de Mayo, and what authoritarianism then and now looks like, as we take a deep dive into her article “How Government Killings and Kidnappings in Argentina drove mothers to resist and revolt – and eventually win,” published in The Conversation on January 27, 2026. This episode explores: features of authoritarianism, liberation theology, the death flights, Nunca Mas, human rights, fear, mothers' activism, and how a society can react to state terrorism. Our guest is: Dr. Laura Tedesco, who is an Associate Professor of Political Science and International Relations. She specializes in Latin American Politics, Political Leadership, Political Corruption, and the dynamics of Authoritarianism and Democracy. From 2016 to 2024, she led a research grant funded by the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), focusing on the political role of the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias (FAR) in Cuba. Additionally, from 2009 to 2021, she directed a research project sponsored by the Open Society Institute, examining political leadership in Latin America. Since 2024, Dr. Tedesco has served as the Associate Dean for Humanities and Social Sciences at Saint Louis University's Madrid campus. Our host is: Dr. Christina Gessler, who is a writing coach and developmental editor for academics. She is the creator and producer of the Academic Life podcast. She holds a PhD in history, which she uses to explore what stories we tell and what happens to those we never tell. Playlist for listeners: The First and Last King of Haiti A Brief History of the World in 47 Borders Thanks To Life Dear Miss Perkins: A Story of Frances Perkins Efforts to Aid Refugees From Nazi Germany Secret Harvests Preparing for War Living Right The Library of Lost Maps Welcome to Academic Life, the podcast for your academic journey—and beyond! Join us again to learn from more experts inside and outside the academy, and around the world. Missed any of the 300+ Academic Life episodes? Find them here. And thank you for listening! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/gender-studies

When young people began disappearing in Argentina, their mothers searched for answers. Despite laws prohibiting protests and political gatherings, the women still met to walk the Plaza de Mayo, a central square in Buenos Aires near the president's residence. The government worked to deny their reports of the missing, to discredit the women, and to erode their standing among their peers. But the Madres de la Plaza de Mayo persisted. Dr. Laura Tedesco joins us to share about her own childhood in Argentina during the military junta of the 1970s, her expertise on the Madres de la Plaza de Mayo, and what authoritarianism then and now looks like, as we take a deep dive into her article “How Government Killings and Kidnappings in Argentina drove mothers to resist and revolt – and eventually win,” published in The Conversation on January 27, 2026. This episode explores: features of authoritarianism, liberation theology, the death flights, Nunca Mas, human rights, fear, mothers' activism, and how a society can react to state terrorism. Our guest is: Dr. Laura Tedesco, who is an Associate Professor of Political Science and International Relations. She specializes in Latin American Politics, Political Leadership, Political Corruption, and the dynamics of Authoritarianism and Democracy. From 2016 to 2024, she led a research grant funded by the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), focusing on the political role of the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias (FAR) in Cuba. Additionally, from 2009 to 2021, she directed a research project sponsored by the Open Society Institute, examining political leadership in Latin America. Since 2024, Dr. Tedesco has served as the Associate Dean for Humanities and Social Sciences at Saint Louis University's Madrid campus. Our host is: Dr. Christina Gessler, who is a writing coach and developmental editor for academics. She is the creator and producer of the Academic Life podcast. She holds a PhD in history, which she uses to explore what stories we tell and what happens to those we never tell. Playlist for listeners: The First and Last King of Haiti A Brief History of the World in 47 Borders Thanks To Life Dear Miss Perkins: A Story of Frances Perkins Efforts to Aid Refugees From Nazi Germany Secret Harvests Preparing for War Living Right The Library of Lost Maps Welcome to Academic Life, the podcast for your academic journey—and beyond! Join us again to learn from more experts inside and outside the academy, and around the world. Missed any of the 300+ Academic Life episodes? Find them here. And thank you for listening! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/academic-life

When young people began disappearing in Argentina, their mothers searched for answers. Despite laws prohibiting protests and political gatherings, the women still met to walk the Plaza de Mayo, a central square in Buenos Aires near the president's residence. The government worked to deny their reports of the missing, to discredit the women, and to erode their standing among their peers. But the Madres de la Plaza de Mayo persisted. Dr. Laura Tedesco joins us to share about her own childhood in Argentina during the military junta of the 1970s, her expertise on the Madres de la Plaza de Mayo, and what authoritarianism then and now looks like, as we take a deep dive into her article “How Government Killings and Kidnappings in Argentina drove mothers to resist and revolt – and eventually win,” published in The Conversation on January 27, 2026. This episode explores: features of authoritarianism, liberation theology, the death flights, Nunca Mas, human rights, fear, mothers' activism, and how a society can react to state terrorism. Our guest is: Dr. Laura Tedesco, who is an Associate Professor of Political Science and International Relations. She specializes in Latin American Politics, Political Leadership, Political Corruption, and the dynamics of Authoritarianism and Democracy. From 2016 to 2024, she led a research grant funded by the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), focusing on the political role of the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias (FAR) in Cuba. Additionally, from 2009 to 2021, she directed a research project sponsored by the Open Society Institute, examining political leadership in Latin America. Since 2024, Dr. Tedesco has served as the Associate Dean for Humanities and Social Sciences at Saint Louis University's Madrid campus. Our host is: Dr. Christina Gessler, who is a writing coach and developmental editor for academics. She is the creator and producer of the Academic Life podcast. She holds a PhD in history, which she uses to explore what stories we tell and what happens to those we never tell. Playlist for listeners: The First and Last King of Haiti A Brief History of the World in 47 Borders Thanks To Life Dear Miss Perkins: A Story of Frances Perkins Efforts to Aid Refugees From Nazi Germany Secret Harvests Preparing for War Living Right The Library of Lost Maps Welcome to Academic Life, the podcast for your academic journey—and beyond! Join us again to learn from more experts inside and outside the academy, and around the world. Missed any of the 300+ Academic Life episodes? Find them here. And thank you for listening! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

When young people began disappearing in Argentina, their mothers searched for answers. Despite laws prohibiting protests and political gatherings, the women still met to walk the Plaza de Mayo, a central square in Buenos Aires near the president's residence. The government worked to deny their reports of the missing, to discredit the women, and to erode their standing among their peers. But the Madres de la Plaza de Mayo persisted. Dr. Laura Tedesco joins us to share about her own childhood in Argentina during the military junta of the 1970s, her expertise on the Madres de la Plaza de Mayo, and what authoritarianism then and now looks like, as we take a deep dive into her article “How Government Killings and Kidnappings in Argentina drove mothers to resist and revolt – and eventually win,” published in The Conversation on January 27, 2026. This episode explores: features of authoritarianism, liberation theology, the death flights, Nunca Mas, human rights, fear, mothers' activism, and how a society can react to state terrorism. Our guest is: Dr. Laura Tedesco, who is an Associate Professor of Political Science and International Relations. She specializes in Latin American Politics, Political Leadership, Political Corruption, and the dynamics of Authoritarianism and Democracy. From 2016 to 2024, she led a research grant funded by the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), focusing on the political role of the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias (FAR) in Cuba. Additionally, from 2009 to 2021, she directed a research project sponsored by the Open Society Institute, examining political leadership in Latin America. Since 2024, Dr. Tedesco has served as the Associate Dean for Humanities and Social Sciences at Saint Louis University's Madrid campus. Our host is: Dr. Christina Gessler, who is a writing coach and developmental editor for academics. She is the creator and producer of the Academic Life podcast. She holds a PhD in history, which she uses to explore what stories we tell and what happens to those we never tell. Playlist for listeners: The First and Last King of Haiti A Brief History of the World in 47 Borders Thanks To Life Dear Miss Perkins: A Story of Frances Perkins Efforts to Aid Refugees From Nazi Germany Secret Harvests Preparing for War Living Right The Library of Lost Maps Welcome to Academic Life, the podcast for your academic journey—and beyond! Join us again to learn from more experts inside and outside the academy, and around the world. Missed any of the 300+ Academic Life episodes? Find them here. And thank you for listening! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

When young people began disappearing in Argentina, their mothers searched for answers. Despite laws prohibiting protests and political gatherings, the women still met to walk the Plaza de Mayo, a central square in Buenos Aires near the president's residence. The government worked to deny their reports of the missing, to discredit the women, and to erode their standing among their peers. But the Madres de la Plaza de Mayo persisted. Dr. Laura Tedesco joins us to share about her own childhood in Argentina during the military junta of the 1970s, her expertise on the Madres de la Plaza de Mayo, and what authoritarianism then and now looks like, as we take a deep dive into her article “How Government Killings and Kidnappings in Argentina drove mothers to resist and revolt – and eventually win,” published in The Conversation on January 27, 2026. This episode explores: features of authoritarianism, liberation theology, the death flights, Nunca Mas, human rights, fear, mothers' activism, and how a society can react to state terrorism. Our guest is: Dr. Laura Tedesco, who is an Associate Professor of Political Science and International Relations. She specializes in Latin American Politics, Political Leadership, Political Corruption, and the dynamics of Authoritarianism and Democracy. From 2016 to 2024, she led a research grant funded by the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), focusing on the political role of the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias (FAR) in Cuba. Additionally, from 2009 to 2021, she directed a research project sponsored by the Open Society Institute, examining political leadership in Latin America. Since 2024, Dr. Tedesco has served as the Associate Dean for Humanities and Social Sciences at Saint Louis University's Madrid campus. Our host is: Dr. Christina Gessler, who is a writing coach and developmental editor for academics. She is the creator and producer of the Academic Life podcast. She holds a PhD in history, which she uses to explore what stories we tell and what happens to those we never tell. Playlist for listeners: The First and Last King of Haiti A Brief History of the World in 47 Borders Thanks To Life Dear Miss Perkins: A Story of Frances Perkins Efforts to Aid Refugees From Nazi Germany Secret Harvests Preparing for War Living Right The Library of Lost Maps Welcome to Academic Life, the podcast for your academic journey—and beyond! Join us again to learn from more experts inside and outside the academy, and around the world. Missed any of the 300+ Academic Life episodes? Find them here. And thank you for listening! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This month of learning is sponsored by our dear friends Matt and Mollie Landes of Riverdale for the neshama of Dovid Yehonatan ben Yitzchak Yehuda.In this episode of the 18Forty Podcast, we speak with Professors Elisheva Carlebach and Debra Kaplan, scholars of early modern Jewish history, about women's religious, social, and communal roles in early modern Jewish life.In this episode we discuss:How have women's prayer and shul-going habits changed over time? When did the women's chevra kadisha become a Jewish institution? How did Jewish emancipation alter the structure of Jewish life and its implications for women? Tune in for a conversation about how women shaped—and were shaped by—the structures of the early modern kehillah.Interview begins at 9:13.Elisheva Carlebach is the Salo Wittmayer Baron Professor of Jewish History, Culture, and Society at Columbia University and Director of its Institute for Israel and Jewish Studies. A specialist in Early Modern European Jewish history, her work explores Jewish–Christian relations, religious dissent, conversion, messianism, and communal life. She is the award-winning author of The Pursuit of Heresy, Divided Souls, and Palaces of Time, and has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities and honors including Columbia's Lenfest Distinguished Faculty Award.Debra Kaplan teaches early modern Jewish history at Bar-Ilan University. A social historian, she is the author of Beyond Expulsion (2011) and The Patrons and their Poor (University of Pennsylvania 2020; winner of the Rosl und Paul Arnsberg-Preis).References:“Notes Toward Finding the Right Question” by Cynthia OzickA Woman Is Responsible for Everything: Jewish Women in Early Modern Europe by Debra Kaplan and Elisheva CarlebachWomen and the Messianic Heresy of Sabbatai Zevi, 1666 - 1816 by Ada Rapoport-AlbertMothers and Children: Jewish Family Life in Medieval Europe by Elisheva BaumgartenComing of Age in Medieval Egypt: Female Adolescence, Jewish Law, and Ordinary Culture by Eve KrakowskiFor more 18Forty:NEWSLETTER: 18forty.org/joinCALL: (212) 582-1840EMAIL: info@18forty.orgWEBSITE: 18forty.orgIG: @18fortyX: @18_fortyWhatsApp: join hereBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/18forty-podcast--4344730/support.

In 2016 Tara Roberts was living in Washington DC feeling, in a new way, the deep fractures in America, including the way we understand our history.  She felt called to be part of trying to heal these divisions.   It was a chance encounter with a photograph at the National Museum of African American History and Culture that changed the trajectory of her life.  It was of a group of Black women on a boat in diving gear who she quickly discovered  were from an organization called Diving with a Purpose, an underwater archeology group with a mission to discover and document the wreckage of slave ships scattered on the ocean floor around the world, and by doing so recover a crucial part of history. Roberts soon quit her job and joined the group to document their work, learning to scuba dive in order to do so. She turned that journey into an award-winning National Geographic-produced podcast called “Into the Depths” and became the first Black female explorer ever to be featured on the cover of National Geographic Magazine.  This work also resulted in a memoir Written in the Waters which both invites us into the fascinating and groundbreaking work below the surface of the Ocean around the globe, and her own personal transformation. Roberts has travelled the world as a diver, backpacker, and adventurer,  bringing to this conversation a global view of history and culture, and a devotion to tell the stories that can bring us together.  She is currently Explorer-in-Residence at the National Geographic Society. Here's Tara Roberts in conversation with Shayna Schlosberg from the 2025 Portland Book Festival, on Literary Arts, the Archive Project. Tara Roberts spent the last six years following, diving with, and telling stories about Black scuba divers as they searched for and helped document slave shipwrecks around the world. Her journey was turned into an award-winning National Geographic-produced podcast called “Into the Depths” and featured in the March issue of National Geographic magazine. Tara became the first Black female explorer ever to be featured on the cover of Nat Geo. In 2022, Tara was named the Rolex National Geographic Explorer of the Year. Currently, she is an Explorer-in-Residence at the National Geographic Society. And her book Written in the Waters: A Memoir of History, Home and Belonging hits stands in January 2025. Tara also worked as an editor for magazines like CosmoGirl, Essence, EBONY and Heart & Soul and edited several books for girls. She was a Fellow at the MIT Open Documentary Lab. She founded her own magazine for women who are ‘too bold for boundaries..’ And Tara spent an amazing year backpacking around the world to find and tell stories about young women change agents. The journey led to the creation of a nonprofit that supported and funded their big ideas. Shayna Schlosberg is the Vice President of Community Connections at OPB and KMHD, where she leads initiatives to ensure that both organizations authentically reflect and serve the diverse communities of the Pacific Northwest. In this role, she shapes and drives the strategy, vision, and implementation of community representation and inclusion across all aspects of OPB and KMHD's work. Shayna joined OPB and KMHD in 2022. Prior to that, she was the Director of Operations and Strategy at Women of Color in the Arts, a national service organization committed to advancing racial and cultural equity in the performing arts. From 2017 to 2021, she served as Managing Director of The Catastrophic Theatre, an acclaimed experimental theater company in Houston, Texas. Before that, she was Associate General Manager at the Alley Theatre, where she played a key role in expanding the theater's international programming, particularly through partnerships with Latin American artists and companies. Shayna's expertise has been recognized nationally—she has served on grant panels for the National Endowment for the Arts. She is a graduate of several leadership programs, including the National Association of Latino Arts and Culture's Advocacy Leadership Institute, Women of Color in the Arts' Leadership Through Mentorship program, and the 2020 New Leaders Council Fellowship. She was also a founding advisory committee member of the Houston BIPOC Arts Network Fund, a groundbreaking effort born out of the Ford Foundation's America's Cultural Treasures initiative. Shayna served in the Peace Corps in Armenia from 2010 to 2012.

In this episode of the Employee Success Podcast, we sit down with Dr. Sarah Anne Strickley—writer, professor, faculty editor of Miracle Monocle, and Director of Undergraduate Studies in English. Dr. Strickley shares how her own creative practice informs the way she teaches and mentors students, from helping them generate bold new work to introducing them to the worlds of editing and publishing. We talk craft, collaboration, and what it means to build literary communities inside and beyond the classroom—and she gives us a sneak peek at a new book on the horizon! -- Sarah Anne Strickley is the author of the short story collection, Incendiary Devices; the novella, Sister; the short story collection, Fall Together; and a collection of essays, Ode to Collapse, forthcoming in October 2026. She's a recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing fellowship, an Ohio Arts grant, a Glenn Schaeffer Award from the International Institute of Modern Letters, the Copper Nickel Editors' Prize for Prose and other honors. Her stories and essays have appeared in Oxford American, A Public Space, Witness, Harvard Review, Gulf Coast, The Southeast Review, The Normal School, Ninth Letter, Hotel Amerika, Copper Nickel, storySouth and elsewhere. She's a graduate of the Iowa Writers' Workshop and earned her PhD from the University of Cincinnati. She's the Director of Undergraduate Studies at the University of Louisville and serves as faculty editor of Miracle Monocle, UofL's award-winning literary journal. --Visit the new Miracle Monocle site here. Keep up with Dr. Strickley on her website and that of Finishing Line Press. Learn more about UofL's English program here.Check out the Employee Success Center website!

Queen Mother: Black Nationalism, Reparations, and the Untold Story of Audrey Moore, published by Pantheon in November 2025, is this latest book by this internationally known and award-winning writer, cultural analyst, and associate professor at the University of Texas at Austin. Farmer's first book, Remaking Black Power, was shortlisted for numerous prizes, and she has received fellowships and awards from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University, and the Whiting Foundation. Farmer's insights have appeared in multiple venues, including Harper's Bazaar, NPR, The Washington Post, and Teen Vogue. Fellow biographer and BIO member Tamara Payne interviewed Ashley D. Farmer.

On today's show we investigate claims by human rights organizations tied to the National Endowment for Democracy that the Iranian government recently committed massacres of civilians during recent protests in that country. Then we shine a light on what is being called the commodification of human suffering by corporations contracted by the Trump administration to process and warehouse those rounded up and detained by ICE.    Finally, we feature a discussion of the state of constitutional rights and civil liberties in these once great United States. The post The Commodification of Human Suffering by Corporations appeared first on KPFA.

With a rebellion underway in New England, the Continental Congress orders an invasion of Quebec, confident that Catholic French Canadians will rally to the Patriot standard, a mere fifteen years after Protestant British Americans helped to conquer the old colony of New France for their king. Featuring: Rick Atkinson, Jeffers Lennox, and Alexandra Lund Montgomery. Voice Actors: Emmanuel Dubois, Evan McCormick, John Terry, and John Winters. Narrated by Dr. Jim Ambuske. Music by Artlist.io This episode was made possible with support from a 2024 grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.  Help other listeners find the show by leaving a 5-Star Rating and Review on Apple, Spotify, Podchaser, or our website. Follow the series on Facebook or Instagram. Worlds Turned Upside Down is a production of the Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media at George Mason University.

Just before his death, Charlie Kirk received threatening, religiously framed messages from a major donor to Turning Point USA over his perceived shift on Israel — and Candace Owens recently exposed these texts. The messages demonstrate the intense pressure Kirk had been under from pro-Israel donors and media figures for platforming critics of Israel and questioning U.S. foreign policy, including Iran and intelligence agencies.  Jimmy suggests TPUSA leadership and donors suppressed this information to protect funding and reputations, while attacking Owens for making it public. The segment frames the situation as evidence of coercive donor influence and a cover-up within conservative political organizations. Plus segments on TPUSA's insane decision to launch a faith tour featuring a pastor accused of covering up sex crimes and Thomas Massie commenting on the House vote to approve the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) budget. Also featuring Stef Zamorano and Mike MacRae. And a phone call from Scott Jennings!

Why is the Democrat AG of Arizona telling the public they might be legally justified in opening fire on ICE agents? That's easy: Because she wants it to happen. Rep. Eli Crane discusses the insanely reckless rhetoric of the anti-ICE left, along with the shameful votes by GOP representatives to fund the deep state National Endowment for Democracy and continue a "kill switch" program for American cars. Tyler Bowyer explains the TP Action plan to create an unbreakable "red wall" for 2028, and the show listens in on JD Vance's March for Life speech. Watch every episode ad-free on members.charliekirk.com! Get new merch at charliekirkstore.com!Support the show: http://www.charliekirk.com/supportSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Western media portrayed Iran's protests as a democratic uprising crushed by state violence. But behind the headlines lies a familiar regime change playbook.In this MintCast episode, Mnar Adley is joined from Tehran by Seyed Mohammad Marandi, professor at the University of Tehran, to examine how U.S.-funded NGOs, intelligence-linked narratives, and corporate media helped reframe economic protests into a foreign-backed destabilization campaign.The conversation breaks down the role of Human Rights Activists in Iran, its funding by the National Endowment for Democracy, and the historical continuity between today's information war and past CIA-led regime change operations in Iran.Support the showMintPress News is a fiercely independent. You can support us by becoming a member on Patreon, bookmarking and whitelisting us, and by subscribing to our social media channels, including Twitch, YouTube, Twitter and Instagram. Subscribe to MintCast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and SoundCloud. Also, be sure to check out the new Behind the Headlines channel on YouTube and subscribe to rapper Lowkey's new video interview/podcast series, The Watchdog.

Why is the Democrat AG of Arizona telling the public they might be legally justified in opening fire on ICE agents? That's easy: Because she wants it to happen. Rep. Eli Crane discusses the insanely reckless rhetoric of the anti-ICE left, along with the shameful votes by GOP representatives to fund the deep state National Endowment for Democracy and continue a "kill switch" program for American cars. Tyler Bowyer explains the TP Action plan to create an unbreakable "red wall" for 2028, and the show listens in on JD Vance's March for Life speech. Watch every episode ad-free on members.charliekirk.com! Get new merch at charliekirkstore.com!Support the show: http://www.charliekirk.com/supportSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

When Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado gave her Nobel "Peace" Prize to warmonger Donald Trump to thank him for bombing her country, it showed how the prize is a tool of war that serves Western foreign policy interests. The winner is very often a US-funded regime-change activist who tries to overthrow independent governments deemed "authoritarian" by NATO. Ben Norton reports. VIDEO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Ow1WRl0Axw Topics 0:00 Trump gets prize from Venezuela's Machado 2:12 Trump has bombed 10 countries 3:01 Alfred Nobel, inventor of dynamite 3:52 Nobel Peace Prize serves US foreign policy 4:39 Henry Kissinger, war criminal 5:42 Barack Obama, war criminal & Nobel laureate 7:07 Nobel Peace Prize: regime-change tool 9:07 Prize money 9:46 National Endowment for Democracy (NED) 11:07 Philippines' pro-US "dissident" 12:54 Russian pro-US "dissident" 14:33 Ukraine & neocons 15:36 Anti-Russian groups 16:23 Anti-Soviet "dissident" 16:51 Belarusian pro-US "dissident" 18:09 Iranian pro-US "dissident" 19:26 Iranian pro-US, pro-war activist 22:07 War is peace: US empire über alles 22:54 Iranian Revolution & imperialism 23:19 USA supports protests in Iran 26:15 NED continues under Trump & Rubio 27:24 China targeted by USA 28:07 Chinese pro-US "dissident" 29:11 US gov't links to Human Rights Watch 30:02 "Color revolution" attempt 31:21 Pro-colonialist fanatic Liu Xiaobo 34:53 Far-right warmonger Solzhenitsyn 35:59 Jean-Paul Sartre rejected Nobel Prize 36:56 Dalai Lama & CIA support 38:22 Nobel "Peace" Prize for war 39:07 Outro

In this episode of Good Morning Liberty, hosts Nate Thurston and Charles 'Chuck' Thompson discuss the most absurd and frustrating events in politics for the week. Key topics include Lindsey Graham's emotional reaction to recent events, the funding of the National Endowment for Democracy, and the ongoing MAGA delusions claiming Javier Milei's policies in Argentina are inspired by Trump. The episode also covers everything from trans issues in healthcare, NYC's new anti-semitic token, and the controversy surrounding Trump's response to a factory worker's outburst. Tune in for a lively discussion on the week's 'dumbest bleeps!' 00:00 Intro 02:34 Sad Lindsey Graham and Iran Discussion 06:19 Ted Cruz and Foreign Relations 16:10 Presidential War Powers Debate 22:06 National Endowment for Democracy Funding 29:04 Transgender Issues and Medical Professionals 33:11 Eric Adams and NYC Token 38:15 Reflecting on BLM and Election Year 38:47 Scott Adams' Controversial Statements 40:53 Debate on Racism and Polls 47:37 Trump's Encounter at Ford Plant 50:21 Union and Free Speech Controversies 59:42 MAGA Delusions and Policies 01:05:40 Nurses' Strike and CEO Pay 01:15:01 Concluding Thoughts and Voting  

This episode is presented by Create A Video – Congressman Mark Harris joins me to discuss passage of three spending bills by the US House and the defeat of a measure to strip funding from the National Endowment for Democracy - which was used to blacklist conservative media in America. Subscribe to the podcast at: https://ThePetePod.com/ All the links to Pete's Prep are free: https://patreon.com/petekalinershow Media Bias Check: GroundNews promo code! Advertising and Booking inquiries: Pete@ThePeteKalinerShow.comGet exclusive content here!: https://thepetekalinershow.com/See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

John Fawcett breaks down the biggest stories of the day, including President Trump's strong response to the chaos in Minneapolis involving ICE agents, the House's funding of the National Endowment for Democracy and the Senate's decision regarding military action in Venezuela.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

In today's episode of Good Morning Liberty, we break down the latest Iran narrative and the familiar propaganda playbook that always shows up right before "targeted strikes" magically become a full-blown conflict. We cover: Does the President have the authority to bomb Iran without Congress? Why the "emotional hook" is always the first step in selling war The shaky casualty claims and where the numbers are coming from The Iraq déjà vu: "moral obligation" turns into decades of blowback Why "America First" keeps turning into "America Funds Everything" Support the show + join the community: Fed Haters Club + merch: GodHatesFeds.com Join the conversation: JoinGML.com Rate/review on Apple + Spotify (it helps a ton)   00:00 Intro   00:52 Discussion on War and Authority   02:43 Constitutional Interpretation and War Powers   06:08 Trump's Statements and Iranian Protests   09:35 Media and Emotional Manipulation   15:34 Historical Context and Regime Change   18:50 Current Developments and Speculations   26:30 Public Opinion and Presidential Responsibility   27:33 Debating US Military Intervention in Iran   28:29 Reflecting on the Iraq War and Moral Obligations   32:02 Questioning the National Endowment for Democracy   36:36 Humorous Take on Government Strategies   42:43 Discussing the Gaza Conflict and US Foreign Policy  

Watch The X22 Report On Video No videos found (function(w,d,s,i){w.ldAdInit=w.ldAdInit||[];w.ldAdInit.push({slot:17532056201798502,size:[0, 0],id:"ld-9437-3289"});if(!d.getElementById(i)){var j=d.createElement(s),p=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];j.async=true;j.src="https://cdn2.decide.dev/_js/ajs.js";j.id=i;p.parentNode.insertBefore(j,p);}})(window,document,"script","ld-ajs");pt> Click On Picture To See Larger PictureConspiracy no more, the D’s in Mass want to limit miles people can drive because of climate change. Biden/Obama forces electrical prices higher, Trump is now bringing the prices down and AI datacenters will be powered separately. The [CB] awakening has begun. Sometime you need to show the people the truth. The world is changing, Trump has shutdown the money supply around the world, the [DS] is in a deep panic and soon the people of Iran will take back their own country. As the [DS] criminal syndicate falls apart are they planning an armed civil war? Trump admin designates the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organization, other chapters to follow. In the end the Patriots have full control, once the chaos begins the partios will round them all up, it will be clean and swift. Economy https://twitter.com/libsoftiktok/status/2010831605430976627?s=20  Telecommunications, Utilities, & Energy and now heads to the Senate Ways and Means Committee (function(w,d,s,i){w.ldAdInit=w.ldAdInit||[];w.ldAdInit.push({slot:18510697282300316,size:[0, 0],id:"ld-8599-9832"});if(!d.getElementById(i)){var j=d.createElement(s),p=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];j.async=true;j.src="https://cdn2.decide.dev/_js/ajs.js";j.id=i;p.parentNode.insertBefore(j,p);}})(window,document,"script","ld-ajs");    major changes beginning this week to ensure that Americans don't “pick up the tab” for their POWER consumption, in the form of paying higher Utility bills. We are the “HOTTEST” Country in the World, and Number One in AI. Data Centers are key to that boom, and keeping Americans FREE and SECURE but, the big Technology Companies who build them must “pay their own way.” Thank you, and congratulations to Microsoft. More to come soon! President DJT Trump Will Request to Limit Credit Card Interest Rates to 10% for One Year to Combat the Scams of the Big Financial Companies   Trump Administration. Thank you for your attention to this matter. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN! PRESIDENT DONALD J. TRUMP This initiative is a great for reversing the damage caused by leftist policies that prioritized uncontrolled spending and galloping inflation over the well-being of the working people. Under the Biden administration, credit card interest rates skyrocketed, reaching an average of 21.5 % in 2024, according to data from the Federal Reserve Bank, exacerbated by inflation that reached peaks of 9 % in 2022. This escalation was not an accident, but the direct result of Democratic policies that injected trillions in unnecessary stimuli, increasing the national debt and forcing the Fed to raise base rates to contain the crisis. Source:  gatewayhispanic.com  https://twitter.com/truflation/status/2011071380175860037?s=20   price data has been showing  https://twitter.com/julie_kelly2/status/2010924086981984640?s=20 https://twitter.com/DrJStrategy/status/2011032604313518251?s=20  a hoax. What Powell actually did •Powell chose to go public with a dramatic video statement saying DOJ subpoenas “threatened a criminal indictment” over his testimony on the Fed's multibillion‑dollar building renovations. •He explicitly framed the subpoenas as “pretexts” and cast them as retaliation for the Fed setting rates independently of the president, elevating a renovation/cost‑overrun inquiry into an existential attack on central bank independence. The framing of criminal indictment came from Powell! In what look liked a scripted response, all of the Fed acolytes on Wall St cried foul, they bought in hook line and sinker!!! What the U.S. Attorney is saying •The U.S. Attorney's Office for D.C. has stated they contacted the Fed “on multiple occasions” about cost overruns and Powell's congressional testimony, were ignored, and therefore resorted to formal legal process, which they stress “is not a threat.” •Jeanine Pirro has been explicit that “the word ‘indictment' has come out of Mr. Powell's mouth, no one else's,” and that “none of this would have happened if they had just responded to our outreach.” “Above the law” behaviour. •Powell now publicly insists “no one is above the law,” even as the record shows the Fed disregarded informal outreach and only engaged once grand jury subpoenas landed, which is the opposite of transparent cooperation. Recall Choke Point 2.0 and the unbanking of individuals. •By recasting a straightforward question of cost overruns and possible misstatements to Congress as an illegitimate “criminal indictment threat,” Powell is effectively demanding a special zone of immunity wrapped in the rhetoric of independence. Why central bankers are “charging the hill” •Former Fed chairs and global monetary grandees have rushed out statements condemning the probe as an attack on Fed independence, treating any prosecutorial look at a central banker as inherently out of bounds. The former Fed officials' statement is doing exactly what the “51 intel officials” letter did on the Hunter Biden laptop: using elite signatures to launder a political narrative into institutional dogma and declare scrutiny itself illegitimate. Powell and his allies are recasting a narrow DOJ inquiry into cost overruns and testimony accuracy as an existential assault on “independence,” and an all‑too‑willing media is once again treating the letter as revealed truth instead of asking hard questions This closes ranks around the idea that central banks sit on a higher plane than normal agencies, immune not only from political pressure on rates, which is legitimate, but also from standard legal and fiscal oversight, which is not. MSM and the death of the 4th estate •Much of legacy media has adopted Powell's framing almost verbatim: “unprecedented attack on independence,” “monetary policy under assault,” while relegating the core factual dispute,ignored outreach, cost overruns, accuracy of testimony, to secondary status. Powell and the central banking crowd are behaving in a way that is frankly odd: they stonewall basic oversight, scream “independence” the moment anyone reaches for legal tools, and act as though they stand above the law—while a compliant MSM gladly carries their narrative, proof the fourth estate has checked out. All of this does not meet the smell test. Is the Fed above the US Constitution? Why did Powell go public and choose the framing that he did? Why did MSM and so called objective pundits not do any objective analysis. Smells like elements of a Russia Russia Russia hoax strategy to me. https://twitter.com/MetaLawMan/status/2010816276508082343?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E2010816276508082343%7Ctwgr%5E6585e9ff019ea8191354a3bf06c918cdfd10f00c%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fjoehoft.com%2Fcorrupt-fed-head-jerome-powell-added-trillions-in-unnecessary-us-debt%2F   service of a subpoena on the Fed is not a threat to indict him. Subpoenas are investigative tools. It's possible that the government separately advised Powell that he was a “target” of the investigation, but he didn't say that. 3. Nowhere in the statement does Powell say his testimony to Congress about the Fed construction project was truthful and accurate. https://twitter.com/USAttyPirro/status/2010886969518170452?s=20  Powell's mouth, no one else's. None of this would have happened if they had just responded to our outreach. This office makes decisions based on the merits, nothing more and nothing less. We agree with the chairman of the Federal Reserve that no one is above the law, and that is why we expect his full cooperation. Political/Rights https://twitter.com/DailyCaller/status/2011107269585616922?s=20 https://twitter.com/RapidResponse47/status/2011108530842108290?s=20 https://twitter.com/DHSgov/status/2010742739562901678?s=20   Procedure is same used in any location, such as hospital etc. https://twitter.com/nicksortor/status/2011067479603257616?s=20 https://twitter.com/CynicalPublius/status/2011085032606102012?s=20  American law and the accompanying reduction in crime. However, there are a few certain locations where law enforcement refuses to assist in law enforcement, and the local politicians and a base of Marxist-organized civilians actively oppose (sometimes violently) ICE’s lawful operations. It’s those latter locations, few in number but outsized in media reporting–all run by Democrats–that give a false impression as to how much Americans appreciate getting what they voted for. https://twitter.com/KCPayTreeIt/status/2010475982038147336?s=20 DOGE Geopolitical https://twitter.com/sentdefender/status/2010965644867485898?s=20   Tehran, according to the Wall Street Journal https://twitter.com/MarioNawfal/status/2011029585161568307?s=20 lowballing. In 2019 they said 230 died, Reuters reported 1,500. Iran International estimated 2,000+ last week based on hospital reports and morgue footage. Now the regime’s confirming it. But they’re framing it as “terrorists killed these people” not “we shot 2,000 protesters.” That’s the setup for mass trials and executions. 2,000 dead in 2 weeks. That’s 140+ per day. During a communications blackout. In a country claiming it has “total control.” Source: Reuters, Iranian official https://twitter.com/IranIntl_En/status/2011018647255322754?s=20   a coordinated blackout aimed not only at security control but at concealing the truth, reflected in internet cuts, crippled communications, media shutdowns, and the intimidation of journalists and witnesses. Publication was delayed until the evidence converged. The assessment is based on a multi-stage review of information from a source close to the Supreme National Security Council; two sources in the presidential office; accounts from several sources within the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps in Mashhad, Kermanshah and Isfahan; testimonies from eyewitnesses and families of those killed; field reports; data linked to medical centers; and information provided by doctors and nurses in multiple cities.  Trump administration designates 3 Muslim Brotherhood branches as terrorist organizations   The Trump administration labeled three Muslim Brotherhood branches as terrorist organizations on Tuesday, imposing sanctions on them and their members. The Lebanese, Jordanian and Egyptian chapters of the Muslim Brotherhood pose a risk to the United States and American interests, according to the Treasury and State departments. “These designations reflect the opening actions of an ongoing, sustained effort to thwart Muslim Brotherhood chapters' violence and destabilization wherever it occurs,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a statement obtained by The Associated Press. “The United States will use all available tools to deprive these Muslim Brotherhood chapters of the resources to engage in or support terrorism.” The Jordanian and Egyptian branches were designated by the Treasury as specifically designated global terrorists for providing support to Hamas. The Lebanese branch was labeled a foreign terrorist organization, which is the most severe, meaning it is a criminal offense to provide material support to the group. Source;  wsbt.com  Rubio Designates Egyptian, Jordanian and Lebanese Chapters of Muslim Brotherhood as Foreign Terrorist Organizations Keep in mind the Muslim Brotherhood is the fabric on the umbrella of political Islam. Each faction represents and individual spline on the umbrella construct, but the Muslim Brotherhood overall is a political extremist system for various levels of authentic Islam. The regional chapters that really matter, the difficult ones to navigate will be in Qatar, Syria and especially the Turkish factions. These are more politically connected to the home government interests. Source: theconservativetreehouse.com 1237 Apr 22, 2018 1:31:31 AM EDT Q !xowAT4Z3VQ ID: 3e4934 No. 1141069  “The process of settlement is a ‘Civilization-Jihadist Process' with all the word means. The Ikhwan [MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD] must understand that their work in America is a kind of grand jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and ‘sabotaging' its miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers…” https://clarionproject.org/muslim_brotherhood_explanatory_memorandum/ Q 3881 Q !!Hs1Jq13jV6 ID: b03e04 No.8238822 Feb 24 2020 20:36:43 (EST) EMHyS2xXkAA8JrB.png https://twitter.com/cain_nate/status/1231066589996318720 Listen carefully. Think: re: why [no] arrests (justice) yet? What if (almost) every critical position [sr] within the US GOV apparatus was infiltrated? WHAT MUST BE DONE FIRST? THE SWAMP RUNS DEEP. +Sleepers Backgrounds are important. Muslim Brotherhood List of ‘in the news now [names]‘ w/ known ties to Islam? THIS IS NOT ANOTHER 4-YEAR ELECTION. [assumptions correct – package well rec [known]] Q https://twitter.com/WhiteHouse/status/2010902536757162398?s=20 765 Feb 15, 2018 1:08:41 AM EST Q !UW.yye1fxo ID: 276796 No. 382161  WATCH THE WATER. Q War/Peace Medical/False Flags [DS] Agenda https://twitter.com/MrAndyNgo/status/2010746570853990773?s=20 https://twitter.com/EndWokeness/status/2010419447987937370?s=20 Antifa TikTok Agitator Urges Armed Leftist Militias to ‘Fight' ICE Agents Radical TikTok agitator Danesh Noshirvan has crossed a dangerous line. The Antifa-aligned mega influencer is now openly calling for organized, armed left-wing militias to confront ICE agents and federal law enforcement in America's largest cities. Danesh Noshirvan is directly linked to Scott Dworkin, founder of the Democratic Coalition Against Donald Trump. According to reports, Dworkin and even foreign interests bankroll Noshirvan's activities. Source: thegatewaypundit.com https://twitter.com/libsoftiktok/status/2010988104853659986?s=20 https://twitter.com/nicksortor/status/2010833162151346316?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E2010833162151346316%7Ctwgr%5Ec535903544267d9392f4466181097498d09593a1%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.thegatewaypundit.com%2F2026%2F01%2Fnew-minnesota-ag-keith-ellison-minneapolis-mayor-jacob%2F   should be in JAIL. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent Says There Are “DISTURBING TAPES” of Minnesota AG Keith Ellison Taking Money to Stop Investigations Into Somali Fraud   the U.S. Treasury Secretary confirmed that federal authorities are aggressively “following the money” amid explosive fraud investigations tied to Minnesota's sprawling Somali-linked financial networks. According to Bessent, the Treasury Department has launched multiple enforcement actions focused on suspicious financial flows between Minnesota residents and businesses and overseas destinations, including East Africa, as the federal government intensifies its immigration and fraud crackdown in the state. But the real bombshell dropped during an interview with Blaze: Scott Bessent:“It's hard to follow the money. There are evidently some disturbing tapes of AG Ellison in meetings with people who donated to him—calling for political favors to stop the investigations. We'll see. I don't want to get out ahead of the investigation. It's going to be very methodical. But I can guarantee you—when the bear trap snaps, we're going to get these folks. We're going to follow the money, whether it's here in Minneapolis and St. Paul or over in East Africa. There are tons of luxury properties and cars that have been bought over there.” WATCH: Source: thegatewaypundit.com    Countries who illegally entered the USA though Sleepy Joe Biden's HORRIBLE Open Border's Policy. Every place we go, crime comes down. In Chicago, despite a weak and incompetent Governor and Mayor fighting us all the way, a big improvement was made. Thousands of Criminals were removed! Minnesota Democrats love the unrest that anarchists and professional agitators are causing because it gets the spotlight off of the 19 Billion Dollars that was stolen by really bad and deranged people. FEAR NOT, GREAT PEOPLE OF MINNESOTA, THE DAY OF RECKONING & RETRIBUTION IS COMING! Minnesota’s total population as of July 1, 2024, is estimated at 5,793,151.  Approximately 8% of the state’s population is foreign-born, meaning about 463,452 individuals, while 92% (around 5,329,699) are native-born (U.S.-born). Minnesota is home to the largest Somali-American population in the United States, with people of Somali descent making up a notable ethnic group.  Recent estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey (ACS) for 2024 put the number of individuals of Somali descent in Minnesota at around 107,000 to 108,000, representing about 1.85% of the state’s total population.  (Note: Some sources provide slightly varying figures, such as 76,000 as a lower estimate, but the ACS data consistently points to the higher range. )Breakdown Within the Somali Population in MinnesotaThe Somali community in Minnesota includes both U.S.-born individuals and foreign-born immigrants or refugees. Here’s a detailed split based on nativity and citizenship status:  https://twitter.com/DataRepublican/status/1919002207896174765?s=20  or his NGOs appeared in the Journal of Democracy. It’s the flagship journal of the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), the same organization featured prominently in that widely circulated “Uniparty NGO” network diagrams below. NED is a U.S. government-funded outfit. It includes currently sitting members of Congress on its board… from both parties, not just former officials. Soros's involvement is deep. He has co-chaired NED conferences abroad and his Open Society NGOs regularly partner with NED operations, especially in countries undergoing “transitions” (read: regime change or soft power penetration). Together, Soros and US-backed NGOs have shaped funding pipelines, media narratives, and even foreign electoral strategies. So when people ask, “Why isn't Soros banned?” … they need to understand: he’s not an outsider. He’s part of our government. The Uniparty protects and partners with him, because he helps carry out a shared foreign policy vision… the same one that labels President Trump as a threat to democracy. NED members include:    Victoria Nuland – Director of the National Endowment for Democracy; Acting United States Deputy Secretary of State under Biden (served in both parties).   Karen Bass – Vice Chair of the National Endowment for Democracy; former U.S. Representative and current Mayor of Los Angeles (Democrat).    Todd Young – Honorary at the National Endowment for Democracy; U.S. Senator from Indiana (Republican).    Elise Stefanik – Director at the National Endowment for Democracy; U.S. Representative from New York and House GOP Conference Chair (Republican).   Mel Martinez – Director at the National Endowment for Democracy; former U.S. Senator from Florida (Republican).   Steve Biegun – Director at the National Endowment for Democracy; former U.S. Deputy Secretary of State (Republican).    Todd Young – Honorary at the National Endowment for Democracy; US Senator from Indiana (Republican). https://twitter.com/EricLDaugh/status/2011165232815882294?s=20 Just In: Bill and Hillary Clinton Refuse To Testify in Front of House Oversight Committee, Daring Chairman Comer To Hold Them in Contempt of Congress After months of dispute against House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer, Bill and Hillary Clinton have today (13) REFUSED to testify in the House's Jeffrey Epstein investigation. This escalates the battle with Comer, Republican of Kentucky, and the former U.S. President and Secretary of State are effectively daring him to hold them in contempt of Congress. The New York Times reported: Source: thegatewaypundit.com President Trump's Plan Lefty DOJ Lawyers Rage-Quit After Harmeet Dhillon Blocks ICE Witch Hunt A group of lawyers in the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) have reportedly resigned after Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Harmeet Dhillon declined to investigate the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer involved in last week’s shooting in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The group had apparently pushed Dhillon to let a DOJ delegation fly to Minneapolis to investigate the January 7 shooting death of far-left agitator Renee Nicole Good, who was shot after she used her two-ton Honda Pilot as a weapon against the officer. Despite pressure from the lefty lawyers – described as “career prosecutors” – to initiate a witch hunt against the officer, Dhillon put a kibosh on their plans. They were apparently informed of the decision not to move forward with an investigation of the ICE agent last Friday.  After being told “no,” a group of “top leaders” in the criminal section of the Civil Rights Division “have left their jobs to register their frustration with the department.” Shock, horror. Sounds like the DOJ is well rid of this cabal, and these departures could be part of a trend of mass resignations amongst the old guard. This, of course, also saves Dhillon the trouble of having to draw up their pink slips.  Source: redstate.com  https://twitter.com/amuse/status/2010791586980933826?s=20   later. This is a system built for abuse by design https://twitter.com/CynicalPublius/status/2010886531838595278?s=20 https://twitter.com/ElectionWiz/status/2010777023673999531?s=20 https://twitter.com/USDOL/status/2010771852696617401?s=20 (function(w,d,s,i){w.ldAdInit=w.ldAdInit||[];w.ldAdInit.push({slot:13499335648425062,size:[0, 0],id:"ld-7164-1323"});if(!d.getElementById(i)){var j=d.createElement(s),p=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];j.async=true;j.src="//cdn2.customads.co/_js/ajs.js";j.id=i;p.parentNode.insertBefore(j,p);}})(window,document,"script","ld-ajs");