Think from KERA

Every year, child refugees are resettled in America and put into schools charged with bringing them up to speed. Helen Thorpe spent a year tracking refugees at one Denver high school, and she talks with us about the challenges these students face. Her new book is called “The Newcomers: Finding Refuge, Friendship, and Hope in an American Classroom” (Scribner).

By day, David Ignatius is a regarded columnist for the Washington Post who writes about politics and international affairs. By night, though, Ignatius has a career as a writer of a different sort. He joins us to talk about the day’s news – and about his latest novel, “The Quantum Spy” (W.W. Norton and Co.). He’ll talk more about each Wednesday night at the World Affairs Council of Dallas-Fort Worth.

A new study has revealed that Boulder, Colo., is the happiest place in the United States. Guest host Courtney Collins talks about how geography affects our well-being with Dan Buettner. His story “The Search for Happiness” appears in the November issue of National Geographic.

Many of the Americans affected most by poverty are children – too young to get jobs and not quite old enough to understand the complex circumstances that contribute to their plight. As part of KERA’s One Crisis Away series, guest host Courtney Collins talks about how poverty affects kids with Jezza Neumann. He’s the producer of the Frontline documentary “Poor Kids,” which airs Wednesday on PBS stations.

Today, everyone’s mind is on the food we’ll be eating tomorrow. And it’s not too late to add some flair to your Thanksgiving table. This hour, we will walk through the day’s menu with Lisa Fain, who writes the Homesick Texan blog; vegetarian cooking expert Mark Bittman; and Megan Wilkes, owner of Emporium Pies.

‘Gone With the Wind’ won eight Oscars and became an instant classic when it was released in 1939. The country has changed significantly, though, in the years since then. Aisha Harris joins us to talk about how we should think about the film in 2017. Her essay “How Movie Theaters, TV Networks, and Classrooms Are Changing the Way They Show ‘Gone With the Wind” appears on Slate.

Dan Rather anchored the CBS Evening News for 24 years. And he’s maintained a public profile since he left the network in 2005 with his frequent essays on current events. He joins us to give his take on the state of the nation and the world, which he writes about in “What Unites Us: Reflections on Patriotism” (Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill). He speaks tonight during DMA Arts & Letters Live.

Right now, researchers are working on everything from elevators that would take us to the moon to 3D printers that can produce organs. Zach Weinersmith joins us to talk about technology dreams that could one day become reality. He’s a co-author of “Soonish: Ten Emerging Technologies That’ll Improve and/or Ruin Everything” (Penguin).

If the 2016 election proved anything, it’s that Russian hacking poses a serious threat to democracy. Juan C. Zarate served as Deputy National Security Advisor for Combating Terrorism under President George W. Bush, and he joins us to talk about how we can protect the integrity of future elections, which he writes about in the fall issue of The Catalyst.

One of the strategies of capitalism is to make raw materials and labor as inexpensive as possible in order to maximize profits. UT-Austin professor Raj Patel joins us to talk about how crises throughout history have actually helped capitalism thrive by making things cheaper. His new book is called “A History of the World in Seven Cheap Things: A Guide to Capitalism, Nature and the Future of the Planet” (University of California Press).