The Lit Review Podcast

By The Lit Review Podcast

What's The Lit Review Podcast about?

Conversations with community organizers, activists, and cultural workers on the books that have shaped their theories of change. Think Spark notes in podcast form! thelitreview.org

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The Lit Review Podcast episodes:

05.16.2022
Episode 64: Evicted with Maya Dukmasova
“We can’t have a conversation about affordable housing without having a conversation about landlord profit.” If you were mad about landlords before, just wait until you listen to this conversation. The mainstream narrative on affordable housing has revolved largely around...
05.02.2022
Episode 63: The Question with Bernardine Dohrn
The Question by Henri Alleg is a short book with a lifelong impact on today’s special guest. The legendary radical activist and movement lawyer, Bernardine Dohrn, first read this anti-war, anti-colonial, anti-racist pamphlet from 1958 as a student in high...
04.25.2022
Episode 62: Care Work with Heena Sharma
There are no shortcuts to disability justice. Access is a process, not a list that can be checked off in organizing work. Part-manifesto, part guide, part-memoir, and so many more parts, Care Work: Dreaming Disability Justice by Leah Laksmi Piepzna-Samarasinha...
04.18.2022
Episode 61: Zami with K Agbebiyi
Audre Lorde is revered for her poetry and writings, rightfully so! Her works are fundamental to the development of Black Feminism. But what did she have to say about her own life? What were the themes and lessons she learned...
04.11.2022
Episode 60: Capital with Angela Davis
An epic book and an epic guest: Welcome to episode 60! Since the start of this podcast, the Lit Review has always wanted to feature Marx’s Capital with someone who could really help organizers dig into it. Published in 1867,...
03.27.2022
Episode 59: Kindling with Shira Hassan
The healing justice movement is an intersectional and organized resistance to the state and state violence, but why is it so often misunderstood as simply an opposition to grind culture? In this episode, we discuss ableism, disability, healing justice, and...
03.20.2022
Episode 58: Ain't I A Woman with Stacy Davis Gates
bell hooks left us in this world with a literal STACK of wisdom and analysis about love, life, and feminism. Her work has transformed the thinking of many people we know in our organizing community. We couldn’t think of a...
02.28.2021
Episode 57: The In-between Episode!
It’s a wrap for Season 3! In 8 episodes, we went deep on topics including colonization and land justice, civil rights history, and movement and organizing fundamentals. And in the midst of the pandemic, uprising, and elections, we did...
12.21.2020
Episode 56: From the Ground Up with Juliana Pino
To close out the season, Monica and Page talk with Juliana Pino Alcaraz, Policy Director at the Little Village Environmental Justice Organization, about From the Ground Up: Environmental Racism and the Rise of the Environmental Justice Movement by Luke Cole...
12.14.2020
Episode 55: Groundwork with Christian Snow
Despite some truly 2020-style audio recording issues, our second to last episode of the season is here! Groundwork: Local Black Freedom Movements in America, edited by Jeanne Theoharis, Komozi Woodard, and Charles Payne, unearths the buried stories of the people,...
12.01.2020
Episode 54: Freedom Farmers with Vivi Moreno
Fannie Lou Hamer is increasingly recognized for her leadership with the Mississippi Democratic Freedom Party, but did you know about the 600-acre Freedom Farm Cooperative she started? This is one of many examples of Black farmers organizing for power and...
11.24.2020
Episode 53: Borderlands with Trina Reynolds-Tyler
This was a hard book to talk about, but we’re so glad that we did. The late Gloria Anzaldúa’s book Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza is beloved to many and considered a fundamental text in Chicana and Latinx studies. With...
11.16.2020
Episode 52: Discourse on Colonialism with Asha Ransby-Sporn
Originally published in 1950, Discourse on Colonialism by Aimé Césaire directly and dramatically influenced the liberation struggles happening in Africa, Latin America, and the Caribbean. A blazing collection of thoughts that affirms Black identity and culture, embraces surrealism as revolt,...
11.09.2020
Episode 51: Rules for Radicals with Maira Khwaja
Have you ever heard of the term “Alinsky-style organizing” and the rules that are involved? For example, “A tactic that drags on too long is a drag” and “Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.” Here in...
11.02.2020
Episode 50: Blood, Marriage, Wine and Glitter with Stephanie Skora
Ready to learn and get in your feelings? In this episode, Monica and Page connect with Stephanie Skora, Associate Executive Director of Brave Space Alliance and author of the Girl, I Guess Voter Guide. Stephanie shares her love and learnings from...
10.26.2020
Episode 49: Hammer & Hoe with Bettina Johnson
There’s importance in collaboration and experimentation when it comes to organizing. But what does that work look like in a community you’re not from? Monica and Page chat with Bettina Johnson, co-founder of Liberation Library and member of Chicago Afrosocialists &...
02.19.2019
Episode 48: The Revolution Will Not Be Funded with Joy Messinger
INCITE! Women of Color Against Violence hands us a sharp critique of the toxic role that the non-profit industrial complex can play in managing our movements in The Revolution Will Not Be Funded, published in 2007. Monica and Page talk...
02.04.2019
Episode 47: Green is the New Red with Brad Thomson
In the U.S., it’s becoming increasingly trendier to “go green” and become more environmentally-conscious in our daily lives under capitalism. However, there’s a whole other movement of eco-consciousness and activism that is being heavily criminalized and repressed. In his debut...
01.14.2019
Episode 46: Fascism Today with Kelly Hayes
What does fascism look like today in the U.S.? Where does the alt-right fit into this? How can it be fought?! Monica and Page sat down with Chicago-based Native abolitionist organizer, co-founder of Lifted Voice, podcast host of Movement Memos, and...
12.31.2018
Episode 45: Making the Second Ghetto with Lynda Lopez
Making the Second Ghetto: Race and Housing in Chicago 1940-1960 by Arnold Hirsch is considered a premier text on the subjects of housing and displacement. However, at about 382 dense & jargon-filled pages, it can be a bit intimidating. Here...
12.17.2018
Episode 44: The Battle of Lincoln Park with Daniel Kay Hertz
A hyper-local conversation: Who knew that the Chicago neighborhood 'Old Town' was actually part of Lincoln Park? Who knew it was a site of transformation, displacement, resistance, gentrification, AND urban renewal? Monica and Page sat down with author and policy analyst...
07.04.2018
Episode 43: The New Jim Crow with Patrice Daniels
Monica has a phone conversation with dear friend, poet and incarcerated activist, Patrice Lumumba Daniels, currently serving life without parole in IDOC for a crime he committed at 18 years old. Patrice and Monica talk about one of his favorite...
03.12.2018
Episode 42: Black Reconstruction In America with Frank Chapman
Monica and Page revisit Black Reconstruction in America by W.E.B. Du Bois, this time with community organizer, Executive Director of the National Alliance Against Racism and Political Repression, and former political prisoner, Frank Chapman. Tune in to hear Frank’s take...
02.05.2018
Episode 41: Occupied Territory LIVE with Simon Balto and Toussaint Losier
In this episode, Monica and Page bring you the Lit Review LIVE from Hairpin Arts Center, the site of For the People Artists Collective’s first city-wide exhibition, Do Not Resist? 100 Years of Chicago Police Violence. Monica and Page chatted with...
01.29.2018
Episode 40: Rethinking the American Prison Movement with Toussaint Losier & Dan Berger
Monica and Page sat down with Dan Berger via Skype and Toussaint Losier in Chicago to chat about their latest book, Rethinking the American Prison Movement, which provides a short and accessible overview of the transformational and ongoing struggles against...
01.22.2018
Episode 39: Kuwasi Balagoon - A Soldier's Story with Jason Lydon
So often we hear anarchy equated with chaos and collapse: a complete breakdown of society. This hour, we're rejecting that. We sat down with Jason Lydon to help us understand what anarchy is and isn't. We define terms, talk through...
12.18.2017
Episode 38: Season 1 Finale
In the final episode of the first season, Monica and Page reflect on a year of the Lit Review podcast! They share some of their favorite episode excerpts from conversations in Season 1 with Joey Mogul, Andrea Ritchie, Bill Ayers,...
12.11.2017
Episode 37: This Nonviolent Stuff'll Get You Killed with Mia Henry
When we are taught about the civil rights movement, the narratives of communities trained up in armed self-defense and grandmas with guns sitting on their porch are definitely left out. In Charles E. Cobbs Jr.’s book, This Nonviolent Stuff’ll Get...
12.04.2017
Episode 36: Octavia's Brood with Tanuja Jagernauth
In Octavia's Brood: Science Fiction Stories from Social Justice Movements, co-edited by adrienne maree brown and Walidah Imarisha, we are gifted twenty short stories exploring the connections between radical speculative fiction and movements for social change. For this episode, Monica and...
11.27.2017
Episode 35: Resistance Behind Bars with Victoria Law
Did you know that the first mass clemency won in 1990 for 25 domestic violence survivors incarcerated for self-defense happened because of incarcerated women organizing themselves on the inside? Or did you know that in the 1970's, a California women's...
11.20.2017
Episode 34: Pedagogy of the Oppressed with Hilda Franco
There is a role for people who know things that others don’t, but how has our relationship with education and the teacher-student dynamic been shaped by colonialism, capitalism, and patriarchy? In 1968, Brazilian educator Paulo Freire wrote Pedagogy of the...
11.13.2017
Episode 33: Transgender History (2nd Edition) with Susan Stryker
With the 2nd edition of Transgender History by Susan Stryker just released, it was a good time to revisit the book, see what’s changed, and touch on parts that didn’t get covered in an earlier conversation on this book in...
11.06.2017
Episode 32: the Earthseed Series LIVE with adrienne maree brown
Do you have your “go bag” ready? Are you ready to lose everything and everyone in order to get free? Aren’t these intense questions?? These are just some of the themes that are explored in Parable of the Sower and...
10.30.2017
Episode 31: Assata with Imani Council & Pat Frazier
A former member of the Black Panther Party and political prisoner, Assata Shakur's intensely personal and political autobiography continues to be a landmark text in many young Black peoples' politicization. For this episode, Page interviews two young Black women about the...
10.23.2017
Episode 30: The Sympathizer (A Novel) with Van Huynh
For this episode, Page turns to fiction as a way to more fully understand the stories and truths of immigration, war, and identity. Page sat down with Van Huynh, an immigration attorney & community organizer in Chicago to discuss Viet Thanh...
10.10.2017
Episode 29: From Deportation to Prison with Arianna Salgado
From Deportation to Prison: The Politics of Immigration Enforcement in Post-Civil Rights America by Patrisia Macías-Rojas unpacks how the incarceration of over two million people in the United States gave impetus to a federal immigration initiative—The Criminal Alien Program (CAP)—designed...
10.02.2017
Episode 28: Demand the Impossible with Bill Ayers
A manifesto for movement-makers in extraordinary times, Demand the Impossible! urges us to imagine a world beyond what this rotten system would have us believe is possible. Monica and Page sat down with insurgent educator and activist Bill Ayers to talk...
09.25.2017
Episode 27: The Warmth of Other Suns with Walter May
From 1915 to 1970, this exodus of almost six million people changed the face of America. In this epic, beautifully written masterwork, Pulitzer Prize–winning author Isabel Wilkerson chronicles one of the great untold stories of American history: the decades-long migration...
09.18.2017
Episode 26: Exile & Pride with Alison Kopit
First published in 1999, Exile and Pride: Disability, Queerness, and Liberation by Eli Clare is a groundbreaking book in the political realm of disability politics, and essential reading for anyone wanting to understand the intersections of queerness, disability, environmentalism, class,...
09.11.2017
Episode 25: Steel Barrio with Corina Pedraza
When we think of Mexican communities, we think of Pilsen, Little Village, and in recent years, Albany Park. But who talks about the neighborhood of South Chicago? Monica and Page chat with powerful Mijente member, immigrants rights activist, baseball mom,...
08.28.2017
Episode 24: Medical Apartheid with Martine Caverl
In this episode, Page talks with UMedics organizer and co-founder Martine Caverl, who breaks down the essential Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present by Harriet Washington. The book brings...
08.21.2017
Episode 23: The Life & Struggles of Stokely Carmichael with Kofi Ademola
Most of us know Stokely Carmichael as the charismatic leader in the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) during the 1960's and as the person who coined the term "Black Power," but what else was behind the life of Stokely Carmichael,...
08.14.2017
Episode 22: Black-on-Black Violence with Jasmine Adams
In his book, Black-On-Black Violence, Amos Wilson argues that "the criminalization of the Black American male is a psycho-politically engineered process designed to maintain the dependency and relative powerlessness" of Black people. Originally published in 1994, the book is still...
08.07.2017
Episode 21: Invisible No More with Andrea Ritchie
Page and Monica sit with their dear friend, researcher, writer, advocate, activist, and organizer, Andrea Ritchie, to talk about her brand new book, Invisible No More: Police Violence Against Black Women and Women of Color. Placing stories of individual women—such as...
07.31.2017
Episode 20 - Part 5: Connecting the Dots from Civil Rights To Ecofeminism
In this very special five-part episode, Page sat down with SNCC freedom fighter and Chicago-native, Fannie Rushing, for an extended conversation about her organizing experiences, and the seven books that have helped to define them. Not wanting to cut a...
07.31.2017
Episode 20 - Part 4: Fannie Answers: What is Organizing?
In this very special five-part episode, Page sat down with SNCC freedom fighter and Chicago-native, Fannie Rushing, for an extended conversation about her organizing experiences, and the seven books that have helped to define them. Not wanting to cut a...
07.31.2017
Episode 20 - Part 3: Fannie Rushing on Fannie Lou Hamer
In this very special five-part episode, Page sat down with SNCC freedom fighter and Chicago-native, Fannie Rushing, for an extended conversation about her organizing experiences, and the seven books that have helped to define them. Not wanting to cut a...
07.31.2017
Episode 20 - Part 2: Fannie talks Capitalism, Racism, Colonialism, and Haiti
In this very special five-part episode, Page sat down with SNCC freedom fighter and Chicago-native, Fannie Rushing, for an extended conversation about her organizing experiences, and the seven books that have helped to define them. Not wanting to cut a...
07.31.2017
Episode 20 - Part 1: Fannie discusses her friend and mentor, Ella Baker
In this very special five-part episode, Page sat down with SNCC freedom fighter and Chicago-native, Fannie Rushing, for an extended conversation about her organizing experiences, and the seven books that have helped to define them. Not wanting to cut a...
07.24.2017
Episode 19: The Boundaries of Blackness with Cathy Cohen
Why, when faced with a disease that was threatening significant numbers of Black people, did Black leaders and dominant institutions fail to take action? In her book, The Boundaries of Blackness: AIDS and the Breakdown of Black Politics, Cathy Cohen...

What's The Lit Review Podcast about?

Download our free app to listen on your phone

The Lit Review Podcast episodes:

Episode 64: Evicted with Maya Dukmasova

Episode 63: The Question with Bernardine Dohrn

Episode 62: Care Work with Heena Sharma

Episode 61: Zami with K Agbebiyi

Episode 60: Capital with Angela Davis

Episode 59: Kindling with Shira Hassan

Episode 58: Ain't I A Woman with Stacy Davis Gates

Episode 57: The In-between Episode!

Episode 56: From the Ground Up with Juliana Pino

Episode 55: Groundwork with Christian Snow

Episode 54: Freedom Farmers with Vivi Moreno

Episode 53: Borderlands with Trina Reynolds-Tyler

Episode 52: Discourse on Colonialism with Asha Ransby-Sporn

Episode 51: Rules for Radicals with Maira Khwaja

Episode 50: Blood, Marriage, Wine and Glitter with Stephanie Skora

Episode 49: Hammer & Hoe with Bettina Johnson

Episode 48: The Revolution Will Not Be Funded with Joy Messinger

Episode 47: Green is the New Red with Brad Thomson

Episode 46: Fascism Today with Kelly Hayes

Episode 45: Making the Second Ghetto with Lynda Lopez

Episode 44: The Battle of Lincoln Park with Daniel Kay Hertz

Episode 43: The New Jim Crow with Patrice Daniels

Episode 42: Black Reconstruction In America with Frank Chapman

Episode 41: Occupied Territory LIVE with Simon Balto and Toussaint Losier

Episode 40: Rethinking the American Prison Movement with Toussaint Losier & Dan Berger

Episode 39: Kuwasi Balagoon - A Soldier's Story with Jason Lydon

Episode 38: Season 1 Finale

Episode 37: This Nonviolent Stuff'll Get You Killed with Mia Henry

Episode 36: Octavia's Brood with Tanuja Jagernauth

Episode 35: Resistance Behind Bars with Victoria Law

Episode 34: Pedagogy of the Oppressed with Hilda Franco

Episode 33: Transgender History (2nd Edition) with Susan Stryker

Episode 32: the Earthseed Series LIVE with adrienne maree brown

Episode 31: Assata with Imani Council & Pat Frazier

Episode 30: The Sympathizer (A Novel) with Van Huynh

Episode 29: From Deportation to Prison with Arianna Salgado

Episode 28: Demand the Impossible with Bill Ayers

Episode 27: The Warmth of Other Suns with Walter May

Episode 26: Exile & Pride with Alison Kopit

Episode 25: Steel Barrio with Corina Pedraza

Episode 24: Medical Apartheid with Martine Caverl

Episode 23: The Life & Struggles of Stokely Carmichael with Kofi Ademola

Episode 22: Black-on-Black Violence with Jasmine Adams

Episode 21: Invisible No More with Andrea Ritchie

Episode 20 - Part 5: Connecting the Dots from Civil Rights To Ecofeminism

Episode 20 - Part 4: Fannie Answers: What is Organizing?

Episode 20 - Part 3: Fannie Rushing on Fannie Lou Hamer

Episode 20 - Part 2: Fannie talks Capitalism, Racism, Colonialism, and Haiti

Episode 20 - Part 1: Fannie discusses her friend and mentor, Ella Baker

Episode 19: The Boundaries of Blackness with Cathy Cohen