Society & Culture

Writer Alexs Pate's first novel is called "Losing Absalom." It's a fictionalized tribute to his father that chronicles end of the title character's life as his family has gathered around his hospital bed. Writer John Willimas wrote, "Losing Absalom is a powerful yet sensitive embrace with black America today." Pate grew up in North Philadelphia and lives in Minneapolis.

Film Critic Stephen Schiff reviews the new Arnold Schwarzenegger/Jamie Lee Curtis film. Schiff says it features small-scale wit and large-scale pyrotechnics -- though it never manages to blend the two.

Nelson Peery has just published his memoir, "Black Fire: The Making of an American Revolutionary," about coming of age against a background of racism, the Depression, and World War II. The book chronicles Peery's travels west during the Depression, and his experiences as a soldier fighting in World War II. He writes about his simultaneous love for America and hatred for the people who discriminated against African Americans, especially in the Army.

Russell is the writer and director of the movie “Spanking the Monkey." It's about Raymond, who returns after his freshman year at MIT to find he has to spend the summer caring for his mother, who’s broken her leg. His loneliness, combined with his mother’s depression, results in a dark comedy about mother-son incest. “Spanking the Monkey” won the Audience Award for the most popular dramatic film at the Sundance Film Festival in January.

Susan Douglas is a professor of media and American studies at Hampshire College. She has just written a book “Where the Girls Are,” that looks at women in baby-boomer pop culture. She explains how the media’s alternating images of stereotypical femininity and feminism created a kind of “schizophrenia” in American women. She talks about how this confusion has caused ambivalence in American women about what feminism means.

Journalist Christopher Joyce has just written a book, "Earthly Goods," about searching for medicinal plants in rain forests. He'll talk about the history of seeking treatments in nature and the recent attempt of pharmaceutical companies, medical researchers, and anthropologists, to preserve the rain forests while they search for cures to disease.

Josephine Humpreys and Ruthie Bolton. Humpreys is a fiction writer who won the Pen/Hemingway award in 1985 for "Dreams of Sleep." She recently transcribed and edited the life story of Bolton, who grew up in the same area of Charleston, South Carolina as Humphreys. The novel is called "Gal," and details Bolton's experiences growing up with an abusive grandfather in 1960's South Carolina.

Lise Funderburg is a journalist who has written for "Mirabella" and "New York Newsday." She is bi-racial, and recently wrote a book called "Black, White, Other," which explores the identities of Americans from racially mixed families. Do they consider themselves white, black, neither, or both? On the show with Funderburg are two other people whose interviews are featured in the book.

Linguist Geoff Nunberg talks about the computer language of the nineties, and looks at how new "information age" words sound remarkably like George Orwell's Newspeak.

James Glab is an airline industry reporter, who is a contributing editor of "Travel and Leisure," "Frequent Flyer" and "Travel Weekly." He recently co-wrote "Rapid Descent," (Simon and Schuster) that looks at how the airline deregulation law, which promised better service and lower airfares, led to chaotic airline fares and deteriorated customer service.

Television critic David Bianculli reviews Aaron Spelling's newest Fox network show, "Models, Inc.," about a woman who runs a modeling agency. Spelling is the executive producer of the successful shows "Beverly Hills 90210" and "Melrose Place."

Father 'Gus' DiNoia is a Dominican Priest and a theologian to the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. On May 31, the Pope issued an Apostolic letter to bishops declaring that women could not be ordained as priests. Though not a formal statement of doctrine, the letter was strongly put, and meant to cut off discussion about the issue.

Speech Therapist Sam Chwat. Chwat's New York Speech Improvement Services attracts 200 to 250 clients a week. He taught Robert DeNiro how to gain an Appalachian accent for his role in "Cape Fear." Julia Roberts sought him out to relearn her southern drawl for "Steel Magnolias." He helped another southerner, Andie McDowell, after her lines for "Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan" were dubbed by Glenn Close.

Actor Sir Ian McKellan. Tomorrow Ian McKellen takes his one-man show, "Ian McKellen: A Knight Out" to Broadway's Lyceum Theatre. Since coming out in 1988, Britain's highly acclaimed Shakespearean actor has become an international voice for the gay and lesbian community. His role in Peter Schafer's "Amadeus" earned him a Tony Award in 1981. He has appeared in the recent popular films, "Last Action Hero" and "Six Degrees of Separation," and has plans for a film version of "Richard III."

Bandleader and pianist Eddie Palmieri. Through his first band, La Perfecta, labeled "the band with the crazy roaring elephants," Palmieri was credited with originating Latin jazz's trombone sound in New York during the sixties. With the release of "Palmas," (Elektra), many critics feel that this respected 58-year old innovator will finally get the exposure and respect that his sound has long merited. Palmieri's lobbying over the past year culminated in the announcement of a new Grammy Award category for Afro-Carribbean Jazz.

Gerald Early is Director of African American Studies at Washington University, and author of several books. His newest book is a memoir about raising his two daughters, "Daughters: On Family and Fatherhood," (Addison-Wesley). One reviewer wrote, "a powerful reminder of the complexity and mystery, and abiding love that exists in families. . . this narrative. . is also suffused with the glory and pain and generational patience of black culture in America."

Roger Connor is founder and Executive Director of the American Alliance for Rights and Responsibilities (AARR), a legal organization aimed at making individuals more responsible for their communities. Connor and the AARR have been active in helping communities enact anti-panhandling laws. His group recently drafted a law making it illegal for panhandlers to step in someone's path, or to panhandle in subway stations or at ATM machines.

Doug Honig works for the ACLU in Washington State. They recently challenged a Seattle ruling which makes it a crime to panhandle aggressively, and to sit on sidewalks in the downtown district.

Maria Foscarinis is founder and executive director of the National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty. Foscarinis has been active in legal issues affecting the homeless since 1983. In 1985, she established the office of the National Coalition for the Homeless in Washington. She calls anti-panhandling laws inhumane and possibly unconstitutional, and works to prevent cities from passing laws which attempt to sweep people off the streets. She has litigated several federal laws which enforce the individual rights of homeless people.

Journalist Nicholas Dawidoff recently wrote a New York Times Magazine piece (24 Apr 94) about it, "The Business of Begging: To Give or Not to Give." Dawidoff went into New York's subways where panhandlers had gotten increasingly aggressive. In January the New York Transit officials announced a crackdown and began arresting the most persistent of the lot.