Word of Mouth

Parenting blogs are full of forums discussing "no touch" policies at school around the country. Today, much less discussed among the nanny state is the physical punishment that’s still happening in some public schools. And then, in an effort to save public face, some universities have went all-in on chasing college rankings. While these lists don’t fully represent the college experience, the tangible, advertised results are invaluable to administrators.

NHPR and The Music Hall present Writers on a New England Stage with Jodi Picoult recorded live at The Music Hall in Portsmouth. Picoult is a phenomenally successful novelist, with more than 14 million books in print worldwide. Small Great Things is her most recent. Like previous books, it debuted at number one on best-sellers lists. Picoult devotees will recognize the relatable, everyday characters thrashing through controversial ethical issues seemingly ripped from the headlines. But for her,

New Hampshire's largest city has a rich industrial history as mill town. Today, it's a hub for tech and companies and education. Today, a Manchester resident says it's time the re-awakened queen city got a new guide. Plus, a comprehensive map of the world’s weirdest places – from Brazil’s Snake Island to an Icelandic elf school, to a giant burning hole in Turkmenistan, Atlas Obscura's new book is sure to make your next vacation a little stranger.

In September, 24 thousand inmates launched the first-ever national prison strike - a story largely lost to election news. Among the complaints: prison labor is akin to slavery. Today, we'll look at the cost of labor on the inside. Plus, the tidying -up trend got people throwing out stuff and organizing their way to serenity. An economist argues that there are upsides to leaving life a little “messy”.

In late August Marvel announced that it would be celebrating Kirby week: in honor of legendary comic book artist Jack Kirby’s 99th birthday. But Jack Kirby, who died in 1994, wasn’t on good terms with company that distributed his work. Even if you’ve never read a comic in your life - there’s a good chance you’ve heard of Stan Lee, the creator of characters like Spiderman and Iron Man. It’s less likely that you’ve heard of Jack Kirby.

80s movies like Back to the Future and The Breakfast Club banked on the boredom, buying power and dramatic urges of teenagers - but were they groundbreaking cinema classics? A superfan says John Hughes and his teen flick colleagues got at truths beyond adolescence angst and suburbia. Then, a group calling itself New World Hacking took down the websites for BBC Global in January, 2016 through denial of service – or DDOS attacks. Other hacks have hit the Trump campaign and MasterCard. The hackers

When asked about what it was like to live with Alzheimer's disease, Donald Burke said, "like standing on melting ice." Today, a husband and wife dig into the metaphor to find meaning. Also today: how is it that humans can send rovers to Mars and 3D print organs, yet still not control rats? For thousands of years, humans have been losing the battle against the vermin that destroy crops, spread disease, and proliferate on an almost unimaginable scale. We're learning about a tech-startup run by a

A group calling itself New World Hacking took down the websites for BBC Global in January, 2016 through denial of service – or DDOS attacks. Other hacks have hit the Trump campaign and MasterCard. The hackers say it’s just the beginning. That could affect all of us, thanks to our increasingly connected lifestyles. Our tech dude explains the internet of broken things. Also, novelist Willa Cather wrote of pioneers on the plains from a farm in Peterborough. More than 65 years after her death, a

In 1976 presidential candidate Ronald Reagan used "welfare queen" when describing a serial criminal who bilked the government for tens of thousands of dollars in aid - what was true then and still true today: the typical welfare recipient is rural and white. But it stuck as code for urban, black, and working the system. Today, how the myth of the “welfare queen” gets in the way of helping real families. Plus, his byline appeared in thousands of international papers celebrating American free

According to estimates, there are some seventy to eighty million stray and feral cats in the United States - one for every four and half humans. Today, the cat wars - an ecologist faces off against passionate cat lovers in order to make a controversial argument: that the cuddly subjects of so many popular gifs are actually an invasive species that threaten biodiversity and human health. Plus, America's great repository of world knowledge faces an existential predicament. In a world where

When foreign nationals commit a crime in the US, their consulates work to avoid what the majority of UN member states consider to be barbaric: execution. Today, we'll hear what the government south of the border is doing to their nationals off death row. Also today, 80s movies like Back to the Future and The Breakfast Club banked on the boredom, buying power and dramatic urges of teenagers - but were they groundbreaking cinema classics? A superfan says John Hughes and his teen flick colleagues

Today, NHPR and the Music Hall present Writers on a New England Stage with Stephen Breyer, recorded live at the Music Hall in Portsmouth. Breyer was appointed Associate Justice of the Supreme Court by President Clinton in 1994. He is now 78 and author of several books throughout his distinguished career. Some are academic, others displaying his unbridled enthusiasm for the democratic system and belief that it is the court’s job is to make government work for real people living today.

There’s a new wrinkle in the universal law: "What goes up, must come down." As attempts to regulate drones grow, a new arms race is afoot to develop technology that can land or destroy non-compliant or wayward drones. And whether it's attending a rally with a parent, or absorbed through TV commercials and yard signs, kids get exposed to the unseemly side of American politics. So, how and when, should parents encourage, shape, or inform civic engagement? A teacher and a blogger weigh in on how to

Poverty, suicide, and alcohol and drug abuse are disproportionately high among the two million Native Americans in the U.S. -- and at crisis levels on reservations. On today’s show, we'll look into one economic impediment: property rights. Plus, this Columbus Day we take a look at the allure and bias of maps, with a look at cartographers who create fictional maps for fantasy novels like Lord of the Rings or Game of Thrones. We'll discover that a good fantasy map must be rooted in reality.

Radio host, writer and historian Louis "Studs" Terkel was known for intimate oral histories of ordinary people—a collection of previously unheard recordings from his landmark 1974 book Working—revealing how regular Americans viewed their jobs four decades ago, and how that's changed. On today’s show, The Working Tapes. Plus, the real cost of a mug shot. Police station photos of someone arrested for a crime are considered public record by the American justice system. They're also a multi-million