With Good Reason

A lot of the day’s popular shows like Lovecraft Country and Watchmen have their roots in Black newspapers. Brooks Hefner says these stories imagined futuristic solutions to issues of Jim Crow and racism. And: Literature influences a lot of how we interpret history. Jonathan Crimmons says the short lived genre of comedic theater, harlequins, opens the door for new historical interpretations.

Later on the show: When Northam’s yearbook photos went public, Stephen Poulson and his students began looking through digital archives of Virginia yearbooks. What they found shocked him. Plus: For centuries, William & Mary has held a copy of Isaac Newton’s Philosphiae -- his document expanding on his theories of space and time. And they couldn’t figure out who wrote the Latin notes. Caitlin Dolt is an undergraduate student. She found out who wrote the notes within a week. Now, she’s looking to uncover why.

The first federally registered Black neighborhood in the United States was Jackson Ward, a once-booming economic and residential district in Richmond, Virginia. Through the Skipwith-Roper Homecoming initiative, Sisters Sesha Moon and Enjoli Moon are working to reconstruct the gambrel roof cottage of Richmond’s first known Black homeowner, Abraham Skipwith. And: Kelli Lemon is Virginia’s biggest cheerleader. She says that Richmond, Virginia will soon become the top destination for Americans to learn about Black American history.

Later in the show: How an image of two unknown women brought arts critic Jessica Lynne back home to Virginia.

Last year, officials and public health leaders across the United States were also talking about a public health emergency besides Covid-19: racism. Jamela Martin says that racism’s direct impact on health is well-documented. What we know less about is how to fix it. And: Cancer is caused by a combination of factors, including genetics, lifestyle, and environmental causes. Li Li studies colon cancer and he’s trying to understand the particular combination of factors that causes African Americans to get and die of colon cancer at much higher rates than white Americans.

Later in the show: Racial health disparities are, of course, much more complicated than Black and white. Elyas Bahktiari says that Middle Easterners and North Africans are considered white on the American census, but they have worse health outcomes than other white populations. Plus: People living with HIV have extra healthcare needs, but they’re often some of the least able to get those needs met. Leah Adams studies the extra difficulties people with HIV face getting care in the justice system and getting care for chronic pain. Adams was named Outstanding Faculty by the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia.

When Colin Rafferty moved to Virginia in 2008 he didn’t know much about the presidents, so he set out to read a biography of each one. What began as a personal project eventually turned into his new publication - a collection of experimental, genre-bending essays on every U.S. president. Also: In 2016, Eric Drummond Smith guest-curated an art exhibit called The Cherry Bounce Show at the William King Museum in Abingdon, VA. He called on artists from all over Appalachia to create modern artwork, with one small stipulation… every piece had to be inspired by a presidential election.

Later in the show: In grade school, many of us learned how the founding fathers carefully defined the office of the presidency. But Nathaniel Green argues that the presidency was shaped by ordinary people, not the political elite. Plus: Loaded with humor and biting satire, political cartoons have a long history of holding people in power to account. What makes political cartoons so effective? Fran Hassencahl says the answer lies in the magic of visual metaphors.

In 1979, members of the KKK shot and killed five labor and civil rights activists in Greensboro, North Carolina. Aran Shetterly, who is writing a book about the incident, says it still reverberates in the racial politics of Greensboro today. Also: The European philosophers of the Enlightenment argued that Europeans were civilized, but Africans were barbarians. Stefan Wheelock describes how radical African American writers used those same philosophical principles to unmask the barbarism of slavery.

Later on the show: One of the darkest pages of American history is the racial terror inflicted on thousands of African Americans through lynching. Gianluca De Fazio and his students have developed a website Racial Terror: Lynching in Virginia, 1877-1927 that focuses on telling the stories of all the 104 known lynching victims who were killed in Virginia between 1877 and 1927, nearly all of them African American men. Plus: Renee Hill coordinated a memorial service to pay tribute to the lives of the thousands of people who suffered lynching in the United States.

Little kids absorb everything around them–from the words we say, to the way we move and dress. Psychologist Chelsea Williams says that long before we realize it, little kids are also absorbing attitudes about race and ethnicity. She studies how parents can help young Latinx kids be proud of their identity. And: The 1980 Marial Boatlift brought 125,000 mostly Black Cuban immigrants into Florida. Monika Gosin says messaging around these arrivals in Miami reveals a lot about the racial tensions that already existed between African Americans and the existing, mostly white, Cuban enclave. Her book shares the memories of Black Cubans who struggled to find their places within African-American and Latinx communities in Florida.

Later in the show: Record numbers of Latino students are enrolled in college, but there’s still a huge achievement gap between Latino and non-Latino Americans. Juan Espinoza and Karina Kline-Gabel are working through The Virginia Latino Higher Education Network to get more Latino students to–and through–college.

As technology advances, society becomes more vulnerable to cybersecurity threats. Bug bounty hunters to the rescue! Bug hunters are ethical hackers who help companies fix vulnerabilities in their systems before the bad guys find them. But Daniel Graham says some ethical hackers face a moral dilemma: should they fix the vulnerability for a modest sum or sell it on the black market for much more? And: Hypothetical scenario: You just suffered a traumatic brain injury. You’re unconscious and doctors say you’ve fallen into a vegetative state. What would you want your family to do? Andrew Peterson says we’re more likely to want to be taken off life support, because of something he calls prognostic pessimism.

Later in the show: Duncan Richter says taking an ethics course is not necessarily transformative, but it will teach how to think through all sides of an issue and determine what resonates with you. Plus: If you swipe a stranger’s car and nobody sees, what do you do? Do you leave a note? Do you track the owner down? Bill Hawk and Erica Lewis study coping strategies for deciding what to do when faced with an ethical dilemma.

Back in the 1950s, the Soviets were eager to follow their Sputnik success with an even bigger milestone: they would send something living to outer space. Amy Nelson says that the pups were easy to rebrand as space pioneers. And: Scientists have reason to believe that Mars has a lot in common with Earth. Joel Levine says the search for life outside of Earth is the driving force of space exploration.

Later in the show: Increasingly, tech that was for extraterrestrials is making its way into the hands of everyday people. David Bowles says this is a good thing, and it's only up from here. Plus: Scientists and engineers aren’t the only ones who belong in outer space. Sterling Hundley says that artists help us get to clearer answers sooner.

The 1970s saw a renaissance of Black women writers like Alice Walker and Gloria Naylor who told stories of Black women’s pain and healing. Tamika Carey says that just a few decades later, these stories trickled up to a whole Black women’s wellness industry, driven by figures like Oprah Winfrey, Iyanla Vanzant, and even Tyler Perry. And: In the wellness world, “natural” reigns supreme. So much so that according to Alan Levinovitz, it’s become a religion. His new book explores how too much faith in nature can be misleading and even harmful.

Later in the show: When we’re making New Year’s resolutions, many of us look to add to our lives to make them better: eat more vegetables, sleep more, start running. Leidy Klotz argues that instead of always trying to make change through additions, we should consider more subtractions. Plus: We are living through what’s been dubbed “the great resignation.” People are leaving their jobs in droves and we can’t quite figure out why. Richard Bargdill thinks that boredom might have something to do with it. Bargdill studies habitual boredom and how people can break out of the boredom cycle to lead a better life.

When Jennifer Malia started researching her young daughter’s behaviors, she realized that both she and her daughter were on the autism spectrum. Malia has a children’s book coming out next year, called: Too Sticky! Sensory Issues with Autism. Also: Leslie Daniel celebrates autism and shares some basic strategies for communicating with children on the autism spectrum. And: Children’s museums can be tricky for kids with autism. Through personal experience and extensive research, Jackie Spainhour has come up with some ways to make children’s museums fun for all.

Later in the show: It’s New Year’s resolution time. In 2022 we will all exercise more, lay off Netflix, and eat better … right? If you’re tired of thinking about your own health, maybe it’s time to turn to the kids. Amy Best says that part of getting young people to make the right food choices means understanding what they like about bad food. Plus: If you ever got a concussion as a kid, doctors might have recommended cocooning: staying in a dark room, no reading, no TV, don’t use your brain. Bob O’Connor has new guidelines that suggest young people should return to normal activity as soon as possible.