Category Archives: Scholars’ Circle Interviews

Information and recordings from Schloars’ Circle radio show is posted here.

Scholars’ Circle – Stories about Secret Heros -/- Britain Loyalist during American Revolution -/- Retirement of US Justice Anthony Kennedy ( part 2 ) – July 8, 2018

First, secret heroes. We know the role of presidents and other leaders in shaping history, however we hear little about the unsung heroes; many who have risked their lives to liberate and rescue others. Who might some of those secret heroes be? We are joined by Paul Martin author of Secret Heroes: Everyday Americans Who Shaped Our World. [ dur: 14 mins. ]

  • Paul Martin is a journalist, author and editor. He is the author of Secret Heroes: Everyday Americans Who Shaped Our World and his most recent American Trailblazers:A Celebration of All But Forgotten Firsts.

Next, tens of thousands of people remained loyal to Britain during the American Revolutionary War, who were they and what happened to them? Where did they go after the war and what do their stories tell us about American history? Maya Jasanoff joins us, she is a Professor of History at Harvard and author of Liberty’s Exiles: American Loyalists in the Revolutionary World.[ dur: 15 mins. ]

  • Maya Jasanoff is Professor of History at Harvard University. She is the author of Liberty’s Exiles: American Loyalists and the Revolutionary War. Edge of Empire: Lives, Culture, and Conquest in the East, 1750-1850, and The Dawn Watch: Joseph Conrad in a Global World.

Finally, what does the retirement of Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy mean for the United States? This is part two of a two part interview. Part one can be found here. [ dur: 29 mins. ]

For a transcript of this interview, please visit: TheBigQ

  • Sanford Levinson, is a Professor in the Department of Government at the University of Texas. He is the author of The Undemocratic Constitution and Nullification and Secession in Modern Constitutional Thought and Framed: America’s 51 Constitutions and the Crisis of Governance (2012)
  • Dr. John Vile is a professor of Political Science at Middle Tennessee University. He is the author of: Constitutional Law in Contemporary America, Essential Supreme Court decisions and The Writing and Ratification of the US Constitution
  • Stephen Griffin is a professor of Constitutional Law at Tulane University. He is the author of American Constitutionalism: From Theory to Politics, Long Wars and the Constitution, and Broken Trust: Dysfunctional Government and Constitutional Reform

This program is produced with contributions from the following volunteers: Ankine Aghassian, Melissa Chiprin, Anaïs Amin, Tim Page, Mike Hurst and Sudd Dongre.

Scholars’ Circle – What is behind rise of suicides in USA -/- Retirement of US Justice Anthony Kennedy ( part 1 of 2 )- July 1, 2018

First, what’s behind the rise in suicide? [ dur: 30 mins. ]

For a transcript of this interview, please visit: TheBigQ

  • Dr. Mark S. Kaplan, is a professor of Social Welfare at the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs. His publications include: The social nature of male suicide: A new analytic model. Suicide among male veterans: a prospective population-based study and Physical illness, functional limitations, and suicide risk: a population-based study.

Then, what does the retirement of Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy mean for the United States? This is part of 2 part interview. Part 2 can be found here. [ dur: 28 mins. ]

For a transcript of this interview, please visit: TheBigQ

  • Sanford Levinson, is a Professor in the Department of Government at the University of Texas. He is the author of The Undemocratic Constitution and Nullification and Secession in Modern Constitutional Thought and Framed: America’s 51 Constitutions and the Crisis of Governance (2012)
  • Dr. John Vile is a professor of Political Science at Middle Tennessee University. He is the author of: Constitutional Law in Contemporary America, Essential Supreme Court decisions and The Writing and Ratification of the US Constitution
  • Stephen Griffin is a professor of Constitutional Law at Tulane University. He is the author of American Constitutionalism: From Theory to Politics, Long Wars and the Constitution, and Broken Trust: Dysfunctional Government and Constitutional Reform

This program is produced with contributions from the following volunteers: Ankine Aghassian, Melissa Chiprin, Anaïs Amin, Tim Page, Mike Hurst and Sudd Dongre.

Scholars’ Circle – Intersection of Music, Art and Politics -/- Healing Traumatic Experiences – June 24, 2018

First, the intersection of music, art and politics. Our guest producer Sam Smith explores how modern artists like Childish Gambino use music and video for political communication. [ dur: 15 mins. ]

For a transcript of this interview, please visit: TheBigQ

  • Patrycja Rozbick is Lecturer in Politics and International Relations at Aston University. She is the author of Childish Gambino shows, pop music can be powerfully political – despite censorship, this article can be found here and Crisis in the Eye of Beholder: Contingency and Perplexity Along the Balkan Migration Route.

Then, the toll of trauma, its aftermath and how to heal after traumatic experiences. We speak with three renowned experts. [ dur: 43 mins. ]

For a transcript of this interview, please visit: TheBigQ

  • Charles R. Figley is Distinguished Chair, Professor in Disaster Mental Health and Director of the Tulane University Traumatology Institute and School of Social Work. He’s Fellow of the American Psychological Association and the author of Mapping the Wake of Trauma: Autobiographical Essays by the Pioneers of Trauma Research; the Encyclopedia of Trauma: An Interdisciplinary Guide; and Beyond Trauma: Cultural and Societal Dynamics, and Death and Trauma.
  • Richard A. Chefetz is a psychiatrist in Washington, D.C. and past President of the International Society for the Study of Trauma and Dissociation. Richard Chefetz is Founder and Chair of their Dissociative Disorders Psychotherapy Training Program, a Distinguished Visiting Lecturer at the William Alanson White Institute of Psychiatry, Psychoanalysis, and Psychology and a faculty member at the Washington School of Psychiatry, the Institute of Contemporary Psychotherapy & Psychoanalysis, and the Washington Center for Psychoanalysis. He is the author of Intensive Psychotherapy for Persistent Dissociative Processes: The Fear of Feeling Real.
  • Dr. Daniel Siegel is a clinical professor of psychiatry at the UCLA School of Medicine and the founding co-director of the Mindful Awareness Research Center at UCLA. He is Executive Director of the Mindsight Institute, the author of books, including The Developing Mind: How Relationships and the Brain Interact to Shape Who We Are, The Mindful Brain: Reflection and Attunement in the Cultivation of Well-Being, and co-author of books including The Yes Brain: How to Cultivate Courage, Curiosity, and Resilience in YourChild and Brainstorm: The Power and Purpose of the Teenage Brain

This program is produced with contributions from the following volunteers: Ankine Aghassian, Melissa Chiprin, Anaïs Amin, Tim Page, Mike Hurst and Sudd Dongre.

Scholars’ Circle – Future of food, food politics -/- US immigration policy and Human Rights Crisis – June 17, 2018

First, we continue our exploration of the future of food. With climate change, contamination and host of stressors on the planet, how will we feed a growing population? What are the politics of food? This is part three of a three part panel from a symposium held in Auckland, NZ. In the third part of this symposium on food, we look at solutions and the changes we need to assure a system is just, sustainable and resilient. Future of Food symposium recording: Part 1, Part 2.[ dur: 23 mins. ]

  • Michael Carolan is a Professor of Sociology and Associate Dean of Research for the College of Liberal Arts at Colorado State University. He has authored and coedited books including Reclaiming Food Security; The Sociology of Food and Agriculture; The Real Cost of Cheap Food; Food Utopias: Reimagining Citizenship, Ethics and Community; and Biological Economies: Experimentation and the Politics of Agrifood Frontiers.
  • Richard Le Heron is a Professor of Geography in the School of Environment at the University of Auckland. His has coauthored and coedited books including Knowledge, Industry and Environment: Institutions and Innovation in Territorial Perspective; Economic Spaces of Pastoral Production and Commodity Systems: Markets and Livelihoods; Agri-Food Commodity Chains and Globalising Networks; and Biological Economies: Experimentation and the politics of agri-food frontiers.
  • Nicolas Ian Lewis is an Associate Professor in the School of Environment at the University of Auckland. He coedited the book Biological Economies: Experimentation and the politics of agri-food frontiers and has authored book chapters including ‘Constructing economic objects of governance: the New Zealand wine industry’ in Agri-Food Commodity Chains and Globalising Networks.
  • Anastasia Telesetsky is a Senior Lecturer in the Faculty of Law at the University of Auckland. She has coauthored and coedited the books The International Law of Disaster Relief; Ecological Restoration in International Environmental Law; and Marine Pollution Contingency Planning, State Practice in Asia-Pacific States.

Then, is America facing a human rights crisis with its immigration policy? With reports of indefinite detentions and separating children from their families, we explore how we got here, what the political and legal ramifications are, and what happens next for America. [ dur: 35 mins. ]

For a transcript of this interview, please visit: TheBigQ

  • Kevin Johnson is Dean and Professor of Public Interest Law at UC Davis School of Law. He has co-authored Opening the Floodgates: Why America Needs to Rethink Its Borders and Immigration Laws, and authored Immigration Law and the US-Mexico Border. His list of publication can be found here.
  • David Kyle is Professor of Sociology at University of California, Davis. His publications include, Global Human Smuggling: Comparative Perspectives, and Transnational Peasants: Migrations, Networks and Ethnicity in Andean Ecuador and Smart Humanitarianism: Re-imagining Human Rights in the Age of Enterprise. You can find his publications here.

This program is produced with contributions from the following volunteers: Ankine Aghassian, Melissa Chiprin, Anaïs Amin, Tim Page, Mike Hurst and Sudd Dongre.

Scholars’ Circle – Future of Food, part 2 of 2 -/- use and misuse of DNA and private data – June 10, 2018

First, with climate change, contamination and host of stressors on the planet, how will we feed a growing population? What are the politics of food? In this second part of this symposium on food, we look at solutions and the changes we need to make to be sure a system is just, sustainable and resilient. [ dur: 28 mins. ]

  • Michael Carolan is a Professor of Sociology and Associate Dean of Research for the College of Liberal Arts at Colorado State University. He has authored and coedited books including Reclaiming Food Security; The Sociology of Food and Agriculture; The Real Cost of Cheap Food; Food Utopias: Reimagining Citizenship, Ethics and Community; and Biological Economies: Experimentation and the Politics of Agrifood Frontiers.
  • Richard Le Heron is a Professor of Geography in the School of Environment at the University of Auckland. His has coauthored and coedited books including Knowledge, Industry and Environment: Institutions and Innovation in Territorial Perspective; Economic Spaces of Pastoral Production and Commodity Systems: Markets and Livelihoods; Agri-Food Commodity Chains and Globalising Networks; and Biological Economies: Experimentation and the politics of agri-food frontiers.
  • Nicolas Ian Lewis is an Associate Professor in the School of Environment at the University of Auckland. He coedited the book Biological Economies: Experimentation and the politics of agri-food frontiers and has authored book chapters including ‘Constructing economic objects of governance: the New Zealand wine industry’ in Agri-Food Commodity Chains and Globalising Networks.
  • Anastasia Telesetsky is a Senior Lecturer in the Faculty of Law at the University of Auckland. She has coauthored and coedited the books The International Law of Disaster Relief; Ecological Restoration in International Environmental Law; and Marine Pollution Contingency Planning, State Practice in Asia-Pacific States.

Then, we explore how DNA and other private data can be used and misused in law enforcement, health care and employment. [ dur: 30 mins. ]

For a transcript of this interview, please visit: TheBigQ

  • Ellen Wright Clayton is a Professor of Law at the Vanderbilt University School of Law, and Professor of Health Policy and Co-Founder of the Center for Biomedical Ethics and Society at the Vanderbilt University Medical School. She is co-author of the book Bioethics and Law and co-author of the research publication Privacy and Security in the Genomic Era, Imagined Futures: Capturing the Benefits of Genome Sequencing for Society, and The Legal Risks of Returning Results of Genomics.
  • Mark A. Rothstein is Chair of Law and Medicine and is the Founding Director of the Institute for Bioethics, Health Policy and Law at the University of Louisville School of Medicine. He is the co-author of Genetics: Ethics, Law and Policy, the editor of Genetic Secrets: Protecting Privacy and Confidentiality in the Genetic Era and co-editor of Behavioral Genetics: The Clash of Culture and Biology.
  • Dennis McNevin is a Professor of forensic genetics in the Centre for Forensic Science at the University of Technology Sydney. He is co-author of the research publications Predictive DNA analysis for bio-geographical ancestry, Forensic DNA phenotyping: Developing a model privacy impact assessment, and Prediction of bio-geographical ancestry from genotype: a comparison of classifiers.

This program is produced with generous contribution from Ankine Aghassian, Melissa Chiprin, Anaïs Amin, Tim Page, Mike Hurst and Sudd Dongre.

Scholars’ Circle – Humanity’s Crisis in Yemen -/- WARs in our times – June 3, 2018

First, Yemen is facing one of the worst humanitarian crisis on earth. How did it get to this? And what should be done?[ dur: 27 mins. ]

Then, scholars note that the world is waging fewer wars, but that the wars that are waged are more brutal and intractable. How far have we come in the science of making peace? [ dur: 31 mins. ]

  • George Lopez is Vice President and Director of International Conflict Management at US Institute of Peace. He is the co-author of Sanctions and the Search for Security: Challenges to UN Action.
  • Ervin Staub is Professor of Psychology at the University of Massettuces, Amherst. He is the author of The Psychology of Good and Evil: Why Children, Adults, and Groups Help and Harm Others.
  • Norrin Ripsman is Professor of Political Science at Concordia University. He is the co-author of Globalization and the National Security State.

This program is produced with generous contribution from Ankine Aghassian, Melissa Chiprin, Tim Page, Mike Hurst and Sudd Dongre.

Scholars’ Circle – Lost African-American land ownership -/- Consequence of Political Corruption – May 27, 2018

First, did predatory developers use the law to confiscate thousands of acres from African-American? [ dur: 16 mins. ]

Then, we continue analyzing political corruption, its causes, consequences and remedies. [ dur: 42 mins. ]

  • Matthew Stephenson is Professor of Law at Harvard Law School. He is the author of Legislation and Regulation and the book chapter Corruption and Democratic Institutions: A Review and Synthesis.
  • Miriam Golden is Professor of Political Science at UCLA. She is the author of Heroic Defeats: The Politics of Job Loss and co-author of Corruption: What Everyone Needs to Know.

This program is produced with generous contribution from Ankine Aghassian, Melissa Chiprin, Tim Page, Mike Hurst and Sudd Dongre.

Scholars’ Circle – Stressed Oceans – May 20, 2018

Ocean life is under threat by multiple stressors: climate change, acidification, plastics, pollution, overfishing, overexploitation. We spend the hour with four experts of the seas. We discuss the realities facing our oceans and strides we’re making to protect, recover, and restore our oceans.[ dur: 58 mins. ]

Find book authored by our guest scholars on this Book Shelf .

This program is produced with generous contribution from Ankine Aghassian, Melissa Chiprin, Tim Page, Mike Hurst and Sudd Dongre.

Scholars’ Circle – Political Corruption, cause and effect – May 13, 2018

We spend the hour discussing corruption, particularly political corruption, its history, causes, costs to society and possible remedies. [ dur: 58 mins. ]

This program is produced with generous contribution from Ankine Aghassian, Melissa Chiprin, Tim Page, Mike Hurst and Sudd Dongre.

Scholars’ Circle – Future of Food – May 6, 2018

Today’s program was recorded in front of a live audience. In this symposium about the future of food, we look at food insecurity, food shortages, food justice and sovereignty. We explore the threats to long term availability of health food: climate change, chemical contamination, soil depletion, loss of land, power politics, mass death of pollinators and host of big business practices. We look at solutions and the changes we need to make to be sure of system is just, sustainable and resilient. [ dur: 58 mins. ]

For a transcript of this interview, please visit: TheBigQ

  • Ann Elizabeth Bartos is a Lecturer in the School of Environment at the University of Auckland. She has authored book chapters including ‘Food sovereignty and the possibilities for an equitable, just and sustainable food system”’in Eating, Drinking, Surviving: The international year of global understanding – IYGU and journal articles including ‘The body eating its food politics: reflections on relationalities and embodied ways of knowing’ in Gender, Place and Culture.
  • Gerhard Benjamin McDonald Sundborn is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Population Health at the University of Auckland. His has coauthored journal articles including ‘Low sugar nutrition policies and dental caries: A study of primary schools in South Auckland’ in the Journal of Paediatrics and Child Health and ‘Sugar, dental caries and the incidence of acute rheumatic fever: A cohort study of Māori and Pacific children’ in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health.
  • Daniel Carl Henare Hikuroa is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Māori Studies and Pacific Studies at the University of Auckland. He coedited the book Ara Mai he Tetekura: Visioning Our Futures: New and Emerging Pathways of Maori Academic Leadership and has coauthored journal articles including ‘Ensuring objectivity by applying the Mauri Model to assess the post-disaster affected environments of the 2011 MV Rena disaster in the Bay of Plenty, New Zealand’ in Ecological Indicators.
  • Mike Joy is a Senior Lecturer at the Institute of Agriculture and Environment at Massey University. He authored the book Polluted Inheritance: New Zealand’s freshwater crisis; authored book chapters including ‘Our deadly nitrogen addiction’ in The New Zealand Land & Food Annual; as well as coauthored journal articles including ‘New Zealand dairy farming: milking our environment for all its worth’ in Environmental Management.

This program is produced with generous contribution from Ankine Aghassian, Melissa Chiprin, Tim Page, Mike Hurst and Sudd Dongre.