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Program or Be Programmed by Douglas Rushkoff

The debate over whether the Net is good or bad for us fills the airwaves and the blogosphere. But for all the heat of claim and counter-claim, the argument is essentially beside the point: it's here; it's everywhere. The real question is, do we direct technology, or do we let ourselves be directed by it and those who have mastered it?

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Directorate S: Steve Coll on the CIA & America’s Secret Wars
The U.S. is intensifying its air war in Afghanistan as U.S. Central Command has announced it is shifting military resources from Iraq and Syria back to Afghanistan, where the United States has been fighting for over 16 years in the longest war in U.S. history. U.S. Air Force Major General James Hecker recently said Afghanistan has “become CENTCOM’s main effort.” The news comes after a particularly bloody period in Afghanistan. Despite the spiraling violence, President Trump recently ruled out negotiations with the Taliban during a meeting of members of the United Nations Security Council. We speak to Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Steve Coll about his new book, “Directorate S: The C.I.A. and America’s Secret Wars in Afghanistan and Pakistan.”
Nathan Englander interview at AWP 2018
Nathan Englander is with PBS Books to talk about his latest novel, Dinner at the Center of the Earth. Englander was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 2013. He’s also a Guggenheim fellow and was selected as one of “20 Writers for the 21st Century” by The New Yorker.

FROM THE PUBLISHER:

A prisoner in a secret cell. The guard who has watched over him a dozen years. An American waitress in Paris. A young Palestinian man in Berlin who strikes up an odd friendship with a wealthy Canadian businessman. And The General, Israel's most controversial leader, who lies dying in a hospital, the only man who knows of the prisoner's existence.

From these vastly different lives Nathan Englander has woven a powerful, intensely suspenseful portrait of a nation riven by insoluble conflict, even as the lives of its citizens become fatefully and inextricably entwined—a political thriller of the highest order that interrogates the anguished, violent division between Israelis and Palestinians, and dramatizes the immense moral ambiguities haunting both sides. Who is right, who is wrong—who is the guard, who is truly the prisoner?
Anti-Globalization in the Era of Trump: Joseph Stiglitz
In the updated edition of Nobel Prize winning economist Joseph Stiglitz’s new book, “Globalization and Its Discontents Revisited: Anti-Globalization in the Era of Trump,” he argues that when Trump became president, he “threw a hand grenade into the global economic order.” We speak with Stiglitz about the impact of free trade agreements that Trump has criticized.
Edwidge Danticat: I Hope Oxfam Scandal in Haiti Is a #MeToo Moment for Aid Orgs
The British charity Oxfam has released its own internal report into the sex scandal. It concluded senior aid workers at Oxfam, including the country director in Haiti, hired prostitutes at Oxfam properties in Haiti and then tried to cover it up. Oxfam’s internal report includes claims that three Oxfam staff members physically threatened a witness during the charity’s internal investigation. For more, we speak with Edwidge Danticat, Haitian-American novelist, author of several books, including “The Farming of Bones,” which won an American Book Award. We also speak with Taina Bien-Aimé, executive director of the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women, and Sean O’Neill, chief reporter at The Times newspaper in London, which broke the story of the scandal.
The Media, Myth & Fake News: From Watergate to Today
American University professor W. Joseph Campbell discusses the rise of "fake news" and the prevalence of media myths in this talk drawn from a new, expanded edition of his book "Getting It Wrong: Debunking the Greatest Myths in American Journalism."

Speaker Biography: W. Joseph Campbell is a professor in the School of Communication at American University. He is the author of "Yellow Journalism: Puncturing the Myths, Defining the Legacies," "The Year That Defined American Journalism: 1897 and Clash of Paradigms" and "Getting It Wrong."
Caitlin Moran - Penguin Random House Presents 2018
Caitlin Moran is back with her latest novel How to be Famous, her follow up to the bestselling How to Build a Girl - and was on hand to join us on the sofa.

As well as the new book, topics of conversation included how famous people have really big heads and bad sex at 17 ("You think it's maybe something you'll get used to - like whisky and olives").
Penelope Lively and Kamila Shamsie introduce Penguin Women Writers
Penguin Women Writers celebrates the centenary of (some) women getting the vote in Britain. Curated by two of the UK’s most acclaimed female writers – Penelope Lively and Kamila Shamsie – this project features four forgotten classics by female authors: Mary McCarthy’s Birds of America, Meatless Days by Sara Suleri, Lifting the Veil by Ismat Chughtai and The Lark by E. Nesbit. We asked them why they were interested in curating the series and what they discovered about the four books they chose.
Brave New Arctic: The Untold Story of the Melting North, by Mark C. Serreze
In the 1990s, researchers in the Arctic noticed that floating summer sea ice had begun receding. This was accompanied by shifts in ocean circulation and unexpected changes in weather patterns throughout the world. The Arctic's perennially frozen ground, known as permafrost, was warming, and treeless tundra was being overtaken by shrubs. What was going on? Brave New Arctic is Mark Serreze's riveting firsthand account of how scientists from around the globe came together to find answers.

In a sweeping tale of discovery spanning three decades, Serreze describes how puzzlement turned to concern and astonishment as researchers came to understand that the Arctic of old was quickly disappearing—with potentially devastating implications for the entire planet. Serreze is a world-renowned Arctic geographer and climatologist who has conducted fieldwork on ice caps, glaciers, sea ice, and tundra in the Canadian and Alaskan Arctic. In this must-read book, he blends invaluable insights from his own career with those of other pioneering scientists who, together, ushered in an exciting new age of Arctic exploration. Along the way, he accessibly describes the cutting-edge science that led to the alarming conclusion that the Arctic is rapidly thawing due to climate change, that humans are to blame, and that the global consequences are immense.

A gripping scientific adventure story, Brave New Arctic shows how the Arctic's extraordinary transformation serves as a harbinger of things to come if we fail to meet the challenge posed by a warming Earth.
Jimmy Soni & Rob Goodman: "A Mind at Play"
Jimmy Soni and Rob Goodman will discuss their new book, A Mind at Play: How Claude Shannon Invented the Information Age.

Claude Shannon’s groundbreaking work at MIT and Bell Labs laid the foundations for digital computing and the Information Age. A Mind at Play, the first biography of Shannon (1916-2001), introduces readers to his life and career, his seminal work on information theory, and his interactions with the likes of Einstein, Turing, and von Neumann. Soni and Goodman will touch on Shannon’s work habits and practical advice on fostering creativity, as well as his hobbies as a gadgeteer, gambler, and juggler. The authors will discuss why Claude Shannon’s work is essential to the story of our age, bringing one of the foremost intellects of the twentieth century to life.
Women of Resistance: Poems for a New Feminism
Against racism, sexism, and violence: against the new authority. Women of Resistance, a poetry collection with a feminist ethos that cuts across race, gender identity, and sexuality, is available now
Colson Whitehead Interview: I Have to Know the Destination
“I became a writer once I realised no one liked my stuff.” Watch Barack Obama and Oprah Winfrey’s favourite author, Pulitzer Prize-winning Colson Whitehead, on how rejections of his first stab at a novel made him realize that he wanted to pursue writing.

As a child, Whitehead read a lot of Marvel comic books and initially wanted to work within that genre. It wasn't until he started working for the New York newspaper The Village Voice that he began writing, and being a freelance journalist furthermore allowed him the time to write fiction. However, his first attempt at a novel was rejected several times – he was even dumped by his agent – but this only made him want to continue writing: “I had no choice than to keep going and start another novel, and that was ‘The Intuitionist’, which came out in 1999.”

“I figured if you know how to do a certain kind of story, why do it again?” Whitehead likes to switch genres, “moving from pseudo-detective novels to non-fiction to horror novels” to keep it interesting – and challenging – for him as a writer: “If there’s an element of fear involved in not knowing how it’s going to work out in terms of execution, that’s always good.” If Whitehead is unsure about which direction to take a story, he writes his ideas in two different notebooks, going with the one where the ideas seem to flow more freely. He takes notes for up to a year before he starts writing, figuring out the characters as well as the beginning and the end: “I have to know the destination before I set out.”

Colson Whitehead (b. 1969) is an award-winning American novelist. He is the author of several novels, including his debut ‘The Intuitionist’ (1999) and ‘The Underground Railroad’ (2016), for which he won the prestigious 2016 National Book Award for Fiction and the 2017 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. He has also written the non-fiction book ‘The Colossus of New York’ (2003). Whitehead is the recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship (2002) and a Guggenheim Fellowship (2013). He lives and works in New York City.

Colson Whitehead was interviewed by Tonny Vorm in August 2017 in connection with the Louisiana Litera-ture festival at the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art in Denmark.
Bookforum: "Bleeding Hearts"
Bookforum's annual Valentine's Day reading, featuring Sloane Crosley, Porochista Khakpour, Patrick McGrath, Dana Spiotta, and Tony Tulathimutte.
Michael Wolff in conversation with Armando Iannucci - Fire and Fury
We are proud to present an extraordinary and entertaining evening of Fire and Fury as author, Michael Wolff, talks by satirist, producer and director Armando Iannucci. In front of packed house at The Light in London they discuss Wolff’s explosive look inside the Trump White House.
Let's Woman-Splain Romance!
With Katharine Ashe, Lisa Kleypas, Beverly Jenkins, Alisha Rai, Alyssa Cole, & Ron Hogan

The romance genre has been objectified since its inception, but has grown into the foremost feminist genre, written for women/by women. This panel features some of the foremost authors of the genre, and a few of the young, diverse voices actively working to evolve the genre and general public perception, coming together to discuss the appeal, power and strength of Romance to an open-minded (male) moderator. It’s time to turn the tables, and womansplain the appeal and cultural relevance of the most popular commercial genre.
Left of Black with Brittney Cooper
Left of Black host Dr. Mark Anthony Neal travels to Wake Forest University to talk with 2018 Anna Julia Cooper lecturer, Dr. Brittney Cooper.

Dr. Brittney Cooper is an Associate Professor of Women’s and Gender Studies and Africana Studies at Rutgers University. She's the author of Beyond Respectability: The Intellectual Thought of Race Women (University of Illinois Press, May 2017) and Eloquent Rage: A Black Feminist Discovers Her Superpower (St. Martin’s, February 2018), and the co-editor of The Crunk Feminist Collection (The Feminist Press 2017).

Dr. Neal teaches Black Popular Culture in the Department of African and African-American Studies at Duke University.

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