Who was Harry Smith? Was he an anthropologist, a filmmaker, a painter? Was he a charlatan? A genius? Was he a moocher, a schmuck, a bum? As John Szwed's Cosmic Scholar: The Life and Times of Harry Smith(FSG, 2023) reveals, Smith was all of these and more. Best known for editing The Anthology of American Folk Music, Smith was also a pioneer in experimental film who Jonas Mekas considered one of the leading lights of the New American Cinema. He created paintings that attempted to transcribe bebop recordings. He acted as mysticism consultant on the 1967 effort to levitate the Pentagon. But he also spent years living in poverty, in SROs, at the Chelsea Hotel, or at the apartments of famous friends like Allen Ginsberg. The story of Harry Smith is thus also a story of a vanished New York Bohemia that mixed high and low, the street and the gallery, the Bowery and MOMA, to create one of the most remarkable outpourings of cultural production this country has even seen. And Smith was at the center of it all.
Andy Boyd is a playwright based in Brooklyn, New York. He is a graduate of the playwriting MFA at Columbia University, Harvard University, and the Arizona School for the Arts.
Located in the Gulf of Guinea, off the west coast of Africa, lies the island nation of São Tomé and Príncipe.
São Tomé and Príncipe have the distinction of being one of the smallest countries in Africa by both population and area, and as such, it is a country that many people have never heard of.
Despite its small size, its geography and history make it a country, unlike any other country in Africa.
Learn more about the nation of São Tomé and Príncipe and how it came to be on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily.
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It wasn’t long ago when social media was a place to go for up-to-the-minute updates in an emergency. But even as internet access is more widespread than ever—and natural disasters more frequent—Twitter and Facebook are less useful than ever. As hubs for news, that era appears over.
Guest: Will Oremus, tech reporter for the Washington Post.
If you enjoy this show, please consider signing up for Slate Plus. Slate Plus members get benefits like zero ads on any Slate podcast, bonus episodes of shows like Slow Burn and Dear Prudence—and you’ll be supporting the work we do here on What Next TBD. Sign up now at slate.com/whatnextplus to help support our work.
New York City’s guaranteed medical coverage for every active and retired city worker has served as a major selling point over the past 57 years for people who would otherwise choose jobs with higher wages and lower stress. In a city where over 70,000 retirees survive on pensions of less than $1,500 a month, retired or disabled workers have relied upon the city’s promise to cover 100% of their medical expenses through Medicare and Medicare supplemental insurance.
But in 2021, then-Mayor Bill de Blasio made a pact with public sector unions to switch retirees from their public Medicare supplemental insurance to a privatized Medicare Advantage plan. Cited as a way to save the city hundreds of millions of dollars annually, the move meant that nearly a quarter of a million retired New York City employees — people who have risked their lives for fellow New Yorkers as firefighters, police officers, nurses, and teachers — would no longer be able to access effective or essential healthcare.
City retirees have sued the city to keep their current coverage. Attorney Jake Gardener, counsel to the retirees, sat down with Ravi to discuss the case, the politics behind the city’s relationship with its unions, and why preserving access to Medicare for current and future retirees in New York is essential, not just for New York City, but people all over the country.
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The globe may be warming, but that doesn’t stop summer from coming to an end. So, in honor of the long weekend which symbolizes the transition from summer vacation to back-to-school, we dug up a couple gems from The Gist’s archives. First up, to honor the return to school, we are replaying Mike’s 2017 interview with Lenora Chu, author of Little Soldiers: An American Boy, a Chinese School, and the Global Race to Achieve, which tells the story of her American family’s rude awakening to Chinese education practices. When Chu moved her family to Shanghai, she eagerly enrolled her young son into an elite Chinese public school. She expected academic rigor and an emphasis on work ethic. But she was surprised to find authoritarian teachers and desperate, obsequious parents. Then, to honor the long weekend, an encouragement to watch some 80s movies this weekend in the form of Mike’s 2016 interview with Hadley Freeman, author of Life Moves Pretty Fast: The Lessons We Learned From Eighties Movies (and Why We Don’t Learn Them From Movies Anymore).
Existing home sales are down around 20% year over year for two reasons: mortgage rates are too high and there aren't enough homes for sale. Matt Argersinger and Deidre Woollard discuss: - The current situation of home sales and what could change it.
- Why homebuilders are in a good position right now.
- If renting will become permanent for more Americans and which companies might benefit. Host: Deidre Woollard
National conservatism (or conservative nationalism) may have had its moment, but a group of so-called Freedom Conservatives have unveiled a statement of principles that includes a more robust voluntary sector of society. Stephanie Slade of Reason comments.
Inspired by the 1976 electronic album for plants and plant people, the Empty Bottle is organizing a celebration of electronic music and plants at the Garfield Park Conservatory. Reset learns more about the two day event from Brent Heyl, an organizer of Plantasia, and musician Jonn Wallen.
The CoinDesk Market Index (CMI) functions as a benchmark for the performance of the digital asset market, delivering institutional quality information to digital asset investors. For more on the CMI you can visit: http://coindeskmarkets.com/
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This episode was hosted by Michele Musso. “Markets Daily” is executive produced by Jared Schwartz and produced and edited by Eleanor Pahl. All original music by Doc Blust and Colin Mealey.
In Industry Unbound: The Inside Story of Privacy, Data, and Corporate Power (Cambridge UP, 2021), Ari Ezra Waldman exposes precisely how the tech industry conducts its ongoing crusade to undermine our privacy. With research based on interviews with scores of tech employees and internal documents outlining corporate strategies, Waldman reveals that companies don't just lobby against privacy law; they also manipulate how we think about privacy, how their employees approach their work, and how they weaken the law to make data-extractive products the norm. In contrast to those who claim that privacy law is getting stronger, Waldman shows why recent shifts in privacy law are precisely the kinds of changes that corporations want and how even those who think of themselves as privacy advocates often unwittingly facilitate corporate malfeasance. This powerful account should be read by anyone who wants to understand why privacy laws are not working and how corporations trap us into giving up our personal information.
Jake Chanenson is a computer science Ph.D. student at the University of Chicago and an AY23-24 affiliate at the Center for Information, Technology, and Public Life (CITAP). Broadly, Jake is interested in topics relating to HCI, privacy, and tech policy. Jake’s work has been published in top venues such as ACM’s CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems.
