Notes from America with Kai Wright

Do you need a revival?  On the longest night of the year, join us to celebrate Yalda, a poetic Persian tradition. Then, a conversation about those we’ve lost with jazz and gospel artist Gregory Porter.

Here’s the translation of the Hafez poem read by Armen Davoudian at the end of our show:

Ghazal 43 (Hafez)

The orchard charms our hearts, and chatter when our dearest friends appear – is sweet;

God bless the time of roses! To drink our wine among the roses here – is sweet!

Our souls’ scent sweetens with each breeze; ah yes, the sighs that lovers hear – are sweet.

Sing, nightingale! Rosebuds unopened yet will leave you, and your fear – is sweet;

Dear singer of the night, for those in love your sad lament is clear – and sweet.

The world’s bazaar contains no joy, except the libertine’s; food cheer – is sweet!

I heard the lilies say, “The world is old, to take things lightly here – is sweet.”

Hafez, the happy heart ignores the world; don’t think dominion here – is sweet.

— Translated by Dick Davis in Faces of Love: Hafez and the Poets of Shriaz (Penguin)

You can watch the live-streamed Yalda event mentioned in the show. Here is the information:

Tuesday, Dec. 21st, 9PM Eastern/ 6PM, PST

Instagram:  @iraniandiaspora studiesFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/CenterforIranianDiasporaStudiesYouTube: Center for Iranian Diaspora Studies 

“Celebrating Shab-e Yalda” is a pre-recorded event premiering on the longest night of the year, Tuesday, December 21, 2021 at 6:00 PM. This very special program includes poetry reading and a performance from Paris-based opera singer and composer Ariana Vafadari and California-based singer Sima Shahverdi, as well as a ceremonial lighting of candles to bring light and warmth to this night.

Co-presented by The Center for Iranian Diaspora Studies at San Francisco State University and the Diaspora Arts Connection, this is a free event and no registration is required. All you have to do is tune in to our Facebook, Instagram, and/or YouTube channels on the evening of December 21 to watch.

Companion Listening:

How the Dead Still Speak to Us (11/1/2021)

This Halloween, we reveal its history and why connecting to the dead is important to so many, from Ireland, to Mexico, to NYC. Plus a guided meditation to help you connect, too.

“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.

Three men — White, Black, and Asian — discuss the nuances of identity that divide this country. A bonus episode, introducing a new podcast we love: “Some of My Best Friends Are…”

Our host Kai Wright talks with Khalil Gibran Muhammed about the new show. And we share an episode in which Khalil and Ben Austen, two best friends who grew up together on the South Side of Chicago in '80s, talk with New York Times journalist and author Jay Caspian Kang about his new memoir, The Loneliest Americans, and his experience growing up Asian in America. 

Companion Listening:

Listen to more episodes of the Some of My Best Friends Are... Podcast:

“Some of My Best Friends Are… is a podcast hosted by Khalil Gibran Muhammad and Ben Austen, two best friends who grew up together on the South Side of Chicago in the 1980s. Today a Harvard professor and an award-winning journalist, Khalil and Ben still go to each other to talk about their experiences with the absurdities and intricacies of race in America. In Some of My Best Friends Are... with Khalil Gibran Muhammad and Ben Austen, they invite listeners into their unfiltered conversations about growing up together in a deeply-divided country, and navigating that divide as it exists today.”

“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.

A.O. Scott, co-chief film critic of the New York Times, helps us review the year in culture. What can we learn about our struggling effort to live together from this year’s art? Then, a conversation with WQXR’s Terrance McKnight about the life and legacy of famed contralto, Marian Anderson.

The List

Here’s a crowd-sourced list of 2021’s defining art gathered from listeners and our guest. If you have a suggestion tweet us at #USofAnxiety.

Film

InsidePassingThe Closer

Television

Squid Game

Music

Marian Anderson--Beyond the Music (This is what we discussed in the last part of the episode)

Art

The Shape of Things by Carrie Mae Weems

Cultural Trends

Non-Fungible Tokens

Companion Listening:

Actor Daniel Kaluuya’s Road to Revolutionary (3/4/2021)

Kai talks to the “Judas and the Black Messiah” star about his award-winning portrayal of Fred Hampton and the legacy of the Black Panther Party.

“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.

Another year of The Supreme Court of the United States is coming to a close. But can we still trust our nine appointed justices to be the final arbiters of the law?. Co-hosts of the Boom! Lawyered podcast, Jessica Mason Pieklo and Imani Gandy, join Kai Wright to answer those questions and more from our listeners about Dobbs v. Jackson and the impact of abortion rights on the U.S. Plus, results from our audience experiment to see how platforms on the Internet shape the content we consume.

 Companion Listening:

Dissent, Dissent, Dissent (9/20/2020)

In this special episode, we reflect on the life and legacy of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, following her passing. Kai is joined by Emily Bazelon (Staff Writer at The New York Times Magazine and Co-Host of “Political Gabfest” at Slate), WNYC’s own Brian Lehrer and callers like you to talk about the impact of the “Notorious RBG” on the nation and its citizens.

“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.

Anti-racist work snuck into the mainstream last year. But ever since, it’s received a huge backlash. Why, and what did right-wing media have to gain? This week, Kai revisits two conversations: First, with Dr. Ibram X. Kendi, author of five best-selling books including How to Be an Antiracist, about what anti-racism really means. Then, Dr. Nicole Hemmer, author of Messengers of the Right: Conservative Media and the Transformation of American Politics, explains how right wing media serves -- and surrounds -- its audience.

Companion listening for this episode:

The ‘Beautiful Experiments’ Left Out of Black History (02/08/2021)

Cultural historian 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.

History shows that our country’s actually been divided from the start. If secession is in our DNA, what’s keeping us together? Should we just break up already? Kai talks with author Richard Kreitner about his book, “Break It Up: Secession, Division, and the Secret History of America’s Imperfect Union.” Plus, a look at how the Internet and the “Filter Bubble” contribute to our isolation today. Stick around for an exercise you can do when the divide gets real at the Thanksgiving table.

Companion listening for this episode:

Can America Be Redeemed? (07/05/2021)

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.

Who’s breaking them, and why? Coming off of COP26, we talk to journalists Elizabeth Kolbert and David Wallace-Wells about the real cost of the climate crisis and who is paying the price. Learn about climate reparations, hear answers to listener questions, and discover what’s left for us to try to move forward as a global society.

Plus, revisit the history of the 1992 Earth Summit that we discuss in the episode: https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/anxiety/episodes/united-states-of-anxiety-season-2-podcast-epiode-2 

Companion listening for this episode:

Nothing You Do Alone Will Save the Climate (9/20/2021)

New science finds we’ve got less than a decade to avoid catastrophe. Activist and author Bill McKibben says the only solutions that can beat that deadline are collective.

“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.

Broadcast journalist Ray Suarez was 59 when he lost a dream job that took decades to reach. What he did next reveals a harsh reality of class blindness and the consequences of job insecurity in the U.S. His experience inspired a new podcast that “gives voice to people who have lost jobs, lost their homes, and sometimes lost the narrative thread of their lives.” He joins host Kai Wright to preview his story and helps take calls from our listeners. 

Listen to Going for Broke With Ray Suarez, a new podcast by the Economic Hardship Reporting Project and The Nation.

Companion listening for this episode:

Maybe We Just Want Less ‘Work’ (9/7/2021)

The “Great Resignation” appears to be a real thing. But why? We ask workers what they really want. Plus, 45 questions to help us understand each other, and ourselves.

“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 Halloween, we reveal the holiday’s often untold history and why connecting to the dead is important to so many people, from Ireland, to Mexico, to NYC. What about this time of year lowers the veil between the living and the dead, and what does this universal desire to connect with those who’ve passed teach us about ourselves? Plus, make sure to listen to the end for a conversation with award-winning psychic medium Betsy LeFae, host of the podcast Trust Yourself. She leads Kai through a guided meditation that can help you connect, too.

Companion listening for this episode:

Collective Loss, Collective Care (3/15/2021)

More than half a million Americans - our family, friends, neighbors, loved ones - have lost their lives to the virus over the past year and our collective grief continues to compound. But communities have come together in remarkable ways to take care of each other.

“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.

In just two weeks, New Yorkers could elect Eric Adams, making him the city’s second-ever Black mayor. What does his rise through civil service tell us about the ways race and power have evolved in the nation’s largest city? Hear from Errol Louis, one of New York's longest-serving political journalists, about how Adams's story is part of a much broader history of Black politics -- a story that began in a Brooklyn church, some 50 years ago.

Companion listening for this episode:

'Community' Is a Verb. And It’s Hard (6/12/2020)

To a lot of people, Eric Adams offers a sense of safety after a spike of violence in their communities. Revisit an episode about how people all over the country found ways to “do the work” in their communities in the midst of the Black Lives Matter movement. But as they did, they faced challenges that went beyond Covid-19 and police violence. Two stories, from Chicago and New York City.

“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.