The Colin McEnroe Show

Our topics today involve censorship, transgression, and reconciliation. Earlier in the week, The Nose panelists started talking about China's "dancing grannies" problem. This sounds like a Monty Python sketch, but it's real. In China's public squares, droves of people --most of them women and most of them with a little snow on their roofs -- assemble and dance, in various styles, to various kinds of music. Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Author Michael Erard is interested in how and why we name things - especially non-human objects and animals - and how naming affects our perceptions and behaviors toward those objects.He spent a lot of time researching how different subcultures name things - including rock musicians, scientists and Maine lobstermen, because naming tells you a lot about what's going on in a particular culture.  Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Rust is all around us. It's in our cars, our homes, our infrastructure. It's also the subject of Jonathan Waldman's first book, Rust, which introduces us to the people who fight it.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Before cyber-bullying was even a term, one person was experiencing it from the internet world mercilessly: Monica Lewinsky. Nearly 20 years after her affair with President Bill Clinton was discovered and she became the internet's target, she is returning to public life. Last week, she gave a TED Talk and addressed the scandal and its aftermath directly.Also, the City of Hartford is restoring damage to a well-known sculpture that was unknowingly marked by work crews with orange paint.Finally this hour, a look at the new album by Kendrick Lamar, which has been the talk of the town among rap fans and critics alike.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Doctors have been treating the symptoms of their patients, often before they know the cause, for centuries. But as medicine has gained sophistication and precision, we've slowly demanded more of our doctors. We want them to treat us, but also to know what we have, and why we have it, and how to treat and cure it. Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Starbucks is trying to start conversation about race relations in America, led by baristas across the nation. The effort has had mixed reviews.  Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Here in America we're taught to celebrate ideas, to think outside the box and to fan the flames of innovation whenever possible. But what do we do when an idea becomes destructive? And even worse; when that idea becomes an ideology?This is the prospect we're facing with extremism around the world. Now America, a nation well adapted to win wars by conventional means, is being forced onto a battlefield it's less accustomed to-- one where social media, propaganda and targeted messaging are the weapons of choice.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

It's that time of year again when productivity slides, sleep is lost and frustration runs high. No, there's not another financial crisis - just March Madness! Join our favorite bracket watching team of Julia Pistell and Bill Curry, as they share their top-secret strategies to pick the winning NCAA bracket, the logic of which stuns even seasoned sports reporter Mike Pesca.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Shade tobacco came to Connecticut in 1900 from the island of Sumatra, which was beginning to dominate the world of cigar wrappers. The leaf had a light color, delicate texture, and mild flavor that cigar lovers love. So it seemed like a good idea to grow it somewhere besides Sumatra and the artificial shade concept developed in Florida in the 1890s. Connecticut growers tried it on one-third of an acre in Windsor in 1900, and the result was so good that farmers, in an un-Yankee-ish burst of headlong passion, planted 50 acres in 1901. The industry grew like shade tobacco -- that is, fitfully -- and woven into its life were the stories of the latest set of immigrants willing to work in cheap and concentrated bursts. We tell you as many of their stories as we can. Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Sixty years ago, patients rarely questioned the authority of their doctors. Like the doctors portrayed on television, these older, wiser, and usually white male doctors would dispense sage advice to trusting parents desperate to make their children well in an age of polio and measles.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.