Notes from America with Kai Wright

Afrofuturism is an old idea that’s reaching new people. This Black History Month, we travel from Seneca Village to Wakanda, from Sun Ra to Lil Nas X as we learn this cosmic vision of Black freedom, directly from the culture makers propelling the movement. Academy Award winning production designer and lead curator of the Before Yesterday We Could Fly: An Afrofuturist Period Room at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Hannah Beachler (Creed, Moonlight, Beyoncé's Lemonade, Black Panther, and more), tells us what Afrofuturism looks like. Then, Professor Louis Chude-Sokei, director of the African American studies program at Boston University and co-curator of the Afrofuturism festival hosted by Carnegie Hall, tells us what Afrofuturism sounds like. 

Companion listening for this episode:

Louis Chude-Sokei: Afrofuturism Playlist

“It’s no secret that when movements and concepts reach the ‘ism’ phase, they often congeal into cliche or harden into orthodoxy. As they expand to attract and include others, the raw, unorthodox creativity that created them in the first place can be forgotten or lost to those who arrive to a table that’s already been set. With this tendency in mind, I’ve selected tracks that honor the wild, experimental sensibilities that feed Afrofuturism across the Black diaspora. From dub textures to the machinic surfaces of techno, kuduro, and gloriously uncategorizable beatscapes, these tracks are intended to keep Afrofuturism geographically, culturally, and sonically nonconformist.” —Louis Chude-Sokei (Carnegie Hall Festivals Playlist)

Tell us what you think. We're @noteswithkai on Instagram and X (Twitter). Email us at [email protected]. Send us a voice message by recording yourself on your phone and emailing us, or record one here.

Notes from America airs live on Sundays at 6 p.m. ET. The podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts.

The former Talking Heads frontman explores the various challenges – and beauties – of human connection while breaking down his hit Broadway show, American Utopia. David Byrne's American Utopia is running at Broadway's St. James Theater through early April. You can also stream the filmed version, directed by Spike Lee, on HBO Max. 

Companion listening for this episode:

Lynn Nottage: Unexpected Optimist (1/3/2022)

Playwright Lynn Nottage breaks down her remarkable career and shares how, as an optimist at heart, she finds the light and resilience in unexpected stories.

“The United States of Anxiety” airs live on Sunday evenings at 6pm ET. The podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts. To catch all the action, tune into the show on Sunday nights via the stream on WNYC.org/anxiety or tell your smart speakers to play WNYC. 

We want to hear from you! Connect with us on Twitter @WNYC using the hashtag #USofAnxiety or email us at [email protected].

Tell us what you think. We're @noteswithkai on Instagram and X (Twitter). Email us at [email protected]. Send us a voice message by recording yourself on your phone and emailing us, or record one here.

Notes from America airs live on Sundays at 6 p.m. ET. The podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts.

Biden’s vow to finally appoint a Black woman to the Supreme Court has ignited a debate before a nomination has even materialized. How do you fight for representation, without getting stuck in the tired old debate over “affirmative action?” Hear reactions from President and CEO of the National Women's Law Center Fatima Goss Graves, Court scholar Elie Mystal, and listeners.  

Companion listening for this episode:

A Court On The Edge (9/21/2020)

After the passing of the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the long sought a stable conservative majority in the Supreme Court became a reality - but not without a fight. WNYC's Jami Floyd (Senior Editor for Race and Justice) and Elie Mystal (Justice Correspondent at The Nation) joined us to set the scene for the battle over the Supreme Court and what a vacancy on the bench of the highest court in the nation represents for Election 2020 and our collective future.

“The United States of Anxiety” airs live on Sunday evenings at 6pm ET. The podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts. To catch all the action, tune into the show on Sunday nights via the stream on WNYC.org/anxiety or tell your smart speakers to play WNYC.

Tell us what you think. We're @noteswithkai on Instagram and X (Twitter). Email us at [email protected]. Send us a voice message by recording yourself on your phone and emailing us, or record one here.

Notes from America airs live on Sundays at 6 p.m. ET. The podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts.

New science finds we’ve got less than a decade to avoid climate catastrophe. Activist and author Bill McKibben says the only solutions that can beat that deadline are collective. Host Kai Wright invites listeners to ask McKibben their own climate questions, on the heels of a United Nations report that declared the damage from carbon and methane emissions at our current rate will be irreversible by 2030. What can we do that will make enough change, quickly enough? 

Companion listening for this episode:

The Birth of Climate Denial (5/11/2017)

How a movement to create doubt about the reality of climate change began — and how scientific consensus has been perpetually undermined. 

"The United States of Anxiety” airs live on Sunday evenings at 6pm ET. The podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts. To catch all the action, tune into the show on Sunday nights via the stream on WNYC.org/anxiety or tell your smart speakers to play WNYC. 

We want to hear from you! Connect with us on Twitter @WNYC using the hashtag #USofAnxiety or email us at [email protected].

Tell us what you think. We're @noteswithkai on Instagram and X (Twitter). Email us at [email protected]. Send us a voice message by recording yourself on your phone and emailing us, or record one here.

Notes from America airs live on Sundays at 6 p.m. ET. The podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts.

Mona Charen discusses the true meaning of conservative and the radical shift in the GOP. Plus, she helps take your calls. Then, a listener mailbag begs us to explore how "normal people" became part of the Jan 6. attack. Host Kai Wright and senior digital producer Kousha Navidar spoke with Seamus Hughes, Deputy Director of the Program on Extremism at George Washington University, to learn more.

 Companion listening for this episode:

Episode 1: How Did We Get Here and Where Are We Going? (9/22/2016)

Listen back to our very first episode where we went to Long Island to find out if America has truly lost its mind.

“The United States of Anxiety” airs live on Sunday evenings at 6pm ET. The podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts. To catch all the action, tune into the show on Sunday nights via the stream on WNYC.org/anxiety or tell your smart speakers to play WNYC. 

We want to hear from you! Connect with us on Twitter @WNYC using the hashtag #USofAnxiety or email us at [email protected].

Tell us what you think. We're @noteswithkai on Instagram and X (Twitter). Email us at [email protected]. Send us a voice message by recording yourself on your phone and emailing us, or record one here.

Notes from America airs live on Sundays at 6 p.m. ET. The podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts.

As recent voting rights legislation struggles to even get a vote in the Senate, we revisit a conversation with historian Dr. Carol Anderson about how American voters, particularly Black Americans, had fought and continue to fight for their right to participate in the democratic process - safely and with certainty that their votes will count.

Dr. Anderson is a Charles Howard Candler Professor of African American Studies at Emory University and author of several books including “White Rage: The Unspoken Truth of Our Nation's Divide” (2016).

Companion listening for this episode:The Short Life and Early Death of Voting Rights (7/12/2021)Birth, August 1965. Death, July 2021. So now what for multiracial democracy?

“The United States of Anxiety” airs live on Sunday evenings at 6pm ET. The podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts. To catch all the action, tune into the show on Sunday nights via the stream on WNYC.org/anxiety or tell your smart speakers to play WNYC. 

We want to hear from you! Connect with us on Twitter @WNYC using the hashtag #USofAnxiety or email us at [email protected].

Tell us what you think. We're @noteswithkai on Instagram and X (Twitter). Email us at [email protected]. Send us a voice message by recording yourself on your phone and emailing us, or record one here.

Notes from America airs live on Sundays at 6 p.m. ET. The podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts.

This MLK Weekend, Rev. Dr. Jacqueline Lewis helps us understand the potential of love in our politics. Then, hear from a student participating in a hunger strike for voting rights. What is it like putting your body on the line when your own Senator is the person standing in the way? Arizona State University sophomore, Michaela Schillinger, takes us through the process of organizing a strike while balancing school, meeting with legislators like Senator Kyrsten Sinema, and a surprising update as the story continues to unfold.

Companion listening for this episode:

How Martin Luther King, Jr., Changed American Christianity (1/18/2021)

What did MLK’s uniquely Black theology teach us about the relationship between faith and politics in 2021?

"The United States of Anxiety” airs live on Sunday evenings at 6pm ET. The podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts. To catch all the action, tune into the show on Sunday nights via the stream on WNYC.org/anxiety or tell your smart speakers to play WNYC. 

Tell us what you think. We're @noteswithkai on Instagram and X (Twitter). Email us at [email protected]. Send us a voice message by recording yourself on your phone and emailing us, or record one here.

Notes from America airs live on Sundays at 6 p.m. ET. The podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts.

On a scale of 1-10, how anxious are you about the state of our democracy? Kai considers when democracy is past its tipping point with New York Times columnist Thomas Edsall. Plus callers tell us how anxious they are about the state of our democracy.

Then is the right better at the internet than the left? Senior producer Kousha Navidar reports back.

Companion listening for this episode:

The Supreme Court v. Our Rights (12/6/2021)

Another year of the SCOTUS is coming to a close. But can we still trust our nine appointed justices to be the final arbiters of the law? Listen to the end for our last digital living segment.

"The United States of Anxiety” airs live on Sunday evenings at 6pm ET. The podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts. To catch all the action, tune into the show on Sunday nights via the stream on WNYC.org/anxiety or tell your smart speakers to play WNYC. 

We want to hear from you! Connect with us on Twitter @WNYC using the hashtag #USofAnxiety or email us at [email protected].

Tell us what you think. We're @noteswithkai on Instagram and X (Twitter). Email us at [email protected]. Send us a voice message by recording yourself on your phone and emailing us, or record one here.

Notes from America airs live on Sundays at 6 p.m. ET. The podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts.

Two-time Pulitzer Prize winning playwright Lynn Nottage (Ruined, Sweat, Clyde’s) breaks down her remarkable career and shares how, as an optimist at heart, she finds the light and resilience in unexpected stories. Plus, she tells host Kai Wright about her hopes for the future of theater and her interest in making the medium accessible and meeting people where they are.

Companion listening for this episode:

Can America Be Redeemed? (7/5/2021)

Eddie Glaude and Imani Perry consider the question through the work of James Baldwin and Richard Wright. Plus: How our country could enter a period of “post-traumatic growth.”

“The United States of Anxiety” airs live on Sunday evenings at 6pm ET. The podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts. To catch all the action, tune into the show on Sunday nights via the stream on WNYC.org/anxiety or tell your smart speakers to play WNYC. 

We want to hear from you! Connect with us on Twitter @WNYC using the hashtag #USofAnxiety or email us at [email protected].

Tell us what you think. We're @noteswithkai on Instagram and X (Twitter). Email us at [email protected]. Send us a voice message by recording yourself on your phone and emailing us, or record one here.

Notes from America airs live on Sundays at 6 p.m. ET. The podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts.

James Reese Europe was already famous when he enlisted to fight in World War I. But the band he took to the frontlines — as part of the famous 369th Infantry Regiment, also known as the Harlem Hellfighters — thurst him, and Black American music, onto the global stage. Moran sits down at the piano to show Kai how Europe’s band changed music, and how jazz carries the resilient sound of Black history and ambition in America. 

Companion listening for this episode:

The ‘Beautiful Experiments’ Left Out of Black History (2/8/2021)

Saidiya Hartman introduces Kai to the young women whose radical lives were obscured by respectability politics, in the second installment of our Future of Black History series.

“The United States of Anxiety” airs live on Sunday evenings at 6pm ET. The podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts. To catch all the action, tune into the show on Sunday nights via the stream on WNYC.org/anxiety or tell your smart speakers to play WNYC. 

We want to hear from you! Connect with us on Twitter @WNYC using the hashtag #USofAnxiety or email us at [email protected].

Tell us what you think. We're @noteswithkai on Instagram and X (Twitter). Email us at [email protected]. Send us a voice message by recording yourself on your phone and emailing us, or record one here.

Notes from America airs live on Sundays at 6 p.m. ET. The podcast episodes are lightly edited from our live broadcasts.