Princeton Alumni Weekly Podcasts

Ge Wang *08 co-founded the mobile music company Smule, whose apps have reached more than 200 million users. Now he’s a professor at Stanford in the Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics. In a conversation with PAW, he talks about music, computing, and his new book, Artful Design: Technology in Search of the Sublime.

Visiting professor Ashoka Mody is the author of EuroTragedy: A Drama in Nine Acts, which unpacks the history and political motivations behind the European Union’s decision to employ a common currency, the euro. In a conversation with PAWcast’s Carrie Compton, Mody discusses the currency’s inherent flaws and its uncertain future — a topic that’s made headlines in recent days.

Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist George F. Will *68, a noted conservative who advocated for voting out the GOP in the 2018 midterms, spoke with PAW about America’s current political climate, the dangers of recent federal spending policy, and why President Donald Trump is “intensely boring” — for a columnist, at least. Will recently was selected to deliver the Baccalaureate address for Princeton’s Class of 2019. This is part of a monthly series of interviews with alumni, faculty, and students.

Nell Irvin Painter, a Princeton professor emerita of history, was 67 years old when she enrolled as an MFA student at the Rhode Island School of Design. During her second year there her book The History of White People was released and would become a New York Times bestseller. It was disorienting event, as she describes it. On one hand, there was the elation of receiving laudatory reviews, and on the other, the ever-present, stinging criticisms she experienced in art school, which she calls “one long tearing down.” Her latest book, Old in Art School, describes her late-in-life journey from preeminent historian to painter.

Two years after leaving Princeton to serve in the Army in Vietnam, Jim Marshall ’72 returned to a campus roiled in conflict. He says that he felt like “an oddity” of sorts — an undergraduate who had seen the war firsthand. Marshall would go on to law school, a career in politics that included four terms in the U.S. House of Representatives, a visiting teaching appointment at Princeton, and a stint as president of the United States Institute of Peace. He’s played a leading role in the recent formation of the Princeton Veterans Association, and he advocates for more opportunities for student veterans. “It’s good for Princeton to be open and supportive, and as helpful as possible, to veterans who have served,” Marshall says.

Economics professor Alan Krueger — former chairman of President Barack Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers — tells PAW’s Allie Wenner about his research on the economics of the music industry, including his opinions about the secondary market for concert tickets, how online streaming has reversed the downward trend in revenue for recordings, and why he thinks Taylor Swift is an “economic genius.”

Washington Post nonfiction book critic Carlos Lozada *97, a Pulitzer Prize nominee earlier this year, tells PAW about his approach to reading (and re-reading) books and shares recommendations from his own shelf. He also remembers the books that made a lasting impression on him as a kid. And he recalls his time at the Woodrow Wilson School, where he took macroeconomics from future Fed chairman Ben Bernanke.

Kyle Berlin ’18 had a lot to be excited about as he finished his senior year: The Spanish and Portuguese languages major was named Princeton’s valedictorian. And he was set to start an artistic residency in Maine, where he and two collaborators will perform a play he wrote last year, exploring the many questions that relate to the concept of “home.” In advance of Commencement, Berlin spoke with Allie Wenner about the inspiration for his play and how his travels as an undergrad have shaped the person that he is today. This is part of a monthly series of interviews with alumni, faculty, and students.

Playing football at Princeton created lasting memories for William Ledger ’54, who lettered in his senior year and had the opportunity to follow one of the Tigers’ greatest teams, the undefeated 1951 squad, as a sophomore. (Season 4, Episode 14)

Celine Gounder ’97 started her Princeton career as an engineering student, but she eventually switched to molecular biology and found a calling in public health and epidemiology. In addition to practicing medicine, Gounder is a journalist and podcaster, and the current season of her podcast, In Sickness and In Health, explores the opioid overdose crisis. She spoke about opioids, as well as her experience as a volunteer during the Ebola epidemic in Guinea, in a recent interview with PAW.