Scene on Radio

The police tell us they are here to protect us. But what if their original purpose was something else altogether? Peabody Award-winning host Chenjerai Kumanyika takes listeners on a journey to uncover the hidden history of the largest police force in the world – from its roots in slavery, to rival police gangs battling across the city, to everyday people who resisted every step of the way. As our society debates where policing is going, Empire City: The Untold Origin Story of the NYPD explores where the police came from.

From Wondery, Crooked Media and PushBlack.

In the first of two episodes looking at responses to capitalism’s failings, we explore reforms aimed at making the current economic system more humane, fair, effective, and sustainable. 

By John Biewen with co-host Ellen McGirt. Interviews with Lutz Schwenke, Jordi Llatje i Espinal, Marjorie Kelly, Oren Cass, Jayati Ghosh, John Fullerton, and Rick Alexander. Story editor: Loretta Williams. Music by Michelle Osis, Lilli Haydn, Chris Westlake, Alex Symcox, and Goodnight, Lucas. Music consulting by Joe Augustine of Narrative Music. 

"Capitalism” is a production of the Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke University, in partnership with I...

A visit to West Africa and Western Europe to look at the cocoa trade. Did the colonial side of early capitalism – Western countries getting rich at the expense of poorer nations – ever change, or does it continue today? 

Reported by Ugochi Anyaka-Oluigbo and written by Ugochi and Loretta Williams, with co-hosts John Biewen and Ellen McGirt. Story editor: Loretta Williams. Mixed by John Biewen. Interviews with Achike Chude, Chernoh Bah, Bart Van Besien, and others. Music by Michelle Osis, Lilli Haydn, Chris Westlake, Alex Symcox, and Goodnight, Lucas. Music consulting by Joe Augustine of Narrative Music. "Capitalism” is a pr...

In 1972, a team of young scientists at MIT published a study exploring what would happen to human civilization if people kept pursuing endless economic growth on a finite planet. They weren’t just disbelieved, they were ridiculed. The story of Donella Meadows and The Limits to Growth.

Reported and produced by Katy Shields and Vegard Beyer, with co-hosts John Biewen and Ellen McGirt. Story editor: Loretta Williams. Archival audio of Donella Meadows, Dennis Meadows, Aurelio Peccei, Jay Forrester, and others. Interviewee: John Fullerton.Original music by Nora Beyer. Additional music by Michelle Osis and Lili Haydn. Music co...

S7 E8: The People’s Pushback 

Over several decades, a growing number of people in the United States and elsewhere – especially younger people – have turned against capitalism. The reasons are not mysterious. 

Reported by Lewis Raven Wallace and produced by John Biewen, with co-host Ellen McGirt. Interviews with Esteban Kelly, Josh Bivens, Malaika Jibali, and Evan Caldwell. Story editor: Loretta Williams. Music by Michelle Osis, Lilli Haydn, Chris Westlake, Alex Symcox, and Goodnight, Lucas. Music consulting by Joe Augustine of Narrative Music. 

"Capitalism” is a production of the Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke Univer...

S7 E7: Gilded Age 2.0

After 40 years of neoliberalism, most Americans of every political stripe agree that the economy is “rigged” in favor of corporations and the wealthy. But we may not know the half of it. 

By John Biewen, with co-host Ellen McGirt. Interviews with Nancy MacLean, Edward Balleisen, Brad DeLong, Marjorie Kelly, and Oren Cass. Story editor: Loretta Williams. Music by Michelle Osis, Lilli Haydn, Chris Westlake, Alex Symcox, and Goodnight, Lucas. Music consulting by Joe Augustine of Narrative Music. 

"Capitalism” is a production of the Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke Universi...

How the balance of power shifted, for a time, in the decades after World War II, and led to a better kind of capitalism – if you think prosperity being broadly shared is a good thing. 

By John Biewen, with co-host Ellen McGirt. Interviews with Eric Rauchway and Brad DeLong. Thanks to the Studs Terkel Archive at WFMT. Story editor: Loretta Williams. Music by Michelle Osis, Lilli Haydn, Chris Westlake, Alex Symcox, and Goodnight, Lucas. Music consulting by Joe Augustine of Narrative Music. "Capitalism” is a production of the Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke University, in partnership with...

An age of invention and mass production, propelled by a new mechanism – the corporate research lab – leads to a surge in material wealth like the world has never seen. How does a new nation, the United States, overtake its parent as the leader of the surging capitalist order? And what does it all mean in the lives of ordinary people? 

By John Biewen, with co-host Ellen McGirt. Interviews with Woody Holton, Robin Alario, Edward Baptist, and Brad DeLong. Story editor: Loretta Williams. Music by Michelle Osis, Lilli Haydn, Chris Westlake, Alex Symcox, and Goodnight, Lucas. Music consulting by Jo...

Economic change happens in a cultural context. We trace the tectonic shifts in the Western mind that made capitalism thinkable – in part through a look at two Enlightenment thinkers: Baruch Spinoza and Adam Smith. (The real Smith, not the one held up as the patron saint of unfettered capitalism.).

By John Biewen, with co-host Ellen McGirt. Interviews with Kate Rigby, Glory Liu, Steven Nadler, and Wendy Carlin. Story editor: Loretta Williams. Music by Michelle Osis, Lilli Haydn, Chris Westlake, Alex Symcox, and Goodnight, Lucas. Music consulting by Joe Augustine of Narrative Music. "Capitalism” is a production of the...

From the voyages of Columbus and Vasco da Gama to colonial conquest and the Atlantic Slave Trade, to the privatization of land in western Europe: humanity’s turn toward the capitalist world we live in now.

By John Biewen, with co-host Ellen McGirt. Interviews with Jayati Ghosh, Jason Hickel, Jessica Moody, Charisse Burden-Stelly, Silvia Federici, and Eleanor Janega. Story editor: Loretta Williams. Music by Michelle Osis, Lilli Haydn, Chris Westlake, Alex Symcox, and Goodnight, Lucas. Music consulting by Joe Augustine of Narrative Music. "Capitalism” is a production of the Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke University, in part...

To fully grasp capitalism, it helps to understand the system it replaced – and the most meaningful differences between feudalism and capitalism. We visit the British Isles of the Middle Ages.  

By John Biewen, with co-host Ellen McGirt. Interviews with Karen Dempsey, Ben Jervis, and Eleanor Janega. Story editor: Loretta Williams. Music by Michelle Osis, Lilli Haydn, Chris Westlake, Alex Symcox, and Goodnight, Lucas. Music consulting by Joe Augustine of Narrative Music. “Capitalism” is a production of the Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke University, in partnership with Imperative 21. 

Introduction to our 7th season: Capitalism. The world’s dominant economic system is on trial as it hasn’t been for at least half a century. Millions, young people especially, now see capitalism as the problem, not the solution. Others fear throwing out the baby with the bathwater. 

By John Biewen, with co-host Ellen McGirt. Interviews with John Fullerton, Cassandra Brooks and Charlene Brooks. Story editor: Loretta Williams. Music by Michelle Osis, Lilli Haydn, Chris Westlake, Alex Symcox, and Goodnight, Lucas. Music consulting by Joe Augustine of Narrative Music.“Capitalism” is a production of the Kenan Institute for Ethic...

Welcome to Season 7: Capitalism. The world's dominant economic system is on trial as it hasn't been for at least half a century. This season tells the story of capitalism -- how people with power built and shaped it over time. We'll also explore what to do now that many people see capitalism as the problem, not the solution. Produced by host/producer John Biewen with co-host Ellen McGirt and story editor Loretta Williams. From the Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke University, in partnership with Imperative 21. 

As we get ready to launch our Season 7, a bonus episode from another podcast we think our listeners will want to hear: Long Shadow. Episode 1 of its newest season, In Guns We Trust, with host Garrett Graff.

Mass shootings have plagued the U.S. for generations. But in 1999, when shots rang out in a suburban Denver school, it was different. What changed? Everything.

What would it take, and what would it even mean, to heal from a wound like the Wilmington massacre and coup of 1898 — or from centuries of white supremacist violence, disenfranchisement, and theft? An exploration of that question with community members in Wilmington, and experts on restorative justice and reparations.

By Michael A. Betts, II and John Biewen. Interviews with Bertha Boykin Todd, Cedric Harrison, Christopher Everett, Kim Cook, William Sturkey, Inez Campbell-Eason, Sonya Bennetonne-Patrick, Candice Robinson, Paul Jervay,Kieran Haile, Larry Reni Thomas, William “Sandy” Darity, and Michelle Lanier. Story editor: Loretta Williams. Voice actor: Mike Wiley. Music b...

After the massacre and coup of November 10, 1898, white supremacists in North Carolina soon finished the job of disenfranchising Black citizens and instituting Jim Crow segregation. They also took control of the narrative. A new propaganda campaign, the one after the fact, succeeded for a century – even as several Black writers tried to tell the truth about 1898 and left breadcrumbs for future historians to find.

By Michael A. Betts, II and John Biewen. Interviews with LeRae Umfleet, Gareth Evans, David Cecelski, William Sturkey, Chenjerai Kumanyika, Doug Jones, and Adriane Lentz-Smith. Story editor: Loretta Williams. Voice actor: Mike Wiley. Music b...

On November 1898, North Carolina Democrats won a sweeping victory at the polls – confirming the success of their campaign based on white supremacy, intimidation, and fraud. But in Wilmington, the state’s largest city, white supremacist leaders were not satisfied. This episode tells what happened on November 10, 1898, in Wilmington: a massacre of Black men, and the only successful coup d'etat in U.S. history.

By John Biewen and Michael A. Betts, II. Interviews with LeRae Umfleet, Bertha Todd, William Sturkey, Cedric Harrison, and Milo Manly. Story editor: Loretta Williams. Voice actor: Mike Wiley. Music by Kieran Haile, Blue Dot S...

By 1898, two decades after the end of Reconstruction, white elites, backed by violent terror groups, have installed Jim Crow across most of the South. North Carolina, led by its largest city, Wilmington, is different. A Fusion coalition, made up of mostly-Black Republicans and mostly-White members of the Populist Party, controls the city and state governments. White supremacist Democrats are frustrated and plot to gain power by any means necessary. ​​

By Michael A. Betts, II, and John Biewen. Interviews with LeRae Umfleet, David Cecelski, and Cedric Harrison. The series story editor is Loretta Williams. Music in this episode by Ki...

This series tells the story of the only successful coup d’etat in U.S. history, and the white supremacist massacre that went with it. It happened in Wilmington, North Carolina in November 1898. But before we get to that story, we explore the surprising world of Wilmington in the 19th century – the world that the massacre and coup violently destroyed.

By Michael A. Betts, II, and John Biewen. Interviews with LeRae Umfleet, Cedric Harrison, David Cecelski, and William Sturkey. The series story editor is Loretta Williams. Music in this episode by Kieran Haile, Blue Dot Sessions, Lucas Biewe...

Introduction to Season 6, a series co-produced by Michael A. Betts II and Scene on Radio producer and host John Biewen, with story editor Loretta Williams. Music by Kevin MacLeod, Okaya, and Lucas Biewen. Echoes of a Coup is a project of America’s Hallowed Ground and Scene on Radio, from the Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke University.

Scene on Radio is on an extended hiatus, but is on its way back. Host and producer John Biewen explains that the show has found a new home: the Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke University.

In the summer of 1787, fifty-five men got together in Philadelphia to write a new Constitution for the United States, replacing the new nation’s original blueprint, the Articles of Confederation. But why, exactly? What problems were the framers trying to solve? Was the Constitution designed to advance democracy, or to rein it in? And how can the answers to those questions inform our crises of democracy today?

By producer/host John Biewen with series collaborator Chenjerai Kumanyika. Interviews with Woody Holton, Dan Bullen, and Price Thomas. The series editor is Loretta Williams.

When it comes to U.S. government programs and support designed to benefit particular racial groups, history is clear. White folks have received most of the handouts. Part of our summer mini-season of rebroadcasts.

By John Biewen, with Deena Hayes-Greene of the Racial Equity Institute and Season 2 series collaborator Chenjerai Kumanyika.

The next in our summer mini-season of rebroadcasts: For Eddie Wise, owning a hog farm was a lifelong dream. In middle age, he and his wife, Dorothy, finally got a farm of their own. But they say that over the next twenty-five years, the U.S. government discriminated against them because they were Black, and finally drove them off the land. Their story, by John Biewen, was produced in collaboration with Reveal, the podcast and radio show from the Center for Investigative Reporting.

In this bonus episode we share a recent installment from Hot Take, the climate podcast co-hosted by Amy Westervelt (co-host/reporter for our Season 5 series on climate, The Repair) and writer Mary Annaïse Heglar. They talk with their guest, author and New York Times writer David Wallace-Wells, about the lessons we can learn from Covid-19, the parallels between pandemic response and climate response, and how Russia’s war in Ukraine sits at the intersection of the two.

Several years after Janey was sexually assaulted by her former boyfriend, Mathew, she told some of her closest friends, and her mother, what Mathew had done. Janey was so troubled by her loved ones’ responses that she went back to them years later to record conversations about it all. In this episode: Janey’s story, and philosopher Kate Manne, who coined the term “himpathy” in her 2017 book, “Down Girl: The Logic of Misogyny.” With co-hosts John Biewen and Celeste Headlee. Part of our summer mini-season of rebroadcasts.

To hear more of Janey Williams’ story and the conversations she had with f...

A refugee from war in Eastern Europe. An NYC-born survivor who grew up poor, Black, Muslim, and gay. And how one, and her music, saved the other. By Aleks Basic, featuring Laila Nur. Part of our summer mini-season of rebroadcasts. Editing by Shea Shackelford and host John Biewen.

How to grieve when the deaths come so quickly? How, as a Black mother in America, to protect your child’s innocence and hope? An audio essay by Stacia Brown. The first in a summer mini-season of rebroadcasts. Editing by Shea Shackelford and host John Biewen. Music by Prince, Eme Dm, One World One Nation, Blu & Exile, Otwin, and goodnight Lucas.

In our Season 5 finale: What’s the cultural transformation we need to make — in the West, and the U.S. in particular — to live in good health with the rest of the natural world and with each other? Episode 11 of The Repair, our series on the climate emergency.

Researched and produced by John Biewen, with co-host Amy Westervelt. Script editor, Cheryl Devall. Interviews with Dirk Philipsen, Christian Felber, Olúfẹ́mi Táíwò, and Jessica Hernandez. Music by Lili Haydn, Kim Carroll, Chris Westlake, Lesley Barber, Cora Miron, Fabian Almazan, and Alex Weston. Music consulting by Joe Augustine of Narr

The first of two concluding episodes in Season 5, in which we focus on solutions. In Part 10 of The Repair, we look at the actions and policies that people need to push for —now — to avoid the most catastrophic effects of climate change.

Reported by Amy Westervelt. Script editor, Cheryl Devall. Production and mix by John Biewen. Interviews with Kate Marvel, Ken Caldeira, Julian Brave Noisecat, Kate Aronoff, Naomi Klein, Julia Steinberger, Leah Stokes, Heidi Marmon, Tamara Toles O’Laughlin, Rhiana Gunn-Wright, Tara Houska, and Max Berger. Music in this episode by Lili Haydn, Kim Caroll, Chris Westlake, Lesley...

In several countries around the world, including Ecuador, New Zealand, and the U.S., some people are trying to protect the planet using a legal concept called “rights of nature” – infusing the law with Indigenous understandings of Mother Earth. Part 9 of The Repair, our series on the climate emergency.

Reported by Amy Westervelt and Polyglot Barbershop. Script editor, Cheryl Devall. Production and mix by John Biewen. Music in this episode by Lili Haydn, Kim Carroll, Chris Westlake, Lesley Barber, Cora Miron, and Fabian Almazan. Music consulting by Joe Augustine of Narrative Music.

Among the wealthy, industrialized Western countries that created the climate crisis, Scotland is one of the leaders in pivoting away from fossil fuels – or promising to. Just how quickly will Scots be willing to cut off the flow – of oil, and money? Part 8 of The Repair, our series on the climate emergency.

Reported and written by Victoria McArthur, with additional writing and script editing by Cheryl Devall. Production and mix by John Biewen. Music in this episode by Lili Haydn, Kim Carroll, Chris Westlake, Lesley Barber, Cora Miron, and Maetar. Music consulting by Joe Augustine of Narrative Music...

The climate crisis is not new to Bangladesh. For decades, global warming has exacerbated storms and flooding and turned many thousands of people into refugees in their own country. Yet, even though Bangladeshis did almost nothing to create the crisis, some are trying to be part of the solution.

Reported by Tareq Ahmed, with recording and production help from Tareek Muhammad and Muhammad Rabbi. The series editor is Cheryl Devall. Music in this episode by Lili Haydn, Kim Carroll, Lesley Barber, and Fabian Almazan. Music consulting by Joe Augustine of Narrative Music.

Earth’s changing climate is already displacing millions of people, worsening tension and conflict, and sometimes violence – for example, between farmers and traditional nomadic herders in Nigeria. Part 6 of The Repair, our series on the climate emergency.

Reported by Ugochi Anyaka-Oluigbo, with reporting and production assistance from Nchetachi Chukwuaja and Tim Cuttings Agber. The series story editor is Cheryl Devall. Mix by John Biewen.

Music in this episode by Lili Haydn, Kim Carroll, Chris Westlake, Lesley Barber, Cora Miron, Alex Weston, Fabian Almazan, and Maetar. Music consulting by Joe Augustine of Narrative Music.

Co-hosts John Biewen and Amy Westervelt discuss the U.S. Congress’s effort to pass its first major climate bill ever, and Senator Joe Manchin’s move to block a key measure seemingly on behalf of the fossil fuel industry. And an episode of Drilled, Amy Westervelt’s true crime podcast about the climate crisis.

Southeast Asia is especially vulnerable to storms, rising oceans, and other climate effects—though countries in the region did very little to create the crisis. In Indonesia, among other climate-related challenges, the capital city is sinking into the sea. Part 5 of our series, The Repair, on the climate emergency.

Reported by Nita Roshita, with recording and production help from Hilman Handoni. Mixed by host John Biewen. Interviews with Bondan Kanumoyoso, Yayat Supriatna, Selamet Daroyni, Amalia Syafruddin, and others.

The series editor is Cheryl Devall. Music in this episode by Lil Haydn, Kim Carroll, Chris Westlake, Lesl...

Why has the United States played such an outsized role in the creation of the climate crisis? As a settler nation, the U.S. emerged from the colonizing, capitalist West, but what did America and its cultural peculiarities bring to the party? Part 4 of our series, The Repair, on the climate emergency.

Researched and written by this season’s co-host, Amy Westervelt, produced and mixed by host John Biewen. Interviews with Colin Jerolmack, Darren Dochuk, Melissa Aronczyk, Bob Brulle, and the Rev. Lennox Yearwood. 

The series editor is Cheryl Devall. Music in this episode by Lili...

If the Enlightenment was so great, why was it not a course correction? In fact, did cultural values that took hold in the West in this period speed up our race toward ecological suicide? Part 3 of our series, The Repair, on the climate crisis.

By season co-host Amy Westervelt, with host and producer John Biewen. Interviews with Devin Vartija, Darren Dochuk, Melissa Aronczyk, and Amber Kanazbah Crotty.

The series editor is Cheryl Devall. Music in this episode by Lili Haydn, Kim Carroll, Chris Westlake, Lesley Barber, and Cora Miron. Music consulting by Joe Augustine of Narrati...

How western Europe really broke bad in its understanding of humanity’s place in the natural world, from the Crusades to capitalism. Part 2 of our series, The Repair, on the climate crisis.

By host and producer John Biewen, with co-host Amy Westervelt. Interviews with Charisse Burden-Stelly, Kate Rigby, Enrique Salmón, and David Pecusa.

The series editor is Cheryl Devall. Music by Lili Haydn, Chris Westlake, Kim Carroll,  Cora Miron, Alex Weston, Lesley Barber, and Fabian Almazan. Music consulting by Joe Augustine of Narrative Music. Season 5 is supported by Scene on Radio listener-donors, and by the I...

Part 1 of our series on the climate emergency. How did we drive ourselves into the ecological ditch? And, crucially, who is this ‘we’? Our story starts with … Genesis. 

By host and producer John Biewen, with co-host Amy Westervelt. Interviews with David Pecusa, Bina Nir, and Kate Rigby. 

The series editor is Cheryl Devall. Music by Lili Haydn, Kim Carroll, Chris Westlake, Alex Weston, and Cora Miron. Music consulting by Joe Augustine of Narrative Music. Season 5 is supported by Scene on Radio listener-donors, and by the International Women’s Media Foundation.  

This season will explore the cultural roots of our current ecological emergency, and the deep changes Western society will need to make to save the Earth and our species. Through interviews with historians and other experts, The Repair will trace the evolution of the West’s colonizing, extractive culture, and how we in the rich Global North drove humanity into the ecological ditch. We’ll hear from producers in countries that did not create the crisis, yet got hit early and hard. Finally, with help from leading thinkers and activists, Biewen and Westervelt will look at potential solutions—the repair

This special re-broadcast of a Season 4 episode is in response to the attack on the U.S. Capitol by Trump supporters. A look at the right-wing counterrevolution in the face of expanding democracy in America: It started long before Donald Trump.

By host and producer John Biewen, with series collaborator Chenjerai Kumanyika. Interviews with Nancy MacLean, Wendy Brown, and Rhon Manigault-Bryant.  

The series editor is Loretta Williams. Music by Algiers, John Erik Kaada, Eric Neveux, and Lucas Biewen. Music consulting and production help from Joe Augustine of Narrative Music. 

What does the 2020 election in the United States tell us, or remind us, about the state of democracy in America? A follow-up to our Season 4 series on democracy, The Land That Never Has Been Yet. Host and producer John Biewen talks with series collaborator Chenjerai Kumanyika.

Editor, Loretta Williams. Music by Algiers, Eric Neveux, and Lucas Biewen. Music consulting and production help from Joe Augustine of Narrative Music.

Photo: An election day march to the polls in Graham, North Carolina, November 2020. Photo by Anthony Crider, Wikimedia Commons.

The word “Hiroshima” may bring to mind a black-and-white image of a mushroom cloud. It’s easy to forget that it’s an actual city with a million people and a popular baseball team. In 1995, John Biewen visited the city to speak with survivors and to ask: What did the world’s first atomic bombing mean in the place where it happened? 

Hearing Hiroshima is a production of Minnesota Public Radio, from American Public Media.

Photo: Selections from the 1995 tapes. Photo by John Biewen.

What will it take to make the United States a more fully-functioning democracy, and how can we, as citizens, bring about that change?

By host and producer John Biewen, with series collaborator Chenjerai Kumanyika. Interviews with Michael Waldman, Jennifer Cohn, and Sanford Levinson.

The series editor is Loretta Williams. Music by Algiers, John Erik Kaada, Eric Neveux, and Lucas Biewen. Music consulting and production help from Joe Augustine of Narrative Music. 

How well do the news media serve us as citizens, and what role does the notion of “objective,” or “neutral,” journalism play in the failings of American democracy?

Story reported by Lewis Raven Wallace, with host/producer John Biewen and collaborator Chenjerai Kumanyika. Interviews with David Mindich, Nikole Hannah-Jones, and Kevin Young.

The series editor is Loretta Williams. *The View from Somewhere *editor: Ramona Martinez. Music by Algiers, John Erik Kaada, Eric Neveux, and Lucas Biewen. Music consulting and production help from Joe Augustine of Narrative Music.

In most American schools, children *hear about* democracy, but don’t get to *practice* it. What would a more engaged brand of civics education look like?

Story reported by Ben James, with host John Biewen and collaborator Chenjerai Kumanyika. Interviews with Arielle Jennings, Hilary Moss, and Nikole Hannah-Jones.

The series editor is Loretta Williams. Music by the Summer Street Brass Band, Algiers, John Erik Kaada, Eric Neveux, and Lucas Biewen. Music consulting and production help from Joe Augustine of Narrative Music.

Photo: Stephen Buckley, Jelicity Mercado, Bella Goncalves, and Angelica Pareja, eighth-grade students at...

“America” and “empire.” Do those words go together? If so, what kind of imperialism does the U.S. practice, and how has American empire changed over time? 

By host and producer John Biewen, with series collaborator Chenjerai Kumanyika. Interviews with Nikhil Singh and Daniel Immerwahr.

The series editor is Loretta Williams. Music by Algiers, John Erik Kaada, Eric Neveux, and
Lucas Biewen. Music consulting and production help from Joe Augustine of Narrative Music. 

The conservative, neoliberal counterrevolution in the face of expanding democracy in America: It started long before Donald Trump. Even before Ronald Reagan and his like-minded counterpart across the Atlantic, Margaret Thatcher.  

By host and producer John Biewen, with series collaborator Chenjerai Kumanyika. Interviews with Nancy MacLean, Wendy Brown, and Rhon Manigault-Bryant.  

The series editor is Loretta Williams. Music by Algiers, John Erik Kaada, Eric Neveux, and Lucas Biewen. Music consulting and production help from Joe Augustine of Narrative Music. 

In the summer of 1964, about a thousand young Americans, black and white, came together in Mississippi to place themselves in the path of white supremacist power and violence. They issued a bold pro-democracy challenge to the nation and the Democratic Party.

Produced by John Biewen, with series collaborator Chenjerai Kumanyika. Interviews with John Lewis, Bob Moses, Unita Blackwell, Hollis Watkins, Dorie Ladner, and many others.

The series editor is Loretta Williams. Freedom song recordings courtesy of Smithsonian Folkways. Other music by Algiers, John Erik Kaada, Eric Neveux, and Lucas Biewen. Music consulting and production help...

In this special episode, host John Biewen and series collaborator Chenjerai Kumanyika discuss
the coronavirus pandemic and how the crisis, and the nation’s response to it, echo themes we’re exploring in our Season 4 series on democracy in the United States.

The season’s editor is Loretta Williams. Music by Lucas Biewen and Eric Neveux.

Photo: Durham, North Carolina, mayor Steve Schewel announces a stay-at-home order on March 25. Photo by Julia Wall, courtesy of the News & Observer.

The Great Depression presented a crisis not only for the U.S. economy, but for American democracy. President Franklin Roosevelt wanted to save the nation’s system of government, and its economic system, while reforming both. What did the New Deal achieve, and not achieve?

Reported and produced by John Biewen, with series collaborator Chenjerai Kumanyika. Interviews with Eric Rauchway and Cybelle Fox. The series editor is Loretta Williams.

Music by Algiers, John Erik Kaada, Eric Neveux, and Lucas Biewen. Music consulting and production help from Joe Augustine of Narrative Music. 

Photo: Men fig...

People fighting for more democracy in the United States often have to struggle against sexism and racism. In fact, those two struggles are often inseparable—certainly from the perspective of black
women and some other women of color.

Reported and produced by host John Biewen, with Season 3 co-host Celeste Headlee and Season 4 collaborator Chenjerai Kumanyika. Interviews with Glenda Gilmore, Ashley Farmer, Sandra Arrington, and
Danielle McGuire.

Music by Alex Weston, Evgueni and Sacha Galperine, and Eric Neveux. Music consulting and production help from Joe Augustine of Narrative Music.

After the Civil War, a surprising coalition tried to remake the United States into a real multiracial democracy for the first time. Reconstruction, as the effort was called, brought dramatic change to America. For a while.

Reported and produced by John Biewen, with series collaborator Chenjerai Kumanyika. The series script editor is Loretta Williams. Interviews with Victoria Smalls, Brent Morris, Eric Foner, Kidada Williams, Bobby Donaldson, and Edward Baptist.

Music by Algiers, John Erik Kaada, Eric Neveux, and Lucas Biewen. Music consulting and production help from Joe Augustine of Narrative Music. 

Photo: Historian B...

In the decades after America’s founding and the establishment of the Constitution, did the nation get better, more just, more democratic? Or did it double down on violent conquest and exploitation?  

Reported, produced, written, and mixed by John Biewen, with series collaborator Chenjerai Kumanyika. The series editor is Loretta Williams. Interviews with Robin Alario, Edward Baptist, Kidada Williams, and Keri Leigh Merritt.

Music by Algiers, John Erik Kaada, Eric Neveux, and Lucas Biewen. Music consulting and production help from Joe Augustine of Narrative Music. 

In the summer of 1787, fifty-five men got together in Philadelphia to write a new Constitution for the United States, replacing the new nation’s original blueprint, the Articles of Confederation. But why, exactly? What problems were the framers trying to solve? Was the Constitution designed to advance democracy, or to rein it in?

By producer/host John Biewen with series collaborator Chenjerai Kumanyika. Interviews with Woody Holton, Dan Bullen, and Price Thomas. The series editor is Loretta Williams.

Music by Algiers, John Erik Kaada, Eric Neveux, and Lucas Biewen. Music consulting and production help from Jo...

In the American Revolution, the men who revolted were among the wealthiest and most comfortable people in the colonies. What kind of revolution was it, anyway? Was it about a desire to establish democracy—or something else?

By producer/host John Biewen with series collaborator Chenjerai Kumanyika. Interviews with Davy Arch, Barbara Duncan, Rob Shenk, and Woody Holton. Edited by Loretta Williams.

Music by Algiers, John Erik Kaada, Eric Neveux, and Lucas Biewen. Music consulting and production help from Joe Augustine of Narrative Music.

Our season-long series will touch on concerns like authoritarianism, voter suppression and gerrymandering, foreign intervention, and the role of money in politics, but we’ll go much deeper, effectively retelling the story of the United States from its beginnings up to the present. Through field recordings and interviews with leading thinkers, we’ll tell under-told stories and explore critical questions like—How democratic was the U.S. ever meant to be, anyway? American democracy is clearly in crisis today, but . . . when was it not?Along the way, there’s a good chance that we’ll complicate, maybe upend, our listeners’...

In our Season Three finale, co-hosts Celeste Headlee and John Biewen talk about where American culture goes from here, sexism-wise. And we hear from scholar Melvin Konner, who argues that we are in fact witnessing—and bringing about—“the end of male supremacy.”

Music by Alex Weston, and by Evgueni and Sacha Galperine.
Music and production help from Joe Augustine of Narrative Music.

Host John Biewen dips into the world of sports talk radio, where guys talk not just about sports but also about how to be a man in twenty-first-century America. What John finds is more complicated than he expected, with revelations both encouraging and sobering. With co-host Celeste Headlee and experts David Nylund and Terry Real.  

Music by Alex Weston, and by Evgueni and Sacha Galperine. Music and production help from Joe Augustine of Narrative Music. 

Writer Ben James and his wife Oona are raising their sons in a progressive and “queer-friendly” New England town. They actively encourage the boys to be themselves, never mind those traditional gender norms around “masculinity” and “femininity.” All was well. Until the elder son, Huck, went to sixth grade. Story by Ben James, with hosts Celeste Headlee and John Biewen, and psychologist Terrence Real.

Music by Alex Weston, Evgueni and Sacha Galperine, Blue Dot Sessions, and Kevin MacLeod. Music and production help from Joe Augustine at Narrative Music.

Lewis Wallace, female-assigned at birth, wanted to transition in the direction of maleness—in some ways. He shifted his pronouns, had surgery, starting taking testosterone. None of that meant he wanted to embrace everything that our culture associates with “masculinity.” Story written and reported by Lewis Wallace, with co-hosts John Biewen and Celeste Headlee.

Music by Alex Weston, Evgueni and Sacha Galperine, and Kevin
MacLeod. Music and production help from Joe Augustine at Narrative Music.

American history—law, economics, culture—has built different notions of masculinity (and femininity) for people of varying races and ethnicities.  A trip through a century of pop culture and the stereotyped images that white supremacy has manufactured and attached to Asian and African American men. With scholars Tim Yu and Mark Anthony Neal and co-hosts John Biewen and Celeste Headlee.

Music by Alex Weston, Evgueni and Sacha Galperine. Music and production help from Joe Augustine at Narrative Music.

Several years after Janey was sexually assaulted by her former boyfriend, Mathew, she told some of her closest friends, and her mother, what Mathew had done. Janey was so troubled by her loved ones’ responses, or lack thereof, that she went back to them years later to record conversations about it all. In this episode: Janey’s story, and philosopher Kate Manne, who coined the term “himpathy” in her 2017 book, *Down Girl: The Logic of Misogyny. *With co-hosts John Biewen and Celeste Headlee.

To hear more of Janey Williams’ story and the conversations she had with friends, check out...

Do nations fight wars because men are naturally violent? Or do societies condition men to embrace violence so they’ll fight the nation’s wars?

Along with co-hosts John Biewen and Celeste Headlee, this episode features reporting by Barry Lam of the Hi-Phi Nation podcast, with scholars Joshua Goldstein of American University, Tom Digby of Springfield College, and Graham Parsons of the United States Military Academy, aka West Point.

Music by Alex Weston, and Evgueni and Sacha Galperine. Music and production help from Joe Augustine at Narrative Music. Song fragment, “Men,” by Loudon Wainwright III.

The #MeToo Movement has shed a harsh light on sexual harassment in the workplace. Just how bad, and how pervasive, is sexism on the job in the U.S., from day-to-day expressions of disrespect all the way to rape? Spoiler: It’s bad.

Reported by Ibby Caputo. With researchers Hannah Riley Bowles of Harvard Kennedy School, Meg Bond of UMass Lowell, Peter Glick of Lawrence University, and Mily Treviño-Sauceda of Alianza Nacional de Campesinas.

Thanks to Tena Rubio for production support. Voiceover by Ruxandra Guidi.

Music by Alex Weston, Evgueni and Sacha Galp...

The struggles against sexism and racism come together in the bodies, and the lives, of black women. Co-hosts Celeste Headlee and John Biewen look at the intersections between male dominance and white supremacy in the United States, and the movements to overcome them, from the 1800s through the 2016 presidential election. Guests include scholars Glenda Gilmore, Ashley Farmer, and Danielle McGuire.

Music by Alex Weston, and by Evgueni and Sacha Galperine. Music and production help from Joe Augustine at Narrative Music. 

A few hundred years ago, the great thinkers of the Enlightenment began to declare that “all men are created equal.” Some of them said that notion should include women, too. Why did those feminists—most of them men, by the way—lose the fight? How did the patriarchy survive the Enlightenment?

Co-hosts John Biewen and Celeste Headlee look into these questions, with historians Londa Schiebinger of Stanford and Toby Ditz of Johns Hopkins, and sociologist Lisa Wade of Occidental College.

Music by Alex Weston, and by Evgueni and Sacha Galperine. Music and production help from Joe Augus...

For millennia, Western culture (and most other cultures) declared that men and women were different sorts of humans—and, by the way, men were better. Is that claim not only wrong but straight-up backwards?

Co-hosts Celeste Headlee and John Biewen explore the current state of the nature-nurture gender debate, with help from Lisa Wade of Occidental College and Mel Konner of Emory University.  

Music by Alex Weston, and by Evgueni and Sacha Galperine.
Music and production help from Joe Augustine at Narrative Music.

Launching our Season 3 series, co-hosts John Biewen and Celeste Headlee look at the problems of male supremacy. And we visit Deep Time to explore the latest scholarship on how, when, and why men invented patriarchy.

Featuring Meg Conkey of UC-Berkeley, Mel Konner of Emory University, and Lisa Wade of Occidental College.

Music by Alex Weston, and by Evgueni and Sacha Galperine. Music and Production help from Joe Augustine at Narrative Music.

Scene on Radio opens its Season 3 series, MEN, with this preview. Host John Biewen introduces the series with series co-host Celeste Headlee.

Music Evgueni and Sacha Galperine. Theme music by Alex Weston. Music and production help from Joe Augustine at Narrative Music. 

A father turns on a recorder while tucking in his 7-year-old, having no idea he’s about to capture a poignant growing-up moment in his son’s life. (Advisory: This episode is not suitable for some young children.)

The concluding episode in our series, Seeing White. An exploration of solutions and responses to America’s deep history of white supremacy by host John Biewen, with Chenjerai Kumanyika, Robin DiAngelo, and William “Sandy” Darity, Jr.

When it comes to U.S. government programs and support earmarked for the benefit of particular racial groups, history is clear. White folks have received most of the goodies.

By John Biewen, with Deena Hayes-Greene of the Racial Equity Institute and recurring series partner Chenjerai Kumanyika.

For Eddie Wise, owning a hog farm was a lifelong dream. In middle age, he and his wife, Dorothy, finally got a farm of their own. But they say that over the next twenty-five years, the U.S. government discriminated against them because of their race, and finally drove them off the land. Their story, by John Biewen, was produced in collaboration with Reveal.

For years, Myra Greene had explored blackness through her photography, often in self-portraits. She wondered, what would it mean to take pictures of whiteness? For her friends, what was it like to be photographed because you’re white? With another conversation between host John Biewen and series collaborator Chenjerai Kumanyika.  

For hundreds of years, the white-dominated American culture has raised the specter of the dangerous, violent black man. Host John Biewen tells the story of a confrontation with an African American teenager. Then he and recurring guest Chenjerai Kumanyika discuss that longstanding image – and its neglected flipside: white-on-black violence.

The story of Bhagat Singh Thind, and also of Takao Ozawa – Asian immigrants who, in the 1920s, sought to convince the U.S. Supreme Court that they were white in order to gain American citizenship. Thind’s “bargain with white supremacy,” and the deeply revealing results.

In 1919, a white mob forced the entire black population of Corbin, Kentucky, to leave, at gunpoint. It was one of many racial expulsions in the United States. What happened, and how such racial cleansings became “America’s family secret.”

The history of Corbin as presented by the Corbin city government, with no mention of the 1919 racial expulsion. 

Elliot Jaspin’s book, Buried in the Bitter Waters: The Hidden History of Racial Cleansings in America

Scientists weren’t the first to divide humanity along racial – and and racist – lines. But for hundreds of years, racial scientists claimed to provide proof for those racist hierarchies – and some still do.

Resources for this episode:

Fatal Invention, by Dorothy Roberts

The History of White People, by Nell Irvin Painter

“How attached are you to the idea of being white?” Chenjerai Kumanyika puts that question to host John Biewen, as they revisit an unfinished conversation from a previous episode. Part 7 of our series, Seeing White.

When it comes to America’s racial sins, past and present, a lot of us see people in one region of the country as guiltier than the rest. Host John Biewen spoke with some white Southern friends about that tendency. Part Six of our ongoing series, Seeing White. With recurring guest, Chenjerai Kumanyika.

Image: A lynching on Clarkson Street, New York City, during the Draft Riots of 1863. Credit: Greenwich Village Society of Historical Preservation.

Shannon Sullivan’s books, Revealing Whiteness and Good White People.

 Thanks to Chris Julin, whose 1991 NPR report on the Wisco...

Growing up in Mankato, Minnesota, John Biewen heard next to nothing about the town’s most important historical event. In 1862, Mankato was the site of the largest mass execution in U.S. history – the hanging of 38 Dakota warriors – following one of the major wars between Plains Indians and settlers. In this documentary, originally produced for This American Life, John goes back to Minnesota to explore what happened, and why Minnesotans didn’t talk about it afterwards.

Image: The Minnesota State Seal, 1858

Key sources for this episode:

Gwen Westerman, Mni Sota Makoc...

“All men are created equal.” Those words, from the Declaration of Independence, are central to the story that Americans tell about ourselves and our history. But what did those words mean to the man who actually wrote them? By John Biewen, with guest Chenjerai Kumanyika.

Key sources for this episode:

Nell Irvin Painter, The History of White People

Ibram Kendi, Stamped from the Beginning

The Racial Equity Institute

Chattel slavery in the United States, with its distinctive – and strikingly cruel – laws and structures, took shape over many decades in colonial America. The innovations that built American slavery are inseparable from the construction of Whiteness as we know it today. By John Biewen, with guest Chenjerai Kumanyika. 

Key sources for this episode:

The Racial Equity Institute

Ibram Kendi, Stamped from the Beginning

Nell Irvin Painter, The History of White People

For much of human history, people viewed themselves as members of tribes or nations but had no notion of “race.” Today, science deems race biologically meaningless. Who invented race as we know it, and why? By John Biewen, with guest Chenjerai Kumanyika. 

Photo: The Monument to the Discoveries, Lisbon, Portugal. The highlighted figure in the center is an effigy of Gomes Eanes de Zurara. The figure at the top right is Prince Henry the Navigator. Photo by Harvey Barrison.  

Events of the past few years have turned a challenging spotlight on White people, and Whiteness, in the United States. An introduction to our series exploring what it means to be White. By John Biewen, with special guest Chenjerai Kumanyika.

Facts can be ignored by the powers that be and still ignite a movement. An interview with Tim Tyson, author of the new book, The Blood of Emmett Till. Tyson was the first historian or journalist to interview the former Carolyn Bryant, the woman in whose name Emmett Till was murdered in 1955.

There’s a long and painful history in the U.S. of white men killing black men and boys without punishment. In this episode, we listen in on “Dar He,” the one-man play by Mike Wiley that brings to life the story of Emmett Till.

The last in our series exploring the spirit of America in the footsteps of one of its greatest writers, John Steinbeck. At key spots on Steinbeck’s 1960 journey across the country, we team up with artists to explore how things have changed, or not, and to talk back to Steinbeck across the years. In this episode, visits with theater director Troy Nickerson in Spokane, Washington, and poet Diana Garcia in Monterey, California.

The second in a three-part series, journeying into the soul of America through the eyes of artists, while following in the footsteps of Nobel Prize-winning writer John Steinbeck who drove across the country in 1960 for his iconic book, Travels with Charley. In this episode, photographer Wayne Gudmundson in eastern North Dakota, and Yurok basket weaver Susan “Tweet” Burdick in Humboldt County, California. Produced by John Biewen.

First in a three-part journey into the soul of America, through the eyes of working people who happen to be artists. In this episode, David Slater in Sag Harbor, New York, and Kalamu ya Salaam in New Orleans. Retracing the 1960 journey by writer John Steinbeck for his book, “Travels with Charley in Search of America.” Produced by John Biewen.

Siler City, North Carolina used to be a typical Southern town. Everybody was white or black. Now the town’s population is half Latino. One community’s journey through the “five stages of grief” – all the way to acceptance? By John Biewen and Tennessee Watson. Music by Blue Dot Sessions and Lucas Biewen.

How to grieve when the deaths come so quickly? How, as an African American mother, to protect your child’s innocence and hope? An audio essay by Stacia Brown.

Scene on Radio is a podcast that asks, How’s it going out there? And leaves the studio to find out, capturing the sounds of life happening and telling stories that explore human experience and American society. 

The last installment in our Storymakers series. Four pieces by citizen storytellers on living together, and apart, in Durham, North Carolina. By Vimala Rajendran, Chip and Teddy Denton, Courtney Reid-Eaton, and Nia Wilson.

More from our team of citizen storytellers in Durham, NC. Stories by Courtney Smith, Katt Ryce, and Kimani Hall, exploring the things that unite and divide people in Durham and in America. Part of Storymakers: Durham, a project of the national Localore: #FindingAmerica initiative.

Three stories conceived and made by citizen storytellers Jamila Davenport, Roberto Nava, and Debby Bussel explore race, class, and gentrification in Durham, North Carolina. 

Part of Storymakers: Durham, a project of the national Localore: #FindingAmerica initiative.

Music by Lucas Biewen and Blue Dot Sessions.

Can stories help to bring a community together?  How about radio stories, conceived and made by citizen storytellers? Introducing Storymakers: Durham, a project of the national Localore: #FindingAmerica initiative.

The word “Hiroshima” may bring to mind a black-and-white image of a mushroom cloud. It’s easy to forget that it’s an actual city with a million people and a popular baseball team. How did the cataclysm of 1945 reverberate in the place where it happened?

Hearing Hiroshima is a production of Minnesota Public Radio, from American Public Media.

It can take a lifetime to make sense of a parent, or to get over him. Or, just maybe, to come to terms. By Ruxandra Guidi.

The people we love have power—the power to upend our lives, or at least to make things interesting. Two stories of surprises, curveballs thrown by family members. Pieces by Qathi Hart and John Rash.

A quartet of very short works exploring memory – most inspired by Third Coast Audio Festival ShortDoc Challenges. Pieces by Ligaiya Romero, Madeline Miller, Nan Pincus, and John Biewen.

A punk farmer. A tale of rogue chickens on the loose in the city. A pair of refreshing takes on the whole Food thing, in and around Durham, NC. Pieces by Emily Hilliard and Joseph Decosimo.

A refugee from Bosnia. An NYC-born survivor who grew up poor, black, Muslim, and gay. And how one, and her music, saved the other.

People in two communities – one in Alaska, one in New York State – wrestle with questions about energy and the environment. We listen in on democracy close to home. Stories by John Biewen and Jon Miller, edited by Deb George.

A South Sudanese refugee and the music that cuts his heart to pieces. Thelonious Monk’s North Carolina roots. Music and home. Pieces by Nusaibah Kofar-Naisa and John Biewen.

It happens. A happy, healthy young person suddenly gets a grave diagnosis. What does not usually happen: The patient rolls tape. By Ibby Caputo.

It waits for us all. A lot of people want to think about death as little as possible. Others want to dive right in and explore the mystery. Two short docs on the Big D.

Music can be a powerful gift – if you get the song right, or the right song. Two stories from North Carolina.  

There’s a long and painful history in the U.S. of white men killing black men and boys without punishment. In this episode, we listen in on “Dar He,” the one-man play by Mike Wiley that brings to life the story of Emmett Till.

A father turns on a recorder while tucking in his 7-year-old, having no idea he’s about to capture a poignant growing-up moment in his son’s life. (Advisory: This episode is not suitable for some young children.)

The surest way for a woman to declare herself a Muslim is to wear the head scarf — the hijab. In these two short pieces, young Muslim women explore the often unwelcome questions and perceptions that come with the scarf, and the deeply personal decision to wear it. Short documentaries by Reem Alfahad and Sofiya Volubuyeva.     

Tens of millions of Americans, most of them men, tune in to sports talk radio. Is sports talk a haven for old-school guy talk, including misogyny and gay-bashing? For the final episode in our series on sports and society, “Contested,” host John Biewen listened in.

Two families, both making big investments of time and money to involve their kids in sports. But the investments they’re able to make are very different. In Part 5 of “Contested,” our series on sports, society and culture: Sports and the American Dream.

Tal Ben-Artzi didn’t worry about being an out bisexual athlete at Penn State. Maybe she would have if she’d known the school’s history. How much have times changed? In Part 4 of “Contested,” our series on sports, society and culture: stories of LGBTQ women athletes, past and present.

Two small towns, one in Idaho, the other in Upstate New York, try to decide whether to change the nickname of their high school sports teams: The Redskins. (Produced in 2015. Listen for the update at the end.)

More from suburban St. Louis, post-Ferguson, on the popular notion that sports unites communities. Can the camaraderie of a team sport make race and class status “disappear” for the kids involved or their parents? Scene on Radio host and producer John Biewen hangs with a girls’ high school basketball team to test the idea. Scene on Radio comes from the Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University.

Can a winning baseball team bring St. Louis together post-Ferguson? John Biewen explores the question in the inaugural episode of Scene On Radio, a new podcast of audio stories from the Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University.