When John Pavlovitz's new book Worth Fighting For: Finding Courage & Compassion When Cruelty is Trending, landed on my desk I was intrigued by the title. Given that trolling on socials, nastiness on the news, and day-to-day unkindness to one another seem to be the norm, there isn't any way to argue that cruelty is not the currency of the day. So a …

All too often we think about, or more accurately don't think about, the ripple effects of low-wage work on families beyond the thought that things must be tight. In this conversation, based on their important book, Getting Me Cheap: How Low Wage Work Traps Women and Girls in Poverty, Lisa Dodson, Amanda Freeman, and I discuss the implications not j…

When I first heard about Engage and Evade: How Latino Immigrant Families Manage Surveillance in Everyday Life, Asad L. Asad's brilliant exploration of how undocumented people navigate living in the U.S. I thought that I had a pretty good understanding of the situation. I did not. The experience of living undocumented in the U.S., particularly in so…

Kat Calvin & Omkari Williams Kat Calvin and I both wrote books! Kat's is American Identity In Crisis: Notes from an Accidental Activist. Mine is Micro Activism: How You Can Make a Difference in the World (Without a Bullhorn). When we realized that our books were coming out within weeks of each other we thought that we should have a conversation abo…

Often, when we think about racial justice immediately following the Civil War we think about a relatively narrow slice of Black history. Blair LM Kelley's Black Folk: The Roots of the Black Working Class shines a light on stories that we don't hear enough about. Drawing on stories from her own family and extensive research Blair tells us a compelli…

David Mura If I am a broken record on any subject it's probably on the impact of story and how the stories we tell to ourselves and others shape our understanding of the world. In his powerful book, author David Mura, writes about some of the stories that underlie the American experience. With examples from literature and film David explores and im…

Leah Penniman In 2018 Leah Penniman wrote Farming While Black, a beautiful book recounting her experience of building Soul Fire Farm and, also, a guide for other Black and Indigenous people looking to reconnect to the land. Now Leah has compiled a treasure trove of conversations that she's had with other Black people who work in harmony with the Ea…

:Debilyn Molineaux Have you ever wished for an unmistakable sign of the direction you should be going in? I know I have. For Debilyn Molineaux, President and CEO of Bridge Alliance that sign set her on a path to work towards healing the divides that are ripping at the fabric of the United States. In this conversation Debilyn and I talk about where …

Shaun Marq Anderson Given how little we are taught about Black history in general it's not surprising that most of us, me included, have relatively little knowledge of the role that Black athletes have played in the social justice movement before the late 20th century. But since the Reconstruction Era Black athletes have been pushing the envelope, …

Allison Butler We hear a lot about Critical Race Theory, as we should. But what about Critical Media Literacy? Have you ever even heard the term? I hadn't. Then I read The Media and Me: A Guide to Critical Media Literacy for Young People. Not to quibble with the authors but really, this isn't only for young people. This is for all of us. We're taki…

Ross Morales Rocketto I feel pretty safe in saying that we all have gripes about our government. Where it's not doing enough, where it's overreaching. Most of us just gripe, Ross Morales Rocketto has taken a decidedly different path. Along with his co-founder, Amanda Litman, Ross has made it his mission to get as many young (read under 40) progress…

EMERALD GARNER Most of us, mercifully, get through life without getting the news that Emerald Garner and her family got on a July day in 2014. Her father, Eric, had been killed by a police officer who used a chokehold on him as Garner spoke those words that we have heard all too often, "I can't breathe". While her older sister, Erica, sprang into a…

Diane Rosenfeld I read a lot of books, most of the people I interview on this podcast are authors, so I'm pretty used to finding interesting aspects to various subjects. But when I started reading this book I was riveted! I couldn't wait to talk with Diane about what we humans, particularly females, could learn from Bonobo apes. That apes had figur…

Kelli Stewart Sports are part of the culture of every country. Here, in the U.S., baseball is our "national pastime". Kelli Stewart and her husband, CJ, decided to use the tool of baseball to teach disadvantaged and at risk young Black boys essential life skills. Founders of the LEAD Center in Atlanta, GA Kelli and CJ have grown a program that reac…

Will Jawando Will Jawando sat down to write a book about the Black men who had the most impact in his life. That book, My Seven Black Fathers, has illuminated corners of the Black experience, particularly the Black male experience, that all too often go unseen. In our conversation Will and I talk about the influence of these men, including Barack O…

Kerri Kelly September 11th changed life for all of us, but for Kerri Kelly the impact was especially personal. In the aftermath of that event Kerri upended her life and went on a search for wellness. What she found was not what she expected and, once again, the trajectory of her life was changed. In her new book, American Detox: The Myth of Wellnes…

Shawn Ginwright What if we've been approaching this whole idea of justice and have left out a critical piece? What if our very approach is actually helping cement the damage that bias and systemic inequity have caused? We all know that there is much healing that has to happen if we're going to be the equitable society that we envision. The question…

Tatenda Musapatike If your best friend asks you what you want to do in the world and your response is, "Run shit" then you and Tatenda Musapatike should probably sit down and grab a drink. The founder of the organization, Voter Formation Project, Tatenda and her team work to leverage the digital age to not only get people registered to vote but als…

Nisha Anand Around the world the divisions that define our societies are becoming deeper and more hardened. In this inspiring conversation Dream Corps CEO Nisha Anand and I talk about the power of finding common ground. If we truly want to make the difference that we say we want to make we have to be willing to work with people who may have radical…

Obery Hendricks From the moment of his announcement that he was running for the presidency Donald Trump directed his efforts towards courting white evangelicals with racist and anti-immigrant sentiments. But he didn't start this trend, he simply hopped on a bandwagon that had been gaining speed for years. Author, scholar, and ordained minister Ober…

For many Black Americans the land itself is the scene of the crime. That legacy of slavery has dramatically impacted the relationship that many Black Americans have with the land. Food and land justice activist Leah Penniman is working to change that. A founder of Soul Fire Farm and the author of Farming While Black, Leah has made it her mission in…

Veronica Chambers For a lot of people Black Lives Matter became part of their lives in a concrete way in the wake of the murder of George Floyd but the story of the organization starts years earlier. In her book, with its gorgeous photographs, NYT editor Veronica Chambers takes us on not only the journey of BLM but also looks to the past and the fu…

Varun Nikore 2020 saw the greatest increase in voter turnout by the Asian American Pacific Islander (AAPI) community in history. That turnout powered the vote in key states like Georgia and helped prevent another four years with the former guy. I wish the fight for our democracy was over but it's clearly not and there are some important lessons to …

Nicole Hockley In the wake of the murders at Sandy Hook Elementary, where 20 children (6 and 7 years of age) and six educators were killed on December 14, 2012, some of the grieving parents joined together to do what they could to prevent such a tragedy from ever happening again and Sandy Hook Promise (SHP) was born. Nicole Hockley's six year old s…

Shelby Kretz In the midst of this awakening, in the larger community, to the systemic injustices in our society we've heard a lot about "wokeness". What if instead of people having to get woke in adulthood we raised children who were aware of and sensitive to social justice issues from the beginning? Imagine if, instead of coming to this work as ad…

Deborah Tuerkheimer In the past couple of years we have watched as, finally, powerful men who are also sexual predators have been brought to some form of justice. Harvey Weinstein, Bill Cosby, Charlie Rose, and Matt Lauer among the most prominent. What we learned from watching their downfall is how very hard it is to have these men held to account.…

Emily Ladau Here's a number for you, 1 billion. One billion people is the estimated number of disabled people in the world. One billion. One in 8 people on the planet. That means that each of us knows someone, likely many someones, with a disability whether visible or hidden. Yet disability is a subject that most of us give little or no thought to.…

Lynden Harris The stories that we don't hear impact us as much as those that we do. We just don't realize that there's something missing. Under the leadership of director Lynden Harris the North Carolina based co-creative collective company, Hidden Voices, brings to light stories that we don't even realize we need to hear. In this conversation Lynd…

Anjuli Sherin Most of us are aware of the toll that this pandemic has taken on us in terms of anxiety and fear around illness, physical safety, societal breakdown, and economic security to name but a few things. And while we may understand that we've been, and continue to be, under enormous pressure we may not know how best to navigate these very r…

Alex Zamalin Most of us are brought up to be polite. We are told, by parents and educators, to mind our manners, to wait our turn, to be civil. Director of the African American Studies Program and Assistant Professor, Political Science at Mercy College Alex Zamalin pushes back against the narrative that what our society needs now is more civil disc…

Dr. Manuel Pastor Okay my California peeps, you get to gloat. This fascinating interview with Dr. Manuel Pastor makes it abundantly clear that the rest of us have a lot to learn from the Golden State. When most of us think of California we probably think of sand, sun, and a reliably blue state. But that's far from the whole story of CA which gave u…

Alesha Monteiro When someone is incarcerated there are impacts that land far beyond those to the incarcerated person. People without partners, children without parents, communities without those who may fill critical roles, and the elderly without a caregiver to name just a few. The truth is that it's rare that we even think about the people left b…

Rebecca Grace and John Gray I can't believe that I've been doing this podcast since 2018! This season I have some remarkable people as guests on the show. Season 4 starts with Rebecca Grace and John Gray of Complete Picture. Imagine that someone you love has been convicted of a non-violent felony and is awaiting sentencing. Typically the sentencing…

Drew Willey Imagine going to law school with the intention of becoming a tax attorney and then doing an internship with the Texas Innocence Project and completely scrapping your previous plan. Meet Drew Willey. Some time back I was fortunate to be in a group studying Joel Goza's book, America's Unholy Ghosts with Drew Willey. Drew and his wife Jess…

Clint Borgen When Clint Borgen was a sophomore in college the war in Kosovo broke out. In 3 months the fighting had killed 10,000 people and displaced 800,000. Borgen decided that he needed to do something so he found a group to volunteer with and went to the region. That experience changed the direction of his life. Being a witness to war and the …

Resmaa Menakem The week of April 19, 2021 was brutal. People around the world, but especially here in the U.S., were waiting on a verdict in the Derek Chauvin trial. But then there were other killings that same week of Black bodies by police. It was almost too much to process. But this conversation with healer, therapist, and NYT best selling autho…

Tammy Tai & Greg Ball Did you know that Boston played a major role in the life of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.? I didn't. Turns out Boston was where he got his PhD, studied with his mentor Howard Thurman, and met Coretta Scott. Clearly, Boston was a significant place in both their lives. In 2022 a sculpture will be installed on the Boston Common in …

Roderick Nunn The United States has approximately 5% of the world's population but accounts for about 25% of those incarcerated. The statistics on re-incarceration are, honestly, awful. We know what happens when people are released from prison with no structure in place to help them successfully reenter society. How might it be different if instead…

Kerra Bolton In this conversation award winning filmmaker Kerra Bolton and I discuss telling Black stories, and the challenges of doing so, including her latest project which will have her diving sunken slave ships. We also talk about her life as an expat and some of the surprising moments that come, like when she realized that she was the oppresso…

Leslie Kern When I first saw the title of Leslie Kern's book, Feminist City: Claiming Space in a Man-Made World, I was intrigued. Then I started reading it and I was fascinated. In this book Kern talks about things that are so much a part of the norm that we often don't notice them, until we do. For instance, have you ever thought about the way tha…

Hari Ziyad In this episode I got to speak with the author of the upcoming memoir Black Boy Out of Time, Hari Ziyad. Hari uses his experience of growing up queer with a Hare Krishna mother and Muslim father to illuminate the experience of being outside. As an outsider, both as a consequence of being queer but also as a Black boy in a world that has …

Tharaka Sriram Season 3 Episode 15 In this episode I talk with Tharaka Sriram who has merged her values of the preservation of the oceans with women's justice issues and more. Tharaka and I discuss the overlap between the damage we're doing to our oceans and domestic violence. She discusses the necessity for more women, particularly women of color,…

In this conversation editor and author Krishan Trotman and I talk about her book Queens of the Resistance (co-authored with Brenda Jones) in which she profiles Nancy Pelosi, AOC, Maxine Waters, and Elizabeth Warren. We also discuss how important it is for us to have representation in publishing if we're going to have a deeper understanding of our v…

Xander Schultz Season 3 Episode 14 How best can we support the work of those on the front lines of social justice? That’s a question that I’ve heard a lot. Xander Schultz, and those he works with, have come up with multiple effective and, often, clever ways to advance the causes that are most important to them. In this inspiring, engaging, and impa…

Ari Honarvar Season 3 Episode 13 She grew up in repressive and war torn Iran, then writer and activist Ari Honarvar came to the United States. In this timely conversation Ari and I talk about intersectionality and bringing joy to those stranded at the US border. Ari and I also talk about what it's like to be from a war torn country and some of the …

Joel Edward Goza Season 3 Episode 12 I have never said, “You have to listen to this episode!”. I am telling you, you have to listen to this episode. In this remarkable conversation Joel Goza, author of America's Unholy Ghosts: The Racist Roots of Our Faith and Politics, and I talk about the deep roots of the structural and systemic racism that plag…

Ruby Smith-Diaz Season 3 Episode 11 As we work towards the goals of freedom and social justice one of the things that is most important is that we listen to and center the voices of young people. They are the ones who will have to live with the consequences of our actions, and our inactions. Ruby Smith-Diaz and I discuss how she uses art to engage,…

Anjali Enjeti Season 3 Episode 10 Anjali Enjeti and I had this great conversation all the way back in June. We talked about the election, about Black Lives Matter, about the role of race in American Literature and more. Given that the election is over it might seem odd to even think about it now but this conversation will expand how you see the way…

Staci K. Haines Season 3 Episode 9 It's 2020 and that means that there is almost no way to be living in the United States and not have experienced some sort of trauma. Lives and jobs upended and lost, our politics are out of control, systemic racism front and center, it's been a brutal year. Somatic practician and activist Staci K. Haines takes on …

Grace Pai Season 3 Episode 8 In this episode organizer and activist Grace Pai and I discuss the divisions between Blacks and Asian Americans, how Coronavirus is impacting the Asian American community, and the potential that lives in cross racial collaborations. Grace is the Director of Organizing at Asian Americans Advancing Justice Chicago. Her ye…