Listen Up! Temple University Press Podcast, Episode 7: David Steele on It Was Always a Choice

This week in North Philly Notes, we debut the latest episode of the Temple University Press Podcast. Host Gary Kramer/Sam Cohn interviews author David Steele about his book It Was Always a Choice: Picking Up the Baton of Athlete Activism, which examines American athletes’ activism for racial and social justice, on and off the field.

The Temple University Press Podcast is where you an hear about all the books you’ll want to read next.

Click here to listen

The Temple University Press Podcast is available wherever you find your podcasts, including Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcast, and Overcast, among other outlets.

About this episode

When Colin Kaepernick took a knee, he renewed a long tradition of athlete activists speaking out against racism, injustice, and oppression. Like Kaepernick, Jackie Robinson, Paul Robeson, Muhammad Ali, Bill Russell, Tommie Smith, and John Carlos—among many others, of all races, male and female, pro and amateur—all made the choice to take a side to command public awareness and attention rather than “shut up and play,” as O. J. Simpson, Michael Jordan, and Tiger Woods did in the years between Kaepernick and his predecessors. Using their celebrity to demand change, these activists inspired fans but faced great personal and professional risks in doing so. It Was Always a Choice shows how the new era of activism Kaepernick inaugurated builds on these decisive moments toward a bold and effective new frontier of possibilities.

David Steele identifies the resonances and antecedents throughout the twentieth century of the choices that would later be faced by athletes in the post-Kaepernick era, including the era of political organizing following the death of George Floyd. He shows which athletes chose silence instead of action—“dropping the baton,” as it were—in the movement to end racial inequities and violence against Black Americans. The examples of courageous athletes multiply as LeBron James, Megan Rapinoe, and the athlete activists of the NBA, WNBA, and NFL remain committed to fighting daily and vibrantly for social change.

Listen Up! Temple University Press Podcast, Episode 6: Billy Brown on Exploring Philly Nature

This week in North Philly Notes, we debut the latest episode of the Temple University Press Podcast. Host Sam Cohn interviews author Bernard “Billy” Brown about his book, Exploring Philly Nature: A Guide for All Four Seasons, which provides a handy guide for all ages to Philly’s urban plants, animals, fungi, and—yes—even slime molds.

The Temple University Press Podcast is where you can hear about all the books you’ll want to read next.

Click here to listen

The Temple University Press Podcast is available wherever you find your podcasts, including Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, and Overcast, among other outlets.

About this episode

Bernard “Billy” Brown is a nature writer and urban herper—that’s someone who recreationally seeks out reptiles and amphibians. In this episode, he talks with podcaster Sam Cohn about his new book, Exploring Philly Nature, a guide to experiencing the flora and fauna in Philly.

This compact illustrated volume contains 52 activities from birding, (squirrel) fishing, and basement bug-hunting to joining a frog call survey and visiting a mussel hatchery. Brown encourages kids (as well as their parents) to connect with the natural world close to home. Each entry contains information on where and when to participate, what you will need (even if it is only patience), and tips on clubs and organizations to contact for access.

The city and its environs contain a multitude of species from the lichen that grows on gravestones or trees to nocturnal animals like opossums, bats, and raccoons. Exploring Philly Nature is designed to get readers eager to discover, observe, and learn more about the concrete jungle that is Philadelphia.

Listen Up! Temple University Press Podcast, Episode 5: Jennifer Lin, author of Beethoven in Beijing

This week in North Philly Notes, we debut the latest episode of the Temple University Press Podcast, host Sam Cohn interviews author Jennifer Lin about her book, Beethoven in Beijing: Stories from the Philadelphia Orchestra’s History Journey to China, which provides an eye-opening account of the Philadelphia Orchestra’s unprecedented 1973 tour. A companion volume to Lin’s documentary of the same name, this photo-rich oral history takes readers to the People’s Republic of China during the time when Western music was banned.

The Temple University Press Podcast is where you can hear about all the books you’ll want to read next.

Click here to listen

The Temple University Press Podcast is available wherever you find your podcasts, including Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts and Overcast, among other outlets.

About this episode

Eugene Ormandy was the conductor of the Philadelphia Orchestra in 1971 when ping pong diplomacy was starting to thaw U.S.-China relations. (An American table tennis team was invited to Beijing—the first American group of any kind asked to visit mainland China since 1949). Wondering about the possibility of having the Orchestra visit, Ormandy’s idea soon became a reality with some assistance from the White House, and President Richard Nixon, and National Security Advisor, Henry Kissinger, among others. In 1973, the Philadelphia Orchestra embarked on a 10-day visit to Beijing and Shanghai to perform a series of concerts. This historic event is retold in Jennifer Lin’s Beethoven in Beijing, which recounts this remarkable breakthrough cultural exchange.

Listen Up! Temple University Press Podcast Episode 3

This week in North Philly Notes, we debut the latest episode of the Temple University Press Podcast, which features host Sam Cohn interviewing author Stephen Feldman about his book Pack the Court!

The Temple University Press Podcast is where you can hear about all the books you’ll want to read next.

Click here to listen

The Temple University Press Podcast is available wherever you find your podcasts, including Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts and Overcast, among other outlets.

About this episode

Should Democrats add justices to the Supreme Court if given the chance, whether in 2021 or afterward? Or would Democratic court packing destroy the Court as an apolitical judicial institution? In his new book, Pack the Court!, Feldman has written a defense of Supreme Court expansion—a topic that is very much in the news right now with Democrats looking to pass the Judiciary Act of 2021, a bill that proposes to increase the number of Justices and change the ideological balance of the conservative majority. 

One criticism of court packing is that it will destroy the legitimacy of the Supreme Court as a judicial institution. According to this view, the Court’s legitimacy is based on a law-politics dichotomy: The idea that law and politics must remain separate and independent. The justices must decide cases by neutrally applying the rule of law. If politics infects the Court and its decision making, then Court decisions are tainted. But as Feldman’s insightful book shows, law and politics are forever connected in judicial interpretation and decision making. Pack the Court! insists that court packing is not the threat to the Supreme Court’s institutional legitimacy that many fear.

Temple University Press podcast host Sam Cohn spoke with Stephen Feldman about his new book and expanding the Supreme Court.