The Spiritual Music of Hawaii
Even given its colonial past and present day kitsch, Hawaii remains both an earthly paradise and a place of natural numinous power. This is evident in its variety of spiritual musical idioms. Here is a taste of some of them, culled from a Smithsonian Festival a few years back. Aloha!
Profile: Jules Feiffer
From his “Sick, Sick, Sick” book to the Village Voice, the Phantom Tollbooth, biting political satire and beyond, Jules Feiffer is known for his beautiful simple lines that bring often neurotic characters to life in both funny and heartbreakingly human ways. Here we get a taste of this American treasure in his own words, and […]
The Genocidal Mentality: Why Good People Do Horrible Things
Not everyone who participates in genocide is a through-and-through evil person. Yet there is something in us, which, given the right circumstances and psychological wounds, can erupt into murderousness on a vast social scale. Such was the case in Nazi Germany, for example, and such was certainly the case in Rwanda in 1994, when over […]
Grieving Vets Remember Their War
For many Americans, Veterans Day means merely a long weekend of relaxation or a parade of patriotic display and brouhaha. But for many of the veterans who fought and killed in war, the psychological wounds engendered by the carnage continues long after the guns have gone silent. I asked a group of everyday vets, many […]
The Status of Women in Israel
Due to religion, socialism, the Zionist ideal, the militarization of the society, Western feminism, Arab culture and many other factors, Israeli women have complex competing factors that inform their self-image and their social roles. This is a half hour documentary I did for National Public Radio back in the 1990s that is still relevant today.
Gary, West Virginia: A Coal Town Flickers Out
At its peak, the town of Gary was completely alive with the sound of coal mining, lunchtime whistles, and the ethnic music that its immigrant laborers made during their rare off hours. US Steel had built the town, and the workers were proud to be there, albeit under very difficult, even backbreaking and dangerous conditions. […]