When you think about the accomplishments of the Civil Rights Movement and the last 50 years, it's tempting to think we've become a post-racial society. But University of Pennsylvania professor John Jackson Jr. believes we're seeing a new type of racial divide, characterized by distrust and paranoia.
Intelligent. Optimistic. Curious.
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Richard Poplak tells Anne Strainchamps about the ill-fated attempt to adapt The Simpsons for the Arab world.
Are we alone in the universe? Almost certainly not. The young science of astrobiology is closing in on a discovery that will rock our world: there IS life beyond earth. New telescopes, new missions, and new discoveries in outer space and in the most remote areas of our own planet all point to one conclusion. Extra terrestrial life exists, and we're very close to finding it. Science writer Marc Kaufman explains what's changed.
Alan Dale says laughing at slapstick is - at its heart - an expression of our sympathy with TV and film characters who get hurt. He says it's also relief that, for once, it's not us in pain.
Natalie Goldberg tells Jim Fleming that people who want to become writers should just write, and find themselves a writing mentor.
Jane Hamilton tells Anne Strainchamps the inspiration for her latest book came when she was teaching a writing workshop on a cruise ship.
Novelists have always mined their own lives for inspiration. But no ever's gone quite as far as Karl Ove Knausgaard. People call him the Norwegian Proust. He recently came out with the sixth volume of his autobiographical novel, "My Struggle." What's remarkable about Knausgaard is not just that he's telling the story of his life as a novel. It's the incredible level of detail.
Mary Lefkowitz is the author of “Greek Gods, Human Lives: What We Can Learn from Myths.” She says that the Greek gods seem too much like us to impress most modern people.
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