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This week we talk about Korean science fiction, with Sang-Joon Park, publisher; Soyeon Jeong, a Science Fiction writer; Gord Sellar, also a writer, and Sunyoung Park, Associate Professor of East Asian Languages and Cultures and Gender Studies at USC. Each are contributors to a new book, Readymade Bodhisattva: The Kaya anthology of South Korean Science Fiction, and this interview offers potential readers some perspectives on Korean science fiction: how it emerged, what its core themes are, how it relates to western science fiction, and how it is linked to technological and political change in their country. In a rapidly changing society like Korea in the late 20th century, reading science fiction connected them with a wider world, offered them a means of working through trauma and of imagining alternative worlds. Initially encountered through translations of western writers curated for the Korean market, later transformed into a genre where local writers could make their own contributions, science fiction has emerged as a vital tradition in both literature and film (for example, Snowpiercer or The Host). What kinds of futures are imagined in this popular culture tradition? How has it allowed Koreans to think about the changes brought by ICTs?

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In this episode we are joined by Kerri Hoffman, CEO of PRX (PRX, a distributor of public media content) and John Barth, Chief Content Editor of PRX. This is our fourth and last episode on the Power and Pleasure of Podcasting (with episodes 32, 33 and 34). We begin by discussing the history of podcasting and public radio, and how it has always been a venture of affecting lives and not money-making. Yet, what makes podcasting special? Listeners often speak about authenticity of the maker, speaker or host as the main distinctive factor, but we are far from knowing more specifics. There is also the ability to connect with a few, yet more interested and dedicated, niche listeners. Even what is considered “good” content differs from more raw, authentic productions, to professionally put-together shows. Its main allure, however, continues to be its ability to be open and participatory. Nonetheless, we wonder, will it join the internet and other original participatory mediums in in spite of being open, still dominated by a few, big, key players? How do we continue encouraging people to create and share podcasts when they are not so easily distributed? Will search engines such as Google, who are not in the game yet, play a significant role on who can find and access podcasts?

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Amber J. Phillips (aka the High Priestess of Black Joy), podcaster and Participatory Civic Media Fellow at USC, takes the reins to interview Chenjerai Kumanyika, Assistant Professor ofJournalism and Media Studies at Rutgers University, and host of Uncivil Podcast. Following our podcasting event at USC (see episodes 32 and 33), they speak about some differences of black voices, performativity, and expectations of "authenticity" in podcasting. We also discuss what is considered professionalism in radio, and where the definition of what radio should be emerged. How was the standard set, and who was excluded from public radio? How do black podcasters negotiate code-switching, in order to be "inclusive" of the wider public, while also being able to speak to their own communities? We delve into trying to bring marginalized stories to mainstream listeners. We get into how and why Chenjerai chose the stories he did for the Uncivil podcast: what are the questions that will help us understand history with the most clarity? Civil war stories for example, are focused on the larger narratives of battles and policies, but the marginalized stories do not get told because of a lack of imagination. We also talk about the word "innovation" and criteria for it, but how the word is being used by opposite communities.

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This is part 2 of our Power and Pleasure of Podcasting event at USC (episode 33), which included performances from our guests. In this episode, we have the Q&A session that followed, where we were able to delve into the process of making and starting to podcast. To reiterate, we had Chenjerai Kumanyika (Uncivil), Davia Nelson and Nikki Silva (The Kitchen Sisters), Melinna Bobadilla and Brenda Gonzalez (Tamarindo), and Taz Ahmed and Zahra Noorbakhsh (#GoodMuslimBadMuslim). Our guests discuss the craft of podcasting and share the stories of this bottom-up way of discussing the issues they tackle for their respective community. They share the difficulties of podcasting, such as its status as "side project" or unpaid labor, as well as the emotional labor of podcasting. We also discussed choosing names and talking to the public, the "fear of Twitter" and more. Also, we see the variability of contexts from our guests: the decision of writing for themselves, owning their own content, as well being part of collectives or working for larger radio companies.

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We recently hosted an event on Power and Pleasure of Podcasting at USC, and we have the live recording to share with you . The lineup included performances by Chenjerai Kumanyika (Uncivil), Davia Nelson and Nikki Silva (The Kitchen Sisters), Melinna Bobadilla and Brenda Gonzalez (Tamarindo), and Taz Ahmed and Zahra Noorbakhsh (#GoodMuslimBadMuslim). We had the privilege of having each of these podcasters share snippets of their episodes, to show us how the alternative storytelling of podcasting can add to larger narratives. We cover the present repercussions of the Civil War; and look at Keepers of cultures, putting the spotlight on librarians and archivists as the heroes of holding down the fort on facts. The hosts of Tamarindo, a podcast that focuses on the Latinx community in LA, do a Minicast from our event; and the #GoodMuslimBadMuslim hosts also do a live episode, where they issue a fatwa to the Muslim ban.

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This week we experiment with format, but also with how we think about media, with our guest Shrikanth S. Narayanan, Engineering professor at a University of Southern California. Shri works in an interdisciplinary lab that looks at "data science before it was cool," showing the benefits of interdisciplinarity when studying media and storytelling. He thinks about "signals" from media as data points to see how we react to different stimuli from film and media, which includes physical reactions emerging from particular emotional stimuli. These data points include sweating, and increased heart rate. How can we think, or study, our reactions to storytelling? How do the music, the dialogue, the visual and other stimuli shape our responses to media?

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This week we touch on gender in film history with Professor of Film at Columbia University School of the Arts, Jane Gaines. During the current #timesup moment, there is an implicit suggestion that women have been waiting a long time for a higher status in the entertainment industry but also often a suggestion that progress has been made but not fast enough. But a different picture emerges when we look at these shifts in a larger historical context. More women were working above and below the line in American cinema during the silent era than are working today. And this active role in filmmaking includes women of color and women in countries around the world. We have thought of early film-making as male dominated, but how do we account for the collective forgetting of the vital roles women played during this transitional moment? How did they acquire this power? What lasting impact did they have on how Hollywood told stories?Where were they? But also, where did they go? And how can their stories help us to understand the power struggles impacting Hollywood today?

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In this episode we discuss the Academy Awards with Raffi Sarkissian, Lecturer at Christopher Newport University, Virginia. Raffi has written about the long narrative created during the “award season” by creators, promotion strategists, the mainstream media etc. We discuss the emergence of the #oscarssowhite protest as a reflection of the industry's structural problems. However, since then, we have witnessed the industry attempting to course correct. Although this year has an unprecedented diversity of nominees, Raffi says, the #oscarssowhite problematic will continue to bubble under the surface. We also discuss the politics in and around Hollywood award ceremonies. Any award show is inherently political: whenever any institution decides what is considered “best," they are making a statement about their values and priorities. While Oscar once found explicit politics distasteful, more recent award shows have included multiple protests against the Trump Administration -- with Meryl Streep’s 2016 Golden Globes speech perhaps the most memorable. Other speeches, such as Viola Davis’. address struggles for inclusion and representation within the industry, not simply celebrating what has been accomplished but pushing for more progress. Even if many people do not recall who won last year's Oscars, the awards have a direct effect on who gets to create more films in upcoming years. Lastly, there are the politics of the broadcast itself: as they try to appeal to a bigger audience, who is in charge of the awards, and who are the Oscars for?

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In this episode we talked to Caty Borum Chatoo, Director of the Center for Media & Social Impact (CMSI) and Executive in Residence at the American University School of Communication in Washington, D.C. Before academia, she ranged from working with Norman Lear to producing documentaries. She collaborated with comedian Hasan Minhaj on the documentary, Standup Planet, identifying comedians in the Global South who tackled serious social justice issues, including global poverty. Comedians and activists share the common goal of identifying problems with the status quo. Caty takes us through why comedy is a viable way of talking through, and getting actual engagement, with difficult issues; the new generation of YouTubers and activists who are bringing it to legislators through, for example, comedy videos about the treatment of sexual assault survivors, and the “comedian in residence” they have at her research center. Also, we consider why it is important that people with different lived experiences and backgrounds can speak directly to their publics without first trying to appeal to majority gatekeepers and how the digital has helped re-shape how we think of audiences. Comedy can help with “activist fatigue”: we need hope, Caty says, not just anger, to deal with such depressing issues. If the question is, how do we get people to engage in serious issue? Caty argues that comedy, as solution, needs to be taken seriously.

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In our third and final installment of the need for critics of color, Eric Deggans, NPR's first full-time TV critic and author of Race Baiter: How the Media Wields Dangerous Words to Divide a Nation, talks to Henry and Colin about his longtime trajectory in radio and print media. Our guest speaks about how his first encounter with white culture was through radio, and asserts that "podcasting is radio for young people" now. When starting he thought, how can we talk about culture in a unique way, of things that other people cannot see? In his case he thought not only about race, but also about other dimensions, such as being a musician. In terms of television, we talk about how critics of color are needed not only to understand the new shows that better represent minority culture, but also to make visible the prevalence of and default to white culture in general. He says that Luke Cage, for example, hit a few touchstones of growing up black in that time, creating a powerful feeling of nostalgia and understanding that he could not get, for example, with The Sopranos, which he enjoyed as an outsider.

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