The Documentary Podcast

The BBC’s Katy Watson travels to Los Angeles and asks why feminism is still regarded by many as a word to avoid. Despite an ongoing gender pay gap, and a lack of female business-leaders, why does the word continue to raise an eyebrow?

Divya Arya meets the women from rural parts of India who are bucking the trend and working in jobs traditionally done by men. She meets the 'Solar Mamas' learning solar engineering, a widowed railway porter taking on the tough job her husband used to do, the women in rural Karnataka finding a voice in local radio, and those learning the male-dominated trades of boat building, masonry, carpentry and farm management.

Cuba's iconic leader has died - we look back over his life

The bizarre tale of Kirsan Ilyumzhinov - master or pawn in the great game of chess?

From a Bolero concert to a cancer ward, and from the apartment of a guy who helps Cubans get foreign visas to an Afro-Cuban Santeria ceremony, reporter Deepa Fernandes finds out how ordinary Cuban women have lived, loved and invented their way through dwindling resources and political isolation.

Unemployment rates in India have shot up in recent years, and around twice as many women are out of work compared with their male counterparts. Divya Arya travels across India meeting some of the women who are challenging gender stereotypes and breaking down social taboos in order to find work in areas traditionally the preserve of men.

Public employee one day, enemy of the state the next. The post coup reality in Turkey.

Country music is commonly associated with downtrodden, lovelorn, white inhabitants of America’s rural south, but it has also long been a significant form of expression for Australia’s Aboriginal peoples. Country music became popular 'down under' during the first half of the 20th Century. Thanks to gramophone recordings, wind-up radios and touring bands, it even reached the bush where most Aboriginals lived, often more or less imprisoned on missions and government-controlled reserves. At a time when their own cultural heritage was being systematically erased, country music became a medium through which they could maintain their practice of sharing stories via the oral tradition. Its resonance was enhanced by melodies which tended towards the melancholic. As one musician put it “country music was all about loss, and we’d lost everything”. Through country music, Aboriginal people were able to give voice to their personal experiences and ongoing struggles for justice. Songs describe, for example, how babies and land were stolen, incidents of racism, poor living conditions, and high levels of incarceration. Country music, far from its origins, has thus become a deeply moving and powerful Aboriginal activism art form. With contributions from Auriel Andrew, Kev Carmody, Roger Knox, Sue Ray, Glenn Skuthorpe and Clinton Walker.

After one of the most extraordinary and unpredictable US Presidential election campaigns, Americans have voted for their next President, choosing Donald Trump to take his place in the White House.

Before the first Presidential debate, polls indicated that the candidates were neck and neck. Then the momentum of the campaign changed, with Donald Trump rocked by the leaked tape of his lewd comments and repudiation by some Republicans. Following an astonishing second debate, Trump fought to keep his campaign on the road, returning to the tactics which had originally secured his nomination, firing up his core support with anti-Washington rhetoric and increasingly bitter attacks on Hillary Clinton. For Hillary Clinton lingering doubts remained in voters’ minds about her trustworthiness, clouding her bid to become the first woman president.

With the result still resonating, Katty Kay takes a post-election view from the perspective of the winning side. She hears why Trump supporters in the key swing state of Pennsylvania were so motivated to vote for Trump and explores the key moments and turning points from the campaigns.

In Mississippi in 2008, Chloe Hadjimatheou met a 15-year-old black boy with dreams of being a policeman. Eight years later, Chloe goes in search of him to find what became of him. Did he prosper in Obama's America?