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Clint Smith and Reginald Dwayne Betts work at the crossroads of multiple disciplines. Both men have pursued graduate degrees in the Ivy League: Smith is working toward his PhD at Harvard and Betts recently obtained his JD at Yale. But they also stay true to their creative lives, publishing and performing poetry in which they grapple with issues such as politics, inequality...
Clothing and recreational equipment company Patagonia has sued the Trump administration over its resolution to reduce the Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante national monument. CEO Rose Marcario says she’s acting according to the company’s values, and customers buy its products because it protects public lands, develops sustainable fabrics, and invests in sustainable...
With Congress mired in partisan gridlock and presidents of both parties relying on the growing use of federal executive power, states are playing an increasingly important role on issues ranging from climate change, immigration, and banking regulation, to health care, data privacy, and the opioid crisis. State attorneys general are leading the charge, alternately teaming u...
Born online after the not-guilty verdict in the killing of Trayvon Martin, and translated to the streets after the killing of Michael Brown, #BlackLivesMatter is an organization, a movement, and a rallying cry for racial justice. Even as the historic presidency of Barack Obama comes to an end, systematic racial injustice persists: young black men are 21 times more likely t...
The world’s young leaders are leading the charge to ensure future generations inherit a vibrant and thriving planet. Hear from inspiring leaders and changemakers, among them Indigenous youth, about the urgent work being done through innovative and inclusive solutions, activism, and community resilience.
The past years have seen a tremendous mobilization of women, from #MeToo and Time’s Up to climate strikes and marches for political freedom. The potential to shift women’s political, economic, and social power is profound, so how will this activism be harnessed to fundamentally change our nation’s course? What is the agenda for women going into the 2020 elections? Hear fro...
As the rest of human activity has been globalized, so has corruption — and to such a degree that it has fueled global inequality, created extremist groups, and converted democratic institutions into autocratic regimes stripping wealth from entire nations. These organized criminals are supported by technology that can anonymize money, by a global criminal-services industry,...
Every few months, it seems, we see more startling evidence — from the Catholic Church, to USA Gymnastics, to the Boy Scouts — of just how rampant sexual abuse of children is in our society. Add to the equation that abuse by family members is far more common than the institutional cases that make the news; the resulting picture is of a deeply destructive global phenomenon....
NBCUniversal News Group recently announced the honorees for its prime-time special, “Inspiring America: The Inspiration List.” NBC News’ Tom Llamas brings this conversation featuring Americans making a difference to Aspen. The panel includes environmental and climate justice activist Catherine Flowers; Susan Burton, creator of the nonprofit A New Way of Life; and actor Joh...
What was the best script you read this year that still hasn't been made into a feature film? That was the simple question to film-industry executives that catalyzed the Black List. Since 2005 the Black List has helped generate over 300 films, including The Revenant, Spotlight, Slumdog Millionaire, Juno, The King's Speech, Argo, and The Social Network. Those films have earn...
Clarence Jones was the person who secreted out the scraps of paper that Martin Luther King, Jr. used to write his “Letter from a Birmingham Jail.” He wrote part of King’s iconic “I Have a Dream” speech, and he fought to have the transcripts of his FBI-taped conversations with the civil rights leader released under the Freedom of Information Act. With a rare, intimate persp...
Ever since the day Caitlyn Jenner peered at America from the cover of Vanity Fair, there’s been a shift in how we talk about gender. From the battle over bathrooms to understanding how to appropriately use pronouns, gender issues have hit the mainstream. Even for compassionate, educated citizens, keeping pace with terminology and sensitivities can be a challenge. In this i...
A church in Denver that is at once ancient and of the future. A home-based experiment in Jewish life in Brooklyn. A Washington, DC, sacred space for artists and activists. Meet a group of leaders reimagining spiritual community for the 21st century.
Is the current chief justice of the United States a conservative activist, or a neutral umpire concerned first and foremost with preserving the institution of the Supreme Court? He may be a bit of both. An acclaimed recent biography, by a journalist who has known and observed Roberts for two decades, contends that Roberts is torn between two, often divergent, priorities: t...
Esther Perel’s TED talks about fidelity have been watched more than 13 million times, and her book Mating in Captivity is a New York Times best-seller. Dan Savage’s syndicated sex advice column “Savage Love” has been a hit for 25 years, and his “Savage Lovecast” continues to top the podcasts charts ten years in. Jennifer Finney Boylan, transgender activist, author, and Tim...
Any city would be lucky to have an artist in its corner like 2016 Harman-Eisner Artist-in-Residence Theaster Gates, whose work embraces activism, cultural preservation, and community development. Since he began work on his now famed Dorchester Projects in 2009, Gates’s transformation of a once-neglected South Side neighborhood into a thriving cultural hub has yielded an en...
Hate takes many insidious forms: as a mass shooting targeting a Black community, as an antisemitic remark, as a wave of anti-Asian violence. Intolerance and hate crimes have spiked in recent years, and experts, activists, and community members themselves are working hard not only to quantify the problem but to find actionable solutions. What does it take to stop hate in co...
Norman Lear is the prolific television writer and producer of stories about diverse American life—among them “All in the Family,” “Sanford and Son,” “The Jeffersons,” “Good Times,” and “Maude”—as well as a lifelong political and social activist. Khizr Khan is a Pakistani American lawyer, speaker at the 2016 Democratic Convention, and parent of US Army Captain Humayun Khan,...
Most of us probably harbor preconceived notions about refugees. Maybe it’s a misunderstanding about what drove them from home. Or maybe it’s a lack of understanding about the lives they led before crises upended them. Or possibly, a failure of imagination about the talents and capacities they bring to their new host countries. How do our misconceptions about refugees keep...
The crown prince Mohammed bin Salman has embarked on the social and economic renewal of Saudi Arabia, launching a national program known as Vision 2030 and announcing $500 billion to build a city of the future, Neom. Social changes looked promising: Gender segregation was easing up as women were granted attendance to sporting events, and the kingdom adopted an official g...