Henry ("Hank") Greenspan is an emeritus psychologist and oral historian in Holocaust studies at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, award-winning playwright and actor, lyricist, essayist, and poet, and social activist in the area of healthcare rights. During the interview he’ll be performing one of the monologues from his remarkable play, REMNANTS, in which he channels the personalities and pivotal experiences of holocaust survivors with whom he formed deep relationships over the course of 50 years. (A video of his performance of the complete play can be viewed, at no charge, here.) We’ll also be talking about his new book, released just last week, REMNANTS and What Remains: Moments from a Life Among Holocaust Survivors, which for the first time publishes the text of the play, as well as providing reflections on its history, production, and reception. (A long excerpt of another of his plays discussed during the interview, The Mad Jester of the Warsaw Ghetto, can be viewed, at no charge, here.)

Recorded 8/19/25.

Psychologists Diane Ehrensaft and Michelle Jurkiewicz are the co-authors of the recently published book, Gender Explained: A New Understanding of Identity in a Gender Creative World. Diane is cofounder and director of mental health at the Child and Adolescent Gender Center at the University of California, San Francisco, where she is also a researcher and professor of pediatrics. She is the author of two previous books on this subject: The Gender Creative Child and Gender Born, Gender Made. Michelle Jurkiewicz is a gender specialist in private practice in Berkeley, California and an early pioneer and trainer in gender-affirmative care with transgender, non-binary, and gender expansive youth.

Recorded 8/13/25.

Remi Adekoya is a political science lecturer at the University of York in the UK, focusing on national and sub-national identities and their role in international relations, especially as they affect Africa. Before joining academia, Remi was a journalist, whose writing appeared in major mainstream publications in Europe, the U.S. and Africa. He has also provided analysis and commentary for wide-ranging international media and is the host of the podcast How to Become a Leader in Africa. Remi’s cultural background – as the son of a Nigerian father and a Polish mother, growing up in Nigeria and living as an adult in Warsaw and now London – give him multifaceted, first hand, international perspectives. Today’s interview will focus on his book, published in 2023: It’s Not About Whiteness, It’s About Wealth: How the Economics of Race Really Work.

Recorded 7/29/25.

Maggie Mertens is a journalist in Seattle, who covers gender, culture, and sports. She has written essays and stories for such major publications as The Wall Street Journal, The Atlantic, and The Guardian and has also been interviewed on NPR affiliates, as well as national and regional television and numerous podcasts. In 2021, she was nominated for the Dan Jenkins Medal for Excellence in Sports Writing. Her recently published first book, Better, Faster Farther: How Running Changed Everything We Know About Women is the subject of today’s interview.

Recorded 7/23/25.

Iñigo García-Bryce is a history professor at New Mexico State University and the director of NMSU’s Center for Latin American and Border Studies from 2011-2016. His research focuses on Latin American social and political history. He is the author of Crafting the Republic: Lima’s Artisans and Nation-Building in Peru, 1821-1879, published in 2004 and Haya de la Torre and the Pursuit of Power in Peru and Latin America, published in 2018. García-Bryce speaks English, Spanish and French fluently, and also has proficiency in Quechua, Latin, Italian, Portuguese and German.  He has presented his research in England, Germany, Peru and Argentina.  He has lived in Lima (Peru), Prague (Czech Republic), Berlin and Munich (Germany), Paris (France) and Colombo (Sri Lanka).  He has also worked as a journalist and a Spanish interpreter and translator.

Recorded 4/28/20. (Note that the recording is occasionally a bit choppy, due to a sub-optimal internet connection.)

Aziz Huq is a professor of comparative and constitutional law at the University of Chicago, focusing recently on democratic backsliding and the regulation of Artificial Intelligence. He has written articles for Politico, the Washington Post, the New York Times, and other mainstream publications, in addition to many scholarly articles, and award-winning books, including Unchecked and Unbalanced: Presidential Power in a Time of Terror with coauthor, Frederick Schwarz, published in 2007; How to Save a Constitutional Democracy with coauthor Tom Ginsberg, published in 2018; The Collapse of Constitutional Remedies, published in 2021; and, most recently, The Rule of Law: A Very Short Introduction, a contribution to the Oxford “Very Short Introduction” series, published in 2024. He has an active pro bono practice and is on the boards of the American Constitution Society, the Seminary Co-op, the New Press, and the ACLU of Illinois. Prior to becoming a law professor, he litigated cases in both the US Courts of Appeals and the Supreme Court, and was a law clerk for Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Recorded 7/16/25.

Rachel Laryea is a Ghanaian-American entrepreneur and author of the recently published book, Black Capitalists: A Blueprint for What Is Possible. She secured a summer an internship at Goldman-Sachs while still in college at NYU and upon graduation was offered a high-paying job there, thereby introducing her to the cutthroat, hyper-competitive world of high finance. She left that world to pursue a dual Ph.D. in African-American Studies and Sociocultural Anthropology at Yale University. Currently Laryea works as an Asset Wealth Management researcher at J.P. Morgan-Chase and is also the founder and CEO of Kelewele, a plantain-inspired food startup based in Brooklyn, New York, with the goal of providing non-exploitive work opportunities. Her work focuses on Black participation in capitalist economies, both in the U.S. and Africa.

Recorded 7/15/25.

Shoumita Dasgupta is a Professor of Medicine at Boston University, where she has held many leadership positions. She is Assistant Dean of Diversity and Inclusion, formerly Assistant Dean of Admissions, Founding Director of Graduate Studies in Genetics and Genomics; Past President of the Association of Professors of Human and Medical Genetics, and Fulbright Specialist, serving as a U.S. State Department, short-term expert at academic institutions abroad. As a scientist educator, she has focused on genetics and genomic medicine, diversity and inclusion, and mentoring of graduate students. She is the author of the recently published, Where Biology Ends and Bias begins: Lessons on Belonging from Our DNA, which is the focus on today’s interview.

Recorded 7/1/25.