Category: Active

The holidays are an unusually social time, filled with parties and family get-togethers. But for most of the year, we feel isolated and unsatisfied with our social lives. Our society isn’t structured to support connection year-round. So it’s an apt time to re-air this episode — a conversation with the writer Sheila Liming about rediscovering the lost art of hanging out.

Liming is an associate professor of professional writing at Champlain College and the author of “Hanging Out: The Radical Power of Killing Time.” In the book, Liming investigates the troubling fact that we’ve grown much less likely to simply spend time together outside our partnerships, workplaces and family units. What would it look like to reconfigure our world to make social connection easier for all of us?

I spoke to Liming in April 2023. But I find that this conversation provides a clearer sense of what’s gone wrong in our social lives — and how to make “hanging out” with others more fulfilling.

Note: We're still gathering questions for an upcoming "Ask Me Anything" episode we'd like to record. If you have any questions for Ezra, please email ezrakleinshow@nytimes.com using the subject line "AMA."

Mentioned:

“You’d Be Happier Living Closer to Friends. Why Don’t You?” by Anne Helen Petersen

“The Nuclear Family Was a Mistake” by David Brooks

Full Surrogacy Now by Sophie Lewis

Regarding the Pain of Others by Susan Sontag

Letters from Tove by Tove Jansson

Book Recommendations:

Black Paper by Teju Cole

On the Inconvenience of Other People by Lauren Berlant

The Hare by Melanie Finn

Thoughts? Guest suggestions? Email us at ezrakleinshow@nytimes.com.

You can find transcripts (posted midday) and more episodes of “The Ezra Klein Show” at nytimes.com/ezra-klein-podcast, and you can find Ezra on Twitter @ezraklein. Book recommendations from all our guests are listed at https://www.nytimes.com/article/ezra-klein-show-book-recs.

This episode of “The Ezra Klein Show” is produced by Annie Galvin, with Jeff Geld, Rogé Karma and Kristin Lin. Fact-checking by Michelle Harris, Mary Marge Locker and Kate Sinclair. Mixing by Jeff Geld. Original music by Isaac Jones. Audience strategy by Shannon Busta. The executive producer of New York Times Opinion Audio is Annie-Rose Strasser. Special thanks to Sonia Herrero and Kristina Samulewski.

Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app.

After a public fallout with the President, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene unexpectedly announces that she'll resign from congress on January 5. Could her decision spark a wave of resignations from her Republican colleagues? Jon, Lovett, and Tommy discuss why so many GOP representatives are unhappy with the status quo, a federal judge's decision to toss out the Justice Department's indictments against James Comey and Letitia James, the administration's threats against Sen. Mark Kelly, and a new Page Six-worthy media/sex scandal involving Secretary of Health Robert F. Kennedy. Then, Rep. Summer Lee stops by the studio to talk to Jon about Greene's resignation and the Oversight Committee's field hearing on ICE immigration raids in LA.

For a closed-captioned version of this episode, click here. For a transcript of this episode, please email transcripts@crooked.com and include the name of the podcast.

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SARAH SQUIRM: LIVE + IN THE FLESH, debuts on HBO and HBO Max December 12th. We command you to tune in! Sarah Squirm joins us once again to speculate on Zohran’s meeting with Trump: is Trump starstruck? In love? Depressed? We also talk about the president’s plan to bring back the Rush Hour movies, the secrets of the White House swimming pool, a reverse Jussie Smollett situation in Ocean City, and shitting yourself. A lot of stories about shitting yourself. Follow Sarah on Twitter/X: https://x.com/SarahSquirm And Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sarahsquirm/?hl=en