February 2008
27 posts
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Move On Up, with Marva
Kate Moos, Managing Producer I can’t think of my mother without thinking of Mahalia Jackson’s recording of “Move On Up a Little Higher”, with its promise of seeing one’s loving mother in heaven, and its crazy-ecstatic refrain, It’ll be always howdy howdy and never goodbye, that makes me just fall apart. The heart-stopping idea is that loss is erased, that...
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Your Help Is Our Musical Gain
Mitch Hanley, Senior Producer Just a few notes regarding the songs on this week’s SOF Playlist. Thanks, to Padraig for his suggestion of Lasairfhiona Ní Chonaola’s music, which I was able to find and place in this week’s program. Also, many thanks to Gerard O’Shea who wrote about attending a John O’Donohue memorial in his blog. In which he mentions that at the end of...
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John O'Donohue's Landscape
Colleen Scheck, Producer One of the exciting aspects of my job as a producer is the opportunities our web site opens up for multimedia content. As soon as we started producing this week’s program, I wanted our audience to be able to see the Irish landscape John O’Donohue described in his conversation with Krista. I desperately wanted to see it. I’m of Irish ancestry (75%!, I’d proudly tell people...
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Poems of a Late Wandering Irishman
Trent Gilliss, Online Editor One thing we know about our fan base — they (you?) love words, especially poesy. The response to Tess Gallagher’s poem about her time with Thich Nhat Hanh made that clear. So, in one of Krista’s limited face-to-face interviews (see Shiraz’s post about what a more typical interview looks like), she was regaled by the lilting tongue and picturesque...
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Calling Up the Elephant Lady
Rob McGinley Myers, Associate Producer As the newest member of the Speaking of Faith staff (I’ve been working for the show for almost 3 months now), I’m still navigating the somewhat awkward transition from fan to employee. This week’s upcoming show really brought that into relief. Before I got this job, Whale Songs and Elephant Loves was perhaps my favorite show in the history...
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Interview Day. Do You Know the Way?
Shiraz Janjua, Associate Producer Most of the interviews Krista does with her guests are remote interviews, meaning that we’re here in our studios while our guest is in another studio in another city. We connect through the magic of technology using a broadcast-quality line. From Studio P at American Public Media, Krista interviews Steve Waldman, founder of Beliefnet, on some of the themes...
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For Muslim Students, a Debate on Inclusion →
Shiraz Janjua, Associate Producer One of our recent shows featured Ed Husain, an ex-member of radical student Islamist groups in Britain in the 1990s. The natural question for American listeners is, “What about the college scene here, now?” Neil MacFarquhar does a piece on this very question in the New York Times. “Experts in American Islam believe college campuses have become...
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“Whenever I was on the plane heading to Washington, my wife was kind of looking...”
– — Andy Pettitte, All-Star pitcher for the New York Yankees, at a press conference several days after he gave a deposition to a congressional committee testifying that he used HGH in 2002 and 2004. The verses read: Let every person be subject to the governing authorities; for there is no authority...
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Martial Arts Meets Ethical Living
Shiraz Janjua, Associate Producer I’ve been really drawn to this idea, brought to our attention by a listener, of the Ultimate Black Belt Test. It’s a very intense 13-month martial-arts training course. This course involves many things, some more traditionally “martial” than others: 1,000 rounds of sparring, 10,000 push-ups, and other grueling physical exercises. Having...
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Taking Play Seriously
Trent Gilliss, Online Editor Our program on the spirit of play continues to garner attention. This time Krista’s appearance at the New York Public Library with Stuart Brown is the entry point for Robin Marantz Henig’s long-form piece in this Sunday’s New York Times Magazine. The program’s trajectory has been a curious one, with a long tail no doubt. I watched the PUSH...
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Language Is Never Innocent →
Kate Moos, Managing Producer The former New York Times and Bloomberg journalist Doug McGill is someone we have tried to have on the show a few times and will certainly have on at some point. Schedules just kept getting in the way — mainly ours, come to think of it. He writes wisely and compassionately about communications and the responsibilities of people who get paid to communicate, and he...
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“Unfortunately, it’s an existential question. It’s far more important...”
– — said by Kate Moos when discussing how to implement the American Public Media brand more effectively in working with potential guests and media companies Trent Gilliss, Online Editor
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Krista and SoF as Blogonauts →
Kate Moos, Managing Producer The blogosphere serves many masters. A personal space for rumination and reflection. An op-ed page. A “Dear Diary” for the literary aspirant. A free training ground for the next great essayist. Not wanting to blog a dead horse, but as new as we are to blogging here at SoF, we are now blogging hand over fist. This week Krista is the featured author-blogger...
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On the Archbishop of Canterbury →
Shiraz Janjua, Associate Producer Our recent guest Ed Husain brought this to our attention: British scholar Abdal Hakim Murad (originally T.J. Winter) weighs in on the latest controversy, this one about comments the Archbishop of Canterbury made regarding shariah law in Britain.
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Generating Some Discussion on WNYC
Trent Gilliss, Online Editor Brian Lehrer interviewed Krista for his daily program on WNYC this morning. As a listener, I was appreciative that he read her book and asked open, insightful questions. (Sure, I’m guilty of being a little bit protective since I work with her. *grin*) The interview generated some engaging — and sometimes loud — discussion on their Web site. You can listen to the...
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The Association of Religion Data Archives →
Trent Gilliss, Online Editor I know, I know. The title of this post doesn’t necessarily grab you like a YouTube video labeled “puppies do backflips on spinning wheel in lake.” But if you look beneath the hood of this Dodge Dart, you’ll find an amazing amount of information and some telling graphics. And, you don’t have to be a researcher or a pollster to appreciate...
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Talking about Islamism
Shiraz Janjua, Associate Producer We’ve just completed our program in which Krista interviews British activist Ed Husain. Ed Husain spent several years in the 1990s in ideologically radical Islamist groups in the UK, where he was born and grew up. He wrote a book about these experiences, The Islamist, which has generated some fierce debate in Britain. (Check out our Particulars page to find...
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No Better Time for a First Entry Than the Last...
Anna Marsh, Intern I started in November as the show’s first-ever production intern. My time here has been brief but wonderful. You all should know that the people who create this show are every bit as bright, funny, insightful, inquisitive, and warm as you hope they are. Two things brought me here: First, I am an unabashed super-fan of the program. Second, I am a student in my last year...
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Seeing Listeners
Krista Tippett, Host I can’t afford — personally or production-wise — to be on the road much of the time. But Kate and I are on a thoroughly energizing, enjoyable trip right now. And there is something amazingly wonderful about getting out like this every once in a while and looking out, while I speak, at a room full of bodies and faces. The radio program has grown so much in reach and...
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40 Days of Carbon Fasting →
Trent Gilliss, Online Editor Tomorrow marks the beginning of the Lenten season for many Christians. For me, it brings back distant memories of frozen breaded fish cutlets, limited television, and sneaking an M&M here there when I was supposed to be abstaining from candy. All that time I merely considered it a mandate of my parents based on doctrine, and not, perhaps, a matter of moral...
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National Cathedral to Dupont Circle Yoga to...
Kate Moos, Managing Producer A fabulous turn-out yesterday at the National Cathedral. It looked like six or seven hundred people in the pews, filling the nave of the Cathedral for the Sunday Forum, during which Dean Sam Lloyd interviewed Krista — always a treat, I think, for the listeners to hear Krista’s take on the sorts of questions she puts to others. Keep an eye on the Cathedral’s...
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NPR Series on Muslim Women in Europe
Colleen Scheck, Producer
I enjoy the reporting of Sylvia Poggioli, NPR’s veteran European correspondent. She was formerly known in my household as “The Pope Reporter” because I often had the radio on when her stories on Pope John Paul II aired. (She was a guest on our program on the religious legacy of the late pontiff).
Last week NPR aired Poggioli’s six-part series...
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Krista at the National Cathedral
Kate Moos, Managing Producer Krista and I head out tomorrow for D.C. where we have another event in our 2008 World Tour, at the National Cathedral’s Sunday Forum. Our travels are exciting, and by far and away the best thing about them is meeting our listeners. It’s just an amazing gift. The event is at 10 am Sunday February 3rd, and is free and open. See you there!
