Code Switch

In 2020, nearly 20% of Americans turned to therapy. Many of those people were looking for a space to process some of the big, painful events they were living through, including the pandemic, a contentious election cycle, and of course, the summer's racial reckoning. But that had us wondering: What exactly can therapy accomplish? Can it mitigate the effects of racism? Help us undo how we internaliz...

Live from your computer screens, it's Code Switch! Guest hosts Ayesha Rascoe and Denice Frohman joined us to talk poetry and humor with special guests Paul Tran and Hari Kondabolu. Then, Ayesha and Denice answered your questions about race and love. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences....

In Canada, tensions between indigenous fishermen and commercial fishermen have been simmering for decades. On today's bonus episode, from our friends at NPR's Planet Money team, we travel to Nova Scotia to figure out how a group of Mi'kmaw fishermen asserted their rights to fish and what happened when commercial lobsterman struck back hard. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection...

It's Black History Month, which is likely to bring boundless stories of Black Excellence and Black Firsts. So today on the show, we're talking about Constance Baker Motley — a trailblazing civil rights judge who paved the way for many to come after her (including, perhaps, the next Supreme Court justice?) But, as we learned, Motley's life was full of contradictions, and her many achievements also...

We hear the phrase "unapologetically Black" thrown around a lot. But what does it actually mean? In this bonus episode from our newest play cousins at NPR's The Limits podcast, actress, businessperson, and author Gabrielle Union talks about what it meant for her to stop paying so much attention to what white people wanted from her. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use o...

People lie about being Native American all the time – on college applications, on job applications, in casual conversation. But how do "Pretendians" hurt real Indigenous people and communities? And what does all that mean for people who aren't quite sure if they're claiming or reclaiming? See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manag...

Since he died this week, André Leon Talley has been described over and over again as "larger than life." But on this episode, brought to us by our friends at NPR's It's Been a Minute podcast, three queer Black men talk about the smaller, more personal moments that made Talley such an icon in the fashion world — and in the broader culture. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection an...

We use words related to color to describe different racial categories all the time — Black, white, brown. But how much of race and identity actually has to do with the color of your skin? What if what appears to be "whiteness" is only skin deep? Today we're sharing stories from people of color with albinism whose experiences challenge what many people think they know about race. See pcm.adswizz.co...

It's now been more than a year since the so-called "racial reckoning" that marked the summer of 2020. The country, some said confidently, was having the biggest racial reckoning since the civil rights movement. But since then, the Code Switch team has been wondering...what was actually being reckoned with? And by whom? And what would the backlash be? See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our c...

What stories do we learn about the history of the United States? Who dreamed up those stories? And what happens when we challenge them? This week on the pod, our play cousins at NPR's Throughline podcast talk to journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones about the historical argument she tried to make with the 1619 project. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for...

This time of year, folks are being inundated with messages about how to become more beautiful. But beauty is an ever-changing goalpost that has everything do with race, class and power. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences. NPR Privacy Policy

Y'all, 2021 brought us a lot of TV. Some of it was even good! So this week, we're talking about the shows that had something interesting to say about race, from We Are Lady Parts to Reservation Dogs to City of Ghosts. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences. NPR Privacy Policy

Our play cousins at NPR's It's Been a Minute podcast reexamine the so-called "Latin explosion" of the late '90s: What it was supposed to be for audiences across the U.S., and what it actually came to represent. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences. NPR Privacy Policy

The term 'Latin Music' can encompass everything from Celia Cruz to Bad Bunny to Selena Gomez to Los Tigres del Norte. It's rock, pop, hip hop, salsa, bachata, reggaeton, and so much more. So...what exactly is the connective tissue? Language? The ethnicity of the artist? Pure vibes? Or is it something else entirely? See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data f...

How do race and class affect the way we eat? What makes dollar store junk food different from organic junk food? And when did Whole Foods become such a polarizing grocery store? We're getting into all those questions and more with Priya Fielding-Singh, author of the new book, How the Other Half Eats. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship...

When Derecka Purnell was growing up, the police were a regular presence in her life. Years later, the lawyer, activist, and author of the new book, Becoming Abolitionists, realized that her vision of a just society was radically different from the world in which she'd been socialized. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage yo...

It's Thanksgiving week, so we're bringing you a second helping of one of our favorite episodes, where we answer your questions about race and food. We're getting into the perceived whiteness of vegetarianism, what it means when H-Mart becomes a little too mainstream, and the etiquette around bringing pungent-smelling food to the (proverbial) office. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our co...

You already know we love books here on Code Switch — and given that we're smack dab in the middle of Native American Heritage month, we thought we'd introduce you to some of our favorite recent books by Indigenous authors. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences. NPR Privacy Policy

When 'Soul Train' first aired in 1971, there had never been a show like it. Fifty years later, that's still true. So this week, we're passing the mic to our friends at NPR's It's Been a Minute podcast, who did a deep dive into the age of Black joy — and Black flyness — that Soul Train kicked off. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and...

If you're Native American, there's a good chance that you've thought a lot about blood quantum — a highly controversial measurement of the amount of "Indian blood" you have. It can affect your identity, your relationships and whether or not you — or your children — may become a citizen of your tribe. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship...

Or do they? This week, we're answering some of your toughest questions about race and your parents. How do you create boundaries with immigrant parents? What dynamics might interracial couples bring to families? And why do so many Black parents want to prevent their kids from looking "too grown"? See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and...

The 2020 census data is finally here! At first glance, it paints a surprising portrait of a changing United States: The number of people who identify as white and no other race is smaller; the share of multiracial people has shot up; and the country's second-largest racial group is... "some other race." But resident census-expert Hansi Lo Wang told us that when you start to unpack the data, you qu...

In a small suburb of Washington, D.C., a non-descript beige building houses thousands of Native human remains. The remains are currently in the possession of the Smithsonian Institution. But for the past decade, the Seminole Tribe of Florida has been fighting to get some of them back to Florida to be buried. The controversy over who should decide the fate of these remains has raised questions abou...

If you've been paying attention to the news over the past couple years, you know what a so-called 'Karen' is: a white woman who uses her race and gender to wield power over someone more vulnerable. But long before most people became familiar with the term Karen, POCs have been calling out Karen-esque behavior. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sp...

Black women have always faced immense pressure to make their bodies look a certain way. But if done the "wrong way," achieving that idealized figure can lead to just as much scrutiny and critique. So today, we're talking about the cosmetic procedure known as a Brazilian Butt Lift, and what its rise in popularity illustrates about the type of bodies that do and don't get valued. See pcm.adswizz.com...