Killer Mike’s Ghetto Gospel

How an Atlanta rapper’s “ghetto gospel” is changing his community, and what the odyssey of Killer Mike says about race and music in the American South.

Published: Mar 25, 2014
Length: 25 minutes (6,421 words)

What Your 1st-Grade Life Says About the Rest of It

Lessons from a groundbreaking Johns Hopkins study of children in Baltimore: Researchers followed them through their lives and found that different factors (like summers off from school) contributed to heightened disadvantages facing lower-income children without a tradition of college attendance in their families.

Source: Washington Post
Published: Aug 31, 2014
Length: 10 minutes (2,694 words)

The Rising

Colorado residents recount surviving one of the worst natural disasters in Colorado history.

Source: 5280 Magazine
Published: Aug 31, 2014
Length: 24 minutes (6,189 words)

Stories From Writers From the National Book Festival: A Reading List

“We went to the National Book Festival for different things, but also the same thing: books and our love of them. Here are four essays and excerpts written by the authors I was lucky enough to see.”

Source: Longreads
Published: Aug 31, 2014

Can Jill Soloway Do Justice to the Trans Movement?

Taffy Brodesser-Akner profiles Jill Soloway, whose new show “Transparent” centers around a family whose patriarch comes out as transgender. Soloway strives to create a truly inclusive environment on her set, complete with gender-neutral bathrooms and a “transfirmative action program,” which favors the hiring of transgender candidates over nontransgender ones.

Published: Aug 28, 2014
Length: 10 minutes (2,722 words)

Jerry Football

He’s one of the most infamous owners in professional sports, in need of one more Super Bowl. The complete story of Jerry Jones and the Dallas Cowboys.

Source: ESPN
Published: Aug 29, 2014
Length: 42 minutes (10,638 words)

The Man Without a Mask

How the drag queen Cassandro—known as Saúl Armendáriz outside the ring—became a lucha libre star.

Source: The New Yorker
Published: Sep 1, 2014
Length: 35 minutes (8,948 words)

This Psychologist Helps Keep Comedians Laughing

An interesting look into the work of Ildiko Tabori, who serves as the in-house psychologist at a Los Angeles comedy club. The club’s owner hired her after he became alarmed by the number of premature deaths in the comic world.

Published: Aug 28, 2014
Length: 6 minutes (1,500 words)

Acting French

Ta-Nehisi Coates on learning a new language, scholastic culture, and the way we “border patrol” class and race.

Source: The Atlantic
Published: Aug 29, 2014
Length: 15 minutes (3,772 words)

Confessions of a Fat Bastard

The life of Texas Monthly’s full-time barbecue editor.

Source: Texas Monthly
Published: Aug 28, 2014
Length: 13 minutes (3,402 words)