With Good Reason

A yellow-eyed witch who sucks the life from unknowing strangers; fish-obsessed ghosts who lure lone men to a watery death; and ghosts who call out in the voice of a loved-one, sealing a murderous fate. Suchitra Samanta (Virginia Tech) says Bengali culture is filled with stories like these of ghostly women who wield supernatural powers after death. And: Horror films often mirror the anxieties and c...

The most important architectural thinker of the young American republic was Thomas Jefferson. He also held captive more than 600 enslaved men, women, and children in his lifetime. Architects Mabel O. Wilson (Columbia University) and Louis Nelson (University of Virginia) discuss Jefferson’s conflicting ideals. Also featured: Erik Neil (Chrysler Museum of Art) takes us through the new Chrysler exhib...

What is a Hogzilla Chuck Norris Duck Ape? It’s the creation of a special education class in St. Louis and winner of the 2014 Global Monster Project. Terry Smith (Radford University) explains how creating monsters can help kids learn and grow. Plus: After a viral video raised new concerns about how teachers should be disciplining young children Kevin Sutherland (Virginia Commonwealth University) ta...

From all-African American sports teams to pioneering black opera singer Camilla Williams, many people thrived while living parallel lives during segregation.

Blown glass is one of the most beautiful and versatile mediums in art. Today, the art of glass blowing may involve up to date technology, but the essence of working with glass remains an ancient art. Jutta Page is an internationally acclaimed glass curator and the executive director of the Barry Art Museum at Old Dominion University. And: 3D printmaking gets a lot of attention these days as techno...

Imagine if Beyonce had a secret recording of her singing Lin-Manuel Miranda’s musical Hamilton, from before they were both famous. It would be epic! Music professor Brooks Kuykendall (University of Mary Washington) has worked with a graduate student to uncover the epic musical crossover of the 19th century--a John Philip Sousa arrangement of Gilbert and Sullivan’s H.M.S. Pinafore. And: Stephen Vit...

The best defense against conspiracy theories and fake news is robust journalism--but only if people trust their sources. Mallory Perryman (Virginia Commonwealth University) studies why people distrust their news sources and what we should do to change their minds. And: Why do people believe weird things? That’s what Jason Hart (Christopher Newport University) wants to find out. He delves into the...

On Sept. 27th and 28th, the most notable poets of our time will gather in the nation’s capital to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Furious Flower Poetry Center, the first academic center devoted to African American poetry in the United States. The founder of Furious Flower, Joanne Gabbin (James Madison University), along with Lauren Alleyne (James Madison University) join us in studio to cele...

In late August 1619, twenty or more enslaved Africans arrived in Virginia at what’s now called Fort Monroe. They were the first Africans documented in British North America. We speak with Terry Brown, Fort Monroe’s park superintendent about how the park--and America--are commemorating their arrival. We hear from the Tuckers, the descendants of the very first African-American baby, and learn about...

In the early 19th century, Americans began to journey away from home simply for the sake of traveling. Will Mackintosh(University of Mary Washington) is the author of a new book Selling the Sights: The Invention of the Tourist in American Culture. And: In the past couple of decades, a lot has changed for rural American tourism. Nancy McGehee (Virginia Tech) says that from public artworks to popula...

Dr. Fern Hauck (University of Virginia Medical System) and Farah Ibrahim (CHIP) work to connect refugees and asylum seekers with high-quality healthcare, no matter what language they speak or what trauma they’ve suffered. Al Fuertes (George Mason University) is also dedicated to improving outcomes for refugees and displaced peoples. He draws on his personal experience growing up under martial law...

In August 2005, Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans. In the years since, as residents have come and gone and rebuilt their lives, a lot has changed about the city-- including, says Katie Carmichael (Virginia Tech), the way people talk. The author of Sudden Spring, Rick Van Noy (Radford University) says that, in many Southern communities, climate change is already here. Later in the show: Resi...

Does the radiation emitted by our cell phones harm us? Deborah O’Dell (University of Mary Washington) recently finished a study that found cell phone radiation can cause changes to our cells. Also: In 2018, most people diagnosed with blood cancer can find a donor to help with their treatment. But not everyone. Karen Ballen (University of Virginia Health Systems) has been working to expand the dono...

There’s a new podcast called Sacred & Profane hosted by two Religious Studies professors, Martien Halvorson-Taylor and Kurtis Schaeffer (University of Virginia). The podcast explores how people think and act with religion, how religion can affect our experience on almost every level, and the relationship between religion, race, and democracy. Later in the show: Christina Anne Kilby (James Madison...

From tracking tigers in Nepal to mountainside surgery on Montana’s wolverines, Deborah McCauley (VIEW) is on a mission to save disappearing wildlife around the world. And: Rowan Lockwood (William & Mary) is taking a closer look at the fossils of giant oysters to learn how to rebuild oyster reefs today. Later in the show: Crystal blue lakes might make for a popular tourist spot, but they’re startin...

When writer and radio producer Lulu Miller (Invisibilia) discovered she’d have to leave Virginia, she wrote a startling love letter to the state-- one that charges everyday people to stay angry about injustice. A.D. Carson (University of Virginia) uses hip-hop and spoken word to tell hard truths about racist history, cutting through denial with metaphor. Later in the show: Tawnya Pettiford-Wates (...

Your summer vacation packing list has some key items: cell phone charger, swimsuit, toothbrush. We're here to add some essentials to your list, with the best book recs from the With Good Reason universe.

U.S. troops turned to popular music as a way of coping with the war in Vietnam. The authors of “We Gotta Get Out of this Place," Doug Bradley and Craig Werner, play songs the soldiers listened from that era and explore how that music became the soundtrack of the war. Joyce Hoffman is the author of On Their Own: Women Journalists in Vietnam. She shares stories of women who won esteemed prizes for t...

The evolution of social change in America can be traced through popular songs by the likes of Nat King Cole, Percy Mayfield, Lena Horne, and the Impressions. Charlie McGovern (William and Mary) shares from his new book Body and Soul: Race, Citizenship and Popular Music, 1930-1977. Nancy Hanrahan (George Mason University) says debates about music and democracy used to focus on a shared national ide...

On the eve of WWI, Antoine Köpe had a front seat to history. A century later, Antoine’s elaborate journals, cartoons, recordings, and collections reveal what it was like in the last days of the Ottoman Empire. Filmmaker Nefin Dinç (James Madison University) is collecting Antoine’s memories into a new documentary. And: Native-Uruguayan Gabriela Toletti (Tidewater Community College and Old Dominion...

When Jennifer Malia (Norfolk State University) started researching her young daughter’s behaviors, she realized that both she and her daughter were on the autism spectrum. Leslie Daniel (Radford University) celebrates autism and shares some basic strategies for communicating with children on the autism spectrum. Through personal experience and extensive research, Jackie Spainhour’s has come up wit...

The very first ironclad ship built by the Union Navy in the Civil War was called The Monitor. It revolutionized the way battleships were built. Jonathan White (Christopher Newport University) is the co-author of “Our Little Monitor: The Greatest Invention of the Civil War.” Civil War buffs pride themselves on knowing the great battles of the war. But what about the fighting that took place away fr...

When parents die, we face powerful emotions, rituals, and tasks, including the eulogy. Listen as poet Jahan Ramazani (University of Virginia) pays tribute at the 2016 memorial service to his father. Also: In addition to our grief at the loss of parents, we’re often also faced with so much stuff. Marietta McCarty (Piedmont Virginia Community College) wrote a loving memoir about the daunting task of...

A poet loses his dad, a daughter empties her parents house, a coach copes with his grief after his player dies in an accident.

In 1883 a young African American worker was alleged to have brushed shoulders with a white woman as they passed each other on a narrow sidewalk in Danville, Virginia. A race riot erupted and Jane Dailey (University of Chicago) says the white supremacist backlash that followed led to the disenfranchisement of Black Virginians for nearly 100 years. And: Jeff McClurken (University of Mary Washington)...