Slate Culture Feed

Josh Levin, Joel Anderson, and Ben Mathis-Lilley are joined by the Ringer’s Lindsay Jones to talk about the controversy Charissa Thompson kicked up about sideline reporting. They also discuss Miami Dolphins head coach Mike McDaniel, and whether he’ll succeed at bringing a new leadership style to the NFL. Finally, the Wall Street Journal’s Joshua Robinson joins to assess Formula 1’s Las Vegas Grand Prix. Sideline reporting (5:41): Why did Thompson’s admission that she made up reports strike such a nerve? McDaniel (29:06): Can a humane coach win big in the NFL? Formula 1 (49L59): How the Las Vegas Grand Prix went from disaster to success. Afterball (1:07:17): Josh on commercials where athletes celebrate “ordinary people.” Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Rachelle Hampton and Candice Lim are joined by writer, comedian and Glamorous Trash host Chelsea Devantez to break down this watershed year of celebrity memoirs. The trio crowns the best and the worst titles, dissect what separates a good memoir from a great one, and reveal the shocking figure who has appeared in way more memoirs than you’d expect.This podcast is produced by Se’era Spragley Ricks, Daisy Rosario, Candice Lim and Rachelle Hampton. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this special mini-episode of Hit Parade, recorded live on at Housing Works bookstore in New York City, host Chris Molanphy is joined by Dan Charnas—author of the New York Times bestseller Dilla Time, The Life and Afterlife of J Dilla, and the acclaimed The Big Payback: The History of the Business of Hip-Hop. They discuss Chris’s new book Old Town Road—how he came to write it, what made the song exceptional, and how decades of chart and genre history led to Lil Nas X’s breakthrough.Podcast production by Kevin Bendis. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

When Giulia Lukach had her first manic episode, it seemed to come out of nowhere. She was in her late twenties, and had been married to her husband, Mark, for three years. “For him it was just so new because I’ve always been the happy girl,” Giulia told Anna in an interview in 2015. Her psychosis was dark and intense.“ The only thing she could talk about was the devil and that she needed to protect the world because the devil was inside her,” Mark said in their 2015 interview.In 2023, Mark and Giulia sat down with Anna again. In the intervening years, they had a second child, and after years without Giulia having a manic episode, they thought they were in the clear. “We had this quasi-pseudo-science theory that maybe by sharing our story with the world, that was becoming this like protective barrier,” Mark told Anna. In this episode, you’ll hear parts of the couple’s original 2015 conversation, and how their outlook has changed since, both in how they treat each other, and how they deal with the unknown. “I have been to war with myself and with my mind many times,” Giulia said, “knowing that my episodes can come at any moment – that's like high anxiety for me – and so I literally live in the moment now. I only live in today.”Also, side note: Will you be in New York City on Saturday, December 9th at 12:30pm? Come to a Death, Sex, & Money live event at Caveat, a cabaret on the Lower East Side, to celebrate the show’s run at WNYC. We’re calling it Four Interviews and a Funeral. Join Anna, the team, special guests, and dance along to live music. Tickets are available here. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On today’s episode, Rachelle and Candice are joined by Patrick Marlborough to discuss their recent essay for Slate, “The Death of the Internet as a Haven for People With Autism.” They wrote, “Things began to shift, if imperceptibly at first, with the advent of social media, and the steady corralling and corporatization of that otherness, weirdness, fun, and joy.” On the show, Marlborough describes what they see the internet what they see the internet shifting away from and what it’s shifting towards and what that shift means for all of us.This podcast is produced by Se’era Spragley Ricks, Daisy Rosario, Rachelle Hampton and Candice Lim. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In 1992, a Minnesota-based software company known for its educational hit The Oregon Trail released another simulation-style game to school districts across the country. Freedom! took kids on a journey along the Underground Railroad, becoming the first American software program to use slavery as its subject matter.Less than four months later, it was pulled from the market. In this episode, we revisit this well-intentioned, but flawed foray into historical trauma that serves as a reminder that teaching Black history in America has always been fraught. This episode was written by Willa Paskin. Decoder Ring is produced by Willa Paskin and Katie Shepherd. This episode was also produced by Benjamin Frisch, and edited by Erica Morrison. Derek John is executive producer. Joel Meyer is senior editor-producer and Merritt Jacob is senior technical director.We’re grateful to Julian Lucas for his expertise, reporting, and generosity, without which this episode would not have been possible. His New Yorker article, “Can Slavery Reenactments Set Us Free?,” revisits the Freedom! story as part of an exploration of the live Underground Railroad re-enactments that Kamau Kambui pioneered.Thank you to Jesse Fuchs for suggesting this topic. Thanks also to Coventry Cowens, Brigitte Fielder, Bob Whitaker, Alan Whisman, Wayne Studer, Alicia Montgomery, Rebecca Onion, Luke Winkie, and Kamau Kambui’s children: Yamro Kambui Fields, Halim Fields, Mawusi Kambui Pierre, Nanyamka Salley, and Kamau Sababu Kambui Jr. If you haven’t please yet, subscribe and rate our feed in Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. And even better, tell your friends.If you’re a fan of the show, please sign up for Slate Plus. Members get to listen to Decoder Ring without any ads and have total access to Slate’s website. Your support is also crucial to our work. Go to Slate.com/decoderplus to join Slate Plus today. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week, Dana and Stephen are joined by Supreme Friend of the Pod, Isaac Butler, who co-hosts Slate’s Working podcast and is the author of The Method: How the Twentieth Century Learned to Act (which is now available in paperback!). The panel begins by pondering Dream Scenario, a provocative new film from Norwegian writer-director Kristoffer Borgli. The nightmarish social satire stars Nicolas Cage as Paul Matthews, a hapless middle-aged biology professor who begins appearing randomly in people’s dreams in a tale about anonymity and the cycle of virality. Then, the three speak with the brilliant author and classicist Emily Wilson about her recent translation of Homer’s the Iliad, and her unique approach to metered verse and how she came to access the interior lives of Hector, Patroclus, Achilles, and more. Finally, the trio discusses Coyote vs. Acme, a completed film based on Ian Frazier’s 1990 comic in The New Yorker, that was shelved last week by Warner Bros. (reportedly in favor of a $30 million tax write-off) then un-shelved when the studio received backlash for being “anti-art.”  In the exclusive Slate Plus segment, the panel descends into a different kind of nightmare: The Beatles’ music video for “Now and Then.” Has director Peter Jackson created a touching CGI tribute to the legendary band? Or has he engineered something truly evil?Email us at culturefest@slate.com. Endorsements:Dana: The Public Domain Review, an online journal and not-for-profit project dedicated to “the exploration of curious and compelling works from the history of art, literature, and ideas.” She’s only just begun to scratch the site’s surface, but recommends starting with “W.E.B. Du Bois’ Hand-Drawn Infographics of African-American Life.”Isaac: Deadloch, an Australian feminist noir comedy set in a fictional working class fishing village that’s been, as he describes, “gentrified by the most granola crunchy lesbians on earth.”  Stephen: The song “New Romantic” by British folk singer-songwriter Laura Marling, specifically her extraordinary 2006 live performance of it when she was quite young at a now-closed music venue in West London. Outro music: “Any Other Way” by Particle HousePodcast production by Cameron Drews. Production assistance by Kat Hong. If you enjoy this show, please consider signing up for Slate Plus. Slate Plus members get an ad-free experience across the network and exclusive content on many shows. You’ll also be supporting the work we do here on the Culture Gabfest. Sign up now at Slate.com/cultureplus to help support our work. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Josh Levin, Joel Anderson, and Ben Mathis-Lilley weigh the evidence in the sign-stealing case against Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh. They also discuss Texas A&M’s decision to fire its football coach Jimbo Fisher. Finally, Josh and Joel speak with writer Megan Swanick about the career and legacy of Megan Rapinoe. Harbaugh (4:04): Should the coach go down or is he getting railroaded? Fisher (26:49): How national championship dreams turned into a $76 million buyout. Rapinoe (44:01): She didn’t get a perfect ending, but she handled her ending perfectly. Afterball (1:06:36): Joel on Jimbo Fisher, Colby Carthel, and Texas-sized football expectations. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Rachelle and Candice map out what happened when TikTok food personality Keith Lee traveled to Atlanta and ignited a culinary controversy. Lee is a former MMA fighter-turned-influencer who has been taking food tours around the country, ranking their cuisine and posting his reviews on TikTok. He was tasting restaurants in Atlanta when the itinerary took a turn for the worst: badly-reviewed establishments were fighting back online, one restaurant started receiving death threats, and even Cardi B had something to say. So how did a humble TikTok food critic become a lightning rod for such fierce (and dangerous) culinary criticism?This podcast is produced by Se’era Spragley Ricks, Daisy Rosario, Candice Lim and Rachelle Hampton. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

When it crash-landed on the charts in 2019, Lil Nas X’s “Old Town Road” felt new and old at the same time: a savvy, TikTok-fueled viral hit that summarized a century of cross-cultural collisions between R&B, rap and country. It was also unexpectedly huge—a record 19 weeks at No. 1 on the Hot 100—and controversial, as Billboard magazine pulled the song from its Hot Country Songs chart, prompting a reckoning on race and the very definition of country music.“Old Town Road” wasn’t just a reckoning—it was a culmination. As a hard-to-categorize hit, it called back to cross-genre experiments by everyone from Ray Charles and the Rappin’ Duke to Bubba Sparxxx and even Jason Aldean. As a viral smash, its antecedents date back to “The Twist,” right through “Crank That (Soulja Boy)” and “Harlem Shake.”In honor of his new book Old Town Road (now in bookstores!) join Chris Molanphy as he walks through the many predecessors to “Old Town Road” and explains why can’t nobody tell Lil Nas X nothin’.Podcast production by Kevin Bendis. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.