From “Game of Thrones” to video games, festivals to theme restaurants, the Middle Ages are popping up everywhere in pop culture. Medievalist and sociologist Paul B. Sturtevant takes a look at what these rehashes of history tell us about the past—and what our re-imaginings of the medieval era reveal about how we see ourselves today.
Film studios and media platforms have recently seen an increased interest in black-centered television shows and movies. NPR television critic and author Eric Deggans sheds light on some of the most important series and films that focus on issues of race and culture to watch right now.
In this interactive, multimedia talk, music historian Kenneth Womack traces the story behind Double Fantasy, John Lennon’s remarkable 1980 comeback album with wife Yoko Ono.
Join Food Network star Alex Guarnaschelli as she talks about the stories behind the food in her new book, Cook with Me: 150 Recipes for the Home Cook. She shares how the recipes, traditions, and insights she captured reflect generations of collective experience and the power that food has to bring people—especially families—together.
Learn how first ladies from Jacqueline Kennedy to Melania Trump have left their mark on White House Christmas celebrations.
Whether intentionally or not, some movies created as entertainment have also had a significant impact on American society. Playwright and screenwriter Mark Lapadula examines a quartet of these—I Am a Fugitive From a Chain Gang, The Graduate, Jaws, and Philadelphia— to reveal what they tell us about the times in which they were created and their continuing significance today.
Over a career that spanned six decades, Sir Alfred Hitchcock’s films never failed in bringing audiences to the edge of their seats. Join playwright and screenwriter Marc Lapadula as he peels back the layers of meaning beneath this grandmaster’s bold intentions and dazzling techniques that made him one of the most influential filmmakers in the history of world cinema.
