This week on the podcast, we're revisiting a conversation we had with Ava Chin about her book, Mott Street. Through decades of painstaking research, the fifth-generation New Yorker discovered the stories of how her ancestors bore and resisted the weight of the Chinese Exclusion laws in the U.S. – and how the legacy of that history still affects her family today.
More states than ever are gearing up to vote on abortion rights this fall, including Republican-led Missouri. There, voters could show the issue isn't a down-ballot Democratic dream everywhere.
There are parallels between the two high-profile events, most starkly the proliferation of similar protests around the country. But key differences set them apart.
In 1963, William Lewis Moore was murdered in Alabama while on a civil rights protest walk. Silence around the murder bothered one man for years, until he campaigned to put up a marker about it.
Thousands of years ago, there was a ceremony to bind close friends together as sworn siblings. Could the practice be resurrected today to strengthen modern friendships? Two women did just that.
Journalist Ari Berman says the founding fathers created a system that concentrated power in the hands of an elite minority — and that their decisions continue to impact American democracy today.
The modern study of starvation was sparked by the liberation of concentration camp survivors. U.S. and British soldiers rushed to feed them — and yet they sometimes perished.
The Panama Canal has been dubbed the greatest engineering feat in human history. It's also (perhaps less favorably) been called the greatest liberty mankind has ever taken with Mother Nature. But due to climate change, the Canal is drying up and fewer than half of the ships that used to pass through are now able to do so. So how did we get here? Today on the show, we're talking to Cristina Henriquez, the author of a new novel that explores the making of the Canal. It took 50,000 people from 90 different countries to carve the land in two — and the consequences of that extraordinary, nature-defying act are still echoing through our present.
Vandalism and violence against markers to Black history are fairly widespread, and Georgia is no exception. In February, a historical marker memorializing Black victims of lynching in DeKalb County was stolen. Organizers who worked to install the marker feel the disappearance is about more than just a missing piece of metal. GPB’s Pamela Kirkland explains.
Where did the idea come from that individuals, rather than corporations, should keep the world litter-free? What history is hidden in the trash? Find out here.
Whether it's pesticides in your cereal or the door plug flying off your airplane, consumers today have plenty of reasons to feel like corporations might not have their best interests at heart. At a moment where we're seeing unprecedented product recalls, and when trust in the government is near historic lows, we're going to revisit a time when a generation of people felt empowered to demand accountability from both companies and elected leaders — and got results. Today on the show, the story of the U.S. consumer movement and its controversial leader: the once famous, now infamous Ralph Nader.