Alan Berliner is a chronic insomniac who goes for days without sleeping.
American writer Amanda Henry is married to a Frenchman. She provides a commentary on how differently they perceive things due to their national origins.
Before there was iTunes, Spotify, or Pandora, there was the mixtape. Jason Bittner is nostalgic for those days, when sweethearts would spend days crafting the perfect playlist. He's the editor of a book and former website called "Cassette From My Ex". He shares some songs from his collection, and explains why the mixtape is such a powerful medium.
Anne Strainchamps goes looking for hope about the world's environmental problems among the children of Randall Elementary School in Madison, Wisconsin.
Andrew Sullivan and Brian Mann appeared together at the Wisconsin Book Festival in a discussion moderated by Steve Paulson on the topic of the new conservatives in America.
Journalist Adam Hochschild says the anti-slavery movement in Britain 200 years ago invented many of the political tools and tactics today's protesters still use.
Alexander Stille tells Steve Paulson how poetry became a political weapon in Somalia’s revolution.
When evangelical Christians say they talk to God, what do they mean? Anthropologist Tanya Luhrmann wanted to find out, so she spent two years as a participant observer in a Charismatic church, talking to the congregation and even praying herself. She says prayer involves cultivating the imagination. Luhrmann also describes her cross-cultural study of schizophrenics who hear voices.