Shows
Notes from America with Kai WrightRevising History, One Monument at a TimeArtist Michelle Browder lives in a city that is increasingly being altered by monumental works…including one she created herself.
More than 30 years ago, as an 18-year-old art student in Atlanta, Michelle Browder came across a work of art that haunted her. The picture was meant as a tribute to Dr. J. Marion Sims, a 19th century doctor long known as the 'Father of Gynecology.’ His discoveries, only made possible by his experimentation on enslaved women, endowed his legacy in U.S. history, yet erased the victims of this research. Armed with this knowledge, she set out to c...2023-03-1331 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightYour Summer Jams…One Last TimeHost Kai Wright checks in with producer Regina de Heer about our summer playlist one last time. Hear the latest submissions from listeners and WNYC staff, about their songs of the summer and why they chose it. Stream the complete Summer Playlist on Spotify here. Plus, we end the playlist by unveiling our show's new name and theme music with our sound designer and engineer, Jared Paul.
Companion listening for this episode:
Introducing 'Notes From America': New Name, Same Show (9/20/2022)We’re inviting you into a more positive – less anxious – conversation. Notes from America with Kai Wright a...2022-09-2111 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightA Pre-Midterms Vibe CheckAn election is coming. Summer is over. And the vibe is…what? We open the phones to hear what’s on your mind–from democracy to baseball.
WNYC's own Brian Lehrer joins to help take your calls. Tune in to The Brian Lehrer Show’s midterm election special, 30 Issues in 30 Days, starting on 9/27.
Companion listening for this episode:
What Could Go Wrong? Everything (And It’s Ok) (8/8/2022)
What zombie movies can teach us about our era of perpetual crisis, and other lessons from a disaster management specialist.
“The United State...2022-09-1937 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightThe Art of RemembranceThe story of one local NYC artist who uses digital technology to honor our city’s past.
Meet Vladimir Nazarov, a visual artist living in New York City, who combined his love for the city and his love of art to create a special 9/11 NFT. Through his story of hope, grief, and artistry, find out what happened to his commemorative NFT – and how this technology can bring a whole new experience to the world of art. Plus, a question about the subject of the piece propels the conversation in a completely unexpected direction.
Companion listening for t...2022-09-1418 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightYour Vote MattersSo why don't more people vote in smaller elections? What motivates people to vote — and how that could inform greater participation in the upcoming midterm elections?
Roxanna Moritz, former chief election officer from Scott County, Iowa, shares her story of what drew her to public service — and what made her walk away. Plus, Zaki Hamid, Director of Community Engagement at KUOW, reports his radio station’s community feedback club's response to the question “what election did you care about the most and why?”
Schools Had a Tough Year. What’d We Learn? (6/6/2022)
Plus, follow the sea...2022-09-1232 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightRevisiting Tara Roberts on Diving for Sunken Slave ShipsA National Geographic explorer’s story of diving for sunken slave ships. Hear more of Tara Roberts' historic journey in the six-part podcast series, Into the Depths.
Companion listening for this episode:
Revisiting A Conservative View of the Vigilante Right (9/5/2022)Mona Charen discusses the true meaning of conservative and the radical shift in the GOP.
*And stream our Summer Playlist on Spotify here.
“The United States of Anxiety” airs live on Sunday evenings at 6pm ET. The podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts. To catch all the action, tune into t...2022-09-0718 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightRevisiting A Conservative View of the Vigilante RightMona Charen discusses the true meaning of conservative and the radical shift in the GOP.
Companion listening for this episode:
Episode 1: How Did We Get Here and Where Are We Going? (9/22/2016)
Listen back to our very first episode where we went to Long Island to find out if America has truly lost its mind.
*And stream our Summer Playlist on Spotify here.
“The United States of Anxiety” airs live on Sunday evenings at 6pm ET. The podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts. To catch all the action, t...2022-09-0530 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightHalf of My Parents, All of MeFolashade Olatunde, a WNYC Radio Rookie, shares a series of open and honest audio diaries, inviting listeners on her journey to rebuild a relationship with her dad.
Folashade's dad went to prison when she was two years old. She used to go visit him all the time with her mom. Until her parents got divorced. Now, it’s been more than a decade since she saw her father. In this extended version of an installment of Radio Rookies, Folashade shares a series of open and honest audio diaries and invites listeners on her journey to rebuild her relati...2022-08-3118 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightThe Prison of Manhood Can’t Hold Shaka SenghorHe went to prison at age 19. When released, he had to learn how to be a father to two Black sons with very different life experiences. His letters to them have lessons for us all.
Read more from Shaka Senghor in his book, Letters to the Sons of Society: A Father's Invitation to Love, Honesty, and Freedom, available now. Audio included in the episode excerpted courtesy of Penguin Random House Audio, read by Shaka Senghor.
Companion listening for this episode:
Jason Reynolds Needs to Be Useful (7/18/2022)
The YA author talks about his...2022-08-2934 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightWhich Election Did You Care About The Most?Which election did you care about the most, and why? We want to hear your stories.
Next month, we’re doing an episode about how we can make voting better. Is it an issue of motivation, or something else? So send us your stories, about any kind of election, political or not. It could be an election for a sports team, to the local PTA, or for your favorite reality competition show. Send us a voice recording to anxiety@wnyc.org. We hope to use your stories during an upcoming episode.
*And stream our Summer Playlist...2022-08-2604 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightDigital Life Is a Moral MessA listener voicemail sends the show’s Senior Digital Producer Kousha Navidar on a search for moral clarity with philosopher and senior lecturer in ethics and public policy at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government, Dr. Christopher Robichaud. Then, Shirin Ghaffary, senior reporter at Recode and co-host of the podcast Land of The Giants, shares the story of Facebook, and why it has been so hard of them to respond to the damage their technology has created.
*You can read more about Land of the Giants, and hear new episodes, here.
*And stream our Summ...2022-08-2251 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightLet’s Hear It For The Summer PlaylistHost Kai Wright checks in with producer Regina de Heer about our summer playlist. Hear the contributions from listeners, and some folks on our team, about their songs of the summer and why they chose it. Stream our Summer Playlist on Spotify here. And keep the song submissions coming by sending us your own summer song recommendations. Record a voice memo with your name, location and the story or memory you associated with your song then email it as an attachment to anxiety@wnyc.org to have your song included in the playlist — and our next update.
Companion li...2022-08-1906 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightMonkeypox: The Making of an OutbreakHost Kai Wright speaks with Joseph Osmundson, microbiologist, activist, writer, professor at New York University, and author of Virology: Essays for the Living, the Dead, and the Small Things in Between (W. W. Norton & Company, 2022). They welcome listener questions about the state of the monkeypox outbreak, and the polarizing narrative surrounding the LGBT communities that the virus is disproportionately affecting.
A special thanks to Kali, Michael, Justin, Larry and Daniel – LGBT community leaders at the forefront of the monkeypox response in the Atlanta Metro Area – who participated in our listening session.
Companion listening for this episo...2022-08-1544 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightMichael Calvert’s Good, Too Short LifeWhat can we learn from the HIV pandemic? We revisit a conversation from a year of living with COVID-19.
Back at the beginning of the COVID pandemic, senior editor, Karen Frillmann was reminded of life in this city in the 1980s. She reached back into the far corners of a closet in her apartment, and dug out a recording that she made decades ago. In this segment, Karen shares parts of that intimate conversation, as an act of remembrance.
Companion listening for this episode:
What Could Go Wrong? Everything (And It’s Ok) (8/8/2022)
...2022-08-1218 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightWhat Could Go Wrong? Everything (And It’s Ok)What zombie movies can teach us about our era of perpetual crisis, and other lessons from a disaster management specialist.
Former Assistant Secretary for Homeland Security under President Obama, and current professor at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, Juliette Kayyem joins host Kai Wright to help us make sense of our current age of constant disasters. Learn what tools we have at our disposal based on her new book, The Devil Never Sleeps: Learning to Live in an Age of Disasters.
Companion listening for this episode:
The Wolf Pack of White Nationalism (5/23/2022)There a...2022-08-0833 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightMichael Tubbs Has A Message for All Of USIn 2020, Michael Tubbs lost his reelection campaign after capturing the nation’s attention. But he hopes the lessons he learned can inspire future generations of local leaders. Find out more about End Poverty in California on their website.
Companion listening for this episode:
How to Start Saving the World (8/1/2022)Climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe has a simple request for the 93 percent who know there’s a crisis: Talk to each other about it more and start with your values.
*And stream our Summer Playlist on Spotify here.
“The United States of Anxiety”...2022-08-0518 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightHow to Start Saving the WorldScientist Katharine Hayhoe has a simple request for the 93 percent of people who know there’s a climate crisis: Talk to each other about it more and start with your values. Plus, producer Regina de Heer is joined by members of the Faith Alliance for Climate Solutions to hear how these ideals are put into practice on a local level.
Find more in Professor Hayhoe’s bestselling book, Saving Us: A Climate Scientist's Case for Hope and Healing in a Divided World and her Global Weirding series on Youtube. The Global Weirding segment mentioned in this episode can be found her...2022-08-0133 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightHow Are We Grieving?Two mothers lost their daughters to gun violence but received disparate levels of attention. Now, they’re using their stories – and their grief – to inspire others.
WNYC correspondent Tracie Hunte introduces host Kai Wright to two mothers – Nelba Márquez-Greene and Celeste Fulcher – who both lost their daughters to gun violence. Their stories teach us about the exacting toll of gun violence, and the power grief yields to stir change and inspire progress.
Companion listening for this episode:
The Culture of Gun Violence (7/25/2022)
And why it must change to make any political pr...2022-07-2819 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightThe Culture of Gun ViolenceHost Kai Wright speaks with Nina Vinik, Founder and Executive Director of Project Unloaded about the culture of gun violence in our country and why that must change to make any political progress on gun control. How can we reduce gun violence, and has there been progress on that front since the shooting in Sandy Hook? Plus, Marie Delus, New York State Survivor Lead of Moms Demand Action, redefines what it means to be a survivor of gun violence.
*Find our Summer Spotify playlist from the previous episode here. To have your song included, record a voice memo of...2022-07-2532 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightLet Us Take You on an Pop EscapadeJoy. Freedom. Resilience. We kick off a summer playlist project with Danyel Smith's selections from the Black women who have defined pop. From Phillis Wheatley to Beyoncé, read more about Danyel’s picks in her new book, Shine Bright: A Very Personal History of Black Women in Pop. Playlist curation will begin this Sunday, so record a voice memo with your playlist recommendation (and the story that inspired it) and email it to anxiety@wnyc.org to have your song included.
*Starting this week, we are publishing individual segments from each live episode. Listen back earlier this wee...2022-07-2119 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightJason Reynolds Needs to Be UsefulThe YA author talks about his successes, fears, and his new podcast that explores his relationship with his mother. Hear more from Jason Reynolds in Radiotopia Presents: My Mother Made Me.
*Starting this week, we are publishing individual segments from each live episode. Check back later this week for another segment talking about our summer playlist.
Companion listening for this episode:
Lynn Nottage: Unexpected Optimist (1/3/2022)
Playwright Lynn Nottage breaks down her remarkable career and shares how, as an optimist at heart, she finds the light and resilience in unexpected stories.
“The...2022-07-1833 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightThe Promise and Failure of CryptocurrencyCryptocurrency promised to democratize the financial world by giving people equal access to banking tools. It has potential, but also a long way to go.
Guest host and senior digital producer Kousha Navidar takes calls and speaks with fintech policy expert Scott Astrada about the value and pitfalls of cryptocurrencies including Bitcoin, Ether and Dogecoin. Then, Dr. Kortney Ziegler from Stanford’s Center on Philanthropy and Civil Society speaks about empowering communities the traditional banking system leaves behind.
Companion listening for this episode:
The End of Institutions: Hollywood Edition (4/4/2022)
To many, cryp...2022-07-1150 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightThe Line Between Independence and InsurrectionDecoding the Jan. 6th Insurrection – what we should have learned from the past and what we must remember for the future.
This Independence Day weekend, host Kai Wright is joined by Andrea Bernstein and Ilya Marritz, who previously hosted Trump Inc. They discuss their new 8-part podcast series, Will Be Wild, which examines the forces that led to the January 6 Insurrection and what comes next.
Companion listening for this episode:
Can America Be Redeemed? (7/5/2021)
Eddie Glaude and Imani Perry consider the question through the work of James Baldwin and Richard Wright. Plus: H...2022-07-0451 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightRoe Is Gone. What Now?Plus, a reflection on the significance of LGBT Pride in a scary political time for the community.
Host Kai Wright and listeners react to the recent SCOTUS decisions, including the fall of Roe v. Wade. Hear Dr. Sanithia Williams from Alabama Women’s Clinic, and her experience as a provider in one of the 13 states with trigger laws; Elie Mystal, justice correspondent at The Nation; and Imara Jones, the creator of TransLash media.
Companion listening for this episode:
The Abortion Clinic That Won't Go Quietly (rereleased on 5/5/2022)
A broken democracy. A Supre...2022-06-2751 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightWhy Juneteenth? Let’s Ask Black TexasOn this national live call-in special: The history. The party. The food. Black Texans school us on the holiday they created.
This Juneteenth, host Kai Wright is joined by Pulitzer-Prize winning historian and Harvard law professor, Annette Gordon-Reed, to break down the history behind the newest federal holiday, and help take calls from Black Texans about what it means to them. Plus, Ms. Opal Lee, retired teacher, counselor and activist known as the "grandmother of Juneteenth," checks in as she's moving between Juneteenth celebrations in Fort Worth, Texas. And Houston Public Media reporter, Cory McGinnis, calls in...2022-06-2051 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightWhy We Can't (and Shouldn't) Move On From Jan. 6Why We Can't (and Shouldn't) Move On From Jan. 6. Fordham University political science professor, Christina Greer, joins to takes our politics questions on the hearings and more. Plus, the story of 91-year-old artist Faith Ringgold, as told by her daughter.
Companion listening for this episode:
A Conservative View of the Vigilante Right (1/24/2022)
Mona Charen discusses the true meaning of conservative and the radical shift in the GOP. Then, a listener mailbag begs us to explore how "normal people" became part of the Jan 6. attack.
“The United States of Anxiety” airs live on Sund...2022-06-1352 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightSchools Had a Tough Year. What’d We Learn?Schools Had a Tough Year. What’d We Learn? Plus, follow the season of a girl’s varsity volleyball team, and find one Brooklyn school building’s effort to bridge its stark racial divide. From WNYC’s new miniseries, Keeping Score.
The past year has forced public classrooms into the center of our country’s intense culture wars and political debates, from Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” bill, to Critical Race Theory, to the ever-present threat of gun violence. What do these fights mean about the future over public education itself? Education reporter for The Washington Post and author of...2022-06-0647 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightAlice Walker Is Very Happy, A Lot of the TimeAfter publishing 34 books, Alice Walker talks through her latest release, a collection of personal journals spanning four decades. Read more in Gathering Blossoms Under Fire: The Journals of Alice Walker, 1965–2000, out now.
Companion listening for this episode:
Lynn Nottage: Unexpected Optimist (1/3/2022)
Playwright Lynn Nottage breaks down her remarkable career and shares how, as an optimist at heart, she finds the light and resilience in unexpected stories.
“The United States of Anxiety” airs live on Sunday evenings at 6pm ET. The podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts. To catch all the a...2022-05-3049 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightSomebody, Sing a Black Girl’s SongAn intergenerational meditation on Ntozake Shange’s iconic Broadway play, For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/When the Rainbow Is Enuf. First, host Kai Wright and producer speak with the director and choreographer of the current Broadway Revival, Camille A. Brown. Then, performers Trazana Beverley, Aku Kadogo, and Carol Maillard reminisce on the original production and with the show's legendary creator, Ntozake Shange.
Companion listening for this episode:
Lynn Nottage: Unexpected Optimist (1/3/2022)
Playwright Lynn Nottage breaks down her remarkable career and shares how, as an optimist at heart, she finds the light and resil...2022-05-1649 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightJustice Alito Said the Quiet Part Out LoudHis leaked opinion tells us more about a powerful minority’s view of the U.S. than it does about the Constitution or the history of abortion. Kai Wright talks to Susan Matthews, news director at Slate and host of the upcoming season of Slow Burn: Roe v. Wade, “The Constitution Wasn't Written for Women.” And Michele Goodwin, a Chancellor's Professor at the University of California, Irvine, joins Kai to open the phones to your questions and emotional reactions to this frightening but galvanizing moment.
Companion listening for this episode:
The Abortion Clinic That Won't Go Quietly ...2022-05-0950 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightThe Abortion Clinic That Won't Go QuietlyIn 2018, host Kai Wright visited the Alabama Women’s Center in Huntsville, to learn how abortion providers were dealing with the state’s new law that sought to make their practice a felony crime. The law was one of several that Republican controlled states passed in an effort to provoke a Supreme Court ruling on Roe.
A leak of Justice Samuel Alito’s draft opinion in a separate case suggests the Court is now poised to overturn the constitutional right to an abortion. So we revisit this 2018 story, to hear first hand from the medical providers who are dete...2022-05-0518 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightVoters to Democrats: Get a Spine!Michigan State Senator Mallory McMorrow and The Nation Magazine’s John Nichols explain how the Democrats can fight – and win – the culture wars. Plus, listeners weigh in with how they would like the party to proceed. Watch State Senator McMorrow’s speech here. Then, read John’s article in reaction to the speech here.
Companion listening for this episode:
How the Right’s Anti-Trans Hate Machine Works (5/28/2021)Last year, guest More than 100 anti-Trans bills have been introduced across 30 states since January. We find out what’s happening — both in the courts and in society — and what still needs to be don...2022-05-0250 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightKai Wright Introduces Dead End: A New Jersey Political Murder MysteryKai Wright talks with WNYC colleague Nancy Solomon about her new podcast: Dead End: A New Jersey Political Murder Mystery
New Jersey politics is not for the faint of heart. But the brutal killing of John and Joyce Sheridan, a prominent couple with personal ties to three governors, shocks even the most cynical operatives. The mystery surrounding the crime sends their son on a quest for truth. Dead End is a story of crime and corruption at the highest levels of society in the Garden State.
“The United States of Anxiety” airs live on Sunday evenin...2022-04-2903 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightThey Dumped Trump for Biden. Now What?Voters who switched from Trump to Biden in 2020 are headed to the polls again, and former GOP strategist Sarah Longwell wants to know what they’re thinking. Longwell is executive director of the Republican Accountability Project and publisher of The Bulwark, where she hosts The Focus Group podcast. She’s convening an ongoing series of focus groups with voters, including “flippers” who ditched Trump in 2020. What are they thinking as they head into primary elections for this year’s midterms?
Then, Dr. Theresa Jean Tanenbaum responds to one of our listener voicemails about choosing a name as a trans wo...2022-04-2550 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightA Historian's Guide to the 2022 Midterm ElectionsAs the country confronts racial tensions and class conflicts, it begs the question: How did we get here? We look back to a moment in history when our country was struggling to become a true, multiracial democracy -- meeting a lot of roadblocks, many of which persist today. Historian Eric Foner gives us a primer on the Reconstruction Era amendments that we explored in season four, as producer Veralyn Williams rides along to help us make sense of what it means today and how we can move forward as one nation.
Companion listening for this episode:
2022-04-1852 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightThe Dangerous Cycle of FearHost Kai Wright attends a free self defense class hosted in partnership between The Alicia and Jason Lee Foundation and University Settlement, and meets the instructor. Read more about the effort’s mission here. Then, he speaks with Jo-Ann Yoo, Executive Director of the Asian American Federation, which works with nonprofits to support the pan-Asian community. What’s the economic and social cost of hate crime on Asian American communities? What are the uncomfortable – yet crucial – tensions between Black and Asian-American communities in the air right now? And then, Kai grabs dinner with Tammie Teclemariam, New York Magazine’s first-ever Di...2022-04-1151 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightThe End of Institutions: Hollywood EditionA slap at the Oscars tarnished Will Smith’s legacy. What about him did Hollywood treasure? Is this institution just a screen for projecting our own social anxieties and cultural debate? Culture critic Soraya McDonald joins to take a deeper look at the roles Hollywood allows us to play, on screen and off. Plus, breaking down the exhausting reaction to Pixar’s defiantly Asian film, Turning Red, with Jeff Yang, the co-author of Rise: A Pop History of Asian America from the Nineties to Now. Read Jeff’s piece for The Guardian here.
Companion listening for this episode...2022-04-0451 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightKetanji Brown Jackson’s Black PatriotismThe Senate’s questioning of Ketanji Brown Jackson revealed where she might fit in the history, and future, of the Supreme Court. Host Kai Wright is joined by Frederick I. and Grace Stokes Professor of Law at New York University, Melissa Murray, to discuss. Plus, a National Geographic explorer’s story of diving for sunken slave ships.
Companion listening for this episode:
Can America Be Redeemed? (7/5/2021)
Eddie Glaude and Imani Perry consider the question through the work of James Baldwin and Richard Wright. Plus: How our country could enter a period of “post-traumatic growth.”2022-03-2851 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightHow "Bich" Became “Beth” – An American TaleWhat’s in a name? A lot. A listener's voicemail inspired us to explore the sometimes complicated relationship between our names and our racial and ethnic identities. Host Kai Wright is joined by novelist Beth Nguyen to discuss her personal journey when it comes to her name, and invited callers to share their own stories. Check out Beth’s article for The New Yorker: America Ruined My Name For Me.
Companion listening for this episode:
Why So Many Are Stuck in the “Other” Box (2/21/2022)
The episode that motivated such listener reactions: The U.S. Census nam...2022-03-2149 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightPeople Feel Unsafe–and It’s More Than CrimeThe social fabric is torn. People nationwide are scared, some going so far as to arm themselves. What can we learn from our history as we react to this fear? Scholar James Forman Jr., author of the book Locking Up Our Own: Crime and Punishment in Black America, helps break down what’s real, vs perception, about the rise in violent crime. Plus, a conversation with Nina Jankowicz, author of How to be a Woman Online: Surviving Abuse and Harassment, and How to Fight Back, about how to make the internet safer for women with political expertise and opinions.
...2022-03-1450 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightWhy the ‘Reagan Regime’ EnduresPresidencies are rarely transformational, and neither Biden nor Trump have lived up to their supporters’ dreams. So what does it take to really change our politics? Host Kai Wright is joined by political theorist Corey Robin to confront that question, and take your calls about Biden’s first year in office.
Companion listening for this episode:
Government: A Love-Hate Story (4/12/2021)
How did Americans come to think so poorly of the government? And how did Joe Biden come to be the first modern president who’s even tried to change our minds? Kai talks with t...2022-03-0731 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightBrian Lehrer on Productive DiscourseDemocracy won’t work if we can’t talk to each other. So how do we do it across the cultural and political divides? WNYC’s own Brian Lehrer has hosted his syndicated show for over 30 years. Find out how a Raegan-era repeal changed the course of his career.
Companion listening for this episode:
The Method to Tucker Carlson’s Madness (5/3/2021)
History suggests we shouldn’t laugh off what’s happening in right wing media right now. Plus, profiting off of racism is a business model as old as the news.
“The United Stat...2022-02-2849 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightWhy So Many Are Stuck in the “Other” BoxU.S. Census data found that more people are choosing "some other race" when asked to self-identify. It reveals just how complicated identity is, especially when it comes to race. Data journalist Mona Chalabi talks us through the data, and the stakes, of that statistic. Plus we hear from people around New York City who live outside of the Black-white binary, as they share their stories.
Companion listening for this episode:
This Land Is My Land, That Land Is Your Land (10/6/2016)
One thing politicians on both sides of the aisle have ag...2022-02-2151 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightDavid Byrne on Musical DemocracyThe former Talking Heads frontman explores the various challenges – and beauties – of human connection while breaking down his hit Broadway show, American Utopia. David Byrne's American Utopia is running at Broadway's St. James Theater through early April. You can also stream the filmed version, directed by Spike Lee, on HBO Max.
Companion listening for this episode:
Lynn Nottage: Unexpected Optimist (1/3/2022)
Playwright Lynn Nottage breaks down her remarkable career and shares how, as an optimist at heart, she finds the light and resilience in unexpected stories.
“The United States of Anxiety” airs live on Su...2022-02-1019 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightRevisiting Nothing You Do Alone Will Save the ClimateNew science finds we’ve got less than a decade to avoid climate catastrophe. Activist and author Bill McKibben says the only solutions that can beat that deadline are collective. Host Kai Wright invites listeners to ask McKibben their own climate questions, on the heels of a United Nations report that declared the damage from carbon and methane emissions at our current rate will be irreversible by 2030. What can we do that will make enough change, quickly enough?
Companion listening for this episode:
The Birth of Climate Denial (5/11/2017)
How a movement to create doubt a...2022-01-3150 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightA Conservative View of the Vigilante RightMona Charen discusses the true meaning of conservative and the radical shift in the GOP. Plus, she helps take your calls. Then, a listener mailbag begs us to explore how "normal people" became part of the Jan 6. attack. Host Kai Wright and senior digital producer Kousha Navidar spoke with Seamus Hughes, Deputy Director of the Program on Extremism at George Washington University, to learn more.
Companion listening for this episode:
Episode 1: How Did We Get Here and Where Are We Going? (9/22/2016)
Listen back to our very first episode where we went to Long Island to f...2022-01-2450 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightA History of Voter SuppressionAs recent voting rights legislation struggles to even get a vote in the Senate, we revisit a conversation with historian Dr. Carol Anderson about how American voters, particularly Black Americans, had fought and continue to fight for their right to participate in the democratic process - safely and with certainty that their votes will count.
Dr. Anderson is a Charles Howard Candler Professor of African American Studies at Emory University and author of several books including “White Rage: The Unspoken Truth of Our Nation's Divide” (2016).
Companion listening for this episode:The Short Life and Early Death...2022-01-2023 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightHow to Spot the End of DemocracyOn a scale of 1-10, how anxious are you about the state of our democracy? Kai considers when democracy is past its tipping point with New York Times columnist Thomas Edsall. Plus callers tell us how anxious they are about the state of our democracy.
Then is the right better at the internet than the left? Senior producer Kousha Navidar reports back.
Companion listening for this episode:
The Supreme Court v. Our Rights (12/6/2021)
Another year of the SCOTUS is coming to a close. But can we still trust our nine appointed ju...2022-01-1050 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightLynn Nottage: Unexpected OptimistTwo-time Pulitzer Prize winning playwright Lynn Nottage (Ruined, Sweat, Clyde’s) breaks down her remarkable career and shares how, as an optimist at heart, she finds the light and resilience in unexpected stories. Plus, she tells host Kai Wright about her hopes for the future of theater and her interest in making the medium accessible and meeting people where they are.
Companion listening for this episode:
Can America Be Redeemed? (7/5/2021)
Eddie Glaude and Imani Perry consider the question through the work of James Baldwin and Richard Wright. Plus: How our country could enter a p...2022-01-0351 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightWhat Does Black Ambition Sound Like?James Reese Europe was already famous when he enlisted to fight in World War I. But the band he took to the frontlines — as part of the famous 369th Infantry Regiment, also known as the Harlem Hellfighters — thurst him, and Black American music, onto the global stage. Moran sits down at the piano to show Kai how Europe’s band changed music, and how jazz carries the resilient sound of Black history and ambition in America.
Companion listening for this episode:
The ‘Beautiful Experiments’ Left Out of Black History (2/8/2021)
Saidiya Hartman introduces Kai to the young...2021-12-2750 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightTalking About Racism Is an Act of LoveThree men — White, Black, and Asian — discuss the nuances of identity that divide this country. A bonus episode, introducing a new podcast we love: “Some of My Best Friends Are…”
Our host Kai Wright talks with Khalil Gibran Muhammed about the new show. And we share an episode in which Khalil and Ben Austen, two best friends who grew up together on the South Side of Chicago in '80s, talk with New York Times journalist and author Jay Caspian Kang about his new memoir, The Loneliest Americans, and his experience growing up Asian in America.
Compan...2021-12-1649 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightA Year of Performing Humanity, ReviewedA.O. Scott, co-chief film critic of the New York Times, helps us review the year in culture. What can we learn about our struggling effort to live together from this year’s art? Then, a conversation with WQXR’s Terrance McKnight about the life and legacy of famed contralto, Marian Anderson.
The List
Here’s a crowd-sourced list of 2021’s defining art gathered from listeners and our guest. If you have a suggestion tweet us at #USofAnxiety.
Film
InsidePassingThe Closer
Television
Squid Game
2021-12-1350 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightThe Supreme Court v. Our RightsAnother year of The Supreme Court of the United States is coming to a close. But can we still trust our nine appointed justices to be the final arbiters of the law?. Co-hosts of the Boom! Lawyered podcast, Jessica Mason Pieklo and Imani Gandy, join Kai Wright to answer those questions and more from our listeners about Dobbs v. Jackson and the impact of abortion rights on the U.S. Plus, results from our audience experiment to see how platforms on the Internet shape the content we consume.
Companion Listening:
Dissent, Dissent, Dissent (9/20/2020)
In th...2021-12-0650 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightAn Anti-Racism RefresherAnti-racist work snuck into the mainstream last year. But ever since, it’s received a huge backlash. Why, and what did right-wing media have to gain? This week, Kai revisits two conversations: First, with Dr. Ibram X. Kendi, author of five best-selling books including How to Be an Antiracist, about what anti-racism really means. Then, Dr. Nicole Hemmer, author of Messengers of the Right: Conservative Media and the Transformation of American Politics, explains how right wing media serves -- and surrounds -- its audience.
Companion listening for this episode:
The ‘Beautiful Experiments’ Left Out of Black Hi...2021-11-2951 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightThe Myth of a ‘United’ StatesHistory shows that our country’s actually been divided from the start. If secession is in our DNA, what’s keeping us together? Should we just break up already? Kai talks with author Richard Kreitner about his book, “Break It Up: Secession, Division, and the Secret History of America’s Imperfect Union.” Plus, a look at how the Internet and the “Filter Bubble” contribute to our isolation today. Stick around for an exercise you can do when the divide gets real at the Thanksgiving table.
Companion listening for this episode:
Can America Be Redeemed? (07/05/2021)
Eddie Glaude...2021-11-2250 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightPromises to Help the Climate Keep BreakingWho’s breaking them, and why? Coming off of COP26, we talk to journalists Elizabeth Kolbert and David Wallace-Wells about the real cost of the climate crisis and who is paying the price. Learn about climate reparations, hear answers to listener questions, and discover what’s left for us to try to move forward as a global society.
Plus, revisit the history of the 1992 Earth Summit that we discuss in the episode: https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/anxiety/episodes/united-states-of-anxiety-season-2-podcast-epiode-2
Companion listening for this episode:
Nothing You Do Alone Will Save the Climat...2021-11-1549 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightFired at 59: Lessons on Job Insecurity in the U.S.Broadcast journalist Ray Suarez was 59 when he lost a dream job that took decades to reach. What he did next reveals a harsh reality of class blindness and the consequences of job insecurity in the U.S. His experience inspired a new podcast that “gives voice to people who have lost jobs, lost their homes, and sometimes lost the narrative thread of their lives.” He joins host Kai Wright to preview his story and helps take calls from our listeners.
Listen to Going for Broke With Ray Suarez, a new podcast by the Economic Hardship Reporting Project and T...2021-11-0850 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightHow the Dead Still Speak to UsThis Halloween, we reveal the holiday’s often untold history and why connecting to the dead is important to so many people, from Ireland, to Mexico, to NYC. What about this time of year lowers the veil between the living and the dead, and what does this universal desire to connect with those who’ve passed teach us about ourselves? Plus, make sure to listen to the end for a conversation with award-winning psychic medium Betsy LeFae, host of the podcast Trust Yourself. She leads Kai through a guided meditation that can help you connect, too.
Comp...2021-11-0100 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightMaking it in New York: The Eric Adams StoryIn just two weeks, New Yorkers could elect Eric Adams, making him the city’s second-ever Black mayor. What does his rise through civil service tell us about the ways race and power have evolved in the nation’s largest city? Hear from Errol Louis, one of New York's longest-serving political journalists, about how Adams's story is part of a much broader history of Black politics -- a story that began in a Brooklyn church, some 50 years ago.
Companion listening for this episode:
'Community' Is a Verb. And It’s Hard (6/12/2020)
To a lo...2021-10-2551 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightThe True Story of Critical Race TheoryIs racism a permanent fixture of society? Host Kai Wright is joined by Jelani Cobb, staff writer for The New Yorker, to unravel the history of Derrick Bell’s quest to answer that question and how it led to our present debate over critical race theory.
Companion listening for this episode:
The Method to Tucker Carlson’s Madness (5/3/2021)
History suggests we shouldn’t laugh off what’s happening in right wing media right now. Plus, profiting off of racism is a business model as old as the news.
“The United States of Anxiety”...2021-10-1151 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightHear No Evil: Asylum Policy in AmericaDisplaced Haitians are still seeking safe harbor. But the U.S. long ago abandoned the ideal that all migrants should at least be allowed to tell their stories. Host Kai Wright is joined by globally recognized immigrant rights advocate and professor at Columbia Law School, Elora Mukherjee, to break down asylum. When refugees arrive, how do we respond, and how are we all implicated in that choice?
Companion listening for this episode:
Wash. Rinse. Repeat. Haiti and International Aid (8/23/2021)
Haiti’s recent tragedies revives a conversation about disaster, aid, and how people recover. The...2021-10-0449 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightArt That MattersThe fall season is here. A season of new shows on television, art in museums, and musicals on Broadway. Can the creative work that’s been made during the pandemic, and that’s going to be made now, help us move forward together? Host Kai Wright takes calls from listeners with bestselling author and senior culture editor at ESPN's The Undefeated, Morgan Jerkins. Then, we revisit a conversation with Ashley C. Ford about a piece of art that we’re still thinking about, the HBO series Lovecraft Country.
Companion listening for this episode:
Can America Be Redeem...2021-09-2751 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightNothing You Do Alone Will Save the ClimateNew science finds we’ve got less than a decade to avoid climate catastrophe. Activist and author Bill McKibben says the only solutions that can beat that deadline are collective. Host Kai Wright invites listeners to ask McKibben their own climate questions, on the heels of a United Nations report that declared the damage from carbon and methane emissions at our current rate will be irreversible by 2030. What can we do that will make enough change, quickly enough?
Companion listening for this episode:
The Birth of Climate Denial (5/11/2017)
How a movement to create doubt a...2021-09-2049 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightA 9/12 Story: ‘I Forgot I Was a Muslim Kid’How did September 11, 2001, and its aftermath, affect the way anyone perceived as Muslim, and those around them, fit inside the American experiment? Host Kai Wright is joined by award winning journalist Aymann Ismail, who talks about his post-9/11 childhood in northern New Jersey -- and what he learned about his identity as an adult. Then, a conversation about diversity, healing, and growth, with Irene Sankoff and David Hein, the co-creators of the Tony Award-winning show Come From Away. A filmed version of the show debuted on Apple TV Plus on the 20th anniversary of 9/11.
Companion Listening:The...2021-09-1350 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightThe Legacy of Abu GhraibOne man’s ongoing effort to get justice for the abuse he endured at a U.S. prison in Iraq.
At the start of the Iraq War in 2003, Salah Hasan Nusaif al-Ejaili was working as a journalist when the U.S. military detained him inside Abu Ghraib, a prison that would become notorious for American abuses committed in the wake of the September 11th terrorist attacks. Only a handful of people were ever held responsible—all of them military personnel. But the private contractors who oversaw interrogations at Abu Ghraib have yet to be held accountable. In this...2021-09-1036 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightMaybe We Just Want Less ‘Work’The “Great Resignation” appears to be a real thing. But why? We ask workers what they really want. Plus, 45 questions to help us understand each other, and ourselves.
Recent research shows that for a lot of us, our relationship with work has evolved greatly through this ongoing pandemic.
In our Labor Day episode, journalist Sarah Jaffe, author of the book Work Won’t Love You Back, returns to the show to explore what’s changing, and why. Plus, we hear from listeners about what they want -- and don’t want -- from their jobs.
Then, i...2021-09-0749 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightHow Zillow Explains Education InequityHundred year old school buildings. Sputtering HVAC systems. Covid revealed a legacy of racism that’s built into the physical infrastructure of education.
A lack of investment in school buildings determines who can safely go back and who can't. But if we all pay taxes, why is our public school system full of inequality and inequity? Kai speaks with reporters Bracey Harris and Meredith Kolodner, who break down the Hechinger Report’s shocking findings on the safety of school buildings across the country.
Later in the show: From infrastructure to PTAs, a school’s priorities are large...2021-08-3047 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightThe Man, the Myth, the ManipulationWhy do we equate macho bullying with competent leadership? The cautionary tale of Andrew Cuomo.
From sexual harassment to intimating deemed rivals, the list of accusations against New York Governor Andrew Cuomo have crescendoed into a long awaited resignation.
But what kind of leader do we value? What makes a competent leader -- and why are we so often looking for a new hero? Kai explores these questions with Zephyr Teachout, Associate Law Professor at Fordham Law School, who challenged Cuomo in the 2014 primary. She talks with Kai about her essay in The Nation from Marc...2021-08-2525 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightWash. Rinse. Repeat. Haiti and International Aid Haiti’s recent tragedies revive a conversation about disaster, aid, and how people recover. Then, a discussion about perspective on the 30th anniversary of the Crown Heights riots.
After a 7.2 magnitude earthquake rocked Haiti’s southwestern region, many of us were left wondering -- what does it mean to best support Haiti through disaster? And if the global community has donated so much humanitarian aid to prevent devastation, why does it keep happening? Is Haiti cursed?
Guest host Nadege Green confronts history, anti-blackness and the way forward with Dr. Marlene Daut, professor and Associate Director of th...2021-08-2351 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightWhat the Olympics Taught Us About UsIf sports are a metaphor for life, what are they telling us about our society right now?
Dave Zirin, sports editor for The Nation, and author of ten books on the politics of sports, joins Kai to talk about the “Pandemic Games,” the peril of chasing perfection, and just how much has changed since the 2020 summer of activism in big league sports.
Plus, the hard conversation so many of us are avoiding: Executive producer Veralyn Williams gets advice from WNYC’s health and science editor Nsikan Akpan on how to talk with loved ones who refuse...2021-08-0950 min
Notes from America with Kai Wright‘Ethical People Can Be Effective’Remembering the life of Bob Moses, and his mission to build a more equitable America from the bottom up.
From teaching in New York City to registering Black voters in the 1960’s Mississippi, Moses was a measured man who believed leadership was about listening, not talking. Rutgers University Professor of African American Studies Charles M. Payne joins us to recap Moses' life’s work -- and his big ideas, from Freedom Summer to a radical education initiative that’s still used in schools today.
Companion listening for this episode:
The Origin Story of Black Hist...2021-08-0250 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightTo Protect and Observe: A HistoryToday’s viral videos of police abuse have a long political lineage. But what if one of the oldest tools of copwatching is now taken away?
Ron Wilkins takes us back to 1966, in the wake of the Watts uprising, in which he joined an early cop watch program -- one that would inspire the likes of the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense.
Then, reporter Jenny Casas introduces us to journalists and activists who have been using police scanners for decades to peek inside the infamously closed world of police departments. Many departments are now trying to e...2021-07-2650 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightThe American Story, in Half a Year2021 began with an insurrection, and it’s remained quietly intense ever since. We open the phones for a six-month check in on the political culture of the Biden era.
Kai is joined by Christina Greer, Associate Professor of Political Science at Fordham University, to unpack all that has — and hasn’t — happened this year. Did the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol really fail? What does the victory of Eric Adams in New York City say about the state of Black politics -- and the Democratic Party? And why the sudden uproar over “critical race theory”? Kai and Christina exp...2021-07-1948 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightThe Short Life and Early Death of Voting RightsBirth, August 1965. Death, July 2021. So now what for multiracial democracy?
Mark Joseph Stern, who covers the Supreme Court for Slate, explains how the Roberts Court has rewritten the Voting Rights Act to render it a dead letter law. We explore what, if anything, can be done to revive it.
And Kai talks with Vann Newkirk II, a senior editor at The Atlantic, about a recent essay in which he tracks the legacy and impact of the Voting Rights Act alongside his family’s history in Mississippi. Influenced by his mother’s tenacity in exercising her right t...2021-07-1250 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightCan America Be Redeemed?Eddie Glaude and Imani Perry consider the question through the work of James Baldwin and Richard Wright. Plus: How our country could enter a period of “post-traumatic growth.”
The two professors of African-American Studies at Princeton talk with each other about the impact of James Baldwin and Richard Wright’s work — on their own intellectuality and creativity, and that of the Black American zeitgeist at large and the harrowing relevance of their work as it echoes into the issues of today.
Later, a conversation with psychologist, minister and artist Dr. Thema Bryant-Davis as we prepare to navigate th...2021-07-0550 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightHow the Right’s Anti-Trans Hate Machine WorksMore than 100 anti-Trans bills have been introduced across 30 states since January. We find out what’s happening — both in the courts and in society — and what still needs to be done.
Executive Producer Veralyn Williams guest-hosts this week and is joined by journalist and media-maker Imara Jones of TransLash to discuss her work to elevate Trans stories and the inner workings of what she calls in her new podcast, The Anti Trans Hate Machine. Also, Veralyn and Imara breakdown why there is a lack of solidarity between Black cis and trans women.
Companion listening for this episode:2021-06-2851 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightWhy We Must VoteNew York City faces a consequential election. We look at the history of our local election laws. Plus, the mastermind behind new voting restrictions nationally.
Senior Reporter Arun Venugopal guest hosts and sits down with WNYC’s City Hall and Politics Reporter Brigid Bergin to discuss her reporting about voter turnout across New York City, the new ranked-choice voting system and how the history of the city’s political machines continue to impact the lives of New Yorkers today.
Then, Ari Berman, reporter at Mother Jones and author of Give Us the Ballot: The Modern Struggle for Vot...2021-06-2149 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightDavid Dinkins vs. the NYPDHow NYC’s first Black mayor tried to balance concerns about public safety with demands for a more accountable police force -- and the violent resistance he faced from the police union.
Under the Dinkins administration, the crime rate declined, but his complex relationship with the New York Police Department - which grew in size under his tenure - often overshadows his legacy. As voting is underway for the 2021 mayoral race, our senior editor Christopher Werth tells the story of Dinkins’s attempt to balance crime fighting and racial justice, and of a police union reaction that looked...2021-06-1449 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightThe Dawn of ‘Anti-Racist’ AmericaIbram X. Kendi reflects on a shifting political culture -- and the fierce backlash against it. Plus, a remembrance of the 1921 Tulsa massacre.
With five best-selling books, including How to Be an Antiracist and Four Hundred Souls, Kendi has been at the center of the nation’s racial reckoning over the past year. He talks with Kai about the ideas people have found most challenging, and about his new podcast, Be Antiracist, which launches on June 9th.
Then, listeners tell us what they’ve learned about the 1921 massacre in Tulsa, Oklahoma, as Kai talks with KalaLea, host...2021-06-0750 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightThe ‘Big Bang’ in Jazz HistoryJazz pianist Jason Moran brings us an exploration into the life and work of James Reese Europe and how the infamous 369th Infantry Regiment - also known as the Harlem Hellfighters - crossed racial lines and brought jazz to Europe.
Joe Young of New York Public Radio talks about how using music as a service member informed his own patriotism
Companion listening for this episode:
Juneteenth, an Unfinished Business (June 26, 2020)
As the nation grapples with a reckoning, we pause to celebrate Juneteenth. Our holiday special, for Black liberation and the ongoing b...2021-05-3159 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightHow NYPD ‘Kettled’ the Spirit of ReformNew Yorkers reacted to George Floyd’s murder with mass protests demanding police accountability. NYPD met them with targeted violence and abuse.
On June 4, 2020, a few hundred people gathered in the South Bronx neighborhood of Mott Haven to protest the murder of George Floyd. They were met with overwhelming force -- in an event that has come to represent NYPD’s steadfast refusal to accept public scrutiny. WNYC’s Race and Justice Unit has been reconstructing what happened that night, from the vantage point of two dozen protestors who were present. Editor Jami Floyd tells the story her team...2021-05-2448 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightMa’Khia Bryant’s Story Is Too FamiliarWe failed her long before the cops killed her. We’re failing thousands more children like her now. In this bonus episode, we meet one of those girls.
Girls often land in detention because they have experienced some form of trauma: abusive families, bad experiences in the foster care system, and especially sexual abuse.
Desiree is a young woman who has bounced between foster care, detention centers, and residential treatment centers since she was 10. Even though she has been the repeated victim of abuse, she says she's been made to feel like she's the problem...an...2021-05-1333 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightNo More ‘Selfless’ MomsErased from history. Ignored in public policy. This Mother’s Day, we ask how to truly value “motherwork.” Plus: The story of one “woke birth.”
Gates scholar and author Anna Malaika Tubbs encourages each of us to reimagine our relationships with motherhood and challenge the erasure of mothering figures - starting in the past. Her book, The Three Mothers: How the Mothers of Martin Luther King, Jr, Malcolm X, and James Baldwin Shaped a Nation, tells the stories of the three women who birthed, raised and shaped these changemakers.
Then, executive producer Veralyn Williams brings us a series...2021-05-1050 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightThe Method to Tucker Carlson’s MadnessHistory suggests we shouldn’t laugh off what’s happening in right wing media right now. Plus, profiting off of racism is a business model as old as the news.
Nicole Hemmer, an associate research scholar at Columbia University and author of Messengers of the Right: Conservative Media and the Transformation of American Politics, explains how right wing media serves -- and surrounds -- its audience.
Then, Channing Gerard Joseph, a journalism professor at the University of Southern California-Annenberg, describes how today’s most notable newspapers built their businesses by selling racism and anti-Black violence. He breaks...2021-05-0349 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightDo We Need the Police at All?The answer isn’t simple, but it’s time to ask. Listeners weigh in with stories of their own efforts to solve problems with and without cops.
Community organizer and educator Lumumba Akinwole-Bandele joins callers as we reimagine a world without policing, and shares his own stories from decades of police reform activism in New York City.
Plus, Dr. Jameta Nicole Barlow, a psychologist, public health scientist, and assistant professor at The George Washington University, explains intergenerational trauma and the lifelong damage that consuming racial violence does to our bodies.
And writer Hali Bey Ramd...2021-04-2649 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightWhy Cops Don’t ChangeA retired NYPD detective says the force’s stubborn, insular culture was built to last. And Elie Mystal explains a 1989 Supreme Court ruling that made killing “reasonable.”
Armed with the lessons from a 20-year-long career in law enforcement, retired NYPD Detective Marq Claxton talks about the police mindset and how a badge never shielded him from the fear that so many Black Americans carry everyday.
Elie Mystal, justice correspondent at The Nation, grounds the conversation in the history of American policing and how the Supreme Court enabled their impunity.
And we check in with a...2021-04-1950 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightThe Missing History of Asian AmericaWe’ve been here before: A time of national stress, Asian Americans made into scapegoats, and violence follows. The community saw it coming. So why didn’t everybody else?
A mass shooting in Atlanta follows a year of warnings from Asian Americans who have said they do not feel safe. But the violence has forced to the surface old questions about where Asian Americans sit in our nation’s maddening racial caste system, and community leaders have struggled to get people across the political and racial spectrum to take the moment seriously.
Helen Zia, activist and aut...2021-03-2246 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightThe Secret Tapes of a Suburban Drug WarA cop in Westchester, NY, was disturbed by what he saw as corruption. He started recording his colleagues -- and revealed how we’re all still living with the excess of the war on drugs.
Following months of investigation into allegations of police corruption in Mount Vernon, reporter George Joseph of WNYC’s Race & Justice Unit brings us a story about unchecked power, policing in communities of color and our long national hangover from the war on drugs.
Part of George Joseph’s story, “The Mount Vernon Police Tapes: At Least Seven Black Men Now Allege False...2021-03-0149 min
IndivisibleWeek 8: Should Health Care Be A Right Or A Choice?WNYC's Brian Lehrer and guests debate what President Trump’s healthcare plan reveals about how Americans define "freedom."
This program is produced in partnership with WNYC Studios, Minnesota Public Radio News, and The Economist. Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and come back Mondays through Thursdays for new episodes.
WNYC Studios is the producer of other leading podcasts including Radiolab, Freakonomics Radio, 2 Dope Queens, Death, Sex & Money, On the Media and many more.
The hosts include WNYC's Brian Lehrer, Minnesota Public Radio's Kerri Miller, WNYC's Kai Wright, John Prideaux and Anne McElvoy of The...2017-03-1457 minIndivisibleSpecial Coverage of President Trump's First Congressional AddressWNYC and NPR will produce a special hour of coverage to set up this important moment in President Trump’s early presidency.
This program is produced in partnership with WNYC Studios, Minnesota Public Radio News, and The Economist. Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and come back Mondays through Thursdays for new episodes.
WNYC Studios is the producer of other leading podcasts including Radiolab, Freakonomics Radio, 2 Dope Queens, Death, Sex & Money, On the Media and many more.
The hosts include WNYC's Brian Lehrer, Minnesota Public Radio's Kerri Miller, WNYC's Kai Wright, John Prideaux an...2017-02-2857 minIndivisibleWeek 5: Can President Trump's Policy Claims Be Taken Seriously?Presidential historian Douglas Brinkley and political commentator Cokie Roberts join WNYC’s Brian Lehrer for a discussion on the Trump administration's changing policy claims and history lesson on how the definition of democracy has evolved through 45 American presidents.
This program is produced in partnership with WNYC Studios, Minnesota Public Radio News, and The Economist. Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and come back Mondays through Thursdays for new episodes.
WNYC Studios is the producer of other leading podcasts including Radiolab, Freakonomics Radio, 2 Dope Queens, Death, Sex & Money, On the Media and many more.
Th...2017-02-2157 minIndivisibleWeek 4: The First 25 DaysWNYC's Brian Lehrer looks back on President Trump's first weeks in office and how his administration and policy are taking shape.
This program is produced in partnership with WNYC Studios, Minnesota Public Radio News, and The Economist. Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and come back Mondays through Thursdays for new episodes.
WNYC Studios is the producer of other leading podcasts including Radiolab, Freakonomics Radio, 2 Dope Queens, Death, Sex & Money, On the Media and many more.
The hosts include WNYC's Brian Lehrer, Minnesota Public Radio's Kerri Miller, WNYC's Kai Wright, John Prideaux and Anne...2017-02-1457 minIndivisibleWeek 4: How Will President Trump's Foreign Policy Affect Our Military?WNYC's Kai Wright and Anne McElvoy from The Economist take calls from military families and veterans about how shifting foreign policy might affect their lives.
This program is produced in partnership with WNYC Studios, Minnesota Public Radio News, and The Economist. Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and come back Mondays through Thursdays for new episodes.
WNYC Studios is the producer of other leading podcasts including Radiolab, Freakonomics Radio, 2 Dope Queens, Death, Sex & Money, On the Media and many more.
The hosts include WNYC's Brian Lehrer, Minnesota Public Radio's Kerri Miller, WNYC's Kai Wrig...2017-02-1357 minIndivisibleWeek 2: President Trump Makes a Supreme Court PickWe talk to Alberto Gonzales, former United States Attorney General and the former Counsel to President George W. Bush, and to WNYC host Jami Floyd, who is also an attorney, about Trump’s choice to succeed Antonin Scalia and what it means for the future of the court. They also visit President Trump's decision Monday night to fire Acting Attorney General Sally Yates for taking a critical stance against the travel ban.
This program is produced in partnership with WNYC Studios, Minnesota Public Radio News, and The Economist. Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and come back Monda...2017-01-3157 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightCall-In Special: Across the AisleWith The United States of Anxiety, WNYC Studios and The Nation brought forth the ideas and concerns that made up part of the coalition bringing President-elect Donald Trump from his midtown Manhattan
But with Hillary Clinton besting the President-elect in the popular vote by over one million votes to date, and protests of "Not My President" erupting across the country, it remains a question if the tides of discontent will ever pacify in the country.
In the midst of this turmoil Anna Sale, host of WNYC's Death, Sex & Money, questions the perceived differences that so many vo...2016-11-2258 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightCall-In Special: Pass the PoliticsWhether you prefer dark meat, white meat, Tofurky or just mashed potatoes, most Americans can agree that the 2016 presidential election was contentious. With neither candidate managing to garner 50-percent of the vote and in a world of charged media outlets, families coming together for Thanksgiving Dinner face the likely prospect of heated political conversation landing on their holiday platters.
And, as The United States of Anxiety found, the caustic nature of politics not only wears away one's patience but also one's health.
So to ensure that the hardest thing you will be between this holiday season...2016-11-1857 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightEpisode 9: Where Are We Now?So, here we are. The race is over and Donald Trump has been elected the 45th President of the United States.
WNYC Studios and The Nation take the temperature of the country following the unprecedented election of a consummate political outsider.
WNYC’s Arun Venugopal checks-in with Trump supporter Patty Dwyer and gauges her reaction on a come-from-behind political victory that shook the world. The Nation's Julianne Hing reports from Arizona, where the defeat of long-standing anti-immigrant Sheriff Joe Arpaio is nonetheless tempered by the elevation of Donald Trump.
Plus, Matt Katz and Chri...2016-11-1047 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightEpisode 7: This Is Your Brain on PoliticsStress is a part of everyday life. But in this election filled with bombast, 24-hour news coverage, and October Surprises emerging at nearly every turn, the road to November 8th often appears overwhelming.
Join WNYC Studios and The Nation as we explore the burgeoning field of biopolitics and uncover how our bodies respond to 2016’s political circus.
WNYC’s Amanda Aronczyk sits down with neuroscientist Jeffrey French and political scientist Kevin Smith, as we perform an unusual test to find out just what in this election is causing voters’ stress.
Plus, learn how our bod...2016-11-0341 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightEpisode 6: The Kids Are Not AlrightGang violence and a drug epidemic might not be the first things one thinks about when they picture the American suburbs, but they have become prominent facts of life for many residents in Suffolk County, Long Island. In fact, the leafy New York suburb led the Empire State in heroin and opioid overdose deaths in 2014.
WNYC Studios and The Nation set out to understand how these problems emerged in the first place.
WNYC’s Arun Venugopal sits down with Anthony, a former-drug user who recounts how he became addicted while growing up in the leafy environs...2016-10-2740 min
Notes from America with Kai WrightEpisode 5: White Like MeOnce again, race has become a central issue in a presidential campaign. But this time, it's not all about people of color. It's also about white Americans, and what their place is in 21st century America.
This week, WNYC Studios and The Nation examine the history of what it means and has meant to be white in the United States of America.
WNYC’s Jim O’Grady accompanies journalist Chris Arnade to Long Island. What they find is that as the economy has transitioned away from manual labor, it's struck at the very heart of the way many...2016-10-2033 min