Where there’s fire, there’s smoke. And there is a lot of both these days in the American West Wildfires have always been part of the landscape in the western states. But the size and intensity of fires over the last several years is something new. Of the 20 largest wildfires in California history, 15 happened…
This hour, amateur detectives, spiritual revelations and other stories of dogged perseverance. The 27th Amendment By Matt Largey for Pop-Up Magazine and KUT Austin (2016) With everything that’s going on in politics these days, it helps to remember the power that we have as individuals to make change. Examples of this are far too few,…
The land and vistas around us tell a story about weather, the seasons, and light, but also about human influence, climate change — and shifts in our culture and priorities. On this episode, The Pulse travels to changing landscapes: from sprawling tobacco farms in Kentucky to misty forests in the mountains of Peru, and finally…
This one-hour special, co-hosted by John Biewen and Celeste Headlee, goes way beneath the #MeToo headlines to explore questions like: How, and when, did male dominance get started in the first place? (Spoiler: The cave men didn’t invent patriarchy, and it’s been around for only a fraction of human history.) How has patriarchy lasted…
In the early 1970’s, author Studs Terkel went around the country with a reel-to-reel tape recorder interviewing people about their jobs. The result was a book called “Working: People Talk About What They Do All Day and How They Feel About What They Do.” The book became a bestseller and even inspired a Broadway musical…
Globalization ushered in an era of free trade, fluid borders, and unparalleled corporate profits. For its proponents, the global integration of states and their economies was a political and economic win that created a wealth of opportunities for workers and consumers around the world. But in the United States, jobs are disappearing. From construction zones…
Water is essential for life – that we know. But the honeycomb lattice that forms when you chill it to zero degrees Celsius is also inexorably intertwined with life. Ice is more than a repository for water that would otherwise raise sea levels. It’s part of Earth’s cooling system, a barrier preventing decaying organic matter…
Populism is sweeping through Europe and it’s changing the political conversation, especially when it comes to Muslim immigration. In some cases these populist movements are also fueling extremist violence against immigrants. In Greece refugee centers have been firebombed. Brexit has emboldened white supremacists in the UK. Finland is forcing many Muslim migrants to return…
Order 9066: Japanese American Incarceration in WWII On February 19, 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, just months after Japan bombed Pearl Harbor. Some 120,000 people of Japanese ancestry were forced from their homes on the West Coast and sent to one of ten “relocation” camps, where they were imprisoned behind barbed…
Long hailed as bastions of intellectual development and ground zero for the free and spirited exchange of ideas, today’s universities have come under attack by those who argue that a new generation of students and administrators are trading in academia’s most cherished values for political correctness and inclusion. At the heart of this debate is…
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