The Modern West

By Wyoming Public MediaSociety & Culture Documentary

The Modern West episodes

November 01, 2023 The Burn Scar Trailer
The Marshall Fire was the most expensive fire in Colorado history. The Burn Scar is a tender yet carefully investigated podcast of one family, one fire and the hard choices people are making in the wake of increasing natural disasters. Hear the trailer now.
4 min
October 18, 2023 Bison Stories: A Conversation With Ken Burns - Part 4
Filmmaker Ken Burns just released a new series called American Buffalo and The Modern West sat down to talk to him about it. He says it’s a very new direction for him. “This is a project we’ve been thinking about for more than 30 years – a biography of an animal.”
28 min
October 11, 2023 Bison Stories: Bringing Home the Buffalo - Part 3
We’re re-sharing all of our bison episodes in preparation for the release of the new Ken Burns film, The American Buffalo! In Part III, we journey to the Fort Peck Reservation in Montana to learn why tribes there are rescuing wild Yellowstone bison… and we experience a bison release ceremony.
50 min
October 04, 2023 Bison Stories: Bringing Home the Buffalo - Part 2
Did you know documentarian Ken Burns is coming out with a film on the American buffalo? I’m going to share my interview with him in a few weeks. Meanwhile, we’re re-releasing all of our bison episodes! In Part II: why American settlers chose to wipe out the bison and replace them with cattle.
40 min
September 27, 2023 Bison Stories: Bringing Home the Buffalo - Part 1
Bringing Home the Buffalo…part one of our mini series Bison Stories. Find it under podcasts at wyomingpublicmedia.org.
30 min
August 30, 2023 Bonus: On Land Podcast from Western Landowners Alliance
You might remember this daunting statistic from our season on ranching: the American West is facing its biggest drought in 1200 years. This special episode from the On Land podcast is all about solutions to that water crisis. Geologist Caroline Nash joins for a conversation about building resilience in times of uncertainty, how restoring beavers to our Western landscapes could help with watershed restoration, and the ways landowners across the West are experimenting with innovative land management practices.
46 min
August 02, 2023 Bonus Episode 3: A Conversation with Lakota Historian Jeff Means
As you might have noticed from previous episodes, Jeff is a committed skeptic. But still, I decide to start by asking Jeff, does he believe healing this history is even possible?
21 min
July 19, 2023 Existence As Protest: Mending the Hoop Part 8
I wanted to be part of contributing to identify healing interventions for our community. And also sharing with people that knowledge, like, it's not all your fault.
56 min
June 28, 2023 Land Back: Mending the Hoop Part 7
It’s popular these days to read a land acknowledgement at public events, but Indigenous leaders and thinkers say that should only be the beginning — “a commitment that should be followed by action.” Like, returning the land itself.
54 min
June 15, 2023 Bonus Episode 2: A Conversation with Lakota Historian Jeff Means
Jeff and I pick up the conversation today where our last one left off. As the 19th century came to a close, the United States may have stopped direct battle with the Plains nations… but the war was far from over. As Native communities were forced onto reservations, the U.S. now used new techniques to attempt cultural genocide … alienating children from their communities at boarding schools and exterminating the bison. Throughout the conversation, Jeff points out the ways Indigenous communities continue to demonstrate a pride in their identities that the U.S. government tried to erase.
26 min

About The Modern West

From the publisher's feed

Exploring the evolving identity of the American West. Produced by Wyoming Public Media and PRX, The Modern West takes you on a sound-rich journey into some of America's most iconic landscapes.…