Access Utah

Tom Paxton says folk music is lumber with the bark still on. His legendary career spans six decades of traditional music and topical songs. He says today's political climate presents an embarrassment of riches to the song writer.

Carol Anderson is the Charles Howard Candler Professor of African American Studies at Emory University and author of White Rage: The Unspoken Truth of Our Nation's Divide, a New York Times Bestseller, Washington Post Notable Book of 2016, and a National Book Critics Circle Award winner.

Thursday on Access Utah we’ll spotlight the ongoing Moab Music Festival. We’ll talk with master fiddler Alasdair Fraser, cellist Natalie Haas, and violinist Charles Yang, all of whom are performing at the festival. We’ll also hear music performed by these artists.

Witty, inspiring, and charismatic, Oscar Wilde is one of the Greats of English literature. Today, his plays and stories are beloved around the world. But it was not always so. His afterlife has given him the legitimacy that life denied him.

In 2012, photographer Matika Wilbur sold everything in her Seattle apartment and created Project 562, which reflects her commitment to visit, engage with and photograph all 562 plus Native American sovereign territories in the United States. With this project she has traveled hundreds of thousands of miles, many in her RV (which she has nicknamed the “Big Girl”) but also by horseback through the Grand Canyon, by train, plane, and boat and on foot across all 50 states.

The Atlantic magazine recently “asked photographers in 24 locations around the globe to point their cameras up to the sky at precisely the same moment—1 p.m. GMT, April 25. At a time when the world is so isolated, these photos are a reminder of what we share.” The resulting article is We Are All Living the Same Moment, written by Gretel Ehrlich.

In 2007, the number of refugees worldwide hit 26 million. Thirteen years later that number has more than doubled to 70.8 million people displaced, cementing this crisis as the humanitarian issue of our time. And while the crisis itself has been well covered, the question that has not been explored is what happens to those “lucky” few who not only manage to escape persecution, but also get what is perceived to be the “golden ticket” of resettlement in the United States?

Renowned American political activist, scholar and author Ibram X. Kendi visited USU in 2017 for a keynote presentation on “How to be an Anti-Racist.” The presentation was sponsored by the USU Inclusion Center.

On August 26th, 1920, the Nineteenth Amendment was passed. Women were no longer barred from voting because of gender. Today on Access Utah, we’ll preview an event happening tomorrow celebrating this anniversary and honoring the people, past and present, who fight for voting rights.

The USU Center for Anticipatory Intelligence (CAI) looks across all disciplines to spot threats posed by emerging technologies and other threats. CAI is an interdisciplinary nexus fusing expertise in national security and geopolitics with cutting-edge instruction in cyber threats, data analytics, and emergent technology. CAI students predicted a novel zoonotic outbreak last year.

You swab your cheek or spit into a vial, then send it away to a lab somewhere. Weeks later you get a report that might tell you where your ancestors came from or if you carry certain genetic risks. Or the report could reveal a long-buried family secret and upend your entire sense of identity.

Today on Access Utah, writer Bill Shapiro joins us to talk about what draws him to other people's photos. He says other people's photographs are "like time-travel and a shortcut to empathy." We talk about how photography can pull us outside of ourselves, connecting us to something greater.

Today we remember a friend of Access Utah, the writer Jeff Metcalf, who died this summer. I had the privilege of interviewing him several times on the show. He was unfailingly warm, witty, open, funny and profound.

A while back on Access Utah, Michael Sowder, USU professor of English and affiliated professor of religious studies, helped us learn some of the history and current practice of yoga. On Tuesday’s Access Utah he’ll lead us in an exploration of mindfulness and meditation, which may be of special interest during these times of pandemic.

Students will be returning to schools in many districts across Utah soon. How are officials planning to keep students and teachers safe amid the pandemic? What will the mix of in-person and online teaching be? How does everyone feel about going back to school?

“Leave it as it is,” Theodore Roosevelt announced while viewing the Grand Canyon for the first time. “The ages have been at work on it and man can only mar it.” Roosevelt’s rallying cry signaled the beginning of an environmental fight that still wages today.

Matthew Crawford, author of the new book “Why We Drive:Toward a Philosophy of the Open Road,” says that once we were drivers, the open road alive with autonomy, adventure, danger, trust, and speed. Today we are as likely to be in the back seat of an Uber as behind the wheel ourselves. Tech giants are hurling us toward a shiny, happy “self-driving” future, selling utopia but equally keen to advertise to a captive audience strapped into another expensive device. Are we destined, then, to become passengers, not drivers? He says that much more may be at stake than we might think.

“There are few subjects that interest us more generally than the adventures of robbers and bandits.” That’s Scottish writer Charles MacFarlane, quoted in Charles Leerhsen’s new book. One such outlaw was Robert LeRoy Parker, born in Beaver, Utah and raised in Circleville, who became, of course, Butch Cassidy. Charles Leerhsen brings the notorious Butch Cassidy to vivid life, revealing the fascinating and complicated man behind the legend in the new book BUTCH CASSIDY: The True Story of an American Outlaw. Charles Leerhsen joins us for the program today.

A coalition of organizations is hosting a national virtual event today, August 6, and Sunday, August 9, on the 75th anniversary of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, to commemorate the survivors of nuclear weapons and production. Still Here: 75 Years of Shared Nuclear Legacy will include highlights from local events, stories from survivors, and a look toward a future free from nuclear threats.

Today on Access Utah we’re doing another non-profit spotlight. We’d love to shine a light on your favorite non-profit or individual doing good in your community. Amy Anderson, Director of Outreach for the Sunshine Terrace Foundation and Spiritual Counselor with Sunshine Hospice in Logan will join us for the hour and we’ll hear from representatives of other nonprofits throughout the hour