Radio Curious

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The transcendent experience of street basketball is the topic of two conversations with Onaje X. O. Woodbine, author of “Black Gods of the Asphalt: Religion, Hip-Hop, and Street Basketball.”  Woodbine grew up in the inner-city of Roxbury, Massachusetts, became a skilled street basketball player and attended Yale University on a basketball scholarship.  After two years as a star player on the Yale team, he chose a different life path and quit.

After graduating from Yale, Woodbine earned his Ph.D. in religious studies from Boston University.  His book, “Black Gods of the Asphalt” presents a social-anthropological view of this inner-city sport where coaches often assume the role of father, mentor and friend.  He contrasts the lessons learned on the street basketball courts, with those learned at the predominantly white basketball courts and locker rooms of Yale University.

Onaje Woodbine visited with Radio Curious by phone on August 13, 2016, from his home in Andover, Massachusetts, and began by describing his relationship with his father, Dr. Robert Woodbine.

The book Dr. Onaje Woodbine recommends is “Jesus and the Disinherited” by Howard Thurman.

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Police misconduct and accountability is the topic of this edition of Radio Curious. Out guest is Dr. Joseph Marshall, a member of the San Francisco Police Commission where he leads the Commissions efforts to reform policing policies at the San Francisco Police Department. In addition Dr. Marshall is the executive director of Alive & Free, a non-profit organization that teaches inner city youth violence prevention and offers higher education scholarships.  He is the host of Street Soldiers Radio aired every Sunday evening live online from 8 to 10 pm on KMEL FM 106.1 in San Francisco, California.

I spoke with Dr. Joseph Marshall on August 15, 2016 from his office in San Francisco, California and began our conversation when I asked him about Black Lives Matter.

The book Dr. Joseph Marshall recommends is “The Autobiography of Malcom X.”

Free & Alive’s website is: http://stayaliveandfree.org/.
Street Soldiers can be heard at: http://streetsoldiersradio.org/listen-watch/.

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Radio Curious revisits a conversation with Mendocino County Deputy Sheriff Orell Massey who, for the past 20 years has been the only black law enforcement officer in the county’s history. A native of South Carolina, Deputy Massey was a 21 year veteran of the U.S. Marine Corps assigned to the Foreign Service Embassy detail before he moved to Mendocino County. When I asked Sheriff Massey to be a guest on this program and share his experience as a black Deputy Sheriff, he asked: “Are the people of Mendocino County ready to hear what I have to say?”

In part one of our conversation, Deputy Massey described some people’s reaction to him while he is in on duty.

In this program, part two, recorded on February 1, 2015, in the Radio Curious studios, Deputy Massey gives his personal response when asked, “what is it like to be the only black Deputy Sheriff ever in the history of Mendocino County?” Later he shares stories about his off duty life, his goals and aspirations.

The book Deputy Massey recommends is “Code Talker: The First and Only Memoir By One of the Original Navajo Code Talkers of World War Two,” by Chester Nez and Judith Schiess Avila.

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Radio Curious revisits a conversation with Mendocino County Deputy Sheriff Orell Massey who, for the past 20 years has been the only black law enforcement officer in the county’s history. A native of South Carolina, Deputy Massey was a 21 year veteran of the U.S. Marine Corps assigned to the Foreign Service Embassy detail before he moved to Mendocino County. When I asked Sheriff Massey to be a guest on this program and share his experience as a black Deputy Sheriff, he asked: “Are the people of Mendocino County ready to hear what I have to say?”

In this program, Part One of our conversation, Deputy Massey describes some people’s reaction to him while he is in on duty.

In Part Two, recorded on February 1, 2015, in the Radio Curious studios, Deputy Massey gives his personal response when asked, “what is it like to be the only black Deputy Sheriff ever in the history of Mendocino County?” Later he shares stories about his off duty life, his goals and aspirations.

The book Deputy Massey recommends is “Code Talker: The First and Only Memoir By One of the Original Navajo Code Talkers of World War Two,” by Chester Nez and Judith Schiess Avila.

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This program is about “passing,” a term sometimes used to define a person of color who passes as white. From the 2004 Radio Curious archives we revisit a conversation with film director Robert Benton, about his film “The Human Stain.” It’s a movie about the life of Coleman Silk, an eminent Jewish intellectual and devoted husband; a professor of classics at a small New England college.  The truth about Coleman Silk, portrayed by Anthony Hopkins, is far more complex than expected or thought to be.  He hid behind a veil of lies, having masked his African-American origins in order to find a freedom he thought would otherwise be impossible to achieve.  But his world of deception unraveled after embarking on a romance with a much younger woman.

Our guest, Robert Benton, is a three time Academy Awards winner for his work as the Director of “Kramer Vs. Kramer,” “Places in the Heart,” and “Nobody’s Fool.” His film, “The Human Stain,” takes place in the 1990s and is based on the third novel of Phillip Roth’s “American Trilogy” describing the post World War Two turmoil in America.

The title “The Human Stain” emerges from the idea that no matter what a person does, a human being leaves a mark on the world, whether by rage, desire, ambition or accident, a kind of scar; stain that cannot be undone.  For Coleman Silk that stain is the deception and concealment he carried for decades. The human stain is the mark we leave on everything.  It speaks to the fact that we can’t get through life without marking the world around us in some way. We have no choice. It’s part of being human.

Robert Benton and I visited by phone in the fall of 2004.

The books Robert Benton recommends are “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night” by Mark Haddon and “The Manuscript Found in Sargossa” by Jan Potocki.

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Who we are and where we come from is a crucial question that now we are more able to answer than ever before. The examination and analysis of our individual DNA, in addition to answering a myriad of medical and forensic secrets also reveals the mix of our individual ancestors and the paths they took. This analysis provides significant and untold information about who we are, from where we came and how we may connect with our relatives.

Dr. Alondra Nelson, the Dean of Social Science and professor of sociology and gender studies at Columbia University, in New York City, is our guest in this edition of Radio Curious.

Professor Nelson is the author of The Social Life of DNA: Race, Reparations, and Reconciliation After the Genome. She s also the author of Body and Soul: The Black Panther Party and the Fight Against Medical Discrimination, which she and I have previously discussed on Radio Curious.

To discuss The Social Life of DNA, Professor Nelson and I visited by phone from her office n New York City, on February 19, 2016. We began by noting that although all human beings are members of the human race, people are grouped by skin color and/or facial features and characterized as being of a different race.

The book she recommends is Come Out Swinging, by Lucia Trimbur.

This program was recorded on February 19, 2016.

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In this edition of Radio Curious, we’ll visit again with Dr. Elizabeth Allen, a Professor of nursing at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. As a high school student, Dr. Allen was one of the first African American students to integrate the West Virginia high schools in 1957.

We begin our conversation with Dr. Allen when she discusses how she was able to successfully get through the educational system, and what changes have occurred in education since then, as they relate to African American students.

The book she recommends is ‘The Price of Loyalty’ by Ron Suskind, with former US Treasury Secretary, Paul O’Neil.

This episode originally broadcast in May, 2004.

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In May, 1954 the United States Supreme Court unanimously declared, ”segregation in public education is a denial of the equal protection of the laws.” Brown v. The Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, was a leader of many that gave strength and support to the initial struggles for equal civil rights and equal access for all people regardless of skin color. Now 62 years later the concept of affirmative action admission policies for racial equality in public universities continues.

In this 2004 archive edition of Radio Curious we visit with Dr. Elizabeth Allen, now a Professor Emeritus of Nursing at the University of Michigan. As a high school student in 1957, Dr. Allen was one of the first African-American students to integrate the West Virginia high schools. Later she was a Captain in the U.S. Army as Combat Nurse in Viet Nam, prior to obtaining a Master’s Degree and Ph.D. in nursing and becoming a professor of nursing at the University of Michigan.

This is the first of a two part series recorded in April 2004, in commemoration of the Brown v. Board of Education decision, recorded in late April 2004, Dr. Elizabeth Allen and I began our visit with her description the changes in racial segregation between 1954 and 2004.

Dr. Elizaeth Allen is an avid romance reader and recommends any book written by Linda Howard. She also recommends “The Price of Loyalty” by David Suskind with former US Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill.

This interview as originally broadcast in May 2004.

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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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