KERA's Think

[2012-07-10 12:00:00] From the archives – How did one of the most influential nations in history come to be? We looked back at the highlights of British history late last year with Guardian columnist and former editor of The Times Simon Jenkins. His recent book is “A Short History of England: The Glorious Story of a Rowdy Nation” (PublicAffairs, 2011).

[2012-07-09 13:00:00] From the archives – Along with its revolutionary political independence, how did the United States of America gain cultural and social differentiation from its former colonial master Great Britain? We’ll talked last fall with Yale University Historian Kariann Akemi Yokota, author of “Unbecoming British: How Revolutionary America Became a Postcolonial Nation” (Oxford University Press USA, 2011).

[2012-07-09 12:00:00] From the archives - How does one overcome a turbulent childhood and go on to achieve a successful career? We talked last fall with Mark Whitaker, executive vice president and managing editor of CNN Worldwide. He writes about his family’s complicated and emotional history in the book “My Long Trip Home: A Family Memoir” (Simon & Schuster, 2011).

[2012-07-05 12:00:00] From the archives – How does a writer emerge triumphant from a personal crisis? We talked last fall with writer and storyteller Dagoberto Gilb. Gilb, who is also the executive director of Centro Victoria at the University of Houston, Victoria, had just published a new collection of stories called “Before the End, After the Beginning” (Grove Press, 2011).

[2012-07-04 12:00:00] From the archives – Where did President Obama get his drive, dedication and commitment and who shaped his value system as a child? Last year, we talked with journalist Janny Scott, whose deeply researched recent book is “A Singular Woman: The Untold Story of Barack Obama’s Mother” (Riverhead, 2011).

[2012-07-03 13:00:00] From the archives – What is life really like for residents of Ciudad Juarez, Mexico? Last year, we explored the lives of people trapped in one of the most violent and dangerous cities in the world with photojournalist Dominic Bracco, who has extensively covered the situation there. His exhibit “The War Next Door: Narco-Violence and the U.S. Mexico Border” showed last fall at the University of Texas at Arlington.

[2012-07-03 12:00:00] From the archives – What is required for an actor to successfully transform themselves into a character, over and over again? We spent an hour last fall with Emmy Award winner and Academy Award nominee Hal Holbrook, who was in town to speak about his memoir “Harold: The Boy Who Became Mark Twain” (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2011).

[2012-07-02 13:00:00] From the archives – How did a “Father of the Constitution” also play a pivotal role in creating the American system of politics? We talked last fall with National Review senior editor and eminent biographer Richard Brookhiser. His recent book is “James Madison” (Basic Books, 2011).

[2012-07-02 12:00:00] From the archives – How is an artist’s view of the world represented by their work and what is necessary to make the leap to the physical form of an artwork? We spent an hour last summer with award-winning, internationally-acclaimed artist Tony Cragg. He was in town to open his exhibit “Tony Cragg: Seeing Things” which showed last fall at the Nasher Sculpture Center.

[2012-06-28 13:00:00] From the archives – How do you know if someone is disturbed? Could they be a psychopath? We explored the bizarre world of psychopaths, the doctors who study them and the penal systems that incarcerate and try to treat them last June with Jon Ronson, author of “The Psychopath Test: A Journey Through the Madness Industry” (Riverhead Books, 2011).

[2012-06-28 12:00:00] From the archives – What allows some ideas to survive, while others are forgotten? We explored the subject last August with writer and filmmaker Jonnie Hughes, who toured the Midwestern United States in an effort to study the natural history of ideas. His resulting book is “On the Origin of Tepees: The Evolution of Ideas (and Ourselves)” (Free Press, 2011).

[2012-06-27 13:00:00] How did human beings develop the concept of “home” and what do our dwellings say about us and our view of the world? We’ll talk this hour with Jerry D. Moore, Professor of Anthropology at California State University and author of “The Prehistory of Home” (University of California Press, 2012).

[2012-06-27 12:00:00] From the archive – How is the rise of social media affecting and changing the practice of law? We talked last summer with Dallas attorney and writer John G. Browning whose recent book is “The Lawyer’s Guide to Social Networking: Understanding Social Media’s Impact on the Law” (Aspatore Books, 2010).