Wonder Cabinet

We play them to pass the time at family functions, or to relax after a long day of work or school. But board games say so much more than we think — about our relationships, our politics, our histories. We learn the storied history of Mahjong, play a few classic games with some modern twists, and consider the mental brutality that is competitive chess.

*Original Air Date: * November 30, 2019

**Guests: **

Angelo Bautista — Eric Thurm — Brin-Jonathan Butler — Annelise Heinz — Linda Feinstein — Jeff Yang

**Interviews In This Hour: **

Picking Up The Pieces Of Mahjong — What You Learn In The 'Magic Circle' — Chess, A Perfect Game for Crushing Your Opponent’s Ego

The line between free speech and hate speech isn't always clear. When college students shout down a campus speaker, when a woman yells racial slurs in a parking lot, or when HR calls with a reprimand — when does free speech violate safe space? When does sensitivity become censorship?

This weekend’s program "Filtering Free Speech" examines the difficult subject of censorship and free expression. In our first interview, acclaimed writer Walter Mosley uses the "N-word" four times to describe a very troubling experience when he was reprimanded for using this word in a Hollywood writers’ room. Mosley, who himself is black, was so angered by the exchange that he resigned from his job.

The "N-word" is intrinsic to his story — not gratuitous — so we have chosen not to bleep the word. On the broadcast our host provides a very clear warning to alert listeners to what they will hear.

If you'd prefer to listen to a censored version, you can listen to one here.

Original Air Date: September 28, 2019

**Guests: **

Walter Mosley — Jonathan Haidt — Dorothy Kim — Alissa Quart — David Maraniss

**Interviews In This Hour: **

An Uncomfortable Conversation In The Writers' Room — Who Decides Who Should Speak On Campus? — White Supremacists Are Embracing Symbols Of The Middle Ages. What's A Medieval Scholar To Do? — So You've Been Cancelled — What Can We Learn About Today From The McCarthy Era Blacklist? — Who Decides Who Should Speak? The Past And Present Of Free Speech On College Campuses

It's easy to take seeds for granted, to assume that there will always be more corn or wheat or rice to plant. But as monocropping and agribusiness continue to dominate modern farming, are we losing genetic diversity, cultural history, and the nutritional value of our food? We speak to farmers, botanists and indigenous people about how they are reclaiming our seeds.

*Original Air Date: * September 14, 2019

**Guests: **

Bob Quinn — Robin Wall Kimmerer — Seth Jovaag — Cary Fowler

**Interviews In This Hour: **

Where Did We Go Wrong With Wheat? — The Wisdom of the Corn Mother — The Seeds Of Tomorrow: Defending Indigenous Mexican Corn That Could Be Our Future — Saving Seeds For Future Generations — Ancient Grains, Native Corn, And The Doomsday Seed Vault: How Growing Food Might Survive Disaster

We’ve all been changed by the experience of living through a pandemic. We figured out how to sanitize groceries, mute ourselves on Zoom and keep from killing our roommates. But we’re also tackling bigger, existential questions — how can we, individually and collectively, find meaning in the experience of this pandemic?

*Original Air Date: * May 23, 2020

**Guests: **

David Kessler — Tyrone Muhammad — Nikki Giovanni — John Kaag — Alice Kaplan

**Interviews In This Hour: **

Grief Is A Natural Response To The Pandemic. Here’s Why You Should Let Yourself Feel It. — 'You Smell Death': Being A Mortician In A Community Ravaged By COVID-19 — Nikki Giovanni Reads a Poem of Remembrance — Does Philosophy Still Matter In The Age Of Coronavirus? — Why Camus' 'The Stranger' Is Still a Dangerous Novel

Not everyone has a nice, big yard to stretch out in while sheltering in place from COVID-19. But maybe you don't need one. People are using virtual spaces to live out the real experiences they miss — like coffee shops, road trips, even building your own house on a deserted island, or Walden Pond. In a world where we're mostly confined to our homes and Zoom screens, does the line between virtual and real-life space mean much anymore?

Original Air Date: * *May 16, 2020

*Guests: *

Mark Riechers — Tracy Fullerton — Simon Parkin — Jane McGonigal — Donald D. Hoffman — Suzanne O’Sullivan

*Interviews In This Hour: *

There's No Pandemic In Animal Crossing — I Went To The Woods To Level Up Deliberately — The Most Boring Video Game Ever Made — Want to be Happier? Turn Everyday Tasks Into a Game — How We Fool Ourselves With The Concept of 'Reality'

Further Reading:

NYAS: Reality Is Not As It Seems

In times of crisis, we need music. We look at how far people will go — even under quarantine, during a pandemic — to find ways to make music together.

Original Air Date: * *April 25, 2020

*Guests: *

Lisa Bielawa — Varttina — Bobby McFerrin — Moken — Vijay Iyer — Brandy Clark — Nicole Paris — Edward Cage

*Interviews In This Hour: *

Putting The Mood Of COVID-19 To Music — The Haunting Finnish Acapella of Värttinä — The 50 Voices of Bobby McFerrin — A Bold and Beautiful Voice from Cameroon — Vijay Iyer on Jazz, Improvisation and the Origins of Music — Country Singer Brandy Clark on a Big Day in a Small Town — Beatboxing With My Dad

We all miss touching things — groceries, door knobs, hands, faces. And most of all, skin. The living tissue that simultaneously protects us from the world, and lets us feel it. In this episode, the politics, biology, and inner life of your skin.

Original Air Date: April 18, 2020

**Guests: **

Angelo Bautista — Tiffany Field — Alissa Waters — Nina Jablonski

**Interviews In This Hour: **

My Problem With Skincare — Even During Quarantine, You Need A 'Daily Dose Of Touch' — Reclaiming Scars As Works Of Art — The Science Of Skin Color

We all tell stories about our lives: funny stories, happy stories, sad stories. But are they true stories? In an

Original Air Date: November 10, 2018

*Guests: *

Caroline Fraser — Terese Marie Mailhot — Karl Ove Knausgård — Errol Morris

*Interviews In This Hour: *

Little Lie in the Big Woods — When It's Real, The Stakes Are Higher — 'This Novel Has Hurt Everyone Around Me': A Frank Conversation with Karl Ove Knausgaard — Errol Morris: Thomas Kuhn Threw an Ashtray at Me

Why do people turn to poetry during troubled times? We saw it after 9/11 and we're seeing it now as the coronavirus travels around the world. When the world seems broken, poetry is often the one kind of language that helps.

Original Air Date: * *April 04, 2020

*Guests: *

Kitty O'Meara — Jericho Brown — Edward Hirsch — Alice Walker — Ken Nordine — Li-Young Lee — Jimmy Santiago Baca

*Interviews In This Hour: *

A Viral Poem For A Virus Time — Can A Poem Be A Prayer? — Poetry In A Time Of Grief And Loss — Hope Rises. It Always Does. — Li-Young Lee's Love Poetry — Ken Nordine's 'Yellow' — Words Can Change Your Life

This week, To the Best of Our Knowledge comes to you from our kitchens and homes. We’re safe, but we’ve all been thinking about the people on the front lines of the pandemic — doctors, nurses and hospital staffs. We’ve been seeing them on social media — the nurses in NYC wearing garbage bags because there aren’t enough

*Original Air Date: * March 28, 2020

**Guests: **

Larry Brilliant — Josh Mezrich — Missy Makinia — Manu Prakash

**Interviews In This Hour: **

The Hippie Doctor Who Helped Eradicate Smallpox — Would You Give Your Kidney to a Stranger? — Could a 50 Cent Microscope Change the World?