KPFA - Letters and Politics

Guest: Howard W. French is a professor of journalism at Columbia University and former New York Times bureau chief in the Caribbean and Central America, West and Central Africa, Tokyo, and Shanghai. He is the author of the book Born in Blackness: Africa, Africans, and the Making of the Modern World, 1471 to the Second World War. The post Africa and the Making of the Modern World appeared first on KPFA.

Guest: Bart D. Ehrman is the James A. Gray Distinguished Professor of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the author of Journeys to Heaven and Hell: Tours of the Afterlife in the Early Christian Tradition The post Early Christianity & The Making of Hell appeared first on KPFA.

Guest: Karen Hao is an award-winning journalist covering the impacts of artificial intelligence on society. She writes for publications including The Atlantic and leads the Pulitzer Center’s AI Spotlight Series.  She is the author of Empire of AI: Dreams and Nightmares in Sam Altman’s OpenAI. The post The Empire of Artificial Intelligence appeared first on KPFA.

Guest: Lyndal Roper is Regius Professor of History at the University of Oxford.  She is the author of several books including, Martin Luther: Renegade and Prophet; Witch Craze, and her latest, Summer of Fire and Blood: The German Peasants’ War. The post The German Peasants’ Revolt appeared first on KPFA.

Guest: Juan Cole is a public intellectual, prominent blogger and essayist, and the Richard P. Mitchell Collegiate Professor of History at the University of Michigan. He is the translator of The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyam: A New Translation from the Persian The post The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyam appeared first on KPFA.

Guest: H. W. Brands is the Jack S. Blanton Sr. Chair in History at the University of Texas at Austin. He is the author of many books, including American Colossus, The General vs. the President, The First American and Traitor to His Class, and his latest, America First: Roosevelt vs. Lindbergh in the Shadow of War. The post The America First Committee: A History appeared first on KPFA.

Guest: Dr. Frank Tallis is a writer and clinical psychologist and author of Mortal Secrets: Freud, Vienna, and the Birth of the Modern Mind. The post The Life & Times of Sigmund Freud appeared first on KPFA.

A look at burning political issues and debates and their historical context within the US and worldwide, hosted by Mitch Jeserich. The post Letters and Politics – July 31, 2025 appeared first on KPFA.

Guest: Ann Schmiesing is professor of German and Scandinavian studies at the University of Colorado Boulder. She is the author of Disability, Deformity, and Disease in the Grimms’ Fairy Tales and most lately, The Brothers Grimm: A Biography. The post The Story Behind the Grimm Brothers’ Tales appeared first on KPFA.

Guest: Emily Hauser is a senior lecturer in classics and ancient history at the University of Exeter, UK. She is the author of three novels reimagining the women of Greek myth: For the Most Beautiful, For the Winner, and For the Immortal. She is also the author of How Women Became Poets, and most recently, of Penelope’s Bones: A New History of Homer’s World through the Women Written Out of It. The post Women in Ancient History: Penelope’s Bones appeared first on KPFA.