Fences
Our inaugural episode of the Price Projection Room podcast features a lively discussion of the film adaptation of August Wilson’s Fences, directed by Denzel Washington. Our guests include Gregg T. Daniel, Ange-Marie Hancock, and Jonathan Schwartz with moderator Erroll Southers.
To listen to the Price Projection Room discussion of Fences use the player here, or download it and subscribe through iTunes, Soundcloud, or Google Play
Dream Cities: Seven Urban Ideas That Shape the World
Wade Graham’s latest book Dream Cities: Seven Urban Ideas That Shape the World< is ostensibly about the architects the seven big ideas that have shaped contemporary cities across the world. Our discussion centers on whether Graham has fulfilled that mission or whether he's trapped in the confines of an under 350 page book for this massive introduction to urban planning and city history. The answer may lie in the reader rather than the book, listen to the conversation for a lively jaunt through recent architectural history.
Krieger again highlighted on The Academic Minute podcast
Inside Higher Ed featured Professor Martin Krieger on The Academic Minute podcast. Krieger explored the flow ways throughout cities and how they keep the information and people moving. Listen to the podcast here. Read the transcript here.
Coming in September!
LA Hastags Itself is a six-episode, limited series podcast coming in September 2016. We will hear from various Angeleno private and public organizations leading the trend of using digital media for urban and social development. Digital media are neither just “useful” nor peculiar to the sharing and cultural economies, but Read more…
Krieger featured on The Academic Minute podcast
Inside Higher Ed featured Professor Martin Krieger on the podcast “The Academic Minute.” Krieger took the minute to discuss whether physics can inform how people cluster in cities. Listen on the Inside Higher Ed website here. For the transcript, click here.
Citizen: An American Lyric
This month’s book is both poetry and criticism, Citizen: An American Lyric. Rankine’s piece is a revolution. A political, a poetic, complex revolution in 169 pages. We look at it through an unusual lens – what should we take away from works of art as we think about governance in America?
The Rise and Fall of Urban Economies
Michael Storper, co-author of our latest book club pick, The Rise and Fall of Urban Economies said recently in an op-ed in the Los Angeles Times: “To succeed in the new economy … Southern California has to face its mistakes over the last 30 years.” The claim is that the Bay Area has been “better” at doing business than we have in SoCal.
The Water Knife
Paolo Bacigalupi’s The Water Knife looks at our use and manipulation of water and water rights in the US and brings us to an ultimate conclusion.
Evicted
Evicted is written by Harvard sociologist and MacArthur “Genius” Award winner Matthew Desmond. It is being hailed as a “landmark work of scholarship and reportage that will forever change the way we look at poverty in America.”
Your Heart is a Muscle the Size of a Fist
Your Heart is a Muscle the Size of a Fist imagines what it means to be empathetic within the institutional violence of our system and the violence humans can commit against each other. Listen to our discussion about power and the necessity of protest within our democratic structure, and how protests should, and can, peacefully engage to solve the world’s “wicked problems.”
Richard II
What is the great tragedy in The Tragedy of Richard II? What makes a good leader – a king, a president? Can Shakespeare inform political discussions today? Listen and see what our guests think.
The Great Inversion
Alan Ehrenhalt argues that the demographics of the urban and suburban landscape are in the midst of a grand change in the book The Great Inversion. After the great sprawl of the 50s, the affluent are reclaiming urban spaces while minorities and immigrants are moving to the edges. New urbanism is winning and Ehrenhalt uses several examples to prove his point. Find out if our readers agreed with the thesis.
BONUS – Interview with David Treuer
Part memoir, part history, Treuer writes about reservations within the boundaries of the United States. This book should be an essential read for all Americans. Find out why Treuer decided to write the book, some challenges he faced along the way, and what might be coming next.
Rez Life
In Rez Life David Treuer spirals in and out of personal story, interviews, and historical narrative to paint a full picture of life as an Ojibwe from Leech Lake Reservation. An important book about the power of individual and collective action, the power of place, and how history lives on in our (collective) lives today.
What I Saw at the Revolution
What I Saw at the Revolution is a political memoir for those who don’t usually read political memoirs, a testimony to the power of language in politics. Noonan was a speechwriter for President Reagan, in both of his terms. Join us for a conversation on the power of language in politics and for a look at how our Federal government works.
Between the World and Me
Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates is ostensibly a letter to his son about growing up a black male in America. This prize winning correspondent of The Atlantic tackles the very big questions of our time.
The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey
Walter Mosley, most known for his LA crime fiction, tackles aging and agency in this beautiful novel, The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey.