The Colin McEnroe Show

How we define what it means to be a hero depends a lot on the values shared by the group that's in power at any given time. We're seeing it today in the push and pull over the statues of men whose values no longer reflect the values of a changing community. And time tends to wash away the nuance and complexity of heroes that stand as a symbol of a prior generation. Yet, America loves its heroes, even if only for a time. But ​we have a way of using the language of "heroism" to sacrifice the very heroes we admire. Many of the essential workers we deemed heroes of the pandemic had to choose between their health and a paycheck. They didn't choose to be heroes. Some didn't want to be. Others were silenced or shamed for speaking out about unsafe conditions. This hour, we talk about what it means to be a hero, and we consider some Connecticut heroes you may not know about. ​ Also, a look at the unlikely hero driven to heroic acts to avoid being labeled a coward. GUESTS: Dahlia Lithwick - Writes about the courts and the law for Slate and hosts the podcast Amicus Chris Walsh - Director of the college of arts and sciences writing program at Boston University and the author of Cowardice: A Brief History Walter Woodward - State historian of Connecticut, the author of Creating Connecticut, and the host of the Grating the Nutmeg podcast Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter. Colin McEnroe and Cat Pastor contributed to this show.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Race is a myth; racism is not. I'm stealing this line from Gene Seymour, one of our guests on our show today.  We're reairing a show with three people who discuss what it's like to be Black in America. The show was originally in 2017. We chose to reair it today to coincide with the memorials this week for Congressman John Lewis, who will be the first Black congressman to lie in state in the Capitol Rotunda, after fighting his entire life for social justice. And because the recent police brutality, along with a pandemic that disproportionately affected minority communities, exposed how little has changed for Black Americans since we first aired this show in 2017. Many of us hoped the election of Barack Obama in 2008 was a sign that we were finally entering a time when America was ready to recognize that racial inequality is the direct result of systemic discrimination going back to the founding of this country.  That did not happen.  Congressman Lewis fought for civil rights and dignity for all black Americans. We should all think about that as we honor his legacy this week.   This show originally aired on July 12, 2017 and was reaired on January 15, 2018.  GUESTS:  Gene Seymour - Cultural critic, writer, jazz aficionado, and contributor for CNN Opinion, The Baffler, Book Forum and The Nation Bruce Haynes - Professor of sociology at U.C. Davis and co-author of Down the Up Staircase  Kris Marsh - Demographer and associate professor of sociology at the University of Maryland and a 2017 Fulbright Scholar in South Africa Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter.  Colin McEnroe and Chion Wolf contributed to this show.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

My son, Simon, is a year old. His mother and his grandmother are both librarians. His father is, well, me. Simon is, predictably, obsessed with books. Back before everything changed, we'd gotten into a pretty good reading routine. Every morning before Simon went to his grandparents', we'd read a big pile of books. Every evening when I got home from work, we'd read a big pile of books. We'd read Goodnight Moon. We'd read Little Blue Truck. We'd read Peek-a Who? and Peek-a Moo! and Peek-a Zoo! We'd read Who Hoots? and Who Hops? We'd read Dear Zoo and Mr. Brown Can Moo! Can You? and Each Peach Pear Plum and Spooky, Spooky, Little Bat and Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? And then we'd probably read them all again. Now that our whole family stays home all day every day, we still do all the reading. What's lost is the routine. What's lost is any sort of limit at all. From Simon's point of view, there's nothing to stop us from reading all day every day, from when he jams me in the back with his copy of The Mixed-Up Chameleon too early in the morning until he falls asleep wearing one sock and with a clump of Cheerios somehow stuck in his diaper too late at night. If you've got smallish kids and you're staying home these days, children's literature has undoubtedly become a much larger part of your life than you'd ever bargained for. This hour, a look at what it's like reading kids' books as an adult. GUESTS: Bruce Handy - The author of Wild Things: The Joy of Reading Children's Literature as an Adult Julia Pistell - Managing director of Sea Tea Improv and cohost of the Literary Disco podcast Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter. Colin McEnroe and Cat Pastor contributed to this show, which originally aired April 9, 2020.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

It took two years for the word AIDS to get from coinage to dictionary. It took COVID-19 thirty-four days. The pandemic has inspired a thousand new or repurposed words, slang, nicknames, and neologisms. It has changed the way we speak.   We made technical medical language part of everyday conversation. We created new words to describe  emotions that had no words. We repurposed old words or combined two words to express a way of life we never expected. Lockdowns. WFH. Pancession. Doomscrolling. We made phrases to unite us, others to make us laugh, and some to explain our confusion. Workers became essential and advertisers made them heroes.    Do you speak Corona? GUESTS: Peter Sokolowski is a lexicographer and editor-at-large at Merriam-Webster; he's also a musician and public radio jazz host at NEPR, and he's the author of a chapter in The Whole World in a Book (@PeterSokowski)  Tony Horne is a linguist, lexicographer, and a language consultant in the faculty of Arts and Humanities, at King’s College, London (@tonythorne007)  Justin Peters is a correspondent for Slate and the author of  The Idealist: Aaron Swartz and the Rise of Free Culture on the Internet (@justintrevett) Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter Colin McEnroe and Cat Pastor contributed to this show. Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Historian Christine Sismondo says that "America, as we know it, was born in a bar." Taverns were where the Boston Tea Party was planned. They were where court cases were carried out, where land was bought and sold, where immigrants came to congregate. Over the centuries since, bars have fostered so much social change. And today, they're where we go to meet people, to catch the game, to talk about our problems, to relax. Or at least they were. Back when bars were open, back when there were games to catch... Back when we could relax. This hour, a look at what we've been missing these last few months when we've been missing bars. GUESTS: Rand Richards Cooper - A contributing editor at Commonweal, and he writes the "In Our Midst" column for Hartford Magazine Christine Sismondo - The author of America Walks into a Bar: A Spirited History of Taverns and Saloons, Speakeasies and Grog Shops Karl Franz Williams - Principle, The Anchor Spa in New Haven Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Religious scholar Elaine Pagels trusted the Gospel of Thomas to get her through the almost unbearably painful years after the death of her six-year-old son -- born with a congenital heart defect -- followed one year later by the unexpected death of her husband.  Thomas was one of many hidden texts discovered in a cave in Egypt in 1945, written around the time of Jesus but omitted from the New Testament.  Pagels's exploration of the secret gospels revealed early Christianity to be a mix of traditions, stories, music, mysticism, art, and poetry that were lost in later versions perpetuated by individual Christian groups. Pagels wonders how Roman Catholics, Baptists, Mormons, and Quakers -- to name a few -- could all proclaim themselves the one true version of Christianity. The Gnostic Gospels challenged thousands of years of Christian ideology regarding our views on God, women, sexuality, and death that still dictate the cultural values we follow today. How had we not become aware that thousands of years of censoring Christianity has come to contradict our own experience of what is meaningful in our lives? So often, religion fails us in our time of need. The Gnostic Gospels gave Elaine Pagels hope. She was grateful for that.  GUEST:  Elaine Pagels - Professor of Religion at Princeton University and the author of several books including The Gnostic Gospels, Beyond Belief, and, most recently, Why Religion? A Personal Story Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter. Colin McEnroe and Chion Wolf contributed to this show, which originally aired February 21, 2019.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The number of people testing positive for coronavirus continues to rise in many parts of the U.S., with sharp rises in places like Florida, Nevada, Alabama, Texas, and Puerto Rico. Yet, President Trump continues to attribute the rise to more testing -- despite the rise in hospitalizations and deaths -- and he wants to reduce federal aid for more testing, tracing, and for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Also this hour: The ABC News/Washington Post poll released Sunday shows former Vice President Joe Biden leading President Trump by 15 points among registered voters, 55% to 40%. A majority of respondents are not happy with the president's handling of the coronavirus, among other things. On a happier note: It's National Moth Week! GUESTS: Maria Sundaram is an infectious disease epidemiologist. She’s a postdoc fellow at ICES in Toronto and a regular contributor to BBC OS (@mariasundaram) Steven Shepard is senior campaign and elections editor and chief polling analyst for Politico. (@politico_steve) Liti Haramaty is a founding member of the Friends of the East Brunswick Environmental Commission and vice-chair of the East Brunswick Commission. She's co-founder of National Moth Week and a researcher at the department of Marine and Coastal Sciences at Rutgers University. (@LeeTeeK) Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter. Colin McEnroe and Cat Pastor contributed to this show.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Four years ago, over the course of three days, film crews documented the musical Hamilton as performed by nearly its entire original Broadway cast. Eventually, Disney bought the distribution rights to the movie and planned to release it in theaters next fall. But then there was a pandemic, and people were stuck in their houses, and the film dropped on Disney+ earlier this month. And: Kanye West is running for president. Unless he isn't. But maybe he is. Some other stuff that happened this week, give or take: Grant Imahara, Host of 'MythBusters' and 'White Rabbit Project,' Dies at 49 This Pickle Is a CakeWelcome to the viral world of hyper-realistic cake slicing videos. 26 Hilarious Tweets About All Those Cakes We're Seeing On The Internet"Are we human? Or are we cake?" TikTok users panic as Trump admin considers banning app Far Side creator Gary Larson publishes first new cartoons in 25 yearsAfter coming out of retirement, the cartoonist says digital technology has allowed him to rediscover the fun of drawing In Conversation: Thandie NewtonAfter decades onscreen, nothing surprises the Westworld actress, though what she’s ready to share will surprise you. This Profile of Charlie Kaufman Has ChangedHow do you write about Hollywood’s most self-referential screenwriter at a destabilizing moment in history? It takes more than one draft. How 'Inception' Redefined Christopher Nolan Could U.S. Theaters Stay Closed Until Mid-2021? Walt Disney World's Reopening Video Didn't Go Over So Well GUESTS: Taneisha Duggan - Producing associate at TheaterWorks Jacques Lamarre - A playwright and director of client services at Buzz Engine Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter. Colin McEnroe and Cat Pastor contributed to this show.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Our ancestors viewed sleep as a highly sensual and transcendent experience. Today, about a third of adults have trouble falling asleep, staying asleep or feeling rested. We're becoming a nation of insomniacs. We live in what Rubin Naiman calls, a "wake-centric era,” where sleeping and dreaming are viewed as less important than being awake and on the go. It's hard to come down from the hyperaroused state we whip ourselves into by the end of a day.  It's not surprising that we can't sleep.  Insomnia can be miserable when all we want to do is sleep. But it's more a human condition than a medical condition to be solved by sleeping pills and tech gadgets.  Plus, insomnia can have its upside. Our minds can be more open to insights and new possibilities in the dark quiet of night when our thoughts can wander to unknown places that the conscious mind can’t see.  GUESTS:  Marina Benjamin is a writer and Senior Editor at Aeon magazine. She’s written five books. Her latest memoir is Insomnia. She’s also the author of The Middlepause and Garden Among Fires: A Lockdown Anthology. (@marinab52) Rubin Naiman is a psychologist, clinical assistant professor of medicine and the sleep and dream specialist at the University of Arizona Andrew Weil Center for Integrative Medicine (@drnaiman) Charlotte Jee is a writer and reporter for MIT Technology Review, where she also writes The Download newsletter (@charlottejee) Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

For decades, we didn't take television seriously. We saw it as ephemeral, as "chewing gum for the eyes," as, literally, furniture. And then, around the turn of the century, things started to change. There was The Sopranos. The Wire. And, at the same time, shows like Big Brother and The Amazing Race. For Emily Nussbaum, it was Buffy the Vampire Slayer that forever changed her take on television. And now... the president is a TV character. This hour: A serious appraisal of television with The New Yorker's television critic. GUEST: Emily Nussbaum - Television critic for The New Yorker and the author of I Like To Watch: Arguing My Way Through the TV Revolution Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter. Colin McEnroe and Cat Pastor contributed to this show.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.