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To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Thirteen-year-old Ava Bigtree is having a difficult time.  Her mother has just died and business is down at her family’s gator-wrestling theme park, Swamplandia!   So begins Karen Russell’s critically-acclaimed debut novel, “Swamplandia!”  In this hour of TO THE BEST OF OUR KNOWLEDGE, we’ll meet...Read more

woman on a mountain

There's been a hot spotlight shining down on women this past year.  From allegations of a war on women to the debate about reproductive rights, it's hard to tell how far women have come and just where they're going. So, what does feminism look like today? The first woman governor...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

On this 4th of July weekend we ask a simple question: Who is a patriot?Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Maybe you can sing like Jennifer Lopez or Ricky Martin.  If not, looking like them is the next best thing.  Right now, it’s never been cooler to be Hispanic.  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, the Latino Revolution.  From the rise of Latino-chic to the spicy secretes of salsa. ...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Siberia is the name for a place we tend to think of as a metaphor as much as a destination on the map. Writer Ian Frazier indulged what he calls his dread Russia love with travels through Siberia, tracing the path of prisoners on their way to lonely exile and through mosquito-ridden swamps at...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Ok, take a breath. Close your eyes. Recall the home of your childhood.  Can you smell the cookies in the kitchen? Can you open a drawer in your bedroom? Do you see the sunlight through a window? Every building has a story. . . And not only a story, every building has a sound.Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

A husband, looking at his wife in a mirror maze, asks “are you coming or going?”  She answers “Yes, yes.”  Next time on To the Best of Our Knowledge, we’ll look at the history of mirrors, as we reflect on the question “How do you know who you are?”Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Crime may not pay but writing crime fiction does. Just ask the Swedish writer, Henning Mankell. Or those who write "Tartan Noir"...Scottish detective fiction. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, we'll explore Northern Europe's fictional crime wave. Also, Roger Ebert on film noir.Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Is there such a thing as true, original creativity? Or "Are we just seeing further by standing on the shoulders of giants?", to paraphrase Sir Isaac Newton. In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge we'll explore the question of where good ideas come from. Steven Johnson will tell us about...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Things go better with "biting the wax tadpole"? That doesn't sound right, does it? Yet that's the literal translation of Coca-Cola that Chinese shopkeepers came up with...a set of characters pronounced "ke-kou ke-la." In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge we'll explore the exotic world of...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Nature, red in tooth and claw. That line from Tennyson's poem still strikes a chord when we contemplate the natural world. Today, there's a divide in how we view nature. On the one hand, we swing through it like a playground, on the other, we're forced to step back to allow for nature's power in...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Are humans innately good? Do we have a generosity gene? Is there an inherent desire to help our fellow human beings? Or, are we natural born sinners who have to fight, tooth and nail, to conquer our inherent tendencies towards selfishness, destruction and war. In this hour of To the Best of Our...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

“The bearded lady/tried a jar/she’s now/a famous movie star/Burma-shave.”  Jingles like that could be found on signs across America’s highways between the 1930's and the 1950's.  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, the story behind the legendary Burman-Shave advertising campaign.  Also...Read more

crumpled pages from a book

Nobody wants to fail.  But maybe we’ve got the idea of failure all wrong.  Maybe it's not something to avoid, but something to strive for.  . Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Men are not really from Mars and women are not really from Venus.  But there are definite differences between the two genders.  Norah Vincent was curious about what a man's life was like.  So she spent eighteen months undercover...as a man.  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, Norah...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Calling Lynne Cox a swimmer is like calling Mohammed Ali a tough guy.  At age fourteen, she swam to Catalina Island from mainland California.  At eighteen she swam between the islands of New Zealand.  Years later, with miles of hard swims behind her, she turned her eye to the unthinkable - the...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

David Rothenburg is a philosopher and a jazz clarinetist, who also loves birds.  So one day he sat down in the National Aviary in Pittsburgh and started playing music.  Lo and behold, a white-crested laughing thrush started singing with him, riffing on the tunes he played.  Since then Rothenburg...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Poet Nick Lantz has a darkly satirical take on American culture. Lately, he’s been thinking about political spin and how politicians speak. In this interview—the third in our series ...Read more

holding hands in hospital

Modern medicine can treat disease at a molecular—or even atomic – level.  And today’s surgeons can fix things the naked eye can’t even see.  But there’s one thing every patient wants that no technology in the world can provide: compassion.  In this hour, doctors talk about the...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

The pint-sized wizard harry Potter has conquered the book world, and it’s not just kids who love him.  In this hour of To the Best of Our Knowledge, what’s behind Harry Potter’s popularity.  Also, acclaimed author Katherine Paterson (pronounced Patterson) on the emotional lives of...Read more

a girl making butterfly wings

Have you ever heard of an “Uncreative Writing” course?  In this class, students are penalized for showing any kind of originality.  Instead, they’re rewarded for plagiarism, plundering and stealing. We’ll meet the man behind “Uncreative
Writing” – poet Kenneth Goldsmith.  Also,...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Future Perfect: Dreamers, Schemers & Visionaries

Part Three

 

Our environment is in trouble. It's not hard to imagine global catastrophe as problems like climate change and overpopulation take their toll. But there's always hope...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Walk into the children's section of any bookstore and the magic wands and secret portals almost materialize in front of you. Wizards, witches, demons, time travel, dragons, orphans, orphaned dragons – doesn't anyone know how to write a non-magical book anymore?! In this hour of To the Best of...Read more

To The Best Of Our Knowledge

Back in 1967, Noam Chomsky wrote a famous essay called "The Responsibility of Intellectuals." Chomsky was furious about what he called "the deceit and distortion surrounding the American invasion of Vietnam." And he urged intellectuals "to speak the truth and expose lies." So what is the...Read more

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