Society & Culture

Aziz Ansari is in the midst of a whirlwind year. In January, the comic hosted Saturday Night Live the day after President Trump's inauguration — an experience he describes as "one of the most watched stand-up sets I'll ever do in my life, if not the most."

Ari Berman, author of Give Us the Ballot, says the new commission will keep alive the idea that voter fraud is rampant — despite the fact that "all the studies show the opposite."

Does it matter when someone gets a quotation wrong? Our linguist Geoff Nunberg considers the question.

Jill Soloway — who identifies as genderqueer and prefers the gender neutral pronouns they/them/their— created the Amazon series Transparent based on their own experience as the child of a transgender woman. Now they have a new Amazon series called I Love Dick.

Before she turned to writing, the National Book Award nominee ran away from home and worked as a stripper. Her new collection of personal essays is Somebody with a Little Hammer.

The Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist revisits the lives and deaths of his parents in his new memoir, Between Them. "As much as they loved me, an only child, they loved each other more," he says.

Emotions like lust and love serve as metaphors for social and political struggles on Lamar's new album. Critic Ken Tucker says the music on DAMN. signals the artist's bold refusal to back down.

Book critic Maureen Corrigan reviews the new memoir by Dani Shapiro; it's her third memoir and it's about marriage. Her first two were best sellers.

In 2017 alone, Merriam-Webster added more than 1,000 words to its dictionary. Noah Webster himself might have struggled to define these new English terms — such as binge-watch, humblebrag, photobomb, NSFW, truther, face-palm and listicle.

Sasheer Zamata has been a cast member of Saturday Night Live since 2014. Now she has new stand up special titled Pizza Mind.

Alec Baldwin has been keeping busy lately. The star of the animated film The Boss Baby has a new memoir out and also keeps popping up on Saturday Night Live to play President Trump.

Growing up, punk rocker Laura Jane Grace always felt conflicted about gender. She tells Fresh Air's Terry Gross that she felt like two "twin souls" were warring inside of her, fighting for control. "I thought that I was quite possibly schizophrenic," she says.

Maureen Corrigan says 'One of the Boys', is a slim, deeply affecting and brutal story, about the fierce power of a father-son relationship.

Ron Powers has written a personal and historical book about the treatment of the mentally ill in the U.S. He watched his two sons be transformed by schizophrenia. His youngest son committed suicide after struggling with the disease; a few years later his oldest son was diagnosed with the same disease.

Linguist Geoff Nunberg tracks the evolution of the word "protest."