May 30 Arts education helps build ‘whole people,’ says singer Jessye Norman By Frank Carlson Award-winning singer Jessye Norman has a big problem with declining arts programs in America’s schools. “It is a big issue and it makes me completely crazy,” Norman told correspondent Jeffrey Brown, when they sat down to discuss her new memoir,… Continue reading
May 29 How an unlikely group changed the face of the FBI, retold in ‘The Burglary’ By Victoria Fleischer “There was a sense in the anti-war movement that it was being infiltrated by spies, by informers, but there was no evidence,” said Betty Medsger, author of "The Burglary." In 1971, a small group of unlikely individuals -- including a… Continue reading
May 28 Watch Remembering Maya Angelou’s iconic voice By PBS News Hour Drawing on a childhood of abuse and segregation, writer and author Maya Angelou moved the nation. Works such as her 1978 poem, “And Still I Rise,” explored the effects of racism and sexism on personal identity, with a voice that… Continue watching
May 28 Watch From rough beginnings, respected writer and activist Maya Angelou made a remarkable journey By PBS News Hour Maya Angelou, one of the most respected cultural figures of her generation, has died at the age of 86. Her debut memoir, “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings,” made her one of the first bestselling African-American female authors. Jeffrey… Continue watching
May 28 Maya Angelou, renaissance woman, dies at 86 By Ellen Rolfes Renaissance woman and civil rights activist Maya Angelou has died at the age of 86. Continue reading
May 26 Weekly Poem: Dan Chiasson and his poetry time machine By Victoria Fleischer Poet Dan Chiasson started working on his book “Bicentennial” after the death of his father, who left when Chiasson was 7 months old. While the two never really knew each other, that event prompted Chiasson to revisit his childhood in… Continue reading
May 25 Watch Soldier documents experience in Afghanistan in tintype photographs By PBS News Hour Continue watching
May 23 Watch What would Plato ask a neuroscientist? By PBS News Hour Can we reconcile the advancements of our modern world with Plato’s philosophical questions of free will? In “Plato at the Googleplex,” author Rebecca Goldstein imagines how Plato would approach neuroscience, the Internet and other technologies that make philosophy obsolete to… Continue watching
May 23 Fire engulfs iconic Art Nouveau building and school in Scotland By Lorna Baldwin Firefighters in Glasgow, Scotland today battled to save what they could of the Glasgow School of Art, one of Scotland’s most famous and treasured buildings. The main doors of the Glasgow School of Art. Photo by Flickr user… Continue reading
May 22 Manga aims to give voice to Fukushima reactor workers By Justin Scuiletti The best way to get inside information on the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant may be through pages of a comic book. Continue reading