Banterly

Our guest is Josefa Velasquez, a senior reporter for The City, a digital publication focused on the New York area. Josefa has been featured in The Guardian, The New York Times, Business Insider, New York Magazine, and Politico, to name a few.  We're bringing her onto this season of Immigrantly because she co-wrote a recent article with fellow city reporter Clifford Michel. Titled "NYC to Pick Up T...

Season 14 of Immigrantly, titled “People’s Choice,” launches today. Our first guest of the season is Ali Noorani, the president and CEO of the National Immigration Forum. Prior, he was the director of the Massachusetts Immigrant and Advocacy Coalition. As the author of two books, one of which  - "Crossing Borders: The Reconciliation of a Nation of Immigrants" was recently published, Ali is recogni...

For season 13 finale, our guest is someone who defies the conventional boundaries of musical expression. Arooj Aftab, is a Grammy-winning Pakistani singer, composer, producer, and editor whose music has gained international recognition for its infusion of many genres. Her song, “Mohabbat,” was featured on Barack Obama’s list of favorite songs for the Summer of 2021 & won the 2022 Grammy for "B...

Our guest today is Maria Akopyan. Maria is a family lawyer, divorce coach, and the founder of Dignified Divorce Coaching. Born in Armenia and immigrated to Los Angeles, California at only ten months old, Maria focuses on helping recently divorced women smoothly transition to a single life in a healthy, positive way. Her work challenges the notion that divorce is lonely and painful. Maria proposes...

Our guest today is Frances Tang, the founder, CEO, of Awkward Essentials, an innovative personal hygiene company. Their most well-known product is called the dripstick, a post-sex cleanup tool that absorbs excess fluid leftover from a partner. During her work in developing this product, Frances immediately became passionate about deconstructing taboo conversations about sex. One of the most exciti...

Dating can be a rocky ride at the best of times, especially in this day and age when narratives and how-tos are thrust upon us by the media, culture, and even friends. It becomes hard to filter what we want out of a relationship from what society expects us to enjoy. And then there is the issue of ignoring narratives that aren't as common or flashy. Today's episode looks at power and privilege wit...

Today's guest, Dr. Bushra Sabri, teaches at Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing & is a recognized expert in exposure to violence and psychosocial outcomes caused by experiencing health inequities among minority and immigrant women. She currently leads Its WeWomenPlus, a research study for immigrant women's health, safety, and empowerment funded by the National Institute on Minority Heal...

Today's guest is family in all senses of the word. Tina Khan (A.K.A Shahjehan khan's mom) describes her journey into marriage and how love is nurtured in her life. Tina shares stories of heartbreak, love letters, & socio-cultural distinction in the context of arranged marriage, with great sage and sass. This episode will make you feel all the feels. So let's jump right in!!   One of the most e...

Our guest today is trailblazing a unique approach towards navigating relationships. Jessica Fern is the author of The book takes its readers into an exploration of the relationship between attachment theory and consensual non-monogamy.      One of the most exciting ways to support us is by becoming a member of our Patreon by going to patreon.com/immigrantly. For the price of an overpriced oat milk...

Did you attend a sex-ed class in middle or high school? If the answer is no, you're not alone. In the United States, only twenty-four states mandate sex education, which leaves nearly half of the country inadequately educated on their sexual health. Justine Ang Fonte, M.Ed, MPH, makes it their mission to provide comprehensive sex-ed, intersecting it with the impacts of colonization, the porn indus...

Sujata Day, the producer of Definition Please and actress on Insecure and Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl, joins us in the studio to discuss her work, a product of what is personal and public. Influenced by heritage, family bonds, and inborn passions,   Sujata attributes this specific voice to the Black and Brown collaboration in the entertainment space. So how did she take control of her care...

Dear Listener, have you ever had your heart broken? Whether by an ex or a friend, every one of us has felt our stomach drop and our heart collapse into a million shards. The moment feels devastating, and the days that follow are almost unbearable. You feel alone when the world you once knew turns darker and colder. But don't worry—we get it, and so does Joanna Carrillo, host of the podcast, Letter...

Today we tackle self-love through a cultural lens. Our guest Tanzila "Taz" Ahmed, is a political strategist, storyteller, and artist based in Los Angeles. She creates at the intersection of counternarratives and culture-shifting as a South Asian American Muslim 2nd-gen woman. She's turned out over 500,000 Asian American voters, recorded five years of the award-winning #GoodMuslimBadMuslim podcast,...

We explore self-love through sexual empowerment. Our today's guest is Anna Lee. Anna is the owner of the wellness company Lioness. Lioness is the first and only intelligent vibrator on the market. But beyond its niche, Lioness is a telling legacy of Anna's journey from a complicated childhood where sex was associated with pain & shame into a position of innovation focused on female pleasure an...

Today, joining us to speak on dating, comedy, finding, and being the source of inspiration is the oh-so wondrous, deeply hilarious, and boldly thoughtful actress and comedian Aparna Nancherla. She has appeared on several Late Night talk shows, Comedy Central, Inside Amy Schumer, and acted in plays like Crashing and The Great North's animated series. And if you are in New York City, catch Aparna an...

Saadia & Shahjehan sit down for a completely unscripted, unfiltered conversation to test their chemistry as co-hosts for season 13. In short, it is there. They exchange their own dating stories, including the failures and uncomfortable moments. In addition, they find common ground in their Desi culture along with the differences they experienced as they navigated the dating world. Hosts: Saadi...

It's official: Immigrantly Podcast is on its 13th season! So for Season 13, LOVE is in the air. We're going to explore all things relationships. Our conversations are going to tackle the constructs we've built around relationships. In addition, we'll be exploring how different political and sociological factors affect the relationships we create with each other. To help us tackle these topics and...

Today we are speaking with an Afghan journalist facing threats under a Taliban regime that is becoming more hostile towards the press every day.   To protect him, we have concealed all aspects of his identity, including altering his voice, to prevent any person from seeking to harm him. Therefore, we will also call him Follad Ahangar, not his real name.  Our goal through this episode is to give yo...

Today, Tanvi Misra, an award-winning independent journalist focused on migration, urban policy, and criminal justice, returns to talk about the process and concentrate on her collaborative article “We Have to Survive,” which represents the advocacy found in immigrant communities.  In this article, Tanvi interviewed four women, from community leaders to activists, to paint a portrait of how migrant...

Our today's guest Paula Wood is a multifaceted woman. She's an artist, a mother, a former editor, and an activist. This conversation brings charm and groundedness because Paula is deeply relatable. We talked about the way our proximity to it shapes our understanding of history, whether history and current events have any objectivity to them, collective denial in privileged groups, and the role of...

We are so excited to have Blair Imani join us today. Blair is an author, educator, and influencer living at the intersections of Black, Bisexual, and Muslim identity. She is the author of "Making Our Way Home: The Great Migration and the Black American Dream", and "Modern HERstory". Her most recent book, "Read This To Get Smarter", is inspired by her viral 30-sec microlearning series, Smarter In S...

This Thanksgiving, Immigrantly colleagues are bringing you a fusion episode, largely reflection-oriented, on the fun and follies of Thanksgiving. Saadia Khan, Yudi Liu & Kylee Roberts share their relationship with Thanksgiving, what they ascribe to, and how they observe this complicated holiday. Enjoy! Producer & Host: Saadia Khan Associate Producer & Content Editor: Kylee Roberts Cont...

It's a common narrative - for immigrants to compensate for positions below their training and education. The conundrum of being overqualified yet foreign was something Alexandra Mori experienced when she first moved to Vancouver. Now she is a regional vice president of the Bank of Montreal. Saadia and Alexandra speak on this process, what shocked them about their new environment, the learnings and...

Today we are so excited to have Khaled Hosseini on Immigrantly. Khaled Hosseini is the author of the New York Times bestsellers "The Kite Runner," "A Thousand Splendid Suns," and "And the Mountains Echoed."  For this conversation, we are passing the mic to one of our content writers, Aleeza Kazmi. Aleeza is a first-generation Afghan and Pakistani American. Producer & Narrator: Saadia Khan Asso...

Ever made eye contact with someone reading on the subway? Uli Beutter Cohen has. As the creator of Subway Book Review, Uli shares *that* moment that ignited her quest to document people and books. Now her platform, which combines digital, oral, and written storytelling, spans over 20 countries. Uli explains what is behind a book (a reader and author), how books paradoxically offer both escapes and...