Ensler, Eve –The Vagina Monologues
Radio Curious brings you an archived conversation with Eve Ensler, creator of the Vagina Monologues.
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Stewart, Maria W. – Sandra Kamusukiri – A Visit With a Free Black Woman – Boston 1840
Radio Curious brings you an archived interview with Maria Stewart, as portrayed by Sandra Kamusukiri. Maria W. Stewart, was a free black woman who lived in Boston, MA, from the 1820s to the early 1840s. She was the first American born woman to lecture in public on political themes and likely the first African-American to speak out in defense of women’s rights.
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Cobb, David — End Corporate Personhood: The 29th Amendment
The decision of the United States Supreme Court, in the case of Citizen’s United v. Federal Elections Commission in January 2010, substantially changed the political process in the United States. That decision held that corporations have the same constitutional rights as have individual people. Four of the nine Supreme Court Justices believe the Citizen’s United was wrong. So many other American’s share that belief that a nationwide grass roots effort called Move to Amend has been organized to promote the 29th Amendment to the United States Constitution. This new amendment would change the result of the Citizen’s United decide and declare:
“The rights protected by the Constitution of the United States are the rights of natural persons only. Artificial entities, such as corporations, limited liability companies, and other entities, established by the laws of any State, the United States, or any foreign state shall have no rights under this Constitution and are subject to regulation by the People, through Federal, State, or local law.”
An amendment to the Constitution requires a two thirds vote of approval in both the House of Representatives and in the United States Senate. It then must be adopted by three-fourths, or thirty-eight, of the fifty states to become the law of the land.
Many city councils including those of Los Angeles, New York, and Portland, Oregon, have passed resolutions urging their congressional representatives to support this amendment. Listeners in Mendocino County, the home of Radio Curious, may soon sign petitions to put a similar resolution on the November 2012 ballot.
Our guest in this edition of Radio Curious is David Cobb, an attorney from Texas, on leave from his trial practice to promote the adoption of this constitutional amendment. David Cobb visited the studios of Radio Curious on February 13, 2012, to talk about Move To Amend. We began our conversation when I asked him to explain why the constitution should be amended to repeal the effect of the Citizen’s United decision.
The books David Cobb recommends are “Gangs of America, The Rise of Corporate Power and the Disabling of Democracy,” by Ted Nace, and ”Corporations Are Not People: Why The Have More Rights Than You Do and What You Can Do About it,” by Jeff D. Clements.
The Move To Amend website is www.movetoamend.org.
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Nelson, Alondra — Health Care & The Black Panthers
The exodus of approximately six million black people from the American South between 1915 and 1970 had a significant role in setting the stage of the civil rights movement of the early 1960s. Many of the children of those who left the south participated in desegregation efforts which included the Freedom Rides and lunch counter sit-ins. The Civil Rights Acts of 1964 and 1965 which attempted to resolve employment discrimination and define voting rights, only changed the law. Many young blacks however did not see changes in their everyday life.
The Black Panther Party for Self-Defense was born out of this disillusionment. Although infiltrated and feared by the F.B.I., the Black Panther Party pioneered social and community programs, including free medical clinics, free meals, and educational programs.
Our guest in this edition of Radio Curious is Columbia University Sociology and Gender Studies Professor Alondra Nelson, author of “Body and Soul: The Black Panther Party and the Fight Against Medical Discrimination.”
We visited by phone from her Office in New York City, on February 13, 2012 and began our conversation when I asked her to describe the Black Panther Party.
The book she recommends is “Crave Radiance: New and Selected Poems,” by Elizabeth Alexander.
Professor Nelson’s website is http://www.alondranelson.com.
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Solomon, Norman — Made Love, Got War
Politics may be safely called the medium for the theory and practice of social change. The implementation of social change is the topic of this edition of Radio Curious.
Our guest is Norman Solomon, founder of the Institute for Public Accuracy. He has been its Director since 1999. Norman Solomon is currently a candidate for Congress for the newly formed 2nd Congressional District that includes the coastal counties of northern California from the Golden Gate Bridge 350 miles north to the Oregon border.
In addition to his work at the Institute for Public Accuracy, Norman Solomon has written 12 books on politics, civil disobedience, and war. When Norman Solomon was barely 17 years old, he came to believe that it was possible to do almost anything with enough desire. At that time he also wanted to write a book called “No Compromise.” He visited the studios of Radio Curious on February 2, 2012, and we began our conversation when I asked him if he ever wrote that book.
The website for the Institute for Public Accuracy is www.accuracy.org. The website for Norman Solomon’s congressional campaign is www.solomonforcongress.com.
The book Norman Solomon recommends is “The Grapes of Wrath,” by John Steinbeck.
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Krol, Debra — Native American Art of the Southwest at the Heard Museum
Founded in 1929, the Heard Museum’s mission is dedicated to educating people about the arts, heritage and life ways of the Indigenous peoples of the Americas, with an emphasis on American Indian tribes of the Southwest. Committed to the sensitive and accurate portrayal of Native arts and cultures, the museum successfully combines the stories of American Indian people from a personal perspective with the beauty of art, showcasing old and new hand woven baskets, kachina dolls, other art and cultural objects.
The museum showcases the art and regalia of Apache, Hopi, Navajo, Pueblo, and Yaqui, to name a few. More than 2000 items make up the museums exhibition. Artwork ranging from pottery, baskets, beadwork, dolls and paintings are on display.
Our guest is Debra Krol, the communications manager who shared portions of the Heard Museum with me on December 10, 2011. We began our conversation with Krol when she introduced us to the Heard Museum and the unique features that reflect the evolution of south western Native American art.
Debra Krol recommends two books: “Ishi’s Brain,” by Orin Starn, and “Indians, Merchants and Missionaries: The legacy of Colonial Encounters on the California Frontiers”, by Kent G. Lightfoot. Our interview with Orin Starn may be found here.
The Heard Museum website is www.heard.org.
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Blaise, Clark — The Creation of Standard Time
Not such a long time ago, time was an arbitrary measure decided by each community without consideration of other localities.
In this edition of Radio Curious, we visit with Clark Blaise, author of “Time Lord: Sir Sandford Fleming and the Creation of Standard Time.” Although this program was recorded a long time ago, we are airing it for the first time in the last week of 2011.
In the mid 19th century, with the advent of continent-spanning railroads and transatlantic steamers, the myriad of local times became a mind-boggling obstacle and the rational ordering of time to some became an urgent priority for transportation and commerce. Standard Time was established in 1884, leading to an international uniformity for telling time. Arguably, the uniformity of time was a “crowning achievement” of Victorian progressiveness, one of the few innovations of that time to have survived unchanged into the 21st century.
Under the leadership of Sir Sandford Fleming, amid political rancor of delegates from industrializing nations, an agreement was reached to establish the Greenwich Prime Meridian passing through Greenwich, England and the International Date Line that wanders it way through the Pacific Ocean. The 1884 agreement resulted in a uniform system of world-wide time zones that exists today.
I had a good time visiting with Clark Blaise in the spring of 2001 as we discussed how our current notion of time was established. We began when I asked him to explain what standard time is.
This interview with Clark Blaise, author of “Time Lord: Sir Sandford Fleming and the Creation of Standard Time,” was recorded in the spring of 2001 and first broadcast in the last week of 2011.
The book Clark Blaise recommends is “Time of Our Singing,” by Richard Powers.
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Dakin, Susanna — An Artist in the White House?
Imagine if you will an artist instead of a politician in the White House. This possibility existed in 1984 in reality, not in the George Orwell novel. Susanna Dakin, a sometimes resident of Santa Monica, California and sometimes of Mendocino County, California, a sculptor by training conceived of her national campaign for the presidency as a one-year durational art performance piece. Although Sue Dakin as she is now known, was defeated having been effectively overshadowed by the second term campaign of Ronald Reagan, Dakin has continued to practice what she calls “system sculpture” in her political, spiritual and art life.
This unusual episode in American Presidential Campaign History is revealed in Dakin’s book An Artist for President: The Nation is the Artwork and We are the Artists, published in 2011.
Maria Gilardin, host and producer of TUC Radio, and a friend of Sue Dakin and me, joined us in the studios of Radio Curious on November 25, 2011 in conversation with Sue Dakin about about her life and book. Maria Gilardin’s website is www.tucradio.org.
The book Sue Dakin recommends is, “The Empire of the Summer Moon: Quanah Parker and the Rise and Fall of the Comanches, the Most Powerful Indian Tribe in American History,” by S.C. Gwynne.
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Ball, Betty — History of the Mendocino Environmental Center
The history of the Mendocino Environmental Center, as told by its co-founder Betty Ball, is the topic of this edition of Radio Curious. Betty and her late husband Gary Ball, founded the Mendocino Environmental Center, based in Ukiah, California in early 1987, which soon became a central organizing hub for several environmental movements in Northern California.
The issues in those years included protection of the Northern California coast from off shore oil drilling, an effort which has remained successful; the Forests Forever initiate campaign in behalf of the Heritage Tree Preservation Act, which narrowly lost a state-wide California election in 2002; and Redwood Summer, a non violent civil disobedience effort to protect old growth redwood trees in northern California from being logged, modeled after the Mississippi Summer civil rights projects in 1964. Shortly before the planned beginning of Redwood Summer in June 2000, Judi Bari, a Redwood Summer organizer was severely injured in a car bomb explosion in Oakland, California. In a subsequent civil jury trial the F.B.I. and the Oakland Police Department were found liable for certain matters related to the bombing, and ordered to pay over $4,000,000.00 compensation. The bombers still remain at large.
These and other issues are discussed in this interview with Betty Ball, which was recorded for video and audio broadcast on November 7, 2011, at the studios of Mendocino Access Television in Ukiah, California. We began when I asked Betty Ball what drew her and her late husband, Gary Ball into the environmental movement.
The books that Betty Ball recommends are any written by Arundhati Roy, Derrick Jensen or Chris Hedges.
This interview with Betty Ball was recorded for radio and television broadcast with the generous cooperation of Mendocino Access Television in Ukiah, California, and the engineering assistance of Mikah Mate.
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Kennedy, Professor Randall — Racial Politics and the Obama Presidency
Racial Politics in America is the topic of this edition of Radio Curious, in our third visit with author and Harvard Law School Professor Randall Kennedy, whose latest book is “The Persistence of the Color Line: Racial Politics and the Obama Presidency.” Kennedy is also the author of “Nigger: The Strange Career of a Troublesome Word,” and “Interracial Intimacies: Sex, Marriage, Identity, and Adoption.” We visited by phone from his home in Massachusetts on October 28, 2011, and began our conversation when I asked him to describe the current role of race in American politics.
The book Randall Kennedy recommends is “Body and Soul: The Black Panther Party and the Fight Against Medical Discrimination,” by Alondra Nelson.
The interview with Professor Kennedy about his book “Nigger: The Strange Career of a Troublesome Word,” may be heard here and the interview about his book, “Interracial Intimacies: Sex, Marriage, Identity, and Adoption,” may be heard here.
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