Society & Culture

A Village Voice critic once wrote of Sundiata, "...like Billie Holiday, Sundiata surprises with images and tumbling phrases that blend with subtle rhythmic variations." Although he's an established and respected artist, he's just completed his debut CD, "The Blue Oneness of Dreams."

Commentator Gerald Early talks about baseball legend Jackie Robinson and his unintended effects on the Negro leagues.

Dorris died last week at the age of 52. In 1989, He won a National Book Critics Circle award for The Broken Cord. A first person account of how fetal alcohol syndrome affected his oldest son, Abel, who later died. He and his wife, Louise Erdrich, wrote several novels together, including Love Medicine, The Crown of Columbus and Yellow Raft in Blue Water. Both are part Native American, and Dorris spent several years of his childhood on an Indian reservation. In January, his new novel Cloud Chamber was published by Scribner Books.

Sullivan was the editor of The New Republic for five years and the first openly gay editor of a national magazine. On leaving the position last year, he revealed he is HIV positive. His new book is "Same-Sex Marriage: Pro and Con" (Vintage Books).

Film reviewer John Anderson reviews the new film "Chasing Amy."

Tucker became a star at 13 years old with the chart-topping song "Delta Dawn." Since then she has had countless other hit songs, grammy nominations, and in 1991 was voted the Country Music Association's Female Vocalist of the Year. But her success has not been without it's low points, such as problems with drug and alcohol abuse and controversy over the "mature" lyrics she sang as a teenager.

Haywood has written a new memoir, "The Haygoods of Columbus" about his family, and growing up in Columbus, Ohio in the mid 60s and 70s. He lived adjacent to Mount Vernon Avenue, the center of Columbus' Black community. Haygood moved back to Columbus to write the book. Haygood has also written a biography of Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. and "Two on the River" a lyrical recollection of a two-thousand mile journey down the Mississippi.

In light of the deaths of rappers Biggie Smalls and Tupac Shakur, a discussion on the culture of rap and the violence that surrounds it with Chicago police officer Eric Davis. He's a member of the rap group the Slick Boys. Davis and two other officers founded the group in 1991 to provide positive role models for the inner-city kids they encountered on their jobs every day. The group has received national acclaim for their songs about the importance of getting an education and staying off of drugs and out of gangs.

Linguist Geoff Nunberg wonders if present day warning signs will be comprehensible to future generations.

Linguist Geoff Nunberg comments on the history of slang, and refers to two books about it: Johnathan Lighter's Random House Historical Dictionary of American Slang (1994) and "Flappers 2 Rappers" by Tom Dalzell (1997).

Stories of people changing their name, an excerpt from This American Life by Ira Glass, produced at WBEZ. Glass tells the story of his grandmother: when she was in her 30's, she was very ill and everyone thought she was going to die. So they changed her name. It was an old Jewish custom, to confuse the Angel of Death. And Margy Rochlin on the place you go to in Los Angeles if you want to change your name. It turns out to be surprisingly easy to change

In her books and plays Bornstein, a transgender activist, argues the need for the acceptance of nontraditional gender roles, meaning those not defined as either male of female. In her book "Gender Outlaw: On Men, Women, and the Rest of Us," she writes about her sex-change experience and her view of society's conceptions of gender. She has also written the novel (with co-author Caitlin Sullivan) "Nearly Roadkill."

Guest film critic John Anderson reviews "Love Jones."

Chapmyn was homeless, surviving on garbage and sleeping in vacant buildings in the '80's. A suicide note he began writing to his mother inspired him to write the play "Our Young Black Men Are Dying and Nobody Seems to Care," which became a big hit on the so-called chitlin circuit. He went on to write other plays on social issues facing the African-American community., making a name for himself as a playwright and a social activist.

Mehl-Madrona has written a new book that explores the medical benefits of Native American rituals. The book is called "Coyote Medicine." Mehl-Madrona himself is Native American. He holds an M.D. from Stanford University and has been a practicing doctor for over 20 years. He is currently a research assistant professor in the Native American Research and Training Center at the University of Arizona of Medicine in Tucson.

Richburg is the Hong Kong bureau chief for the "Washington Post," the paper's former Africa bureau chief, and has won awards for his reporting, including being selected as a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. In his new book "Out of America," he reflects on his three years experience in Africa and questions the connections made between the identity of African-Americans and their African roots.

Saul Friedlander is the author of "Nazi Germany and the Jews, Vol. 1: The Years of Persecution 1933-1939." He examines the period looking at how Hitler's "murderous rage" and ideologies, converged with internal political pressures, and attitudes of German and European societies to create the Holocaust. Friedlander was born in Prague and was seven when his parents hid him in a Catholic seminary in France where he took on a new identity. His parents died in the Holocaust. Friedland now teaches at Tel Aviv University and at UCLA.

Daniel Jonah Goldhagen is the author of the controversial book "Hitler's Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust." He offers evidence that ordinary Germans knowingly cooperated in the Holocaust, that they were motivated by anti-Semitism, not by economic hardship, coercion, or psychological pressures, as usually put forth by historians. Goldhagen is Associate Professor of Government and Social Studies at Harvard University.

Justin Kaplan and Anne Bernays are the authors of the new book, "The Language of Names: What We Call Ourselves and Why It Matters." Both have written previous books: Ms. Bernays is the author of eight novels, including the award-winning "Growing Up Rich" and "Professor Romeo," as well as numerous short stories. Mr. Kaplan won a Pulitzer Prize for his biography, "Mr. Clemens and Mark Twain." He's also the General Editor of Barlett's Familiar Quotations.

Gates is the W.E.B. DuBois Professor of Humanities and chair of the Department of Afro-American Studies at Harvard University as well as a staff writer for "The New Yorker." In his new book, "Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Black Man," Gates records the thoughts of some of society's most revered black American men. The men debate the current state of black men and the difficulties of race and gender relations in American society.