COVIDCalls

EP #194 - 12.23.2020 - Stitching the Situation, Art in the Pandemic

Today we have a discussion of art in the pandemic with artist Heather Schulte, creator of the Stitching the Situation project.

Heather Schulte is an interdisciplinary artist in Boulder, CO. Her work combines analog textile materials and techniques with digital material and design processes, analyzing the intersection of personal and public forms of language and communication. She received her BFA from the University of NE-Lincoln in 2003. She has exhibited at numerous galleries and contemporary art spaces, including RedLine Contemporary Art Center in Denver and Woman Made Gallery in Chicago, IL. Her work has been featured in publications such as, "Fiber Art Now," and the "Surface Design Journal."

EP #193 - 12.23.2020 - A Journalist Confronts 2020 with Ed Young

Today we have a discussion with Ed Yong science writer for The Atlantic, whose exceptional stories this year have set the bar for pandemic reporting.

Ed Yong is a science journalist who reports for The Atlantic, and is based in Washington DC. 

His work appears on The Atlantic's website and its print magazine; it has also featured in National Geographic, the New Yorker, Wired, Nature, New Scientist, Scientific American, and many more. He has won several awards, including the Victor Cohn Prize for medical science reporting, the Neil and Susan Sheehan Award for investigative journalism, and a AAAS Kavli Science Journalism Award for in-depth reporting in 2020 among many others.  He regularly does talks and interviews, and his TED talk on mind-controlling parasites has been watched by over 1.5 million people. 

I CONTAIN MULTITUDES, his first book, looks at the amazing partnerships between animals and microbes. Published in 2016, it became a New York Times bestseller, and was listed in best-of-2016 lists by the NYT, NPR, the Economist, the Guardian, and several others. His second book, AN IMMENSE WORLD, will look at the extraordinary sensory worlds of other animals.

EP #192 - 12.21.2020 - A Food Writer Describes his COVID-19 Experience

Today we have a discussion of food, cooking, and restaurants in the midst of the pandemic with Washington Post food writer Tim Carman.

Tim Carman is a James Beard Award-winning food writer and columnist for The Washington Post. His work has appeared in numerous editions of the “Best Food Writing” collections. He has also written for Imbibe magazine, American Scholar, Food Network magazine and other publications. Before joining The Post in 2010, he served as food editor and columnist for Washington City Paper. He lives in Hyattsville, Md., with his wife, the writer M. Carrie Allan, and their two dogs, Lucinda and Hans Floofer.

EP #191 -12.18.2020 - Fair Housing in the COVID-19 Pandemic

Today we have a discussion of fair housing in the COVID-19 pandemic with Marie Flannery Mel Jones, and Orla McCaffrey.

Marie Flannery is the President and CEO of The Fair Housing Center, and since joining the organization in October 2018 she has been actively engaged with community efforts in the Toledo area, serving on the Housing First Core Leadership Team and Homelessness Board and participating as a member of the United Pastors for Social Empowerment (UPSE) and Interdenominational Ministerial Alliance (IMA). Previously she was with Inland Fair Housing and Mediation Board (IFHMB), located in Southern California, since 2012 President/CEO since July 2016.

Mel Jones is a Research Scientist and Associate Director of the Virginia Center for Housing Research at Virginia Tech.  She leads housing studies and housing research in Virginia and beyond. Mel  specializes in quantitative analysis and data driven policy connecting housing to broad urban issues including economic and community development, individual economic opportunity, and well-being.

Orla McCaffrey covers consumer finance and regional banking for The Wall Street Journal. She previously interned on the Journal’s markets desk. She is a graduate of the State University of New York at Binghamton and has a master’s degree from the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY.

EP #190 - 12.17.2020 - Choreography in the Pandemic

Born and raised in Japan and a resident of New York since 1976, Eiko Otake is a movement-based, interdisciplinary artist. She worked for more than 40 years as Eiko & Koma but since 2014 has been performing her own solo project A Body in Places, which began with a twelve-hour performance at the Philadelphia Amtrak station. Since then, Eiko has performed variations of the project at nearly 80 sites. 

Between 2014 and 2019, she and photographer/historian William Johnston travelled five times to post-nuclear meltdown Fukushima and collaborated on creating A Body in Fukushima, an extensive and expanding project that documents places of nuclear contamination with Eiko’s body. Eiko has presented both photo exhibitions and film screenings of A Body in Fukushima internationally at museums, art centers, and conferences on environmental disasters. 

Also in 2017, she launched a multi-year Duet Project, an open-ended series of cross-disciplinary, cross-cultural and cross-generational experiments with a diverse range of artists both living and dead. David Brick is one of her collaborators of the Duet Project. In January 2020, Eiko travelled to China for a month to work with choreographer Wen Hui, during which the Covid-19 epidemic was identified. Since March, Eiko has been creating works in her Virtual Studio, which archives her art making and public conversations in the time of the pandemic.

Eiko has been honored with a MacArthur Fellowship, the Samuel H. Scripps American Dance Festival Award, and the first Doris Duke Artist Award. For her solo work, she has received a Bessies Special Citation, an Art Matters Fellowship, the Anonymous Was a Woman Award, and the Sam Miller Award for Performing Arts. Eiko teaches interdisciplinary college courses about the atomic bombings and other environmental issues at Wesleyan University, New York University, Colorado College, and Tokyo University. During the 2017–2018 academic year, Eiko was a Think Tank Fellow in Wesleyan’s College of the Environment. 

David Brick co-founded Philadelphia’s Headlong Dance Theater with Amy Smith and Andrew Simonet in 1993. Over the next two decades, these three co-founders created over forty dances as Headlong, performing nationally and internationally.

In 2008, David co-founded the Headlong Performance Institute, a training program for creating experimental performance.

David collaborates broadly in creating performance, participatory events, and community. His experience of growing up as a hearing member of a Deaf family continually influences David’s understanding of human bodies as active manifestations of culture. His recent work includes a residency at Dance Place in Washington DC to work on Island of Signs—a performance that explored growing up in a family with two languages, one that was shared and one that was not. He shared this residence with Carolyn Brick, his 78-year old Deaf mother who attended nearby Gallaudet University and was featured in a 1959 documentary about her experience there.

 

 

EP #189 - 12.16.2020 - Mental Health in the Pandemic with Asante Haughton

Today we have a discussion of mental health in the pandemic with Asante Haughton.

Asante Haughton has emerged as a leader in mental health. Asante has presented across the globe, including a pair of TEDx talks telling stories detailing the impact of family trauma on mental health. Through his work, Asante was also named as a CAMH 150 Difference Maker, being awarded the distinction of being one of the top 150 difference makers in Canadian mental health. Since 2019 as the host of Cypher (www.storiesforcaregivers.com), a web show that takes caregiving stories and turns them into songs, Asante has been interviewing loved ones supporting loved ones to spotlight the healing power of connection. In addition, Asante has rediscovered his love of writing, becoming a contributing editor to Inspire Magazine (www.kbiinspires.com), a wellness resource for youth. Most recently, Asante has co-founded the Reach Out Response Network (reachouttoronto.ca), an advocacy organization currently working with the City of Toronto to usher in transformative crisis response reform.

EP #188 - 12.15.2020 - The United States Military and the COVID-19 Pandemic

Today we have a discussion of the US military in the pandemic with Stars and Stripes reporter Erica Earl.

Erica Earl is an active duty U.S. Army service member specializing in public affairs. She currently works as a reporter at Stars and Stripes in Tokyo, her recent reporting has been on how the coronavirus has impacted the military. 

EP #187 - 12.14.2020 - Navajo Nation in the Pandemic

Today we talk about how COVID-19 is effecting Navajo Nation with journalist Shondiin Silversmith.

Shondiin Silversmith is a Diné journalist working as the Indigenous Affairs Reporter for The Arizona Republic, which is part of the USA Today network. She has a master’s degree in journalism from Northeastern University in Boston, Massachusetts with nearly 10 years of journalism experience mostly covering Indigenous Communities. She previously worked for The Navajo Times and has held various internships over the years including PRI’s The World and The GroundTruth Project. 

EP #186 - 12.11.2020 -Understanding COVID-19 Testing

Today we have a DISCUSSION OF COVID-19 testing with Shobita Parthasarathy.

Shobita Parthasarathy is Professor of Public Policy and Director of Science, Technology, and Public Policy at the University of Michigan. Her research specializes in the governance of emerging science and technology, and the politics of evidence and expertise in policymaking in comparative and international perspective. She is the author of two books--Patent Politics: Life Forms, Markets, and the Public Interest in the United States and Europe (University of Chicago Press. 2017) and Building Genetic Medicine: Breast Cancer, Technology, and the Comparative Politics of Health Care (MIT Press, 2007). She is currently working on two projects. The first examines the politics of inclusive innovation in international development, and the second compares COVID-19 responses (particularly as it relates to diagnostic testing) in the United States, United Kingdom, Singapore, and South Korea.

EP #185 - 12.10.2020 - COVID-19 and the National Aids Memorial

John joined the National AIDS Memorial as Executive Director in 2009. A graduate of the University of California at Berkeley, he received a degree in political science and organizational behavior. John spent over 25 years working for several Fortune 500 companies holding management positions in human resources, risk management and organizational development. In 1993 he founded and served as president of Golden Gate Granite Group, focusing on human capital management and effectiveness. In 2004 he realigned his career, merging his passion for community activism with his relationship development skills, joining the non-profit Positive Resource Center as Director of Development. John has held numerous non-profit board level positions, serving as President of the CastroCommunity Business Alliance, Board Chair of the New Hampshire AIDS Foundation,Vice President of Folsom Street Events, and Board Member of Positive Resource Center.